text:
Pronunciation: sa KWIN a veer

Brand: Invirase

Invirase 500 mg

slide 1 of 1, Invirase 500 mg,

oblong, orange, imprinted with SQV 500, ROCHE

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What is the most important information I should know about saquinavir?

Saquinavir must be taken together with another medicine called ritonavir.

Life-threatening side effects may occur if you take saquinavir with certain other medicines. Tell your doctor about all medicines you use, and those you start or stop using during your treatment with saquinavir.

What is saquinavir?

Saquinavir is an antiviral medicine that prevents human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) from multiplying in your body.

Saquinavir is used together with ritonavir to treat HIV, the virus that can cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Neither saquinavir nor ritonavir will not cure HIV or AIDS.

Saquinavir may also be used for purposes not listed in this medication guide.

What should I discuss with my healthcare provider before taking saquinavir?

You should not take this medicine if you are allergic to saquinavir or ritonavir (Norvir, Kaletra), or if you have:

  • a serious heart condition called "AV block" (unless you have a pacemaker);
  • personal or family history of long QT syndrome;
  • severe liver disease; or
  • low levels of potassium or magnesium in your blood.

Life-threatening side effects may occur if you take saquinavir with:

  • alfuzosin;
  • atazanavir;
  • oral midazolam, or triazolam;
  • sildenafil (Revatio, for treating pulmonary arterial hypertension);
  • tacrolimus;
  • trazodone;
  • anti-psychotic medication --chlorpromazine, clozapine, haloperidol, mesoridazine, pimozide, thioridazine, ziprasidone;
  • certain anti-infective medicines --clarithromycin, dapsone, erythromycin, halofantrine, pentamidine, rifampin;
  • cholesterol medication --lovastatin (Mevacor, Altoprev, Advicor) or simvastatin (Zocor, Simcor, Vytorin);
  • ergot medicine --dihydroergotamine, ergotamine, ergonovine, methylergonovine; or
  • heart rhythm medicine --amiodarone, dofetilide, flecainide, lidocaine, propafenone, or quinidine.

To make sure saquinavir is safe for you, tell your doctor if you have:

  • heart disease;
  • liver disease (including hepatitis B or C);
  • a bleeding or blood clotting disorder such as hemophilia;
  • diabetes; or
  • high cholesterol or triglycerides.

Tell your doctor if you are pregnant or plan to become pregnant. HIV can be passed to your baby if you are not properly treated during pregnancy. Take all of your HIV medicines as directed to control your infection.

If you are pregnant, your name may be listed on a pregnancy registry. This is to track the outcome of the pregnancy and to evaluate any effects of saquinavir on the baby.

Saquinavir can make birth control pills less effective. Ask your doctor about using non hormonal birth control (condom, diaphragm with spermicide) to prevent pregnancy.

Women with HIV or AIDS should not breast-feed a baby. Even if your baby is born without HIV, the virus may be passed to the baby in your breast milk.

Saquinavir is not approved for use by anyone younger than 16 years old.

How should I take saquinavir?

Follow all directions on your prescription label. Do not take this medicine in larger or smaller amounts or for longer than recommended.

Read all patient information, medication guides, and instruction sheets provided to you. Ask your doctor or pharmacist if you have any questions.

Saquinavir must be taken together with ritonavir and it should not be used alone. You should not take saquinavir with cobicistat (Evotaz, Genvoya, Prezcobix, Stribild, Tybost).

Take your medicine with food or within 2 hours after eating a full meal.

To make swallowing easier, you may open the saquinavir capsule and sprinkle the medicine into 1 tablespoon of jam or sugar syrup (use sorbitol if you are diabetic). Stir the mixture for about a minute and allow it to reach room temperature. Swallow the mixture right away without chewing. Do not save the mixture for later use.

While using saquinavir, you may need frequent blood tests.

Use saquinavir regularly to get the most benefit. Get your prescription refilled before you run out of medicine completely.

HIV/AIDS is usually treated with a combination of drugs. Use all medications as directed by your doctor. Read the medication guide or patient instructions provided with each medication. Do not change your doses or medication schedule without your doctor's advice. Every person with HIV or AIDS should remain under the care of a doctor.

Store at room temperature away from moisture and heat. Keep the bottle tightly closed when not in use.

What happens if I miss a dose?

Take the missed dose as soon as you remember. Skip the missed dose if it is almost time for your next scheduled dose. Do not take extra medicine to make up the missed dose.

Try not to miss any of your doses. Skipping doses may increase the risk of your virus becoming resistant to antiviral medicine.

What happens if I overdose?

Seek emergency medical attention or call the Poison Help line at 1-800-222-1222.

What should I avoid while taking saquinavir?

Taking this medicine will not prevent you from passing HIV to other people. Do not have unprotected sex or share razors or toothbrushes. Talk with your doctor about safe ways to prevent HIV transmission during sex. Sharing drug or medicine needles is never safe, even for a healthy person.

What are the possible side effects of saquinavir?

Get emergency medical help if you have signs of an allergic reaction: hives; difficult breathing; swelling of your face, lips, tongue, or throat.

Saquinavir may increase your risk of certain infections or autoimmune disorders by changing the way your immune system works. Symptoms may occur weeks or months after you start treatment with saquinavir. Tell your doctor if you have:

  • signs of a new infection--fever, night sweats, swollen glands, mouth sores, diarrhea, stomach pain, weight loss;
  • chest pain (especially when you breathe), dry cough, wheezing, feeling short of breath;
  • cold sores, sores on your genital or anal area;
  • rapid heart rate, feeling anxious or irritable, weakness or prickly feeling, problems with balance or eye movement;
  • trouble speaking or swallowing, severe lower back pain, loss of bladder or bowel control; or
  • swelling in your neck or throat (enlarged thyroid), menstrual changes, impotence, loss of interest in sex.

Call your doctor at once if you have:

  • any type of infection, skin infection, or open sores;
  • cough with yellow or green mucus, stabbing chest pain, wheezing, feeling short of breath;
  • high blood sugar --increased thirst, increased urination, hunger, dry mouth, fruity breath odor, drowsiness, dry skin, blurred vision, weight loss; or
  • liver problems --nausea, upper stomach pain, itching, tired feeling, loss of appetite, dark urine, clay-colored stools, jaundice (yellowing of the skin or eyes).

Common side effects may include:

  • nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, stomach pain;
  • tired feeling; or
  • changes in the shape or location of body fat (especially in your arms, legs, face, neck, breasts, and waist).

This is not a complete list of side effects and others may occur. Call your doctor for medical advice about side effects. You may report side effects to FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088.

What other drugs will affect saquinavir?

Many drugs can interact with saquinavir, and some drugs should not be used together. Tell your doctor about all your current medicines and any you start or stop using, especially:

  • any other antiviral medicines to treat hepatitis or HIV;
  • colchicine;
  • dexamethasone or fluticasone (Flonase, Advair);
  • fusidic acid;
  • fentanyl or methadone;
  • omeprazole (Prilosec);
  • sildenafil (Viagra) and other erectile dysfunction medicines;
  • warfarin (Coumadin, Jantoven);
  • an antibiotic or antifungal medicine;
  • an herbal supplement, especially garlic or St. John's wort;
  • cholesterol medication;
  • heart or blood pressure medication;
  • medicine to prevent organ transplant rejection;
  • medicine to treat pulmonary arterial hypertension;
  • a sedative such as Valium, or other medicines to treat anxiety or mental illness; or
  • seizure medicine.

This list is not complete and many other drugs can interact with saquinavir. This includes prescription and over-the-counter medicines, vitamins, and herbal products. Give a list of all your medicines to any healthcare provider who treats you. Not all possible interactions are listed in this medication guide.

Where can I get more information?

Your pharmacist can provide more information about saquinavir.

Remember, keep this and all other medicines out of the reach of children, never share your medicines with others, and use this medication only for the indication prescribed.

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Cinema Escapist

Explore and connect the world through a cinematic lens

Interview: Director Oualid Mouaness Talks “1982,” His Feature Film Debut

Director Oualid Mouaness' film "1982" stars prominent actress Nadine Labaki and tells a coming-of-age story amidst the 1982 Lebanon War.

By , 5 Sep 19 00:25 UTC
(146)  (24)

Oualid Mouaness on the set of 1982. (Courtesy of Oualid Mouaness)

In his feature film debut 1982, director/writer Oualid Mouaness tells the story of an 11 year-old named Wissam who, after sending anonymous love notes, resolves to tell his classmate Joanna that he is in love with her. The narrative occurs at a school on the outskirts of Beirut during its final exam day—and right as the 1982 Lebanon War begins. As conflict escalates in the distance, teachers desperately try to mask their fears; however, the situation begins to crumble as the day progresses.

The film follows two pivotal focal points. One centers on students: love-struck Wissam (Mohamad Dalli), his best friend Majid (Ghassan Maalouf), the object of Wissam’s affection Joanna (Gia Madi), and possible nemesis Abir (Leyla Harkous). Another focuses on the teachers and staff of Wissam’s English-language school, including Wissam’s teacher Yasmine (Nadine Labaki) and her politically divergent colleague Joseph (Rodrigue Sleiman).

Reminiscent of Philippe Falardeau’s Monsieur Lazhar, the film is a touching, delicate look at childlike wonder and humanity, and the loss of innocence that comes with adulthood. 1982 demonstrates the complexities of love and war, as well as the resilience of the human spirit.

This poignant drama is due to premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival next week. As Mouaness says, “I do hope it resonates with people, and the world. I’m very excited to see how it’s going to be received.”

In this interview, Oualid Mouaness reflects on the making of 1982, and shares with Cinema Escapist his inspiration behind the film.

•   •   •

You state at the beginning of the film that it is based on actual events. What was your inspiration for 1982?

It’s very close to how I recall my last day in Lebanon in 1982. It was that day that we had to leave the school very quickly and stop our exams. I tried to write it as a short story a few years back. I found it very hard to ever finish it until, somehow, I decided I wanted it to be a film. It just unfolded. It’s based on that last day, which has really stayed with me.

It’s strange how certain experiences are meant to become written stories, while others are just destined to become films.

It is unusual that this became a film because, in my mind, there was a short story that I wasn’t even sure I was going to finish. I had a conversation with a friend about it and she said, “this is the film,” and she told me to finish it. A year later, I was going through some things I’ve written and I came across it and, reading it, was very emotional and I felt that she was right. That’s when I started writing that story into the film and here we are eight years later.

Was the writing process why 1982 took so long to get made, or were there other factors?

There were other factors, but it was a combination of things. I finished the first draft of the film and, immediately off the press, I got into the Sundance Middle East screenwriters lab, which was in Jordan.

Then it was about raising the finances to do this film. As a first film, and as a Lebanese film, it was not easy. That process took quite a while. I needed the right team of producers for this project. By the end, I think we became a family who travelled along together for years. The financing part took the most time.

I tend to take my time with a project and I like to go off, keep my distance, and then come back to it. I find that that process was very important for bringing the depths to these characters because there’s a lot of characters in this film.

Wissam and Joanna. (Courtesy of Tricycle Logic)

This is your feature film debut. Long before writing about your experiences, did you always want to tell a story about Lebanon and its past?

Deep down inside, I think I did. We are the product of our history and I’ve written other material but, somehow, this felt like the first story I could tell that, once I told this story, I would be able to tell other stories.

I’ve been living in the US for a very long time. I’ve been working here; I’ve had a very good career and done a lot of things in music and film. Then I started getting drawn back to the Middle East and I reconnected with it over there. I think I reconnected on a much more profound level because I understood how to read what happened back then.

I had an objective eye. I grew up between two countries—Liberia and Lebanon—and both of them have had their share of challenging histories of war and, for me, there’s a perspective that’s very important. War affects people in so many different ways, and they somehow leave a mark on you.

The one thing that was very important to me was to really capitalize on the human experience and the desire to live and the desire for education. Education is the way out and the irony of the film is the fact that education is disruptive, yet you know that these people will defy life. I see the world in a very positive light and try to hold the darkness. Generally, the core values of humans are love and goodness, and I think that’s what drives us all.

You make it a point to focus on both the adults’ and children’s perspectives. How was it achieving that delicate balance?

It was very hard. That balance meant that I was doing a story about love, a story about war but, for me, it’s more of a coming-of-age story about both of those things together. We needed to feel the palpable nature of how the adults are perceiving the world, the adult experience, but I tend to favor the kid’s experience, clearly.

Some of the hardest scenes to write were the scenes in which the adults had to communicate with each other about what was going on without being heavy-handed. I just wanted to express the emotional truth of the period. I think it’s about the emotional truth of people and their relationships to each other that brings about that balance.

You have the kids who are very pure, very unmediated; they’re the heart and love. Then you have the adults who are completely impacted by what’s going on around them. The question is will they be able to reconcile. The film really addresses the fact that people should talk through things to get through to the other side. That’s really the core of the adult narrative of the film.

There is a stark contrast between the childlike innocence of the students as opposed to the fear consuming the teachers as the day progresses. That makes quite an impact early on in the film.

It’s interesting you’ve observed that tension. During my process, one of the things I learnt during the casting process with the kids was that I didn’t just learn about them, I learnt about myself. I understood that if there’s two kids talking in a room and you’re completely invisible, they way they address each other is very different than when an adult enters the room.

This was a challenge. How can I be an invisible adult? How can I not be present so I can get the truth from the kids? Children have a world that’s complete for them. They sort of understand what’s going on in the adult world but they have peace with how complete their own world is in and of itself.

I tried to make that situation pretty clear. When I was working with the kids on-set and when I needed to talk to them, I needed to be at their level and never talked to them like an adult talking down to a kid. Some of the things we talked about are very funny! They talked to me like they talked to their peers because of how we broke down these walls, which, for me, was very important during filming and the rehearsal process. They felt at home.

Oualid Mouaness working with actor Mohamad Dalli. (Courtesy of Oualid Mouaness)

You’ve assembled a cast of wonderful young actors. What was the casting process like?

We saw a lot of kids. I wanted the cast to be very diverse and wanted them to be from different classes and different segments of Lebanese society; representation is very important to me. We went to a lot of different schools and, starting in 2014, I would go to Lebanon and work with a friend of mine who is a teacher. We’d go in, we’d workshop, and get to a level where they can actually improvise; that’s how I like to understand them because they surprise you to no end.

We had to move fast because kids grow quickly so, the moment the decision was made to film, we cast a very wide net. We looked at close to 700 kids from different schools. I would go to all different schools sometimes and just observe the students and meet them in their classrooms. After that, we whittled down to between 25–30 kids. They became a core group with whom I’ve worked and brought in. We did different workshops and exercises; we made it fun for them.

All the time, I had a camera on me because I no longer wanted them to feel the camera’s presence. They didn’t know what roles they were playing either, so I used that to see the dynamic and then define the roles. I think we’ve delivered some beautiful roles in the film. I was moved watching them come to life on-set. As we rehearsed and shot, they just got better and better. They became comfortable and became themselves.

It feels so natural in the film, and the way [the kids] interact with one another is wonderful.

That was one of the main things I tried to do: create a classroom where everybody sort of understands everybody else’s idiosyncrasies.

During the rehearsal process, we started assigning each kid their own locker, their own desk. They even put stuff that wasn’t supposed to be in the film in those lockers so they got used to their space. It helped get them in the mindset.

The funniest thing was the first day of the shoot because, during rehearsals we were shooting with smaller cameras, so the first day they were emotional as it was the first time they’d actually seen the big camera! It was very cute.

It was suddenly real!

Exactly! It’s not just summer camp! We had a very specific window of time that we needed to shoot the film. The film definitely had to shoot in the summer and during a particular month of summer when the school was available. Part of the reason why the film took so long to be made was because, if we didn’t shoot that summer, we literally had to wait another year for the school. We were ready to shoot in 2015 and 2016 but, at the last minute for both those years, a piece didn’t fall into place. It was like, “Oh my God, we have to push another year.” That was the tough part. Everything happens for a reason though and you have to trust that.

The choice to focus on Wissam and Joanna’s love story as the 1982 Lebanon War rages on in the background is somewhat unusual. Why did you focus on Wissam, in particular?

My mom was once called into my school because I had written love notes! I got really chastised for it. It was something that stayed with me, and the notion of loving at such an early age was a part of who I was at the time.

Between Majid and Wissam’s characters, I think there’s a lot of me that’s familiar with that world. I got into trouble and they called my mom in! I remember my mom was driving home and she said, “Oualid, you are too young. You shouldn’t be writing these love notes!” I remember that very clearly.

The notion that you’re too young to love, you’re really not. We tend to disregard the emotions of different age groups but, then again, there’s something fascinating in being able to understand each age group. That’s where the love story comes from, it comes from the fact that I did have a crush and I do respect every kid’s crush that they could have. I think it’s a beautiful thing.

A shot from the school where 1982 takes place. (Courtesy of Tricycle Logic)

The Lebanese conflict is the backdrop of the film yet, despite this, we never see war, only hints of it. This was clearly a deliberate choice to stay within the school grounds. Why?

Very much so. It was because of my personal experience of this. At the time, Lebanon was split in half, and there was a part that was more dangerous than another.

The school in which I filmed is actually the school I went to when this happened. I cannot speak to the experience of people who were in a different part of the country. I wanted to speak to the truth that I knew. In a lot of war-torn countries, where everybody is saying it’s a disaster, there are always pockets of surprise from people. They continue living. I think the fact that it’s going on in the background, that you have life trying to happen and trying to be as normal as possible is, in itself, very resilient.

This is something I find very prevalent in the Lebanese people, given our history. There is a resilience and there is a love of life that continues no matter what. I wrote from what I knew. I didn’t feel I had the right to tell a story I didn’t know.

It must have been quite emotional to go back to your old school to film there and recreate your memories.

I did have some emotional moments during the process of shooting. It becomes very real all of a sudden. Part of me was dealing with it a little bit. We always have to understand our past.

I remember getting home when I was young and it was utter panic because, although we were on the safe side, the magnitude of the sound and the magnitude of everything that was going on had completely incarcerated the entire country. It was the first time I had really experienced something of that magnitude. Though I knew as a kid that there were dangers in the country, this was the first time that it actually impacted everybody.

Very little music is used throughout 1982, which gives the film a peaceful, yet eerie quality. Was this choice deliberate because of its subject matter or for a more impactful ending?

It’s a bit of both. I knew where I wanted to take the story. The film is a very naturalistic piece that has these little hints of the kids’ imaginations. For it to work emotionally, I had to stay deep within the naturalism and interfere as little as possible.

There are different sounds when there is something going on with the adults and when something’s going on with the kids. I think the music was emotional and really accompanied the kids’ trouble and strife. I tend to lean towards less is more because, sometimes, you don’t want to interfere.

The first part of the film is very quiet; I wanted you to feel like you are in a school and doing exams. I wanted to take the audience back to that moment in time that we’ve all had on exam day; that silence, that quietness, that peace. Then the midpoint of the story completely changes the film. I gravitated towards the piano as a basis and, with the ending; I wanted to conjure innocence and the period.

Oualid Mouaness working with Nadine Labaki on set. (Courtesy of Oualid Mouaness)

Nadine Labaki is one of the Arab film industry’s biggest stars, and she’s just enjoyed immense success with her latest film. How did you end up working together on this film?

There’s a camaraderie within the Lebanese film industry because we’re pretty small. I’ve known Nadine since 2009, shortly after she did Caramel (2007), and we have mutual friends.

As I wrote this film, I thought that she would be perfect for it. I grew to know her and, as a person, she has a presence. She read [my script] in late 2013 and liked it a lot. As a filmmaker herself, she knows it’s going to take time to finance and I asked if she was still down to do this and she said, “Absolutely!” She read it again and said she loved it and wanted to do it.

Somehow the stars aligned and she was taking a break from editing Capernaum (2018) and she said, “I can give you 14 days.” She understood the role very profoundly, she knew it and she knew the weight of what she represents in the film. She was a pleasure. I think things worked out beautifully to get to that point for us working together. Over the years, she had become a mother, which I think brought a lot to the role and you feel that in her character. She doesn’t take on a lot of roles in general but I think this one really spoke to her, so I was very excited that she loved it.

You’re a director, writer, and producer. Was aspect of the filmmaking process do you find the most challenging and/or satisfying?

All of them! That’s a tough question. It’s funny; I find it very difficult to separate them from each other because of the way I work. Even as a producer, I work closely with directors. One meshes with the other. That’s a very tough question!

I do love producing, I do love directing and I do love writing. I think, for me, they are one large correlation and, when you’re telling a story, you’re telling all aspects of it.

The tough part is actually making the decision to do the film; to make that decision to start writing and undertaking the whole project. That’s when you make the decision to commit. That’s the most difficult part: how far you go, how far you let the story take you and how much you let it take over your life.

Sitting down and making that decision is always the hardest part.

When I first set out to make this film, I didn’t think it would take more than a year. Here we are eight years later, and I’m happy with the results. Over the years, because of my producing, my documentary background, and my music background, I think that really does come to life in the film somehow, particularly with the ending. I had to go into the kids’ imagination, which liberated the film visually as well.

A shot from 1982. (Courtesy of Tricycle Logic)

The film does have a documentary feel to it, in terms of being able to transport the audience back to their school days.

I feel that’s where the film succeeds. I surprised myself because I was afraid I would be unable to convey that feeling. As the film progresses, the language changes and it becomes looser.

The first half of the film is much more compositional. As it moves forward and as tension rises, I get closer into the situation and, at that point, you’re already engaged with the characters. The second part of the film, from both a camera and script standpoint, the film is very disruptive. The first half is paradise and the second half is paradise getting lost.

What are your biggest influences or inspirations as a filmmaker?

They are very strange, but two films that really drove me a lot growing up are Baghdad Café (1987) by Percy Adlon, and Emir Kusturica‘s Time of the Gypsies (1988).

At the same time, I’m very grounded in stories, and I was one of those kids that just watched movies over and over, to the chagrin of my parents. I’ve had different influences over time but, for example, Au Revoir les Enfants (1987) is just another type of film that has stayed with me forever.

As an adult, I’ve very much gravitated towards Italian cinema, towards the darker side of things. I tend to work in layers in the narratives of films. Each layer reveals something new.

In the short film I did—The Rifle, the Jackal, the Wolf, and the Boy (2016)—was a very simple story, but the film also had a lot of layers and people can choose how deeply they want to read it.

People, nowadays, are watching films more than they are reading books. I love books so, as a filmmaker, I will try to preserve the literary aspect of visuals, in terms of the colors I use, the layers I choose, and how my dialog unfolds.

Do you have any upcoming projects planned?

I do have one that is written! It is close to done but not completely done yet. Ideally, I’d like to be delving into it in the next two and a half to three years. It might not be a Lebanese film; it might be an American film.

This interview was edited for clarity and length.

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TED: Changing the World, One 15-Minute Presentation at a Time

If you get a chance to attend a TED event, do it, columnist Rob Enderle writes. The talks are specifically designed to be short, slide-free and inspiring. Even sponsored events are free of sales pitches and data-driven presentations.

Bill Gates Ted talk
Gisela Giardino (Creative Commons BY or BY-SA)

TED conferences tend to be must-see events. TED picks interesting topics and trains the speakers on giving short presentations that don't rely on bullet-point slides. I always walk away amazed.

For the last few years, TED has held sponsored talks. Rather than pitch products, though, researchers and other deep thinkers who work for the sponsor share ideas and concepts on how to make their business and the world better for everyone. This week's TED@IBM in San Francisco covered a fascinating set of topics in just a couple of hours.

Several talks stood out to me. I'll say why below. There were also short films addressing big issues; for instance, Project Lucy highlighted how IBM Watson can improve education in the developing world.

TED Talk Model: Tell Stories, Ditch the PowerPoint

One advantage of going through the Ted process is learning how to be a storyteller, to pace your speech and to be brief. This helps the audience retain much of what you say – in sharp contrast to the typical data-rich, story-poor vendor talks that go on forever but no one can seem to recall. This skill could benefit any career path, particularly executives who pitch investors, employees and customers on a regular basis. Frankly, it would help a lot of folks in verbal interviews as well. Online resources that can help you learn this amazing skill – and if you think you have something amazing to say, you can audition for TED.

[ How-to: Create Magical Vendor Presentations ]

Solar Power to the Masses

Back to TED@IBM. If global warming concerns you, you likely hope solar power can replace oil and gas refineries eventually. On top of having a PH.D. in physics and nanotechnology, Airlight Energy's Gianluca Ambrosetti is pushing Sunflower, a low-cost, high-powered solar technology with IBM and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. It uses a set of mirrors and solar photovoltaic cells, coupled with concreate and aluminum building materials, to create high-yield sun-tracking solar plants that could be used in individual homes or remote areas in need of power. The result looks like a big oversized sunflower (thus the name). IBM's contribution was cheap warm-water cooling technology to keep the solar cells from melting – kind of an important feature.

[ News: IBM Solar Energy Tech Claims to Harness Power of 2,000 Suns ]

Shared Ideas to Reimagine Our Future

Bryan Kramer, president of PureMatter, got his talk to trend on Twitter: He got us to Tweet our own idea to change the world. Given how many followers the assembled group has, we dented the Internet. Kramer then talked about the impact of shared ideas. He also says we should stop talking about B2B and B2C and instead realize that every interaction is human-to-human. He's one of the few speakers I've seen who actually could change the world largely by motivating his audiences to step up.

[ Commentary: The New Killer App is a Real Human ]

Leadership in the Digital Era Means Giving Up Control

The incomparable Charlene Li is one of the most amazing people I know. She touched on a number of things, but what really stuck with me was that influence is no longer connected to titles but, rather, to how many people a person influences. Often in today's companies, it's often unrecognized rank-and-file employees who drive success and performance, not named executives. It fascinates me to see otherwise-smart executives lay these people off, knowing nothing about who they are, only to face them again when they work for more powerful competitors. Li also says sharing and transparency define winning companies in the digital age. This also resonated with me; an excessive focus on privacy doesn't work during this period when everyone's connected.

[ Q&A: Why CIOs Must Embrace Social Software: A Conversation With Charlene Li ]

Questioning Tone in Analytics

I've said that analytics isn't working in many firms because data feeds are biased and critical information is left out. IBM researcher Kareem Yusuf points out that we aren't capturing the tone of communications well, either, and often misinterpret the data as a result. The same set of words can mean very different things in different tones, and we don't have a good mechanism to address this. That's why neural computers will become more important going forward; it's believed they'll be able to not only report what someone said or wrote, but when they actually meant, which could be very different.

[ Related: Forget Big Data, the Value's in 'Big Answers' ]

Tomorrow's Cinema Should Turn Back Time

This had little to do with IT but is touched my heart. Brad Bird – a movie industry legend, director, screenwriter, animator, producer and actor for the Pixar division of Disney – shared some fascinating Steve Jobs stories. He also discussed how going to the movies used to be an amazing event: The theaters focused on one film, waiting in line was like waiting to buy a new iPhone, and everything was orchestrated to make the experience special. This gave way to the Cineplex: Big boxes with little theaters that shuffle customers in and out as quickly as possible. Much of the magic of movies was lost – which is why, he argues, the film industry is ailing. You get a better experience watching movies at home. If we want to fix the movie industry, Bird says, we need to turn back the clock and make going to the theaters amazing again.

[ News: Blade Servers Make the Movies ]

Cognitive Cooking: Recipes for the Food in Your Kitchen

IBM researcher Florian Pinel spoke about what would happen if everyone could have Watson design a dinner menu. Use Watson to analyze your dietary needs, as well as the food you have on hand, and it could suggest the healthiest meals at the lowest cost (as you'd waste almost nothing). Getting Watson to understand what your body needs, as well as data-entering all the food you just bought at the store, could be painful – unless you tied Watson to an online shopping service and/or had a connected pantry and refrigerator that automatically inventoried the food on hand. Or imagine you had a 3-D food printer, or a stove that would cook the meal for you. This is in our future, but it'll take a while to get there.

[ More: IBM Watson Cooks Up Some New Dishes ]

Imagine the Future and Make it Happen

A good deal of the TED mission is about creating a better future. A lot of the ideas and concepts are fascinating – but perhaps the most powerful is TED itself, which gives people who otherwise might not have much voice access to a large number of influential people who do. Thank you, IBM, for inviting me – Watson isn't a client of mine, but I follow it closely.

If you get a chance to attend a TED event, you'll find it to be a mind-expanding honor. If you can get some of your executives to give TED talks, you'll likely find they become far better executives. If you give a TED talk, it very well may make your career.

Copyright © 2014 IDG Communications, Inc.

6 digital transformation success stories


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Pelican Products' Smooth Data Migration

By William Atkinson  |  Posted 10-03-2013
Data center

By William Atkinson

In 2008, Pelican Products, which designs and manufactures watertight protective cases and portable lighting systems, implemented SAP ERP, as well as SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse, which enabled the company to consolidate operations among its expanding number of facilities and achieve additional business objectives.

However, the Torrance, Calif.-based company, which has offices and manufacturing facilities around the world, knew that reliably supporting and hosting its new SAP system would require expert facilities and resources. Management decided to outsource the hosting work, largely due to Pelican's small IT staff and other challenges related to multifaced environmental and industrial considerations. For example, one of the Pelican Products' major manufacturing facilities is located in an earthquake zone and also experiences frequent blackouts because of an antiquated electric grid.

Pelican began talks about the hosting project with a number of vendors, one of which was itelligence, which offers full SAP managed hosting and is one of only a few SAP Global Hosting Partners in the world.

Pelican selected itelligence because, as Jeff Cushing, vice president of IT for Pelican, says, "We were looking for more than just a hosting company. We were looking for a long-term partnership that would develop and adapt as Pelican grew." According to Cushing, itelligence made it clear that it understood Pelican's challenges and had the resources to manage Pelican's hosting needs and also evolve with the company.

Once the contract was signed, the two organizations mapped out an aggressive, six-month schedule to migrate the data center operations from Pelican's headquarters in California to itelligence's data center in Ohio. The migration took place in early 2012, and, according to Cushing, the project went as planned. "While the size of the migration was concerned us initially, things went very well," Cushing says.

Actually, Pelican underwent two data migrations in 2012. This was because itelligence opened a new data center, also in Ohio, eight months after Pelican's first data migration went live. The new state-of-the-art, 16,000-square-foot data center was designed according to the Uptime Institute's Tier IV definition, providing complete redundancy throughout all of the infrastructure components. "Both migrations went very well, with no customer or user impact," he said.

The partnership with itelligence has provided Pelican's IT staff with the time and resources to focus on other IT and business responsibilities. "While I have a strong IT staff, I want them to focus more on serving their internal users, not just on infrastructure," says Cushing. "Hosting with itelligence enables us to concentrate on getting more value from our SAP investment, and leave the core infrastructure to itelligence. Pelican's IT staff can now focus on optimizing our applications and getting the most from our SAP investment."

Overall, outsourcing proved to be a much better decision for Pelican than building its own data center, according to Cushing. "Building your own data center is an expensive proposition, and there are many viable alternatives," he says. "Even if we had built a new data center, we still wouldn't have had staff augmentation with SAP expertise. Our SAP systems are now hosted at itelligence's world-class data center, and we can direct our capital investments to other areas of the business."


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children running children smiling

Delmar: September 4th

Ravena: September 4th

First Day

Ravena : September 12th

Open House

Ravena: October 11th

Picture Day

Delmar: October 31st

Ravena: October 31st

Harvest Festival

Delmar: December 19th

Revena: December 18th

Delmar: November 21st

Ravena: November 26th

Delmar: April 13th-April 17th

Ravena: April20th-April 24th

Week of Young Child

Ravena: June 19th

Donuts with Dad

Delmar: April 13th-17th

Awesome Kids week

Ravena: May 8th

Muffins with Mom

Ravena: June 21st-24th

woman holding a chid


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How could a brand as well-known as Coca-Cola disappear from the face of the internet? In mid-November 2018, the king of soft drinks basically did just that for an entire weekend. Coca-Cola wiped its social media accounts clean so it could relaunch on World Kindness Day, kick-starting a rebrand rooted in optimism. But what spurred the change in the first place? Coca-Cola’s Social Center found that its fans preferred uplifting content— think inspiring quotes and graphics— and the brand refresh positioned Coca-Cola to better align with good vibes.

Coca-Cola hasn’t always gotten it right, though. Remember New Coke? This was the result of Coca-Cola’s marketers and product creators underestimating the loyalty their consumers already felt to their existing product. This kind of misstep is especially prevalent in rebranding, where artistic choices sometimes have little value beyond their initial flair. Rebrands are powerful things, though, and brand leaders should not waste an opportunity to forge a deeper audience connection.

To do that, they must tap into the power of emotion.

The Psychological Road Map to Better Rebrands

Emotion is the most potent connector in the world, particularly where brand storytelling is concerned. The Institute of Practitioners in Advertising found that brand campaigns that appeal purely to emotions perform approximately twice as well as those that appeal primarily to logic. We don’t have to look far to see how these findings translate to real life.

While Nike didn’t launch a full rebrand, its powerful 30th-anniversary campaign featuring politically polarizing Colin Kaepernick offers a great example. Nike made a bold but strategic business decision to ignite a cultural firestorm with the outspoken quarterback’s presence and the headline: “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything.” And while the campaign caused some consumers to swear off Nike forever, the emotional creative clearly resonated with others. The campaign increased sales and customer engagement, adding an impressive $6 billion to Nike’s overall market value.

Pressing psychological buttons like Nike did is less about manipulation than it is about tapping into biological drivers. In their book “Driven: How Human Nature Shapes Our Choices,” Harvard Business School professors Paul Lawrence and Nitin Nohria posit that humans are motivated by four primary biological drivers: the drive to acquire, defend, bond, and learn. Each drive operates independently from the others. So while the drive to acquire encourages people to collect everything from status to resources, the drive to bond spurs social connections.

The brands with the most faithful followers know how to tap into all four drivers in their rebrands, activating “cult loyalty” — the strongest expression of a customer relationship. Marketers and PR professionals can lead a rebrand that inspires cult loyalty by leaning on psychology in three distinct areas:

1. Leverage social proof

Consumers choose to patronize certain brands because they signify who they are as people. Fans of the brand aren’t just those who prefer the product but members of a group that shares their values. We can find examples of this everywhere we look: Mercedes-Benz enthusiasts feel a camaraderie different from that of BMW loyalists, just as iPhone users swear they’ll never switch to an Android.

Marketers can leverage the power of social proof to encourage consumers to see their brand as an extension of themselves. Research by social psychologist and neuroscientist Matthew Lieberman showed that our brains are wired to prioritize social interactions, suggesting that people may be more likely to follow a brand if they see evidence that others are already on board.

So show consumers how engagement with the new brand is not just what they should do— but what others already do. This sounds complicated, but it might manifest in strategies as simple as reframing messaging from “you should love our rebrand” to “your social group loves it already.”

2. Feed consumers’ wants until brand alignment feels like a need

Desire is a powerful emotion, and in life, it often feels spontaneous: “I simply can’t live without this thing.” In rebranding, however, marketers need to direct desire systematically, unraveling their brand’s distinct source of desirability and cultivating it. Don’t misunderstand: This isn’t about manipulation. Consumers want to be in on the joke, not the butt of one.

Instead, use your rebrand to represent something that consumers can’t live without. Feed that desire until the line between the perceived need to align with the brand and the real need of personal fulfillment begins to blur. E-Trade’s “Don’t Get Mad” campaign is a good example. The ads connect not just to consumers’ desire to earn more money, but also to their need to win the game of capitalism (especially within personal circles). When people don’t just like certain brands but need them, they’ll follow these brands to the ends of the earth.

3. Appeal to status

As humans, we’re constantly aware of our position within the pack. Marketers can help consumers along during the rebrand by showing them how the brand increases an individual’s status within the hierarchy.

Dior offers a lesson in the power of status. A few years back, the brand began to offer handbags at more accessible prices, but the move had the unintended effect of drawing both mid- and high-income buyers to the lower price point. Rather than spread the brand thin across multiple price points while losing market share, Dior did away with the lower-priced bags and was able to recapture its luxury buyers. By selling a true luxury product, Dior maintained the aspirational prestige of the brand— and sales numbers jumped, too.

People don’t want to belong just anywhere; they want to feel special and better. And they use their connections to brands to accomplish that. Use your rebrand to feed that and encourage people to adopt brand loyalty as a personality trait.

In our “always on” world, consumers are mired in rebrands. If brands can capture even a few seconds with consumers, that matters. But if they fail to do so in a meaningful way, all they’ve done is waste money and time. We know how powerful emotions are, so rather than use your next rebrand opportunity to appeal to your customers’ surface impulses, lean on the science of psychology to forge deeper bonds. If people can see themselves in your brand in a way they didn’t before, you have the opportunity to connect with them for a lifetime.

Kevin Thompson is CMO of Sotheby’s International Realty Affiliates LLC, where he oversees and implements marketing, interactive, digital, advertising, and PR initiatives for the brand. Kevin has an extensive background working with globally recognized luxury brands. He’s passionate about creating an unparalleled customer experience through exceptional marketing and brand management.

About Cision Contributor

This post was written by a guest Cision contributor.

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When to Use Infographics: 4 Content Types Perfect for Custom Visuals

An infographic can be a great addition to your content but isn't the only multimedia option. How do you know...


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High Performance Work System

Every company must design a set of HR policies and practices that make sense for its own strategy and situation. The employee-testing program that works for hiring engineers may not work for a retail store, for instance. And Ford Motor Corp. lost a president in part because he tried unsuccessfully to impose GEâ€™s famous â€˜forced distributionâ€™ appraisal process on Fordâ€™s managers. GEâ€™s appraisal system didnâ€™t make sense for Ford.

However, research shows that the HR systems of high performing companies do have many things in common, and that they differ in measurable ways from those of low-performing companies. Specifically, these HR systems are â€œhigh-performance work systemsâ€ (HPWS). HPWS generate more job applicants, screen candidates more effectively, provide more and better training, link pay more explicitly to performance, and provide a safer work environment, among many other things. In terms of measurable outcomes, these HPWS produce more qualified applicants per position, more employees hired based on validated selection tests, more hours of training for new employees, and a higher percentage of employees receiving regular performance appraisals. The general aim of the HPWS is to maximize the competencies and abilities of employees throughout the organization.

Every manager makes decisions within the context of the guidelines laid down by his or her companyâ€™s strategic plan. As weâ€™ll see in this chapter , the companyâ€™s strategic plan defines the nature of the companyâ€™s business, for instance, in terms of the markets in which it will compete and the ways in which it will differentiate itself from its competitors. The strategic plan lays out the broad guidelines within which the companyâ€™s managers take decisions. It thereby has a big influence on things like: â€œWhat sorts of people should we hire?â€ What kind of sales force do we need?â€ What production methods will we use?â€ and â€œHow should we build our brand image and market our products?â€ In a very real sense, then, the HR manager canâ€™t make intelligent decisions regarding how to design the companyâ€™s HR systems unless he or she understand how each of those systems helps the company achieve its strategic goals.

The main purpose of this is to show how to develop an HR system that supports, and makes sense in terms of, the companyâ€™s strategic goals. In this article we are trying to explain the strategic management process, how to develop a strategic plan, and the HR managerâ€™s role in the strategic management process. Also discussed is how to create a strategy oriented HR system, and explain the step-by-step â€œHR Scorecard approachâ€ to creating a strategy oriented HR system.

The central challenge facing human resources management is always to provide a set of services that make sense in terms of the companyâ€™s strategic plan. A strategic plan is the companyâ€™s plan for how it will match its internal strengths and weakness with external opportunities and threats in order to maintain a competitive advantage. The basic strategic planning process involves asking, â€œWhere are we now as a business, and where do we want to be? The manager then formulates specific (HR and other) strategies to take the company from where it is now to where he or she wants it to be. A strategy is thus a company course of action. The companyâ€™s various strategies â€“ its HR, sales, finance, and manufacturing strategies, for instance — need to support the companyâ€™s strategic plan. Suppose the strategic plan calls for improving the quality of the companyâ€™s products such as Fordâ€™s former plan to â€œMake quality Jobâ€ then one HR strategy might be to â€œboost employee qualityâ€.

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Monday 14 November 2016 4:15 am

My key aim as lord mayor is to promote London’s unique business and cultural offering

It has been a busy few days since starting as the 689th lord mayor. After my swearing in at the ancient Silent Ceremony on Friday came the world’s biggest and oldest street pageant: the Lord Mayor’s Show.

Since 1215, every newly-elected lord mayor has travelled through the City of London to Westminster to swear loyalty to the Crown. Over the centuries, this journey has become a much loved fixture in the national cultural calendar, with hundreds of thousands of people lining the streets and millions more watching on TV. The rain certainly didn’t deter anyone.

It’s a historic tradition – 801 years old – but it continues to attract people from all walks of life. They come from all over the world to watch this classic piece of British pageantry, and this year I was especially pleased that Blackpool – my adopted home town – took part with a Blackpool Tower float.

My family and I are privileged to have been part of a procession of over 6,500 people, including 180 horses, 164 vehicles, jazz bands, steam engines, fire engines, pea harvesters, sports cars, tractors and a tank. I am especially pleased that a huge number of London’s community groups, school children and civic organisations took part as they really showcase the diversity of this city.

Crowds Watch The Lord Mayor's Show
The lord mayor in his carriage (Source: Getty)

Now that I am in office, I will be working hard to promote the City and all that it has to offer. I have three main goals for my year which I believe to be crucial in making sure the City continues to be the world-leading place to do business it currently is.

First, I will be working to promote the UK’s world-leading offer in financial and professional services. The City is the world’s greatest financial centre, boasting an unprecedented clustering of expertise, and the UK’s regional centres of excellence such as Leeds, Edinburgh and Bristol complement London’s exceptional offer very well. I will be speaking about this during my trips to a planned 29 key international markets.

Read more: My year as lord mayor –and why London will remain the world’s greatest city

Second, as a teacher, I will be highlighting the need for City firms to open up more apprenticeships for talented young people, and promoting the importance of a top quality education. One of the many reasons London’s financial and professional services offer is so unmatched is because of the talented people who live and work here. We must ensure that we maintain this world-leading talent pool by investing in the City’s future workforce.

Finally I will be working to promote London’s cultural offer. One of the reasons that I am optimistic that the City will maintain its position as the world’s most important financial centre is because people like living and working here. London is a dynamic and alive city, with countless museums, galleries, theatres, and music venues that attract the world’s great treasures and performers.

The capital is the world’s greatest city, and the City of London is its beating economic and cultural heart. I will work tirelessly over the next year to show that the City is not simply a bastion for bankers, but a place welcoming of people from all backgrounds and professions, as well as a great place to do business.

City A.M.'s opinion pages are a place for thought-provoking views and debate. These views are not necessarily shared by City A.M.


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The European Tango Week, to be organized for the first time in the country will take place between September 10th and September 17th in Bucharest and Busteni. The event is dedicated to the dance style of tango and encompasses free tango classes, film screenings, tango demonstrations and exhibitions.

Argentinian singer Analia Selis and Argentinian musician Mariano Castro (a double nominee at the Latin Grammy) are some of the ambassadors of the European Tango Week. Several tango schools, Romanian or foreign, are also participating at the event and have prepared special programs for the public.

Entrance is free at events dedicated to a wide audience and fee-based for the workshops and master classes held by guests.

Some of the events part of the European tango week are: an international seminar dedicated to tango instructors, a screening of the film Norma, dedicated to the Argentinian dancer Norma Gomez Tomasi, a special tango gala to be held at Bragadiru Palace, and an open-air exhibition titled The History of Tango.

Some of the personalities delivering master classes and demonstrations in Bucharest and Busteni are: Carlos Enrique Maturano Luissi and Heide Maria Schmollgruber (Austria), Claudio Forte and Barbara Carpino (Italy), Dimitris Biskas and Mariana Patsarika (France), Andrea Pirity and Laszló Budai (Hungary). The pair Lucian Stan and Raluca Aldea will be attending from the Romanian side. The two made it to the finals of the Tango Escenario contest and the semifinals of the Tango Salon at the European Tango Championship in Cervia, Italy in 2016.

There are over 3,000 tango dancers and over 40 tango schools in Romania, according to the organizers of the event.

The agenda of the event can be checked here.

Photo: Anouchka Unel/ Wikipedia


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Trading Bitcoin

What is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is a decentralised cryptocurrency or peer-to-peer digital payment system which is used as a method of investment as well as transaction for other currencies, services or products.

Initially launched in 2009 by an anonymous internet user or group known only as “Satoshi Nakamoto,” the virtual currency has grown rapidly since its inception.

The value of early Bitcoin transactions were negotiated by miners on the bitcointalk forums with each Bitcoin at the time worth an estimated $0.06.

As Bitcoin has become more widely used and as greater quantities of Bitcoin have been mined the price has risen sharply.

How does Bitcoin work?

Bitcoin transactions are managed by a network of independent computers using the blockchain which acts as a decentralised, digital public ledger for all Bitcoin transactions.

The information stored in the blockchain is open to anyone and because of the high level of transparency makes Bitcoin transactions exceptionally secure. Records stored using blockchain cannot be altered retroactively and must be confirmed and collaboratively authenticated by a community of Bitcoin “miners” or the overall network majority.

bitcoin price

Benefits of Bitcoin trading

Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency and as a decentralised asset it is free from interference by a single country, macro events or natural disasters which can impact more traditional asset classes. Because Bitcoin is not traded on an official exchange, you can trade 24 hours a day.

When you trade Bitcoin:

  • You can take advantage of Bitcoin volatility without owning it
  • Markets are open during FX market hours, which means that you can trade around the clock
  • Unlike when you buy Bitcoin, when you trade at City Index you can go both long and short to profit from falling price
  • You’ll be able to use our advanced risk management tools to protect yourself from losses

Risks of Bitcoin trading

Bitcoin is also a highly volatile market and as demand surges for a finite number of Bitcoins (there are 21 million available) so prices can experience dramatic and significant surges.

The price of Bitcoin has surged 40,000% since its inception and one of the biggest risks to traders is this extreme volatility. Bitcoin is currently much more volatile than any other market and when excess volatility crashes, you can be faced with significantly larger losses than in other markets.

Because there are a limited amount of reputable digital asset exchanges and no single reliable price source, this could, in theory, cause the price to tumble sharply. Remember, Bitcoin is also a very new asset so we don’t yet know how it may perform in a major financial crisis. Nobody knows whether it will become globally accepted or even whether it may one day disappear or be overtaken by other cryptocurrencies.

It is also possible that certain governments may ban its citizens from holding Bitcoin with the effect that the price of cryptocurrency may collapse.

Furthermore, there is a possibility for large scale cyber attacks on digital asset exchanges which are likely to have a strong, short-term impact on the price of Bitcoin.

Investors involved in Bitcoin trading should also be aware of the potential for a so-called “51 percent attack”. A 51 percent attack refers to one centralized Bitcoin mining operation gaining over 50% control of the blockchain which would allow the operation to reverse transactions making the entire blockchain unusable with the effect that the future of Bitcoin might become questionable.

Remember that while this heightened volatility in the Bitcoin market brings opportunity, it also means a greater degree of risk so understanding the market and managing your risk carefully with the use of stops and limits is crucial when trading Bitcoin. Like with any market, make sure you do your research and understand how and why the price of Bitcoin moves before you start trading.

How to trade Bitcoin

You can trade Bitcoin at City Index as a CFD. When you trade Bitcoin at City Index you do not own any underlying Bitcoin assets and do not need a virtual wallet, you are speculating on price movements between Bitcoin and USD. Our pricing is based on the underlying price from multiple, reputable exchanges.

When you trade Bitcoin at City Index you are trading on leverage and this means you can gain a larger exposure to the market than might be possible by buying actual Bitcoins. This means that you can open a position without tying up a lot of your capital and can benefit from sharp market movements.

Remember, Bitcoin can be extremely volatile  and sharp market movements can mean that you had the potential to suffer significant losses quickly, and in some cases losses that are more than you initially invest.We strongly recommend that you understand the risks of trading Bitcoin and ensure that your strategy incorporates strong risk management tactics.

Should you have any further questions regarding trading on Bitcoin, please see our FAQ page.

What is the City Index policy on Bitcoin forking?

In the event that the current bitcoin splits into two, new bitcoins are created, this is known as a hard fork. We will generally follow the bitcoin that has the majority consensus of cryptocurrency users and will therefore use this as the basis for our prices. In addition we will also consider the approach adopted by the exchanges we deal with, which will help determine the action we take.

We reserve the right to determine which cryptocurrency unit has the majority consensus behind them.

As the hard fork results in a second cryptocurrency, we reserve the right to create an equivalent position on client accounts to reflect this. However, this action is taken at our absolute discretion, and we have no obligation to do so.

If the second cryptocurrency is tradeable on major exchanges, which may or may not include the exchanges we deal with, we may choose to represent that value, but have no obligation to do so. We may do this by making the product available to close based on the valuation, or by booking a cash adjustment on client accounts.

If, within a reasonable timeframe, the second cryptocurrency does not become tradeable, then we may void positions that had previously been created at no value on client accounts.

Over periods of substantial price volatility around fork events, we may take any action as we consider necessary in accordance with our terms and conditions including suspending trading throughout if we deem not to have reliable prices from the underlying market.

Important Notice:

Cryptocurrencies are not legal tender currency and trading of derivatives on cryptocurrencies are currently not covered under any regulatory regime in Singapore. Consequently, investors should be aware they do not have protection under the Securities and Futures Act (Cap. 289). Please ensure that you are fully aware of the risks.

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CJPME: Canada Must Respect Court Decision on Settlement Wines

Montreal, August 22, 2019 — Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) urges the Canadian government to respect the July 29 Federal Court decision in David Kattenburg vs. Attorney General of Canadadetermining that labelling Israeli “settlement” wines as “Products of Israel” is both inaccurate and misleading.  In respect of this ruling, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) must henceforth insist that, to be sold in Canada, such wines conform to this decision.  To demonstrate respect for international law, CJPME urges the Canadian government to accept – and not to appeal – the July 29 Federal Court ruling.

For the past two years, CJPME has closely followed this case, urging the Canadian government ensure transparency and compliance in regard to the labeling of wines coming from the Middle East, specifically the Palestinian Territories.  In 2016, the UN Human Rights Council urged all states to avoid actions which “recognize or assist the expansion of [Israeli] settlements … in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, including with regard to the issue of trading with settlements, consistent with their obligations under international law.” As Kattenburgmade clear, by accepting Israeli settlement wines as a “Product of Israel,” Canada was failing to distinguish between Israel and its settlements, which are illegal under international law.  Such a policy effectively normalized and legitimized Israeli settlement growth, facilitating their economic growth by allowing their goods and services to enter Canada tariff-free.

“This Federal Court ruling was a fair and reasonable ruling, which considered international law, long-standing Canadian foreign policy and Canada’s food safety laws.  Canada must respect the ruling, which gives proper priority to human rights and the integrity of Canada’s food safety,”   asserts CJPME President Thomas Woodley.  In wake of the Federal Court’s decision, CJPME recommends that Canada distinguish in its dealings with Israel and Israeli colonies and ensure that products from Israeli companies operating out of the West Bank be treated differently than those from Israel proper.

In explanations to the plaintiff in the Federal Court case, the government had suggested that Canada’s free trade agreement with Israel (CIFTA) justified the mislabelling of the wines because of the way it defined Israel’s borders. Nevertheless, Alex Neve, executive director of Amnesty International Canada and Michael Lynk, Special Rapporteur for the United Nations Human Rights Council on the situation in the Palestinian territories recently wrote a letter strongly criticizing CIFTA.  Neve and Lynk point out that the trade agreement is “contrary to Canada’s general duty to uphold international law, [and it] expressly violates both international and Canadian law.”

About CJPME – Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) is a non-profit and secular organization bringing together men and women of all backgrounds who labour to see justice and peace take root again in the Middle East. Its mission is to empower decision-makers to view all sides with fairness and to promote the equitable and sustainable development of the region.

For more information, please contact Thomas Woodley on 438-380-5410
Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East www.cjpme.org

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The story behind the hockey term ‘deke’

Image by Nottingham Trent University via Flickr.

This is a column about deception.

A couple of weeks ago, New York Times columnist David Brooks discussed his belief that there were, in effect, two different kinds of White House: “I sometimes wonder if the Invisible White House has learned to use the Potemkin White House to deke us while it changes the country.”

“Deke” is an unusual word, though you might figure out its meaning from the context. In the Brooks column, it was also an unusual juxtaposition of (possibly false) history and hockey.

From archives: “Journalistic carelessness caused the project to backfire, and thus miss its target”

“Potemkin” means “empty” or “hollow,” though mostly in a political context. Grigory Potemkin was a Russian minister and a rumored lover of Catherine the Great. During Catherine’s 1787 tour of Crimea, Potemkin was said to have constructed elaborate facades, presenting a view of prosperity as she passed by, while behind the fake village things were not so rosy.

The truth of that story is disputed (fake news, folks!). Even so, it’s been more than 100 years since the phrase “Potemkin village” entered English—1904, according to The Oxford English Dictionary. By 1938, the adjective “Potemkin” was being applied to mean “Sham, insubstantial; consisting of little or nothing behind an impressive facade,” the OED says.

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That takes care of the facade Brooks was putting up in front of the White House, but what about “deke”?

RELATED: Newspaper staffers push back against their paper’s publisher

“Deke” has its origin in Canada, where hockey is not just the national sport, but an obsession. Signature moves in hockey, as in other sports, have one player faking a move to distract the opposing side. Then that player (or another) can move in for the kill. It’s often called a “feint.”

But in 1960, the OED says, a hockey player talked about a particular kind of fake-out: “On the ice, Moore is one of the league’s best players in the split-second art of faking a goalie out of position. ‘I’ve developed a little play of my own,’ he says. ‘It’s a kind of fake shot—we call them “deeks” for decoys.’” The Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles Online shows that it took a few more years for it to be spelled “deke.”

“Deke” and its participle “deking” are rarely found outside of hockey though it’s occasionally used in basketball (“Lawrence ended the period by deking his defender with a crossover that led to a stepback 3-pointer,” which needs its own translation).

Merriam-Webster notes that Hemingway used “deke” as a diminutive of “decoy,” so hockey is just a copycat. And M-W curls its lip a little at the way Brooks used it. “Deke,” a note says, “has also checked its way into more general usage to refer to deceptive or evasive moves or actions. However, this general application of ‘deke’ has never made it past the defenders. It occurs too rarely in English to merit its own sense in the dictionary.” Icing call against Brooks!

A similar “fake” term can be found in football: “juke.” This showed up in 1967, not too long after “deke,” M-W says. It also means “to fake out of position,” as in a player who was “able to use his athleticism to juke out would-be tacklers.” M-W says it may be a derivation of English dialect “jouk,” which means “deceive” or “joke,” but the American Heritage Dictionary traces it to “jowken,” a Middle English word meaning “to bend in a supple way.”

In case you’re wondering, the faking out kind of “juke” has little to do with a “jukebox” or its contemporary “juke joint.” Those are American slang words that arrived via African or Creole slave dialects for “wicked” or “disorderly.” A “juke” was a less-than-genteel establishment where you could dance, drink, and listen to music pretty cheaply. They also might have other, less savory, activities found in “wicked” places. That might involve some “deception” of a different kind.

ICYMI: Newsroom chaos came to a head last night

Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today.

Merrill Perlman managed copy desks across the newsroom at the New York Times, where she worked for twenty-five years. Follow her on Twitter at @meperl.


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America’s role in a ‘climate of hatred’ for journalists

A growing “climate of hatred” permeates the 2018 World Press Freedom Index, in which the United States dropped two places. Compiled by Reporters Without Borders, the annual report measures the level of media freedom based on a host of factors, and ranked America 45th out of 180 countries analyzed. “In the report, there is very little to celebrate,” writes The Washington Post’s Jason Rezaian. “The survey paints yet another depressing portrait of the gradual erosion of one of free societies’ most treasured principle.”

The most troubling conclusion may be that “hostility towards the media from political leaders is no longer limited to authoritarian countries such as Turkey and Egypt.” The report finds that “more and more democratically-elected leaders no longer see the media as part of democracy’s essential underpinning, but as an adversary to which they openly display their aversion.” Criticizing President Trump as a “media-bashing enthusiast,” the survey directly links the administration’s abdication of its press-championing role to the worsening climate around the world.

RWB’s report builds on a trend that the organization identified in last year’s rankings. In 2017, the organization described “a world in which attacks on the media have become commonplace and strongmen are on the rise.” This year’s biggest drop in the rankings came from Malta, which fell 18 spots to 65th. Last fall, journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was killed by a targeted car-bombing in the Mediterranean island nation.

RELATED: When it comes to press freedom, America is no longer a ‘beacon’ for the world

Asked about the report’s linkage of President Trump’s media bashing to a deteriorating climate around the globe, Press Secretary Sarah Sanders rejected the idea that Trump or his administration had contributed to the negative environment. “I think we’re one of the most accessible administrations that we’ve seen in decades,” she said at Wednesday’s press briefing. CNN’s Jim Acosta followed up, asking with some degree of incredulity, “Are you trying to say that this administration is a champion of a free press?” Sanders complained about the tone of some questions and stated, “We support a free press but we also support a fair press. And I think that those things should go hand in hand, and there’s a certain responsibility by the press to report accurate information.”

The Trump administration can hardly be held responsible for every crackdown against the press or incident of intimidation or violence; there are numerous factors at play, and plenty of countries have had issues that long predate Trump’s arrival on the world stage. At the same time, America has long been a vocal advocate for press freedom, even when it wasn’t living up to its ideals at home. The constant attacks from the White House—on outlets, individual journalists, and the institution of the free press as a whole—do have an impact. When the US shirks its role as a defender of journalism, it provides leeway for leaders in other countries, authoritarian and democratic, to crack down. The result is a darkening picture around the globe.

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Below, more on the state of press freedom in America and abroad.

Other notable stories

  • NBC bet big on the idea that Megyn Kelly could make the transition from firebrand Fox News host to morning show anchor. So far, writes The Wall Street Journal’s Joe Flint, that wager hasn’t paid off. Since joining NBC last year, Kelly has courted controversy and seen her audience numbers drop. Flint writes that Kelly’s struggles underscore “the big risks of high-stakes wagers on celebrity news personalities.”
  • Mediaite’s Aidan McLaughlin profiles The Daily Beast, an outlet that consistently punches above its weight in coverage of the politics-and-pop-culture world. Since taking the reins from founder Tina Brown in 2013, Editor in Chief John Avlon has “transformed the publication from hobbling website with constant rumors of its demise, to leading media staple with a defined sensibility that routinely rivals the reporting of the prestige press,” McLaughlin writes.
  • CJR’s Mathew Ingram asks, “Do people really want to watch a Netflix show about BuzzFeed journalism?” The streaming service announced Wednesday that it is launching a series of 15-minute episodes that will follow BuzzFeed reporters as they go about their work.
  • CNN’s Tom Kludt breaks down the controversy surrounding MSNBC host Joy Reid. After homophobic posts were discovered on her now-defunct blog, Reid claimed that she had been hacked. Several people have expressed doubts about that assertion, but Reid’s lawyer claims the FBI has opened a criminal investigation into the matter.
  • For CJR, historian Danielle McGuire argues that journalists and public figures who rely on historical research to tell their stories need to do a better job crediting those who did the work. When writers, bloggers, and public figures “take historians’ work, including our analysis, framing, and argument—our intellectual property—and present it as an ‘untold’ story or readymade fact, we feel that without reference or attribution it is not translation. It is presenting our work as their own,” she writes.
  • Peter Thiel won’t be buying after all, according to The Wall Street Journal’s Jonathan Randles. The billionaire investor made the decision in order to “avoid a potential lawsuit over his secretly funding litigation that drove the news and gossip blog’s publisher out of business,” Randles reports.
  • Programming note: Just after this newsletter goes live, President Trump will appear on Fox & Friends. It’s his first major TV interview in a while.

ICYMI: As election looms, Brazil braces for fake news

Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today.

Pete Vernon is a CJR staff writer. Follow him on Twitter @ByPeteVernon.


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About TS-E 135mm f/4L Macro

Delivering L-series optics and a long working distance to the TS-E line-up, the TS-E 135mm f/4L Macro provides expansive tilt and shift range and a moderate f/4 maximum aperture ideal for product photography, studio portraits and any time where the situation calls for a lighting setup between the subject and the camera. Its optical formula includes two UD lens elements and an optimized lens coating for sharp, detailed images with minimized aberrations. Built for dependable, reliable operation, it features large, easily operated knobs and locking mechanisms, plus a convenient minimum focusing distance of 19 in./0.49m. Rounding out Canon's premier line of TS-E lenses with its long focal length, the TS-E 135mm f/4L Macro offers performance and precision well-suited for advanced photographers.


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Your Friend the Rat: Rats Started It
00:01:38 - 00:03:19
This clip depicts the migration of rats to Europe and the role played by rats in the spread of the Bubonic Plague, or Black Death.

  • Martha Ann Harper
    over 1 year ago
    Great review clip
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Science → Microbiology → Bacteria
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Science → Microbiology → Bacteria


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Gift duty statement (IR196)

(published October 2011)

About this form

Use this form if you made gifts that total more than $12,000 in any 12-month period.

PDF | 99kb | 2 pages

This form can be completed on-screen by typing content directly into the PDF document. Once you have completed the form it is important that you print it out as you will not be able to save the information you enter into the form.

When to use this form

You must complete this form when the gifts made by you total more than $12,000 in any 12-month period. The 12-month period does not relate to a calendar or financial year, but runs from the date at which you made the first of the gifts that in total exceed $12,000.

What you will need
  • Your IRD number - if you do not have this contact us.
  • The dates of gifts.
  • Copies of any documents that created or evidenced the gifts.
  • Details of monetary value you received in return for gifts.
After you finish

Please print two copies, sign both and post the completed copies with any attachments to:

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You may wish keep a copy of this form for your personal records. We will return one copy to you after it has been processed.

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US tried and failed to kill another top Iranian military official in Yemen

On the same day the U.S. military killed Iranian General Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad, U.S. forces carried out another top-secret mission against a senior Iranian military official in Yemen, according to a new report.

The simultaneous strike targeting Abdul Reza Shahlai, a financier and key commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force who has been active in Yemen, did not result in his death, four U.S. officials familiar with the matter told the Washington Post.

The successful January 3 strike that killed Soleimani sparked fury from the Iranian regime, which retaliated with ballistic missile strikes on two Iraqi bases that host U.S. troops but caused no casualties.

Officials say the Pentagon would have announced the two strikes together if they had been successful but did not disclose the Shahlai mission because it did not go according to plan.

It’s unclear why the operation to kill Shahlai was unsuccessful, and the Department of Defense declined to elaborate when reached by

‘We have seen the report of a January 2 airstrike in Yemen, which is long-understood as a safe space for terrorists and other adversaries to the United States,’ said Cmdr. Rebecca Rebarich, Pentagon spokeswoman, in a statement.

‘The Department of Defense does not discuss alleged operations in the region,’ Rebarich said. Shahlai, born around 1957, has been linked to attacks against U.S. forces in Iraq, including a sophisticated 2007 raid in which Iranian-backed militiamen abducted and killed five Americans troops in the city of Karbala.

Last month, the State Department offered a $15 million reward for information leading to Shahlai and the disruption of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s financial mechanisms.

The announcement said that Shahlai is based in Yemen and has a ‘long history of involvement in attacks targeting the U.S. and our allies, including in the 2011 plot against the Saudi ambassador’ at an Italian restaurant in Washington. Shahlai’s base of operation is in Sana’a, Yemen, where he serves as the Quds Forces’ chief financier backing Iran’s Shiite proxy forces in the region, as well as funding assassination and terror plots, according to the State Department. Sana’a is under the control of Houthi rebels, an Iran-backed Shiite faction fighting American-armed Saudis and local Sunni factions in Yemen’s brutal ongoing civil war.

The failed mission against Shahlai suggests President Donald Trump envisioned a broader strike against the Quds Force in the Middle East, and not just Iraq. In an interview with Fox News on Friday, Trump said he authorized the strike on Soleimani because four U.S. embassies, including the embassy in Baghdad, were under imminent threat of attack from Iran-backed forces.

He said the decapitation strike on the Quds Forces, which essentially serves as Iran’s combined CIA and Special Operations, was an act of self-defense to protect against an imminent threat.

On Friday, Trump ordered new retaliatory economic sanctions on Iran, even as his administration faced persistent questions over its drone strike on Soleimani.

Trump issued an executive order adding additional U.S. sanctions to an already long list his administration has imposed, aiming to force Iran to accept a new agreement that would curb its nuclear program and halt support for militant groups throughout the Middle East.

The president, in a statement announcing the new measures, referenced Iran’s nuclear program and use of proxy forces throughout the region while noting that the Iranians have threatened U.S. service members, diplomats and civilians – an apparent reference to his administration’s justification for killing Soleimani in a drone strike last week in Baghdad.

‘The United States will continue to counter the Iranian regime’s destructive and destabilizing behavior,’ he said. But Trump and his administration faced continuing questions over its claims of an ‘imminent’ threat as justification for killing Soleimani.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and others in the administration have said the threat posed by Soleimani was imminent, but they have not offered evidence to support that. Members of Congress said officials did not provide sufficient detail or justification in briefings this week.

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Another Dell workaround in check_esxi_hardware

Written by - 3 comments

Published on April 24th 2013 - Listed in Nagios VMware Virtualization Monitoring

A new version of the Nagios/Monitoring plugin check_esxi_hardware has been released today.

It "extends" the already existing workaround for Dell systems with another CIM element always reporting "not connected" as well.
To be more specific, the CIM element System Board 1 LCD Cable Pres 0: Connected was exiting with return code 12 on a Dell PowerEdge R720 system.

Special thanks to Ricardo Pardini for reporting the issue and making a lot of tests for me.

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Comments (newest first)

Steven from wrote on May 6th, 2013:

i\'ve solved with 60 min check.

Thank you again!

Claudio from Switzerland wrote on May 6th, 2013:

The plugin is very CPU intensive, not that it makes a lot of calculations, but it takes some time to fetch all information from the ESX hosts. You might have to adapt the check_interval setting for this check. It doesn't make sense to check the status of a hardware every 3-5mins anyway.

Steven from wrote on May 6th, 2013:

First of all thank you for your script. It's a very good work and is very important for my ESXi servers.
I want to ask you only one question:

can you look why the script request an high cpu?

18787 nagios 18 0 271m 147m 3116 R 65.9 14.7 0:02.82 check_esxi_hard
18756 nagios 15 0 204m 80m 3128 S 30.3 8.0 0:01.56 check_esxi_hard

Here the load graphic of the poller.
You can view the difference before and after I install the script.

Thank you again!


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CL254 - Midi Racing Cleat

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CL254 Racing Midi Cleat made from aluminium.

Availability: In stock

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With the CL254 the rope drops down into the teeth to give a quick and positive lock that is easy to release. Will hold very high loads when used with high quality ropes.

Manufactured from aluminium for light weight and durable performance the CL254 is available in two finishes:

1. CL254 has a silver stove enamel finish for a cost effective, high quality coating. Suitable for all inland and coastal conditions.
2. CL254AN has a hard anodised finish to give the ultimate hard wearing surface. Excellent for extreme coastal conditions.

Also available in nylon - CL209

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Technical drawing of CL254 that can be printed full size on A4 or US letter paper.

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Ohio GOP chair blasts Josh Mandel for presidential endorsement

Josh Mandel.JPG

Ohio Republican Party Chairman Matt Borges said Wednesday that Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel (above) was a "bit player" who shouldn't have endorsed U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida for president until Ohio Gov. John Kasich announces whether he'll launch a White House bid in 2016.

(Associated Press file)

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio Republican Party Chairman Matt Borges sharply criticized Treasurer Josh Mandel, a fellow Republican, for backing one of Gov. John Kasich's potential rivals for president.

Borges described Mandel as a "bit player" who should have waited for Kasich to announce his presidential intentions before endorsing U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida for the GOP nomination.

"The smart political move would be to wait and see if [Kasich] decides to get in," Borges said in a phone interview with Northeast Ohio Media Group.

The remarks came hours after Mandel's endorsement of Rubio was published by the Daily Caller, a conservative news website.

Mandel spokesman Chris Berry stated in an email that Borges "has a difficult job to do and we completely respect him and the position he's in."

Berry added that Mandel is supporting Rubio "because they have a personal relationship, and Josh believes he's a new generation conservative who can unite the party and inspire the nation."

New Day America, Kasich's political action committee, did not immediately return a phone call Wednesday afternoon. A Kasich administration spokesman referred comment to an Ohio Republican Party spokesman, who also didn't immediately return a phone call.

Borges, who has said he would like Kasich to run for the White House, said he shared his views with Mandel before the Daily Caller had published the endorsement.

Borges said he gave Mandel "what I believe to be the wise political advice," though the GOP chair declined to say how the treasurer responded.

Most Ohio Republicans are waiting to see what Kasich decides before backing a presidential candidate, Borges said, adding, "I don't think that not having the support of a bit player is going to impact that decision one way or the other."

Mandel, who ran unsuccessfully for U.S. Senate in 2012, has clashed with Kasich in the past, publicly opposing the governor's efforts to expand Medicaid and increase taxes on oil and gas fracking.