Month: June 2018

Theater Club at NASA Center Gives Scientists Creative Outlet

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

By day, she’s a cryogenics engineer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, where she works on what she calls a “baby step toward a mission to Mars.” By night, she participates in Goddard’s Music and Drama Club, often known as MAD. She played keyboard for the club’s spring musical.  

“The work here can get very intense,” said Breon, a 30-year NASA veteran. “We did our thermal vacuum testing a couple of months ago, and it was an around-the-clock, 24/7 operation.” 

The club members include scientists, engineers and managers who work for NASA on projects including weather satellites and space telescopes, and they say the club is a creative outlet for them.  

“We’ve got more engineers per square foot than any other theater group around,” said Randy Barth, who directed the club’s latest musical, “Weird Romance.”

MAD has staged at least one show a year at Goddard since 1970, from “Oklahoma!” and “The Sound of Music” to science-fiction fare. Club members say it helps them with their day jobs and shows the public another side of scientists at the sprawling flight center northeast of Washington.

Astrophysicist Kim Weaver is the club’s president. Doing theater helps her connect with people who aren’t scientists, she says.  

“When I say I’m an astrophysicist, I usually get a blank stare. So in order to get (people) to actually open up and smile at me, I then say I also do theater, because that’s the part that they think is cool,” Weaver said. “You say you’re a scientist, and I think that scares people. They think they can’t talk to you.”

She was a graduate student intern when she saw a flyer about the club’s auditions for “Sweet Charity.” Making the show was what led her to take a job at Goddard. 

“It really helped improve my chances, even in my career,” Weaver said. “I met some more senior astronomers who later on down the line were able to help steer me and guide me in my career path.”

“Weird Romance’” combines science and drama.  

In the first act, “The Girl Who Was Plugged In,” a corporate mogul creates his own celebrity using a beautiful, artificial body that is controlled by a homeless woman. 

The second, “Her Pilgrim Soul,” was adapted from a “Twilight Zone” episode. In it, a projector shows holographic images of a woman that were not programmed into it, to the surprise of the scientists involved. 

One of the production’s stage directions describes a character as having “a smile that could melt frozen methane.” 

Breon considered that a good omen, since her job actually involves melting frozen methane. 

“We have to do more than smile at it, though,” she joked. 
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Warner Bros. to Release New Prince Album in September

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Warner Bros. Records has announced a new Prince album on what would have been the musician’s 60th birthday.

 

The company said Thursday that “Piano & A Microphone 1983” from Prince’s storied vault will be released on Sept. 21 on CD, vinyl and digital formats.

 

Warner Bros. says the album features Prince working through nine tracks in a private rehearsal recording at his now-demolished home studio in the Minneapolis suburb of Chanhassen.

 

Among the songs are “17 Days,” Joni Mitchell’s “A Case of You,” “Strange Relationship,” “International Lover” and “Purple Rain,” the title song of Prince’s 1984 hit movie.

 

Also included is Prince performing the spiritual “Mary Don’t You Weep.”

 

Prince was 57 when he died of an accidental fentanyl overdose at his Paisley Park recording complex in 2016.
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Google Says No to Doing AI Weapons Work

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

Google won’t do artificial intelligence work for weapons, the company said Thursday.  

The company will not work on “technologies that cause or are likely to cause overall harm,” wrote Sundar Pichai, Google’s CEO, in a blog post.

 

Google has come under fire in recent months for its contract with the U.S. Department of Defense to use AI for sifting through drone footage. AI is a field of study whereby a computer or technology is able to do things typically associated with human behavior, such as make decisions, plan and learn.

 

Google and other tech firms have been bringing the advances in AI to fields such as medicine, natural disaster planning, energy, transportation and manufacturing.

But these advances have also led to ethical concerns about the kinds of decisions being made without human input.

“How AI is developed and used will have a significant impact on society for many years to come,” Pichai wrote. “As a leader in AI, we feel a special responsibility to get this right.”

 

Sifting through drone footage

In recent months, more than 4,000 Google employees signed a petition calling for the cancellation of the company’s contract with the Department of Defense as part of the DoD’s Project Maven initiative. They joined other critics in raising alarms that the project could lead to the use of autonomous weapons.

 

Last week, a Google executive reportedly told employees that the company would not seek to renew its Project Maven contract with the military.  

Kirk Hanson, the executive director of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University, which counts Google as a financial supporter, said Google’s contract highlights a larger debate about AI and military applications.

“Until we have trust that those systems will not make mistakes, we’re going to have a lot of doubts about the use of artificial intelligence for autonomous weapons,” Hanson said.

 

Google will continue some work for the military, Pichai said.

 

“We want to be clear that while we are not developing AI for use in weapons, we will continue our work with governments and the military in many other areas,” he said. “These include cybersecurity, training, military recruitment, veterans’ healthcare, and search and rescue.”
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NASA Rover Data Shows Mars Had Ingredients Needed for Life

By Uponsci | | No Comments | Science

A NASA rover has detected a bonanza of organic compounds on the surface of Mars and seasonal fluctuations of atmospheric methane in findings released on Thursday that mark some of the strongest evidence ever that Earth’s neighbor may have harbored life.

But National Aeronautics and Space Administration scientists emphasized there could be nonbiological explanations for both discoveries made by the Curiosity rover at a site called Gale crater, leaving the issue of Martian life a tantalizing but unanswered question.

Three different types of organic molecules were discovered when the rover dug just 2 inches (5 cm) into roughly 3.5 billion-year-old mudstone, a fine-grained sedimentary rock, at Gale crater, apparently the site of a large lake when ancient Mars was warmer and wetter than the desolate planet it is today.

Curiosity also measured an unexpectedly large seasonal cycle in the low levels of atmospheric methane. About 95 percent of the methane in Earth’s atmosphere is produced from biological activity, though the scientists said it is too soon to know if the Martian methane also is related to life.

Organic molecules are the building blocks of life, though they can also be produced by chemical reactions unrelated to life. The scientists said it is premature to know whether or not the compounds were created in biological processes.

Whether anywhere other than Earth has harbored life, perhaps even in microbial form, is one of the paramount questions in science.

“There’s three possible sources for the organic material,” said astrobiologist Jennifer Eigenbrode of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. “The first one would be life, which we don’t know about. The second would be meteorites. And the last one is geological processes, meaning the rock-forming processes themselves.”

The rover, which has allowed scientists to explore whether Mars ever boasted conditions conducive to life, in 2014 made the first definitive detection of organic molecules, also in Gale crater rock formed from ancient lake sediment — but it was a much more limited set of compounds.

“What the organic detections in the rock do is to add to the story of habitability. It tells us that this ancient environment on Mars could have supported life,” Eigenbrode said. “Everything that was needed to support life  was there. But it doesn’t tell us that life was there.”

Christopher Webster, an atmospheric science research fellow at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, said it is possible existing microbes are contributing to the Martian atmospheric methane.

“With this new data, we again cannot rule out microbial activity as a potential source,” Webster said.

The amount of methane peaked at the end of summer in the northern hemisphere at about 2.7 times the level of the lowest seasonal amount.

The scientists were surprised to find organic compounds, especially in the amounts detected, considering the harsh conditions, including bombardment of solar radiation on the Martian surface. After drilling, Curiosity heats the rock samples, releasing the compounds.

Referring to the findings regarding organic compounds and methane, Webster said, “They hint at an earlier time on Mars when water was present and the existence of primitive life forms was possible.”

The scientists hope to find better preserved organic compounds with Curiosity or other rovers that would allow them to check for chemical signatures of life.

The research was published in the journal Science.
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Doctor Uses Brain Scans in Diagnoses of Mental Illness

By Uponsci | | No Comments | Science

If doctors suspect a patient has a broken bone, they typically take an X-ray to be sure of the problem. But to treat a mental health issue, doctors typically don’t take a picture of the brain. One doctor is trying to change that with a controversial brain scan. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti explains.
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Hawaii Volcano Gives Experts Clues to Boost Science

By Uponsci | | No Comments | Science

Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano may be disrupting life in paradise with its bursts of ash and bright-orange lava, but it also has scientists wide-eyed, eager to advance what’s known about volcanoes.

The good news is: Volcanoes reveal secrets when they’re rumbling, which means Kilauea is producing a bonanza of information.

While scientists monitored Big Island lava flows in 1955 and 1960, equipment then was far less sophisticated. Given new technology, they can now gather and study an unprecedented volume of data.

“Geophysical monitoring techniques that have come online in the last 20 years have now been deployed at Kilauea,” said George Bergantz, professor of earth and space sciences at the University of Washington. “We have this remarkable opportunity … to see many more scales of behavior both preceding and during this current volcanic crisis.”

Starting May 3, Kilauea has fountained lava and flung ash and rocks from its summit, destroying hundreds of homes, closing key highways and prompting health warnings. Kilauea is one of five volcanos that form the Big Island, and is a “shield” volcano — built up over time as lava flows layer on top of layer.

Technically speaking, it has been continuously erupting since 1983. But the recent combination of earthquakes shaking the ground, steam-driven explosions at the top, and lava creeping into a new area some 12 miles (20 kilometers) from the summit represents a departure from its behavior over the past 35 years, said Erik Klemetti, a volcanologist at Ohio’s Denison University.

What’s happening now is a bit more like the Kilauea of nearly a century ago. In 1924, steam explosions at the summit lasted for more than two weeks.

Scientists are looking into what caused the change and whether this shift in the volcano’s magma plumbing system will become the new normal.

Radar allows researchers to measure the height of ash plumes shooting from the summit, even when they occur at night. Plume heights are an effect of how much heat energy is released and the explosion’s intensity.

“It’s one of the key factors that dictates how far ash will be dispersed,” said Charles Mandeville, volcano hazards coordinator for the U.S. Geological Survey. The other is where the winds are blowing. Such knowledge is useful in alerting the public.

Scientists can also monitor where gas is emerging, as well as determine its composition and volume. They can even measure the subtle rise and fall of the ground over a broad area and time — down to seconds — which suggests when and where magma is pooling underground.

Discovering variations or correlations between past and present activity provides more clues on what’s happening. It also helps scientists understand past lava flows, anticipate what could occur next, and pinpoint signs or patterns before an eruption.

“You’re sort of zeroing in on finer and finer levels of detail into how the volcano works,” said Michael Poland, a U.S. Geological Survey volcanologist. “The more stuff you put on the volcano to make measurements, the more you realize there’s stuff going on that you never knew.”

Better technology has also meant U.S. Geological Survey scientists have been able to accurately forecast Kilauea’s behavior as it sputters over Puna, the island’s most affected district.

“They’ve been spot on,” said Janine Krippner, a volcanologist at Concord University in West Virginia. “It’s incredible — they’re looking at things happening below the surface, using the monitoring equipment that they have, the knowledge they have of past eruptions, and have been able to get people to not be in a deadly area.”

This is unfortunately not always possible, as nature can be unpredictable. On June 3, Guatemala’s Volcano of Fire sent a mixture of hot gas, rock and other material racing down its slopes and inundating the valley, killing nearly 100 people.

Krippner compared the Guatemala eruption to opening a can of soda after shaking it vigorously. Volcanic gas underneath created bubbles that expanded, increasing pressure that blew magma apart when it reached the surface, spewing cooled lava rocks ranging from the size of sand grains to boulders.

Explosions can be bigger, or occur differently, than expected, and that presents a learning opportunity for scientists, who work on computer models to map out areas that may be at higher risk in the future. “Looking at the footage afterward, we can start to tease out how these things actually work,” Krippner said, as it’s often too dangerous for experts to physically get close to an eruption.

Volcanic eruptions happen fairly regularly — as many as 60 occur worldwide each year — but many are in isolated areas, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

After Kilauea’s 1924 summit explosions, the volcano entered a decade of piddly rumblings, followed by 18 years of silence. Experts say Kilauea may be heading toward years — even decades — of little or no activity.

For now, volcanologists feel a “tremendous amount of responsibility” to learn as much as possible from the volcano, Poland said. Its latest activity has destroyed about 400 homes — including about 280 over the last several days — and displaced thousands of residents. Lava from Kilauea has also downed power lines and knifed across highways.

“It’s coming at a great cost in terms of impact on the lives and livelihoods of so many people — we owe it to the people of Puna to make sure that we learn the lessons the volcano is teaching us,” Poland said.
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Trump’s Solar Tariff Costs US Companies Billions

By Uponbiz | | No Comments | Business

President Donald Trump’s tariff on imported solar panels has led U.S. renewable energy companies to cancel or freeze investments of more than $2.5 billion in large installation projects, along with thousands of jobs, the developers told Reuters.

That’s more than double the about $1 billion in new spending plans announced by firms building or expanding U.S. solar panel factories to take advantage of the tax on imports.

The tariff’s bifurcated impact on the solar industry underscores how protectionist trade measures almost invariably hurt one or more domestic industries for every one they shield from foreign competition. 

Trump announced the tariff in January over protests from most of the solar industry that the move would chill one of America’s fastest-growing sectors.

​Utility-scale projects

Solar developers completed utility-scale installations costing a total of $6.8 billion last year, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. Those investments were driven by U.S. tax incentives and the falling costs of imported panels, mostly from China, which together made solar power competitive with natural gas and coal.

The U.S. solar industry employs more than 250,000 people, about three times more than the coal industry, with about 40 percent of those people in installation and 20 percent in manufacturing, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

“Solar was really on the cusp of being able to completely take off,” said Zoe Hanes, chief executive of Charlotte, North Carolina solar developer Pine Gate Renewables.

Companies with domestic panel factories are divided on the policy. Solar giant SunPower Corp opposes the tariff that will help its U.S. panel factories because it will also hurt its domestic installation and development business, along with its overseas manufacturing operations.

“There could be substantially more employment without a tariff,” said Chief Executive Tom Werner.

​Lost profits, jobs

The 30 percent tariff is scheduled to last four years, decreasing by 5 percent per year during that time. Solar developers say the levy will initially raise the cost of major installations by 10 percent.

Leading utility-scale developer Cypress Creek Renewables LLC said it had been forced to cancel or freeze $1.5 billion in projects, mostly in the Carolinas, Texas and Colorado, because the tariff raised costs beyond the level where it could compete, spokesman Jeff McKay said.

That amounted to about 150 projects at various stages of development that would have employed 3,000 or more workers during installation, he said. The projects accounted for a fifth of the company’s overall pipeline.

Developer Southern Current has made similar decisions on about $1 billion of projects, mainly in South Carolina, said Bret Sowers, the company’s vice president of development and strategy.

“Either you make the decision to default or you bite the bullet and you make less money,” Sowers said.

Neither Cypress Creek nor Southern Current would disclose exactly which projects they intend to cancel. They said those details could help their competitors and make it harder to pursue those projects if they become financially viable later.

Both are among a group of solar developers that have asked trade officials to exclude panels used in their utility-scale projects from the tariffs. The office of the U.S. Trade Representative said it is still evaluating the requests.

Other companies are having similar problems.

Stockpiling panels

For some developers, the tariff has meant abandoning nascent markets in the American heartland that last year posted the strongest growth in installations. That growth was concentrated in states where voters supported Trump in the 2016 presidential election.

South Bend, Indiana-based developer Inovateus Solar LLC, for example, had decided three years ago to focus on emerging Midwest solar markets such as Indiana and Michigan. But the tariff sparked a shift to Massachusetts, where state renewable energy incentives make it more profitable, Chairman T.J. Kanczuzewski said.

Some firms saw the tariff coming and stockpiled panels before Trump’s announcement. For example, 174 Power Global, the development arm of Korea’s Hanwha warehoused 190 megawatts of solar panels at the end of last year for a Texas project that broke ground in January.

The company is paying more for panels for two Nevada projects that start operating this year and next, but is moving forward on construction, according to Larry Greene, who heads the firm’s development in the U.S. West.

‘A lot of robots’

Trump’s tariff has boosted the domestic manufacturing sector as intended, which over time could significantly raise U.S. panel production and reduce prices.

Panel manufacturers First Solar and JinkoSolar , for example, have announced plans to spend $800 million on projects to increase panel construction in the United States since the tariff, creating about 700 new jobs in Ohio and Florida. Last week, Korea’s Hanwha Q CELLS joined them, saying it will open a solar module factory in Georgia next year, though it did not detail job creation.

SunPower Corp, meanwhile, purchased U.S. manufacturer SolarWorld’s Oregon factory after the tariff was announced, saving that facility’s 280 jobs. The company said it plans to hire more people at the plant to expand operations, without specifying how many.

But SunPower has also said it must cut up to 250 jobs in other parts of its organization because of the tariffs.

Jobs in panel manufacturing are also limited because of increasing automation, industry experts said.

Heliene, a Canadian company in the process of opening a U.S. facility capable of producing 150 megawatts worth of panels per year, said it will employ between 130 and 140 workers in Minnesota.

“The factories are highly automated,” said Martin Pochtaruk, president of Heliene. “You don’t employ too many humans. There are a lot of robots.
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Blockchain Advances Could Revolutionize Daily Life

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

As the internet continues to revolutionize communications, the next world-changing technology may already be here. Blockchain, a way of recording data and automatically storing it on computers around the world, has the potential to change everything from collecting crime scene evidence to creating new digital currencies. VOA’s Jill Craig visited a blockchain hackathon in Memphis, Tennessee, to learn more.
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Colorado Muslims Build a Mosque Inside a Community Center to Attract Their Children

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Prayer is an especially important part of Ramadan observances this month, and for Muslims in Aurora, Colorado, that happens at the Daral Tawheed mosque. The mosque is not just a focus for the religious community, it is part of a center for the entire community … with a swimming pool, tennis courts and a gym. As Alam Burhanan learned, the idea was to attract young Muslims to come to the mosque to pray … and play. VOA’s Ariono Arifin narrates his report.
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NASA Chief: US Will Always Have Astronauts in Orbit

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

Major changes could be ahead for the International Space Station but there will always be an American astronaut in orbit, NASA’s new boss said Wednesday.

The space agency is talking with private companies about potentially taking over the space lab after 2025, but no decision will made without the other 21 countries that are partners in the project, NASA Administrator James Bridenstine said in his first briefing with reporters.

President Donald Trump’s recent budget requests have put discussions about the station’s future “on steroids,” he said. Under Trump’s 2019 proposed budget, U.S. funding for the space station would end by 2025. The U.S. has spent more than $75 billion on the space station.

Options include splitting the station into different segments or reducing its size by breaking it up and discarding one part.

Always a US astronaut in orbit

But no matter what happens, there won’t be any gap when Americans aren’t in space, Bridenstine vowed. It won’t be as it was after the Apollo moon program closed or even the retirement of the space shuttle fleet, which has forced NASA to pay Russia to ferry astronauts to the station.

“There are kids graduating from high school this month, that their entire lives, we’ve had an astronaut in space,” Bridenstine said. “And we want that to live on in perpetuity forever. No gaps.”

Companies are interested in running the station and “there’s a range of options” that are just now being examined, he said.

The first station piece was launched in 1998. The complex was essentially completed with the end of the shuttle program in 2011. It is about the size of a six-bedroom house, complete with two bathrooms, a gym and a 360-degree bay window. It usually has a crew of six.

Climate change

In wide-ranging remarks, the former Oklahoma Republican congressman said he generally supports NASA’s Earth science missions, including missions that monitor heat-trapping carbon dioxide. He said at least three climate science satellites that the Trump administration had tried to cancel earlier in budget proposals “could all end up in very good shape” and that he supported them in Congress, crossing party lines.

“We’re going forth with missions that are going to do carbon monitoring,” he said, ticking off a couple of projects. “We’re committed to that.”

When told that a Pew Research poll out Wednesday said that 63 percent of Americans said NASA’s top priority should be monitoring key parts of Earth’s climate, Bridenstine said “good” and reiterated his acceptance of human-caused climate change as a threat to national security and the globe.

Back to the moon

Bridenstine also said he hopes NASA will put some kind of small robotic landers on the moon next year, followed at some later date by humans. Astronauts should use the moon as a “proving ground” for future missions to Mars, especially checking out potential health issues for living far away from Earth for a long time. He said he worried about balance, vision, bone loss and heart issues that have been reported with space station astronauts.

“We do not want to go to Mars and have our astronauts to be marshmallows on the surface of Mars,” Bridenstine said. “The moon is our best opportunity to be successful when we go to Mars.”
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Emirates Seeks to Lead the Way to Windowless Planes

By Uponbiz | | No Comments | Business

Passenger jets of the future will be safer, lighter, faster, more fuel-efficient and … windowless.

So predicts Emirates Airlines chief Tim Clark. The Dubai-based airline has already introduced virtual windows in the first-class suites of its newest planes. 

Instead of being able to see out a conventional window, the passengers will be able to enjoy the view on a full display of windows that will project live camera feeds on a high-definition screen. 

Clark said the images are “so good, it’s better than with the natural eye.”

Clark told the BBC that the ultimate goal was to have a completely windowless plane. 

“Now you have a fuselage which has no structural weaknesses because of windows. The aircraft are lighter, the aircraft could fly faster, they’ll burn less fuel and fly higher,” he said.

But Emirates’ experiment has raised concerns that might not win it the votes of safety regulators. Some passengers have expressed concerns of possibly feeling claustrophobic on windowless planes. 
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Last Munchkin Dies at 98

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

The last Munchkin has died.

Actor Jerry Maren was the last survivor of the group of little people known as Munchkins who greeted Judy Garland’s Dorothy when she landed in Munchkinland in the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz. He died May 24 at age 98 in a San Diego nursing home, but news of his death did not become widely known  until Wednesday.

Maren immortalized himself as a member of the Lollipop Guild when he sang, shuffled his feet and presented Dorothy with a lollipop.

He appeared in countless television shows and commercials and in dozens of other movies, most notably the Marx Brothers’ At the Circus. 
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Trump ‘Will Be Sticking to His Guns’ at G-7 Summit, Adviser Says

By Uponbiz | | No Comments | Business

U.S. President Donald Trump “will be sticking to his guns” at the upcoming Group of Seven summit despite criticism of his trade policies from allies, one of his key economic advisers told reporters Wednesday.

“The president is at ease with all these tough issues,” said Larry Kudlow, director of the National Economic Council. “There’s always tension about something” between the United States and other G-7 members.

The comments in the White House press briefing room came shortly after both Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is hosting the G-7 summit in Quebec’s Charlevoix region, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel forecast difficult discussions on Friday and Saturday.

Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said, “This is essentially a recipe for a G-6 plus one.”

Protecting American workers

Kudlow, in his remarks, denied the United States was engaged in a trade war with its strategic partners, as well as China, but said that the United States would do what was necessary to protect American workers and industries.

Speaking to reporters in Brussels on Wednesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said it was too early to call the tariffs dispute a trade war and contended the United States was justified in demanding “fair and reciprocal” trade with its partners.

Mattis said economic disputes with allies were not expected to damage military and security relations.

Kudlow said that “the world trading system is a mess. It’s broken down.” But, he added, “Don’t blame Trump. Blame the nations that have broken away from those conditions.”

It is now clear that the United States and the other G-7 countries are “no longer singing from the same hymn book,” and that has serious ramifications for the global trading order, said Lynn Fischer Fox, a former deputy assistant secretary for policy and negotiations in the U.S. Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration.

Fischer Fox, who led negotiations for a number of trade remedy disputes during former President Barack Obama’s administration, described Trump’s approach to trade as upsetting and unpredictable.

Asked by VOA News whether the administration would respect decisions of the World Trade Organization filed against the United States over recent tariffs imposed by Trump, Kudlow replied: “We are bound by the national interests here more than anything else. International multilateral organizations are not going to determine American policy.” 

While there have been tensions between the United States and other G-7 leaders previously on strategic issues, such as the placement of nuclear weapons in Europe and the Iraq War, this rift appears far more fundamental, according to some analysts.

International rules

The United States has always followed the international rules, Fischer Fox told VOA. “And we’ve confronted other nations that use this kind of tactic of saber-rattling or hostage-taking, as it were, to try to get what they want out of the international system, outside of the rules,” she said.

Fischer Fox contended, “Violating the rules doesn’t give you a means to negotiate around the rules. If they [the Trump administration] want to negotiate the rules to be different, that’s what they should be putting on the table.”

The leaders of the other countries have no political choice now but to confront Trump, Kirkegaard, of the Peterson Institute, told VOA.

“If you do not sanction an American president who behaves like this, every president and administration after this will think that trade policy is something you can easily mess with,” Kierkegaard said.

Speaking in the Bundestag on Wednesday, Merkel warned that G-7 countries “must not keep watering down” previous summit conclusions committing the group to fair multilateral trade and rejecting protectionism.

“There must not be a compromise simply for the sake of a compromise,” Merkel said. If an acceptable agreement can’t be reached, a “chairman’s summary” by the Canadian hosts “is perhaps a more honest path — there is no sense in papering over divisions at will.”

Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, said Wednesday that steel and aluminum tariffs imposed by the United States coming into force on July 1 were illegal and that the Canadian response would be measured and proportionate.

Trump will be seeing many of the G-7 leaders again soon. He is set to meet British Prime Minister Theresa May in the United Kingdom next month. And he is also expected to attend the annual NATO summit to be held in Brussels in mid-July.
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Current Miss America: Scholarships Don’t Rely on Swimsuits

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

In the nine months that Cara Mund has been Miss America, not once has she ever had to don a swimsuit as part of her duties.

The reigning Miss America told The Associated Press on Tuesday night she supports the decision of the Miss America Organization to drop the swimsuit competition, starting this September.

The former Miss North Dakota said Miss America is all about scholarship opportunities for young women, adding they shouldn’t have to display their bodies in swimwear in order to get college assistance.

“Swimsuits should never equal scholarships,” she said. “I believe that a woman’s lifestyle and fitness can be showcased in a way that does not display her in a swimsuit. The Miss America Organization is a scholarship program. No woman should ever feel like her physical appearance limits her from seeking out these scholarship opportunities.”

Mund will be the last Miss America to have worn a swimsuit onstage during the nationally televised competition.

Gretchen Carlson, a former Miss America and the new head of the organization’s board of trustees, made the announcement Tuesday.

Carlson, whose sexual harassment lawsuit against Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes led to his departure, said the board had heard from potential contestants who lamented, “We don’t want to be out there in high heels and swimsuits.”

The announcement came after a shake-up at the organization that resulted in the top three positions being held by women. The overhaul was triggered by an email scandal last December in which Miss America officials mocked winners’ intelligence, looks and sex lives.

Instead of showing off in a bathing suit, each contestant will interact with the judges to “highlight her achievements and goals in life and how she will use her talents, passion and ambition to perform the job of Miss America,” the organization said.
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Pop Star David Cassidy Said He Lied About Dementia, Drinking

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Former teen idol David Cassidy did not have dementia, as he claimed before he died, and lied about giving up drinking, the singer told the makers of a documentary about him in the months before his death.

Cassidy, 67, who shot to fame in the 1970s TV show “The Partridge Family,” died of organ failure at age 67 in Florida in November 2017, nine months after declaring he was fighting dementia in a bid to stave off reports about odd behavior.

But in an excerpt released on Wednesday from documentary “David Cassidy: The Last Session,” Cassidy told producers that his problems were due to alcoholism.

“I have a liver disease,” Cassidy told one of the producers in a recorded telephone call after an emergency hospital admission in September.

“There is no sign of me having dementia at this stage of my life. It was complete alcohol poisoning. The fact is, I lied about my drinking,” he added.

Cassidy, whose hits “Cherish” and “I Think I Love You,” had teen girls swooning in the 1970s, was arrested three times for drunken driving between 2010 and 2014 and ordered to rehab as part of his sentence in 2014.

Speaking of his alcoholism, Cassidy told the documentary producers, “I did it to myself, to cover up the sadness and the emptiness.”

The documentary, which was chronicling the singer’s attempts to make a comeback and cope with dementia, was filmed in the months before his death and is due to be broadcast on cable channel A&E on June 11.

Cassidy, who was married three times, left a son, Beau, and a daughter Katie.

“We, the Cassidy family, were not affiliated with the A&E documentary. All we are interested in is maintaining the legacy of the icon he was,” Beau Cassidy said in a statement on Wednesday.

Co-producer Saralena Weinfield told People magazine that the documentary makers were unsure at first what to do with the footage and the telephone recording.

“We didn’t want to exploit him. But ultimately he was honest about what killed him and we decided that his legacy would be best served if we shared that,” Weinfield told People in an interview released on Wednesday.
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Cambridge Analytica Boss Admits Getting Facebook Data From Researcher

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

The former head of Cambridge Analytica admitted on Wednesday his firm had received data from the researcher at the center of a scandal over Facebook users’ personal details, contradicting previous testimony to

lawmakers.

Cambridge Analytica, which was hired by Donald Trump in 2016, has denied its work on the U.S. president’s successful election campaign made use of data allegedly improperly harvested from around 87 million Facebook users.

Former chief Alexander Nix, in earlier testimony to parliament’s media committee, also denied the political consultancy had ever been given data by Aleksandr Kogan, the researcher linked to the scandal.

On Wednesday he said it had received data from Kogan.

“Of course, the answer to this question should have been ‘yes,'” Nix said, adding that he thought he was being asked if Cambridge Analytica still held data from the researcher.

He denied deliberately misleading British lawmakers and said the company had deleted the data, which had been of no use.

The committee is investigating fake news, and focusing on the role of Cambridge Analytica and Facebook in the 2016 Brexit vote as well as the Trump election.

In lengthy, and often testy, questioning by lawmakers, Nix apologized for an undercover film in which he said Cambridge Analytica’s online campaign played a decisive role in Trump’s election win.

But he defended the now-defunct consultancy’s reputation and said he felt victimized.

Cambridge Analytica said after the film was broadcast by Channel 4 television in March that the comments did not “represent the values or operations of the firm.”

Lawmakers asked Nix to return to face questions about inconsistencies in his evidence.

Kogan had told lawmakers he did give Cambridge Analytica the data.

Facebook says Kogan harvested it by creating an app on the platform that was downloaded by 270,000 people, providing access not only to their own but also their friends’ personal data.

Facebook said Kogan then violated its policies by passing the data to Cambridge Analytica.

Embarrassed but vindicated

Nix apologized for his comments in the film, saying he had been foolish and had made exaggerated claims in order to attract what he thought was a potential client.

“It’s not only deeply embarrassing, but it’s something I regret enormously,” he said.

Nix said that Channel 4 had heavily edited the footage to portray him in a worse light. “All Mr Nix’s comments carried in our reports were used in context, including any caveats,” the broadcaster said in a statement.

On other matters, Nix was less apologetic.

He said that he was vindicated in saying Cambridge Analytica had not been involved in the Brexit campaign by a report by the Electoral Commission, and that whistleblower Christopher Wylie had lied about the consultancy’s involvement in Brexit.

Wylie had told the committee that Cambridge Analytica played a pivotal role in the campaign.

On Wednesday he told Channel 4: “I actually backed up everything I said with documents. I am quite comfortable standing by the statements that I made.”

Nix denied a story in the Financial Times that he had withdrawn $8 million from Cambridge Analytica before its collapse last month.

Asked about a Guardian report that a Cambridge Analytica employee visited Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in 2017, he said he had been unaware of the meeting.
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India’s Central Bank Raises Key Lending Rate to 6.25 Percent

By Uponbiz | | No Comments | Business

India’s central bank raised its benchmark lending rate Wednesday to tamp down rising inflation following an increase in oil prices.

The increase of one-quarter percentage point to 6.25 percent is the first since January 2014 and comes at a time when consumer inflation is at a four-year high.

The Reserve Bank of India said it expects inflation of 4.8 to 4.9 percent in the first half of the 2018-19 financial year, which started April 1.

More rate hikes are likely in coming months, said Shilan Shah of Capital Economics in a report.

The bank said crude oil prices have been volatile, causing uncertainty to the inflation outlook. There was a 12 percent increase in the price of Indian crude basket, which was sharper than expected.

The bank forecast GDP growth for the 2018-19 financial year at 7.4 percent, up from the previous year’s 6.7 percent.

That increase has been underpinned by improved rural demand on the back of a bumper harvest and the government’s emphasis on rural housing and infrastructure.

The bank said the forecast of a normal June-September monsoon is a good sign for agricultural.
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As Internet of Things Lacks World Market Leader, Focus Turns to Startups

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

A surge in participation by startup companies this week, at a highlight of Asia’s biggest annual tech event, shows an increased reliance on young entrepreneurs to come with the IT industry’s strongest ideas for connected devices and artificial intelligence.

The InnoVEX segment of Taipei Computex 2018 brought together 388 startups, a term usually defined as founder-owned firms of three to five years old. That number is a jump from 272 at the same event a year ago. Venture capitalists, including at least one with half a billion dollars in investment funds, evaluated them one-on-one and at formal pitching events.

Startups are catching attention as inventors of Internet-of-things technology because there’s no market leader yet, said Jamie Lin, founding partner of AppWorks Ventures, a startup accelerator in Taipei. That technology refers to software and hardware that let computers or phones communicate with everyday devices such as cameras and alarm systems.

Some connections run on artificial intelligence, which means computerized processing of the data collected from those devices. That can mean making human-like decisions.

“Computers continue to morph and there are no dominant players in IoT,” Lin said. “That’s why they need startups and that’s what makes the show relevant.”

In software, by contrast, Google and Microsoft dominate markets worldwide. Apple and Samsung, among others, lead in smartphones.

Coinciding with the tech show this week, Lin’s accelerator, another like it and a Japanese venture capital firm are all holding their own events in Taipei this week for startups.

Expanding market

More than 20 billion things will be connected to the internet by 2020, up from 8.4 billion connected last year, market research firm Gartner forecasts. The number will pick up especially as 5G wireless services speed up connections.

By next year, Gartner anticipates, startup firms working with artificial intelligence will overtake Amazon, Google, Microsoft and IBM in “driving the artificial intelligence economy” for businesses.

Artificial intelligence, also known by its abbreviation AI, will reach a market value of $1.2 trillion per year by 2020 as investment triples between now and then, Forrester Research said.

“There’s a process, which is experimental — error and trial, error and trial – so there’s no one with a ready solution, and AI is so broad that one that can do it all,” said Tracy Tsai, a Gartner research VP in Taipei.

“With AI startups, they say ‘I’m focused, I just do some part of it and I do it well, and I do it attentively,’” she said. “For companies looking for a full solution, if you can show your part works, then they use it.”

Venture capitalists watching

Venture capital firms at the three-day InnoVEX show Wednesday watched a spread of mostly Asian startups with software and hardware ideas focused largely on connected devices. Healthcare and the management of drones were among the fields that companies said they could help with AI.

The show offered chances for startups to pitch their ideas to venture capital firms and accelerators, which are programs that show young firms how to improve their businesses.

Startup promotion authorities from 13 countries, including France and the Netherlands, also scanned the exhibition hall for Asian firms that might complement their own.

“What we care about the most is whether these startups or smaller firms have technology, so if it’s a just a business model only, they aren’t suitable for us,” said Amanda Liu, CEO of the Taiwan government-backed business accelerator StarFab. Her accelerator takes 10 to 15 of every 100 applicants. “They need to have products and their core competence must come from technology.”

Taiwanese firms are good at altering hardware specs, Liu said, and for technology ideal for businesses rather than individual consumers, Liu said. Taiwan positioned itself decades ago as a high-tech hardware manufacturing hub for much of the world.

Qara was one AI-dependent startup at InnoVEX. The 4-year-old South Korean developer with $1 million in venture capital funding uses an AI algorithm to predict the movement of stock and cryptocurrency markets. It has earned revenues of $1.5 million and reports a profit.

“Anyone can see the predictions powered by AI,” said Qara’s global CEO Katie Bomi Son. In terms of accuracy, she said, “Some are from 70, or between 70 to 90. Most of our information [comes] from the machine.”

Qara counts mostly companies as clients but it’s looking for a way to monetize the free app for common users.
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