Wastholm.com

It’s that moment. He’s on one knee, he opens the box, the ring twinkles in the light. Ah, a diamond! Does that mean it must be love? Or that your suitor has paid a massively overinflated price for a cheap and common stone, whose value is artificially manipulated by a single company founded by Britain’s greatest colonialist, a stone whose profits have recently funded the bloodiest of violent conflicts in Africa, and whose entire modern tradition was invented by an expensive marketing campaign in the mid-20th century?

What's in a name? Not much, when it comes to the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. As Luc Devigne, the top EU negotiator on ACTA made clear today, he has no intention of limiting ACTA to, you know, its name.

We recently had a fun post about Hollywood accounting, about how the movie industry makes sure even big hit movies "lose money" on paper. So how about the recording industry? Well, they're pretty famous for doing something quite similar. Reader Jay pointed out in the comments an article from The Root that goes through who gets paid what for music sales, and the basic answer is not the musician. That report suggests that for every $1,000 sold, the average musician gets $23.40.

...

And that explains why huge megastars like Lyle Lovett have pointed out that he sold 4.6 million records and never made a dime from album sales. It's why the band 30 Seconds to Mars went platinum and sold 2 million records and never made a dime from album sales. You hear these stories quite often.

The US Air Force developed a top-secret plan to detonate a nuclear bomb on the moon as a display of military might at the height of the Cold War.

In an exclusive interview with The Observer, Dr Leonard Reiffel, 73, the physicist who fronted the project in the late Fifties at the US military-backed Armour Research Foundation, revealed America's extraordinary lunar plan.

'It was clear the main aim of the proposed detonation was a PR exercise and a show of one-upmanship. The Air Force wanted a mushroom cloud so large it would be visible on earth,' he said yesterday. 'The US was lagging behind in the space race.'

We opened homepage titled "Friend" with an aim to achieve a common progress of humankind and contribute to promoting mutual understanding and cooperation under the ideals of independence, peace and friendship.

A fascinating mix of friendly greetings, celebratory "news" and harsh propaganda from North Korea.

The board is to vote on a sweeping purge of alleged liberal bias in Texas school textbooks in favour of what Dunbar says really matters: a belief in America as a nation chosen by God as a beacon to the world, and free enterprise as the cornerstone of liberty and democracy.

...

Several changes include sidelining Thomas Jefferson, who favoured separation of church and state, while introducing a new focus on the "significant contributions" of pro-slavery Confederate leaders during the civil war.

The new curriculum asserts that "the right to keep and bear arms" is an important element of a democratic society. Study of Sir Isaac Newton is dropped in favour of examining scientific advances through military technology.

There is also a suggestion that the anti-communist witch-hunt by Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s may have been justified.

En av dessa saker är argumentet om att den som har rent mjöl i påsen inte har något att frukta. Det är ett sånt där argument som 'vanligt hederligt' folk går med på, och kanske till och med använder själva lite då och då. Problemet med det här argumentet är dock att det inte är ett argument. Det är inte heller ett pseudoargument. Det är - och jag gör här ett noggrant och väl avvägt urval av de många begrepp jag har lärt mig använda under mina år på universitetet - ett skitargument.

På denna blogg kommer juristerna på Antipiratbyrån; Henrik Pontén och Sara Lindbäck att i mån av tid och behov ge mer personliga kommenterar till händelser som berör oss. Detta är en sida som välkomnar alla som vill delta i en seriös debatt men man ska våga stå för sina åsikter och skriva under sina inlägg med sitt riktiga namn. För er som inte vill göra detta finns det ett otal andra forum på internet. Välkomna!

Kameror som gör det möjligt för flygsäkerhetspersonal att se igenom passagerarnas kläder ska införas även på storflygplatserna i Rom och Milano.

...

I USA används tekniken bland annat på ett 20-tal flygplatser.

MyNewsdesk connects the right stories with the right journalists. That’s why thousands of journalists rely on MyNewsdesk for the latest business buzz and press information.

Share press releases, blogs, images, video, contact details, events and more. MyNewsdesk gets your business heard.

|< First   < Previous   51–60 (86)   Next >   Last >|