title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Iraq was formed as a League of Nations mandate by the partition and domination of various tribal lands by the British Empire in the early 20th century, after the break-up of the Ottoman Empire in the aftermath of World War I. The United Kingdom granted independence to the Kingdom of Iraq in 1932, on the urging of King Faisal, though the British Armed Forces retained military bases and transit rights. King Ghazi of Iraq ruled as a figurehead after King Faisal's death in 1933, while undermined by attempted military coups, until his death in 1939. The United Kingdom invaded Iraq in 1941 for fear that the government of Rashid Ali al-Gaylani might cut oil supplies to Western nations, and because of his links to the Axis powers. A military occupation followed the restoration of the Hashemite monarchy, and the occupation ended on October 26, 1947. Iraq was left with a national government led from Baghdad made up of Sunni ethnicity in key positions of power, ruling over an ad hoc nation splintered by tribal affiliations. This leadership used death squads and committed massacres in Iraq throughout the 20th century, culminating in the Ba'athist dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: The country has since become increasingly partitioned following the Iraq War into three zones: a Kurdish ethnic zone to the north, a Sunni center and the Shia ethnic zone to the south. The secular Arab socialist Baathist leadership were replaced with a provisional and later constitutional government that included leadership roles for the Shia (Prime Minister) and Kurdish (President of the Republic) peoples of the nation. This paralleled the development of ethnic militias by the Shia, Sunni, and the Kurdish (Peshmerga).


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: There were death squads formed by members of every ethnicity. In the national capital of Baghdad some members of the now-Shia Iraqi security forces (and militia members posing as members of Iraqi Police or Iraqi Armed Forces) formed unofficial, unsanctioned, but long-tolerated death squads. They possibly had links to the Interior Ministry and were popularly known as the 'black crows'. These groups operated night or day. They usually arrested people, then either tortured or killed them.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: The victims of these attacks were predominantly young males who had probably been suspected of being members of the Sunni insurgency. Agitators such as Abdul Razaq al-Na'as, Dr. Abdullateef al-Mayah, and Dr. Wissam Al-Hashimi have also been killed. These killings are not limited to men; women and children have also been arrested and/or killed. Some of these killings have also been part of simple robberies or other criminal activities.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: A feature in a May 2005 issue of the magazine of "The New York Times" claimed that the Multi-National Force – Iraq had modelled the "Wolf Brigade", the Iraqi interior ministry police commandos, on the death squads used in the 1980s to crush the left-wing insurgency in El Salvador.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Western news organizations such as "Time" and "People" disassembled this by focusing on aspects such as probable militia membership, religious ethnicity, as well as uniforms worn by these squads rather than stating the United States-backed Iraqi government had death squads active in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: In a report from October 2015, Amnesty International documented incidents that "appear to have been extrajudicial executions" against Palestinian civilians. Several of those incidents occurred after Palestinians attempted to attack Israelis or Israel Defense Forces soldiers. Even though the attackers did not pose a serious threat, they were shot without attempting to arrest the suspects before resorting to the use of lethal force. Medical attention for severely wounded Palestinians was in many cases delayed by Israeli forces.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: "The New York Times" reported 13 November 2020 that Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah was assassinated 7 August 2020 on the streets of Tehran by Israeli operatives at the behest of the United States, according to four intelligence officials of the United States.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Iranian nuclear physicist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was killed 27 November 2020 on a rural road in Absard, a city near Tehran. One American official — along with two other intelligence officials — said that Israel was behind the attack on the scientist.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Extrajudicial killings and death squads are common in Pakistan. A form of extrajudicial killing called encounter killings by police is common in Pakistan. Case in point is Naqeebullah Mehsud and Sahiwal Killings. The Province of Balochistan has also seen a significant number of disappearances, many of which have been attributed to security forces by residents: anti-government Baloch nationalists claim thousands of cases and have stated a belief that most of these disappeared persons have been killed. Official numbers of disappeared persons have varied considerably, ranging between 55 and 1,100 victims. Human rights organizations have dubbed this practice as the "kill and dump policy".


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called the massacre the single deadliest event for journalists in history. Even prior to this, the CPJ had labeled the Philippines the second most dangerous country for journalists, second only to Iraq.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Following the victory of Rodrigo Duterte in the 2016 Philippine presidential election, a campaign against illegal drugs has led to widespread extrajudicial killings. This follows the actions by then-Mayor Duterte to roam Davao in order to "encounter to kill".


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: The Philippine president has urged its citizens to kill suspected criminals and drug addicts, ordered the police to adopt a shoot-to-kill policy, has offered rewards for killing suspects, and has even admitted to personally killing suspected criminals.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: The move has sparked widespread condemnation from international publications and magazines, prompting the Philippine government to issue statements denying the existence of state-sanctioned killings.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Though Duterte's controversial war on drugs was opposed by the United States under President Barack Obama, the European Union, and the United Nations, Duterte claims that he has received approving remarks from US President Donald Trump.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: On September 26, 2016, Duterte issued guidelines that would enable the United Nations Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Killings to probe the rising death toll. On December 14, 2016, Duterte cancelled the planned visit of the Rapporteur who declined to accept government conditions that were not consistent with the code of conduct for special rapporteurs.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: The Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi was assassinated at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Reportedly thousands of extrajudicial killings occurred during the 2003 anti-drug effort of Thailand's prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Rumors still persist that there is collusion between the government, rogue military officers, the radical right wing, and anti-drug death squads.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: In 1990 Amnesty International published its first report on extrajudicial executions in Turkey. In the following years the problem became more serious. The Human Rights Foundation of Turkey determined the following figures on extrajudicial executions in Turkey for the years 1991 to 2001:


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: In 2001 the UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Ms. Asma Jahangir,


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: presented a report on a visit to Turkey. The report presented details of killings of prisoners (26 September 1999, 10 prisoners killed in a prison in Ankara; 19 December 2000, an operation in 20 prisons launched throughout Turkey resulted in the death of 30 inmates and two gendarmes).


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: For the years 2000–2008 the Human Rights Association (HRA) gives the following figures on doubtful deaths/deaths in


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Nguyễn Văn Lém (referred to as Captain Bay Lop) (died 1 February 1968 in Saigon) was a member of the Viet Cong who was summarily shot in Saigon during the Tet Offensive. The photograph of his death would become one of many anti-Vietnam War icons in the Western World.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: In 1999 Belarusian opposition leaders Yury Zacharanka and Viktar Hanchar together with his business associate Anatol Krasouski disappeared. Hanchar and Krasouski disappeared the same day of a broadcast on state television in which President Alexander Lukashenko ordered the chiefs of his security services to crack down on “opposition scum”. Although the State Security Committee of the Republic of Belarus (KGB) had them under constant surveillance, the official investigation announced that the case could not be solved. The disappearance of journalist Dzmitry Zavadski in 2000 has also yielded no results. Copies of a report by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, which linked senior Belarusian officials to the cases of disappearances, were confiscated. Human Rights Watch claims that Zacharanka, Hanchar, Krasouski and Zavadski likely became victims of extrajudicial executions.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Extrajudicial killings have taken place in Russia. In the Russian Federation, a number of journalist murders were attributed to public administration figures, usually where the publications would reveal their involvement in large corruption scandals. It has been regarded that the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko was linked to Russian special forces. American and British intelligence agents have claimed that Russian assassins, some possibly at orders of the government, are behind at least fourteen targeted killings in the United Kingdom that police authorities have termed non-suspicious. The United Kingdom attributes the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in March 2018 to the Russian military-intelligence agency GRU. The German foreign minister Heiko Maas said there were "several indications" that Russia was behind the poisoning of Alexei Navalny.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: In Soviet Russia, since 1918 the secret police organization Cheka was authorized to execute counter-revolutionaries without trial. Hostages were also executed by Cheka during the Red Terror in 1918–1920. The successors of Cheka also had the authority for extrajudicial executions. In 1937–38 hundreds of thousands were executed extrajudicially during the Great Purge under the lists approved by NKVD troikas. In some cases, the Soviet special services did not arrest and then execute their victims but just secretly killed them without any arrest. For example, Solomon Mikhoels was murdered in 1948 and his body was run over to create the impression of a traffic accident. The Soviet special services also conducted extrajudicial killings abroad, most notably of Leon Trotsky in 1940 in Mexico, Stepan Bandera in 1959 in Germany, Georgi Markov in 1978 in London.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: From 1983 until 1987, the Spanish government supported paramilitary squads, denominated GAL, to fight ETA, a Basque terrorist organization. A relevant example was the Lasa and Zabala case, in which José Antonio Lasa and José Ignacio Zabala were kidnapped, tortured and executed by police forces in 1983.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: During the Troubles, an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland, British security forces and intelligence agents were accused of committing extrajudicial killings against suspected IRA members. Brian Nelson, an Ulster Defence Association member and secret British agent, was convicted in a court of sectarian murders.


title: Extrajudicial killing

text: Operation Kratos referred to tactics developed by London's Metropolitan Police for dealing with suspected suicide bombers, most notably firing shots to the head without warning. Little was revealed about these tactics until after the mistaken shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes on 22 July 2005.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Daryl Frank Dragon (August 27, 1942 – January 2, 2019) was an American musician, known as Captain from the pop musical duo Captain & Tennille with his then-wife, Toni Tennille.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Born into a musical family, Dragon was the son of Eloise (Rawitzer) and conductor, composer, and arranger Carmen Dragon, and the elder brother of Dennis Dragon, a member of the 1960s pop combo The Dragons and the 1980s surf band the Surf Punks. His godfather was actor and comedian Danny Thomas.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Dragon suffered from megalocornea, a condition which results in large eyeballs. It forced him to wear ever-present sunglasses.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Dragon's familiar image and stage name came from his time as a keyboard player with The Beach Boys from 1967 to 1972. Beach Boys lead singer Mike Love gave him the nickname "Captain Keyboard", and it stuck; Dragon began wearing a nautical captain's hat to go along with the name. As Captain in Captain & Tennille, Dragon was frequently silent and a man of very few words, playing a foil to his outgoing, vivacious wife, Toni Tennille.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: In 1962, Dragon became a member of the band Charles Wright and the Wright Sounds, which included the future Watts Band member John Raynford. He also played with The Yellow Balloon in 1967.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Dragon studied piano at San Fernando Valley State College from 19631966, dropping out to form a band with his brothers. In 1968, Dragon and his brother Dennis formed a studio band called The Mission, which produced a one-off single on the small Bet Records label: "Calmilly"/"Galing Made It". The songs later appeared on a joint album in 1971 titled "Me and My Brother" (aided by another brother, Doug, who sang the vocals), which was released on CD in 2005.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: In the late 1960s, Daryl and his brothers Doug and Dennis recorded sessions for a psychedelic soul/rock album as "The Dragons", but they were unable to get a record label to release the album. The album was titled "BFI", which stood for "Blue Forces Intelligence". In 2007, UK label Ninja Tune discovered that the recording engineer, Donn Landee, still had the master tapes and they released the album.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Dragon also made significant contributions with keyboarding and musical scoring on the Beach Boys' 1972 release "Carl and the Passions – "So Tough""; he co-wrote the track "Cuddle Up" with Dennis Wilson. Also, Dragon's orchestrations on the tracks "Make It Good" and "Cuddle Up" translated the melodic ideas that Wilson was seeking. Additionally, Dragon arranged the coda on "Don't Go Near The Water" from the Beach Boys' 1971 release "Surf's Up". A plaque featuring Dragon's name was unveiled by Roger Williams University and music historians Al Gomes and Connie Watrous of Big Noise at the Baypoint Inn & Conference Center in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, on September 21, 2017, honoring the Beach Boys for a significant historic event in their career - the band's concert on September 22, 1971, at The Ramada Inn in Portsmouth. The concert was the first-ever appearance of South African musicians Ricky Fataar and Blondie Chaplin in the band, essentially changing the Beach Boys' live act into a multi-cultural group. Dragon served as musical director for the 1971 concert.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Dragon contributed vibes and melodica in the song "Wind 'n' Sea" by the band Farm, a group assembled by Dennis and Doug for the soundtrack to "The Innermost Limits of Pure Fun", a surf film directed by George Greenough. He also did session work with Dennis for the "Go for It" soundtrack and, in the early 1980s, with the rock band Survivor. In 1981, Dragon contributed to Carpenters' "Made In America" album, programming synthesizers on "(Want You) Back In My Life Again".


title: Daryl Dragon

text: In late 2009, Toni Tennille announced her husband had developed familial tremor. According to Tennille, his condition was neither debilitating nor terminal. Rather, his noticeable tremor was exacerbated by stress and anxiety. Subsequently, the tremor condition limited most of Dragon's public appearances. In November 2009, Toni Tennille announced that Dragon was under a physician's care to determine the best method of his treatment.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: In September 2010, Tennille publicly clarified her husband's condition as "a neurological condition (later confirmed to be essential tremor), which causes him to have tremors". Tennille indicated the condition was debilitating to Dragon's abilities as a musician.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Tennille filed for divorce from Dragon in Arizona on January 16, 2014, after 39 years of marriage. Dragon stated he was unaware of this until he was served with the divorce papers. Dragon, contacted by TMZ on January 22, 2014, stated: "I don't know why Toni filed for divorce."


title: Daryl Dragon

text: On January 23, 2014, "The Washington Post" reported health insurance related to health issues might be the reason for the divorce, as both issues had been referenced in divorce documents filed with the courts. Tennille had reported on her blog in 2010 her husband's neurological condition was characterized by such extreme tremors he could no longer play keyboards.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: The divorce was finalized in July 2014. In her memoirs, Tennille described their marriage as loveless and lacking physical affection.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Regarding his ex-wife's new memoirs, Dragon stated, "No, I haven't read it." In an interview on March 17, 2016, Dragon, responding to the book by his ex-wife, would comment only, "I was drugged [at the time of my divorce] — that's all I can tell you."


title: Daryl Dragon

text: On April 12, 2016, while appearing on the "Today" show, Tennille confirmed her divorce from Dragon was finalized and stated the reason for the divorce was Dragon's "inability to be affectionate". Tennille later said that Dragon had reacted positively to the "Today" segment and told her: "I saw you on "The Today Show". I was proud of you."


title: Daryl Dragon

text: In an interview published in a February 2017 issue of "People", Dragon stated he was making great progress and feeling like himself again, after corrections were made in the dosage of medications he was taking, which had been causing side effects. Dragon stated his ex-wife had flown to Arizona and had been a help in his improvement.


title: Daryl Dragon

text: Dragon died on January 2, 2019, from kidney failure in Prescott, Arizona, aged 76, with Tennille by his side.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: Shantanu Narayen (born May 27, 1963) is an Indian-American business executive. He has been the chairman, president, and chief executive officer (CEO) of Adobe Inc. since December 2007. Before this, he was the company's president and chief operating officer since 2005.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: Narayen grew up in Hyderabad, India, in a Telugu-speaking family, and was the second son of a mother who taught American literature and a father who ran a plastics company. He attended Hyderabad Public School.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: He earned a bachelor's degree in electronics and communication engineering from University College of Engineering, Osmania University in Hyderabad. He moved to the United States to complete his education, and in 1986 received a master's degree in computer science from Bowling Green State University in Ohio. In 1993 he received an MBA from the Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: In 1986 Narayen joined a Silicon Valley start-up called Measurex Automation Systems, which made computer control systems for automotive and electronics customers. He then moved to Apple, where he was in senior management positions from 1989 to 1995.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: After Apple, he served as director of desktop and collaboration products for Silicon Graphics. In 1996 co-founded Pictra Inc., a company that pioneered the concept of digital photo sharing over the Internet.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: Narayen joined Adobe in 1998 as senior vice-president of worldwide product development, a position he held through 2001. From 2001 to 2005 he was executive vice-president of worldwide products.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: In November 2007, Adobe announced that Bruce Chizen would step down as CEO effective December 1, 2007, to be replaced by Narayen.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: As CEO, Narayen led the transformation of the company, moving its creative and digital document software franchises – which include flagship programs such as Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and Acrobat/PDF – from the desktop to the cloud. In addition, during his tenure as CEO, Adobe has entered the digital experiences category, an expansion which began with the company’s acquisition of Omniture in 2009.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: In 2018 Adobe exceeded $100 billion in market cap and joined the Fortune 400 for the first time. In 2018 it also ranked No. 13 on "Forbes"’ Most Innovative Companies list.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: In May 2011, Narayen received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Bowling Green State University.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: Narayen is the lead independent director on the board of directors for Pfizer, and vice chairman of the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: In 2018, Narayen was ranked #12 on "Fortune"'s "Businessperson of the Year" list, and was deemed "Global Indian of the Year" in 2018 by "The Economic Times" of India.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: Narayen lives in Palo Alto, California. He met his wife Reni while at Bowling Green State University in the mid 1980s; she has a doctorate in clinical psychology. They have two sons.


title: Shantanu Narayen

text: He once represented India in sailing at an Asian Regatta. He, along with Satya Nadella, has also invested in Major League Cricket to be hosted by the American Cricket Enterprises (ACE).


title: Botnet

text: A botnet is a group of Internet-connected devices, each of which runs one or more bots. Botnets can be used to perform Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks, steal data, send spam, and allow the attacker to access the device and its connection. The owner can control the botnet using command and control (C&C) software. The word "botnet" is a portmanteau of the words "robot" and "network". The term is usually used with a negative or malicious connotation.


title: Botnet

text: A botnet is a logical collection of Internet-connected devices, such as computers, smartphones or Internet of things (IoT) devices whose security have been breached and control ceded to a third party. Each compromised device, known as a "bot," is created when a device is penetrated by software from a "malware" (malicious software) distribution. The controller of a botnet is able to direct the activities of these compromised computers through communication channels formed by standards-based network protocols, such as IRC and Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP).


title: Botnet

text: Botnet architecture has evolved over time in an effort to evade detection and disruption. Traditionally, bot programs are constructed as clients which communicate via existing servers. This allows the bot herder (the controller of the botnet) to perform all control from a remote location, which obfuscates the traffic. Many recent botnets now rely on existing peer-to-peer networks to communicate. These P2P bot programs perform the same actions as the client–server model, but they do not require a central server to communicate.


title: Botnet

text: The first botnets on the Internet used a client–server model to accomplish their tasks. Typically, these botnets operate through Internet Relay Chat networks, domains, or websites. Infected clients access a predetermined location and await incoming commands from the server. The bot herder sends commands to the server, which relays them to the clients. Clients execute the commands and report their results back to the bot herder.


title: Botnet

text: In the case of IRC botnets, infected clients connect to an infected IRC server and join a channel pre-designated for C&C by the bot herder. The bot herder sends commands to the channel via the IRC server. Each client retrieves the commands and executes them. Clients send messages back to the IRC channel with the results of their actions.


title: Botnet

text: In response to efforts to detect and decapitate IRC botnets, bot herders have begun deploying malware on peer-to-peer networks. These bots may use digital signatures so that only someone with access to the private key can control the botnet, such as in Gameover ZeuS and the ZeroAccess botnet.


title: Botnet

text: Newer botnets fully operate over P2P networks. Rather than communicate with a centralized server, P2P bots perform as both a command distribution server and a client which receives commands. This avoids having any single point of failure, which is an issue for centralized botnets.


title: Botnet

text: In order to find other infected machines, P2P bots discreetly probe random IP addresses until they identify another infected machine. The contacted bot replies with information such as its software version and list of known bots. If one of the bots' version is lower than the other, they will initiate a file transfer to update. This way, each bot grows its list of infected machines and updates itself by periodically communicating to all known bots.


title: Botnet

text: A botnet's originator (known as a "bot herder" or "bot master") controls the botnet remotely. This is known as the command-and-control (C&C). The program for the operation must communicate via a covert channel to the client on the victim's machine (zombie computer).


title: Botnet

text: IRC is a historically favored means of C&C because of its communication protocol. A bot herder creates an IRC channel for infected clients to join. Messages sent to the channel are broadcast to all channel members. The bot herder may set the channel's topic to command the botnet. For example, the message codice_1 from the bot herder alerts all infected clients belonging to #channel to begin a DDoS attack on the website www.victim.com. An example response codice_2 by a bot client alerts the bot herder that it has begun the attack.


title: Botnet

text: Some botnets implement custom versions of well-known protocols. The implementation differences can be used for detection of botnets. For example, Mega-D features a slightly modified Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) implementation for testing spam capability. Bringing down the Mega-D's SMTP server disables the entire pool of bots that rely upon the same SMTP server.


title: Botnet

text: In computer science, a zombie computer is a computer connected to the Internet that has been compromised by a hacker, computer virus or trojan horse and can be used to perform malicious tasks under remote direction. Botnets of zombie computers are often used to spread e-mail spam and launch denial-of-service attacks (DDoS). Most owners of zombie computers are unaware that their system is being used in this way. Because the owner tends to be unaware, these computers are metaphorically compared to zombies. A coordinated DDoS attack by multiple botnet machines also resembles a zombie horde attack.


title: Botnet

text: The process of stealing computing resources as a result of a system being joined to a "botnet" is sometimes referred to as "scrumping".


title: Botnet

text: Botnet command and control (C&C) protocols have been implemented in a number of ways, from traditional IRC approaches to more sophisticated versions.


title: Botnet

text: Telnet botnets use a simple C&C botnet protocol in which bots connect to the main command server to host the botnet. Bots are added to the botnet by using a scanning script, which runs on an external server and scans IP ranges for telnet and SSH server default logins. Once a login is found, the scanning server can infect it through SSH with malware, which pings the control server.


title: Botnet

text: IRC networks use simple, low bandwidth communication methods, making them widely used to host botnets. They tend to be relatively simple in construction and have been used with moderate success for coordinating DDoS attacks and spam campaigns while being able to continually switch channels to avoid being taken down. However, in some cases, merely blocking of certain keywords has proven effective in stopping IRC-based botnets. The RFC 1459 (IRC) standard is popular with botnets. The first known popular botnet controller script, "MaXiTE Bot" was using IRC XDCC protocol for private control commands.


title: Botnet

text: One problem with using IRC is that each bot client must know the IRC server, port, and channel to be of any use to the botnet. Anti-malware organizations can detect and shut down these servers and channels, effectively halting the botnet attack. If this happens, clients are still infected, but they typically lie dormant since they have no way of receiving instructions. To mitigate this problem, a botnet can consist of several servers or channels. If one of the servers or channels becomes disabled, the botnet simply switches to another. It is still possible to detect and disrupt additional botnet servers or channels by sniffing IRC traffic. A botnet adversary can even potentially gain knowledge of the control scheme and imitate the bot herder by issuing commands correctly.


title: Botnet

text: Since most botnets using IRC networks and domains can be taken down with time, hackers have moved to P2P botnets with C&C to make the botnet more resilient and resistant to termination.


title: Botnet

text: Some have also used encryption as a way to secure or lock down the botnet from others, most of the time when they use encryption it is public-key cryptography and has presented challenges in both implementing it and breaking it.


title: Botnet

text: Many large botnets tend to use domains rather than IRC in their construction (see Rustock botnet and Srizbi botnet). They are usually hosted with bulletproof hosting services. This is one of the earliest types of C&C. A zombie computer accesses a specially-designed webpage or domain(s) which serves the list of controlling commands. The advantages of using web pages or domains as C&C is that a large botnet can be effectively controlled and maintained with very simple code that can be readily updated.


title: Botnet

text: Disadvantages of using this method are that it uses a considerable amount of bandwidth at large scale, and domains can be quickly seized by government agencies with little effort. If the domains controlling the botnets are not seized, they are also easy targets to compromise with denial-of-service attacks.


title: Botnet

text: Fast-flux DNS can be used to make it difficult to track down the control servers, which may change from day to day. Control servers may also hop from DNS domain to DNS domain, with domain generation algorithms being used to create new DNS names for controller servers.


title: Botnet

text: Some botnets use free DNS hosting services such as DynDns.org, No-IP.com, and Afraid.org to point a subdomain towards an IRC server that harbors the bots. While these free DNS services do not themselves host attacks, they provide reference points (often hard-coded into the botnet executable). Removing such services can cripple an entire botnet.


title: Botnet

text: Calling back to large social media sites such as GitHub, Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, the XMPP open source instant message protocol and Tor hidden services are popular ways of avoiding egress filtering to communicate with a C&C server.


title: Botnet

text: Newer bots can automatically scan their environment and propagate themselves using vulnerabilities and weak passwords. Generally, the more vulnerabilities a bot can scan and propagate through, the more valuable it becomes to a botnet controller community.


title: Botnet

text: Computers can be co-opted into a botnet when they execute malicious software. This can be accomplished by luring users into making a drive-by download, exploiting web browser vulnerabilities, or by tricking the user into running a Trojan horse program, which may come from an email attachment. This malware will typically install modules that allow the computer to be commanded and controlled by the botnet's operator. After the software is downloaded, it will call home (send a reconnection packet) to the host computer. When the re-connection is made, depending on how it is written, a Trojan may then delete itself or may remain present to update and maintain the modules.


title: Botnet

text: In some cases, a botnet may be temporarily created by volunteer hacktivists, such as with implementations of the Low Orbit Ion Cannon as used by 4chan members during Project Chanology in 2010.


title: Botnet

text: China's Great Cannon of China allows the modification of legitimate web browsing traffic at internet backbones into China to create a large ephemeral botnet to attack large targets such as GitHub in 2015.


title: Botnet

text: The botnet controller community constantly competes over who has the most bots, the highest overall bandwidth, and the most "high-quality" infected machines, like university, corporate, and even government machines.


title: Botnet

text: While botnets are often named after the malware that created them, multiple botnets typically use the same malware but are operated by different entities.


title: Botnet

text: Botnets can be used for many electronic scams. These botnets can be used to distribute malware such as viruses to take control of a regular users computer/software By taking control of someone's personal computer they have unlimited access to their personal information, including passwords and login information to accounts. This is called phishing. Phishing is the acquiring of login information to the "victim's" accounts with a link the "victim" clicks on that is sent through an email or text. A survey by Verizon found that around two-thirds of electronic "espionage" cases come from phishing.


title: Botnet

text: The geographic dispersal of botnets means that each recruit must be individually identified/corralled/repaired and limits the benefits of filtering.


title: Botnet

text: Computer security experts have succeeded in destroying or subverting malware command and control networks, by, among other means, seizing servers or getting them cut off from the Internet, denying access to domains that were due to be used by malware to contact its C&C infrastructure, and, in some cases, breaking into the C&C network itself. In response to this, C&C operators have resorted to using techniques such as overlaying their C&C networks on other existing benign infrastructure such as IRC or Tor, using peer-to-peer networking systems that are not dependent on any fixed servers, and using public key encryption to defeat attempts to break into or spoof the network.


title: Botnet

text: Norton AntiBot was aimed at consumers, but most target enterprises and/or ISPs. Host-based techniques use heuristics to identify bot behavior that has bypassed conventional anti-virus software. Network-based approaches tend to use the techniques described above; shutting down C&C servers, null-routing DNS entries, or completely shutting down IRC servers. BotHunter is software, developed with support from the U.S. Army Research Office, that detects botnet activity within a network by analyzing network traffic and comparing it to patterns characteristic of malicious processes.


title: Botnet

text: Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories are analyzing botnets' behavior by simultaneously running one million Linux kernels—a similar scale to a botnet—as virtual machines on a 4,480-node high-performance computer cluster to emulate a very large network, allowing them to watch how botnets work and experiment with ways to stop them.


title: Botnet

text: Detecting automated bot attacks is becoming more difficult each day as newer and more sophisticated generations of bots are getting launched by attackers. For example, an automated attack can deploy a large bot army and apply brute-force methods with highly accurate username and password lists to hack into accounts. The idea is to overwhelm sites with tens of thousands of requests from different IPs all over the world, but with each bot only submitting a single request every 10 minutes or so, which can result in more than 5 million attempts per day. In these cases, many tools try to leverage volumetric detection, but automated bot attacks now have ways of circumventing triggers of volumetric detection.


title: Botnet

text: One of the techniques for detecting these bot attacks is what's known as "signature-based systems" in which the software will attempt to detect patterns in the request packet. However, attacks are constantly evolving, so this may not be a viable option when patterns cannot be discerned from thousands of requests. There is also the behavioral approach to thwarting bots, which ultimately tries to distinguish bots from humans. By identifying non-human behavior and recognizing known bot behavior, this process can be applied at the user, browser, and network levels.


title: Botnet

text: The most capable method of using software to combat against a virus has been to utilize honeypot software in order to convince the malware that a system is vulnerable. The malicious files are then analyzed using forensic software.


title: Botnet

text: On 15 July 2014, the Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, held a hearing on the threats posed by botnets and the public and private efforts to disrupt and dismantle them.


title: Botnet

text: Non-malicious botnets, also known as volunteer computing, such as the ones part of BOINC are often used for scientific purposes. For example, there is Rosetta@home, which aims to predict protein–protein docking and design new proteins; LHC@home, which aims to simulate various different experiments relating to the Large Hadron Collider; SETI@home, which helps analyzing data related to search for extraterrestrial intelligence and Einstein@Home, which searches for signals from spinning neutron stars. These botnets are voluntary, requiring user consent to add a computer (and therefore having no self-spreading capability) and allowing much simpler removal from the botnet than a malicious one. Because of the user being aware, lack of self-spreading capability, and less risk of harm, computers in these botnets are often just referred to as "nodes" rather than "zombies". These botnets provides large computational capabilities to researchers at near zero cost.


title: Botnet

text: The risk of an unintentional DDoS attack on a website remains a possibility, as a poorly-"teamed" botnet could delegate too many, if not all, of its computers to a website, for example to collect data. However, because the nodes send as "few" requests as possible, the botnet will often cease access to a website when work in that website is done, like the completed collection of data in this case. No new nodes will attempt to connect to the website, causing the "attack" to dissolve just as suddenly as it started. The limitation of requests by the botnet itself further weakens the "attack".


title: Botnet

text: The first botnet was first acknowledged and exposed by EarthLink during a lawsuit with notorious spammer Khan C. Smith in 2001. The botnet was constructed for the purpose of bulk spam, and accounted for nearly 25% of all spam at the time.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: Un Verano Sin Ti (; ) is the fourth solo studio album, and fifth overall, by Puerto Rican rapper and singer Bad Bunny. It was released on May 6, 2022, by Rimas Entertainment following the release of his previous record "El Último Tour Del Mundo" (2020). Comprising twenty-three tracks, the album is primarily a reggaeton, cumbia and indie pop record, and contains guest appearances from Chencho Corleone, Jhay Cortez, Tony Dize, Rauw Alejandro, Bomba Estéreo, the Marías and Buscabulla. Un Verano Sin Ti became the first album by a Latin artist to reach 10 billion streams on Spotify.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: A critical and commercial success, "Un Verano Sin Ti" debuted atop the US "Billboard" 200, marking Bad Bunny's second number-one album and the second all-Spanish language album to top the chart. At the 23rd Annual Latin Grammy Awards, "Un Verano Sin Ti" won Best Urban Music Album, while at the 65th Annual Grammy Awards, it became the first Spanish-language album to earn a Grammy nomination for Album of the Year.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: Bad Bunny first teased "Un Verano Sin Ti" on January 24, 2022, when he posted a teaser announcing his upcoming 2022 stadium tour World's Hottest Tour: "now yes, 2022 has started". He called the album "a record to play in the summer, on the beach, as a playlist". The music video for "Moscow Mule" was filmed in Miami, Florida and Puerto Rico.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: "Un Verano Sin Ti" is primarily a reggaeton, cumbia, and indie pop record driven by musical styles hailing from the Caribbean, such as reggae, bomba, dembow, mambo, merengue and bachata. The album also contains elements of a cappella, afrobeats, alternative rock, ballad, bossa nova, chillwave, dancehall, dance-pop, disco, electronic, hip-hop, house, psychedlia, R&B, samba, sandungueo, soul, synth-pop, techno, and trap.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: "Un Verano Sin Ti" was met with critical acclaim. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received an average score of 85, based on seven reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: David Crone of AllMusic writes, ""Un Verano" is not only a seasonal statement-piece but a testament to Benito's singular songwriting -- across genres, generations, and even languages, he works to produce enduring landmarks that trace universal joys, sorrows, and passions." Lucas Villa of "Consequence" praised the album's musical versatility, highlighting that "Side B is the more adventurous half of the album, pushing Bad Bunny's sound into new places with collaborations with alternative acts. ... With the sun-kissed "Un Verano Sin Ti", Bad Bunny continues to proudly give pop music some much-needed flavor, swagger, and sounds by way of the Caribbean." Honored with its "Best New Music" tag, Jennifer Mota of "Pitchfork" echoes Villa's remarks, writing that the album is a "cohesively packaged voyage through the various sounds synonymous with the Caribbean region—reggaetón, reggae, bomba, Dominican dembow, Dominican mambo, and bachata, among others.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: Julyssa Lopez of "Rolling Stone" praised the album, but noted that it "does fall into some of the problems of modern reggaeton. Many have pointed out that though Bad Bunny draws inspiration from the Dominican Republic in particular, no Dominicans appear in the actual features. And the length of the album produces some lulls and selections that are pretty mid: Unsurprisingly, the most mainstream reggaeton songs on here land among the least interesting."


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: "Un Verano Sin Ti" is the first Spanish-language album nominated for the Grammy Award for Album of the Year.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: "Un Verano Sin Ti" debuted at number one on the US "Billboard" 200 with 274,000 album-equivalent units. It is Bad Bunny's second number-one album and the second all-Spanish language album to top the "Billboard" 200. The album also achieved the biggest streaming week for a Latin album ever, accumulating 356.66 million official streams in the United States, the most for any album since Drake's "Certified Lover Boy" (2021), and was the most-streamed album on Spotify in 2022 by that point. It spent 13 nonconsecutive weeks atop the chart, becoming the album with the most weeks at No. 1 in 2022 and the ninth album overall to spend more than 10 weeks on top of the chart since 2000. "Un Verano Sin Ti" is also the first album to spend its first six months on the chart in the top two, since the "Billboard" 200 began publishing in 1956. It topped the 2022 "Billboard" 200 Year-End Chart, the first all-Spanish album to do so. In addition, it also placed at No. 1 on the year-end Independent Albums, Top Latin Albums and Latin Rhythm Albums charts.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: According to the magazine "Hits", "Un Verano Sin Ti" sold 2.3 million units as of September 2022, making it the second-best-selling non-English-language album in U.S. history, behind Linda Ronstadt's "Canciones de Mi Padre" at 2.5 million units.


title: Un Verano Sin Ti

text: The album reached number one on the Spanish Albums Chart and has received a four-times platinum certification for having moved 160,000 units in the country. "Un Verano Sin Ti" became Bad Bunny's first album to reach the top 10 on the music charts of Canada, Italy, the Netherlands and Switzerland.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its members were directly appointed by the governments of member states from among those already sitting in their own national parliaments. Since 1979, however, MEPs have been elected by direct universal suffrage. Earlier European organizations that were a precursor to the European Union did not have MEPs. Each member state establishes its own method for electing MEPs – and in some states this has changed over time – but the system chosen must be a form of proportional representation. Some member states elect their MEPs to represent a single national constituency; other states apportion seats to sub-national regions for election.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: They are sometimes referred to as delegates. They may also be known as observers when a new country is seeking membership of the European Union.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: From 1 January 2007, when Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU, there were 785 MEPs, but their number was reduced to 736 at the elections in 2009. With effect from the elections held in May 2014 the number had risen to 751. This has been reduced to 705 members after the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union in January 2020, with each member state now having at least six and at most 96 MEPs.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Elections are held once every five years, on the basis of universal suffrage. There is no uniform voting system for the election of MEPs; rather, each member state is free to choose its own system, subject to three restrictions:


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: The allocation of seats to each member state is based on the principle of degressive proportionality, so that, while the size of the population of each nation is taken into account, smaller states elect more MEPs than would be strictly justified by their populations alone. As the number of MEPs granted to each member state has arisen from treaty negotiations, there is no precise formula for the apportionment of seats. No change in this configuration can occur without the unanimous consent of all national governments.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: The European Parliament has a high turnover of members compared to some national parliaments. For instance, after the 2004 elections, the majority of elected members had not been members in the prior parliamentary session, though that could largely be put down to the recent enlargement. Hans-Gert Pöttering served the longest continuous term from the first elections in 1979 until 2014.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: MEPs are organised into seven different cross-nationality political groups, except the 37 non-attached members known as "Non-Inscrits". The two largest groups are the European People's Party (EPP) and the Socialists & Democrats (S&D). These two groups have dominated the Parliament for much of its life, continuously holding between 40 and 70 per cent of the seats together. No single group has ever held a majority in Parliament. As a result of being broad alliances of national parties, European groups parties are very decentralised and hence have more in common with parties in federal states like Germany or the United States than unitary states like the majority of the EU states. Although, the European groups, between 2004 and 2009, were actually more cohesive than their US counterparts.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Aside from working through their groups, individual members are also guaranteed a number of individual powers and rights within the Parliament:


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Every month except August the Parliament meets in Strasbourg for a four-day plenary session. Six times a year the Parliament meets for two days each in Brussels, where the Parliament's committees, political groups, and other organs also mainly meet. The obligation to spend one week a month in Strasbourg was imposed on Parliament by the member state governments at the 1992 Edinburgh summit.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: The total cost of the European Parliament is approximately €1.756 billion per year according to its 2014 budget, about €2.3 million per member of parliament.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Until 2009, MEPs were paid (by their own Member State) exactly the same salary as a member of the lower House of their own national parliament. As a result, there was a wide range of salaries in the European Parliament. In 2002, Italian MEPs earned €130,000, while Spanish MEPs earned less than a quarter of that at €32,000.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: However, in July 2005, the Council agreed to a single statute for all MEPs, following a proposal by the Parliament. Thus, since the 2009 elections, all MEPs receive a monthly pre-tax salary set at 38.5 per cent of that of a judge at the European Court of Justice. As of July 1, 2019, the monthly salary is of , or just over per year. MEPs also receive a general expenditure allowance of per month.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: The single statute represented a pay cut for MEPs from some member states (e.g. Italy, Germany, and Austria), a rise for others (particularly the low-paid eastern European members) and status quo for those from the United Kingdom, until January 2020 (depending on the euro-pound exchange rate). The much-criticised expenses arrangements were also partially reformed.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Members declare their financial interests in order to prevent any conflicts of interest. These declarations are published annually in a register and are available on the Internet.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Under the protocol on the privileges and immunities of the European Union, MEPs in their home state receive the same immunities as their own national parliamentarians. In other member states, MEPs are immune from detention and from legal proceedings, except when caught in the act of committing an offense. This immunity may be waived by application to the European Parliament by the authorities of the member state in question.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Around a third of MEPs have previously held national parliamentary mandates, and over 10 per cent have ministerial experience at a national level. There are usually a number of former prime ministers and former members of the European Commission. Many other MEPs have held office at a regional or local level in their home states.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Current MEPs also include former judges, trade union leaders, media personalities, actors, soldiers, singers, athletes, and political activists.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Many outgoing MEPs move into other political office. Several presidents, prime ministers or deputy prime ministers of member states are former MEPs, including former President of France Nicolas Sarkozy, former Deputy PM of the United Kingdom Nick Clegg, former Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi, Danish former Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt, and Belgian former PM Elio Di Rupo.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: The so-called "dual mandate", in which an individual is a member of both his or her national parliament and the European Parliament, was officially discouraged by a growing number of political parties and Member States, and is prohibited as of 2009. In the 2004–2009 Parliament, a small number of members still held a dual mandate. Notably, Ian Paisley and John Hume once held "triple mandates" as MEP, MP in the House of Commons, and MLA in the Northern Ireland Assembly simultaneously.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Women are generally under-represented in politics and public life in the EU, as well as in national parliaments, governments and local assemblies. The percentage of women in the EU parliament has increased from 15.2 per cent after the first European Parliament election in 1979 to 41 per cent after 2019 European Parliament election. To reach gender parity, women should hold 50 per cent of seats and positions of power. However, according to the goal set by the European Institute for Gender Equality, a ratio between 40 and 60 per cent is considered acceptable.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: After the 2014 European Parliament election 11 countries of 28 reached this goal in their own quota of elected candidates. While in nine EU countries there were mechanisms in place to facilitate female representation, only in four of these countries did women exceeded 40 per cent of elected candidates. On the other hand, in eight countries this goal was reached despite the absence of such systems. The FEMM Committee requested a study exploring the results of the election in terms of gender balance. EU institutions have focused on how to achieve a better gender balance (at least 40 per cent) or gender parity (50 per cent) in the next Parliament, and for other high-level posts in other institutions.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: In the 2019 elections 308 female MEPs were elected (41 per cent). Sweden elected the highest percentage of female MEPs: 55 per cent. Overall, thirteen countries elected 45 to 55 per cent female MEPs, with seven countries reaching exactly 50 per cent. On the other hand, Cyprus has elected zero women, and Slovakia elected only 15 percent. Other Eastern European countries, namely Romania, Greece, Lithuania and Bulgaria, all elected fewer than 30 per cent female MEPs. Eight member states elected a lower number of women in 2019 than in 2014. Malta, Cyprus and Estonia lost the most female representation in the EU parliament, dropping by 17 percentage points, while Slovakia dropped by 16. However, despite the drop, Malta still elected 50 per cent women in 2019. Cyprus dropped from 17 per cent in 2014 to zero women this year, while Estonia dropped from 50 to 33 per cent. Hungary, Lithuania and Luxembourg made the greatest gains (19, 18 and 17 percentage points respectively) when we compare 2019 with 2014, followed by Slovenia and Latvia, both increasing their percentage of women MEPs by 13 points. Luxembourg, Slovenia and Latvia all elected 50 per cent female MEPs.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: , the youngest MEP is Kira Marie Peter-Hansen of Denmark, who was 21 at the start of the July 2019 session, and is also the youngest person ever elected to the European Parliament. The oldest MEP is Silvio Berlusconi of Italy, who was 82 at the start of the July 2019 session.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: European citizens are eligible for election in the member state where they reside (subject to the residence requirements of that state); they do not have to be a national of that state. The following citizens have been elected in a state other than their native country;


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: It is conventional for countries acceding to the European Union to send a number of observers to Parliament in advance. The number of observers and their method of appointment (usually by national parliaments) is laid down in the joining countries' Treaties of Accession.


title: Member of the European Parliament

text: Observers may attend debates and take part by invitation, but they may not vote or exercise other official duties. When the countries then become full member states, these observers become full MEPs for the interim period between accession and the next European elections. From 26 September 2005 to 31 December 2006, Bulgaria had 18 observers in Parliament and Romania 35. These were selected from government and opposition parties as agreed by the countries' national parliaments. Following accession on 1 January 2007, the observers became MEPs (with some personnel changes). Similarly, Croatia had 12 observer members from 17 April 2012, appointed by the Croatian parliament in preparation for its accession in 2013.


title: PH meter

text: A pH meter is a scientific instrument that measures the hydrogen-ion activity in water-based solutions, indicating its acidity or alkalinity expressed as pH. The pH meter measures the difference in electrical potential between a pH electrode and a reference electrode, and so the pH meter is sometimes referred to as a "potentiometric pH meter". The difference in electrical potential relates to the acidity or pH of the solution. Testing of pH via pH meters (pH-metry) is used in many applications ranging from laboratory experimentation to quality control.


title: PH meter

text: The rate and outcome of chemical reactions taking place in water often depends on the acidity of the water, and it is therefore useful to know the acidity of the water, typically measured by means of a pH meter. Knowledge of pH is useful or critical in many situations, including chemical laboratory analyses. pH meters are used for soil measurements in agriculture, water quality for municipal water supplies, swimming pools, environmental remediation; brewing of wine or beer; manufacturing, healthcare and clinical applications such as blood chemistry; and many other applications.


title: PH meter

text: Advances in the instrumentation and in detection have expanded the number of applications in which pH measurements can be conducted. The devices have been miniaturized, enabling direct measurement of pH inside of living cells. In addition to measuring the pH of liquids, specially designed electrodes are available to measure the pH of semi-solid substances, such as foods. These have tips suitable for piercing semi-solids, have electrode materials compatible with ingredients in food, and are resistant to clogging.


title: PH meter

text: Potentiometric pH meters measure the voltage between two electrodes and display the result converted into the corresponding pH value. They comprise a simple electronic amplifier and a pair of electrodes, or alternatively a combination electrode, and some form of display calibrated in pH units. It usually has a glass electrode and a reference electrode, or a combination electrode. The electrodes, or probes, are inserted into the solution to be tested. pH meters may also be based on the antimony electrode (typpically used for rough conditions) or the quinhydrone electrode.


title: PH meter

text: In order to accurately measure the potential difference between the two sides of the glass membrane reference electrode, typically a silver chloride electrode or calomel electrode are required on each side of the membrane. Their purpose is to measure changes in the potential on their respective side. One is built into the glass electrode. The other, which makes contact with the test solution through a porous plug, may be a separate reference electrode or may be built into a combination electrode. The resulting voltage will be the potential difference between the two sides of the glass membrane possibly offset by some difference between the two reference electrodes, that can be compensated for. The article on the glass electrode has a good description and figure.


title: PH meter

text: The design of the electrodes is the key part: These are rod-like structures usually made of glass, with a bulb containing the sensor at the bottom. The glass electrode for measuring the pH has a glass bulb specifically designed to be selective to hydrogen-ion concentration. On immersion in the solution to be tested, hydrogen ions in the test solution exchange for other positively charged ions on the glass bulb, creating an electrochemical potential across the bulb. The electronic amplifier detects the difference in electrical potential between the two electrodes generated in the measurement and converts the potential difference to pH units. The magnitude of the electrochemical potential across the glass bulb is linearly related to the pH according to the Nernst equation.


title: PH meter

text: The reference electrode is insensitive to the pH of the solution, being composed of a metallic conductor, which connects to the display. This conductor is immersed in an electrolyte solution, typically potassium chloride, which comes into contact with the test solution through a porous ceramic membrane. The display consists of a voltmeter, which displays voltage in units of pH.


title: PH meter

text: On immersion of the glass electrode and the reference electrode in the test solution, an electrical circuit is completed, in which there is a potential difference created and detected by the voltmeter. The circuit can be thought of as going from the conductive element of the reference electrode to the surrounding potassium-chloride solution, through the ceramic membrane to the test solution, the hydrogen-ion-selective glass of the glass electrode, to the solution inside the glass electrode, to the silver of the glass electrode, and finally the voltmeter of the display device. The voltage varies from test solution to test solution depending on the potential difference created by the difference in hydrogen-ion concentrations on each side of the glass membrane between the test solution and the solution inside the glass electrode. All other potential differences in the circuit do not vary with pH and are corrected for by means of the calibration.


title: PH meter

text: For simplicity, many pH meters use a combination probe, constructed with the glass electrode and the reference electrode contained within a single probe. A detailed description of combination electrodes is given in the article on glass electrodes.


title: PH meter

text: The pH meter is calibrated with solutions of known pH, typically before each use, to ensure accuracy of measurement. To measure the pH of a solution, the electrodes are used as probes, which are dipped into the test solutions and held there sufficiently long for the hydrogen ions in the test solution to equilibrate with the ions on the surface of the bulb on the glass electrode. This equilibration provides a stable pH measurement.


title: PH meter

text: Details of the fabrication and resulting microstructure of the glass membrane of the pH electrode are maintained as trade secrets by the manufacturers. However, certain aspects of design are published. Glass is a solid electrolyte, for which alkali-metal ions can carry current. The pH-sensitive glass membrane is generally spherical to simplify the manufacture of a uniform membrane. These membranes are up to 0.4 millimeters in thickness, thicker than original designs, so as to render the probes durable. The glass has silicate chemical functionality on its surface, which provides binding sites for alkali-metal ions and hydrogen ions from the solutions. This provides an ion-exchange capacity in the range of 10 to 10 mol/cm. Selectivity for hydrogen ions (H) arises from a balance of ionic charge, volume requirements versus other ions, and the coordination number of other ions. Electrode manufacturers have developed compositions that suitably balance these factors, most notably lithium glass.


title: PH meter

text: The silver chloride electrode is most commonly used as a reference electrode in pH meters, although some designs use the saturated calomel electrode. The silver chloride electrode is simple to manufacture and provides high reproducibility. The reference electrode usually consists of a platinum wire that has contact with a silver/silver chloride mixture, which is immersed in a potassium chloride solution. There is a ceramic plug, which serves as a contact to the test solution, providing low resistance while preventing mixing of the two solutions.


title: PH meter

text: With these electrode designs, the voltmeter is detecting potential differences of ±1400 millivolts. The electrodes are further designed to rapidly equilibrate with test solutions to facilitate ease of use. The equilibration times are typically less than one second, although equilibration times increase as the electrodes age.


title: PH meter

text: Because of the sensitivity of the electrodes to contaminants, cleanliness of the probes is essential for accuracy and precision. Probes are generally kept moist when not in use with a medium appropriate for the particular probe, which is typically an aqueous solution available from probe manufacturers. Probe manufacturers provide instructions for cleaning and maintaining their probe designs. For illustration, one maker of laboratory-grade pH gives cleaning instructions for specific contaminants: general cleaning (15-minute soak in a solution of bleach and detergent), salt (hydrochloric acid solution followed by sodium hydroxide and water), grease (detergent or methanol), clogged reference junction (KCl solution), protein deposits (pepsin and HCl, 1% solution), and air bubbles.


title: PH meter

text: The German Institute for Standardization publishes a standard for pH measurement using pH meters, DIN 19263.


title: PH meter

text: Very precise measurements necessitate that the pH meter is calibrated before each measurement. More typically calibration is performed once per day of operation. Calibration is needed because the glass electrode does not give reproducible electrostatic potentials over longer periods of time.


title: PH meter

text: Consistent with principles of good laboratory practice, calibration is performed with at least two standard buffer solutions that span the range of pH values to be measured. For general purposes, buffers at pH 4.00 and pH 10.00 are suitable. The pH meter has one calibration control to set the meter reading equal to the value of the first standard buffer and a second control to adjust the meter reading to the value of the second buffer. A third control allows the temperature to be set. Standard buffer sachets, available from a variety of suppliers, usually document the temperature dependence of the buffer control. More precise measurements sometimes require calibration at three different pH values. Some pH meters provide built-in temperature-coefficient correction, with temperature thermocouples in the electrode probes. The calibration process correlates the voltage produced by the probe (approximately 0.06 volts per pH unit) with the pH scale. Good laboratory practice dictates that, after each measurement, the probes are rinsed with distilled water or deionized water to remove any traces of the solution being measured, blotted with a scientific wipe to absorb any remaining water, which could dilute the sample and thus alter the reading, and then immersed in a storage solution suitable for the particular probe type.


title: PH meter

text: In general there are three major categories of pH meters. Benchtop pH meters are often used in laboratories and are used to measure samples which are brought to the pH meter for analysis. Portable, or field pH meters, are handheld pH meters that are used to take the pH of a sample in a field or production site. In-line or in situ pH meters, also called pH analyzers, are used to measure pH continuously in a process, and can stand-alone, or be connected to a higher level information system for process control.


title: PH meter

text: pH meters range from simple and inexpensive pen-like devices to complex and expensive laboratory instruments with computer interfaces and several inputs for indicator and temperature measurements to be entered to adjust for the variation in pH caused by temperature. The output can be digital or analog, and the devices can be battery-powered or rely on line power. Some versions use telemetry to connect the electrodes to the voltmeter display device.


title: PH meter

text: Specialty meters and probes are available for use in special applications, such as harsh environments and biological microenvironments. There are also holographic pH sensors, which allow pH measurement colorimetrically, making use of the variety of pH indicators that are available. Additionally, there are commercially available pH meters based on solid state electrodes, rather than conventional glass electrodes.


title: PH meter

text: The concept of pH was defined in 1909 by S. P. L. Sørensen, and electrodes were used for pH measurement in the 1920s.


title: PH meter

text: In October 1934, Arnold Orville Beckman registered the first patent for a complete chemical instrument for the measurement of pH, U.S. Patent No. 2,058,761, for his "acidimeter", later renamed the pH meter. Beckman developed the prototype as an assistant professor of chemistry at the California Institute of Technology, when asked to devise a quick and accurate method for measuring the acidity of lemon juice for the California Fruit Growers Exchange (Sunkist).


title: PH meter

text: On April 8, 1935, Beckman's renamed National Technical Laboratories focused on the manufacture of scientific instruments, with the Arthur H. Thomas Company as a distributor for its pH meter. In its first full year of sales, 1936, the company sold 444 pH meters for $60,000 in sales. In years to come, the company sold millions of the units. In 2004 the Beckman pH meter was designated an ACS National Historic Chemical Landmark in recognition of its significance as the first commercially successful electronic pH meter.


title: PH meter

text: The Radiometer Corporation of Denmark was founded in 1935, and began marketing a pH meter for medical use around 1936, but "the development of automatic pH-meters for industrial purposes was neglected. Instead American instrument makers successfully developed industrial pH-meters with a wide variety of applications, such as in breweries, paper works, alum works, and water treatment systems."


title: PH meter

text: In the 1940s the electrodes for pH meters were often difficult to make, or unreliable due to brittle glass. Dr. Werner Ingold began to industrialize the production of single-rod measuring cells, a combination of measurement and reference electrode in one construction unit, which led to broader acceptance in a wide range of industries including pharmaceutical production.


title: PH meter

text: Beckman marketed a portable "Pocket pH Meter" as early as 1956, but it did not have a digital read-out.


title: PH meter

text: In the 1970s Jenco Electronics of Taiwan designed and manufactured the first portable digital pH meter. This meter was sold under the label of the Cole-Parmer Corporation.


title: PH meter

text: Specialized manufacturing is required for the electrodes, and details of their design and construction are typically trade secrets. However, with purchase of suitable electrodes, a standard multimeter can be used to complete the construction of the pH meter. However, commercial suppliers offer voltmeter displays that simplify use, including calibration and temperature compensation.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Mathias Rust (born 1 June 1968) is a German aviator known for his flight that ended with a landing near Red Square in Moscow on 28 May 1987. A teenage amateur pilot, he flew from Helsinki, Finland, to Moscow, being tracked several times by Soviet Air Defence Forces and civilian air traffic controllers, as well as Soviet Air Force interceptor aircraft. The Soviet fighters did not receive permission to shoot him down, and his aeroplane was mistaken for a friendly aircraft several times. He landed on Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge, next to Red Square near the Kremlin in the capital of the Soviet Union.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust said he wanted to create an "imaginary bridge" to the East, and that his flight was intended to reduce tension and suspicion between the two Cold War sides.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust's flight through a supposedly impenetrable air defence system had a great effect on the Soviet military and led to the dismissal of many senior officers, including Minister of Defence Marshal of the Soviet Union Sergei Sokolov and the Commander-in-Chief of the Soviet Air Defence Forces, former World War II fighter ace pilot Chief Marshal Alexander Koldunov. The incident aided Mikhail Gorbachev in the implementation of his reforms, by allowing him to dismiss numerous military officials opposed to his policies. Rust was sentenced to four years in a general-regime labour camp for violation of border crossing and air traffic regulations, and for provoking an emergency situation upon his landing. After 14 months in prison, he was pardoned by Andrei Gromyko, the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, and released.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust, aged 18, was an inexperienced pilot, with about 50 hours of flying experience at the time of his flight. On 13 May 1987, Rust left Uetersen near Hamburg and his home town Wedel in his rented Reims Cessna F172P, registration D-ECJB, which was modified by removing some of the seats and replacing them with auxiliary fuel tanks. He spent the next two weeks travelling across northern Europe, visiting the Faroe islands, spending a week in Iceland, and then visiting Bergen on his way back. He was later quoted as saying that he had the idea of attempting to reach Moscow even before the departure, and he saw the trip to Iceland (where he visited Hofdi House, the site of unsuccessful talks between the United States and the Soviet Union in October 1986) as a way to test his piloting skills.


title: Mathias Rust

text: On 28 May 1987, Rust refuelled at Helsinki-Malmi Airport. He told air traffic control that he was going to Stockholm, and took off at 12:21. Immediately after his final communication with traffic control, he turned his plane to the east near Nummela, Vihti. Air traffic controllers tried to contact him as he was moving around the busy Helsinki–Moscow route, but Rust turned off all his communications equipment.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust disappeared from the Finnish air traffic radar near Espoo. Control personnel presumed an emergency and a rescue effort was organized, including a Finnish Border Guard patrol boat. They found an oil patch near Sipoo where Rust had disappeared from radar observation, and conducted an underwater search but did not find anything.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust crossed the Baltic coastline over Estonia and turned towards Moscow. At 14:29 he appeared on Soviet Air Defence Forces (PVO) radar and, after failure to reply to an IFF signal, was assigned combat number 8255. Three SAM battalions of 54th Air Defence Corps tracked him for some time, but failed to obtain permission to launch missiles at him. All air defences were brought to readiness and two interceptors were sent to investigate. At 14:48, near Gdov, MiG-23 pilot Senior Lieutenant A. Puchnin observed a white sport plane similar to a Yakovlev Yak-12 and asked for permission to engage, but was denied.


title: Mathias Rust

text: The fighters lost contact with Rust soon after this. While they were being directed back to him, he disappeared from radar near Staraya Russa. West German magazine "Bunte" speculated that he might have landed there for some time, noting that he changed his clothes during his flight and that he took too much time to fly to Moscow considering his plane's speed and the weather conditions.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Air defence re-established contact with Rust's plane several times but confusion followed all of these events. The PVO system had shortly before been divided into several districts, which simplified management but created additional overhead for tracking officers at the districts' borders. The local air regiment near Pskov was on maneuvers and, due to inexperienced pilots' tendency to forget correct IFF designator settings, local control officers assigned all traffic in the area friendly status, including Rust.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Near Torzhok there was a similar situation, as increased air traffic was created by a rescue effort for an air crash the previous day. Rust, flying a slow propeller-driven aircraft, was confused with one of the helicopters taking part in the rescue. He was spotted several more times and given false friendly recognition twice. Rust was considered as a domestic training plane defying regulations, and was assigned the least priority by air defense.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Around 19:00, Rust appeared above Moscow. He had initially intended to land in the Kremlin, but he reasoned that landing inside, hidden by the Kremlin walls, would have allowed the KGB to arrest him and deny the incident. Therefore, he changed his landing spot to Red Square. Heavy pedestrian traffic did not allow him to land there either, so after circling about the square one more time, he was able to land on Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge by St. Basil's Cathedral. A later inquiry found that trolleybus wires normally strung over the bridge—which would have prevented his landing there—had been removed for maintenance that morning, and were replaced the next day. After taxiing past the cathedral, he stopped about from the square, where he was greeted by curious passersby and asked for autographs. When asked where he was from, he replied "Germany" making the bystanders think he was from East Germany; but when he said West Germany, they were surprised. A British doctor videotaped Rust circling over Red Square and landing on the bridge. Rust was arrested two hours later.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust's trial began in Moscow on 2 September 1987. He was sentenced to four years in a general-regime labour camp for hooliganism, for disregard of aviation laws, and for breaching the Soviet border. He was never transferred to a labour camp, and instead served his time at the high security Lefortovo temporary detention facility in Moscow. Two months later, Reagan and Gorbachev agreed to sign a treaty to eliminate intermediate-range nuclear weapons in Europe, and the Supreme Soviet ordered Rust to be released in August 1988 as a goodwill gesture to the West.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust's return to Germany on 3 August 1988 was accompanied by huge media attention, but he did not talk to the assembled journalists; his family had sold the exclusive rights to the story to the German magazine "Stern" for 100,000 DM. He reported that he had been treated well in the Soviet prison. Journalists described him as "psychologically unstable and unworldly in a dangerous manner".


title: Mathias Rust

text: William E. Odom, former director of the U.S. National Security Agency and author of "The Collapse of the Soviet Military", says that Rust's flight irreparably damaged the reputation of the Soviet military. This enabled Gorbachev to remove many of the strongest opponents to his reforms. Minister of Defence Sergei Sokolov and the head of the Soviet Air Defence Forces Alexander Koldunov were dismissed along with hundreds of other officers. This was the biggest turnover in the Soviet military since Stalin's purges 50 years earlier.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Rust's rented Reims Cessna F172P (serial #F17202087), registered "D-ECJB", was sold to Japan where it was exhibited for several years. In 2008 it was returned to Germany and was placed in the Deutsches Technikmuseum in Berlin.


title: Mathias Rust

text: Because Rust's flight seemed like a blow to the authority of the Soviet regime, it was the source of numerous jokes and urban legends. For a while after the incident, Red Square was jokingly referred to by Muscovites as Sheremetyevo-3 (Sheremetyevo-1 and -2 being the two terminals at Moscow's international airport). At the end of 1987, the police radio code used by law enforcement officers in Moscow was allegedly updated to include a code for an aircraft landing.


title: Mathias Rust

text: While doing his obligatory community service ("Zivildienst") in a West German hospital in 1989, Rust stabbed a female co-worker who had rejected him. The victim barely survived. He was convicted of injuring her and sentenced to two and a half years in prison, but was released after 15 months. Since then he has lived a fragmented life, describing himself as a "bit of an oddball". After being released from court, he converted to Hinduism in 1996 to become engaged to a daughter of an Indian tea merchant. In 2001, he was convicted of stealing a cashmere pullover and ordered to pay a fine of 10,000 DM, which was later reduced to 600 DM. A further brush with the law came in 2005, when he was convicted of fraud and had to pay a €1,500 fine. In 2009 Rust described himself as a professional poker player. Most recently, in 2012, he described himself as an analyst at a Zurich-based investment bank.


title: Mathias Rust

text: In October 2015, "The Hindu" published an interview with Rust to mark the 25th anniversary of German reunification. Rust opined that institutional failures in Western countries to preserve moral standards and uphold the primacy of democratic ideals were creating mistrust between peoples and governments. Pointing to the genesis of a New Cold War between Russia and the Western powers, Rust suggested that India should tread with caution and avoid entanglement: "India will be better served if it follows a policy of neutrality while interacting with EU member countries as the big European powers at present are following the foreign policy of the U.S. unquestioningly". He claimed: "Governments have been dominated by the corporate entities and citizens have ceased to matter in public policy".


title: Mathias Rust

text: Following the 20th anniversary of his flight on 28 May 2007, the international media interviewed Rust about the flight and its aftermath.


title: Mathias Rust

text: "The Washington Post" and "Bild" both have online editions of their interviews. The most comprehensive televised interview available online is produced by the Danish Broadcasting Corporation. In their interview "Rust in Red Square", recorded in May 2007, Rust gives a full account of the flight in English.


title: Pink Martini

text: Pink Martini is an American band that was founded in 1994 by pianist Thomas Lauderdale in Portland, Oregon. Group members call it a little orchestra that crosses several styles, such as classical, latin, traditional pop, and jazz. The co-lead vocalists of Pink Martini are China Forbes and Storm Large.


title: Pink Martini

text: Thomas Lauderdale has worked in politics since his years in high school in his hometown of Portland, Oregon. He considered the music at most fundraisers loud and boring. So as a remedy he founded the band Pink Martini in 1994, crossing genres such as classical, latin, traditional pop, and jazz to appeal to a broad audience. During the following year, he called China Forbes, one of his colleagues from Harvard University, and invited her to join the band. Their first single, "Sympathique", was released in 1997 and was nominated as "Song of the Year" at the "Victoires de la Musique Awards" in France.


title: Pink Martini

text: Forbes is monolingual but sings in 15 languages. "All of us in Pink Martini have studied different languages as well as different styles of music from different parts of the world", says Lauderdale. "So inevitably, our repertoire is wildly diverse. At one moment, you feel like you're in the middle of a samba parade in Rio de Janeiro, and in the next moment, you're in a French music hall of the 1930s or in a Palazzo in Napoli. It's a bit like an urban musical travelogue. We're very much an American band, but we spend a lot of time abroad and therefore have the incredible diplomatic opportunity to represent a broader, more inclusive America… the America which remains the most heterogeneously populated country in the world… composed of people of every country, every language, every religion". Featuring 10–12 musicians, Pink Martini performs its multilingual repertoire on concert stages and with symphony orchestras throughout the world.


title: Pink Martini

text: Pink Martini made its European debut at the Cannes Film Festival in 1997 and its orchestral debut in 1998 with the Oregon Symphony under the direction of Norman Leyden. Since then, the band has gone on to play with more than 50 orchestras around the world, including multiple engagements with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl, the Boston Pops, the National Symphony at the Kennedy Center, the San Francisco Symphony, and the BBC Concert Orchestra at Royal Albert Hall in London.


title: Pink Martini

text: Other appearances include the grand opening of the Los Angeles Philharmonic's Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall, with return sold-out engagements for New Year's Eve 2003, 2004, 2008 and 2011; two sold-out concerts at Carnegie Hall; the opening party of the remodeled Museum of Modern Art in New York City; the Governor's Ball at the 80th Annual Academy Awards in 2008; the opening of the 2008 Sydney Festival in Australia; two sold-out concerts at Paris' legendary L'Olympia Theatre in 2011; and Paris' fashion house Lanvin's 10-year anniversary celebration for designer Alber Elbaz in 2012. In its twentieth year, Pink Martini was inducted into both the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame and the Oregon Music Hall of Fame. Pink Martini performed with the Eugene Ballet in 2006 and 2018.


title: Pink Martini

text: On New Year's Eve 2005, Pink Martini performed live at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall in Portland, Oregon. This performance was aired live on National Public Radio's "Toast of the Nation", and in partnership with Oregon Public Broadcasting was recorded for a live DVD and later broadcast on US public broadcasting and French television. The DVD has been re-released to retail as "", featuring not only the full concert, but several vignettes and a short documentary of the band's history.


title: Pink Martini

text: On November 22, 2005, Pink Martini appeared on "Late Night with Conan O'Brien". On June 1, 2007, the band appeared on the long-running BBC Two "Later with Jools Holland" TV music program. On June 14, 2007, Pink Martini performed on "Late Show with David Letterman", performing "Hey Eugene".


title: Pink Martini

text: In December 2010 the band performed "We Three Kings" on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" and returned in December 2011 to perform "Santa Baby."


title: Pink Martini

text: In February 2011, China Forbes recorded a video greeting to the European Space Agency's Italian astronaut, Paolo Nespoli, and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Kaleri, on board the International Space Station. The astronauts were preparing to oversee the docking of ESA's Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) cargo vessel, Johannes Kepler, which took place at 17:08 CET on 24 February. The greeting was set to the soundtrack of "Dosvedanya Mio Bombino"—one of Pink Martini's signature songs—and was mixed with footage of the docking.


title: Pink Martini

text: Pink Martini's debut album "Sympathique" was released independently in 1997 on the band's own label, Heinz Records, and earned the group nominations for "Song of the Year" and "Best New Artist" in France's Victoires de la Musique Awards in 2000.


title: Pink Martini

text: Pink Martini released "Hang On Little Tomato" in 2004, "Hey Eugene!" in 2007 and "Splendor in the Grass" in 2009. In November 2010 the band released "Joy to the World", a festive, multi-denominational holiday album featuring songs from around the globe. "Joy to the World" received glowing reviews and was carried in Starbucks stores during the 2010 and 2011 holiday seasons. All five albums have gone gold in France, Canada, Greece, and Turkey and have sold well over 2.5 million copies worldwide.


title: Pink Martini

text: In Fall 2011, the band released two albums: "A Retrospective", a collection of the band's most beloved songs spanning their 17-year career, which includes eight previously unreleased tracks, and "1969", an album of collaborations with Japanese singer Saori Yuki. "1969" has been certified platinum in Japan, reaching No. 2 on the Japanese charts. On September 24, 2013 the band released their seventh studio album "Get Happy". On March 4, 2014, they released "Dream a Little Dream" with the von Trapps.


title: Pink Martini

text: In August 2014, Derek Rieth was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head in what was ruled a suicide. In his honor, the band established the Derek Rieth Foundation with the goal of "Empowering Youth Through Music and Dance".


title: Pink Martini

text: In 2016, Pink Martini released its 9th new studio album, "Je dis oui!", featuring three songs bandleader Thomas Lauderdale co-wrote for the film "Souvenir" starring Isabelle Huppert. The album's guest vocalists include Ari Shapiro, Rufus Wainwright, Kathleen Saadat, and Ikram Goldman.


title: Pink Martini

text: In 2018, the band released a "20th Anniversary Edition" of its seminal debut album "Sympathique". This version of the album features the band's popular arrangement of Ravel's "Bolero", which had to be removed from the original album, and was reinstated on the 20th Anniversary Edition after entering the public domain. Also in 2018, the band collected songs in French from across its catalogue and released them on a compilation entitled "Non Ouais! - The French Songs of Pink Martini".


title: Pink Martini

text: The band has performed with Jimmy Scott, Carol Channing, Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright, Jane Powell, Henri Salvador, Chavela Vargas, Joey Arias, Basil Twist, Georges Moustaki, Michael Feinstein, Gus Van Sant, Courtney Taylor Taylor of The Dandy Warhols, Norman Leyden, Hiroshi Wada, Alba Clemente, Johnny Dynell and Chi Chi Valenti, Ari Shapiro, Pepe Raphael of Pepe & the Bottle Blondes, the original cast of "Sesame Street", Lions of Batucada, Jorge Alabê, March Fourth Marching Band, the Bonita Vista High School Marching Band from Chula Vista, California, and the Pacific Youth Choir of Portland, Oregon.


title: Pink Martini

text: Pink Martini's songs appear in the films "In the Cut", "Nurse Betty", "Josie and the Pussycats", "Tortilla Soup", "Hitch", "Shanghai Kiss", "Mary and Max", and "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" and have been used on the television shows "Dead Like Me", "The Sopranos", "The West Wing", "Castle", "Sherlock", "Parks and Recreation", "Better Call Saul", and "Scream Queens". Their song "Una notte a Napoli" is an integral part of the Italian movie "Mine Vaganti" (2010) by Italian-Turkish director Ferzan Özpetek.


title: Pink Martini

text: Heinz Records is an independent record label that produces the band's albums. Named after Lauderdale's dog, Heinz Records is run by its members and is distributed by RED Distribution. Heinz Records is also the label for China Forbes, Storm Large, and The von Trapps.


title: Deng Lun

text: Deng Lun () also known as Allen Deng, is a Chinese film and television actor, born on October 21, 1992, in Shijiazhuang City, Hebei Province. He graduated from the Performance Department of Shanghai Theatre Academy. He made his acting debut in the romance drama "Flowers in Fog" (2013). He also starred in the TV series "Because of Meeting You" (2017) and "Ashes of Love" (2018). He currently holds the No. 1 spot on the top TV drama record for all the "Post-90s Generation" of actors. He is leading the 'top ratings in prime ratings' with "Because of Meeting You" (1.93%) and the 'most rating break 1%' with five dramas ("Because of Meeting You", "Sweet Dreams", "Ashes of Love", "My True Friend", and "Mr. Fighting"). He is the only "Post-90s Generation" actor that holds two male lead dramas in the Top 10 of China Central Television (CCTV). Within a year, he achieved the grand slam for the “Big 5” men's magazines in China with appearances in Harper's Bazaar Men, GQ, Elle Men, L’Officiel Hommes, and Esquire, another first for the “Post-90s Generation”.


title: Deng Lun

text: Deng Lun has been named as one of China’s most accomplished actors, who has garnered both popular and critical acclaim since his debut. He has worked with the brands like Bvlgari, L’Oreal, Ralph Lauren, Roger Vivier, and Bally. He is regarded as one of those rare combinations of "traffic and skill", as he can captivate the viewers to a show with his looks and popularity, but also has the skills to back it up. He was recognized by China Central Television (CCTV) for his outstanding performance in "Faith Makes Great: Tianhe" (2021).


title: Deng Lun

text: On March 15, 2022, Deng Lun was fined US$16.6 million for tax evasion. He subsequently apologised on his personal social media account, before his and his studio's social media accounts were later suspended and made unavailable.


title: Deng Lun

text: In 2012, Deng Lun was picked by Chiung Yao to star in the romance series "Flowers in Fog". Deng Lun played opposite Yang Zi (Bai Menghua) as Xu Hao. The drama aired in 2013, marking his debut.


title: Deng Lun

text: In 2014, Deng Lun was featured in the period drama "Moment in Peking". He played the female lead Yao Mulan's younger brother Yao Afei.


title: Deng Lun

text: In 2015, Deng Lun starred in the urban family comedy series "Dad to be Married", in which he played the ideal and aspiring big boy Su Da, watching over his half-sister and helping her find true love. He also co-starred with Sun Yi in the urban sitcom "Love Upper Lot", playing the role of Sun Xiaofei, a business administration graduate with a fair-looking, shy and unsociable character. In the same year, Deng Lun began filming for "Promise of Migratory Birds" and the historical mythical drama "Investiture of the Gods", his first historical drama. He also worked on two more drama projects, "Brotherhood in War" and "White Deer Plain".


title: Deng Lun

text: In 2016, Deng Lun co-starred with Zhang Ruoyun and Sun Yi in "Promise of Migratory Birds", an urban youth idol drama adapted from the novel of the same name, playing the second male lead Liu Qianren who is cold in appearance but warm in heart. Deng Lun also appeared in the urban drama "Super Cinderella", playing the female lead Du Qihua's younger brother, Du Qitian. In the same year, Deng Lun filmed the urban drama "Graduation Season" with Krystal Jung. He also began working on three more new TV series, "Because of Meeting You", "Princess Agents" and "Ode to Joy 2". On December 10, Deng Lun won the ‘Trending Young Actor of the Year’ award at the 10th Tencent Video Star Awards for his performance in "Promise of Migratory Birds".


title: Deng Lun

text: On March 2, the family series "Because of Meeting You" was premiered, with Deng Lun again starring with Sun Yi. The series’ ratings soared to No.1 throughout its broadcast, winning the national TV series concurrent viewership ratings with an average of 1.93% in 52 cities and an average of 3.26% on the national network, the highest ratings for a single episode exceeded 5%, and the number of online broadcasts surpassing the 7 billion mark. "Because of Meeting You" became the biggest dark horse of TV dramas in 2017. This drama set the record-ratings with an all-time series high.


title: Deng Lun

text: On April 16, broadcast began for the critically acclaimed period drama "White Deer Plain". Deng Lun gained recognition for his performance as the supporting role Lu Zhaohai, winning the Breakthrough Actor award at Weibo TV Drama Awards. He also won 2017’s Popular Artist award at the 6th iQIYI Scream Night Awards Ceremony. On May 11, the metropolitan romance series "Ode to Joy 2" began premiering. Deng Lun played Xie Tong, a rising musician in his early twenties opposite Qiao Xin. Deng Lun also contributed two singles to the series’ soundtrack. On June 5, the historical action drama "Princess Agents" was premiered, with Deng starring opposite Zhao Liying. With an average audience rating of 1.741% and a market share of 10.84%, the drama was ranked as the champion of weekly dramas in 2017–2018.


title: Deng Lun

text: Deng Lun continued working on new series. "Blossom in Heart"’s filming began in February, "Ashes of Love" in June, and "Sweet Dreams" in October.


title: Deng Lun

text: In March, Deng Lun participated in "Who's the Keyman", a 13-episode variety game show that challenged the players’ strength in deductive reasoning. Deng Lun went on to win the season's ‘Almighty Reasoning King’ title. He is widely known to excel in logical reasoning.


title: Deng Lun

text: In May, Deng Lun began filming for the TV series "My True Friend" alongside Angelababy. On June 25, the romance drama "Sweet Dreams" was premiered. Deng Lun starred as the male lead opposite Dilraba Dilmurat. The series’ concurrent viewership ratings ‘broke 1%’, with an average of 1.018% in 52 cities. Sweet Dreams was one of the Top 20 highest rated dramas in 2018. The series reached 6 billion views before the drama wrapped its run. His romance drama "Ashes of Love" began premiering from August 2 – September 4, with Deng co-starring with Yang Zi. Since the broadcast, the series’ ratings climbed to No.1, the concurrent viewership ratings of 52 Cities ‘broke 1.3%’, and the highest view count for a single day was 41,208,066 views on September 2. The series reached 100 million views in just 15 minutes after the broadcast of the first episode. "Ashes of Love" became 2018 summer vacation's national ratings champion.