Rendell Denounces Postponement of Eagles Game

Abstract: PHILADELPHIA — Whether rooting on the University of Pennsylvania basketball team or analyzing the Eagles on a weekly postgame television program, Gov. Edward G. Rendell has long been an outspoken Philadelphia sports fan. But Rendell was perhaps the most vocal, and prominent, opponent of the N.F.L.’s decision to postpone the Eagles’ game against the Minnesota Vikings until Tuesday before the blizzard struck the Northeast. He called it the “wussification of America.” Though Rendell’s view seemed sure to carry more weight than the game, the Eagles hurt their playoff position with an ugly 24-14 loss at Lincoln Financial Field. Their sloppy play meant they would be the third seed in the N.F.C., with no bye week. The loss also hurt the Giants’ chances of making the playoffs. The Bears clinched the No. 2 seed, and some key starters may sit or play sparingly against the Packers at Lambeau Field on Sunday. If the Packers win, the Giants will be eliminated from playoff contention. The timing of the postponement the game was as unexpected as the outcome. On Sunday morning, the league made the rare move to delay the game, citing public safety. But there was less snowfall than predicted, and nothing close to what fell on New York. “Had we made the decision at 6 o’clock and broadcast it at 6 o’clock, we would have seen that the blizzard that was forecast wasn’t happening,” Rendell said Tuesday in an interview in his Center City office. “We would have seen that it was O.K. to get there, and we would have played a football game that would have made memories for everyone that was there for the rest of their lives.” For the Vikings, the delay was the latest weather-related issue. The previous two weeks, the team played home games at Detroit’s Ford Field and the University of Minnesota’s outdoor stadium after the Metrodome’s roof collapsed under the weight of 17 inches of snow. Although the Vikings (6-9) had sat in a hotel since Saturday, the Eagles (10-5) looked as if they were taking their regularly scheduled day off Tuesday. In the first N.F.L. game on a Tuesday in 64 years, the Eagles accumulated 12 penalties and could not stop running back Adrian Peterson, who ran for 118 yards and a touchdown. Michael Vick was 25 of 43 for 263 yards and a touchdown but was sacked six times, lost two fumbles and threw an interception, looking uncharacteristically pedestrian. “No excuses,” Eagles Coach Andy Reid said. “They played better than we did, flat out. All phases. Every phase wasn’t right. Penalties. Missed assignments.” The good news at the Linc, though tempered by the result, was that there was hardly a hint of a blizzard. The Eagles said 615 workers spent 47 hours preparing the stadium and shoveling it clean, removing 2.63 million pounds of snow in 1,300 truckloads. As much as 18 inches had been expected at the stadium, but there was only 12. “I think it was better than expected,” Don Smolenski, the Eagles’ chief operating officer, said at halftime. “Me and the crew slept here Christmas night and Sunday night and went home Monday night to shovel our own driveways.” Rendell watched the game Tuesday from his seats on the 50-yard line. In his mind, the notion of canceling a football game because of the threat of snow was emblematic of some of the things he sees in society, hence the “wussification” sentiment. “This country was born on risk,” Rendell said. “We grew into the greatest nation in the world because we were bold; we had courage; we had a sense of adventure; we had a willingness to go forward and get things done. It seems like we lost that pioneer spirit that made this a special place.” Rendell said his opinion, which he initially expressed Monday in a radio interview, came up while he was walking along slushy Broad Street and in line at the food court at his office. His office fielded inquires from international news media outlets, and at his desk Tuesday, he pulled out his cellphone and read text messages from amused friends. On the Eagles, Rendell griped about how they now had less time to recover before facing the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday, made even more painful by the loss. Still, when asked for his prediction, Rendell confidently projected the Eagles to play the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl . Then Rendell, a fan so ardent he refers to the Eagles inclusively, made perhaps his most controversial statement of the week. “I don’t know if we can outscore the Patriots,” Rendell said. “If we need 31 points, Vick will get us 31 points. If we need 35 points, he’ll get us 35 points. But I’m not sure he can get us 50.”

Minnesota Vikings
Football
Philadelphia Eagles
Snow and Snowstorms


De Blasio and Developer Are Close, but Not on Lower-Cost Housing

Abstract: Unlike many of his more wary real estate brethren, Rob Speyer moved quickly to build a strong relationship with New York’s liberal mayor, Bill de Blasio , after his election in 2013. The relationship flowered, and Mr. Speyer, whose company owns Rockefeller Center and operates on four continents, was a host at Mayor de Blasio’s birthday party at Gracie Mansion last May. At a real estate gathering five months later, Mr. de Blasio singled out Mr. Speyer, telling the 6,200 attendees that the developer was “tremendously civically oriented.” While enjoying a close relationship, however, the two men do not seem to be on the same page when it comes to the pressing need for affordable housing in a city where rents are soaring beyond the grasp of the poor and middle class. Mr. Speyer is racing to start work on an $875 million residential complex with three high-rises and nearly 1,800 apartments in Long Island City, Queens, a neighborhood a short subway ride from Manhattan. He must begin the foundations by June 15 to qualify for a 15-year tax abatement worth about $200 million under a tax program known as 421-a that is intended to stimulate construction and generate affordable housing. After mid-June, the program expires or could be renewed with regulations requiring developers to include a higher concentration of affordable housing. But under current rules, Mr. Speyer is one of six developers eligible for the subsidy without having to build a single low-cost unit, because of where their projects are. None of the other projects, though, is as big as Mr. Speyer’s. If Mr. Speyer’s project, on Jackson Avenue near Queens Plaza, were in Manhattan or along stretches of the East River waterfront in Brooklyn and Queens, he would have to set aside 20 percent of the units for poor and moderate-income tenants. “It’s a huge missed opportunity to create affordable housing,” said Benjamin Dulchin, executive director of the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development , an advocacy group. “They’re getting an extra tax break for free. It’s unfortunate that the city hasn’t explored whatever leverage it has to get a public benefit.” Mr. de Blasio has made the creation of 80,000 units of affordable housing a hallmark of his administration and has repeatedly said that developers must build low-cost apartments if they expect any help from the city. Mr. Speyer, the chief executive of Tishman Speyer Properties , declined to comment, but Stephen Rubenstein, a spokesman for the developer, said the company was turning a largely vacant site into a vibrant neighborhood. “We believe this project will greatly add to the Long Island City community,” he said. No one is suggesting that Mr. Speyer is doing anything underhanded or illegal, and city officials say they have little leverage because he needs no public approvals or reviews. Mr. Speyer, one official suggested, is doing what developers do: making as much money as they can. Mr. de Blasio declined to comment, but Deputy Mayor Alicia Glen expressed disappointment over the situation. “This isn’t our vision for the city,” she said. “This is, in fact, a great example of why we need to change the status quo. In many ways, it’s the most overt example of the need to think through the public benefits we get when the city and the state offer tax breaks.” At least 30 developers, including major builders such as Bruce C. Ratner, Gary Barnett and Stephen M. Ross, are trying to meet the June 15 deadline to qualify for the tax abatement, though many of them would have to set aside 20 percent of their units and make them affordable to certain renters. Housing advocates consider the 421-a program a boondoggle that gives generous tax breaks to developers and apartment owners for too little in return. The Real Estate Board of New York, the lobbying arm for the industry, says the program is necessary because New York has the country’s highest construction and land costs and taxes. Image Rob Speyer, right, and Mayor Bill de Blasio at the 2015 gala of the Real Estate Board of New York, which Mr. Speyer heads. Credit Vince Collura/Gotham Photo Company The program will end in June, unless it is renewed by the State Legislature, and the de Blasio administration has been meeting with developers, including Mr. Speyer, as chairman of the Real Estate Board, and housing advocates over plans to extend and overhaul the 44-year-old program. The mayor has yet to reveal his intentions, but according to officials and real estate executives, the de Blasio administration would provide generous tax abatements only to developers who include a substantial block of affordable apartments in their projects. “We are committed to supporting his mission of growing affordable housing,” Mr. Rubenstein said of the mayor, adding that Tishman Speyer was working on a number of potential projects that would include “significant affordable housing components.” Mr. Speyer and his father, Jerry I. Speyer, the company chairman, are known in New York as civic leaders, art collectors and, mostly, commercial developers with a portfolio that includes the Chrysler and MetLife Buildings. The Long Island City project would be the company’s first move into residential development in New York since 2010, when it lost control of Manhattan’s largest apartment complex, Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village. Rob Speyer’s job as chairman of the Real Estate Board necessarily involves cultivating relationships with the mayor, the governor and lawmakers, all of whom govern land use, property taxes and subsidy programs for developers. Mr. de Blasio reappointed Mr. Speyer chairman of the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City, the same position he held under Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. Mr. Speyer was also co-chairman of a benefit for the Gracie Mansion Conservancy and was among the 10 co-chairmen of the host committee for the administration’s unsuccessful bid to bring the 2016 Democratic National Convention to Brooklyn. But the relationship between the two men strengthened last March, according to executives who know them, after Mr. Speyer and the Real Estate Board quickly offered 40 apartments for tenants displaced from their East Harlem homes after a gas explosion leveled two buildings . As a result, the mayor was able to announce an ambitious recovery plan two days after the explosion. The Speyers have owned land for over 10 years in Long Island City, a once-industrial neighborhood where the real-estate boom arrived only recently, despite the efforts of several mayors. There are nearly 4,000 apartments under construction or in the planning stages, with an additional 11,527 units on the way in nearby Hunters Point, said Nancy Packes, a real estate consultant. Tishman Speyer plans to erect three towers on its Long Island City site, ranging from 33 to 53 stories, with a total of 1,789 apartments. Tishman Speyer is also negotiating to buy air rights from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority for $9 million, which would enable the company to build an additional 75 apartments. “We’ve had a huge population influx,” said Pat O’Brien, chairman of Community Board 2, which covers the area. “The infrastructure has yet to catch up. If all these things get built, we could wind up with 25 pounds of people in a five pound bag.” Though city officials say they cannot compel Tishman Speyer to build affordable housing, critics say they do have some sway because of an agreement that the city and the developer have at a nearby site across Jackson Avenue where Tishman Speyer built an office building, 2 Gotham Center, for the city’s health department. Tishman Speyer was supposed to begin a second office tower there by January 2011, and has been paying an annual $1 million penalty for failure to do so. The developer met recently with city officials to discuss incorporating far more profitable apartments, along with affordable units, into the office proposal. Housing advocates said the city could allow Tishman Speyer to do so, but only if the developer included affordable units in its plan for the three towers. Ms. Glen, the deputy mayor, said, “No decisions have been made yet.”

Housing
Real Estate
Rob Speyer
Bill de Blasio
Affordable housing
Tishman Speyer
NYC
Long Island City Queens


Visuals

Abstract: This collection of columns takes a look behind the numbers to show hidden trends and relationships over a range of science and health topics from education to road safety to agriculture. YOU THINK THAT HELMET WILL SAVE YOU? IT WILL. Fewer people are dying in vehicle accidents compared with recent decades. Federal safety officals credit less driving during the economic slowdown and the enforcement of better safety standards. But through the same years, motorcycle deaths were climbing. Some of the increase was linked to more registrations, but more bikers didn’t account for all of it. (Published: April 1, 2014) Fewer Helmets, More Deaths More states are being pressured to repeal their universal motorcycle helmet laws. But when those laws are changed, the number of fatalities starts to rise immediately. ARE YOU AS SMART AS A HIGH SCHOOLER? High school students are taking more advanced science and math courses than ever, and graduating with many more science credits that could pave the way to careers in science and technology. We invited high school teachers and other educators to send us their favorite questions. Try taking a short quiz and see how well you match up. (Published: Sept. 2, 2013) The High School Challenge We invited high school teachers and other educators to send us their favorite science questions. Take a short quiz and see how well you match up. THE EFFECTS OF DRIVING DRUNK WHILE YOUNG The National Transportation Safety Board recently recommended that states lower the current blood-alcohol limit of 0.08 percent to 0.05 percent. Fatal accidents involving drivers who have been drinking — even those with low blood-alcohol levels — vary sharply depending on a driver’s age and the time of day. (Published: May 27, 2013) For Young Drivers, Drinking Is More Dangerous Fatal accidents involving drivers who have been drinking vary sharply depending on a driver’s age and the time of day. THE DISEASES OF AGE, AND THE OVERLAP BETWEEN THEM Alzheimer’s disease, high blood pressure and heart disease are the three most common chronic conditions in assisted living facilities: 82 percent of residents have at least one of them, according to a new government study. But what is alarming is how these ailments overlap. A Venn diagram based on data from the study, by the National Center for Health Statistics in 2010, shows just how often these three conditions coincide in patients, and why this overlap is becoming an important new field of study. (Published: April 16, 2013) For the Elderly, Diseases That Overlap Most residents in assisted-living centers suffer from multiple ailments. GIRLS AND SCIENCE EXAMS ACROSS THE GLOBE For years — and especially since 2005, when Lawrence H. Summers, then president of Harvard, made his notorious comments about women’s aptitude — researchers have been searching for ways to explain why there are so many more men than women in the top ranks of science. Now comes an intriguing clue, in the form of a test given in 65 developed countries by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. It finds that among a representative sample of 15-year-olds around the world, girls generally outperform boys in science — but not in the United States. (Published: Feb. 4, 2013) Girls Lead in Science Exam, but Not in the United States Girls outperformed boys in more countries in a science test given to 15-year-old students in 65 countries — but in the United States, the scores reverse. THE START-STOP SPEED OF SAFETY Americans drive a staggering number of miles — close to three trillion every year, according to the government. (That is half a light-year, or 120 million trips around the world.) And although traffic accidents remain a major public safety problem, the biggest killer of people ages 5 to 34, vehicle travel is far safer than it was a few decades ago. Several factors appear to account for the sharp decline in fatalities. (Published: Sept. 17, 2012) Driving Safety, in Fits and Starts Auto fatalities have been falling for decades, but in a very interesting plateau-drop pattern. A LOOK AT DROUGHT, CROP BY CROP This summer’s heat and rainlessness, which rivals the devastating 1988 drought, has left crops withering in the fields and farmers trying to calculate their losses. An analysis by The New York Times looks at the widely varying effects of this summer’s heat and drought on crops critical to the nation’s farm economy. (Published: Aug. 24, 2012) Drought Extends, Crops Wither An analysis by The New York Times looks at the widely varying effects of this summer’s heat and drought on crops critical to the nation’s farm economy.

Agriculture
Automobile safety
Alzheimer's
Old age,elderly,senior citizens
Roads and Traffic
Accidents and Safety


Girl, 6, Is Strangled as Playful Dog Pulls Scarf on L.I.

Abstract: In a bizarre accident, a 6-year-old girl was strangled Tuesday in her backyard on Long Island, when the family dog tugged on her scarf while they played behind the house in Manorville, the Suffolk County police said yesterday. The girl, Kaitlyn Hassard, had just arrived home from school around 4:30 p.m. when the dog, an 18-month-old female golden retriever named Jessy, greeted her inside the house by tugging on her scarf, the police said. Kaitlyn's mother, Korey Hassard, put the dog in the backyard and told Kaitlyn, her 9-year-old sister and 11-year-old brother to get ready to help her run an errand. About 10 minutes later, after Mrs. Hassard answered a phone call, the brother went out in the yard to look for Kaitlyn and found her unconscious, the police said. The police said it was clear that the 70-pound dog had grabbed the scarf in its mouth and dragged Kaitlyn, who weighed about 40 pounds, a short distance, tightening the scarf around her neck. She was pronounced dead of asphyxiation at Brookhaven Memorial Hospital, the police said. Detective Lt. Jack Fitzpatrick said no bite marks or scrapes were found on the girl. "It looks like the dog was just playing tug of war with the child's scarf," he said, calling the death "a very tragic story." James Talamini, a friend who spoke on behalf of the family, said: "The dog pulled on her scarf and she was asphyxiated. It was a complete accident." He said the Hassards were "coping as best they can under the circumstances." The Hassards live in a relatively new Suffolk County subdivision of well-kept homes, with S.U.V.'s in driveways and picket fences closing in spacious backyards. Mr. Talamini said the family got Jessy about a year ago and had never had any problems with her playing too roughly with the children. He said Kaitlyn had just turned 6 last Saturday. "She was a bright, smart, energetic, beautiful 6-year-old," he said. The dog was taken to the Brookhaven Animal Shelter. Town officials said that family members had decided they did not want the dog back in their home, but had not requested that it be destroyed. "The animal is gentle and is showing no signs of aggression at the shelter," said Mark Grossman, a deputy supervisor for the Town of Brookhaven. He said the shelter had already received dozens of calls from people asking to adopt the dog. An adoption seems likely, he said. Roy Gross, chief of the Suffolk County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said that golden retrievers were generally not aggressive dogs. "But they can be very playful, and I would guess that the dog didn't mean to harm the girl in any way," he said. "There was probably a one-in-a-million chance for something like this to happen." He said that golden retrievers were so gentle and affectionate that the society used them as therapy dogs, taking them to nursing homes and hospitals to cheer patients up. Janet Leek, a board member of the Long Island Golden Retriever Club and a dog breeder, said the average weight for an adult female golden retriever was about 65 pounds. She said that dogs younger than 2 years could be rambunctious. "If I have puppies to sell, I usually will tell people to wait until their children are at least 6 years old," she said. "Because they are a retrieving breed and they might take the kids' toys or take a child's arm in their mouths, just playing with them."

DOGS
BROOKHAVEN ANIMAL SHELTER
LONG ISLAND (NY)
FITZPATRICK JACK
HASSARD KAITLYN
ACCIDENTS AND SAFETY
CHILDREN AND YOUTH


A Clash Over a Piece of Moroccan Tranquillity

Abstract: ASILAH, Morocco — A few kilometers south of Tangier, near the port town of Asilah, lies the wide golden beach of Sidi Mghait. It is a peaceful place, overlooked by the simple farmhouse of a peasant family, a luxurious modern villa built by a wealthy European businessman, and a small mosque, the burial place of a Muslim holy man who gave the place its name. Appearances here are deceptive. The beach and its hinterland are the focus of a 10-year clash over land, rights and cultures that has been chronicled in a documentary, “Hercule Contre Hermès,” by Mohamed Ulad, a French film director and producer who was born in Morocco. The film, 72 minutes long and shot over three years, lingers over the rhythms of a pastoral life: water drawn by hand from the farmhouse well; a field tilled by a wooden donkey plough; fish netted, gutted and grilled over a fire; bread baked in a wood-fired clay oven; tourists playing in the surf or eating in a reed-covered restaurant shack that the family builds and runs every summer on the beach. There is the wedding of the farmer’s oldest daughter, and a trip by his oldest son to see a girlfriend in Spain and to visit his married sister in Brussels. But the film also shows a way of life under threat from development: Former neighbors gather at the mosque, grumbling that they have been cajoled, pressured or tricked into selling their land; a track to the beach is churned into mud by earth-moving vehicles; beach dunes are bulldozed and rolled flat; the farmer’s wife, summoned by the police, must answer a complaint about land access, one of many, filed by her wealthy neighbor; the family’s lawyer argues over payment, then refuses further assistance. The protagonist of Mr. Ulad’s film is Mohamed El Mektiri, known to his friends as Hercules because of his physical strength. He is the oldest of eight children of Mrait El Mektiri, a farmer. “If he hits someone with his big hands, he could kill,” a local taxi driver said, describing how Mohamed, who has become famous in the neighborhood for protecting his family in adversity, came by his nickname. Mr. Mektiri’s adversary, omnipresent but unseen in the documentary, is Patrick Guerrand-Hermès, a sports entrepreneur, real estate developer and former president of the International Polo Federation who, since arriving in Sidi Mghait over 10 years ago, has acquired, parcel by parcel, all the land surrounding the Mektiri farm. Mr. Guerrand is a grandson and heir of Émile-Maurice Hermès, who headed the Paris fashion house Hermès for decades until his death in 1951. Mr. Guerrand’s mother, a Hermès, married Jean-René Guerrand, and several of her children added Hermès to their name. Mr. Guerrand met with Mr. Ulad last year in Paris and gave his conditional agreement to participate in the film but later changed his mind, saying that the film was exploiting the Hermès name for commercial purposes, Mr. Ulad said in an interview. “I thought he was a very charming man,” Mr. Ulad recalled. “He insisted on talking to me about the charity he was doing in the region. But he refused to comment on what he is accused of.” In the film, and in separate interviews, critics of Mr. Guerrand accuse him of running an electric power line across a neighbor’s property without his consent, taking sand from a public beach to build a polo field, and misappropriating communal water resources. For example, Mr. Guerrand “took sand from one part of the beach that belongs to the state and used it to build his polo field,” Rachid Chebihi, the provincial director of the High Commission for Water and Forests in Tangier, said in an interview, adding that court proceedings over the matter had been pending since early this year. Mr. Guerrand met with a reporter to discuss this article but declined to make any comment on the record. In a subsequent e-mail, however, he described Mr. Ulad’s film as a “documentary (or fiction?),” dealing with a “non-event.” The documentary was broadcast on the Moroccan television channel 2M on Oct. 14 after a court rejected a bid by Mr. Guerrand to block it — the last move in a battle of lawsuits and countersuits that accompanied the making of the film. It has also been optioned by the French and German network Arte, and Al Jazeera. Dates for showings have not been set. Mr. Ulad said he had made the film to explore how state power, through the law and the police, allied itself with wealth and privilege rather than with the idea of protecting ordinary people. The filmmaker, who is the partner of Mazarine Pingeot — the daughter of François Mitterrand, the late French president — lives in Paris. He was born in Asilah and returns there every summer for vacation with family and friends. For years, he said, one of the rituals of summer life had been to eat at the Mektiri family’s beach restaurant at Sidi Mghait. “One summer, Hercules wasn’t around,” he said, using Mr. Mektiri’s nickname. “When I asked, people told me he was in jail.” It was 2008: According to the family, police officers had come to the farm saying they were investigating a complaint by the family’s wealthy neighbor, and ransacked the property. “They destroyed my oven,” the farmer’s wife, Rachida Mektiri, says in the documentary. “They destroyed the stables. They threw everything out.” When Mr. Mektiri defended his mother, who challenged the search, they were arrested. They were sentenced to six months and two months in prison, respectively, for assaulting an officer. It was this, and the way the family was treated even by its own lawyer, Mr. Ulad said, that led him to make the film. “My father had a physically damaging accident when I was younger and his lawyer betrayed him and allowed the other party to get away without paying anything,” he said. “Since, I have been obsessed with the question of injustice.” Speaking of Mr. Mektiri, he said: “I see myself in him a lot. We come from the same place, and we both have strong-willed, imposing mothers. Then, when all the legal problems started with the movie, I felt like I was going through the same thing the family was going through.” Of Mr. Guerrand’s unseen presence in the film, he said: “Hermès as a person, whatever his behavior, never interested me. I think he is revealing of many dysfunctions and is a mirror of the way the Moroccan administration works.” “There are many dimensions to this story,” he added. “What I expect from European investors is to help us get out of a corrupt system, not use it for their own business interests.” For now, the legal jousting has ended: The Mektiri family remains on its land, and means to stay there. Selling and moving away has never been an option, Mrs. Mektiri said in an interview. “My children were born here,” she said. “They earn a living here. Why would I ever want to move to the city? The money from selling won’t last forever and the family will fall apart. I will never sell.”

Morocco
Documentary Films and Programs
France
Hermes International SA


Israel to Display the Dead Sea Scrolls on the Internet

Abstract: JERUSALEM — In a crowded laboratory painted in gray and cooled like a cave, half a dozen specialists embarked this week on a historic undertaking: digitally photographing every one of the thousands of fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls with the aim of making the entire file — among the most sought-after and examined documents on earth — available to all on the Internet. Equipped with high-powered cameras with resolution and clarity many times greater than those of conventional models, and with lights that emit neither heat nor ultraviolet rays, the scientists and technicians are uncovering previously illegible sections and letters of the scrolls, discoveries that could have significant scholarly impact. The 2,000-year-old scrolls, found in the late 1940s in caves near the Dead Sea east of Jerusalem, contain the earliest known copies of every book of the Hebrew Bible (missing only the Book of Esther), as well as apocryphal texts and descriptions of rituals of a Jewish sect at the time of Jesus. The texts, most of them on parchment but some on papyrus, date from the third century B.C. to the first century A.D. Only a handful of the scrolls exist in large pieces, with several on permanent exhibit at the Israel Museum here in its dimly lighted Shrine of the Book. Most of what was found is separated into 15,000 fragments that make up about 900 documents, fueling a longstanding debate on how to order the fragments as well as the origin and meaning of what is written on them. The scrolls’ contemporary history has been something of a tortured one because they are among the most important sources of information on Jewish and early Christian life. After their initial discovery they were tightly held by a small circle of scholars. In the last 20 years access has improved significantly, and in 2001 they were published in their entirety. But debate over them seems only to grow. Scholars continually ask the Israel Antiquities Authority , the custodian of the scrolls, for access to them, and museums around the world seek to display them. Next month, the Jewish Museum of New York will begin an exhibition of six of the scrolls. The keepers of the scrolls, people like Pnina Shor, head of the conservation department of the antiquities authority, are delighted by the intense interest but say that each time a scroll is exposed to light, humidity and heat, it deteriorates. She says even without such exposure there is deterioration because of the ink used on some of the scrolls as well as the residue from the Scotch tape used by the 1950s scholars in piecing together fragments. The entire collection was photographed only once before — in the 1950s using infrared — and those photographs are stored in a climate-controlled room because they show things already lost from some of the scrolls. The old infrared pictures will also be scanned in the new digital effort. “The project began as a conservation necessity,” Ms. Shor explained. “We wanted to monitor the deterioration of the scrolls and realized we needed to take precise photographs to watch the process. That’s when we decided to do a comprehensive set of photos, both in color and infrared, to monitor selectively what is happening. We realized then that we could make the entire set of pictures available online to everyone, meaning that anyone will be able to see the scrolls in the kind of detail that no one has until now.” The process will probably take one to two years — more before it is available online — and is being led by Greg Bearman, who retired from the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Data collection is directed by Simon Tanner of Kings College London. Jonathan Ben-Dov, a professor of biblical studies at the University of Haifa, is taking part in the digitalization project. Watching the technicians gingerly move a fragment into place for a photograph, he said that it had long been very difficult for senior scholars to get access. Once this project is completed, he said with wonder, “every undergraduate will be able to have a detailed look at them from numerous angles.”

Israel
Dead Sea Scrolls
Israel Museum
Museums
Jewish Museum
Computers and the Internet
Jerusalem (Israel)


The Continuing Education of Patrick Vieira

Abstract: PURCHASE, N.Y. — Patrick Vieira, once a master of angles on the soccer field, deflected a barrage of second-guesses as he stood on the sideline after practice Wednesday. One reporter asked, Why had Vieira, New York City F.C.’s rookie coach, switched goalkeepers for the Major League Soccer playoffs? Another: Why had he not started the experienced midfielder Frank Lampard? Why did he pull his top scorer, David Villa, with the score tied? Why was Villa, a 23-goal scorer this season, taking corner kicks instead of stationing himself in front of the net to finish them? Vieira smiled through the inquisition, declining to host a symposium on either his lineup or his tactics. “If you lose, everything is wrong,” Vieira said later, in his office on the SUNY Purchase College campus, where his team trains. “Your decision is wrong. The way you want to play is wrong. Everything is wrong. Image In a surprising move, the experienced midfielder Frank Lampard, right, pictured vying with Toronto forward Sebastian Giovinco for a ball, did not start last Sunday’s playoff game. Credit Dan Hamilton/USA Today Sports, via Reuters “People only remember the last game. And my job is not to do the same thing as the people.” Vieira was on a hot, uncomfortable seat this past week after New York City F.C. lost last Sunday at Toronto, 2-0, in the first leg of its M.L.S. conference semifinal series. The defeat means his team faces a daunting task in the return leg Sunday at Yankee Stadium: It needs to win by at least two goals in the home-and-home, total-goals series. Giving up even a single away goal to Toronto in regulation might well prove fatal, too, because N.Y.C.F.C. would then require four to advance . If elimination is the club’s fate, it will be a great disappointment to the second-year team and to Vieira, its first-year coach. Vieira, 40, had been a bold/curious/intriguing pick to coach N.Y.C.F.C. last winter. While he was a respected, pedigreed player who had won the World Cup with France and three Premier League titles with Arsenal, he had never coached a professional first team. His only coaching experience, in fact, had been a few seasons with Manchester City’s reserve team. Yet suddenly he was leading a high-profile franchise in a league with a reputation for byzantine roster and salary rules and a track record of burning through foreign coaches who could not adapt to them. Still, after a 7-0 defeat in May that at least one of his stars described as “ a disaster ,” Vieira’s first season has been largely successful. N.Y.C.F.C. finished second behind the Red Bulls in the Eastern Conference to earn its first playoff berth, and it became far more adept on the attack. Villa finished second in league scoring with 23 goals, Lampard added a dozen more and the young forward Jack Harrison made a strong case to be named the M.L.S. rookie of the year. Vieira’s team still sputters and clunks occasionally on defense — on set pieces in particular, and as it did by yielding both goals during the final 10 minutes in Toronto. (N.Y.C.F.C. gave up 57 goals in 34 matches this season, just one fewer than it allowed in 2015, when the club finished eighth.) Still, after watching the game film from last weekend three times, Vieira stood by each of his decisions against Toronto, and he refused to place a disproportionate share of the blame on his frequently leaky back line. “When we talk about goals, we always talk about the personnel in the back, but that’s not the problem,” he said. “The problem is the collective, the protection for the back four, the work from the people up front. We score a lot of goals by building up from the back, creating more space for the strikers. For the defending side, if we do our work in front of the back four, it would be more easy for them. “As a team, we didn’t defend well. We have to improve for next year.” For now, Vieira is still concerned with this year, and with figuring out his lineup for Sunday based on experience, health and form. His decisions in the first leg were surprising. He started goalkeeper Eirik Johansen over the veteran Josh Saunders, who had played in 33 games. Despite electing to rest midfielder Andrea Pirlo (calf), he chose not to start Lampard, who insisted he had been “raring to go” for more than a week after a recent injury of his own. Vieira also removed Villa in the 78th minute while the game was scoreless. A published report Monday said “livid” players had held a gripe session over Vieira’s decisions, but players and team officials vehemently denied such an event had taken place. “It’s nonsense, been made up,” Lampard said. “Any discord is because we lost.” Lampard, however, did hint that he would like to see the team’s three highest-paid stars — himself, Pirlo and Villa — back on the field together Sunday. “In big games, big players more often than not will make the difference,” he said. And even as a first-year coach, Vieira is smart enough to understand how his celebrated stars might find it hard to accept a lesser role. He, too, carried a celebrated, championship-winning résumé to the final stops of his playing days. He recalled being benched by José Mourinho at Inter Milan and by Roberto Mancini at Manchester City near the end of his career. “I wasn’t playing and it was difficult, really hard,” Vieira said. “As a player, you always think that you’re the best. It’s even more difficult for big players who never used to be on the bench. I don’t expect them to agree with my decision. But I expect them to respect my decision.” He added: “I never complained. I never disrespected the manager or any of my teammates. I never started any sort of negativity around the team. I have to deal with it, because it’s a professional world. The manager can’t please everybody, and the manager is not there to please one or two players. And sometimes, the manager gets it wrong, or he gets it right. But it’s a decision.”

Patrick Vieira
Soccer
New York City Football Club Soccer Team
MLS


Finnish Opposition Wins Vote

Abstract: HELSINKI — The opposition Center Party has won Finland’s parliamentary election, but its leader faces tough talks on forming a government after the success of a populist, anti-establishment party that has refused to join such talks in the past. That party, the Finns Party, won more seats than each of the main partners of the current governing coalition, the conservatives and Social Democrats. Juha Sipila, the leader of the Center Party, said he would approach the leaders of the three parties on Monday. “Finding trust between the future government parties is the most important factor,” said Mr. Sipila, whose center-right party traditionally represents farmers and landowners. Mr. Sipila, a self-effacing millionaire businessman who entered politics four years ago, warned that Finland, in the midst of a three-year recession, was in a “difficult” situation. “It will take 10 years to get Finland back into shape,” Mr. Sipila told reporters. Prime Minister Alexander Stubb had campaigned on economic issues and acknowledged that his government had not made sufficient changes. He has also advocated spending cuts of 6 billion euros ($6.5 billion) over the next four years, a proposal strongly opposed by Mr. Sipila, who says half the amount would suffice. The leader of the Finns Party, Timo Soini, who has vehemently opposed bailouts for ailing eurozone members and advocates kicking Greece out of the zone, dropped out of government formation talks in 2011 because the other parties supported bailouts. Mr. Soini declined to discuss whether his party would take part in future government talks.

Center Party
Finland
Election
Juha Sipila
Economy
Legislature


Copley Weighs Sale of 7 of Its Newspapers

Abstract: SAN DIEGO, Oct. 31 (AP) — The Copley Press, parent company of The San Diego Union-Tribune, said Tuesday that it was exploring possible sales, mergers or other alternatives for its seven newspapers in Ohio and Illinois. Copley’s Illinois newspapers are published in Springfield, Lincoln, Peoria and Galesburg. In Ohio, the company’s newspapers are in Canton, Massillon and Dover/New Philadelphia. Copley is a privately held company based in La Jolla, Calif., where it publishes The Union-Tribune, which it will retain. “The newspaper business has been very good to my family and me for over a century,” the chief executive, David C. Copley, said in a statement. “The flagship remains San Diego and the moves we are announcing secure our ability to keep The San Diego Union-Tribune as an independent, locally owned newspaper for many years into the future.”

Newspapers
Copley Press
San Diego Union-Tribune
Ohio
Illinois


Top Conferences to Allow Aid for Athletes’ Full Bills

Abstract: OXON HILL, Md. — In a milestone, the five most prominent conferences in college sports voted on Saturday to increase their scholarships to cover athletes’ full cost of attendance, which is typically several thousand dollars more than colleges currently provide. The vote was 79-1, with the sole opposing vote coming from Boston College, a member of the Atlantic Coast Conference. “This legislation further segregates student-athletes from the general student population by increasing aid without need-based consideration,” Chris Cameron, Boston College’s associate director of athletics, said in a statement. The conferences, acting for the first time under autonomy they were granted by the N.C.A.A. last August, also passed a concussion safety policy, prohibited colleges from withdrawing athletic scholarships for solely athletic reasons and granted athletes the ability to borrow against future earnings to buy loss-of-value insurance, which reimburses athletes if playing in college ends up harming their future earning power in professional sports. The resolutions are binding on the 65 colleges in the so-called Big 5, which include the Atlantic Coast, the Big Ten, the Big 12, the Pacific-12 and the Southeastern conferences. The 27 other Division I conferences — or the nearly 300 other Division I colleges themselves, if they receive their conferences’ permission — may adopt the measures if they choose. Cost of attendance in particular was seen as a foregone conclusion after the autonomy vote last year. Gene Block, U.C.L.A.’s chancellor and an N.C.A.A. board member, said, “The slate of reforms starts us down a path that strikes the right balance between providing better support for scholarship athletes and provisions that ensure academics come first.” Jim Delany, the Big Ten’s commissioner, added: “We got what we wanted. It was great to have five conferences singing off the same sheet of music.” As much as the substance of the resolutions marked a new era for top-tier collegiate athletics, also notable was the conferences’ ability to set policies for themselves, by themselves, although still under the N.C.A.A. rubric. Greg Sankey, executive associate commissioner of the SEC, said, “This was a really important day in the N.C.A.A.’s journey, and a significant step.” The legislative session Saturday afternoon at the annual N.C.A.A. convention in Oxon Hill, just south of Washington, was led by Nathan Hatch, the president of Wake Forest, who was instrumental in crafting the autonomy structure for the five conferences. Mark Emmert, the N.C.A.A.’s president, was on the dais before the voting, but he hardly spoke and was not available for comment afterward. “This is in many ways a historic gathering,” Emmert said in his brief opening statement. “The change in governing was something I was delighted to see.” Saturday was also the first instance in the N.C.A.A.’s modern era in which students had a substantial say. Three athletes from each conference, one football player among each set of three, accounted for 15 votes of the total of 80; the other 65 came from representatives from each university in the Big 5. Students’ questions, objections and arguments dominated a discussion period before the vote. “What we showed here today was, we’re not here symbolically,” Ty Darlington, who started at center this season for Oklahoma’s football team, said in an interview. Several students opposed the resolution to ban colleges from removing scholarships for solely athletic reasons. Josh Tobias, a baseball player at Florida, said: “College sports prepare you for professional sports. In professional sports, if you don’t play well, you get cut.” Two resolutions failed. One, sponsored by the SEC, would have required colleges to report to the N.C.A.A. when students’ costs of attendance increased during the year. The other, sponsored by the A.C.C., would have loosened restrictions on how much universities could contribute to the cost of course books as part of newly approved financial aid packages. One of the most divisive resolutions was the concussion safety policy, which requires each college to have practices in place that include mandatory examinations of players by medical personnel. Several Big 12 members said that it did not go far enough and noted that language in an earlier version of the resolution that would have granted medical personnel “unchallengeable authority” had been taken out. In an implicit challenge to the SEC, which sponsored the resolution and whose bloc sat behind the Big 12 representatives on one side of the large ballroom, Steve Patterson, Texas’s athletic director, said: “We’ve been straight-armed the whole time. It starts to raise questions as to why. Why can’t we get it clear that the medical personnel are in charge?” As Sankey, the SEC official, presented the concussion resolution, he enlisted the testimony of Brian Hainline, the N.C.A.A.’s chief medical officer. “This is an imperfect yet exceptionally important start,” Hainline told the gathering. “And I would much rather have an imperfect start than a perfect pause.”

College Sports
College
Scholarships
Atlantic Coast Conference
Southeastern Conference
Mark Emmert
Big 12 Conference
Big Ten Conference
Pacific-12 Conference
NCAA


Airbnb Will Hand Over Host Data to New York

Abstract: Airbnb, the apartment sharing service, and New York law enforcement officials came to an agreement Wednesday after a dispute over rental data that lasted for the better part of a year. Under the terms of the deal, Eric T. Schneiderman, the New York State attorney general, will get the information he is seeking about Airbnb hosts in New York City, but it will be stripped of names and other personally identifiable information. That satisfies the short-term rental company, which did not want its law-abiding hosts to be subjected to what it called a “fishing expedition” by regulators. The attorney general will have a year to use the data to identify bad actors — hosts who are renting out large blocks of rooms in violation of local laws. If he sees suspicious activity, Airbnb is required to identify the hosts. Both sides claimed victory. “We are going to pursue anyone who’s running illegal hotels,” Mr. Schneiderman told The Associated Press. David Hantman, Airbnb’s head of global public policy, called it “a strong agreement that best protects our community’s data and sets us on a positive path forward.” As a result of the deal, would-be Airbnb hosts in New York City will have to directly acknowledge that they are confronting a legal thicket of potential issues. Starting next month, a new host will get a pop-up window on Airbnb’s site that will inform him or her that the New York State Multiple Dwelling Law prohibits apartment rentals of less than 30 days unless a permanent occupant of the apartment is present. The pop-up will also note that there are restrictions on renting out rent-stabilized and rent-controlled properties, and that prospective hosts must be mindful of tax considerations as well. Airbnb has listings in 34,000 places in 192 countries, and is valued in the neighborhood of $10 billion. Possibilities for New York City on a random weekday next month range from a “very cute and cozy” room in a retired police detective’s apartment in Kew Gardens ($35 a night) to a “spacious mansion” on the Upper East Side ($10,000 a night, but it’s pet friendly). The listings service has been a boon to people with a spare room who need money, but it has also incited the ire of affordable housing groups, who say it is exacerbating the current crisis by taking much-needed apartments off the market. Other opponents note that having a different set of tourists as neighbors every day can bring up questions of quality of life, safety and tax fairness. Airbnb says those tourists spend a lot of money. A spokeswoman for the Hotel Association of New York City hailed the deal. Liz Krueger, a state senator who represents the Upper East Side and is a determined Airbnb foe, said the battle was adjourned, not ended. “Despite today’s settlement, Airbnb remains a scofflaw company whose business model is at odds not just with multiple New York laws, but with the basics of the New York City real estate market,” Ms. Krueger said. “Its leaders believe they can pick and choose which laws they follow and which they ignore.” Mr. Schneiderman originally subpoenaed Airbnb last fall for information on thousands of hosts in the city. He was not after the individual apartment owner who might rent out his place while he went to Boston or Buffalo for a few days, technically illegal though that might be. He was after landlords who were operating on a larger scale. Airbnb called the subpoena overbroad even as it purged the site of hosts who were not providing a “quality” experience. A state judge agreed, quashing the subpoena last week. But the judge also said there was evidence that a “substantial” number of hosts were breaking the law. Mr. Schneiderman immediately filed a narrower subpoena, which provided enough common ground for Wednesday’s deal. San Francisco, among other cities, is still struggling to figure out how to regulate Airbnb. Mr. Schneiderman said the deal was “a template for other places in the country where the issue has been raised.” An Airbnb spokesman declined to comment on that point.

Airbnb
Rent
Housing
Real Estate
NYC
Eric T Schneiderman


Alabama and Georgia Are Back in the B.C.S. Title Hunt

Abstract: Alabama center Barrett Jones tried to remain calm in front of the television Saturday night when Baylor took an early lead on Kansas State, No. 1 in the B.C.S., and Stanford stood toe-to-toe with No. 2 Oregon. But when the Bears put away the Wildcats and the two-loss Cardinal shocked the Ducks, Jones said he and his friends became rather “uncomposed.” They left his apartment near The Strip on campus and joined the many revelers in the street. And with that, a nervous week for the Southeastern Conference had come to an end. Alabama (10-1), little more than a week removed from a home loss to Texas A&M, is in control of its fate again, as is Georgia (10-1), giving the SEC two teams with a solid chance to play for the Bowl Championship Series title and run the league’s streak of national championships to seven. “We haven’t won the West yet — we still have to beat Auburn — but it’s a good feeling not to have to depend on others,” Jones said of winning a division title. “It was pretty wild around here Saturday night; people were running all over the streets.” Alabama moved to No. 2 in the B.C.S. standings and was poised to beat Auburn (3-8) in the Iron Bowl rivalry game Saturday and set up a matchup with No. 3 Georgia in the SEC championship game on Dec. 1. The winner of that game, presumably, will play for the national title. And so the polarization of college football — the SEC versus everyone else — continues. Jimbo Fisher, the coach of Florida State, which has one loss and plays in the Atlantic Coast Conference, has already complained about the Seminoles’ being ranked behind teams from the SEC with one loss. Indeed, the commentators for Saturday night’s national broadcasts of Kansas State-Baylor and Stanford-Oregon ignored the possibility that one-loss Florida State, one-loss Oregon or one-loss Kansas State could potentially face an unbeaten Notre Dame for the national title. They leapt right to the conclusion that Alabama would climb to No. 2, Georgia would be No. 3, Florida would be No. 4 and the winner of the SEC championship game would get a date with the Irish. The SEC’s résumé in recent years is unmatched, but the league’s teams have not merely been good during this run of titles. They also have been lucky. In 2006, Southern California was upset late in the season and Florida squeezed into the national championship game. In 2007, two-loss Louisiana State got in the title game when Pittsburgh upset West Virginia. This season, unbeaten Ohio State would be ranked ahead of the one-loss SEC teams, but the Buckeyes are ineligible for the postseason because of N.C.A.A. violations. Alabama is not the only team giddy about upsets. Georgia still has to beat Georgia Tech on Saturday and play in the SEC championship game, but the Bulldogs could not restrain their glee on Twitter. “Thank you Baylor thank you Stanford,” cornerback Sanders Commings wrote Saturday night. On Sunday morning, he added: “And I wake up pinching myself. Yea it’s real. We control our own destiny.” Twenty years ago, SEC coaches bemoaned the creation of the conference’s championship game, insisting teams were already handicapped by a difficult regular-season schedule. Now the SEC has a chance to win its seventh straight championship and the caliber of the conference — five teams in the top 10 in the Associated Press poll — is more of a help than a hindrance. For another week, at least, the dominance of the SEC continued.

Bowl Championship Series
Football
Bowl Games
University of Alabama
University of Georgia
College Athletics
Football (College)
Records and Achievements
Kansas State University
University of Oregon


E.U. Push on Animal Welfare May Open New Trade Front With U.S.

Abstract: BRUSSELS — One of the first things the European Union’s new health and consumer affairs commissioner did after taking office was to approve the planting of a genetically modified potato in Europe — riling environmentalists but giving hope to U.S. officials that an end to a long trade dispute over biotech crops might be in sight. But John Dalli, who began his first official visit to Washington on Monday, may open a new, potentially disruptive front: animal welfare. In an interview ahead of the trip, Mr. Dalli said he planned to tell his American counterparts that he intended to propose a new law on animal welfare. He also said he wanted to eliminate exceptions that have allowed cosmetics companies like Estée Lauder and L’Oréal to use ingredients that are tested on animals. Such products could not be sold in Europe then unless the testing stopped by the end of 2012. If cosmetics companies do not find alternatives by then, “there are going to be problems,” he said. According to E.U. experts familiar with the plans, Mr. Dalli’s law probably would promote the use of cruelty-free labels for some meat products, which could lead to European consumers shunning U.S. products. He signaled there would be no end to Europe’s bans on imports of chickens washed with chlorine and beef treated with hormones, which have long irritated American meat exporters. And he said that Europe needed further time to determine whether to allow imports of meat from cloned animals, which U.S. regulators have declared safe to eat. Promoting higher standards for animal welfare would not only address the concerns of a growing number of Europeans who — in the wake of mad cow disease and dioxin-tainted poultry of recent years — have become sensitized to the way animals are treated in certain industries, Mr. Dalli said. There are economic reasons as well. “Products coming from animals that have been well treated,” he said, can offer “better quality” and “better marketing possibilities, with better pricing.” Mr. Dalli, 61, is a soft-spoken accountant who was finance minister in his native Malta for 10 years before being appointed to one of the most wide-ranging portfolios in Brussels late last year. As a member of the European Commission, he has the power to propose, shape and enforce legislation affecting sectors from pharmaceuticals to food and farming. Unusually for a newcomer to Brussels, Mr. Dalli courted controversy almost as soon as he arrived by decreeing on March 2 that a genetically modified potato, engineered by the German industrial company B.A.S.F., could be cultivated in Europe. That decision was the first of its kind in more than a decade in the Union, where genetically modified foods are viewed by many consumers as an unnecessary and potentially dangerous interference with nature. Environmental and health activists were furious, arguing that in this particular case, growing the potato risked exacerbating the problem of growing resistance to antibiotics in humans, even though it is to be used primarily for manufacturing starch for the paper industry. Mr. Dalli rejected accusations that he had gutted the Union’s so-called precautionary principle, under which something should not be allowed until it is proved to be safe. The E.U. approach has often been criticized by Washington, especially in trade disputes, as overly restrictive. But Mr. Dalli did appear to question the way that the precautionary principle had sometimes been applied in the past, warning that it should not be used to pander to public opinion, especially when it holds back business opportunities in Europe. “Any innovative thrust cannot be stifled simply by innuendo or by the fear of the unknown, which we cannot really define,” said Mr. Dalli. To overcome what he described as a “civil war” in Europe over the cultivation of biotech crops, he pledged to make a formal proposal by the summer that would allow each of the 27 members of the Union to make their own decision on opening their farmlands to biotech crops, even if other countries decided to keep theirs shut. Banning cosmetics products with ingredients that have been tested on animals has been a goal of activists in Europe for decades. Eight years ago the Union agreed to end most testing by 2009. But it kept the door open for three specific tests, for which the cosmetics industry said there were no alternatives. Those remaining tests are intended to make sure products are not harmful when used over long periods of time, and do not interfere with human reproductive systems. They are also the most painful for animals to endure, according to Eurogroup for Animals, a federation of animal welfare organizations from across Europe. At least 4,000 animals die annually as a result of tests on ingredients that go into cosmetics, the group said. Emma Tuddenham, a spokeswoman for Colipa, a group representing the cosmetics industry, said: “All tests are performed to prove safety for human health, which is our top priority.” Stephanie Carson-Parker, a spokeswoman for L’Oréal, said the company “is committed to developing new alternative methods.” But she said it would be “up to the European Commission and its experts to assess the status of development” of those alternatives. A spokeswoman for Estée Lauder in New York said the company had no immediate comment. Mr. Dalli said he was confident that “pressing the industry for alternatives” would yield results. The new animal welfare law could have other implications for trade as well. It could change the way Europeans buy meat by classifying and promoting more humane ways of treating animals, like stunning chickens and other poultry first before killing them, or introducing techniques to detect “boar taint” boar taint — an odor or taste that can show up in a small percentage of boars as they sexually mature — in pork products to avoid having to castrate pigs. A goal of the law would be to encourage meat producers to label their products to show that their animals had been raised and killed using certified procedures, something that could disadvantage U.S. producers if they did not adopt the same procedures. Malta joined the European Union just six years ago, and the appointment of Mr. Dalli to such a weighty post was seen as a triumph for a country with population of about 400,000. Mr. Dalli, a former minister for social policy and finance minister, led the legislative changes that enabled Malta to qualify for E.U. membership, and reflect his modernizing leanings. “We removed to a large extent the protectionist attitude and we turned Malta into a vibrant market economy,” he said.

Animals
European Union
Food
Cruelty to Animals
Genetic Engineering
International Trade and World Market


Spider-Man Is Among the Most Wanted

Abstract: MEXICO CITY — Spider-Man has successfully taken on the Green Goblin, Doctor Octopus and Venom, to name just a few of his foes over the years, but the web-spinning superhero was no match for Mexico ’s federal police, who recently manhandled him and easily took him into custody. In a crackdown on pirated piñatas some months ago, officials from the attorney general’s office and the federal police seized more than 100 of the papier-mâché party accessories, Spider-Man prime among them, and took into custody several real-life piñata vendors as well. The authorities said the raid was a response to a complaint filed by Marvel Entertainment, which owns the rights to the characters in question. Hulk, another Marvel character, was also overwhelmed by the men in black that day, as was Captain America. But the story line got a twist when it turned out that the raid might have been as questionable as the piñatas that were seized. The attorney general’s office said it had no record of Marvel’s calling for such an operation, which existing law required before a raid could be conducted, and the company insists it had nothing to do with it. Federal officials later said that it was Televisa, a Mexican television conglomerate, that filed the complaint that led to the raid. Whatever the raid’s provenance, the lawyer assisting the vendors, Fidel López García, said that it appeared to have been aimed primarily at extorting money from the vendors and commandeering their wares, not an uncommon event in Mexico. Mr. López and the vendors say that, after seizing thousands of piñatas, the police and the officials not only began selling them on the street but offered to sell them back to the vendors. A spokeswoman for the Mexican federal prosecutors dismissed the vendors’ accusations about the raid, saying simply, “It wasn’t illegal.” The piñata roundup created a stir in this city’s piñata-selling zones, where Spider-Man, who goes by the name Hombre Araña here, used to hang out on the sidewalk with Snow White, Mickey Mouse, SpongeBob SquarePants and Lightning McQueen, to name a few of the popular piñatas awaiting purchase. After being forced to pay hefty fines of thousands of dollars to the attorney general’s office, some vendors have eliminated Spider-Man from their shops and others have relegated him to the back. It is not as though proprietary characters have disappeared altogether, though. On a recent afternoon, Darth Vader (Lucasfilm Ltd.) was hanging next to Ben 10 (Cartoon Network), and Princess Tiana (Disney) was in close proximity to Thomas the Tank Engine (Gullane (Thomas) Ltd.), Tigger (Disney) and Shrek (DreamWorks Animation). Piñatas are one small corner of the counterfeiting business, which is flourishing in Mexico. “The statistics don’t lie, and we had to do something because 8 of every 10 people buy counterfeit products, and 54 percent of the products on the market are falsified,” said Arturo Zamora Jiménez, a lawmaker who advocated for a beefed-up antipiracy law that has since been adopted. Besides depriving the government of tax revenue and siphoning profits from corporations, piracy helps to fuel organized crime, the authorities say. Mexican drug gangs have embraced the business, the government said, trafficking in such things as pirated movies, computer software and apparel. Critics of the government maintain that only the poor will suffer from any crackdown on counterfeit goods. “Instead of creating jobs, this government pursues people who have made the decision not to join the criminal element and who look for honest work to bring bread to their homes,” said Gerardo Fernández Noraña, an opposition lawmaker. Standing amid Dora the Explorers, Barneys and Tinker Bells, some piñata sellers said they saw nothing wrong with providing customers with what they wanted, even without permission from a foreign corporation. “A piñata is Mexican,” said Eduardo Bejaramo, a vendor who had been detained in the raid. “It’s just newspaper with paint on it. We’re not copying music or films. We’re doing all this by hand. How can we copy if Marvel does not make piñatas?” Down the street, another piñata vendor, who declined to be identified out of fear that his comments could prompt a follow-up raid, said he would have to go out of business if he had to pay companies to use their characters. “Traditionally, Mexican piñatas were made in the shape of stars,” he said, meaning celestial bodies, not celebrities. “But with TV, children began wanting a piñata like what they saw on the screen.” As for whether he was violating the law, the vendor shrugged. “We’re not a factory,” he said. “This is a family business. We pay our taxes. We’ve heard about rights of authors and all that, but is Marvel really worried about us?” Under the new antipiracy measure, prosecutors can go after violators even without a specific company complaint. And some piñata vendors, eager to comply with the law, recently formed a trade group, the National Association of Piñata Artisans, and met with various company representatives to try to work out a licensing deal. “It’s an art form,” said Hugo Manuel Mena Álvarez, a fourth-generation piñata maker and president of the new association. “Without piñatas, there is no party. It’s so important.” The American ambassador to Mexico, Carlos Pascual, raised the issue of pirated goods in a recent speech to an American business group in the industrial city of Monterrey. Praising the new Mexican law, he said the United States government would work with Mexican prosecutors to ensure they had the resources to enforce it. “But more needs to be done on a very personal level,” the ambassador continued. “How many counterfeit handbags are in this room? How many of you use counterfeit software in your business? Who has recently watched a pirated DVD movie or bought your kid an unlicensed video game DVD?” There was some squirming in the audience as Mr. Pascual suggested that fighting intellectual property violations was an important part of the effort to promote a culture of lawfulness in Mexico. “Let’s all do our part at home and in the office,” he said. Mr. Pascual, the father of a school-age boy, will no doubt practice what he preaches and officially ban Spidey from the yard of the ambassador’s residence when his son’s next birthday rolls around. It is actually at such parties that superheroes face their most formidable foes: sugar-high children wielding a stick.

Mexico
Police
Piñatas
Mexico City (Mexico)
Fines (Penalties)
Counterfeit Merchandise
Frauds and Swindling
Comic Books and Strips


Global Fight Against AIDS Reports Failure at Fund-Raising

Abstract: In another signal that the global battle against AIDS is falling apart for lack of money, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria failed on Tuesday to reach even its lowest “austerity level” fund-raising target of $13 billion — the amount it had said it needed just to keep putting patients on treatment at current rates. Three-year pledges from 40 countries attending a two-day conference held in Manhattan amounted to $11.7 billion. The pledges were announced at the United Nations . The fund had hoped to raise $20 billion to catch up with the growing epidemic. No one now on treatment will be cut off, said Dr. Michel Kazatchkine, the fund’s executive director, but the targets for the next few years must be lowered. He said that he “deeply appreciates” the amount raised, but that “we need to recognize that it’s not enough to meet expected demand and will lead to difficult decisions in the next three years.” He could not, he said, estimate exactly how many deaths would result. The fund pays for AIDS drugs for almost three million patients now, and still might be able to reach four million by 2013. It had hoped to reach five million or more. It supports about half of the world’s poor who are getting treatment. The President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or Pepfar, started under the administration of President George W. Bush, pays for the other half. An estimated 33 million people are infected worldwide, a number that grows by a million people a year after adding new infections and subtracting deaths. Of that number, about 14 million are already so sick that, under World Health Organization guidelines, they should be on drugs. It looks increasingly likely that that number will outpace the number getting drugs. The United States pledged $4 billion, which is a nearly 40 percent increase over its previous contribution. It is by far the most generous donor, and most countries raised their contributions by less. France, Canada and Norway went up by 20 percent, Japan by 28 percent. Britain, Sweden and the Netherlands could not commit because of budget cycles, but were expected to be in that ballpark; Italy and Spain gave nothing. South Africa, which has the world’s worst AIDS epidemic, made a token contribution of $2 million. Russia and China gave $60 million and $14 million respectively, far less than fund officials had hoped. To reach the fund’s $20 billion goal, all countries would have had to roughly double their giving. AIDS activists vented open frustration, both with the overall result and the American contribution. “This is a modest course correction, not what we were hoping for in terms of U.S. leadership,” said Dr. Paul Zeitz, executive director of the Global AIDS Alliance, an advocacy group that had lobbied the administration for a $6 billion contribution. “This took the other donors off the hook. Everyone could aim low.” By not reaching a decision earlier, he complained, the United States dithered away its leverage over other countries. Under American law, the United States can contribute only one-third of the fund. If it had told other donors privately weeks ago that it intended a 40 percent increase, they would have been under pressure to match that, both to avoid sounding cheap, and because the United States cannot pay unless its donation is matched 2 to 1. Dr. Eric Goosby, the global AIDS coordinator, said the intra-administration debate about how much to pledge was “robust” and went on right up until Tuesday morning. “We’re proud of the pledge,” Dr. Goosby said in a telephone interview. Getting the United States, which has a one-year budget cycle, to commit to a three-year pledge was “swimming upstream,” especially in such a weak economy. The battles against malaria and tuberculosis will also suffer, but the effect on AIDS is easier to measure. Malaria waxes and wanes with hot weather and local spraying. The TB epidemic echoes the AIDS epidemic because so many people have both, but TB can be cured in six months, which shrinks case counts rapidly.

Global Fund to Fight AIDS Tuberculosis and Malaria


NATO Document Addresses Nuclear Disarmament

Abstract: BERLIN — Two months before what could be the most important NATO summit meeting in more than a decade, the 28 member states of the alliance have received a draft of its new strategic concept, which for the first time, at the insistence of Germany and other countries, includes calls for nuclear disarmament. At the same time, according to diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, NATO’s secretary general, has completed another highly classified document, numbering several hundred pages, that will be attached to the final strategic concept. Mr. Rasmussen’s document sets out in detail how NATO would react and assign units and forces to respond to a range of attacks — terrorist, cyber, conventional, nuclear or other — several diplomats said Thursday. “If you think the strategic concept is classified, you cannot imagine how secretive the operational paper is and will remain,” an East European diplomat said. The members of NATO agreed at their last summit meeting, in April 2009, to update the organization’s 1999 strategic concept, which they said did not address the defense concerns of the 21st century. Even if agreement on the draft is reached in principle at the next gathering, set for Nov. 19-20 in Lisbon, any pact must still be approved by each country, a process that could take considerable time, and any move to ban nuclear arms would face significant practical issues in Europe and the United States.. The move by Germany and other nations to place disarmament high in the strategic concept comports with President Barack Obama’s declared goal of eventually abolishing nuclear weapons , but it also exposes a rift between European nations that want to rid the Continent of atomic arms and those that want to keep them both for prestige and as a deterrent to longstanding enemies. Germany’s stance has put it at loggerheads with France, a nuclear power. France opposes NATO’s having any role or influence in disarmament issues, fearing that it could undermine France’s sovereignty. “If there is a sticking point in reaching agreement, then this is it,” said a German diplomat who has seen the document and has insisted on anonymity because of its sensitivity. Frédéric Bozo, security expert at the Sorbonne University in Paris, said: “You can understand why France is not happy with the section on disarmament. It does not want its nuclear deterrent to be in any way dragged into NATO discussions.” Officials from Britain — the third nuclear power in the U.S.-led alliance — would not comment on the issue. “We have received the draft. We are studying it carefully,” a British official said. “There will be extensive discussions.” Mr. Obama’s call 18 months ago for complete nuclear disarmament is playing a key part in the NATO deliberations, according to diplomats, arms experts and national officials. In particular, Germany’s Free Democrats, the junior partner in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s center-right coalition, have seized on the chance to make NATO a player in disarmament issues. Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, leader of the Free Democrats, met Wednesday in Washington with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Among the issues discussed was NATO’s strategic concept and Germany’s position on disarmament. “We are facing important foreign policy decisions this autumn,” Mr. Westerwelle said after his meeting. Referring, obliquely to the internal NATO over disarmament, he added: “Secretary General Rasmussen has circulated a draft that we believe provides a good basis for further discussions and that takes up many of the suggestions that we have made in the process of preparing this new strategic concept.” Several East European countries that joined NATO in recent years, in part to secure common defense against Russia, do not support the German push to abandon traditional deterrence. “Deterrence should and will remain central to NATO,” said Imants Liegis, defense minister of Latvia, who has seen the draft. “Other than that,” he added in a telephone interview, “we are pleased with the draft document so far. It meets our concerns, especially over NATO remaining an alliance committed to collective security.” NATO has 180 to 200 nuclear weapons based in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey. Mr. Rasmussen has said he is determined to reach agreement at or before the Lisbon summit meeting. During his summer vacation he rewrote the original 55-page draft presented in May by a group of experts led by Madeleine Albright, the former U.S. secretary of state. Defense analysts said that the document was wordy and asked more questions than it answered. By taking charge of the issue, “Rasmussen does not want endless debates, revisions and arguments over the positioning of paragraphs, sentences and even commas,” said James Appathurai, a NATO spokesman. “Actually, the document is surprisingly lucid and crisp,” Mr. Liegis said. Mr. Rasmussen, appointed secretary general in 2009 after serving as prime minister of Denmark, has said he wants the alliance’s 28 foreign and defense ministers to debate the draft during their meeting in Brussels next month. By then, diplomats said, Mr. Rasmussen will know “which issues will go to the wire” when heads of states and leaders gather for the November meeting. “So far, the nuclear issue has taken center stage,” a senior NATO diplomat said. “The nuclear weapons issue has boiled down to this: Is NATO going to retain the status quo by keeping its weapons for deterrence, or is NATO finally going to give arms control and disarmament precedence?” Diplomats from Poland and the Baltic states, still suspicious of Russia’s intentions, want little or no change to the status quo. They fear that if nuclear weapons were further reduced or removed, the idea of collective defense guaranteed by the presence of the weapons on European soil would be reduced. In turn, they say the trans-Atlantic alliance would be undermined. “U.S. nuclear weapons are regarded as a strong symbol of the credibility of the American commitment to the security of Europe,” said Karl-Heinz Kamp, director of research at the NATO Defense College in Rome. “Eliminating the American nuclear presence in Europe, even if the number of warheads is small, could further erode alliance cohesion at a time when reassurance and solidarity are at the heart of the alliance debate on its new strategic concept.” On the other side of the divide are Germany, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. In a letter sent to Mr. Rasmussen in February, the countries insisted on an open discussion on how NATO could further reduce the role of nuclear weapons. This led to such a rift that when NATO defense ministers met in Brussels in June, they could not even agree on a mention of the nuclear issue in their final statement. “They could not reach agreement on the wording,” Mr. Kamp said. Mr. Rasmussen is spending the next few weeks trying to reconcile both sides. Some experts see this as possible. “NATO can hold on to nuclear weapons and at the same time support calls for disarmament,” said Tomas Valasek, a security expert at the Center for European Reform in London who was an adviser to Mrs. Albright.

Europe
Nuclear Weapons
North Atlantic Treaty Organization


Seeking to Save the Planet, With a Thesaurus

Abstract: WASHINGTON — The problem with global warming , some environmentalists believe, is “global warming.” The term turns people off, fostering images of shaggy-haired liberals, economic sacrifice and complex scientific disputes, according to extensive polling and focus group sessions conducted by ecoAmerica, a nonprofit environmental marketing and messaging firm in Washington. Instead of grim warnings about global warming, the firm advises, talk about “our deteriorating atmosphere.” Drop discussions of carbon dioxide and bring up “moving away from the dirty fuels of the past.” Don’t confuse people with cap and trade; use terms like “cap and cash back” or “pollution reduction refund.” EcoAmerica has been conducting research for the last several years to find new ways to frame environmental issues and so build public support for climate change legislation and other initiatives. A summary of the group’s latest findings and recommendations was accidentally sent by e-mail to a number of news organizations by someone who sat in this week on a briefing intended for government officials and environmental leaders. Asked about the summary, ecoAmerica’s president and founder, Robert M. Perkowitz, requested that it not be reported until the formal release of the firm’s full paper later this month, but acknowledged that its wide distribution now made compliance with his request unlikely. The research directly parallels marketing studies conducted by oil companies, utilities and coal mining concerns that are trying to “green” their images with consumers and sway public policy. Environmental issues consistently rate near the bottom of public worry, according to many public opinion polls. A Pew Research Center poll released in January found global warming last among 20 voter concerns; it trailed issues like addressing moral decline and decreasing the influence of lobbyists. “We know why it’s lowest,” said Mr. Perkowitz, a marketer of outdoor clothing and home furnishings before he started ecoAmerica, whose activities are financed by corporations, foundations and individuals. “When someone thinks of global warming, they think of a politicized, polarized argument. When you say ‘global warming,’ a certain group of Americans think that’s a code word for progressive liberals, gay marriage and other such issues.” The answer, Mr. Perkowitz said in his presentation at the briefing, is to reframe the issue using different language. “Energy efficiency” makes people think of shivering in the dark. Instead, it is more effective to speak of “saving money for a more prosperous future.” In fact, the group’s surveys and focus groups found, it is time to drop the term “the environment” and talk about “the air we breathe, the water our children drink.” “Another key finding: remember to speak in TALKING POINTS aspirational language about shared American ideals, like freedom, prosperity, independence and self-sufficiency while avoiding jargon and details about policy, science, economics or technology,” said the e-mail account of the group’s study. Mr. Perkowitz and allies in the environmental movement have been briefing officials in Congress and the administration in the hope of using the findings to change the terms of the debate now under way in Washington. Opponents of legislation to combat global warming are engaged in a similar effort. Trying to head off a cap-and-trade system, in which government would cap the amount of heat-trapping emissions allowed and let industry trade permits to emit those gases, they are coaching Republicans to refer to any such system as a giant tax that would kill jobs. Coal companies are taking out full-page advertisements promising “clean, green coal.” The natural gas industry refers to its product as “clean fuel green fuel.” Oil companies advertise their investments in alternative energy. Robert J. Brulle of Drexel University, an expert on environmental communications, said ecoAmerica’s campaign was a mirror image of what industry and political conservatives were doing. “The form is the same; the message is just flipped,” he said. “You want to sell toothpaste, we’ll sell it. You want to sell global warming, we’ll sell that. It’s the use of advertising techniques to manipulate public opinion.” He said the approach was cynical and, worse, ineffective. “The right uses it, the left uses it, but it doesn’t engage people in a face-to-face manner,” he said, “and that’s the only way to achieve real, lasting social change.” Frank Luntz , a Republican communications consultant, prepared a strikingly similar memorandum in 2002, telling his clients that they were losing the environmental debate and advising them to adjust their language. He suggested referring to themselves as “conservationists” rather than “environmentalists,” and emphasizing “common sense” over scientific argument. And, Mr. Luntz and Mr. Perkowitz agree, “climate change” is an easier sell than “global warming.”

Environment
Polls
ecoAmerica
Language
Climate Change Global Warming
Advertising Marketing
US Politics
Lobbying


State Rescue Urged for Xanadu in Jersey Meadowlands

Abstract: With the Xanadu entertainment and shopping complex three years behind schedule and in need of an estimated $875 million to open, Gov. Chris Christie said Wednesday that it was time for the state to help resuscitate the project. The owner of Xanadu, a partnership led by Colony Capital, has already spent $2 billion on the three-story, 2.2-million-square-foot complex, which was originally supposed to open in 2007 on a 104-acre site in the state-owned sports complex in the New Jersey Meadowlands. The project — featuring an 800-foot-long indoor ski jump, the tallest Ferris wheel in North America and much-reviled blue-and-white checkerboard exterior walls — has been stalled for more than a year, ever since two of its lenders went into bankruptcy before completing the loans. The owner, who has a tentative plan to bring in a new partner — the developer Stephen M. Ross of the Related Companies — has asked the state for help, and Mr. Christie seems willing to provide it. “On Xanadu,” said Mr. Christie, a Republican, “you have essentially two choices you’re confronted with: Make it work, or tear it down.” Given the developers’ investment to date and the project’s potential as a revenue generator, he said he was not prepared to endorse the second option. Still, the notion of providing subsidies for a developer is controversial at a time when the governor is cutting the state budget for social services and education. George Zoffinger, the former president of the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority , who made the deal for Xanadu in 2003, said it would be a mistake for the state to provide subsidies or incentives to the project. He required Xanadu to pay part of its rent, $160 million, upfront. “It should be a viable business all on its own,” Mr. Zoffinger said. “The overriding principle of the Xanadu project was: no taxpayer money. They paid us rent upfront because we wanted to protect ourselves against this.” Mr. Christie endorsed a report issued Wednesday by a commission he appointed to come up with recommendations for bolstering the state’s troubled gambling and horse racing industries. The commission, which was headed by Jon F. Hanson, a former chairman of the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, recommended a state takeover of the Atlantic City casino district and possibly closing the Meadowlands racetrack . At Xanadu, which is adjacent to the racetrack, the commission recommended that the state provide tax-exempt bonds for some of the money needed to complete the project. Under one chain of events under discussion, the bonds would be paid off with sales taxes from the project. The developer would also be required to make a substantial equity investment. If the state does invest in Xanadu, the governor said, “we have to become owners along with those who would operate and own Xanadu so that we can participate in the upside of that project.” The report did not say what kind of stake the state might obtain in the complex. Thomas H. Bruinooge, a lawyer and developer in Rutherford, N.J., and a leading member of the Meadowlands Regional Chamber of Commerce, said the proposal for tax-exempt financing was “an investment that has to be made.” “It’s an asset that, if fully realized, would help the destination marketing of the region, the hotels and a lot of different businesses,” he added. In talks with the owners of Xanadu, the commission has discussed a $180 million financing package, but the developer is seeking more, according to executives familiar with the talks, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter. Mr. Ross, chief executive of the Related Companies, has been in negotiations with Colony Capital since February. Colony Capital’s hope is that he can do for Xanadu what he did in building Time Warner Center, a large office, hotel, condominium and upscale retail complex in Manhattan. The developer has said he would “rename, rebrand and re-skin” Xanadu. But he has stopped short of a formal partnership while both his company and Colony seek new tenants, financing and incentives from New Jersey. But luring tenants, or even holding on to those Xanadu already has, may be tough given the economy and anemic sales. “We’re looking to ensure that it’s feasible,” Mr. Ross said Wednesday. “I don’t think New Jersey wants another false start.” This would not be the first effort to rescue Xanadu. The Mills Corporation, a mall operator, was selected for the project in 2003 and broke ground in late 2004. But Mills, teetering at the edge of bankruptcy, turned the project over in 2007 to a partnership led by Colony Capital, a private real estate firm based in Los Angeles.


Lorenzo Charles, 47; Made Winning Dunk in 1983 N.C.A.A. Title Game

Abstract: Lorenzo Charles, whose dunk in the final seconds of the 1983 National Collegiate Athletic Association national championship game propelled North Carolina State University to victory over Houston and himself to the realm of basketball legend, died Monday when the charter bus he was driving crashed in Raleigh, N.C. He was 47. North Carolina State announced the death. It occurred on Interstate 40 as Charles was driving a bus for Elite Coach. News reports said the bus, which had no passengers, veered off the highway and sustained heavy damage to its front end. The police did not immediately comment on how or why the accident occurred. Charles had been a bus driver for 10 years. His moment came in his sophomore year, when he leapt to rebound a teammate’s shot that fell short of the basket and jammed the ball through the hoop, giving the Wolfpack a 54-52 victory. Like the clutch performances of Michael Jordan for the University of North Carolina the year before and Christian Laettner for Duke in 1992, Charles’s game-winner has become emblematic of the N.C.A.A. tournament. It has been shown thousands of times on television, as has the image of the victorious N.C. State coach, Jim Valvano, darting across the court looking for someone to hug. Charles said that not a day passed that he was not asked about it. The title game, in Albuquerque on April 4, 1983, pitted the Wolfpack against a Houston team that had been ranked No. 1 in the nation. The high-flying Cougars were led by the future Hall of Famers Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler. The Wolfpack, by contrast, had a 17-10 regular-season record. In beating Houston, they became the first team to win a national championship after losing 10 games. When N.C. State guard Dereck Whittenburg hoisted a 30-foot desperation shot with only seconds remaining, Charles was directly under the hoop. He said many times that he immediately knew it would fall short. After his dunk, he glanced at the clock and saw there were two seconds left. He later said he had never understood why the Cougars did not call a timeout. “At the time, I didn’t realize the magnitude,” Charles said in a 1996 interview with The Daily News of New York. “I didn’t realize what I had done.” Lorenzo Emile Charles was born in Brooklyn on Nov. 25, 1963, and grew up in the Starrett City housing project near Jamaica Bay. Growing to 6 feet 7 inches, he played basketball for Brooklyn Technical High School, from which he graduated. In 1983, before advancing with his team to the N.C.A.A. finals, Charles sealed a 71-70 victory in an Atlantic Coast Conference tournament game against Wake Forest with a 3-point play. In the N.C.A.A. tournament, he hit two free throws with 23 seconds left to beat Virginia, 63-62, in the West Region final. Charles played two more years at N.C. State, finishing with 1,535 points. He was the 41st pick in the 1985 National Basketball Association draft, by the Atlanta Hawks. He played only 36 games for the team, averaging 3.4 points. Charles then played professionally in Europe and South America and for minor league teams. In the early 2000s, he coached the Fargo-Moorhead Beez, a North Dakota team in the Continental Basketball Association. He is survived by his parents, a sister and a daughter, an N.C. State spokesman said.

North Carolina State University
Basketball
Charles Lorenzo
NCAA Basketball Tournament (Men)
Deaths (Obituaries)
College Athletics


A Smartphone Keyboard App That Anticipates What You Want to Type

Abstract: LONDON — Typing on the glass of a smartphone can be a headache. The keyboards are tiny. Errors are easy to make, even on the simplest of words. And autocorrect, the function meant to fix typing mistakes, often introduces errors, switching words that have little to do with what people actually mean. Consumers’ irritation with typing has enticed the likes of Google, Apple and several start-ups to try to put the smart into smartphone keyboards — knowing that there is a big opportunity in having such a prominent place in users’ hands. Perhaps no company, though, has found more success with enhancing keyboards than SwiftKey , a London start-up that first released a keyboard app in 2010. SwiftKey says the app, which cost $4 until last Wednesday, when it became available free, was downloaded more than 30 million times. It ranked as one of the most popular paid smartphone applications on Google’s Play Store. The app predicts what you will type next by using artificial intelligence and reams of online data, including what you type on other apps, to learn what words you typically use. It then applies that information to predict what you will type next. “There’s huge strategic value in owning the keyboard,” said Jon Reynolds, 28, a co-founder of SwiftKey, whose app is now used on almost 250 million handsets. “Whatever app you use across your phone, we’re there.” SwiftKey’s technology and growth have gained the attention of some global tech giants. Google and Facebook, for example, have made inquiries about a potential takeover of the company, though no deal has ever been reached, according to several people who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about such talks. A spokeswoman declined to comment about takeover rumors. Finding a long-term growth plan has not been easy. SwiftKey announced last week that it was ending its paid app business model. Instead, the app is now free, and the company charges users for extras like different colored keyboard themes. This so-called freemium model, which is popular with online gaming companies like King, the maker of the CandyCrush franchise, is an effort by SwiftKey to woo new consumers, particularly in developing markets. In countries like India and China, people often balk at paying for smartphone apps, preferring to download them free and pay for premium content. “China represents the next billion smartphone users,” said Ben Medlock, 35, a SwiftKey co-founder. “The freemium model will help us to build our user base.” So far, the app has been limited to Android, which allows third-party developers like SwiftKey to alter the look and feel of the operating system. SwiftKey has also teamed with handset makers including Samsung and LG, and the app is installed on many of their new high-end phones. Yet while the start-up is still looking to increase its users on Android, which has roughly 80 percent of the global smartphone market and typically is used in low-cost models, SwiftKey also wants to attract Apple users. Image The app is available in 66 languages so far, including Mongolian. Credit Tom Jamieson for The New York Times This month, Apple announced it was opening its keyboard to third-party apps like SwiftKey. The start-up had already teamed with Evernote, the popular note-taking app, to offer its predictive keyboard on Apple’s iPhones. But now SwiftKey says it is working on a keyboard app that will work across Apple smartphone software. “As the Android experience gets better, Apple will have to consider opening up more,” said Richard Wong, a partner at the venture capital firm Accel Partners in California, which has invested in SwiftKey. “Despite phones’ becoming smart, most apps have remained dumb.” Finding success with Apple will not be easy. While Apple said other companies could develop apps for its operating system, Apple also introduced its own predictive keyboard that it will include on its new mobile operating system — a keyboard that operates a lot like SwiftKey’s product. That could make it hard to persuade users to download a separate keyboard app. “You need to have control of the operating system,” said Nick Dillon, a senior analyst at the technology research company Ovum in London. “That favors Apple and Google. For SwiftKey, there’s a limit to what they can do.” SwiftKey has built its success so far on personalization. By mining data from its users and other online sources, the start-up can offer different text predictions for each individual, depending on how they type, what their interests are and which language they use. An American user, for example, might be prompted to use the word “soccer” in a text message related to the World Cup in Brazil, while a British user would be offered “football.” In total, SwiftKey now offers word predictions in 66 languages, including Mongolian and Welsh. It is running a trial of a Japanese version and soon plans to introduce a Chinese edition. “We tap into a lot of different sources — it’s the best way to figure out what people are trying to type,” said Joe Osborne, who leads SwiftKey’s text prediction team. “From the get-go, we can understand exactly how you write.” SwiftKey can personalize its keyboard according to what and how each person writes across emails, social networks like Facebook, and mobile Internet searches on Google. Users have the option to link their online accounts to the app’s predictive text algorithms. SwiftKey then analyzes their personal habits on the likes of Twitter to tailor its suggestions to each user. The company says it complies with European data protection rules, which are more stringent than those in the United States. SwiftKey also says people must opt in to add their accounts to its system, and they are not automatically signed up for the personalization service. As part of SwiftKey’s global rollout, Caroline Gasperin, a Brazilian who runs the company’s language group, spent more than two years working on the Japanese version before its introduction last month. Her 11-person team had to crack the complexity of predicting words in the character-based language. The process took two years — in contrast to less than a week needed to build a similar model for a European language. “We started the company to make a better keyboard,” said Mr. Reynolds, the co-founder. “From the beginning, our focus has been to get on a billion handsets.”

Smartphone
Google
Apple
SwiftKey
Android
Mobile Apps