Melissa Harris-Perry Walks Off Her MSNBC Show After Pre-emptions

Abstract: In an unusually public flare-up, one of MSNBC’s television personalities clashed with the network on Friday in a dispute about airtime and editorial freedom and said she was refusing to host the show that bears her name this weekend. The host, Melissa Harris-Perry, wrote in an email to co-workers this week that her show had effectively been taken away from her and that she felt “worthless” in the eyes of NBC News executives, who are restructuring MSNBC. “Here is the reality: Our show was taken — without comment or discussion or notice — in the midst of an election season,” she wrote in the email, which became public on Friday. “After four years of building an audience, developing a brand and developing trust with our viewers, we were effectively and utterly silenced.” In a phone interview, Ms. Harris-Perry confirmed she would not appear on the show this weekend. She said she had received no word about whether her show, which runs from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturdays and Sundays, had been canceled, but said she was frustrated that her time slot had faced pre-emptions for coverage of the presidential election. She said she had not appeared on the network at all “for weeks” and that she was mostly sidelined during recent election coverage in South Carolina and New Hampshire. (She was asked to return this weekend.) In her email, Ms. Harris-Perry wrote that she was not sure if the NBC News chairman, Andrew Lack, or Phil Griffin, the MSNBC president, were involved in the way her show was handled recently, but she directed blame toward both. “I will not be used as a tool for their purposes,” she wrote. “I am not a token, mammy or little brown bobble head. I am not owned by Lack, Griffin or MSNBC. I love our show. I want it back.” Ms. Harris-Perry is black, and Mr. Lack and Mr. Griffin are white. In the phone interview on Friday, Ms. Harris-Perry clarified her remarks and said she did not think race played a role in her recent absence from the air. “I don’t know if there is a personal racial component,” she said. “I don’t think anyone is doing something mean to me because I’m a black person.” An NBC News spokesman said in a statement, “In this exciting and unpredictable presidential primary season, many of our daytime programs have been temporarily upended by breaking political coverage, including M.H.P. This reaction is really surprising, confusing and disappointing.” For MSNBC, this is unwelcome news during a heated election. Last year, after its scandal involving Brian Williams, Mr. Lack, the former head of NBC News, was brought back to run the news division, and one of his chief missions was to fix the ailing MSNBC, which significantly trails Fox News and CNN in viewership. In the last few months, Mr. Lack has steered MSNBC away from its liberal identity and moved it toward harder news in the daytime hours. Since January, the network has had round-the-clock election coverage (including the reintroduction of Mr. Williams as co-anchor on primary nights), and notched strong ratings gains year-over-year in the mornings and afternoon. Ms. Harris-Perry, who is also a professor at Wake Forest University, has hosted her MSNBC show since 2012. She has used the show to explore issues like social justice and racism, and diversity has been the centerpiece of the show since its start. “I care only about substantive, meaningful and autonomous work,” she wrote in her email. “When we can do that, I will return — not a moment earlier.” She said that last month the onscreen branding for her show was replaced by MSNBC’s slogan, “The Place for Politics.” With the election heating up, her show was pre-empted each of the last two weeks and for the most recent edition, on Super Bowl Sunday, she was told to talk mostly about the presidential race. She still did speak about other topics, including Beyoncé’s new video for her song “Formation” and how it addressed race. But perhaps in a sign of the network’s shifting priorities, as she and her guests engaged in a lengthy discussion about the video, live video of rallies for Jeb Bush and Chris Christie in New Hampshire played in a box on the screen as well. Ms. Harris-Perry, who is under contract, said that she was told that pre-emptions and election coverage were going to play out for the “foreseeable future.” Joy Reid will take over her time slot on Saturday, just as she has for the last couple of weeks. Ms. Harris-Perry said not being able to talk to her viewers felt like a “betrayal.” “It is perfectly fine, 100 percent reasonable and perfectly acceptable for MSNBC to decide they no longer want the M.H.P. show,” she said. “But they should say that. They should cancel the show; they should stand up. And maybe it would be rewarded with huge ratings, but they shouldn’t kill us by attrition and take us off the air without telling anybody, including us. That for me is what’s painful and difficult.”


Hornets Keep Eric Gordon

Abstract: The Hornets have matched the Phoenix Suns’ four-year, $58 million offer to Eric Gordon, keeping the restricted free agent guard in New Orleans. The move to retain Gordon on Saturday was expected, as Hornets general manager Dell Demps and coach Monty Williams had indicated they hoped the 23-year-old former Indiana standout could be the center piece of a rebuilding effort that will also include first overall draft choice Anthony Davis and No. 10 pick Austin Rivers. Whether the decision will be palatable to fans remains to be seen. Last week, in the days before signing the Suns’ offer sheet, Gordon said he hoped to play for Phoenix, but that did not deter New Orleans from retaining his rights. “Eric is a phenomenal player that we are thrilled to have in our organization,” Demps said. Gordon, meanwhile, sounded more conciliatory in a statement released by the Hornets. “There is always a business element to the NBA when dealing with contracts, but I never lost my appreciation for New Orleans,” Gordon said. “I look forward to giving my very best on the court this season to make our team successful.” Gordon was limited to nine games last season because of a bruised right knee that required minor surgery. However, he averaged a team-high 20.6 points, and New Orleans was 6-3 when he played. The Hornets acquired Gordon shortly before last season in a multiplayer trade that sent All-Star point guard Chris Paul to the Los Angeles Clippers. In four seasons in the NBA, Gordon has never averaged fewer than the 16.1 points per game he scored as a rookie. In this third season, injuries limited him to 56 games with the Clippers, but he averaged 22.3 points. He was invited to try out for the 2012 US Olympic team and narrowly missed the cut, with Oklahoma City’s James Harden edging him out for one of the final spots. Demps and Williams never wavered in saying Gordon was New Orleans’ best player and a key part of the club’s long-term future. Still, Gordon’s first season in New Orleans left many fans wondering if he really wanted to be in the Big Easy. After scoring the winning basket in the Hornets’ season opener in — of all places — Phoenix, he sat out for about two weeks while trying to recover from his bruised knee. He attempted to come back in a loss to Philadelphia on Jan. 4, but the knee was still bothering him. He then went through a prolonged and seemingly fruitless six-week rehabilitation period that sparked debate among fans over whether the high-scoring guard was refusing to play. Those debates heated up further when Gordon rejected the Hornets’ four-year contract extension offer at a late-January deadline for teams to complete extensions with players who were due to become restricted free agents after the season. In mid-February, Gordon and the Hornets finally opted for surgery, and Gordon returned triumphantly on April 4, scoring 15 points in an upset victory over playoff-bound Denver. New Orleans, which won only 21 games all season, won eight of its last 13 thanks in large part to Gordon’s return. Gordon was a regular at the Hornets’ training center leading up to the draft, indicating he had confidence in the club’s direction under new owner Tom Benson, who also owns the NFL’s New Orleans Saints. But when free agency began this month, Gordon went on a tour of teams interested in his services and got an offer from Pheonix that represented the maximum a team could pay for another team’s restricted free agent. Gordon then said he hoped to play for the Suns because they made more of an effort to sign him than the Hornets had. Gordon said the Hornets’ decision to draft Rivers, who had played Gordon’s position of shooting guard in college, indicated that New Orleans was moving in a different direction. Gordon added that the Hornets also had failed to address the need for more front-court players. Since Gordon’s comments, however, the Hornets have acquired 6-foot-10 forward Ryan Anderson, and have traded away former starting point guard Jarrett Jack in a deal that cleared about $5 million under the salary cap to help New Orleans seek another big man in free agency. The Hornets also have begun training Rivers to play point guard, starting in the Las Vegas summer league that opened this weekend. Those moves appeared to be aimed at helping Gordon thrive in New Orleans. Time will tell if he truly is interested in doing so.


An Early Wimbledon Exit for Federer

Abstract: WIMBLEDON, England — When Wednesday began, the talk was about Roger Federer’s shoes. All England Club had warned him that the orange-soled Nike shoes he wore during the first round had too much color in them and that they violated the club’s “predominantly white dress” code. But at the end of one of the strangest days at Wimbledon in recent memory, which saw seven players retire or withdrawal and third-seeded Maria Sharapova lose to a qualifier, the most fitting end was one of the rarest sights of all: Roger Federer losing in the second round of a Grand Slam tournament. Federer’s remarkable streak of reaching 36 consecutive Grand Slam quarterfinals ended Wednesday at the hands of Sergiy Stakhovsky of Ukraine, who used old-school serve-and-volley tactics to send the latest shock through Wimbledon with a 6-7 (5), 7-6 (5), 7-5, 7-6 (5) victory. Asked to explain his victory on the BBC telecast after the match, Stakhovsky said, “Magic.” “I did everything I needed and everything I wanted,” he added. “It was a fantastic day for me.” Less than a week ago, when the draw came out, there were visions of a quarterfinal between Federer and Rafael Nadal. Now, suddenly, shockingly, they are both gone from the tournament. The bottom half of the draw, thought to be overloaded with talent, no longer has Nadal, Federer or No. 6 seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, who was one of the seven retirements Wednesday. A spot in the final is now Andy Murray’s for the taking. But none of the previous upsets during the first three days of the tournament, none of the injuries or oddities, come close to Federer’s loss here. Though nearing his 32nd birthday and having won only one tournament this year, Federer had made a home at Wimbledon. He has won seven championships here, including last year. He had not lost before the quarterfinals at Wimbledon since falling in the first round to Mario Ancic in 2002.

Roger Federer
Tennis
Wimbledon Tennis,Wimbledon


Novak Djokovic to Face Gaël Monfils in U.S. Open Semifinal

Abstract: As Novak Djokovic pursues a third United States Open title, he finds himself in the odd position of issuing get-well messages to a chorus line of incapacitated opponents. Tennis is not a contact sport, but for many of those across the net from Djokovic, this has been a treacherous few days. “I can only wish all of my opponents a speedy recovery,” Djokovic said after another injury struck down his latest foe. It has been the oddest of tournaments for Djokovic, the world’s No. 1 player. First, Jiri Vesely, exhausted by a five-set match in the first round, pulled out before a second-round match with Djokovic. Then, in the third round, Mikhail Youzhny had to pull out with a leg injury during the first set, which Djokovic won, 4-2. Kyle Edmund actually remained upright for a three-set match against Djokovic in the fourth round, but then it was back to the infirmary for Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the quarterfinals on Tuesday. Image Tenth-seeded Gaël Monfils defeated his fellow Frenchman Lucas Pouille in a quarterfinal match, 6-4, 6-3, 6-3. Pouille, seeded 24th, had eliminated Rafael Nadal in the round of 16. Credit Ben Solomon for The New York Times Djokovic was going to win that match, anyway. He took the first two sets, 6-3, 6-2, before Tsonga received treatment for his left knee and had to retire. Djokovic has played only six sets in his last four scheduled matches. “This Grand Slam is very unique for me,” he said. “I never experienced something like this, to have three retirements on the road to the semifinals.” At the end of a long season, Djokovic said, the rest will serve him well, especially because he entered the tournament with a sore left wrist. Now he will face an old adversary of sorts in Gaël Monfils, the 10th seed, who beat a fellow Frenchman, Lucas Pouille, by 6-4, 6-3, 6-3 to gain a spot in a U.S. Open semifinal for the first time in his career. Monfils has entertained tennis fans for more than a decade with his balletic athleticism and his penchant for the occasional trick shot. He might hit a ball through his legs for no compelling reason, jump off the back wall to retrieve a ball, or dive while reaching for a drop shot. Djokovic said Monfils was one of the few players he would pay to watch, because of his theatrical style of play and his cheerful approach. Image Lucas Pouille, left, and Gaël Monfils after their quarterfinal. Monfils has reached the semifinals at a Grand Slam event only once before, at the 2008 French Open. Credit Ben Solomon for The New York Times But in 122 minutes on court Tuesday, Monfils displayed virtually none of that, other than one body-bending slide early in the match. Instead, Monfils remained on his feet, and a vast majority of his shots were the stuff of a technical tennis manual rather than a YouTube highlight reel. “He seems more focused at this time of his career,” Djokovic said. Monfils’s chosen style of play proved the right one against an exhausted Pouille. But the stakes will rise significantly now. Djokovic has beaten Monfils in 12 of their 13 encounters: Monfils won a match in a futures tournament — a kind of minor league to the main tour — in 2004, and Djokovic won their next 12 matches, beginning with a five-set affair at the 2005 U.S. Open. “He’s better player than me, definitely,” Monfils said. “I think I have no shame to say it. He is better than me.” Reaching the semifinals at a major tournament for only the second time feels like the culmination of a solid year for Monfils, in which he has, at times, tamped down his theatrical style of play in favor of a relatively traditional approach. But if it seemed like a more conservative Monfils at Arthur Ashe Stadium on Tuesday, that was only because he did not have the opportunity to make one of his signature circus shots, he said. “Let’s say today if I have a 360-smash, definitely I do it,” he said. “But I don’t have the ball.” Either way, his results have certainly been positive. He reached the final at the Monte Carlo Masters event in April, won the Citi Open in Washington and made the semifinals at the Rogers Cup in Toronto in July, and is now into his first Grand Slam semifinal in eight years. Monfils said that the jumping, sliding and diving he is known for only increased his chances of injury, and that he was loath to invite that possibility. He also bristled at suggestions that he favors showmanship over winning. “I dive because I want to win the point,” he said. “Definitely I want to win the point. You know, when you make the show, honestly, it’s to entertain, but it’s to win. So what’s the point to make the show and lose? That’s why people think, ‘Oh, he’s jumping; he’s sliding.’ In the end, you think I’m stupid?” Pouille, the 24th seed, made the only circus shots of Tuesday’s match. One of them came with the score 1-2 in the third set. Pouille chased down one of Monfils’s many perfect lobs and, with his back to the net, hit a low, hard shot through his legs. It went wide, like so many of Pouille’s other attempts. “Lucas hit two good tweeners,” Monfils said. “I don’t think you will tell him he tried to entertain.” Pouille did most of his entertaining during his fourth-round upset of fourth-seeded Rafael Nadal on Sunday. But that was the third straight five-set match that Pouille had played, and the fatigue caught up with him Tuesday. “He was dead,” said Pouille’s coach, Emmanuel Planque. “He tried.” After his demanding match with Nadal on Sunday, Pouille had a light practice Monday, hitting on court for 20 minutes with the 18-year-old American Jessica Livianu. His legs were spent and his body drained from all the hours on court. Obviously, fatigue will not be a problem for Djokovic, who recalled playing against Monfils as a junior. Later, they played each other in the first round of the 2005 U.S. Open. Djokovic won that match, still at a very early stage of their careers, in five tough sets. At the time, people were just learning how entertaining Monfils can be. But Djokovic and others are also sensing a renewed focus. “I’m winning more, you know, more matches,” Monfils said. “So it’s tougher for some people to say that I’m just a showman.”

Novak Djokovic
Tennis
Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
Lucas Pouille
US Open Tennis
Gael Monfils


Injuries Sideline Pair of U.S. Soccer Players

Abstract: Clint Dempsey and Fabian Johnson were dropped from the United States roster for exhibition games at Scotland on Friday and Austria on Tuesday. Dempsey strained his right calf in training. Johnson has been bothered by his right ankle.

Soccer
Clint Dempsey
Fabian Johnson
US Men's Soccer Team


Artificial-Intelligence Research Center Is Founded by Silicon Valley Investors

Abstract: A group of prominent Silicon Valley investors and technology companies said on Friday that they would establish an artificial-intelligence research center to develop “digital intelligence” that will benefit humanity. The investors — including Elon Musk, Peter Thiel and Reid Hoffman — said they planned to commit $1 billion to the project long term, but would initially spend only a small fraction of that amount in the first few years of the project. But, Mr. Musk said, “Everyone who is listed as a contributor has made a substantial commitment and this should be viewed as at least a billion-dollar project.” The organization, to be named OpenAI , will be established as a nonprofit, and will be based in San Francisco. Its long-range goal will be to create an “artificial general intelligence,” a machine capable of performing any intellectual task that a human being can, according to Mr. Musk. He also stressed that the focus was on building technologies that augment rather than replace humans. Mr. Musk, who is deploying A.I.-based technologies in some of his products like the Tesla automobile, said that he has had longstanding concerns about the possibility that artificial intelligence could be used to create machines that might turn on humanity. He began discussing the issue this year with Mr. Hoffman, Mr. Thiel and Sam Altman, president of the Y Combinator investment group. “We discussed what is the best thing we can do to ensure the future is good?” he said. “We could sit on the sidelines or we can encourage regulatory oversight, or we could participate with the right structure with people who care deeply about developing A.I. in a way that is safe and is beneficial to humanity.” “Artificial intelligence is one of the great opportunities for improving the world today,” Mr. Hoffman said in an email. “The specific applications range from self-driving cars, to medical diagnosis and precision personalized medicine, to many other areas of data, analysis, decisioning across industries.” Other backers of the project include Jessica Livingston of Y Combinator; Greg Brockman, the former chief technology officer of Stripe, as well as Amazon Web Services, Amazon’s Cloud Services subsidiary; and Infosys, an Indian software consulting and consulting firm. The research effort has also attracted a group of young artificial intelligence researchers. The founders said they were not yet ready to provide details on who had donated how much and the rate at which the project money would be spent. They will fund the development of the project on a year-by-year basis. They also said they were not yet ready to describe how quickly the project would grow in terms of funding or staffing. The announcement occurs in the same week that one of the main academic gatherings focusing on artificial intelligence, the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems, is being held in Montreal. In recent years the event has grown as major technology corporations like Apple, Facebook, Google, IBM and Microsoft have started competing to hire the most talented researchers in the field. Salaries and hiring incentives have soared. The research director of OpenAI will be Ilya Sutskever, a Google expert on machine learning. Mr. Brockman will be the chief technology officer. The group will begin with seven researchers, including graduate researchers who have been standouts at universities like Stanford, the University of California, Berkeley, and New York University. “The people on the team have all been offered substantially more to work at other places,” Mr. Musk said. Mr. Altman added, “It is lucky for us the best people in any field generally care about what is best for the world.” In October 2014, Mr. Musk stirred controversy when, in an interview at M.I.T., he described artificial intelligence as our “biggest existential threat.” He also said, “With artificial intelligence we’re summoning the demon.” In October, he donated $10 million to the Future of Life Institute, a Cambridge, Mass., organization focused on developing positive ways for humanity to respond to challenges posed by advanced technologies. He said the new organization would be separate from the Future of Life Institute, and that while the new organization did have a broad research plan, it was not yet ready to offer a specific road map. In a statement, the group sounded an open-source theme — open-source software can be freely shared without intellectual property restrictions — and said it was committed to ensuring that advanced artificial tools remained publicly available. “Since our research is free from financial obligations, we can better focus on a positive human impact,” the group said. “We believe A.I. should be an extension of individual human wills and, in the spirit of liberty, as broadly and evenly distributed as possible.” Mr. Musk said he remained concerned that A.I. advances might work against, rather than benefit, humanity. “There is always some risk that in actually trying to advance A.I. we may create the thing we are concerned about,” he said. In the last two years there has been a race to set up research facilities focused both on advancing A.I. and in assessing its impact. In 2014, Paul Allen, Microsoft’s co-founder, established the nonprofit Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, which says its mission is “to contribute to humanity through high-impact A.I. research and engineering.” Also in 2014, the Microsoft A.I. researcher Eric Horvitz gave an undisclosed amount as a gift to Stanford to study the impact of the technology over the next century. Last month, the Toyota Corporation said that it would invest $1 billion in a five-year research effort in artificial intelligence and robotics technologies to be based in a laboratory near Stanford.

Research
Elon Musk
OpenAI
Artificial intelligence
Reid Garrett Hoffman
Peter A Thiel


New Leader in Vuelta

Abstract: Caleb Ewan won the fifth stage of the Vuelta a España, and Tom Dumoulin passed Esteban Chaves for the overall lead. Dumoulin finished five spots ahead of Chaves, enough for a one-second lead in the three-week Vuelta. Ewan won the 103.9-mile leg in 3 hours 57 minutes 28 seconds.

Tom Dumoulin
Esteban Chaves
Biking
Vuelta a Espana


When the New York City Subway Ran Without Rails

Abstract: It was immediately hailed as positively futuristic and yet dismissed as a fantasy. In the search to find a better way to move people from one place to another, a wealthy inventor proposed packing passengers into a container that would hurtle through a tube, propelled by little more than a gust of air and gravity. It is not the “Hyperloop” proposed this week by the technology mogul Elon Musk, which attracted some buzz by offering the possibility of whisking passengers from San Francisco to Los Angeles in 35 minutes. This idea came more than 140 years ago, when pneumatic pressure for mass transit was first tested beneath the streets of New York City. In 1870, Alfred Ely Beach, an inventor and publisher, unveiled the city’s first subway, running through a pneumatic tunnel under Broadway from Warren Street to Murray Street. For three years, a giant fan blew thousands of passengers at the stately pace of 10 miles per hour in an elegant car, richly upholstered and illuminated by a zirconia light for 25 cents a ride. Ultimately, the city chose elevated trains, and later, an underground railway instead of the Beach subway. But his vision remained alive. Born in December 1826, Mr. Beach had long been obsessed with finding a way to help alleviate traffic on New York City’s increasingly crowded streets. As an editor and part owner of Scientific American, he published a paper in 1849 proposing the creation of a tunnel beneath Broadway for horse-drawn carriages. However, a few years later, Mr. Beach became aware of experiments in England to use pneumatically propelled containers to transport mail and other items, according to an article in The New York Times. “Several men had lain down in the cars and been whisked through the tubes along with the mail,” The Times reported. In 1867, Mr. Beach built a 107-foot-long model of the tube he hoped to place beneath the city streets and displayed it at the 14th Street Armory at the American Institute Fair. The propulsion method was relatively simple: a massive steam-powered fan forces air into the tunnel to push the car along, and when the current is reversed, a vacuum is created, propelling the car in the other direction. Image An illustration depicting the city’s first subway, which ran through a pneumatic tunnel under Broadway from Warren Street to Murray Street beginning in 1870. Having proved the technology feasible, Mr. Beach forged ahead with constructing a branch of his pneumatic tunnel. At the time, there was widespread fear that construction under the street would cause buildings to collapse, so he worked in secret . Mr. Beach invented a “tunneling shield” that allowed excavation to be done with minimal disruption at street level. Workers carted off the earth dug out of the tunnel at night to avoid detection, according to The Times. (Fifty-eight years later, Mr. Beach’s tunneling shield was credited with helping make possible the excavation of the twin tubes that would become the Holland Tunnel.) The subway opened to the public on Feb. 26, 1870. “Certainly the most novel, if not the most successful, enterprise that New York has seen in many a day is the Pneumatic Tunnel under Broadway,” The Times reported the next day. Those who “expected to find a dismal, cavernous retreat under Broadway, opened their eyes at the elegant reception room, the light, airy tunnel and the general appearance of taste and comfort in all the apartments,” The Times reported. While human travel in pneumatic tubes did not take hold and the tunnel was closed in 1873, the American Pneumatic Service Company used the same principle when it started operating a 27-mile system of pneumatic tubes connecting 22 post offices around the city in 1897. And the dream of using gravity and air to propel people never quite faded. The idea was revived in 1965, when Lawrence K. Edwards, an engineer for Lockheed Missiles and Space Company, proposed a 400-mile-long underground pneumatic tube to take passengers from Boston to Washington in 90 minutes. Mr. Edwards detailed his proposal in Scientific American. He estimated the cost at $2.4 billion and proposed a less ambitious project that would serve only the New York metropolitan area and cost $1.25 billion. Unlike Mr. Musk’s Hyperloop, which would run above ground, Mr. Edwards proposed sinking tubes 3,500 feet below ground. Cylinders 65 feet long carrying 64 passengers each would travel at 335 m.p.h. “To achieve a smooth ride, the tubes would be floated in water in their tunnel,” The Times reported in 1965. The proposal never made it beyond the conceptual stage. Still, Mr. Edwards persisted, and in 1968 he proposed reviving and updating Mr. Beach’s idea of running subway cars in vacuum tubes. He envisioned an aluminum train that could be packed with as many as 2,500 passengers traveling twice as fast as the express trains of the day. The Regional Plan Association, a research and advocacy association, was enthusiastic. “Of all the numerous ‘future technology’ concepts that are now discussed,” the association said, “we see the gravity vacuum as the only one to fulfill these requirements.”

Subway
Alfred Ely Beach
Inventions and Patents
NYC


Video Puts New Focus on Donald Trump’s Ties to Dubai Partner

Abstract: WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald J. Trump praised a business partner from Dubai during a New Year’s Eve party at his lavish Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla., on Saturday night, raising new questions about the scope of his potential business conflicts around the world just weeks before he is sworn in. In a video captured by a guest , Mr. Trump can be heard singling out “Hussain and the whole family” as “the most beautiful people,” apparently referring to Hussain Sajwani, the chairman of Damac Properties, which has built the Trump International Golf Club, Dubai; Trump Prvt luxury homes; and a Trump Spa, in addition to building a second golf course there that is scheduled to open next year. The tape, obtained by CNN on Monday night, is the latest reminder of Mr. Trump’s vast array of global business relationships that could create conflicts of interest for his presidency, including the prospect that a commander in chief might make policy decisions guided by what is best for his own family’s brand and wealth. Hope Hicks, a spokeswoman for Mr. Trump, sidestepped questions about the issue on Monday night, saying only that the gathering where the president-elect had praised the Dubai billionaire had been a “social event.” But the episode illustrated just how blurry the line is likely to be between the comments and actions of a President Trump and the interests he shares with scores of business associates he has cultivated around the world. “Even if this was truly a social meeting and not a business one, there’s a cloud of doubt that hangs over it and will last for the next four years unless he sells the business outside of the family and places the assets in a true blind trust,” said Jordan Libowitz, a spokesman for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a nonprofit legal watchdog group. “When he makes foreign policy decisions that affect Dubai, will they be in the interest of the American people or in the interest of his business partnership?” Mr. Libowitz said. “Is he catching up with an old friend or ironing out a secret deal? We have no way of knowing.” Mr. Trump canceled a news conference last month at which he had said he would provide details about how he planned to sever ties with his vast business empire and alleviate conflicts. While he has noted, correctly, that anti-conflict laws will not apply to him as president, Mr. Trump said he would work to eliminate even the appearance of such inappropriate influence. He has rejected calls to liquidate his company and place the proceeds in a blind trust, as ethics experts in both parties have urged. He has said he plans to separate himself from the Trump Organization and leave his sons, Eric Trump and Donald J. Trump Jr., at the helm. Still, the details of how he would remove himself from an organization that bears his name and operates in dozens of countries, including many that have complicated relationships with the United States, are murky at best. Mr. Trump has dismissed such questions. On Twitter last month, he suggested that journalists were manufacturing controversy about the issue. “The media tries so hard to make my move to the White House, as it pertains to my business, so complex — when actually it isn’t!” he wrote . Mr. Trump has an important partnership with Mr. Sajwani, whose company is building Akoya , a 42-million-square-foot development that includes the Trump golf course, Trump-branded luxury homes and the Trump Spa and Wellness Center. Mr. Sajwani, who is close to the emir of Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, said after Mr. Trump’s election that he hoped to deepen his business relationship with the Trump Organization, telling NBC News that he was confident that his deep relationships with the three children of Mr. Trump who run his business would allow him to do so. After the election, Mr. Sajwani said he had met in the United States with Ivanka Trump, Mr. Trump’s eldest daughter, who is exploring a move to Washington to play some role in her father’s administration.

Donald Trump
Dubai
Hussain Sajwani
Conflict of interest
Trump Organization
US Politics


Snap’s I.P.O. Bankers Also Helped Bring Alibaba to Market

Abstract: SAN FRANCISCO — As Snapchat’s parent company prepares to go public, it has turned to some familiar faces to help shepherd it through the process. In picking Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs as the lead banks for an initial public offering of stock, the social media company Snap Inc. has hired two of the banks that worked on the $25 billion stock market debut of the Chinese company the Alibaba Group, the biggest I.P.O. on record. They will be working hand in hand with Imran Khan, who was Credit Suisse’s top internet investment banker and is now the chief strategy officer of Snap. Officially, six banks led Alibaba’s initial offering. But Credit Suisse and Morgan Stanley did much of the work on the deal’s prospectus and the early preparation for the offering and ended up taking home the biggest percentages of fees paid to the six lead underwriters. That is not to say that other companies like Goldman or JPMorgan Chase played only small roles in the Alibaba offering. But teams from Credit Suisse, co-led by Mr. Khan, and Morgan Stanley worked for Alibaba well before it became an e-commerce colossus with enormous valuations in the private markets. (Several of the other banks that worked on Alibaba’s market debut are now working on Snap’s, according to a person briefed on the matter. They include Credit Suisse, JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank. Other companies are likely to be added as the social network moves down the I.P.O. path.) Morgan Stanley’s selection as the overall lead bank for Snap’s initial offering — giving it the title “lead-left” underwriter because of where its name would appear on an offering’s prospectus — was perhaps telegraphed when Snap hired it to put together a line of credit last month. Such a move is often regarded as a precursor to a public offering, with banks often clamoring to lead those debt offerings to gain a spot on the more prominent initial public offering. There are other reasons to turn to Morgan Stanley. The firm was the top underwriter on initial public offerings worldwide for the first nine months of the year, according to Thomson Reuters. Goldman usually duels Morgan Stanley to win the prestige of leading tech I.P.O.s in the United States. According to Thomson Reuters, Goldman tops that list so far this year, with JP Morgan Chase second and Morgan Stanley third.

Snapchat
Morgan Stanley
Imran Khan
IPO
Goldman Sachs Group


Paraguay Presidential Candidate Killed in Helicopter Crash

Abstract: RIO DE JANEIRO — Lino Oviedo, a candidate in Paraguay’s presidential election and one of the country’s most polarizing political figures, was killed in a helicopter crash on Saturday night while returning from a rally in northern Paraguay, government officials said Sunday. The death of Mr. Oviedo, 69, opens new uncertainty in Paraguay, where President Fernando Lugo was ousted last year. After the authorities confirmed Mr. Oviedo’s death and called it an accident, officials in Mr. Oviedo’s party, the National Union of Ethical Citizens, immediately questioned whether he had been assassinated. Mr. Oviedo, a retired general who had led the Paraguayan Army, had a tumultuous political career. He initially gained prominence in 1989, when he helped topple Gen. Alfredo Stroessner , the dictator who ruled Paraguay for 35 years . Mr. Oviedo fled the country in 1999 — seeking exile first in Argentina and then in Brazil — after being charged with organizing an aborted coup in 1996 against Juan Carlos Wasmosy, who was then Paraguay’s president. The authorities also indicted Mr. Oviedo on charges of masterminding the assassination of Vice President Luis María Argaña, who was killed by gunmen outside Asunción, the capital, in March 1999. But after Mr. Oviedo returned to Paraguay in 2004 and served time in prison in connection with the coup plot, Paraguay’s Supreme Court absolved him of the various charges. He then took up a hard-charging political career, campaigning as a populist who nimbly used Guaraní , Paraguay’s widely-spoken indigenous language, in his speeches. He became known as the “bonsai horseman,” in a nod to his short stature, and came in third in the country’s last presidential vote, in 2008. Paraguay was officially commemorating Mr. Stroessner’s overthrow on Sunday, and some of Mr. Oviedo’s supporters questioned the timing of the helicopter crash, which also killed an aide and the pilot. The Paraguayan aviation authorities said the helicopter went down during a storm in northern Paraguay and said they would investigate the cause of the crash. “Twenty-four years ago today General Oviedo overthrew the dictatorship,” César Durand, a spokesman for Mr. Oviedo’s party, told Radio Ñanduti. “This is a message from the mafia,” he said, employing a blanket term often used by Paraguayans to refer to shadowy organizations involved in drug trafficking and the smuggling of pirated goods into neighboring Brazil. Mr. Oviedo’s chances of winning Paraguay’s presidential election, scheduled in April, appeared to be slim, political analysts said. According to recent polls, support for Mr. Oviedo remained in the single digits, placing him far behind the front-runner, Horacio Cartes, a banking and tobacco magnate. The election comes after a stretch of political turmoil in Paraguay in which the Senate hastily ousted Mr. Lugo from office in June. Mr. Lugo, a former Roman Catholic bishop, had ended six decades of one-party rule when he was elected, but he faced fierce opposition from lawmakers in his attempts to reduce Paraguay’s landholding disparities. If Mr. Cartes, 56, holds his lead, the presidency will return to the Colorado Party, which has long dominated Paraguay. Still, his campaign is facing questions over his business dealings. State Department diplomatic cables obtained by WikiLeaks revealed allegations that a bank under Mr. Cartes’s control was involved in money-laundering in 2007. Mr. Cartes has denied those accusations , calling them “laughable rubbish.”

Paraguay
Lino Oviedo
Election
Plane Crashes and Missing Planes
Fatalities,casualties


2 U.S. Companies Stand to Benefit From Satyam Scandal

Abstract: One company’s scandal is another’s opportunity. The financial fraud at Satyam is rippling through the technology services industry, as customers scramble to line up other suppliers and rivals look to pick up business. Already, competitors are angling for a share of Satyam’s nearly $2 billion in annual revenue. The big winners from the fallout are likely to be two American companies, Accenture and I.B.M. , Rod Bourgeois, a technology services specialist at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, said Thursday. Accenture and I.B.M., Mr. Bourgeois said, have three advantages over other competitors. Each company already supplies most of the blue-chip corporate clients of Satyam. I.B.M. and Accenture have built up their Indian operations in recent years, so they offer Satyam customers the same skills at competitive prices. And they are not Indian companies. The $50 billion-a-year offshore outsourcing business was growing at a 29 percent annual rate until the credit crisis hit last fall, Mr. Bourgeois said. But he now forecasts growth in 2009 to be about 10 percent. The impact on other Indian outsourcing companies is unclear, but analysts say that, long term, the fraud could have wide implications. The scandal at Satyam — a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange and audited by an American accounting firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers — raises doubts about other Indian companies. “This is a crisis of trust,” said Frances Karamouzis, an analyst at Gartner. “It’s not really Satyam at stake; it’s the India Inc. brand.” The big Indian outsourcers like Tata Consulting Services, Infosys and Wipro could pick up business as a result of Satyam’s travails. The same is true, analysts say, for Cognizant Technology Solutions, which has its headquarters in Teaneck, N.J., but most of its operations in India. Yet in the business of outsourced technology services, where suppliers build and maintain a customer’s vital software, reputation matters a lot. Companies often depend on their outsourcing suppliers to manage the technology behind basic tasks like billing, purchasing and customer relations. In the corporate market, it is said, customers are not buying technology, which can change rapidly, but buying a relationship with a supplier. For that reason, Ms. Karamouzis said, the odds are that the Indian government and the industry’s powerful trade group, Nasscom, will develop a rescue package for Satyam, if necessary. For corporate customers, the crucial resource is the software developers at Satyam, far more than the corporate entity itself. Satyam’s strongest business is maintaining and customizing so-called enterprise resource planning software, typically from SAP and Oracle, which runs the basic operations at companies. Ms. Karamouzis said Gartner’s advice to clients was to identify by name the most important Satyam developers working on a company’s outsourced software projects. Then, she said, companies must assess the risk at Satyam, which may include sending people to India for a first-hand look. In a letter to the Satyam board on Wednesday, Ramalinga Raju, the chairman and co-founder, said that the company’s cash reserves were about $69 million, instead of the $1.1 billion reported last year. “If they don’t make payroll, there will be a mass exodus of employees,” Ms. Karamouzis said. If Satyam remains intact, she said, companies may well want to offer bonuses to keep the important engineers working on their projects, instead of defecting to outsourcing rivals. The Satyam setback has occurred at a time when the once-torrid growth of the Indian technology outsourcing industry has been slowing significantly. The terrorist attacks in Mumbai last November and a stronger rupee, analysts say, have prompted some companies to look at lower-cost alternatives in China, Mexico and Brazil. But the main reason is the sudden slowdown in the global economy, especially the crisis in the financial services sector, a large source of business for the Indian outsourcers. Yet when the global economy comes out of its slump, many analysts expect the growth of the leading Indian outsourcers to pick up, if not to the previous levels. “The golden age of very high growth and financial returns is over,” said John C. McCarthy, an analyst at Forrester Research. “But Satyam and the current economic troubles do not change the fundamental economics of offshore outsourcing.” Forrester projects that the offshore outsourcing business will grow by 17 percent annually through 2012.

International Business Machines Corporation


Working Out of a Jam, Robertson Gives Yanks Room to Stretch

Abstract: The drive from Massachusetts to Tuscaloosa, Ala., takes 22 hours. Dave Robertson had driven 21 in his Toyota Camry, adding to its 200,000 miles after finishing a summer in the Cape Cod League in 2006. He and his future wife, Erin, were on Interstate 59 outside Birmingham when his cellphone rang. The Yankees were calling. Robertson, soon to be a junior at the University of Alabama, had planned to return to the Crimson Tide. The Yankees were offering $150,000 after taking him in the 17th round that June, but Robertson expected to rise in the draft the next season. He knew he was worth more. After watching him pitch in the Cape Cod League, the Yankees agreed. Robertson struck out about two batters per inning in the playoffs, and he did not allow a base runner in his four saves. He was on the mound when his team, the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox , won the title. Robertson was the postseason most valuable player, and the Yankees wanted to secure him. They raised their offer to $200,000, an exorbitant sum for a player picked so low, but a bargain for a team that soon spent $46 million on Kei Igawa. Robertson accepted, and the Crimson Tide’s loss was the Yankees’ gain. On Friday, Robertson was a postseason M.V.P. again. It was Robertson, of all people, who was awarded the wrestling championship belt as the top player in the Yankees’ 4-3 victory over the Minnesota Twins in Game 2 of their American League division series . Not Alex Rodriguez, who smoked the tying homer in the ninth. Not Mark Teixeira, who ended it with a homer in the 11th. In the clubhouse, Robertson was the star. Derek Jeter , the Yankees’ captain, made the decision to give the belt to Robertson, a 24-year-old right-hander. It was his first of the season, and Robertson had earned it, wiggling out of a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the top of the 11th inning. Delmon Young lined out to Teixeira at first. Carlos Gomez grounded to Teixeira, who fired home for a force. And Brendan Harris flied to center. Robertson stamped off the mound, screaming for joy, a 3-3 tie protected. “We called him Houdini after that,” Jeter said. “Bases loaded, nobody out, that’s a tough jam to be in. We were fortunate he hit that first ball to Tex. But I liked his expressions, his demeanor. He looked like he was unfazed the whole time.” Robertson inherited most of the jam. The left-hander Damaso Marte had started the inning, giving up singles to his only two hitters (including one to Joe Mauer that followed a sure double inside the left-field line that the umpire Phil Cuzzi called foul). Michael Cuddyer greeted Robertson with a single to center, loading the bases. With Young coming up, it was the ideal spot for a strikeout, which is Robertson’s specialty. Among pitchers with at least 40 innings, Robertson had the best strikeout ratio in the American League this season, with 12.98 per nine innings. Robertson did not get a strikeout Friday, but it did not matter. After the two balls to first base, Robertson saw his way out of the crisis. “That’s what I thought, I can get out of this,” he said. “The main thing was not to walk a guy.” He challenged Harris with three fastballs, 92 or 93 miles an hour, before the flyout to center. Robertson, who earned the victory, was pitching to Francisco Cervelli, the third-string catcher who caught him at Class A Tampa in 2007. “He was outstanding,” Cervelli said. “I never felt he was scared. He’s prepared, mentally and physically, everything. We’ve got to trust in everybody, because everybody’s here for a reason.” Robertson’s performance turned a potential bullpen failure into a success as the Yankees took a 2-0 lead in the best-of-five series . Phil Hughes had come within a pitch of handing the game to Mariano Rivera for the ninth with no worse than a tie. But with two outs in the eighth and a 1-2 count, Hughes threw three balls to walk Gomez, a hitter not known for patience. “On 1-2 and 2-2, I was overthrowing the ball,” Hughes said. “I was really trying to put a fastball by him. That caused me to open up a little bit and lose the zone. On 3-2, I was thinking, Throw this guy a strike and don’t walk him. I ended up babying it in there and missing down and in. I’m just lucky I didn’t cost us the game because at the time it seemed like I did. Two-out walks can’t happen.” The bullpen is not a long-term role for Hughes. The Yankees see him as a starter, the role he has filled successfully in the minors and, at times, in the majors. But Robertson was groomed to relieve. It is easy to imagine him as the primary setup man next season. Three relievers who started the season with the Yankees — Jonathan Albaladejo, Brian Bruney and Edwar Ramirez — did not make the postseason roster. Another, Jose Veras, was let go in June. It paid to have a reservoir of minor league options. Robertson, who started this season at Class AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, went 2-1 with a 3.30 earned run average in 45 games for the Yankees. Relievers’ performance can be volatile, but Robertson looks like a keeper. “I couldn’t be happier for him,” Hughes said. “With the way he came into the season, not really expecting to do much, he’s worked his way into being a major contributor. To get out of that jam not only won us the game, but it does a world of good for his confidence. He was definitely the player of the game.”

Minnesota Twins
Baseball
New York Yankees
Playoff Games
Robertson Dave
Jeter Derek
Hughes Phil


Hard Feelings Emerge as Mets Face Lo Duca

Abstract: VIERA, Fla. — Paul Lo Duca and Lastings Milledge, two players no longer with the Mets , sat in the opposing clubhouse Monday and did their best not to say anything controversial about the fact that they now play for the Washington Nationals . Milledge succeeded more than Lo Duca did. Lo Duca, who hit .272 last year in his second, and last, season as the Mets’ No. 1 catcher, remained calm as he talked about becoming a free agent after the season and drawing no interest from the Mets. Then a reporter told him that Mets General Manager Omar Minaya might have been interested in retaining him had he been willing to take less than a three-year deal. “Are you kidding me with that?” said Lo Duca, who will turn 36 next month and who, along with Milledge, had not encountered his old team in spring training until Monday. “There was never a phone call. I don’t want to throw stones and I don’t want to get mixed up in any of this stuff, but that is ridiculous. And that’s the bottom line.” The bottom line, maybe, but not necessarily the last word. Minaya commented later in the day that Lo Duca’s agent had told him his client wanted a contract of three to four years. Lo Duca, meanwhile, maintained that the Mets went after three catchers — Jorge Posada, Yorvit Torrealba and Brian Schneider — without making an overture toward him. He described it as an odd and frustrating feeling of wanting to stay in New York and not having the sentiment reciprocated. “Any time in your lifetime when you’re not wanted, it’s tough,” he said. “But that’s it. It’s on to a new start.” Earlier, the vocal, and sometimes emotional, Lo Duca had been greeted on the field with handshakes and hugs from former teammates. “They’re like your second family,” Lo Duca said of the Mets players. “I still get along with a lot of them. I felt like we were so close to making it to the World Series. On the cusp.” Not far away, Milledge, who will turn 23 next month, was saying how fortunate he felt to be a Met for a year and a half. That was in sharp contrast to other remarks Milledge has made since being traded in which he implied that he was misused and misunderstood by the Mets, who were not always thrilled with his brash behavior. “They gave me an opportunity to play at a young age on a big stage,” Milledge said, adding that he now feels he can play for any team in baseball because of the scrutiny he received as a Met. Lo Duca had a rough off-season in any number of ways. He was mentioned prominently in the Mitchell report on performance-enhancing drugs — he has acknowledged making a “mistake” in regard to such drugs — and he had knee surgery shortly before spring training. He is expected to play for the first time this spring later this week. Milledge, meanwhile, has had a strong spring, batting .333, although he did not play Monday, either. He seemed to greet fewer former teammates Monday than Lo Duca did. Both said playing the Mets 18 times a year should be interesting. Lo Duca, who had hoped to make his spring training debut against the Mets and was apparently upset that he did not, agreed that it would provide him with extra motivation. “I’d be lying if I said differently,” he said. “We’re here to try to win the National League East. Anybody who doesn’t think that way, they should leave the clubhouse.” Milledge said playing in center field for the Nationals would allow him to show more defensive skill than he exhibited as a Met. And Washington Manager Manny Acta said he felt the Nationals had a future All-Star in Milledge. “If he stays healthy, he’ll play 150 games or more,” Acta said. “That’s what we want out of him.” INSIDE PITCH The left-hander Oliver Pérez gave up two hits and one unearned run, walking none and striking out five, in five innings in the Mets’ 7-3 victory and pronounced himself ready for the regular season. Pérez, who threw 57 pitches, said his control and slider improved over his last outing. ... The left-hander Jason Vargas will have surgery for a torn labrum in his left hip.

Washington Nationals
New York Mets
Duca Paul Lo
Milledge Lastings


Alibaba Sales Up 39% on Increased Consumer Spending in China

Abstract: HONG KONG — The Alibaba Group, which owns China’s biggest online marketplaces, is squeezing more money out of slowing growth. The Chinese e-commerce giant, which lists shares on the New York Stock Exchange, reported on Thursday a surge in profit and revenue in the first three months of the year compared with the same period last year. The company made more money by charging retailers to use its platforms, which connect vendors small and large with China’s growing ranks of connected consumers. But the figures, covering the fourth quarter of the company’s fiscal year, also showed stalling growth in the volume of sales over its platforms. Gross merchandise volume, a closely watched measure of the transactions on the company’s websites, grew 24 percent compared with the same period a year earlier, about the same pace in the prior quarter. Still, investors bid Alibaba’s shares up on Thursday. In a blog post released with the earnings report, Alibaba’s executive vice president, Joseph C. Tsai, said the company was able to buck the trend of broader global economic troubles because of the resilience of Chinese consumers, which economists say must make up for China’s weakening manufacturing and construction sectors. “Chinese consumers, with their healthy balance sheets and ability to spend, will propel China’s shift from an export- and investment-led economy to a consumption-driven economy,” Mr. Tsai said. For American investors, Alibaba has become a proxy for the Chinese economy. Though a sizable portion of China’s retail sales take place on Alibaba’s marketplace websites — Chinese consumers spent almost $500 billion on Alibaba last year — the company’s sales growth outperformed the rise in transactions on its site. The results also showed the growing toll that Alibaba’s forays into hypercompetitive areas outside its core business are taking on its finances. It said that its Koubei business, which allows Chinese consumers to order food and other items and services on their smartphones, had generated $135 million in losses for its parent company in the quarter. In his post, Mr. Tsai pointed to the patience involved in creating the company’s Taobao marketplace, now the major sales driver of the company. He said the company would take a similar long-term view and continue spending on new businesses it thinks can help it grow. When Alibaba was listed in late 2014, the hype the company had built up helped it raise more than $20 billion, the largest public listing in United States history. Since then, a sagging Chinese economy and a slowdown in spending growth on Alibaba’s platforms have meant that despite solid results, the company’s share price has not returned to the level it reached on the first day of trading. Still, Alibaba has made progress making more money from its main business. Unlike Amazon.com in the United States, which keeps its own inventory and sells directly to customers, Alibaba serves as a middleman and makes money from getting vendors on its services to buy advertising and other services. Although the amount spent on Alibaba’s marketplaces has grown about 20 percent this quarter and last, its revenue from ads and commissions on those sites has grown 30 percent or more. In the longer term, investors expect those numbers to align more closely, meaning slower sales growth. Spending growth on Alibaba’s e-commerce sites will most likely continue to moderate. The company also faces rising competition from JD.com , which operates a business model similar to Amazon’s, as well as continued expenses from some of its strategic investments and acquisitions. Still, Chi Tsang, an HSBC analyst in Hong Kong, pointed to its continued strong cash position and dominance in online shopping as advantages. “People don’t think about how much cash this company generates,” he said. Alibaba said on Thursday that sales rose 39 percent in the fourth quarter, to $3.75 billion. Gross merchandise volume rose 24 percent, to $115 billion. Its profit rose more than 80 percent, to $832 million. Minus one-time items, the company posted a profit of 3.02 renminbi, or 46 cents, a share, lower than the 3.60 renminbi a share that analysts had expected.

China
Earnings Reports
Stocks,Bonds
Ant Financial


Blasts Rock Aleppo as Dozens More Are Reported Killed in Syria

Abstract: BEIRUT, Lebanon — Powerful car bombs exploded outside two security headquarters in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Friday, killing 28 people by official count and signaling that emboldened forces seeking the government’s overthrow can strike at the very seat of its power. The blasts, about two minutes apart, shattered the calm of a Muslim Sabbath morning and nearly 11 months without significant violence in Aleppo, Syria ’s commercial capital. A combination of military and police personnel, as well as civilians, including children, were killed outside a military security headquarters and a police compound, according to a Ministry of Health statement on state television. The attack in Aleppo signaled another escalation in a crisis that began 11 months ago, as the government and the opposition hardened their resolve to use force and diplomatic efforts continued to fail. On Friday, as government forces pressed an unrelenting offensive against the city of Homs, demonstrations edged close to the center of the capital, Damascus, pushing antigovernment action into new territory. In Aleppo, a bastion of government support, the dual explosions wounded about 235 people, state television said, 14 of them critically. State television repeatedly broadcast images of disemboweled victims lying amid jumbled concrete wreckage. One of the buildings appeared flattened and the other was a rose-colored, five-story expanse of shattered windows and cracked masonry. In the absence of a negotiated or diplomatic solution after the latest attempt failed in the United Nations Security Council last Saturday, and with cities and towns across the country besieged by government tanks, the rise of an armed insurgency has gained momentum. Though it was unclear who was responsible for the bombings in Aleppo, or similar attacks in Damascus in December and January, it seemed that Syria was facing the kind of violence it had long been accused of supporting in neighboring Iraq and Lebanon. In Washington , analysts were looking seriously at the possibility that Al Qaeda ’s affiliate in Iraq was responsible for Friday’s attack in neighboring Syria. “It comes as no surprise that Al Qaeda’s Iraq affiliate — through its networks in Syria — might attempt to seem relevant by going after the Assad regime,” said an American official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the assessment contained classified information. “It is opportunism, plain and simple.” Andrew Tabler, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and author of a recent book on Syrian-American relations, said, “This is the regime’s foreign policy coming back to bite it.” The bombings in Damascus claimed 70 victims. Like those in Aleppo, they bore the hallmarks of attacks carried out by Sunni extremist groups, experts said. The government has always argued that it was fighting foreign terrorists, a charge dismissed as propaganda by the Syrian activists leading the uprising. But the attacks on Friday suggest that now foreign fighters may indeed be jumping into the conflict in response to the vicious government crackdown, which human rights groups say has left about 6,000 people dead, experts said. “Clearly the gloves are coming off,” Mr. Tabler said. “You cannot have the shelling of Homs for six days without someone hitting back.” Diplomats and analysts are quick to point out that although this attack and the earlier ones in Damascus bear the hallmarks of Al Qaeda, there is no indication of an organized branch of the organization like those in Iraq, Yemen or North Africa. Syria is a patchwork of religious sects and ethnic minorities, with some extremists pushing the Sunni majority toward a sectarian war against the Alawite minority that has ruled the country for 40 years. In the 1970s and 1980s, Aleppo was the scene of running battles between the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood and the government of President Hafez al-Assad , father of the current president, Bashar al-Assad . But there was no sign that the attack Friday amounted to a resurrection of that fight, since the Muslim Brotherhood ranks were decimated and have never been rebuilt, the analysts and diplomats said. There were confused claims of responsibility for the bombings. Senior officers in the Turkey -based Free Syrian Army, which includes defectors from the security forces, said it had carried out an armed attack on the two headquarters earlier in the day, prompting skirmishes with the military. As rebels were withdrawing, Gen. Atef Hammoud said, the car bombs erupted, but he said that his troops had nothing to do with them. The Syrian government described the attacks as the work of “terrorist gangs,” and the Foreign Ministry sent letters to the United Nations , the Arab League and other international agencies stressing “that this horrible terrorist attack came with the framework of the unfair campaign launched against Syria,” according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency. Some government opponents accused the Assad government of carrying out the attacks, although they presented no evidence. The explosions came a week after the authorities began what activists have depicted as a major effort to crush dissent. The next diplomatic steps are expected to emerge from a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers on Sunday in Cairo and the United Nations General Assembly on Monday. Saudi Arabia is circulating the text of a General Assembly resolution that echoes the one vetoed in the Security Council on Feb. 4. It endorses an Arab League peace plan that includes President Assad’s delegating power to his vice president, but the vote would largely symbolic. On Friday, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia publicly castigated Russia and China , saying the veto was “absolutely regrettable.” In Syria, demonstrators throughout the country placed blame for the spiraling violence on Russia, which vetoed the Security Council resolution along with China. More than 30 people were killed in clashes throughout the country, activists said, including 7 in Aleppo at antigovernment protests after Friday Prayer, and around 17 in besieged Homs. Of the victims in Homs, five died of wounds suffered earlier in the siege of the city that has gone on for a week, said a statement from the Britain -based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Homs residents reached by telephone said that although the shelling of at least one neighborhood, Baba Amr, went on without pause, Friday had been the lightest day this week over all. In Washington, an American military official said Friday that in recent weeks the Pentagon had begun to review potential military possibilities for Syria, but that the discussions were in the hypothetical phase. “We’re looking at a whole range of options, but as far as going to one course of action, I’ve not seen anything,” said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss secret internal discussions. The official declined to elaborate on the possible options, but typically the Pentagon — which, as a matter of course, reviews options when conflicts around the world arise — would consider everything, including humanitarian assistance, arming rebels, covert action, airstrikes, deploying ground troops or doing nothing. Using Libya as a model, it is difficult to imagine that the United States would act unless it was part of a United Nations-sanctioned international coalition.

Syria
Bombs
Military
Aleppo Syria
Homs Syria
Arab Spring
Terrorism


In Danbury, Motorcyclists’ Haven Will Become a Strip Mall

Abstract: DANBURY SEAN MARCUS watched from the edge of Sugar Hollow Road as thousands of motorcycles sped past; a band of perverse carolers bringing the joy of exhaust noise to those overburdened with Sunday morning peace. The topic of the moment was the impending closing of his family’s Dairy Bar restaurant, which now stands in the shadows of Interstate 84, Route 7 and a towering silo that once held much of Fairfield County’s cream. “I know. It’s like, they paved paradise and put up a parking lot,” he shouted. “Why do you need another shopping center? And you know what? It’s a good question!” By March, Mr. Marcus said, demolition crews will raze the 62-year-old restaurant and the Marcus Dairy milk distribution warehouses, and prepare the site for a 65,000-square-foot strip mall. The dairy distribution business will move to a more rural area, and the Dairy Bar will eventually reopen, near its current location, but probably not for at least another year. “Only it’ll be much nicer,” Mr. Marcus said. Restaurant regulars will find other places to eat in the meantime, but for thousands of area motorcyclists who have made this their Sunday morning meeting spot for decades, the forced exile is a bigger problem. Fueled with coffee, eggs and fragments of conversation, the bikers surge from this noisy ventricle into the region’s most scenic roadways. Before heading off, they lean toward one another, barking route sequences over the din. “Seven, thirty-five, thirty-three, seven, fifty-eight...“ Hike! Where these riders will huddle next year while the area is under construction is anyone’s guess. “Essentially, the crowd scatters to the wind,” predicted Mr. Marcus, 38, as gawkers knelt alongside his Harley showpiece. “I don’t think there’s any one place that can handle this size crowd, that sits at the gateway of so many great rides.” Vaughn Thiebauth, a 65-year-old auto mechanic in East Chester, N.Y., pondered the question of where they would gather now as he stepped onto his 2008 Yamaha Royal Star Venture. Mr. Thiebauth started riding to Marcus Dairy around 1980, following a route first ridden by his father, Warren, years earlier. How many years earlier? He wasn’t exactly sure. Mr. Thiebauth sought guidance from a diminutive woman in oversize sunglasses at the rear of his bike. “How long you been coming here, Ma?” “Oh, we’ve been coming here forever,” said Anita Thiebauth, who turned 91 this month. “When we did the midnight run from the Yonkers Motorcycle Club, we used to come over here and have breakfast after we finished up at 9 o’clock in the morning.” Weather permitting, mother and son ride here every Sunday, where she orders a sandwich of Egg Beaters and sliced tomato, on wheat. Her son, no slave to the heart healthy diet, downs eggs and ham. When Marcus Dairy closes next year, the Thiebauths will have few breakfast options. “We go too far, and she falls asleep,” he said. “At least I used to,” Ms. Thiebauth countered, grabbing a steel bar alongside the bike’s passenger seat. “I like these bars here. I hold on to these bars. It keeps me awake.” Her son wasn’t convinced. “I’m not going to beat her on the helmet with a hammer to wake her up,” he said. “Generally she’s good for 45 minutes to an hour.” In decades past, Ms. Thiebauth and her husband, who died in 1994, often took Sunday rides to Canada and back. Then there were the four times they rode to Alaska, and the other two times they were turned back in the Yukon territories by snow. She’s survived two crashes, including one that earned her husband an extended hospital visit. It is probably wise not to touch this woman’s helmet with a hammer. In years past, Mr. Thiebauth said, he rode to Marcus Dairy with no plan for the day, then gathered ideas. “Bike shows? Races? Clambakes? Then you just move along with the crowd.” A few times a year, Marcus Dairy holds the bikers’ attention for the entire day, with a so-called Cycle Sunday rally featuring dozens of vendors, music, a motorcycle show and between 5,000 and 10,000 attendees — some of whom arrive on four wheels. Last Sunday’s rally was the last one held at this site, since the incoming retailers won’t yield their parking lots to such a massive crowd. The regular Sunday crew will still fit in the dairy bar’s lot, Mr. Marcus said. Whether the place can recreate its chemistry is another question. After all, the big cycle Sunday rallies somehow managed to lose their charm over the years, Mr. Thiebauth pointed out. “It got to be all about clothes,” he said, “and everything was black.” “But the place itself, it’ll be missed,” he added. “Put it this way: it’ll be a hole somewhere in the background. Like if you’re divorced or whatever.”

Motorcycles Motor Bikes and Motorscooters


France: Free Abortions for Teenagers

Abstract: The lower house of the French Parliament voted on Friday to fully reimburse all abortions and to make contraception free for minors from the age of 15 to 18. France ’s national medical insurance pays for abortions for minors and the poor, while other women are reimbursed for up to 80 percent of the procedure’s cost, which can be as much as $580. Contraception is partly reimbursed. The bill now goes to the Senate, where it is likely to pass.

France
Abortion
Teenagers and Adolescence
Law and Legislation
Birth Control and Family Planning


With Freddie Roach

Abstract: Tyson, De La Hoya, Pacquiao. Freddie Roach has worked with the best. Roach was a successful lightweight, with a 40-13 record before he retired at 26; he later developed Parkinson’s disease. Roach, who was tutored by Eddie Futch, has guided 28 boxers to become world champions. He was inducted to the World Boxing Hall of Fame and was recently elected to the International Boxing Hall of Fame. The United States Olympic Committee has partnered with Roach, 51, to train the leading amateurs at Roach’s Wild Card gym in Hollywood for the 2012 Games in London. His life will be chronicled by the filmmaker Peter Berg in the HBO series “ On Freddie Roach ” beginning Jan. 20. Q. You still do some light sparring and padded glove work when you work with the boxers. Are you concerned about exacerbating your Parkinson’s? A. I’ve found that the hand and eye coordination is the best thing in the world for me. It’s funny, but once I get into the ring, the tremors go away and everything is O.K. And I don’t get hit in the head too often. Maybe once in a while. Q. Has boxing done enough for the safety of the fighters? A. I think so. It’s really hard to pinpoint where the problems are. Some of the tests can show progression where the symptoms are getting worse, and that’s the biggest thing out there. They do a brain stimulation test in England where they pull your license if you test poorly. There are steps in the right direction. Q. Have you connected with Muhammad Ali, who also developed Parkinson’s? A. Yes. I was invited to his fund-raiser. And he came out to my gym one day. The funny thing about it was, once he started to hit the heavy bag, his tremors went away and he was fine. But as soon as he stopped, the tremors came back. We both have that muscle memory to box. Just like when I’m in the ring working out, everything goes away. Q. Your fighter Manny Pacquiao won a controversial decision against Juan Manuel Marquez in November to retain his welterweight title. What do you think about those who contend that Marquez won the bout? A. It was very close and very competitive, and every time they fight it will be the same way. They know each other very well. Manny has trouble with that counterpunching style. That’s something that we’ve been working on for a long time. That gives him more trouble than a guy that will come to him. Q. Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather has been put on hold again. After negotiations about blood testing seemed to be settled, last month Mayweather was sentenced to prison on charges of domestic violence and harassment. Will the fight ever happen? A. Sometimes I think it will be forever up in the air. Everywhere I go, they want that fight to happen. And I want it as badly as anyone. Hopefully it will get made soon. Manny probably has four or five fights left in him and I’m sure Mayweather will be one of them. Q. If Pacquiao and Mayweather do meet, what will your strategy be? A. We do have trouble with the counterpunching style, and Floyd is a great counterpuncher. We have to go in with a good game plan. If one guy averages 85 punches a round and one guy averages 15 punches a round, I think the 85 will beat the 15. The thing is, Mayweather is very precise and very conservative with his punches. But he’s very accurate and he lands good shots. There’s no doubt it’s a tough fight. It’s a challenge and that’s why I like it. I like getting ready for challenges. And Mayweather is the biggest challenge for me and Manny. Q. Whom will Pacquiao fight next? A. I talked to Bob Arum (the Top Rank promoter) the other day, and the three names we’re looking at now are (Lamont) Peterson, (Timothy) Bradley and (Miguel) Cotto. I told Bob it doesn’t matter to me. We’ll fight anyone of those guys. Q. In 2010, Pacquiao was elected to the Philippines Congress representing the province of Sarangani. He’s talked about running for governor in 2013. Do you think his political career can be a distraction to his training? A. Being a congressman is one thing. But being the governor brings a lot more responsibility. I don’t think he could do both. He gets time off as a congressman, but a governor has to be more hands on. And he really wants to be good at politics. And for him to be good at politics, he’s going to have to put his whole life into it. I would say he would be close to retirement for him to be governor. Q. How many fights do you think he has left? A. The way our training camp went before the Marquez fight, I would say he had a long career ahead of him. We had a great training camp. But something was distracting him in that fight. I haven’t put my finger on it yet. We had a great camp, but we did not have a great performance in the fight. I have to give some credit to Marquez about that. But his focus was not there. It was the first time in 10 years we had a bad night. It was bad timing on our part. Q. You trained Mike Tyson late in his career. What do you think happened to a fighter many experts thought would be the best heavyweight in history? A. If you do something for a long enough time, anything can get old. I think he got tired of it. Inside of four rounds, he would knock you out. Outside of that, he would bow out. Q. What has been the key to your success as a trainer? A. The relationship and the trust I have with my fighters. They know I’m there for them 1,000 percent. Q. What’s the most important aspect of training that Eddie Futch passed along to you? A. You can’t change a fighter. You can’t make them something that they’re not. Once they get hit in the ring, they’re going to revert back to what they are. A boxer, a puncher — take what they have. Improve on the weak points. The strong points, they have down pretty much already. Q. You’re a student of boxing history. Who are your top boxers, regardless of weight class? A. I like Joe Louis. He was the best textbook fighter in the world. Then there’s Ali, who wasn’t a textbook fighter but probably would have beaten Joe Louis because of his natural ability. Julio César Chávez. And Ruben Olivares who I consider the best Mexican boxer in history. Salvador Sanchez who died tragically and shortened a great career. And Sugar Ray Robinson may have been better than anyone. There are no films of him fighting as a welterweight. But you can guess how good he was at that weight. Q. You also work with Ultimate Fighting Championship competitors. How is the training different? A. I’m training Georges St. Pierre, who is recovering from knee surgery now. I train these guys to use their hands because that’s all I know. If I can make them better fighters, I will. It’s not more complicated than that. A good fight’s a good fight. Q. Who would win a fight between champions from both sports? A. How long would Randy Couture last with James Toney in a boxing match? About the same as Toney would last in a mixed martial arts match. Boxers don’t know ground games and M.M.A. guys don’t know how to box. Q. You’ve also trained actors and other athletes, including Mickey Rourke, who tried boxing as a career; Shaquille O’Neal; and Mark Wahlberg, for movie and television roles. Which celebrity had the most potential to succeed in boxing? A. I’ve been making some noise about Wahlberg and Mario Lopez fighting each other. They both train in my gym. They’re both very good. Mario has fought six exhibition fights in my gym. He’s 6-0 with six knockouts. He trains everyday, just like a fighter. Wahlberg has his own gym. I would like to get them together for a charity bout. That would be fun.

Boxing
Television
Roach Freddie
Parkinson's Disease
On Freddie Roach (TV Program)
Home Box Office


Who Spewed That Abuse? Anonymous Yik Yak App Isn’t Telling

Abstract: During a brief recess in an honors course at Eastern Michigan University last fall, a teaching assistant approached the class’s three female professors. “I think you need to see this,” she said, tapping the icon of a furry yak on her iPhone. The app opened, and the assistant began scrolling through the feed. While the professors had been lecturing about post-apocalyptic culture, some of the 230 or so freshmen in the auditorium had been having a separate conversation about them on a social media site called Yik Yak. There were dozens of posts, most demeaning, many using crude, sexually explicit language and imagery. After class, one of the professors, Margaret Crouch, sent off a flurry of emails — with screenshots of some of the worst messages attached — to various university officials, urging them to take some sort of action. “I have been defamed, my reputation besmirched. I have been sexually harassed and verbally abused,” she wrote to her union representative. “I am about ready to hire a lawyer.” In the end, nothing much came of Ms. Crouch’s efforts, for a simple reason: Yik Yak is anonymous. There was no way for the school to know who was responsible for the posts. Eastern Michigan is one of a number of universities whose campuses have been roiled by offensive “yaks.” Since the app was introduced a little more than a year ago, it has been used to issue threats of mass violence on more than a dozen college campuses, including the University of North Carolina, Michigan State University and Penn State. Racist, homophobic and misogynist “yaks” have generated controversy at many more, among them Clemson, Emory, Colgate and the University of Texas. At Kenyon College, a “yakker” proposed a gang rape at the school’s women’s center. In much the same way that Facebook swept through the dorm rooms of America’s college students a decade ago, Yik Yak is now taking their smartphones by storm. Its enormous popularity on campuses has made it the most frequently downloaded anonymous social app in Apple’s App Store, easily surpassing competitors like Whisper and Secret. At times, it has been one of the store’s 10 most downloaded apps. Image “I have been defamed, my reputation besmirched. I have been sexually harassed and verbally abused. I am about ready to hire a lawyer,” said Margaret Crouch, professor of philosophy at Eastern Michigan University, after learning of comments posted about her on Yik Yak. Credit Joshua Lott for The New York Times Like Facebook or Twitter , Yik Yak is a social media network, only without user profiles. It does not sort messages according to friends or followers but by geographic location or, in many cases, by university. Only posts within a 1.5-mile radius appear, making Yik Yak well suited to college campuses. Think of it as a virtual community bulletin board — or maybe a virtual bathroom wall at the student union. It has become the go-to social feed for college students across the country to commiserate about finals, to find a party or to crack a joke about a rival school. Much of the chatter is harmless. Some of it is not. “Yik Yak is the Wild West of anonymous social apps,” said Danielle Keats Citron, a law professor at University of Maryland and the author of “Hate Crimes in Cyberspace.” “It is being increasingly used by young people in a really intimidating and destructive way.” Colleges are largely powerless to deal with the havoc Yik Yak is wreaking. The app’s privacy policy prevents schools from identifying users without a subpoena, court order or search warrant, or an emergency request from a law-enforcement official with a compelling claim of imminent harm. Schools can block access to Yik Yak on their Wi-Fi networks, but banning a popular social media network is controversial in its own right, arguably tantamount to curtailing freedom of speech. And as a practical matter, it doesn’t work anyway. Students can still use the app on their phones with their cell service. Yik Yak was created in late 2013 by Tyler Droll and Brooks Buffington, fraternity brothers who had recently graduated from Furman University in South Carolina. Mr. Droll majored in information technology and Mr. Buffington in accounting. Both 24, they came up with the idea after realizing that there were only a handful of popular Twitter accounts at Furman, almost all belonging to prominent students, like athletes. With Yik Yak, they say, they hoped to create a more democratic social media network, one where users didn’t need a large number of followers or friends to have their posts read widely. “We thought, ‘Why can’t we level the playing field and connect everyone?’ ” said Mr. Droll, who withdrew from medical school a week before classes started to focus on the app. “When we made this app, we really made it for the disenfranchised,” Mr. Buffington added. Just as Mark Zuckerberg and his roommates introduced Facebook at Harvard, Mr. Buffington and Mr. Droll rolled out their app at their alma mater, relying on fraternity brothers and other friends to get the word out. Within a matter of months, Yik Yak was in use at 40 or so colleges in the South. Then came spring break. Some early adopters shared the app with college students from all over the country at gathering places like Daytona Beach and Panama City. “And we just exploded,” Mr. Buffington said. Image Yik Yak founders Tyler Droll and Brooks Buffington at their offices in Atlanta. Credit Raymond McCrea Jones for The New York Times Mr. Droll and Mr. Buffington started Yik Yak with a loan from Mr. Droll’s parents. (His parents also came up with the company’s name, which was inspired by the 1958 song, “Yakety Yak.” ) In November, Yik Yak closed a $62 million round of financing led by one of Silicon Valley’s biggest venture capital firms, Sequoia Capital, valuing the company at hundreds of millions of dollars. The Yik Yak app is free. Like many tech start-ups, the company, based in Atlanta, doesn’t generate any revenue. Attracting advertisers could pose a challenge, given the nature of some of the app’s content. For now, though, Mr. Droll and Mr. Buffington are focused on extending Yik Yak’s reach by expanding overseas and moving beyond the college market, much as Facebook did. Yik Yak’s popularity among college students is part of a broader reaction against more traditional social media sites like Facebook, which can encourage public posturing at the expense of honesty and authenticity. “Share your thoughts with people around you while keeping your privacy,” Yik Yak’s home page says. It is an attractive concept to a generation of smartphone users who grew up in an era of social media — and are thus inclined to share — but who have also been warned repeatedly about the permanence of their digital footprint. In a sense, Yik Yak is a descendant of JuicyCampus , an anonymous online college message board that enjoyed a brief period of popularity several years ago. Matt Ivester, who founded JuicyCampus in 2007 and shut it in 2009 after it became a hotbed of gossip and cruelty, is skeptical of the claim that Yik Yak does much more than allow college students to say whatever they want, publicly and with impunity. “You can pretend that it is serving an important role on college campuses, but you can’t pretend that it’s not upsetting a lot of people and doing a lot of damage,” he said. “When I started JuicyCampus, cyberbullying wasn’t even a word in our vernacular. But these guys should know better.” Yik Yak’s founders say the app’s overnight success left them unprepared for some of the problems that have arisen since its introduction. In response to complaints, they have made some changes to their product, for instance, adding filters to prevent full names from being posted. Certain keywords, like “Jewish,” or “bomb,” prompt this message: “Pump the brakes, this yak may contain threatening language. Now it’s probably nothing and you’re probably an awesome person but just know that Yik Yak and law enforcement take threats seriously. So you tell us, is this yak cool to post?” In cases involving threats of mass violence, Yik Yak has cooperated with authorities. Most recently, in November, local police traced the source of a yak — “I’m gonna [gun emoji] the school at 12:15 p.m. today” — to a dorm room at Michigan State University. The author, Matthew Mullen, a freshman, was arrested within two hours and pleaded guilty to making a false report or terrorist threat. He was spared jail time but sentenced to two years’ probation and ordered to pay $800 to cover costs connected to the investigation. Image A Yik Yak post that prompts a cautionary message. In the absence of a specific, actionable threat, though, Yik Yak zealously protects the identities of its users. The responsibility lies with the app’s various communities to police themselves by “upvoting” or “downvoting” posts. If a yak receives a score of negative 5, it is removed. “Really, what it comes down to is that we try to empower the communities as much as we can,” Mr. Droll said. When Yik Yak appeared, it quickly spread across high schools and middle schools, too, where the problems were even more rampant. After a rash of complaints last winter at a number of schools in Chicago, Mr. Droll and Mr. Buffington disabled the app throughout the city. They say they have since built virtual fences — or “geo-fences” — around about 90 percent of the nation’s high schools and middle schools. Unlike barring Yik Yak from a Wi-Fi network, which has proved ineffective in limiting its use, these fences actually make it impossible to open the app on school grounds. Mr. Droll and Mr. Buffington also changed Yik Yak’s age rating in the App Store from 12 and over to 17 and over. Toward the end of last school year, almost every student at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire had the app on his or her phone and checked it constantly to read the anonymous attacks on fellow students, faculty members and deans. “Please stop using Yik Yak immediately,” Arthur Cosgrove, the dean of residential life, wrote in an email to the student body. “Remove it from your phones. It is doing us no good.” At Exeter’s request, the company built a geo-fence around the school, but it covered only a few buildings. Students continued using the app on different parts of the sprawling campus. “We made the app for college kids, but we quickly realized it was getting into the hands of high schoolers, and high schoolers were not mature enough to use it,” Mr. Droll said. The widespread abuse of Yik Yak on college campuses, though, suggests that the distinction may be artificial. Last spring, Jordan Seman, then a sophomore at Middlebury College, was scrolling through Yik Yak in the dining hall when she happened across a post comparing her to a “hippo” and making a sexual reference about her. “It’s so easy for anyone in any emotional state to post something, whether that person is drunk or depressed or wants to get revenge on someone,” she said. “And then there are no consequences.” Image The Yik Yak mascot outside a fraternity at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill last week. The anonymous digital bulletin board has been a hit, if a problematic one, at colleges across the country. Credit Travis Dove for The New York Times In this sense, the problem with Yik Yak is a familiar one. Anyone who has browsed the comments of an Internet post is familiar with the sorts of intolerant, impulsive language that the cover of anonymity tends to invite. But Yik Yak’s particular design can produce especially harmful consequences. “It’s a problem with the Internet culture in general, but when you add this hyper-local dimension to it, it takes on a more disturbing dimension,” says Elias Aboujaoude, a Stanford psychiatrist and the author of “Virtually You.” “You don’t know where the aggression is coming from, but you know it’s very close to you.” Jim Goetz, a partner at Sequoia Capital who recently joined Yik Yak’s board, said the app’s history of misuse was a concern when his firm considered investing in the company. But he said he was confident that Mr. Droll and Mr. Buffington were committed to ensuring more positive interactions on Yik Yak, and that over time, the constructive voices would overwhelm the destructive ones. “It’s certainly a challenge to the company,” Mr. Goetz said. “It’s not going to go away in a couple of months.” Ms. Seman wrote about her experience being harassed on Yik Yak in the school newspaper, The Middlebury Campus, prompting a schoolwide debate over what to do about the app. Unable to reach a consensus, the paper’s editorial board wrote two editorials, one urging a ban, the other arguing that the problem wasn’t Yik Yak but the larger issue of cyberbullying. (Middlebury has not taken any action.) Similar debates have played out at other schools. At Clemson, a group of African-American students unsuccessfully lobbied the university to ban Yik Yak when some racially offensive posts appeared after a campus march to protest the grand jury decision’s not to indict a white police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Mo. “We think that in the educational community, First Amendment rights are very important,” said Leon Wiles, the school’s chief diversity officer. “It’s just problematic because you have young people who use it with no sense of responsibility.” During the fall, Maxwell Zoberman, the sophomore representative to the student government at Emory, started noticing a growing number of yaks singling out various ethnic groups for abuse. “Fave game to play while driving around Emory: not hit an Asian with a truck,” read one. Image Maxwell Zoberman, a student at Emory University, became a target of vitriol on Yik Yak after leading a charge to have the app disabled. “Guys stop with all this hate. Let’s just be thankful we arn’t black,” read another. After consulting the university’s code, Mr. Zoberman discovered that statements deemed derogatory to any particular group of people were not protected by the school’s open expression policy, and were in fact in violation of its discriminatory harassment rules. Just because the statements were made on an anonymous social-media site should not, in his mind, prevent Emory from acting to enforce its own policies. “It didn’t seem right that the school took one approach to hate speech in a physical medium and another one in a digital medium,” he said. Mr. Zoberman drafted a resolution to have Yik Yak disabled on the school’s Wi-Fi network. He recognized that this would not stop students from using the app, but he nevertheless felt it was important for the school to take a stand. After Mr. Zoberman formally proposed his resolution to the student government, someone promptly posted about it on Yik Yak. “The reaction was swift and harsh,” he said. “I seem to have redirected all of the fury of the anonymous forum. Yik Yak was just dominated with hateful and other aggressive posts specifically about me.” One compared him to Hitler. A few colleges have taken the almost purely symbolic step of barring Yik Yak from their servers. John Brown University, a Christian college in Arkansas, did so after its Yik Yak feed was overrun with racist commentary during a march connected to the school’s World Awareness Week. Administrators at Utica College in upstate New York blocked the app in December in response to a growing number of sexually graphic posts aimed at the school’s transgender community. In December, a group of 50 professors at Colgate University — which had experienced a rash of racist comments on the app earlier in the fall — tried a different approach, flooding the app with positive posts. Generally speaking, though, the options are limited. A student who felt that he or she had been the target of an attack on Yik Yak could theoretically pursue defamation charges and subpoena the company to find out who had written the post. But it is a difficult situation to imagine, given the cost and murky legal issues involved. Schools will probably just stand back and hope that respect and civility prevail, that their communities really will learn to police themselves. Yik Yak’s founders say their start-up is just experiencing some growing pains. “It’s definitely still a learning process for us,” Mr. Buffington said, “and we’re definitely still learning how to make the community more constructive.”

Yik Yak
Eastern Michigan University
Social Media
Threat
College
Middlebury College
Cyberharassment,Online harassment
Mobile Apps