motherfucking seconal: 2013

Monday, October 28, 2013

Goodbye to Lou Reed, the godfather of punk

photo: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

"Every song we've ever written was a rip-off of a Lou Reed song," Bono once announced from the stage, while bringing Reed up to sing on a duet of "Satellite of Love," a staple during U2's Zoo TV tour. What Bono said reconfirmed what many fans think about Reed, who died Sunday: He was a giant among rock stars, and a good deal of the punk and indie bands that followed in his wake were happy to be orbiting objects.

The most famous quote having to do with Reed's music may be apocryphal. "The first Velvet Underground record sold 30,000 copies in the first five years. I think everyone who bought one of those 30,000 copies started a band," Brian Eno is alleged to have said. We say alleged because Eno's biographer couldn't find any trace of the original aphorism (and anyway, that album, 1967's The Velvet Underground & Nico, actually sold more than 58,000 copies in its first two years of release). But: Point taken! It's hard to find even a 2010s rock band that doesn't have the Velvets as an influence, or that wouldn't at least lie and say they were, if asked.

Lou Reed was not the most influential man in rock 'n' roll; as long as Elvis Presley isn't erased from history, that'll be a hard mantle to cede. But is Lou the most cited influence in rock? Now, that one, he has a lock on. As much of a household name as he became, he never became nearly mainstream enough to become a signifying cliché. And in a celebrity culture where hotter is always better (not to be confused with White Light/White Heat), he epitomized cool to the sellout-free end.

Arguably...no, maybe make that inarguably...without Reed, we wouldn't have had punk. As the "godfather" of the movement, he was, after all, the cover boy for the very first issue of Punk magazine, a publishing moment immortalized in the recent CBGB film, which briefly dramatized Lou in his mid-'70s blond phase. And without punk, pretty much every band you liked in the last 30 years would disappear from the landscape like goodness dissipated from the alternate reality in It's a Wonderful Life. If Lou had a penny royalty from every act that owed him a debt, he'd have been able to hire Justin Bieber as his houseboy.

Morrissey found seeing the man who recorded Transformer to be a transforming experience. "At the age of 12 I went to see Lou Reed by myself. Which was extraordinary now, on reflection, to go and see Lou Reed at the age of 12 in Manchester and to survive the experience," the former Smiths frontman told Britain's Telegraph. It "seems extraordinary to me now, to imagine a 12- or 13-year-old going by themselves, to see somebody such as Lou Reed who was at the time singing exclusively about transsexuality and heroin and death and the beauty of death and the impossibility of life." To Morrissey, Reed was nothing less than "the WH Auden of the modern world."

Bono also waxed poetic with his literary comparisons, declaring, "Lou Reed is to New York what Mark Twain is to Dublin."

For many the influence had more to do with Reed's seemingly simple-to-replicate talk/sing vocal tones and streetwise lyricism than his chops, although he certainly worked with top-flight musicians over the years. In the Rolling Stone History of Rock, critic Ken Tucker cited his influence on proto-punk band the New York Dolls: "The mean wisecracks and impassioned cynicism that informed the Dolls' songs represented an attitude that Reed's work with the Velvet Underground embodied, as did the Dolls' distinct lack of musicianship."

Was he "mean"? That was the image, at least, for a long time. The Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde wasn't just influenced by him as a musician; she wrote about him when she was a rock critic at NME in the mid-'70s. Reviewing the 1974 live album Rock 'n' Roll Animal, Hynde summarized the appeal of his unwillingness to kiss up to a fanbase: "He looks like a monkey on a chain, court geek," wrote the future rock star. "Listen to him scramble to a corner, damaged and grotesque, huddled in rodent terror. Animal Lou. Lashing out in a way that could make the current S&M trend freeze in its shallow tracks. And the audience cheers after every song: we’re with you, yeah, we always loved those songs, ha ha. Well…he hates you.”

In his interview with the Telegraph decades later, Morrissey downplayed the idea of Reed as "grumpy." "He’s terribly nice! Terribly, terribly nice," insisted Morrissey — although, as an admitted misanthrope himself, Morrissey may not be the best judge of that. "And he’s one of those people who, when I first met him, I expected the worst. But he’s terribly nice. Once again, very friendly and very interested. Not a difficult, abrasive moment. But you have to remember that throughout the '70s he was exclusively drug-ravaged. And that doesn’t really make for terribly balanced relationships."

With the Sex Pistols, the influence was visible right in a name: The last half of Sid Vicious's moniker came from Reed's "Vicious." Johnny Rotten, though, was a rare non-admirer. He didn't object to Reed's music, just his association in the early '70s with the drug culture (Lou later cleaned up). According to Rotten/Lydon, Vicious "had a Lou Reed record and he believed in the druggy image Lou gave off," Lydon told The Daily Star after the band's breakup. "Sid's downfall was that he didn't get a chance to meet Lou Reed before he knew what he was doing. He would never have messed with heroin had he seen what a vacuous fat slob Lou Reed really is." Needless to say, perhaps, Lydon was influenced by Reed's cantankerousness, if nothing else.

For the British proto-punk band the Buzzcocks, it would be far harder to downplay the influence: They got together after Howard Devoto placed an ad looking for band members who could join him in playing the Velvet Underground's "Sister Ray."

Some bands came to the Velvet Underground via Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers, who really took Reed's minimalist ball and ran with it in the early '70s, even as he was becoming more interested, for a time, in the expansiveness of glam-rock. "If the Velvet Underground had a protégé, it would be Jonathan," said Sterling Morrison. By at least one account, Richman saw the band 80 times as a youngster in the '60s. The Modern Lovers' "Roadrunner" — which some saw as a virtual rewrite of the VU — was a song that helped spur punk as we knew it. Eventually, Richman wrote and recorded a song called "Velvet Underground":

Both guitars got the fuzz tone on
The drummer's standing upright pounding along
A howl, a tone, a feedback whine
Biker boys meet the college kind
How in the world were they making that sound?
Velvet Underground

But it wasn't all attitude. There were songs there. "I like their darkness, but I also like the pop side of the Velvet Underground," Martin Gore, who certainly wasn't influenced by the group's fuzzy guitars as the mastermind behind the mostly guitar-less Depeche Mode, told Release magazine. "I do a cover of a Velvet Underground song ['Candy Says'], and they were one of the most important bands, for me."

If you want to talk about covers, the list is endless. "Satellite of Love," besides being covered by U2 every night on the Zoo TV tour (with Reed usually appearing on a video screen as duet partner), was also recorded by Eurythmics and Porno for Pyros. U2 also had "Sweet Jane" as a tour staple in the '80s, when Bono would sing it as a duet with Maria McKee of opening act Lone Justice. "Sweet Jane" was also an FM radio hit for Mott the Hoople in the early '70s and Cowboy Junkies in the late '80s. David Bowie, who produced Reed in the mid-'70s, recorded a version of "White Light/White Heat" in '73 and released it as a single a decade later. Billy Idol put out his cover of "Heroin" as a single in 1993. Duran Duran recorded two of Reed's songs, "Femme Fatale" and "Perfect Day." Both of those tunes have been widely covered by others, as well. "Femme" is in the recorded catalogs of Big Star, Tom Tom Club, R.E.M., and Elvis Costello.

"Perfect Day" covers have proven controversial: Though the lyrics are depressing in an underlying way, and some would say reflect his addiction at the time, the ostensibly upbeat title has led to seemingly "positive" cover versions, including an allstar group-sing that was a British charity single in 1997 and a variety of TV commercials. By the time Susan Boyle covered it, some Reed fans began to wonder whether his influence on pop music had extended a little too far.

These aren't even the half of it. "I'm Waiting for the Man," alone, has been covered on record or in concert by OMD, Cheap Trick, Vanessa Paradis, Bowie, and Robert Plant & Jimmy Page. An original Death Cab for Cutie song quotes from it. Joy Division, another obviously influencee, did "Sister Ray"; Nirvana, with an equally traceable lineage, did "Here She Comes Now." Roxy Music took some cues from the Velvets, so it was no surprise to see Bryan Ferry doing "What Goes On." The ballad "Pale Blue Eyes," meanwhile, has been taken up by Hole, R.E.M., Patti Smith, the Kills, Alejandro Escovedo, and the duo of Sheryl Crow & Emmylou Harris.

But Beck outdid them all — recording a cover version of the Velvet Underground & Nico album in its entirety, released exclusively to his record club. "I grew up listening to the Velvet Underground,” Beck told the Wall Street Journal when it came out this August. “When I was 15, I was taken with trying to imitate Lou Reed.” He'd covered "Sunday Morning" frequently before, but "by doing the whole album, you get to do some of the lesser-known songs you would’ve never chosen to perform. You end up learning things.” The whole thing was recorded in one day, but the album's ubiquitousness among his fellow musicians made that not a problem, Beck said: "The Velvet Underground & Nico was an obvious choice [because] everybody was familiar with it. It took us a couple of minutes to figure out the songs.”

In "Rock & Roll" — a song that was covered by the Runaways and Jane's Addiction — Reed sang about a girl whose life was "saved by rock 'n' roll." For Morrissey, Richman, Bono, Michael Stipe, David Byrne, Sonic Youth, and too many thousands of others to count, Reed, seemingly standoffish as he could be, was the very specific savior in question. Rock itself might owe Reed a saving debt.

Moving In With Manufacturers, Amazon Delivers A New Approach

Faster delivery is the new frontier of Internet competition.

iStock

Faster delivery is the new frontier of Internet competition.

iStock

Amazon's business is built on three basic concepts: faster delivery, greater selection, and cheaper prices.

In service of that, it has built enormous warehouses staffed largely by robots that shuttle around, pulling goods out of bins at remarkable speed. It can take just a matter of minutes to go from order to shipment.

And lately it's pursuing a program where Amazon goes directly into manufacturers, and manages their logistics and online retailing.

"It fits right into world domination for Amazon, because what this is doing is now allowing them to even broaden wider the scope of products that they're going to offer," says Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst for NPD Group.

He says Amazon's so-called Vendor Flex program benefits manufacturers, because they can sell more of their products directly to consumers. And it gives Amazon a bigger warehouse footprint, enabling it to ship more goods faster and cheaper.

"It's kind of like a win-win-win. There are three wins," he says, for the manufacturer, Amazon, and the consumer.

"The only ones that's not going to win are traditional brick and mortar retailers, which now have just gotten an additional competitor in categories that they've traditionally not had online competition in," he says.

Amazon declined to discuss the program, but it has shopped Vendor Flex to various manufacturers, including Procter & Gamble.

It allows Amazon to set up shop and hire its own workers within a manufacturer's warehouse or facility. Amazon essentially runs the e-commerce and logistics for the manufacturer, which can sell direct to the consumer.

John Replogle is CEO of Seventh Generation, a cleaning products company that has worked with Amazon since the online retailer's early days. Although he declined comment about Vendor Flex, he says the company is thinking about new sales channels.

"I think the notion of what it means to be a big box is being redefined," Replogle says.

He says for his company, direct online sales make up a low, single-digit percentage of sales. But he expects it to double in the next few years, because fewer people want the traditional suburban experience of hauling bulky consumer products in their cars.

"If you look at the consumer today, it tends to be young and well-educated," he says. "And increasingly, what they're doing is living in urban centers. Their shopping behavior is shifting increasingly to online and in urban centers. So, as we think about strategically how we position ourselves, we've got to move with that consumer."

Wal-Mart and others also realize that, and are responding by beefing up their online presence and delivery speeds. But retailers like Wal-Mart also have a big advantage over purely online retailers. Namely, they have physical locations close to their consumers.

"Wal-Mart has a huge, much larger logistical footprint than Amazon," says Tom Forte, an Internet analyst with the Telsey Advisory Group.

And by partnering with manufacturers, Amazon is essentially trying to expand its geographic footprint quickly, to get closer to the customer.

Forte calls faster delivery the new frontier of Internet competition. EBay's eBay Now service is experimenting with delivery of goods in an hour, and Google's Shopping Express promises same-day delivery.

"Amazon's adding fulfillment centers outside of major metropolitan areas, and eBay and Google are leveraging the retail stores within the major metros," Forte says. "So they should, at least in theory, be able to get the merchandise faster to the consumer than Amazon, which I think's a risk for Amazon."

But Amazon, too, is running its own same-day delivery experiments in Seattle and Los Angeles.

"The average consumer visits a grocery store 2.2 times a week, so one of the reasons that Amazon is rolling out grocery is they want that frequency of purchase," Forte says.

And, he says, that's only skimming the surface of what's to come.

Source: http://www.npr.org/2013/10/28/240742832/moving-in-with-manufacturers-amazon-delivers-a-new-approach?ft=1&f=3
Related Topics: Texas A&m brandon jacobs USA vs Costa Rica Larry Shippers Dufnering

No Seat Belts Required: Drone Hobbyists Talk Safety

Christopher Vo pilots his aircraft as local drone enthusiasts gather for a Maryland fly-in at an airport in Laytonsville, Md.

Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post/Getty Images

Christopher Vo pilots his aircraft as local drone enthusiasts gather for a Maryland fly-in at an airport in Laytonsville, Md.

Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post/Getty Images

Last month, I got hit by a drone. No, it was not a giant surveillance robot, or a sinister armed device. It was a cute little quadcopter about the size of a coconut, operated by a professor who built it for fun.

What is a drone?

A flying device capable of autonomous flight, often equipped with a camera. Scientific American has explored the topic in detail. Synonyms: Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV), Unmanned Aerial System (UAS).

The hobby of building and flying drones has grown rapidly over the last few years, as technology has gotten cheaper and open source autopilot software has been smoothed out by thousands of users. With such rapid growth comes the growing pain that most nascent hobbies run into — when to come up with rules.

Recent incidents — on scales much larger than the little drone hitting me in the shoulder — have gotten amateur drone users thinking more about safety.

A Few Close Shaves

A warning message appears on the website of a company called 3DR Instruct, which sells ready-made drones for recreational use, and courses on how to use them:

" ... an out-of-control or lost aircraft can ... be transformed into a lethal, flying object falling from the sky at near terminal velocity."

To my knowledge, that hasn't happened yet. But there have been a few close shaves.

In March, a black quadcopter came within 200 feet of a flight arriving at John F. Kennedy International Airport. In August, a drone went haywire and careened into a group of people who had just emerged unscathed from outrunning live bulls. In a darker, sadder situation, a New York teen died after the propeller of his remote control helicopter "cut off the top of his head." And this month, a three-pounder fell from the sky, barely missing a man walking in Manhattan.

Droning in D.C.

The DC Area Drone User Group organizes fly-ins and drone-building workshops. Just one year after it started, it has over 650 members. About 60 of them showed up — drones in hand — at a recent fly-in in Laytonsville, Md.

The ability to operate a drone flying far beyond the range of human vision has brought up many privacy and safety concerns.

Rae Ellen Bichell/NPR

The ability to operate a drone flying far beyond the range of human vision has brought up many privacy and safety concerns.

Rae Ellen Bichell/NPR

Many of their drones look like bundles of circuit boards and wires strapped to metal frames, flanked by about four to 10 propellers. Some of them are even equipped with "first-person view" technology — mainly, a camera and a pair of electronic goggles — so that the flyer can see straight out of the drone's camera, as if they were riding on it, hundreds of feet in the air.

"The drones we're talking about weren't here five years ago," says Gerald Richards, a longtime remote control pilot. Just years ago, he says, the copters would have cost tens of thousands of dollars. Now, small ones can be purchased online for about $100, like the one-ounce copter Richards flies around his living room to entertain his grandchildren.

An Unregulated Path

These days, you can do almost anything with drones — shoot stunning aerial photography, deliver medicine in places with bad roads, inspect offshore oil platforms, create 3-D maps of archaeological sites, herd sheep, deliver pizza and textbooks, map disasters like the Colorado floods, and even zoom around a taxidermied cat.

A lot of municipalities don't quite know how to handle the personal flying robots operated by a growing number of amateurs, particularly when it comes to privacy issues.

The Federal Aviation Administration is working on regulations for commercial drones that should go into effect by 2015, but the only rules that apply to drone hobbyists are the ones issued to model aircraft enthusiasts in 1981.

They basically say: Don't fly too high, don't fly too close to an airport without alerting air traffic controllers, don't play chicken with a full-size airplane, and don't fly over people or hurt them.

We Need More Rules

It's counterintuitive, but many in the drone community want more rules.

"I very much want rules," says Chris Anderson, who founded 3D Robotics and DIY Drones. "Why? Because I want clarity. We want to know what the landscape is so that we can respond appropriately." Anderson says such clarity could start with a few definitions — like what a recreational drone really is.

Right now, he says, all drones are lumped into the same category, from the little foam ones available at Wal-Mart to the 50-pound behemoths some people could choose to convert into flying weapons.

In the absence of official rules, people have started coming up with their own.

"There have been some recent unsafe instances that don't represent our community, but in a sense they do," said Timothy Reuter, founder of the DC Area Drone User Group, addressing members at a meeting to discuss safety guidelines.

"In the public mind ... anyone who operates a drone in an unsafe manner is tarnishing the reputation of the entire community," he wrote in an email later.

Reuter says the need for establishing these safety guidelines is quickly approaching.

"We don't want regulations to come down on us like a ton of bricks," he told the group. "Because if we don't come up with our own safety guidelines, then other people who don't understand the technology will." He likens public anxiety about personal drones to that in the 1800s about balloons, and more recently about 3-D printing.

A Larger Discussion

Safety discussions have cropped up in other places as well.

A website exists for people to report "fly away" incidents. People have proposed tweaking the safety code of the Academy of Model Aeronautics to apply to drones. Online forums host discussions about how to filter out glitches in software that might end up causing an aircraft to lose control. Some hobbyists are designing parachute systems that would deploy automatically, saving the equipment from impact, as well as the people that might be below it.

This month, at a conference on drones and aerial robotics in New York, there was even talk of using radio-frequency "license plates" to alert people about what's flying in the air above them.

Looking Forward, And Up

A pre-flight safety checklist might include doing test runs with new equipment far from public spaces, making sure the batteries are fully powered, and putting the cost out of mind. Assembling a drone from scratch tends to add up to a minimum of about $500. Companies like intelligentUAS sell whoppers like this one, which goes for upwards of $7,000 — without batteries, camera gear and the latest autopilot system.

According to Chris Anderson, sense-and-avoid technology is "the holy grail in our industry." That's when a drone detects obstacles and steers clear of them, saving the equipment — and the obstacle — from harm.

"Someday, absolutely, all drones should have really good sense-and-avoid technology," he says. "But right now, they're of limited use and they're not perfect. It's sort of an unsolved technical problem."

At least nine states have passed laws that restrict drone use by public agencies like policemen, or by individuals like hobbyists. According to Academy of Model Aeronautics officials, the FAA plans to release proposed rules for small unmanned aircraft by year end.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/10/26/228486982/no-seat-belts-required-drone-hobbyists-talk-safety?ft=1&f=1019
Tags: cnet Ken Norton Namaste Bill De Blasio Madden 25

Soft-spoken teen accused of killing Mass. teacher

DANVERS, Mass. (AP) — A 14-year-old Massachusetts high school student charged with killing a teacher has been ordered held without bail.

Philip Chism was ordered held Wednesday at his arraignment in adult court on a murder charge in Salem.

His defense attorney, Denise Regan, argued for the proceedings to be closed and her client to be allowed to stay hidden because of his age. The judge denied the request. Regan declined to comment outside court.

Prosecutors say the teen beat well-liked Danvers High School math teacher Colleen Ritzer to death. Her body was found in the woods behind the school early Wednesday.

The boy also was reported missing Tuesday. He was spotted walking along a road early Wednesday.

He is due back in court Nov. 22.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/soft-spoken-teen-accused-killing-mass-teacher-184209455.html
Tags: oarfish kate upton national coffee day sofia vergara Manny Diaz

Preparing For The Big One, Whisper Campaigns, 'Frankenstein'

Cars lie smashed by the collapsed Interstate 5 connector a few hours after the Northridge earthquake on Jan. 17, 1994, in California.

AFP/Getty Images

Cars lie smashed by the collapsed Interstate 5 connector a few hours after the Northridge earthquake on Jan. 17, 1994, in California.

AFP/Getty Images

In this weekend's podcast of All Things Considered, host Arun Rath explores the power of Hollywood whisper campaigns, learns what some people are doing to prepare for "the big one," and talks to first time composer Alexander Ebert.

News

Preparing For The Big One, Whisper Campaigns, 'Frankenstein'

News

Engineering A Cooler Climate, Robo-Roaches, Anoushka Shankar

Weekends On All Things Considered Podcast

Tobacco Money, Spy Animals And 'Einstein On The Beach'

Weekends On All Things Considered Podcast

Living With Wildfires, North Korea's 'Gone With The Wind' And The Poetry of War

Source: http://www.npr.org/2013/10/27/241238396/preparing-for-the-big-one-whisper-campaigns-frankenstein?ft=1&f=1032
Related Topics: sat scores breast cancer awareness Kendra Spears miley cyrus Jennifer Rosoff

Nanomaterials database improved to help consumers, scientists track products

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

28-Oct-2013

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Contact: John Pastor
jdpastor@vt.edu
540-231-5646
Virginia Tech

Database restructured to improve functionality, add scientific credibility

Nanomaterials are the heart of the smaller, better electronics developed during the last decade, as well as new materials, medical diagnostics and therapeutics, energy storage, and clean water. However, exposure to nanomaterials may have unintended consequences for human health and the environment.

As a resource for consumers, scientists, and policy makers, the Virginia Tech Center for Sustainable Nanotechnology (VTSuN) has joined the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars to renew and expand the Nanotechnology Consumer Product Inventory, an important source of information about products using nanomaterials.

"We want people to appreciate the revolution, such as in electronics and medicine. But we also want them to be informed," said Nina Quadros, a research scientist at Virginia Tech's Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science and associate director of VTSuN, who leads a team of Virginia Tech faculty members and students on this project. Todd Kuiken, senior program associate, and David Rajeski, director of the science and technology innovation program, lead this project at the Wilson Center.

The Wilson Center and the Project on Emerging Nanotechnology created the inventory in 2005. It grew from 54 to more than 1,000 products, many of which have come and gone. The inventory became the most frequently cited resource, showcasing the widespread applications of nanotechnology. However, in 2009, the project was no longer funded.

"I used it in publications and presentations when talking about all the ways nano is part of people's lives in consumer products," said Matthew Hull, who manages the Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science's investment portfolio in nanoscale science and engineering, which includes VTSuN. "But the inventory was criticized by researchers, regulators, and manufacturers for the lack of scientific information available to support product claims."

In a meeting with his friend, Andrew Maynard, director of the University of Michigan Risk Science Center, who had initiated the inventory when he was at the Wilson Center, Hull proposed leveraging Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science and VTSuN resources to improve the inventory.

"My role was to ask 'what if' and VTSuN ran with it," said Hull.

A partnership was formed and, with funding from the Virginia Tech institute, VTSuN restructured the inventory to improve the reliability, functionality, and scientific credibility of the database.

"Specifically, we added scientific significance and usefulness by including qualitative and quantitative descriptors for the products and the nanomaterials contained in these products, such as size, concentration, and potential exposure routes," said Quadros.

For example, an intentional exposure route would be the way a medicine is administered. An unintentional exposure would be when a child chews on a toy that has been treated with silver nanoparticles that are used as an antimicrobial.

The potential health effect of nanomaterials on children was Quadros doctoral research and she used the inventory to find products designed for children that use nanomaterials, such as plush toys.

"One of the best things about the new version of the inventory is the additional information and the ability to search by product type or the type of nanomaterial," she said. "When researchers were first attempting to assess the potential environmental impacts of nanotechnology, one main challenge was understanding how these nanomaterials might end up in the environment in the first place. After searching the CPI and seeing the vast applications of nanotechnologies in consumer products it was easier to narrow down scenarios."

For example, Quadros said many silver nanoparticles are used in clothing for antimicrobial protection, so we can infer that some silver nanoparticles may end up in wastewater treatment plants after clothes washing. This helped justify some of the research on the effects of silver nanoparticle in the biological wastewater treatment processes. Currently, the inventory lists 188 products under the 'clothing' category."

This team also included published scientific data related to those products, where available, and developed a metric to assess the reliability of the data on each inventory entry.

The team interviewed more than 50 nanotechnology experts with more than 350 combined years of experience in nanotechnology, Quadros said. "Their answers provided valuable guidance to help us address diverse stakeholder needs."

In addition, the site's users can log in and add information based on their own expertise. "Anyone can suggest edits. The curator and reviewer will approve the edits, and then the new information will go live," Quadros said.

"We've added the horsepower of VTSuN, but opened it by means of crowdsourcing to new information, such as refuting or supporting claims made about products," Hull said.

"The goal of this work is to create a living, growing inventory for the exchange of accurate information on nanoenabled consumer products," Quadros said. "Improved information sharing will allow citizens, manufacturers, scientists, policymakers, and others to better understand how nanotechnology is being used in the consumer marketplace," she said.

The inventory currently lists more than 1,600 consumer products that claim to contain nanotechnology or have been found to contain nanomaterials.

Quadros will give a presentation about the inventory on Monday, Nov. 4, at the Second Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization Conference in Santa Barbara and will present to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the National Science Foundation in the spring.

###

Key collaborators at Virginia Tech are Sean McGinnis, an associate research professor in the materials science and engineering department; Linsey Marr, professor of civil and environmental engineering; and her postdoc, Eric Vejerano, who was instrumental in development of product categories; and Michael Hochella, a university distinguished professor in the geosciences department and VTSuN director.

VT SuN is an interdisciplinary research center focused on advancing nanoscale science and engineering research and education with an emphasis on sustainability. The center develops nanoscale technologies and leverages these technologies to help remedy global sustainability challenges in areas such as clean air and water, waste minimization, environmental remediation, food safety, and renewable energy.

By Susan Trulove

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Nanomaterials database improved to help consumers, scientists track products

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

28-Oct-2013

[

| E-mail

]

Contact: John Pastor
jdpastor@vt.edu
540-231-5646
Virginia Tech

Database restructured to improve functionality, add scientific credibility

"My role was to ask 'what if' and VTSuN ran with it," said Hull.

A partnership was formed and, with funding from the Virginia Tech institute, VTSuN restructured the inventory to improve the reliability, functionality, and scientific credibility of the database.

The potential health effect of nanomaterials on children was Quadros doctoral research and she used the inventory to find products designed for children that use nanomaterials, such as plush toys.

This team also included published scientific data related to those products, where available, and developed a metric to assess the reliability of the data on each inventory entry.

"We've added the horsepower of VTSuN, but opened it by means of crowdsourcing to new information, such as refuting or supporting claims made about products," Hull said.

The inventory currently lists more than 1,600 consumer products that claim to contain nanotechnology or have been found to contain nanomaterials.

###

By Susan Trulove

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Share

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-10/vt-ndi102513.php
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Sunday, October 27, 2013

Chiefs hold on to beat Browns 23-17, stay unbeaten

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Kansas City Chiefs know that they're going to get the opposing team's best shot every time they step on the field.

That comes with being the NFL's lone unbeaten team.

They wouldn't want it any other way.

"We love it," Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith said. "You want the stages to get bigger. That's why you put all the work in. You want this opportunity. You want that honor."

The Chiefs got another stiff test from the Cleveland Browns on Sunday, racing out to a big first-half lead and then holding on through a harrowing second half.

The result was a tenuous 23-17 victory and just the second 8-0 start in franchise history.

"I mean, not that anybody sneaks up on anybody in this league, but yeah, we're the only undefeated team," said Smith, who threw for 225 yards and two touchdowns.

"I think that teams have recognized how we're playing and no question, they're coming prepared."

Jason Campbell, starting in place of the ineffective Brandon Weeden, threw for 293 yards and two touchdowns for the Browns.

His second scoring pass, a 17-yarder to Fozzy Whittaker out of the backfield, got Cleveland within a field goal early in the third quarter.

The Chiefs kept making stops down the stretch, though. They punted with 3:55 left, but forced Campbell out of the pocket on fourth down, and his pass bounced off wide receiver Davone Bess for an incompletion. It was one of several drops for Bess, who also fumbled on a punt return.

Ryan Succop tacked on his third field goal of the game with 17 seconds left, and the Browns were unable to do anything with their final possession before time expired.

"We weren't able to make the plays at the end there to win the game," Brown coach Rob Chudzinski said. "Kansas City started fast and we weren't able to get anything going early in the game. I thought our guys did a great job of fighting and getting back in the game.

"We were in position a couple of times," he said, "one break or one play."

Josh Gordon had five catches for 132 yards and a touchdown in what could be his final game for the Browns. They've been fielding offers for him ahead of Tuesday's trade deadline.

"I know just as much as you all know," Gordon said. "When it happens, if it doesn't happen, we'll know at the same time."

The Chiefs marched downfield on the game's opening possession before settling for Succop's first field goal, and then did the exact same thing when they got the ball back moments later.

Kansas City eventually reached the end zone early in the second quarter when Smith found fullback Anthony Sherman out of the backfield on third-and-10. He picked up a couple of marvelous blocks and rumbled 12 yards for his first career score and a 13-0 lead.

Meanwhile, the Browns' offense struggled to get on track, going three-and-out on their first three series. Campbell overshot a couple of wide receivers, but the real problem was their lack of a running game — they had three carries for minus-1 yard at halftime.

"We have to start faster," Campbell said.

It took some trickery for Cleveland to score. Campbell handed off to Willis McGahee, who flipped it back to the quarterback, and he hit Gordon in stride for a 39-yard reception.

The good vibes on their sideline were short-lived, though.

Jamaal Charles ripped off two long runs, including one to convert another third down — the Chiefs were 9 of 12 in the half — to get into Cleveland territory. Smith finished the drive by hitting Dexter McCluster down the seam for a 28-yard scoring pass.

The Browns managed to get a field goal to get within 20-10 just before the break, and then carried the momentum into the second half, closing within a field goal on Whittaker's TD catch.

That was as close as the Chiefs defense would allow them to get.

"The best you can be right now is 8-0 and that's where we're at," Chiefs linebacker Derrick Johnson said. "Everybody's going to give us their best. We know that. If we can take that punch and keep rolling, that's what we did today. It wasn't pretty, but a 'W' sure does look good."

Notes: Chiefs DL Mike Catapano left the game with a sprained ankle and did not return. ... Charles briefly left the game with a bruised knee. ... Browns WR Travis Benjamin left the game with a knee injury. ... Smith had thrown 122 passes without a TD completion before hitting Sherman in the second quarter.

___

AP NFL website: www.pro32.ap.org

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/chiefs-hold-beat-browns-23-17-stay-unbeaten-202143394--spt.html
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Obstruction Obfuscation

Allen Craig and Will Middlebrooks — Allen Craig of the St. Louis Cardinals gets tripped up by Will Middlebrooks of the Boston Red Sox during the ninth inning of Game 3 of the 2013 World Series.

This article originally appeared on Baseball Prospectus. Follow Baseball Prospectus during the playoffs for expert commentary and analysis of every series, and consider subscribing for just $39.95 per year.

We don't nearly appreciate the extent to which luck decides who wins or loses baseball games. We think we do, because we look at BABIP and Pythagorean records and such, but really there are layers upon layers of luck—luck being the loaded word; good fortune being perhaps the more accurate phrase, and more generous—that we either don't notice or don't anticipate. The ending to Game 3 of the World Series would fall under the luck we don't anticipate.

By now, you've made up your mind on whether the obstruction call that granted Allen Craig safe passage home with the winning run was the right call. You're probably so certain of your decision that you can't even imagine a person would dispute your ruling. It's so obvious! How could you miss that? Without a doubt, that was/wasn't obstruction. But, whether the call was right or wrong, we should recognize that the very fact that so many people currently disagree with each other about it is evidence that it's not nearly that simple. It very easily could have gone the other way, right or wrong.

The rulebook, for example, is extremely specific on this play. At the end of Rule 2.00 (Obstruction) Comment, it lays out this exact scenario: "For example: if an infielder dives at a ground ball and the ball passes him and he continues to lie on the ground and delays the progress of the runner, he very likely has obstructed the runner." It's so specific. It is as though this play happened and they wrote the rule immediately after with a play exactly like this one in mind. And the rule they came up with is ... ambivalent! "He very likely has obstructed the runner." Not "he has," but "he very likely has." Probably. Maybe. Up to you to decide. Use your best judgment. What am I, God?

A few statements of fact:

1. Will Middlebrooks attempted to field a ball he had the right to field.
2. Upon failing to field that ball, he was in a position to impede Allen Craig's attempt to score.
3. Allen Craig has a generally acknowledged right to attempt to score.
4. He (Craig) did not do anything unusual or unnatural. He stood up, ran toward home, and was thwarted.
5. Therefore, Middlebrooks has "very likely" obstructed the runner.

Here's the GIF that you've probably already seen, from @cjzero:

Now, in the defense of uncertainty:

1. A reasonable person might consider Middlebrooks to have still been in the act of attempting to field the ball. He had not moved on to another action. He had not failed to move, with unnecessary delay. If—and, frankly, we're going to get into hypotheticals not because I want to convince you of anything but because they are the best way to grapple with the consequences of our assumptions—Middlebrooks had leapt for the ball, surely his descent to earth would still be considered part of the act of attempting to field the ball. So, the umpires are forced to grapple with difficult decision no. 1: When does Middlebrooks stop being a defender and start being an obstruction? When does he go from lying on the ground to "continu(ing) to lie on the ground," as specified in the rule? Is it the second a ball is one inch past him? Maybe! But that's an awfully demanding requirement, and one that might make an umpire look at the "very likely" portion of that rule and conclude that the defender acting in good faith falls into the implied exceptions.

2. Upon failing to field that ball, he was in a position to impede Allen Craig's attempt to score because of Allen Craig himself. Maybe, at least. Here's the frame-by-frame of the play:

Frame 1: Middlebrooks reaches for the throw, which is leading him away from the base.

Frame 2: Middlebrooks begins to lean.

Frame 3: Middlebrooks, standing in front of the base, appears to have his glove hit by Craig, sliding.

Frame 4: It's not easy to say conclusively, but it appears that Craig's upper body is now colliding with Middlebrooks' arm, and his left leg or even right knee might have made contact with Middlebrooks' left leg.

Frame 5: Middlebrooks topples over, putting all the parties in place for an obstruction call. In Timothy Burke's GIF of the trip itself, Middlebrooks' body is lying on the ground at an angle that suggests he was spun a bit, like by Craig. Naturally, Craig has every right to slide into the base. Just like Middlebrooks has every right to dive for a ball in an attempt to field it. Does it change the math from step 1, when we try to determine when Middlebrooks gave up his rights, if Craig is himself the reason for Middlebrooks ending up in an obstructing position? Remember: "very likely has obstructed." The rules want us to consider these things.

3. Yes, Allen Craig has a right to score, by running in a baseline toward his next base. And, yes, the baseline is that line which he himself sets when he starts toward the base. Allen Craig was running in his baseline and Will Middlebrooks lifted his feet up and blocked that baseline. But Middlebrooks, in a more generous interpretation of the play, lifted his feet away from the more common baseline. For all we know, he was trying to clear a space for Craig, and was simply unfortunate that Craig was running a somewhat unconventional route.

Now, the natural response to this is a great response: Intent doesn't matter. (This is a great response as nearly all defenses of the obstruction call are great defenses; it being the case, after all, that an obstruction call is completely reasonable! As would be, many intelligent people would argue, a non-obstruction call.) Intent doesn't matter in sports officiating, but of course intent does matter sometimes. Falling down in soccer isn't against the rules; falling down on purpose, to deceive the officials, is. Throwing a baseball that hits a batter isn't against the rules; doing so intentionally very much is. The neighborhood play at second base is simply a fielder failing to touch the bag but doing so intentionally, and being granted leniency by the knowing umpires. (The word intention appears in the rulebook 47 times.) Heck, umpires often fail to call a strike when the pitch, though in the zone, is not where the pitcher and catcher had intended it. That last one is a lousy part of umpiring that should make you mad, but it establishes a basic fact about umpires: they consider intent. It is perfectly consistent with how umpires do their jobs, and how the game is played. In a situation like this, where the rule is intentionally ambiguous, then it is arguably truer to the nature of the sport for intent to be considered.

I lean toward calling obstruction, and I lean toward cleaning up the wording in the rulebook before this happens again and/or starts getting exploited by runners who realize that the rulebook apparently gives them exploitably broad rights. Of course, if runners started abusing this—intentionally running into defenders on the ground—I assume umpires would stop granting them bases. Intent, after all, matters to umpires.

My point is not that the umpires made the right call, or the wrong call. It is that they very easily could have made either call. The only wrong opinion in this case is certainty, because the rulebook very specifically leaves room for uncertainty. It was the Cardinals' good fortune that it went their way, and the Red Sox' bad fortune that it didn't go their way. Will Middlebrooks didn't do anything wrong. Allen Craig didn't do anything wrong. There's no morally right solution in this rulebook, so Dana DeMuth and Jim Joyce chose the morally neutral one: They more or less guessed.

Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2013/10/world_series_obstruction_did_the_umps_make_the_right_call_on_the_crazy_play.html
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Lou Reed, Beloved Contrarian, Dies

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American rock singer-songwriter Lou Reed performs at the Hammersmith Odeon in London in 1975. He is playing a transparent, plexiglass guitar. Reed died Sunday at the age of 71.

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Reed and Nico perform with Velvet Underground in 1972.

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Reed, Mick Jagger and David Bowie share a joke at a party at Cafe Royal thrown by Bowie in 1973.

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Reed performs at the Regent Theater in Melbourne, Australia, in 2000.

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Maureen Tucker, Martha Morrison (wife of Sterling Morrison), John Cale and Lou Reed pose for photographers shortly after The Velvet Underground was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Jan. 17, 1995.

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Reed performs his album Berlin at the CCH Congress Center in Hamburg in 2008.

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Reed presents his photography exhibition at the Matadero cultural center in Madrid on Nov. 16, 2012.

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Reed attends an event for the photography book Transformer, by Mick Rock, in New York City on Oct. 3.

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One of rock's most beloved and contrarian figures has died. Lou Reed epitomized New York City's artistic underbelly in the 1970s, with his songs about hookers and junkies. He was 71.

Reed died Sunday morning on Long Island of complications from a liver transplant earlier this year, his literary agent, Andrew Wylie, said.

The famous iconoclast actually got his start as a staff songwriter pumping out pop tunes in a wannabe hit factory called Pickwick Records. Reed recalled his days as a frothy pop lyricist in a 1989 NPR interview.

"When I first started out I really liked the spontaneity of it, cause you know I've got a B.A. in English — not that that means I should be good at it, but it gives me some kind of background in it," he said. "I thought I was pretty fast."

Lou Reed was fast. In more ways than one. He went from hit factory to Andy Warhol's Factory, the epicenter of trashy, avant-garde experimentation in '60s New York. Warhol mentored Reed and his band, The Velvet Underground. He urged them to keep things gritty. The band's Welsh co-founder, John Cale, told NPR in 2000 that the band was never easy listening.

"We were not user-friendly at all," he says. "Anyone listening to a bass guitar and regular guitar coming out of the same amp — it couldn't have been a really great listening experience."

Beyond their sound, The Velvet Underground disturbed even hard-core scenesters with graphic songs about debauchery and doing drugs. In an interview on WHYY's Fresh Air, drummer Moe Tucker remembered performing the song "Heroin": "We got fired from the Cafe Bizarre," she said. "The woman came rushing up to us and said, 'If you play one more song like that you're fired.' "

They did, and they were, and the band's albums did not sell very well. Reed left and embarked on a spotty solo career that reflected his up and down life enthralled with New York's darker corners and the hustlers who hid there.

"Walk on the Wild Side" became Reed's only Top 40 hit, partly because a number of radio station programmers had no idea what it was really about. The album it came from, Transformer — co-produced by David Bowie — brought Reed critical acclaim and attention. Which Reed, in characteristic fashion, hated. That played out in interviews, including one in 1989 with NPR's Bob Edwards, who asked Reed about his choice of subjects.

"I mean, it might be harder to write about a chair," he said. "As a matter of fact, it would be harder to write about a chair. I mean, I could write a song about a chair: Who sat in this chair. Who built this chair. How long had this chair been here. You could do that."

And a few years later, while promoting his album The Raven, Reed vented to another NPR host, who wanted to know how other journalists had somehow mixed up Reed's original lyrics with the writings of Edgar Allan Poe.

"Well, if you're deaf, dumb and retarded, it's easy. I can't believe people interview me for this stuff and don't notice," he says. "I grade them and I put them on my website when they fail really badly, to warn other people, other musicians: 'Watch out for this interviewer.' It's like talking to a squirrel."

As ornery as Reed was with journalists, he was often supportive of other artists. He influenced REM, The Replacements and Talking Heads, and he collaborated with musicians ranging from Metallica to a young woman he met at a concert.

"I just said, 'Hey, hey Lou Reed. This is Emily Haines.' " Haines talked to NPR in 2012 about her band, Metric. She said Reed asked her if she would rather be in The Beatles or The Rolling Stones. She said The Velvet Underground. Then she asked if he would sing on her album. "I just asked him, and he said, 'Yes.' "

When Reed was not onstage or working with other artists, he was happiest in New York City, where he mellowed into a Lower Manhattan elder statesman, riding his bike, practicing tai chi and taking photos. He could get cranky about his own composition.

"I did not place that stupid bird there," he said in an interview he gave Weekend Edition in 2006, walking around his neighborhood with his camera. "The light comes and goes so quickly when it's perfect. You know that. There's a certain time in the morning, certain time around dusk, where the light is golden."

An ephemeral moment, like Warhol's Factory. Or a city sunset. "And I wanted to catch that," he said. Lou Reed caught it — on celluloid and vinyl.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2013/10/27/240819314/lou-reed-beloved-contrarian-has-died?ft=1&f=1039
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Banners reflect hard-line backlash in Iran

A poster depicting an American negotiator wearing a suit jacket and tie at a negotiating table and a dog to his side is displayed in Palestine square, Tehran, Iran, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2013. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has described his outreach to the U.S. as part of a "new era'' and a chance to put the nuclear standoff with the West to rest. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Banners that suddenly cropped around Tehran in the past week depict an American diplomat dressed in a jacket and tie, while under the negotiating table he is wearing military pants and pointing a gun at an Iranian envoy.

The anti-American images were ordered taken down Saturday by Tehran authorities. But they made their point.

It was another salvo by hard-liners who are opposed to President Hassan Rouhani's pursuit of better ties with Washington and worried that Iran could make unnecessary concessions in its nuclear program in exchange for relief from Western sanctions.

The banners and posters were something of a warm-up to the main event: Rouhani's critics are planning major anti-U.S. rallies — and amped-up "Death to America" chants — on the Nov. 4 anniversary of the U.S. Embassy takeover in 1979 following the Islamic Revolution.

Anti-American murals have long been part of the urban landscape in Iran, and include images of the Statue of Liberty transformed into a creepy skeleton and bombs raining down from the Stars and Stripes. The storming of the U.S. Embassy is marked every year with protests outside the compound's brick walls.

Now, however, the images reflect internal divisions in Iran and suggest more intrigue ahead.

Rouhani's groundbreaking overtures to the U.S. appear to have the backing of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. This means that — at least for the moment — he has the ultimate political cover to try to reach a nuclear deal and perhaps find other ways to cross the 34-year diplomatic no man's land between the countries.

However, the criticism and protests by hard-line resisters, led by the Revolutionary Guard, are as much directed at Rouhani's government as they are intended as a message for the supreme leader.

The Guard and others know that Khamenei does not want to risk an open confrontation that could sow further discord in Iran. The subtext of the posters and banners: More pressure could come if Rouhani's government is perceived as moving too fast toward concessions when nuclear talks resume next week in Geneva with the U.S. and other world powers.

The signs had an ad-agency quality that is rare compared with the usual anti-American fare of simple fliers and hand-lettered placards.

"American Honesty," read one in Farsi and slightly mangled English, showing the U.S. negotiator with the gun under the table.

Another depicted an American negotiator in a suit, a black attack dog by his side. The third one showed an open hand facing the open claws of what appeared to be an eagle, the symbol of the U.S.

On Sunday, with most of the images taken down, new posters popped up around Tehran. They contained just one sentence, in Farsi: "We don't oppress and don't allow to be oppressed."

The high production values of the banners and posters suggest possible connections to the powerful propaganda machinery of well-funded groups such as the Revolutionary Guard or its nationwide paramilitary network, known as the Basij.

Mohsen Pirhadi, head of Basij's Tehran branch, said he ordered the posters put up, but gave no further details on the designers or financial backers.

"These posters were in line with the interests of the (ruling) system," the Bahar newspaper quoted him as saying Saturday.

A day earlier, protesters trampled posters of Wendy Sherman, the chief U.S. nuclear negotiator with Iran, who said earlier this month that past experience suggests "deception is part of the DNA" of the nuclear talks. Iran's hard-line media, however, added "Iranian" to the quote and stirred outrage.

"Our people have seen nothing but dishonesty, deception of public opinion, betrayal and back-stabbing by Americans during the past years. ... Therefore, there is no way they can trust American promises and deceiving smiles," hard-line politician Hamid Reza Taraqi told The Associated Press on Saturday.

Israel and others suspicious of Iran have used similar language to question Rouhani's sincerity.

A conservative lawmaker, Hamid Rasaei, decried the order to take down the posters and banners. "Why is a group seeking to erase the 34-year-old honor of the Iranian nation?" he told Parliament on Sunday.

A moderate lawmaker, Mohammad Javad Kowlivand, demanded a probe into the U.S.-bashing campaign.

Political analyst Hamid Reza Shokouhi said opposition to Rouhani's outreach reflects the insecurities that come with any bold diplomatic gestures.

"Public opinion cannot easily digest that everything has suddenly changed," he said.

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-10-27-Iran-Poster%20Pressure/id-fe996fc261144edab3ba858d18bb3077
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Canada sex offender pleads not guilty to US charge


	Essential News from The Associated Press

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Monday, October 28, 2013

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