Month: July 2018

Lunar Eclipse, Blood Moon Delight Skywatchers in Cairo

Astronomers and local residents gathered to gaze in awe at the longest lunar eclipse of the 21st century: 1 hour, 43 minutes. During eclipses, the moon turns a red or brownish color because the light that reaches it passes through the earth’s atmosphere. In Cairo, astronomers with their telescopes volunteered to wow stargazers

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Next ‘Star Wars’ Film to Use Unreleased Fisher Footage

Carrie Fisher is not done with Star Wars after all. Lucasfilm says unreleased footage of the actress will be used in the next installment of the science fiction saga to draw her character’s story to an end.

The studio and writer-director J.J. Abrams announced Friday that footage of Fisher shot for 2015’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens will be used in the ninth film in the space opera’s core trilogies about the Skywalker family that includes Fisher’s character, Leia. 

Filming is scheduled to begin Wednesday at London’s Pinewood Studios.

Mark Hamill, who plays Luke Skywalker, will also appear in the film, which for the moment is simply called Episode IX. It is scheduled to be released in December 2019.

Fisher died in December 2016 after she finished work on the middle installment in the trilogy, The Last Jedi. Director Rian Johnson opted not to alter her storyline, leaving Leia’s fate to be handled by Abrams.

“We desperately loved Carrie Fisher,” Abrams said in a statement. “Finding a truly satisfying conclusion to the Skywalker saga without her eluded us.”

He said recasting Fisher or re-creating her using computer graphics, as was done in a spinoff film, Rogue One, was not an option.

“With the support and blessing from her daughter, Billie, we have found a way to honor Carrie’s legacy and role as Leia in Episode IX by using unseen footage we shot together in Episode VII,” Abrams said.

Friday’s announcement also confirmed that Billy Dee Williams will be returning to the franchise as Lando Calrissian, a hero of the rebellion who hasn’t been seen in the latest trilogy.

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Twitter Reports Drop in Active Users; Share Price Sinks

Twitter’s share price fell more than 20 percent Friday after the social media giant reported a drop in active users. 

Twitter said it had 335 million monthly users in the second quarter of the year, which was down a million from the amount of monthly users in the first quarter of the year, and below the 339 million users Wall Street was expecting.

Twitter said that the number of monthly users could continue to fall next quarter as the company continues to ban accounts that violate its terms of service and as it makes other accounts less visible.

The company says it is putting the long-term stability of its platform above user growth. However, the move has made it more difficult for investors to value the company, as they rely on data pertaining to the platform’s potential user reach.

Shares in Twitter tumbled 20.5 percent to close at $34.12 Friday. The fall in the share price came despite Twitter’s report of higher than expected revenue. During the last quarter, Twitter posted a profit of $100 million, marking the company’s third consecutive profitable quarter.

The drop in Twitter’s share price came a day after Facebook lost 19 percent of its value. Facebook said Thursday that slower user growth in big markets and increased spending to improve privacy would hit margins for years, leading to the company’s worst trading day since it went public in 2012.

Both Twitter and Facebook have been under pressure from regulators in several countries to protect user data as well as stamp out hate speech and misinformation.

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Facebook Sued after Stock Plunge

Facebook Inc and its chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, were sued Friday in what could be the first of many lawsuits over a disappointing earnings announcement by the social media company that wiped out about $120 billion of shareholder wealth.

The complaint filed by shareholder James Kacouris in Manhattan federal court accused Facebook, Zuckerberg and Chief Financial Officer David Wehner of making misleading statements about or failing to disclose slowing revenue growth, falling operating margins, and declines in active users.

Kacouris said the marketplace was “shocked” when “the truth” began to emerge Wednesday from the Menlo Park, California-based company. He said the 19 percent plunge in Facebook shares the next day stemmed from federal securities law violations by the defendants.

The lawsuit seeks class-action status and unspecified damages. A Facebook spokeswoman declined to comment.

Shareholders often sue companies in the United States after unexpected stock price declines, especially if the loss of wealth is large.

Facebook has faced dozens of lawsuits over its handling of user data in a scandal also concerning the U.K. firm Cambridge Analytica. Many have been consolidated in the federal court in San Francisco.

Thursday’s plunge also hit Zuckerberg’s bottom line.

Zuckerberg had been tied with Warren Buffett as the world’s fourth-richest person, but the Berkshire Hathaway Inc chairman’s current $83 billion fortune tops Zuckerberg’s $66 billion, Forbes magazine said.

Buffett now ranks third among the world’s billionaires, while Zuckerberg is sixth.

Facebook shares fell another 0.8 percent on Friday, closing at $174.89 on the Nasdaq.

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New Baby for Brigitte Nielsen, Age 54, Opens Debate on Older Mothers

How late is too late to become a mother? Actress Brigitte Nielsen has had her fifth child at 54, reopening debate on the growing number of women using IVF to have babies later in life.

Fertility experts say the average age of mothers is steadily rising across the world, with women increasingly turning to fertility treatments to extend their childbearing years.

Some have renewed calls for women to prioritize having children in their younger and more fertile years, but others said health providers needed to take into account the pressures that led women to put off starting a family.

“We should trust women to make this decision for themselves,” Katherine O’Brien, head of policy research at the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), a charity.

“What we need is a health care service that supports their decisions rather than trying to cajole women into children at a time that’s not right for them,” she told Reuters.

Nielsen said she conceived using eggs she had frozen in her 40s, an increasingly popular choice among women seeking to extend their fertile years.

Given that the quantity and quality of eggs declines with age, most women trying to conceive in their mid-40s or above would be advised to consider using donor eggs taken from a younger woman.

A recent analysis of fertility treatments in 1,279 institutions across Europe found almost a third of births through egg donation in 2014 were to women aged 40 or older.

One Indian woman thought to be in her 70s gave birth last year using a donor egg, according to Britain’s Guardian newspaper, a case that promoted debate over the ethics of older women using treatment to conceive.

“There is a global trend for women choosing to have their children later in life,” said Richard Kennedy, the president of the International Federation of Fertility Societies.

“Certainly, in the UK and western Europe it’s personal choices: It’s lifestyle, it’s women pursuing their professions and [they] are making lifestyle choices to delay having families to until their late 30s or early 40s,” he said.

Kennedy said pregnancies of women in their 50s or older “is not something that should necessarily be encouraged,” citing the heightened risks of cardiac and other health problems during pregnancy.

“I think that women should be conscious of their fertility,” he added. “A woman should be encouraged to consider that when she is making decisions around her career and personal life.”

O’Brien, however, said much of the debate around fertility “just ignores the reality of women’s lives.”

She pointed to research by BPAS that found women were aware that fertility declined with age, but were often waiting to have children for practical reasons — such as concern over their financial stability or the impact on their careers.

“The fact that women are able to have children at that stage of their life should be celebrated,” she said. “All this finger-wagging is directed solely at women and that ignores that this is largely a decision taken by two people.”

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Facebook Deletes Hundreds of Posts Under German Hate-Speech Law

Facebook said it had deleted hundreds of offensive posts since a law banning online hate speech came into force in Germany at the start of the year that foresees fines of up to 50 million euros ($58 million) for failure to comply.

The social network received 1,704 complaints under the law, known in Germany as NetzDG, and removed 262 posts between January and June, Richard Allan, Facebook’s vice president for global policy solutions said in a blog.

“Hate speech is not allowed on Facebook,” Allan said, adding that the network had removed posts that attacked people who were vulnerable for reasons including ethnicity, nationality, religion or sexual orientation.

Complaints covered a range of alleged offenses under Germany’s criminal code, including insult, defamation, incitement to hatred and incitement to crime, the report said. Of the posts that were blocked, the largest number was for insult.

Facebook is less popular in Germany than other European countries, with only around two in five internet users logging on each month, according to researchers eMarketer.

That’s in part due to collective memories of hate-filled propaganda that date back to Germany’s 20th century history of Nazi and Communist rule that don’t always sit well with Facebook’s broad view on freedom of speech.

Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg faced criticism in Germany after saying in a recent interview that Facebook should not delete statements denying that the Holocaust happened — a crime in Germany. He later clarified his remarks.

Facebook has a dedicated team of 65 staff handling complaints under the NetzDG, Allan said, adding that this could be adjusted in line with the number of complaints.

From January to June, Facebook removed a total of around 2.5 million posts that violated its own community standards designed to prevent abusive behavior on the platform.

“We have taken a very careful look at the German law,” Allan wrote in his blog, which was published in German. “That’s why we are convinced that the overwhelming majority of content considered hate speech in Germany, would be removed if it were examined to see whether it violates our community standards.”

A lawmaker for Chancellor Angela Merkel’s ruling Christian Democratic Union (CDU), Tankred Schipanski, said the NetzDG law — which requires social platforms to remove offensive posts within 24 hours — was doing the job for which it was intended.

($1 = 0.8579 euros)

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Factbox: Impact of US Trade Tariffs on European Companies

Some European companies are rethinking their strategies to cushion the impact of trade tensions between the world’s two biggest economies, the United States and China.

The focus will switch back to China after a truce on tariffs emerged from U.S. President Donald Trump’s meeting with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker on July 25.

Trump and Juncker agreed to suspend any new tariffs on the European Union, including a proposed 25 percent levy on auto imports, and hold talks over duties on imports of European steel and aluminum.

However, Trump retained the power to impose tariffs, if no progress is made.

In the case of China, Trump threatened this month that he was ready to impose tariffs on an additional $500 billion of imports.

The United States has already imposed tariffs on $34 billion of Chinese imports. In return, China has levied taxes on the same value of U.S. products.

Below are recent comments from European companies on trade tensions:

  • Mercedes maker Daimler blamed U.S.-China tariffs for a 30 percent drop in second-quarter profit announced on July 26 and prefigured in a profit warning last month.

  • French electrical equipment company Schneider Electric said on July 26 that it foresaw growth slowing in the second half of the year and expected the first extra costs linked to higher U.S. tariffs, which could reach 20 million

euros.

  • “If the trade war escalates we are more concerned about the consequences that it can have on global macro environment,” STMicro’s new Chief Executive Jean-Marc Chery, said on July 25, adding that direct impact of trade war risks were currently “negligible.”

  • Fiat Chrysler cut 2018 outlook on July 25, hurt by weaker performance in China. Its operating profit for the second-quarter was negatively impacted by China import duty changes.

  • French mining group Eramet warned that current favorable markets could be hurt by trade rows.

  • Chief Executive Frans van Houten confirmed Philips’ sales growth target for this year on July 23, but added that trade worries and the unknown consequences of Brexit continued to cause uncertainty.

  • Finnish steel maker Outokumpu sees two-fold impact from the U.S. tariffs, with surging imports to Europe resulting in heavy price pressure, whilst in the Americas, base prices have risen throughout spring benefiting local manufacturers, including the company.

  • Fellow Finnish company Valmet said tariff increases could derail the recovery and depress its medium-term growth prospects.

  • Chinese-owned Volvo Cars (IPO-VOLVO.ST) said it was shifting production of its top-selling SUV production for the U.S. market to Europe from China to avoid Washington’s new duties on Chinese imports.

  • German automaker BMW said this month that it would be unable to “completely absorb” a new 25 percent Chinese tariff on imported U.S.-made models and would have to raise prices on the vehicles made in South Carolina.

  • The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, whose members include General Motors Co, Volkswagen AG and Toyota Motor Corp, also warned on the impact of the tariffs. A study released by a U.S. auto dealer group warned

that the tariffs could cut U.S. auto sales by 2 million vehicles.

  • Sweden’s Electrolux said on July 18 that the U.S. tariffs announced at the beginning of July would have an impact of $10 million plus this year. In the third quarter, it expects raw material costs to rise by 0.5 billion Swedish

crowns.

  • Belgian steel wire maker Bekaert reported on the same day that it sees underlying operating profit 20 percent below analysts’ estimates in the first half, blaming wire rod costs partly driven up by tariffs.

  • Swedish lock maker Assa Abloy’s CEO said on July 18 that he sees an important further increase in steel prices in the second part of the year in U.S., partly due to new import tariffs. He expects price hikes to compensate better for the higher cost in the last six month of the year than in the second quarter.

  • Austrian steelmaker Voestalpine said on June 6 that about a third of its U.S. sales would be impacted by Washington’s steel import tariffs, adding that it was talking to its customers about who would bear the cost.

  • Norway’s REC Silicon booked an impairment charge of $340 million “due to the market disruption from the curtailment of solar incentives in China, as well as continued trade barriers that prevent access to primary markets inside

China.”

“We need the U.S. and Chinese governments to cooperate in ending the solar trade dispute … to prevent additional job losses and to enhance the value of the solar industry in the U.S. and China.”

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The Latest: Facebook Market Value Plunges $119 Billion

The Latest on the aftermath of Facebook’s release of user growth and expectations for the company ahead (all times local):

4:50 p.m.

The 19 percent loss in Facebook’s stock chopped $119 billion off its market value.

It was the company’s worst trading day since going public in 2012, and among the biggest one-day losses of market value in U.S. stock market history.

The loss came a day after Facebook revealed that its user base and revenue grew more slowly than expected in the second quarter as it grappled with privacy issues.

Those revelations stunned investors, who believed the company had weathered the recent scandal over users’ privacy and pushed the stock to an all-time high Wednesday of $217.50.

12:45 p.m.

The erosion in the value of Facebook as it is perceived on Wall Street involves some staggering numbers.

In midday trading Thursday, the company’s market value (the number of outstanding shares multiplied by the value of a single stock), fell by more than $122 billion.

That means that in one day, just the decline in Facebook’s market value is roughly the entire market value of McDonald’s or Nike, give or take a few billion. And it far exceeds to total market value of major U.S. multinational corporations such as General Electric, Eli Lilly or Caterpillar.

The company still has a total market value close to $511 billion, which exceeds the annual gross domestic product of countries like Poland, Belgium and Iran.

Facebook was downgraded by a number of industry analysts who were caught off guard by slowing growth in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

Company shares fell 19 percent Thursday.

10:40 a.m.

Facebook may be heading for its worst day on the markets in its history a day after the company revealed that user growth, amid swirling questions about how their information is used, has slowed.

The stock plunged 19 percent in early trading Thursday, eradicating well in excess of $100 billion in market value.

The social media company’s financial results, released late Wednesday, fell short of Wall Street expectations as the company continues to grapple with privacy issues. It also warned that revenue would decelerate as it promotes new products

Facebook had 2.23 billion monthly users as of June 30, up 11 percent from a year earlier, but well short of what industry analysts had been expecting.

The results are from the first full quarter following the revelation of the Cambridge Analytica privacy scandal. The company is also contending with European privacy rules that went into effect in May.

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Demand for Diversity in US vs. What Interests Chinese Fans

Whether it’s in movies, comic books or video games, fans say there is diversity in the superhero universe.

At the international Comic-Con convention that ended July 22, Emmeline Ye, a Chinese-American from San Diego, is dressed up in a Wonder Woman costume. She said her next costume will be of her favorite character in the video game, “Overwatch.”

“I appreciate that they put a Chinese character in that game, and the fact that she’s a scientist and she’s smart. She’s helping save the world,” Ye said.

For many African-American movie fans, the film “Black Panther,” released this year, was a milestone.

“When ‘Black Panther’ came out, I was so excited to see my future children have something to look up to,” said Shanice Souvenir, who also attended Comic-Con dressed as Princess Shuri of Wakanda, a character in the movie.

Diversity in comics

In recent years, superheroes in comic books and American popular culture have become increasingly diverse. But fans and creators say more work needs to be done, especially on the big screen, to fully represent American society.

“Print, I think, tends to be able to get away with that first and kind of test the waters,” said freelance comic book writer Vita Ayala.

University of Oregon director of comics and cartoon studies Ben Saunders agreed that initial risks can be taken with comics, a medium that can be more experimental than big-budget Hollywood films. But he said comic book superheroes have not always been so diverse.

“The initial wave of superheroes of the 1930s and ’40s was predominantly male and always exclusively white,” Saunders said.

Nonwhite characters at the time were stereotypes, said Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson, granddaughter of Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, founder of DC Comics.

“African-Americans were always drawn with big white lips, which is just horrible. And the Asian characters’ skin tone was usually yellow, which is just weird. And so, they were usually the menace. They were usually the evil bad guy,” she said.

​First nonwhite heroes

The first nonwhite superheroes did not quite look human and took the form of the green Hulk and The Thing, who is orange.

“The Hulk is readily sort of understandable as a kind of complicated allegory for race, as a sort of figure through ideas of monstrosity,” Saunders said.

In 1966, in the midst of the U.S. civil rights movement, Black Panther became the first black superhero in the Marvel universe, which Hollywood has embraced.

“We actually saw ‘Black Panther’ a couple of different times on opening day because it was so good,” said comics and pop culture fan Rosemary Matthew. “And we were really glad to see that something that was related to somebody that we could relate to was done really well.”

“Black Panther” opened strong in China, earning $66.5 million during the first three days in theaters. Reviews in China have been lukewarm.

“A lot of the times, I do hear that China doesn’t want to see black people or other people of color. Hollywood doesn’t think that diverse stories could sell overseas, so they make less of it, and they don’t give chances to diverse stories that could be good,” said Chinese-American Alice Mei Chi Li, who works as a freelance illustrator.

In May, Marvel released its first Chinese superheroes in print.

The Black Panther, the Hulk and other superheroes appear together in the latest Marvel film, “Avengers: Infinity War.” It has become Marvel’s most successful superhero movie in China and was granted a 30-day extended run.

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Tom Cruise Does the Impossible in ‘Mission: Impossible Fallout’

Tom Cruise’s latest action installment of Mission: Impossible Fallout follows operative Ethan Hunt, the daredevil spy, on an extremely perilous quest to save the world.

Cruise and the rest of the Mission: Impossible cast, along with the powerful visuals and the megastar’s mind-bending stunts, keep audiences on the edge of their seats for almost three hours.

The film starts with a dramatic failed operation in which Hunt, an operative of the fictional independent espionage agency “Impossible Mission Force” — or IMF — loses three plutonium bombs to the enemy. With nuclear devastation looming, Hunt teams again with field agents Benji and Luther, played by Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames, to reclaim the missing bombs. They are not alone. The CIA’s deputy director, Erica Sloane, played by Angela Bassett, insists on sending along one of the agency’s own with Hunt’s team.

Enter CIA assassin August Walker, played by Henry Cavill, of DC Comics Superman fame. He portrays a large, powerfully built fighter and something of a wild card in the movie.

​Strong women

Rebecca Ferguson returns as operative Ilsa Faust, an antagonist and a love interest for Hunt, who more often than not, saves his life.

“Oh, I always save Tom’s life. I’m tired of saving Tom’s life, actually,” she joked during a red carpet event. 

Ferguson, smart and funny, told VOA how happy she’s been to work on the set with the rest of the cast in an action film that respects and elevates women. 

“They brought back incredible women and introduced women, who, all of them, have a character and a reason and a purpose for being in this film, and that’s gender equality,” she said.

Her feelings are echoed by Oscar nominee Angela Bassett.

“What my character brings to the movie is gravitas, her brilliance, her mystique, her strength, her integrity and her ability to play chess very well when she is being underestimated by those around her,” Bassett said. “But she also does not mistake her presence for the be-all and end-all. If she is right, she is right. And if she is wrong, she can admit that, too.”

Jaw-dropping stunts

From Europe to India, the action-packed film offers a tight storyline and a stellar cast, but the franchise’s secret weapon is Cruise himself, who performs his own jaw-dropping stunts — from a skydive 27,000 feet above ground, and a plane flying 167 miles per hour, to a vertical helicopter fall he himself is piloting.

He flashes his trademark smile when VOA asks him about his fearlessness. 

“I don’t know where it comes from,” Cruise said. “I just have a tremendous passion for what I do and I can’t stop unless I know it’s really there and it’s working.”

He describes his two greatest stunts on film. 

“Both of them are very intense,” he said. “On the helicopter, I spent a year and a half training, and I trained with aerobatic helicopter pilots. I’ve trained in airplanes before, I fly aerobatics in airplanes, but the airplanes are very different than helicopters, so I went through grueling training, and I did anything I could to make sure that I was as competent as possible.”

And for a good reason: his life depends on it. Co-star Ferguson recounts her terror when she saw Cruise fall during the helicopter stunts above New Zealand’s mountain peaks. 

“And I scream. I was terrified, absolutely terrified until he says, ‘That’s great, that’s a cut, we got that.’ I thought, ‘Oh my God! This is Mission. Phew!’ I’ve done some of the stunts, but nothing compares to what he does,” she added.

Cruise tells us he saved the most difficult stunt for last. He jumps off a C-17 military transport plane airplane. 

“It took over 106 jumps to get it. One-hundred-and-six jumps, and you know, we planned to be there for a week and ended up being there almost a month trying to get that sequence. It is significantly more challenging than I anticipated. I have to say, it was pretty exciting, too,” Cruise said.

So, how long does Cruise plan to keep going? And how can he keep outdoing his previous exploits? Smiling, he says, “As long as I can.”

Film’s value in story, characters

Mission: Impossible producer Jake Myers says that although it is stressful to watch Cruise do all these impossible feats, “We wouldn’t have the movies without them. But obviously there is a nail biter every time he does a stunt, so that’s what we are here for.”

Since Cruise assumed the role Hunt in the Mission: Impossible movies, he has infused the franchise with extremely dangerous stunts that bring audiences to the theater. At this point everyone is wondering about the personal risks he takes. During the shooting of this installment, Cruise broke his ankle jumping out of a window and over a wall.

Filmmaker Christopher McQuarrie does not hide his concern.

“Yes, I mean, when you look at what happened in this movie, when he broke his ankle when he was doing the simplest stunt. There are no small stunts. So, when you are doing a helicopter chase or you are jumping out of a plane at 25,000 feet, it’s all pretty nerve-wracking,” McQuarrie said.

Stunts aside, the Oscar-winning filmmaker says that the film’s value lies in its unpredictable storyline and its complex and endearing characters. One of them is Pegg, who plays the witty, loyal but often skittish Benji.

“I think he is like the most kind of an audience member, Benji, that is why people relate to him,” Pegg said. “That is why sometimes he can be funny because he says the things we are thinking in these incredible situations, where the cool guys are just getting on with it, Benji is the one who asks ‘why are we doing this?’”

Mission: Impossible FALLOUT offers stellar cinematography, which as filmmaker McQuarrie says, was incredibly sophisticated based on the action he had to tape.

“It is very challenging, especially because you have an actor who is willing to do all those stunts,” he said. “It gives you the freedom to put the camera wherever you want and sometimes it is very challenging to find the right place to put it.”

Especially when his team had to capture the star fall from the sky just as the sun was setting. The efforts have not gone unrewarded. Critics are calling the movie one of this year’s best action films.

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Tom Cruise Does the Impossible in Mission: Impossible Fallout

Tom Cruise’s latest action installment of “Mission: Impossible FALLOUT” follows operative Ethan Hunt, the daredevil spy on a mission impossible to save the world. VOA’s Penelope Poulou spoke with Cruise, inhabiting his character Ethan Hunt, along with the rest of the cast, about the powerful visuals and megastar’s mind-bending stunts that keep audiences on the edge of their seats for almost three hours.

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How Superheroes Are Changing The Way Hollywood Handles Diversity

Superheroes in comic books and American popular culture have become increasingly diverse, but fans and creators say more work needs to be done, especially on the big screen to fully represent American society. But Hollywood is already looking beyond the U.S. as it tries to capitalize on the popularity of superheroes. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee reports from Comic-Con about how far superheroes have come.

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In Rural Malawi, Medical Tips Just a Phone Call Away

In Malawi, pregnant women and new mothers who live in remote villages are getting medical help thanks to a toll-free hotline and text messaging service known as “Chipatala cha pa Foni” or Heath Center by Phone. Run by the nonprofit VillageReach, the program connects expecting mothers in rural areas with health workers. More pregnant women are receiving prenatal care and birth planning thanks to the medical hotline, as Lameck Masina reports for VOA from Lilongwe.

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Court: Starbucks, Others Must Pay Workers for Off-Clock Work

Starbucks and other employers in California must pay workers for minutes they routinely spend off the clock on tasks such as locking up or setting the store alarm, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The unanimous ruling was a big victory for hourly workers in California and could prompt additional lawsuits against employers in the state.

The ruling came in a lawsuit by a Starbucks employee, Douglas Troester, who argued that he was entitled to be paid for the time he spent closing the store after he had clocked out.

Troester said he activated the store alarm, locked the front door and walked co-workers to their cars — tasks that he said required him to work for four to 10 additional minutes a day.

Starbucks said it was disappointed with the ruling. In a brief filed with the California Supreme Court, attorneys for Starbucks said Troester’s argument could lead to “innumerable lawsuits over a few seconds of time.” The U.S. Chamber of Commerce in a court filing also warned of the possibility of “significant liability” to businesses in the state.

A U.S. District Court rejected Troester’s lawsuit on the grounds that the time he spent on those tasks was minimal. But the California Supreme Court said a few extra minutes of work each day could “add up.”

Troester was seeking payment for 12 hours and 50 minutes of work over a 17-month period. At $8 an hour, that amounts to $102.67, the California Supreme Court said.

“That is enough to pay a utility bill, buy a week of groceries, or cover a month of bus fares,” Associate Justice Goodwin Liu wrote. “What Starbucks calls ‘de minimis’ is not de minimis at all to many ordinary people who work for hourly wages.”

Trivial and not trivial

The ruling also applies to tasks done before the workday begins, said Bryan Lazarski, an attorney in Los Angeles who handles wage claims against employers.

Lazarski said he expects the ruling to open the door to additional lawsuits by workers in similar situations as Troester. But he also expects lawsuits that “test the boundary of what this case says” to determine how much time spent doing work off the clock is enough to get paid.

The court in Thursday’s ruling said it was not closing the door on all claims by employers that the amount of additional work was too negligible.

“The court is saying, ‘We haven’t really drawn a line with regard to what is trivial and what is not trivial, but in this case, the time that the employee was not compensated was significant,'” said Veena Dubal, a labor law expert at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law.

Associate Justice Leondra Kruger wrote separately to say that there may be some periods of time that are “so brief, irregular of occurrence, or difficult to accurately measure or estimate,” that requiring an employer to account for them would not be reasonable.

She cited as examples a glitch that delays logging in to a computer to start a shift or having to read and acknowledge an email or text message about a schedule change while off the clock.

Tracking time

The federal court that threw out Troester’s lawsuit also said it would be hard for an employer to track the additional time that he worked. But Liu said employers could use technology for that or restructure employees’ work so they don’t have any tasks after they clock out.

Employers can also estimate the additional time, he said.

Troester appealed the U.S. District Court’s decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The appeals court asked the California Supreme Court to determine whether a federal rule permitting employers under some circumstances to require employees to work as much as 10 minutes a day without compensation applied under state law.

The lawsuit now returns to the 9th Circuit. 

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Japanese City Fighting Off Would-Be Ninjas

The Japanese city of Iga is fighting off would-be ninjas after a news report suggesting the city wanted to hire the traditional assassins went viral.

The confusion began last week, when a reporter for National Public Radio in the United States said Japan was suffering from a shortage of workers because of declining birth rates.

The report quoted Sakae Okamoto, mayor of Iga, as saying the worker shortage had affected the city’s plans to build a second museum focused on the warriors.

Iga is famous for being the home of the powerful Iga ninja clan.

While the report mentioned that ninja performers could earn as much as $85,000, it did not say the city was looking to hire them. 

The story was subsequently picked up on social media and other news outlets that failed to clarify the lack of jobs. 

Iga city officials received 115 emails from would-be ninjas offering their services and asking when they could start. Other job requests were sent to the city’s ninja museum, the regional tourist board and a a local university.

The applications have come from around the world, including Italy, India, Ecuador and the U.S.

The ninja-centric city has posted a statement in several languages on its website stressing it was not hiring. But it took the opportunity to extol the virtues of its “splendid tourist attractions, including facilities about ninjas.”

Besides its first ninja museum, the central Japanese city also has several ninja costume rental shops and holds an annual ninja festival. 

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Boxing Gym Challenges Parkinson’s Symptoms

Rock Steady Boxing NOVA gym opened in McLean, Virginia, outside Washington, D.C., last December. That was the good news for 75-year-old Neil Eisner, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s six years ago and finds boxing an effective way to fight back against the disease.

Rock Steady Boxing (RSB) was designed especially for people with Parkinson’s, a neurodegenerative disorder that leads to tremors and balance problems. Each exercise in the program focuses on a specific skill — one is combining punches on a bag to work on strength, another is crawling across the floor. Eisner says the exercises help him perform everyday tasks like moving around and getting in and out of bed.

Some strengthening exercises target vocal cords. “One of the things that’s interesting enough is [Parkinson’s patients] tend to have a [softer] voice. When you have that lower voice, and people can’t hear you, you don’t realize. So, he asks us to bring our voice clearly and more loudly,” Eisner said.

​Becoming an RSB trainer

For personal trainer Alec Langstein, working with an older population is familiar. He understands their health issues and the need for them to stay active.

“My aunt has a gym in Westchester, New York, and she does a Rock Steady Boxing program there,” he said. “She invited me up to her gym to check out the program. She thought it would be a perfect fit for what I do. I helped out with a few classes, and it was just, I thought, an amazing program.”

The Rock Steady Boxing nonprofit was founded in 2006 by attorney Scott C. Newman, who was looking for ways to stay active after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s at age 40. Since then, more than 500 boxing programs have been introduced in the U.S. and around the world.

Langstein went to the organization’s headquarters to become an RSB-licensed trainer, and a few months later, he opened his Rock Steady Boxing NOVA gym.

“It’s a typical boxing program,” he explained. “They focus on balance, hand-eye coordination, reaction, footwork. There is some cognitive stuff because in boxing, certain numbers equal certain punches. So, when I yell certain numbers, you have to move and react at the same time. So, the brain and the body are working together. It’s also taking out the aggression some people may have out of having the disease.”

​Improving quality of life

To understand how RSB can help Parkinson’s patients, physical therapist Danielle Sequira says it’s important to know what triggers the symptoms.

“Parkinson’s mainly affects the dopamine-producing cells in the brain. That leads to a lack or a loss of dopamine, which contributes to the movement difficulties,” she said.

While boxing and other exercises don’t cure the disease or stop the dopamine decline, they can improve the patient’s quality of life. Exercises can be modified for people with Parkinson’s, including those in wheelchairs.

“The research shows that exercise helps the brain use dopamine more efficiently,” Sequira said. “My goal usually, after I work with some of my patients with Parkinson’s, is to refer them out to get involved in an exercise program out in the community.”

​The social effect

RSB seems to have helped Victoria Hebert reduce the symptoms of her Parkinson’s. She has a tremor in her left hand, and says certain situations trigger it.

“Being cold, being hot, or sitting with a crowd I’m not very comfortable with, I can’t help starting to shake. I end up having to sit on my hand just to keep it still,” she said.

But with this crowd, Hebert doesn’t feel the need to hide the disease. “These people have become very close in the four or five months we’ve been together.”

“That’s the big part of it, sharing experiences with others,” she added. “I have to say, it’s very embarrassing, but over eight years of time I’ve never met another person with Parkinson’s. Then, I came here, and it was like a whole class of 20, 25 people with it. It was kind of surprising to me, kind of surprising that I, myself, didn’t reach out to anybody before that.”

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Facebook Shares Sink; Further Growth Drops Expected

Social media giant Facebook, which has weathered storms about privacy and data protection, is now looking at cooler growth following a years-long breakneck pace.

Shares in Facebook plummeted 19 percent to close at $176.26 Thursday, wiping out $100 billion. It was believed to be the worst ever single-day evaporation of market value for any company.

The plunge came one day after the firm missed revenue forecasts for the second quarter and warned that growth would be far weaker than previously estimated.

Chief Financial Officer David Wehner warned Wednesday in an earnings call with analysts that revenue growth had already “decelerated” in the second quarter and would drop “by high single-digit percentages” in coming quarters.

At one point during the call, Facebook shares were trading down as much as 24 percent, an unprecedented drop for a large firm.

On the call, Jefferies & Co. analyst Brent Thill said that “many investors are having a hard time reconciling that deceleration. … It just seems like the magnitude is beyond anything we’ve seen.”

Facebook said the slowdown would come in part from a new approach to privacy and security, but also appeared to acknowledge the limits of growth in advertising, which accounts for virtually all its revenue.

Brian Sheehan, a Syracuse University professor of communication and advertising, said the weak forecast “made investors nervous about more basic long-term issues” with the huge social network, notably its diminished appeal to younger users.

“With or without privacy issues, investors are scared that Facebook’s interactions, particularly with those under 25, are falling,” Sheehan said.

For the second quarter, profit was up 31 percent at $5.1 billion; revenues rose 42 percent to $13.2 billion, only slightly below most forecasts.

User base still growing

Facebook reported its user base was still growing but not as fast as some expected. Monthly active users rose 11 percent to 2.23 billion — below most estimates of 2.25 billion.

Richard Windsor, a technology analyst who writes the Radio Free Mobile blog, said the new outlook should not be surprising.

“This is a direct result of scale as it becomes increasingly difficult to grow at such high rates when a company hits this size,” Windsor wrote.

Windsor added that Facebook is forced to hire more people to handle tasks such as filtering inappropriate content after discovering the limits of artificial intelligence.

“Weaknesses in AI are forcing [Facebook] to keep hiring humans to do the jobs that the machines are incapable of,” he said.

Brian Wieser at Pivotal Research Group said the company appears to have hit a “wall” on growth in advertising.

In a research note, he said Facebook’s outlook “suggests that while the company is still growing at a fast clip, the days of 30 percent-plus growth are numbered.”

Until Wednesday, Facebook shares had been at record highs as investors seemed to shrug off fears about data protection and probes into the hijacking of private information by the political consultancy Cambridge Analytica.

Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook has invested heavily in “safety, security and privacy” after being rocked by concerns of manipulation of the platform to spread misinformation, warning of an “impact” on profitability.

Some analysts however said it was too soon to write off Facebook or its growth prospects, and that the company may have simply been warning of the worst-case scenario.

“The company has a track record of resetting revenue growth and expense expectations only to turn around and exceed those expectations the following quarter,” said Gene Munster of Loup Ventures. “We suspect Facebook is sticking with its historical playbook and will, in fact, beat these lower numbers.”

A positive view

Richard Greenfield of BTIG Research said he remained upbeat on Facebook despite the abrupt forecast shift.

“Facebook is actively choosing to make less money, deprioritizing near-term monetization to drive engagement to even higher levels,” Greenfield said in a note to clients.

Greenfield said he could “sense the fear/panic in investors’ voices” after the Facebook analyst call, but that he had maintained his outlook.

“Mobile is eating the world and Facebook is a core holding to benefit from that shift,” he said.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Mark Mahaney said the drop creates a rare buying opportunity for Facebook shares.

“Facebook stills owns two of the largest media assets in the world [Facebook and Instagram] and the two largest messaging assets in the world [Messenger and WhatsApp],” Mahaney said in a note to clients, adding that he sees “no material change in marketer views of the attractiveness” of Facebook platforms. 

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Taking a Jab at Parkinson’s

Rock Steady Boxing (RSB) is a fitness program designed for people with Parkinson’s, a neurodegenerative disorder that leads to tremors and balance problems. The Rock Steady Boxing nonprofit was founded in 2006. Since then, more than 500 boxing programs have been introduced in the U.S. and around the world. Faiza Elmasry visited an RSB gym in McLean, Virginia. Faith Lapidus narrates.

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