Scoring drugs

 MOST people agree that some drugs are worse than others: heroin is probably considered more dangerous than marijuana, for instance. That's why a study published by the Lancet makes interesting reading.

Researchers led by Professor David Nutt, a former chief drugs adviser to the British government, asked drug-harm experts to rank 20 drugs (legal and illegal) on 16 measures of harm to the user and to wider society, such as damage to health, drug dependency, economic costs and crime.

Alcohol is the most harmful drug in Britain, scoring 72 out of a possible 100, far more damaging than heroin (55) or crack cocaine (54). It is the most harmful to others by a wide margin, and is ranked fourth behind heroin, crack, and methamphetamine (crystal meth) for harm to the individual.

TED Talk: Weird or just different?

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Garment factory workers (video)

After watching the video, please provide the following information 

1. Who? 
2. Where? 
3. When? 
4. Now they .... 
5. They want...

 
 

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A new island (video)

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Tower Infinity - the "invisible skyscraper"

When it comes to approving the construction of new developments, some countries are especially supportive of a ‘bigger is better’ approach. Here's something innovative: Tower Infinity, South Korea's 'invisible' skyscraper.

Designed by U.S.-based GDS Architects, the glass-encased Tower Infinity will top out at 450 meters and have the third highest observation deck in the world.  The project is backed by Korea Land & Housing Corporation, a state-owned land and public housing developer.

The invisibility illusion will be achieved with a high-tech LED facade system that uses a series of cameras placed at three different heights on six different sides of the building to capture real-time images of the surroundings. Three other sections, each filled with 500 rows of LED screens, will project the individual digital images.

According to GDS, managers will be able to alter the level of power used and give the building different levels of invisibility.

The building is due for completion in 2014 and will be used primarily for activities. It will include a theme park, a movie theater, a roller coaster, a water park and numerous food and beverage outlets, restaurants and an observation deck positioned at a height of 392 metres.

When completed, it will come in sixth on the list of the world's highest towers, behind Tokyo SkyTree, Guangzhou's CantonTower, Toronto's CN Tower, Moscow's Ostankino Tower and Shanghai's Oriental Pearl.
International visitors to Seoul will have no trouble seeing it – or not, as the case may be – when they arrive in South Korea since the architects behind the project, American firm GDS, are building Tower Infinity near the capital’s Incheon International Airport.

Edited from CNN and Telegraph


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The impact of rising seas (video)

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Starbucks: No Guns Please

Starbucks says that guns are no longer welcome at its coffee shops around the world - inside or at its outside seating areas. In an open letter Tuesday September 17, Starbucks chief executive Howard Schultz said it is respectfully asking customers not to bring weapons into the 18,000 outlets it operates in 62 countries.  The message was particularly aimed at U.S. customers. The coffee chain is a focal point of the debate over gun rights in the U.S., whose Constitution protects gun ownership.

An Open Letter from Howard Schultz, chairman, president and C.E.O. of Starbucks Coffee Company


Dear Fellow Americans,

Few topics in America generate a more polarized and emotional debate than guns. In recent months, Starbucks stores and our partners (employees) who work in our stores have been thrust unwillingly into the middle of this debate. That’s why I am writing today with a respectful request that customers no longer bring firearms into our stores or outdoor seating areas.

We appreciate that there is a highly sensitive balance of rights and responsibilities surrounding America’s gun laws, and we recognize the deep passion for and against the “open carry” laws adopted by many states. (In the United States, “open carry” is the term used for openly carrying a firearm in public.)

Our company’s approach to “open carry” has been to follow local laws: we permit it in states where allowed and we prohibit it in states where these laws don’t exist. We believe that gun policy should be addressed by government and law enforcement—not by Starbucks and our store partners.

Recently, however, the “open carry” debate has become increasingly uncivil and, in some cases, even threatening. Pro-gun activists have used our stores as a political stage for media events misleadingly called “Starbucks Appreciation Days” that portray Starbucks as a champion of “open carry.” To be clear: we do not want these events in our stores.

For these reasons, today we are respectfully requesting that customers no longer bring firearms into our stores or outdoor seating areas—even in states where “open carry” is permitted—unless they are authorized law enforcement personnel.

I would like to clarify two points. First, this is a request and not an outright ban. Why? Because we want to give responsible gun owners the chance to respect our request. Second, we know we cannot satisfy everyone. For those who oppose “open carry,” we believe the legislative and policy-making process is the proper arena for this debate, not our stores. For those who champion “open carry,” please respect that Starbucks stores are places where everyone should feel relaxed and comfortable. The presence of a weapon in our stores is unsettling and upsetting for many of our customers.

I am proud of our country and our heritage of civil discourse and debate. It is in this spirit that we make today’s request. Whatever your view, I encourage you to be responsible and respectful of each other as citizens and neighbors.

Sincerely,

Howard Schultz

edited from Starbucks site

Ray Dolby dies (audio)

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Ray Dolby, whose inventions ………………………………………………………. the way audiences listen to entertainment, has died. He ……………………………………… 80 years old.

NPR's Mandalit del Barco ……………………………………………………… the sound pioneer - whose name ……………………………………………………… synonymous with sound - ……………………………………………………… at home in San Francisco.

……………………………………………………… Ray Dolby for inventing the system that ……………………………………………………… you with sound at the movie theater and in your headphones.

Dolby ……………………………………………………… a prolific inventor of so many innovations used in the film and recording industries. He ……………………………………………………… out in high school, ……………………………………………………… for the Ampex Corporation in the San Francisco Bay Area. There, Dolby ……………………………………………………… on the company's first audiotape recorder in 1949. Then in the 1950s, he ……………………………………………………… the chief designer of the first videotape recorder that ……………………………………………………… practical. He ……………………………………………………… degrees in electrical engineering and physics, and ……………………………………………………… as a technical advisor to the United Nations in India.

Then, in 1965, Dolby ……………………………………………………… his own audio company, Dolby Laboratories. That's where he ……………………………………………………… up with noise-reducing technology that ……………………………………………………… rid of annoying hiss on recordings. Here he is ……………………………………………………… to the Audio Engineering Society.

RAY DOLBY: I ……………………………………………………… to spend a lot of time ……………………………………………………… and ……………………………………………………… endless demonstrations to skeptical engineers all over the world who had been taught that noise reduction ……………………………………………………… impossible and that only charlatans ……………………………………………………… along once in a while with the promise of noise reduction.

Ray Dolby ……………………………………………………… a billionaire and a member of the Forbes 400. During his career, he ……………………………………………………… more than 50 patents, and ……………………………………………………… several Emmy awards, a Grammy and two Oscars for scientific and technical achievement.

 


 from NPR

Bribespot - Fighting Corruption (video)

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Bank of America will Pay $39 Million in Gender Bias Case

Bank of America agreed on Friday to pay $39 million to women who worked in its Merrill Lynch brokerage operation, another costly settlement of a discrimination case filed by its employees.

The agreement, filed Friday evening in a federal court in Brooklyn, was the second by the nation’s largest bank over 10 days. Last week, Merrill Lynch told a federal judge in Chicago that it will pay $160 million to settle an eight-year-old racial discrimination suit filed on behalf of 700 black brokers.

With the new agreement, Merrill will have paid out nearly half a billion dollars to settle employee discrimination claims over the last 15 years.

The case settled on Friday was originally brought by women who worked in the brokerage division of Bank of America, but it later included women who were brokers at Merrill Lynch after the bank bought Merrill. The money will be divided among 4,800 current and former employees of the two brokerage operations.

Merrill, which has about 15,000 brokers worldwide, will change its policies to give women a better chance of succeeding. The firm will bring in an applied organizational psychologist to study some of its policies, particularly how teams of brokers are formed and how they share customers’ accounts, said Rachel Geman, a partner at Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein and one of the lawyers who represented the plaintiffs.

Bill Halldin, a Merrill spokesman, said in a statement that the company was “pleased to resolve this matter.” He added, “The resolution includes a number of additional and enhanced initiatives that will enrich our existing diversity, inclusion and development programs, providing even more opportunities for women to succeed as financial advisers.”

Merrill has a long history of litigation over its treatment of women and minority employees. In the 1970s, the firm settled a discrimination suit by consenting to make its work force more diverse but never met that goal.

Two decades later, Merrill settled another class-action suit brought by 900 women who worked at the firm and led by a plaintiff named Marybeth Cremin. Merrill settled that suit, known as the Cremin case, in 1998 and ended up paying about $250 million. It also agreed to make changes to give female brokers a better chance of succeeding in the male-dominated brokerage business.

Less than 10 years later, three women who worked in Bank of America’s brokerage business contended that they faced the same obstacles that Ms. Cremin had cited at Merrill. They first took their complaints to the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 2007.

In 2010, they sued Bank of America for practices at both the bank and Merrill Lynch. Judy Calibuso, one of the lead plaintiffs, was a longtime broker for the bank and now works for Merrill Lynch. She said “This settlement will advance our efforts to foster diversity and professional success within the work force.”

adapted from The New York Times

Will Bernanke step down next year? (video)

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"I forgot my phone", a viral video.

This viral short film is now at over 21 million views and says something about how we often use technology.

Are we obsessed with capturing moments  instead of just experiencing them?





Written by/Starring Charlene deGuzman
Directed by Miles Crawford



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"I have a dream" 50th anniversary (video)

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Facebook is bad for you - Get a life!

 
THOSE who have resisted the urge to join Facebook will surely feel vindicated when they read the latest research. A study just published by the Public Library of Science, conducted by Ethan Kross of the University of Michigan and Philippe Verduyn of Leuven University in Belgium, has shown that the more someone uses Facebook, the less satisfied he is with life.

Past investigations have found that using Facebook is associated with jealousy, social tension, isolation and depression. But these studies have all been “cross-sectional”—in other words, snapshots in time. As such, they risk confusing correlation with causation: perhaps those who spend more time on social media are more prone to negative emotions in the first place. The study conducted by Dr Kross and Dr Verduyn is the first to follow Facebook users for an extended period, to track how their emotions change.

The researchers recruited 82 Facebookers for their study. These volunteers, in their late teens or early 20s, agreed to have their Facebook activity observed for two weeks and to report, five times a day, on their state of mind and their direct social contacts (phone calls and meetings in person with other people). These reports were prompted by text messages, sent between 10am and midnight, asking them to complete a short questionnaire.

When the researchers analysed the results, they found that the more a volunteer used Facebook in the period between two questionnaires, the worse he reported feeling the next time he filled in a questionnaire. Volunteers were also asked to rate their satisfaction with life at the start and the end of the study. Those who used Facebook a lot were more likely to report a decline in satisfaction than those who visited the site infrequently. In contrast, there was a positive association between the amount of direct social contact a volunteer had and how positive he felt. In other words, the more volunteers socialised in the real world, the more positive they reported feeling the next time they filled in the questionnaire.

A volunteer’s sex had no influence on these findings; nor did the size of his (or her) social network, his stated motivation for using Facebook, his level of loneliness or depression or his self-esteem. Dr Kross and Dr Verduyn therefore conclude that, rather than enhancing well-being, Facebook undermines it.

Their study does not tease out why socialising on Facebook has a different effect from socialising in person. But an earlier investigation, conducted by social scientists at Humboldt University and Darmstadt’s Technical University, both in Germany, may have found the root cause. These researchers, who presented their findings at a conference in Leipzig in February, surveyed 584 users of Facebook aged mostly in their 20s. They found that the most common emotion aroused by using Facebook is envy. Endlessly comparing themselves with peers who have doctored their photographs, amplified their achievements and plagiarised their bons mots can leave Facebook’s users more than a little green-eyed. Real-life encounters, by contrast, are more WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get).

What neither study proves is whether all this is true only for younger users of Facebook. Older ones may be more mellow, and thus less begrudging of their friends’ successes, counterfeit or real. Maybe.

from The Economist 

A new payment system (video)

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If the canal is built in Nicaragua... (video)

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