text:
There is one food item that I can safely say is probably the best things I have ever eaten. Nothing has been as memorable or created more memories for me, than a small, simple, dish which people refer to with pride as "sex on rice". The name is more than suiting.
As in introduction, Takashi, in my opinion, is hands down, the best and most high-end sushi restaurant in Salt Lake City. When I want sushi, Takashi is what I most always have in mind. However, there is something special about this restaurant, so I tend to make sure I don't overdo it or that when I go, there is some kind of appropriate reason. This is one place that I would never want to overdo. In fact, each of my Takashi experiences I can name, who I was with, and what the occasion was. I would like to keep it that way.
Having said that, let us get back to the "sex on rice". This is not something you will find on the menu. If there is one tip you get from Nosh Maven, let it be this: if you ever find yourself at Takashi, you really must request this special dish—and your server WILL know what "sex on rice" is. "Sex on rice" comes with two pieces, so I recommend ordering two—because you will want more than one. So, what is this sushi dish in a nutshell? Simple: seared Sable fish over a small amount of rice, garnished with what seems to me to be some kind of marinated shredded green onion. To be honest? I am not entirely sure—and since it isn't on the menu, this is only my best guess. But really, who cares? Once you put this mouth watering, melts-like-butter, smoky yet savory piece of sushi in your mouth, I promise it won't matter.
You won't want to speak and you sure won't want anyone else to speak to you until chewing and swallowing is done. Get ready to hold up your "just one minute" finger until you have really experienced this dish. Tell your date, your friend, your mom, whoever (!) to just simply be quiet for a few seconds. I don't use the term "life changing" very often. But this is flavor that will certainly change your life. And if it doesn't, then I wonder about your pallet!
Okay, so Takashi also has other amazing items. I have never had anything from their menu that I wasn't a fan of. The freshness of their fish is very noticeable and the quality of their sushi chefs shines in each roll. They are true pieces of art and are always presented with perfection. On this occasion, my date and I also ordered a few other things besides "sex on rice". Tuna Nigiri, The Crunchy Ebi, and also the Sunshine Roll (I have to keep up with my lemon craving). All of them were pretty great.
My recommendation? Get the the 'sex on rice' with any nigiri of your preference, then the Sunshine Roll, and save the Crunchy Ebi for last. This has a little bit of a sweet flavor to it and will finish off any of your sushi rolls or nigiri fabulously.
It has been mentioned to me that the service at Takashi has been spotty for a few people, but I have to say that has never been the case in my experience. The servers have been knowledgeable about not only sushi, but sake and wine. They have been attentive and nice. I will say that Takashi gets busy quickly, so either get there early, make a reservation, or be prepared to wait. I enjoy hitting Kristauf's next door for a Saketini called the Lotus Blossom before dinner–so waiting has never been a problem for me.
Now I need some kind of special occasion to get me there again! Anyone have a birthday coming up? Or, I can tag along on a anniversary dinner…just let me know!
Also, if anyone has had any other good or bad experiences with the food or service at Takashi, I would love to hear about it!
Find Takashi at 18 West Market Street in Salt Lake City.


text:
Addressing the congregation of more than 2,000 people, with millions more watching on television around the world, the Archbishop of Canterbury paid tribute to the selflessness of a monarch who in 60 years of "utterly demanding yet deeply joyful service" had "made her public happy".
He also offered prayers for the speedy recovery of the Duke of Edinburgh, whose absence from the Queen's side in "the nation's church" cast a shadow over the proceedings.
Writing in her journal on June 22 1897, on the last occasion of a Diamond Jubilee, Queen Victoria made note of the crowds that had gathered to watch her progress from Buckingham Palace to the steps of St Paul's.
"No one ever, I believe, has met with such an ovation as was given to me, passing through those 6 miles of streets . . . the cheering was quite deafening & every face seemed to be filled with real joy. I was much moved and gratified."
No one until now. For the past three days, the streets of London have been awash with flags and cheers, and yesterday the crowds had begun to gather outside St Paul's from 5am, to catch a glimpse of the royal arrivals.
Inside, to the sound of pealing bells, congregants had begun to take their places more than an hour before the arrival of the Royal party — an array of formal fig, military splendour and dazzling headgear.
Leaders of the Government and Opposition sat in a block to the left of the nave. Beside the Prime Minister, Samantha Cameron chatted cordially to Nick Clegg, and his wife Miriam to William Hague. Behind them, Boris Johnson leaned forward to engage Jeremy Hunt in earnest conversation.
To the right of the nave sat representatives of other faiths and of the Commonwealth, the endurance of which surely numbers among the Queen's greatest achievements
These great occasions of state, in their combination of time-honoured tradition and pageantry, bring forth a singular cast of actors whose roles and purpose seem to be at the same time both completely mystifying and deeply necessary: Heralds and Pursuivants, looking like a royal flush in a poker hand in their richly embroidered tabards; the Keeper of the Closet, the Clerk of the Closet; the Lord High Almoner.
All play their parts as if directed by clockwork. At 9.57 precisely, the Queen's bodyguard of Yeomen of the Guard moved down the north nave aisle in steady measure, followed by Her Majesty's Body Guard of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen, resplendent in red tunics, their golden helmets extravagantly plumed in swan feather, pikes in hand, the tread of their boots echoing on the marble floor.
At 10.25, from inside the cathedral one could hear a massive cheer rising from the crowd, signalling the arrival of the Prince of Wales, the Duchess of Cornwall, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and — as the Order of Service had it — Prince Henry, to muster at the Great West Door.
Three minutes later, the Queen arrived, accompanied by a lady-in-waiting, Diana, Lady Farnham. A fanfare shook the cathedral.
At the last Diamond Jubilee, Queen Victoria was too frail to withstand the rigours of procession; the thanksgiving service took place on the steps of St Paul's, so that the Queen could remain in her carriage.
Queen Elizabeth, having stood on Sunday for the best part of four hours in the worst weather a British summer could provide, has displayed a stamina and resilience extraordinary in a woman of her age, but processing slowly through the nave, to the stirring strains of Te Deum in G, she looked preoccupied, almost troubled — her thoughts no doubt torn between the matter at hand and the well-being of her husband.
Taking her place on a red velvet chair, bathed in light streaming in through the high vaulted window above the north transept, the Prince of Wales to her right, the Queen might well have reflected on the curious twists of fate that had led her to this moment.
Seventy-seven years ago, in May 1935, as a 10-year-old girl, she had sat in St Paul's for the Silver Jubilee of her grandfather, King George V. Within nine months the King was dead. In December 1936, Edward VIII abdicated, and the
10-year-old Princess had become heir presumptive.
Now, surrounded by all the embodiments and trappings of high state, one could reflect that what one was witnessing was the summation of a 1,000-year evolution towards a form of governance that has served the nation better than any other possibly could, with a head of state who embodies continuity, sangfroid and steadfastness — the national values — impervious to the transitory caprices of politics and current affairs.
It is not so long ago that the steps of St Paul's was the scene of another, less majestic spectacle, occupied by protesters calling for the heads of bankers and hedge-fund capitalists.
We live in a troubled and, in many ways, divided nation.
And it is one of the great triumphs of the monarchy that it should have somehow detached itself from the fractious social divisions in Britain between increasing wealth and increasing poverty. That the very seat of inherited privilege should somehow stand above the fray, commanding a deep and abiding respect, borne from a collective recognition that the Queen stands quite apart from such things — the great unifying principle and rock of constancy — and that her interests are not in the self but in the nation.
In this small, grandmotherly figure stands the fulfilment of the pledge she made on her 21st birthday in 1947, that "my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service" — a pledge to the nation that she renewed this February, on the anniversary of her accession to the throne, when she vowed to "dedicate myself anew to your service".
Service. It was a word that constantly echoed throughout the proceedings. In his New Testament reading, from Romans, the Prime Minister spoke of presenting "your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God", not to think of yourself "more highly that you ought to think", and to recognise that "we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us".
In his sermon, the Archbishop of Canterbury extolled the virtue of dedication, sounding a playful reference to the popular 1960s hit Dedicated Follower of Fashion (the first, and surely the last, time the spirit of The Kinks will be summoned in a Diamond Jubilee service). Dedicated, he said, has come to mean "enthusiastic".
But true dedication is to say "I have no goals that are not the goals of this community; I have no well-being, no happiness, that is not the well-being of the community. What will make me content or happy is what makes for the good of this particular part of the human family."
The Queen, he went on, had exemplified this ideal, displaying a dedication that had endured "faithfully, calmly and generously" through the 60 years of her reign.
Queen Victoria wrote that, before leaving Buckingham Palace for her Diamond Jubilee procession, that she "touched an electric button, by which I started a message which was telegraphed throughout the whole Empire. It was the following, 'From my heart I thank my beloved people, may God bless them.' "
There is no longer an Empire; the Queen's subjects have dwindled in number — but the Queen's dominion is of a different kind. She is the repository not of global power, but global fascination, and of a deep affection and respect.
In his sermon the Archbishop of Canterbury spoke of his hope that these Jubilee celebrations would create a lasting legacy inspired by the example of the Queen — "the rebirth of an energetic, generous spirit of dedication to the common good and the public service, the rebirth of a recognition that we live less than human lives if we think of just of our own individual good". For the Queen's example to effect such a transformation in her Jubilee year would be her crowning achievement.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Originally published on May 25, 2014 on https://wordpress.com/post/dstluke.wordpress.com/422
I read a blog today by Leigh Patrick called "What a Straight White Man Knows About Strong Women". In the blog Patrick talks about the strong women of his family. It is this interaction with a few emotionally and psychologically strong women that Patrick assumes he understands feminism. In a Twitter battle where he first accuses me of saying that all men are potential rapists and later calls me an idiot and a psycho, I get the full brunt of his "understanding". But someone somewhere is missing the point.
I've heard the same refrain over and over from other people. It goes like this; person A has met or lived with a woman who is strong and intelligent. This leads person A into the false sense that this experience leads them to have an understanding of what women are like/go through in their lives. The idea being that because the woman or women in their lives were strong that means that all women are strong or have a well of strength to draw upon. After all, this one or few women did it, why can't we all be like that?
Wouldn't it be wonderful if women and girls around the world were able to draw upon such a well of strength on command? Shouldn't we all be able to share in this strength? It's been proven that it can be done. Why not?
Let's start with circumstances. I'm privileged to live in Canada, a country that embraces diversity and supports those who cannot support themselves. As a Metis woman, I draw upon a culture that has a rich heritage from my Metis side and embody that stubborn Scots blood that runs so thickly through my veins. Yet I realize my privilege and I still struggle with anxiety daily. I see the problems women around me have that are not of their own doing.
I can honestly say I don't know what it's like to be a young girl who gets shot for posting a video on YouTube explaining why she wants to go to school. Yet, Malala Yousafzai is one of my heroes. I don't know what it's like to be a young girl in Nigeria, ripped away from her home and family simply because she had the audacity to go to school. My heart bleeds for them. I have never been a five year old girl enduring a genital mutilation without anesthetic where my labia is ripped away all in the belief that it will ensure my virginity will remain intact. I have never miscarried five times as a result of beatings administered by a man who kidnapped me and held me as a slave in his basement. Nor have I been a woman who has survived giving birth to a child in that basement amid terror and pain. I am lucky.
The person who has known the strong woman doesn't understand what it's like to be a curvy woman and to feel the fear she feels just going outside. He doesn't hear the whispers or see the stares as she walks down the street. They don't know what it is to be a young woman dressed in a short skirt on a spring day to get leered at and have guys assume she's a slut simply because of what she wears. Those strong women don't look in a mirror and hate what they see because the media says they aren't perfect. They don't spent three to four hours on makeup trying to hide the flaws that only they see. Flaws that are beautiful like the brush strokes on a painting.
I've heard people rip apart female celebrities because of what they were wearing to an event. Call into question their very existence because of a few snips of fabric. I'm tempted to tell the celebrities to start going naked and see how that fixes the critics' little red wagon. If a woman like Angelina Jolie is torn down because of a dress, how much better can I fare when wearing shorts from Walmart?
I see women endure abuse, abuse themselves, hurt themselves, hate themselves, injure and kill themselves all because of the pain they hold inside. A woman who is a saint, a mother, a nanny, a caregiver, a grandmother is held in esteem and may be forgiven those mistakes and flaws they have made of themselves. A slut, a whore, a cunt, a bitch, a vixen, a succubus can never be forgiven. She must be ridiculed and beaten down for the error of believing her sexuality, her being is her own. She must be transformed into the Virgin Mary so society can feel safe around her. She must have a husband, although a wife is allowable in some circumstances, to keep her from straying away from her path and becoming a danger to all around her. She must never alter her gender, her genetic code defines her. We do not talk about those who have an XY gene but live as females.
So many women have lost their voices and do not wish to or cannot speak out. They hide in terror at being less than perfect and mutilate their every flaw or imperfection. If I could say one thing to those women it would be this; please show those flaws. They are beautiful. Those scars, those pains, those small things that make you who you are. Please paint them so I can see them. Please be proud of them. They are your flowers. They are your voice. They are you and they are beautiful.
I understand, Mr. Patrick, that you've had a few strong women in your life and I applaud them. Most of us, though, aren't that strong. We're scared and afraid of the ridicule and scorn we face daily. So we'd appreciate it if, until you've experienced some of that, if you'd kindly keep your opinions to yourself. We've had enough opinions of who we should be in our lives. We really don't need another.


text:
This event occurred in the past
Richard Crawford Pugh Lecture on Tax Law & Policy
This event occurred in the past
Date and Time
- Thursday, April 24, 2014 at 4:00 p.m.
Warren Hall, Grace Courtroom
Progressive Tax or Progressive Fiscal System?
Americans largely take for granted that our tax system should be "progressive." But why is that desirable? This presentation will analyze the normative foundations of progressive taxation, and argue that the instinct ultimately is misguided: what those who favor progressivity should care about is a progressive fiscal system. The two are not synonyms: even regressive taxes can lead to progressive fiscal outcomes.
The slides from this presentation are available in the "Download Attachment" link on the right side of this webpage.
Watch the webcast or download the podcast.
About the Speaker
Edward D. Kleinbard is a professor of law at University of Southern California Gould School of Law and a fellow at The Century Foundation. Before joining USC Law, Kleinbard served as chief of staff of the U.S. Congress's Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT). The JCT staff are the nonpartisan tax resource to Congress, helping legislators to formulate legislation, writing analyses of legislative proposals or tax issues of interest to the Congress, and estimating the revenue consequences of legislative proposals. Prior to his appointment to JCT, Kleinbard was a partner in the New York office of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP for over 20 years.
Kleinbard's work focuses on the taxation of capital income, international tax issues and the political economy of taxation. His recent papers include "Stateless Income" (Florida Tax Review), "The Lessons of Stateless Income" (Tax Law Review), "The Better Base Case" (Tax Notes), "Paul Ryan's Roadmap to Inequality" (Tax Notes), "Herman Cain's 9-9-9 Plan" (Tax Notes), "Tax Expenditure Framework Legislation" (National Tax Journal) and "An American Dual Income Tax: Nordic Precedents" (Northwestern J. of Law and Social Policy). Kleinbard has testified before Congress on tax policy matters and has written opinion pieces for the New York Times, the Huffington Post, CNN.com and other media outlets.
Kleinbard received his JD from Yale Law School and his MA in History and BA in Medieval and Renaissance Studies from Brown University.
MCLE Credit
The University of San Diego School of Law is a State Bar of California-approved provider of MCLE and Legal Specialization in Taxation Law credits and certifies that this event is approved for 1.0 hour of general MCLE credit and 1.0 hour of Legal Specialization in Taxation Law credit. Credit is available only to those who attended the lecture in person.
About the Richard Crawford Pugh Lecture on Tax Law & Policy
The Richard Crawford Pugh Lecture on Tax Law & Policy brings a distinguished practitioner, judge or government official who has played a significant role in shaping U.S. and international tax policy to the law school each year to discuss current and developing tax law and policy trends. The endowed lecture was established in 2009 in honor of the long and illustrious career of USD's Professor of Law Emeritus Richard Crawford Pugh.
Location and Directions
- From the North: Use I-5 South, exit Sea World Dr. & Tecolote Rd. and proceed left at stoplight toward Morena Blvd. Turn right on Morena, left on Napa, and left on Linda Vista Rd. Travel to the second stoplight to USD's East (Main) entrance, turn left and enter campus.
- From the South (or the airport): Use I-5 North, exit Morena Blvd. (signs will say: Morena Blvd. use I-8 East) Stay to the right and follow the signs for Morena Blvd. Take the first right onto Linda Vista Rd. Travel to the third stoplight to USD's East (Main) entrance, turn left and enter campus.
- From the East: Use I-8 West, exit at Morena Blvd., go right onto Linda Vista Rd. and travel to the third stoplight to USD's East (Main) entrance, turn left and enter campus.
Once you have entered campus (from all directions): From the East (Main) entrance, stop at the entrance kiosk to obtain a complimentary visitor parking permit. Please be sure to obtain a permit and display it in your vehicle. Parking is available in the Mission Parking Structure across the street from the kiosk. Warren Hall is the third building on the left side of Torero Way (immediately after passing the kiosk).


text:
Coaching staff to take shape in time
GM Zduriencik, new manager McClendon meeting in Orlando
ORLANDO, Fla. -- Mariners GM Jack Zduriencik said he plans to spend the next few days with new manager Lloyd McClendon, and one of their first major decisions will be how to go about building a coaching staff.
That process began Monday, when McClendon picked his bench coach, former Nationals third-base coach Trent Jewett. Zduriencik spoke about it again on Tuesday, when McClendon arrived at the JW Marriott for the General Managers Meetings.
"Everything's up in the air every time you bring in a new manager," Zduriencik said. "I have my thoughts. He knows what they are. We'll share our thoughts, who's got some ideas, and we have current staff members that we'll look at first. If that meets both of our criteria, then they'll be retained. Otherwise, we're just going to explore options if we feel like we need to do that."
Zduriencik said he isn't going to set a deadline for those hires, and he doesn't have a timeframe in mind. The most important thing, he said, is making sure he and McClendon are comfortable with their choices.
"I would have rather had it done yesterday, but that's just the way it is," Zduriencik said. "You've got guys coming in from different parts of the country.
"As soon as we get guys in here and have a chance to sit down and talk. I think we just need to do a thorough job and at the end, what if it takes us three days, four days, five days? It doesn't matter. The time element isn't a factor. I think what's important is to get the right guys."
All of Seattle's holdover coaches have a year remaining on their contracts, so the GM and manager will first evaluate how they factor into the club's plans for 2014. Pitching coach Carl Willis, third-base coach Daren Brown, first-base coach Mike Brumley and bullpen coach Jaime Navarro were involved with the Mariners before former manager Eric Wedge's tenure began.
"The guys that are on staff right now have been told that they'll get an opportunity to sit down with Lloyd. He and I will get together," Zduriencik said. "We've been doing it, we'll continue to do it and we've got to do what's best for the organization going forward. He has his thoughts. I have mine. We'll put our heads together and make decisions."


text:
"Solid midsize car, now in its second year."
Midsize Cars
Editor: New Car Test Drive
$18,995 Base Price MSRP
$22,415 As Tested MSRP
Model Lineup: "Chrysler 200 LX ($18,995), Touring ($21,370), Touring Convertible ($26,575), Limited ($24070), Limited Convertible ($31,570), S ($26,365), S Convertible ($32,070)"
Standard Engine: 2.4-liter dohc 16-valve I4
Engine Options: 173-hp 2.4-liter dohc 16-valve I4; 283-hp 3.6-liter V6
Standard Transmission: 6-speed automatic
Transmission Options: 4-speed automatic; 6-speed automatic
Basic Warranty: "3 years/36,000 miles"
Assembled In: "Sterling Heights, Michigan"
Model Tested MSRP: "Chrysler 200 Touring sedan ($21,370)"
Standard Equipment: "cloth upholstery, air conditioning, cruise control, ambient LED lighting, 60/40 folding rear seat, acoustic laminated glass windshield and front windows, halogen headlamps, heated folding sideview mirrors, illuminated keyless entry, power door locks and windows, 17-inch aluminum wheels, eight-way power driver's seat, vehicle information center and trip computer, 6-speaker sound system, automatic temperature control, automatic headlamps, premium headliner with universal garage door opener, leather-wrapped steering wheel, leather-wrapped shift knob with chrome accent, satellite radio. "
Options As Tested: Cold Weather Package ($295)
Standard Safety Equipment: "front and side airbags, airbag curtains, active headrests, electronic stability control, traction control, ABS with brake assist and brake-force distribution, tire pressure monitor"
Optional Safety Equipment: noneDestination Charge: $750
We found the Chrysler 200 offers good gas mileage, a smooth ride, a solid feel, a quiet cabin and, surprisingly, tight handling.
Because the Chrysler 200 was new for 2011, there are no mechanical, exterior or interior changes for 2012. However, however there is a new model.
A new 2012 Chrysler 200 S joins the LX, Touring and Limited models. Essentially a loaded Chrysler 200 Limited, the Chrysler 200 S comes standard with the 3.6-liter Pentastar V6. Industry watchdog Ward's Automotive named that V6 one of the 10 Best Engines"" for 2012.
The V6, optional for the Chrysler 200 Touring and Limited models, standard in the 200 S, makes 283 horsepower and 270 foot-pounds of torque. Even with 110 more horsepower, it gives up little in fuel economy to the four-cylinder, with an EPA-estimated 19/29 mpg City/Highway.
The Chrysler 200 LX, Touring and Limited models come standard with the 2.4-liter World engine that Chrysler shares with Mitsubishi and Hyundai. Rated at 173 horsepower and 166 foot-pounds of torque at 4400 rpm, it's a double-overhead-cam 16-valve four-cylinder engine with variable valve timing that gives it good power at both low and high rpm. Chrysler 200's 2.4-liter four-cylinder is EPA rated at 20/31 mpg City/Highway.
As its name indicates, the Chrysler 200 falls under the Chrysler 300 in size and price. The front-wheel-drive Chrysler 200 competes with the Ford Fusion, Chevrolet Malibu, Nissan Altima, Toyota Camry, and possibly the Lexus ES and Lincoln MKZ. Midsize sedans comprise America's largest market segment for cars, with 1.7 million units sold per year. The Chrysler 200 has an old-school feel all its own that separates it from these other cars.
The Chrysler 200 replaced the much-maligned Chrysler Sebring. It uses the same platform as the Sebring, but engineers changed and strengthened so many things (chassis, engine, transmissions, suspension, brakes, body, interior) that it was almost a new car. It's impressive work, especially considering the changes were made in 12 months, and during a bankruptcy.
If you compare the Chrysler 200 to the old Sebring, you can stretch and call it sleek; it's clearly wider and lower, not to mention prettier. It's not a car that gathers second looks, but its buyers aren't people who care about second looks. They want the most metal for their money, the most affordable size and convenience, and the Chrysler 200 offers that. It's American, well-equipped and inexpensive. Popular options are bargain-priced, among them a cold weather package and media center with touchscreen and 30g music hard drive.
The cabin is one of the quietest in the segment, thanks to new sound absorption materials, as well as an acoustic glass windshield, laminated side glass usually found in higher priced vehicles, and special engine mounting for the I4 engine. The interior offers luxury, with soft seat coverings and trim, and supportive seats. The instrument panel's gray-on-gray graphics are pleasing, and its white accent lighting is wonderful at night, with nice ambient cockpit lighting.
Underway, we were quite impressed by how smooth and solid the 200 feels. It's put together well. Low road noise means a lot, and the quiet Michelin tires and new exhaust system help. Steering and ride are the same smooth and solid, even the convertible, which we drove in Seattle.
The 6-speed manual automatic transmission that comes on Touring, Limited and S models is seamless and not over-programmed. Chrysler calls it AutoStick, a name they've been using for 15 years, because they invented it, and they remain true to its blissful simplicity. A 4-speed automatic comes on the base LX model.
The 200 comes with Chrysler's longstanding 5-year 100,000-mile powertrain warranty."""
"The 2012 Chrysler 200 LX ($18,995) comes with the 2.4-liter engine with a 4-speed automatic transmission. Standard equipment includes cloth upholstery, air conditioning, cruise control, acoustic laminated glass windshield and front windows, halogen headlights, heated folding sideview mirrors, illuminated keyless entry, power door locks and windows, manual driver's seat adjustment with lumbar, 130-watt sound system with CD/MP3 radio, steering wheel controls, adjustable steering wheel, ambient LED lighting, 60/40 folding rear seat, 17-inch steel wheels.
Chrysler 200 Touring ($21,370) upgrades to the 6-speed automatic transmission, automatic temperature control, eight-way power driver's seat, Electronic Vehicle Information Center and trip computer, satellite radio, six speakers, automatic headlights, premium headliner, universal garage door opener, leather-wrapped steering wheel, leather-wrapped shift knob with chrome accent, 17-inch aluminum wheels. The 3.6-liter V6 ($1,795) is optional and comes with an upgraded alternator, engine oil cooler, and dual exhaust with bright exhaust tips.
Chrysler 200 Limited ($24,070) upgrades to leather upholstery, heated front seats, upgraded interior trim, remote start, touch-screen display, compass, outside temperature reading, 430-watt sound system Media Center CD/DVD with 40-gig hard drive, iPod input, Bluetooth, U-Connect hands-free phone, fog lamps, 18-inch polished aluminum wheels. The V6 is optional ($1,795). Navigation is optional ($695) and comes with Sirius Real Time Traffic and Sirius Travel Link.
Chrysler 200 S ($26,365) comes standard with the 3.6-liter V6 engine, Boston Acoustics sound system, leather, special front seats with suede inserts, heated front seats, perforated leather-wrapped steering wheel, 18-inch polished aluminum wheels with black trim, body color mirrors and door handles, and special trim: black-barred grille, headlights with black background, unique foglight bezels, and a black-inlayed winged Chrysler badge. Navigation is optional ($695).
The Chrysler 200 convertible comes similarly equipped in Touring ($26,575), Limited ($31,570) and S ($32,070) models.
Mopar, Chrysler's performance brand, offers sports suspension, special induction and exhaust pieces and other parts to improve handling and performance.
Safety equipment on all models includes advanced multistage front driver and passenger air bags, supplemental front-seat mounted air bags, side curtain airbags, active head restraints, four-wheel anti-lock disc brakes, electronic stability control, and electronic traction control, and tire pressure monitor on all models but the LX."
Walk Around
"The Chrysler 200 bears family resemblance to the Town and Country, the minivan sharing visual cues in the grille, headlamps, air intakes and front bumper. The Chrysler 200 front air dam is clean: low, thin, and horizontal. Its halogen headlights appear small from head-on, but flow around the front corners into the bulging fenders, creating a line that widens to the rear of the car. It makes a statement that says, We're bold not fancy. We got slab sides. So what? We like them.
If you compare the 200 to the old Sebring, you can stretch and call it sleek; it's clearly lower and wider. The main thing about the 200 is that it's big, for a midsize car, and it's American (also that it's well-equipped and inexpensive).
The rear deck lid looks chopped, with a chrome strip between LED taillamps and another chrome bar between the exhaust outlets that widens the look of the car. It bears a wing logo in brushed metal and blue, replacing the old traditional wing logo, to signify the rebirth of Chrysler.
The Chrysler 200 is not a car that gathers second looks, at least not for its beauty. But its buyers are not the type of people who care about second looks. They want the most metal for their money, the most affordable size and luxury, and the 200 offers that."
"The Chrysler 200 cabin is nice, with seat coverings and trim that feel soft and luxurious. The seats feel supportive and should be comfortable for long periods behind the wheel.
Rear legroom measures just 36.2 inches, which is on the short side for a midsize car. Toyota Camry offers 38.3 inches of rear legroom while Ford Fusion has 37.1 inches, although the Chrysler beats the Lexus ES, at 35.9. The rear seat is split 60/40 and folds down for more cargo space, always appreciated.
The instrument panel contains the usual three round gauges, with gray-on-gray graphics that are pleasing to the eye, while its white accent lighting is wonderful at night. The three-spoke steering wheel has a thick leather-wrapped rim and padded hub with controls for the sound system and cruise setting. Armrests are soft, and door pockets roomy. Some models have two USB ports, handy for phone and laptop charging.
The cabin is one of the quietest in the segment, thanks to new sound absorption materials, as well as an acoustic glass windshield, laminated side glass usually found in higher priced vehicles, and new engine mounting for the 2.4-liter engine."
Driving Impressions
"The standard powerplant for the Chrysler 200 is the 173-horsepower, 2.4-liter World engine that Chrysler shares with Mitsubishi and Hyundai. With dual variable valve timing, the power is good at both low and high rpm, and its 166 foot-pounds of torque are sufficient for the demands of its owners. The engine has proven itself reliable, over the years around the world, while delivering good gas mileage.
Fuel economy is an EPA-rated 20/31 mpg City/Highway with the 2.4-liter four-cylinder with 6-speed automatic transmission in a Chrysler 200 Touring sedan. That's about what we got during a week of good seat time in the Northwest.
Later, we drove a convertible with the top down on a hot summer day near Seattle, at the event called Run to the Sun by the Northwest Automotive Press Association, and it was a blast. This is the kind of car you can simply enjoy, because there are no worries. It's about what a car like this gives you, not what it is or how impressive it is.
Still, we were way impressed by how smooth and solid the 200 feels. It's put together well. Low road noise contributed a lot to this conclusion, with quiet-running Michelin tires and a retuned exhaust system.
Same with the steering and ride: smooth and solid, even the convertible. The Chrysler 200 corners really well, with little body roll.
The 6-speed manual automatic transmission is beautiful, seamless and not over-programmed. Chrysler calls it AutoStick, a name they've been using for 15 years, because they invented it. That's right, the manual automatic transmission first appeared in the 1997 Chrysler Cirrus Sebring, when it was perfectly programmed; that is, it did nothing without the driver's input. (We might add that its 2.5-liter V6 made less horsepower than today's four-cylinder, and cost more in today's dollars.) The 6-speed automatic is a good reason to step up from the base model, which comes with a 4-speed automatic.
We also got good seat time in a Chrysler 200 Limited, with the 3.6-liter Pentastar V6 that's been around two years and continues to get rave reviews.
The V6 makes a 283 horsepower and 260 foot-pounds of torque, coupled to a 6-speed manual automatic. At highway cruising speeds, there is some wind and tire noise (the price you pay for more aggressive tires), but it's not objectionable.
Using third and fourth gears on the mountain two-lanes, it showed off its class-leading power and acceleration. According to Chrysler, the engine makes more than 90 percent of its peak torque from 1600 rpm all the way up to redline 6400, and our mountain driving supports that, as we had plenty of torque and acceleration coming off slow corners. The engine has a nice, powerful growl when it's working, and you can't hear it when it's not.
The V6 gives up very little to the I4 in fuel mileage, with a strong EPA rating of 19 city/29 highway miles per gallon."
"The Chrysler 200 is an affordable midsize car that offers exceptional value. Available in sedan and convertible versions, it's smooth and quiet and feels solid. Two excellent engines coupled to the sweet 6-speed AutoStick automatic both get good gas mileage.
Sam Moses reported on the Chrysler 200 after his test drive through the Columbia River Gorge; Jim McCraw contributed to this NewCarTestDrive.com report."
Top Cars


text:
Corporate America's Communication Style
>> Thursday, March 25, 2010
I had a great opportunity this month to go to a three day workshop on Communication through Collaboration by Learning Tree, a company that provides training to several corporations. In the mist of training project managers, software engineers, and web developers, just to name a few, there are also courses on assisting in employee communication enhancement. I was so happy that my place of employment paid for this course as I am very interested in people to people interactions.
What I learned was so helpful that I will share my notes with you. There was so much information that I will share the most important aspect with you. I can see this being very helpful not just at work but of course with our spouse. You knew that was where I was going with this whole thing right? So there are four communication styles and if you understand each one you will be able to effectively fill the gap towards better communication.
1. Analyzer-Data and facts driven, communicates precisely, needs time to process.
2. Affiliator- Enthusiastic and motivated. Likes to pull everyone together, likes interaction, feeling focused.
3. Conceptualizer- Focuses on concepts, theories and ideas, innovative, wants to know the why's, "Ivory Tower thinking".
4. Implementer- Very direct, lets get it done, action and results oriented.
Analyzers find it hard to make decisions as they need time to process data.
Affiliators emotions can be a hindrance ex. they do not like to be left out.
Conceptualizers although involved in their work/project can miss what is happening with everyone else around them.
Implementers are so driven they can miss important details in not taking time to review.
Now how does this work in marriage? Some seem pretty obvious. But I was applying these concepts of communication styles in scenarios and this is what I came up with:
If you live with an an Analyzer, they need time to process what you're saying to them and much patience is needed. They have to be ready on their own terms which is a great sign of respect for them. Affiliators, like myself, need to feel needed and cared for. It is important to speak on a thought and especially heart felt level for them to even listen to you as they need to feel and know you hear them. Conceptualizers should be encouraged to say what they think. Allow them to be in their natural element by asking for their input. Their ideas need to be respected even if you may disagree. Follow up on how they think both of you can reach the common goal or end result together. With an Implementer they do not need or like details. They like to hear possible solutions to the problem. They get great peace from not having too much information to process. They like life to have a nice flow and are intellectually stimulated.
Now the four styles are not exact descriptions as our group was told throughout the course and my descriptions for the styles in marriage is just my take on application in marrige. If you could add more insight that would be great and you are more than welcomed. Until next time.


text:
There are other options for getting started in FTM2014. Will just quickly show the other options and may publish more details on these options in the future.
Start with What You Know:
If you haven't used Family Tree Maker before, and are just starting out, you can select Start with what you know, and on the right, will have a place for your (full) Name. For females, that would be your birth surname. You can add the parents names. This is just the starting point, creating a New FTM2014 from scratch. You can add your birth date and birth place on this screen, and selecting the sex of this person.
To the right, is where you Name the file:
I generally enter the Surname followed by the Version of Family Tree Maker that created the file, a dash, followed by the Product Version, found on the Help, About menu. I do NOT use any spaces in my filenames. This is just my 'best practice' and it's more for use outside of Family Tree Maker, like with Windows Explorer and file sorting.
The next option is to Download from Ancestry.com. If you have an Existing Ancestry Member Tree (AMT) you can Download it directly from your AMT and all of the information will be downloaded into FTM2014.
You will notice on this screen capture, that I am NOT logged in. I am reminded of that on the Right. Clicking on that Link will take me to the appropriate Login screens.
Further down the list was a file that isn't linked to FTM2012 and the Download option is available.
Copyright © 2013 by H R Worthington


text:
Forecasters are now predicting the northeast will plummet into a deep freeze.
The nation's capital was at a standstill Tuesday evening as snow continued falling at a rate of about an inch an hour — while commuters across the Northeast struggled to get home through blizzard-like conditions and snow coming down harder and faster than many people expected.
The wintry wallop brought more than a foot of snow in some areas and another blast of arctic air, snarling traffic, closing schools and shutting down the federal government.
As the wind blows the snow around, it makes for very difficult visibility on Long Island. NBC News' Ron Mott reports from Syosset.
Initially forecast to be a modest blurt of cold weather, the system has intensified, unleashing wind-driven snow and frosty air on the Northeast Tuesday night into Wednesday.
The National Weather Service said Manalapan, N.J., got 15.5 inches of snow, Philadelphia got slightly more than a foot and Brookhaven, near Philadelphia's airport, got 15. It said parts of New York City had 10 inches.
In D.C., most offices of the government were shut down Tuesday — although the Supreme Court justices did show up for work — and officials were asking residents to stay off the roads.
"We've had about 80+ calls for personal injury collisions today," said Scott Graham, assistant chief of nearby Montgomery County, Md., Fire and Rescue, told NBCWashington. "Some of which have been very minor... turning out to be property damage; some more significant, with minor traumatic injuries, vehicles overturning."
The capital was set to see about a half-foot of snow and wind gusts of 30 mph, while Boston could see around 8 inches and wind gusts up to 40 mph.
Meanwhile, governors in Delaware, New Jersey and New York on Tuesday afternoon declared states of emergency as blizzard conditions hit along the heavily populated Interstate 95 corridor.
"This winter storm will bring a one-two punch of snow and extreme cold. I urge all those in the affected regions to exercise caution, and avoid travel if possible," New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said.
New York broke three snowfall records Tuesday. And, for the first time since snow accumulation has been recorded in the 19th century, Philadelphia has had three 6-inch-or-greater snow events before Feb. 1.
NBC News' Al Roker has the latest forecast as the storm continues to deepen, creating blizzard-like conditions. As the arctic air tunnels in, the snow will eventually end, but it will still be blowing and drifting.
"Every once in a while these little winter storms go bananas, and we think this might be the one," said Kevin Roth, a lead meteorologist with the Weather Channel.
The storm could bring up to 14 inches of snow to Philadelphia and southern New England and up to a foot in New York City through the night, to be followed by bitter cold as arctic air from Canada streams in. Washington was expecting 4 to 8 inches.
In Maryland, 11 inches had accumulated in Northeast Heights.
Up and down the East Coast, area schools and city and state governments hunkered down, but with more than 3,000 flights cancelled, many airports were virtual ghost towns as well.
More than 6,600 flights were delayed and another 3,342 were canceled by 11:30 p.m., according to FlightAware.com. More than 1,000 flights for Wednesday had already been nixed.
A winter storm warning was in effect for New York City and the surrounding areas by the National Weather Service from noon Tuesday through Wednesday morning, and Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city has activated all of its emergency preparation systems, according to NBC New York.
The heaviest snow was expected in the later afternoon into the evening. Overnight lows could reach the single digits with the wind chill making it feel like 5 below.
A shortage of propane gas in the Midwest and Northeast is impacting millions of homes and businesses in rural areas beyond the reach of utilities.
The storm has already led some school districts in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Connecticut, Virginia, West Virginia and Kentucky to send students home early Tuesday or cancel classes ahead of time.
It has also forced New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to scrap a party Tuesday night on Ellis Island in celebration of his second inauguration.
In Philadelphia, a Tuesday night game between the Philadelphia Flyers and Carolina Hurricanes was postponed due to the snow emergency declared in the city.
With federal workers in D.C. told to stay home, Tom Ripley, who works at a Washington hardware store, said his morning commute was cut in half because "there was almost no one on the road."
He said the store was jammed Monday as customers stocked up on ice melt and shovels.
"Nobody prepares because we never get any snow, so the slightest chance of it, everybody freaks out," Ripley said.
Coupled with the snow is another bone-chilling winter blast, but it's not the same as the polar vortex that plunged temperatures to record lows two weeks ago. With the wind chill, the air will feel 10 degrees below zero or worse in some parts.
Temperatures "have already dropped 30 to 40 degrees across the Dakotas, Iowa and Minnesota, and 35 in Chicago," Roth said. "That cold air is going to drop into the South and then there's another surge of cold air coming on Friday."
Meanwhile, lake-effect snow is expected in parts of Michigan and Indiana, with as much as a foot likely throughout parts of northern Indiana on Tuesday.
The storm began hammering the upper Midwest early Tuesday. When all is over, Southern Ohio is expected to get 3 to 5 inches, while the Central Appalachians — through West Virginia and western Maryland — could pick up 5 inches to a foot of snow.
In anticipation of the storm, Ohio Gov. John Kasich followed the lead of officials in 17 other states — mostly in the Midwest and North — who declared energy emergencies and loosened rules for propane.
In many of these states, residents are also being urged to cut down on propane use as supplies become limited.
While the eastern U.S. struggles with the snow, the West Coast will remain high and dry, Roth said. The ongoing ddrought om California has created ideal conditions for wildfires.
"Perhaps next week we can talk about rain coming to California," Roth added.
Brian Snyder / Reuters
A pedestrian walks through the falling snow in Medford, Massachusetts.
NBC News' Becky Bratu and Elisha Fieldstadt and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
This story was originally published on Tue Jan 21, 2014 11:28 PM EST


text:
2013 record: 10-3 overall, 6-3 in Pac-12 Conference (2nd in South division)
2013 postseason: Sun Bowl vs. Virginia Tech (42-12 win)
2013 final AP/coaches' ranking: No. 16/No. 16
Head coach: Jim Mora (19-8 overall; 19-8 in three years at UCLA)
Offensive coordinator: Noel Mazzone (3rd year at UCLA)
2013 offensive rankings: 35th rushing offense (196.6 ypg); 43rd passing offense (251.8 ypg); 38th total offense (448.5 ypg); 2oth scoring offense (36.9 ppg)
Returning offensive starters: nine
Defensive coordinator: Jeff Ulbrich (3rd year at UCLA)
2013 defensive rankings: 71st rushing defense (169.5 ypg); 40th passing defense (217.6 ypg); 54th total defense (387.1 ypg); 35th scoring defense (23.2 ppg)
Returning defensive starters: eight
Location: Los Angeles
Stadium: Rose Bowl (92,542; grass)
Last conference title: 1998
The talent on UCLA's roster makes the Bruins contenders in the Pac-12 Conference. The play of quarterback Brett Hundley can place the team in national title contention. Hundley is among the Top 3 quarterbacks in college football along with Oregon's Marcus Mariota and Florida State's Jameis Winston. Like Mariota, Hundley would have a first-round pick in May's NFL draft if he decided to declare early. But he decided to stay in Westwood. The Bruins will gladly continue to build around their talented quarterback. Hundley is an impressive athlete at 6-3 and 226 pounds. Last season. Hundley threw for 3,071 yards and 24 touchdowns. He also led the team with 748 rushing yards and 11 rushing touchdowns. One of the reasons Hundley returned to UCLA for his redshirt junior campaign is to become a better overall quarterback. Hundley did improve his decision making through the final six games of last season. He only threw one of his nine interceptions after Oct. 26. As Hundley continues to develop his overall game, the Bruins will be the biggest beneficiary. And top-notch quarterback play is a key ingredient for any program ready to make the jump from being good to great.
UCLA head coach Jim Mora is a defensive coach by nature. It had to drive him crazy to see the Bruins play as poorly on defense as they did last seson. The Bruins actually finished fifth overall in the Pac-12 in total defense, but that is more an indictment of the overall defensive play around the league. The country's 71st overall rushing defense simply isn't good enough. UCLA wants to be able to compete with any team in the country. And it has to be better on defense. The team relied heavily on two talented freshmen, Eddie Vanderdoes and Kenny Clark, along the defensive line last season. Both should naturally improve during their sophomore campaigns. While the team's starting front is talented, the depth is questionable beyond Ellis McCarthy. Players such as junior Kevin McReynolds, need to provide quality reps as part of the team's defensive line rotation for them to improve significantly against the run. Isaako Savaiinaea will also be inserted into the starting lineup to replace Jordan Zumwalt at inside linebacker. UCLA knows what to expect of senior linebacker Eric Kendricks, but Savaiinaea's play could prove to be the difference in the Bruins' defense as a whole. The Bruins' progression on the defensive side of the football should be the primary indicator how far the team can go this season.
UCLA's offense line was in constant flux in 2013. The team used four different offensive line combinations throughout the season. The team actually changed its starting lineup in six of its last seven games. A lack of continuity up front will have a drastic effect throughout the rest of the offense. While this shouldn't be a concern which lingers between seasons, the Bruins have already started off on the wrong foot with at least one significant injury along this year's offensive line. Left tackle Simon Goines will miss at least the first two games of the season after he had bone spurs removed in his ankle Aug. 9. Malcolm Bunche, a Miami transfer, has 13 career starts at left tackle, and he is expected to slide into the spot vacated by Goines. Once Goines returns, the coaching staff will have shuffle the starting lineup. How many times will they have to do so this season? Will Bunche slide inside to guard once Goines is healthy or he remain on the blindside? The fact of the matter is UCLA won't have their top offensive line on the field until week three of the season with very little practice time as an entire unit. Goines is expected to return just in time for one of the Bruins' biggest games of the season against Texas. However, he won't have much time to build a rapport with the rest of the unit. The only ones who will suffer if the offensive can't gel quickly are Hundley and the rest of UCLA's skill positions.
MAKE-OR-BREAK GAME: vs. Stanford
It's been six years since UCLA defeated Stanford. To put that time frame into context, the 2008 season was Rick Neuheisel's first at UCLA. It was Jim Harbaugh's second with the Cardinal. Stanford has gone on to become one of the most successful and intimidating teams in the Pac-12 Conference. The Bruins, meanwhile, have searched for an identity and found one under Mora. This game will be Mora's opportunity to truly put his stamp on the program. It's the last game of the regular season. Both UCLA and Stanford are expected to be battling for an appearance in the Pac-12 championship game. Since the game falls on a Friday, both teams will have short practice weeks. The Bruins want to prove they're among the Pac-12's elite and a potential national championship contender. Stanford is as tough a team as the Bruins will face all season.
HEISMAN HOPEFUL: linebacker/running back Myles Jack
Hundley is the obvious choice here. There is, however, a natural curiosity that will draw college football fans and Heisman voters to Jack. On one hand, Jack is one of the best young linebackers in college football. On the other, he is a dynamic runner when the Bruins decide to hand him the football. Last season, Jack was third on the Bruins' defense with 49 tackles. He also added seven tackles for loss and 13 deflected passes while dropping in coverage. On offense, Jack led the team with an average of 7.0 yards per carry. He only ran the ball 38 times, yet he was second on the team with seven rushing touchdowns. And Jack accomplished these numbers as a true freshman. The "runningbacker" simply brings a completely different dynamic to both sides of the football. He'll be expected to make the big play on defense in crucial parts of the game. And the team clearly favors him when they're around the goal line on offense. The novelty of Jack playing both ways will draw interest from fans around the country. It's his talent and ability to play at a high level on both sides of the football that will make him a legitimate Heisman contender.
(Click HERE for the CFT 2014 Preseason Preview Repository)


text:
Friday, 10 June 2011
LCF BA Show 2011
5 comments:
- steve said...
It's been a while since last I commented: The few items shown here are fun, colorful, but I wonder if "wearable" fits any of them aside from Sean McGirr's. A question for me is, being in my September years, is anyone producing edgier menswear for gentlemen "d'une certaine âge?"
- 10 June 2011 at 13:01
- StyleSalvage said...
Steve: Welcome back to the discussion. In terms of London menswear I point you in the direction of Casely-Hayford, a label that strives for innovation through innovation. Or Lou Dalton and Tim Soar. The difficulty in judging a show collection on wearability is that wearable clothes rarely create much of a spectacle on the catwalk. To be truly appreciated they are better suited to a presentation format. Also, it depends upon how you wear any of it of course.
- 10 June 2011 at 15:34
- Colin Chapman said...
Wow! love the Bret de Jager stuff. Such great colours, and just the right balance of garish and subdued.
- 10 June 2011 at 19:20
- Milan Boya said...
this shoes r awesome!
- 14 June 2011 at 20:42
- Brandon said...
I'm with Colin on this one! Bret de Jager looks verrrry wearable to me! All about layering my friend steve! If a piece is good, you find a way to wear it. Especially if you appreciate it!
- 3 July 2011 at 05:16


text:
Salsa redesigns their long-travel 29er with Split Pivot rear suspension and enhanced geometry for tighter handling.
Horsethief 1 on the Piedmont Trails above Duluth.
I'm beginning to think Salsa recruits its male employees from the NFL; either that or the logging industry. Several guys in the Salsa crew I hung out with in Duluth, Minnesota this past week are taller than six feet, weigh more than 200 pounds, sport healthy beards and have leathery handshakes that will crush anyone with a feeble grip.
So it goes without saying that guys with these types of dimensions need as much beef in their bike as they do on their dinner plate. Enter the redesigned 2014 Salsa Horsethief – a burly-yet-agile 120mm full-suspension 29er featuring Split Pivot technology that feels as natural on the Enduro racing circuit as it does on tight, technical singletrack.
Dave Weagle's Split Pivot rear end is the nucleus of the new Horsethief.
Split Pivot is an innovative rear suspension design pioneered and patented by David Weagle, also known for his World Cup Downhill-winning DW-Link design. When Salsa engineers sat down at the design table to enhance the Horsethief, instead of making up something new, they decided to stick with what they know works. So a phone call to Martha's Vineyard was made, and DW was proud to partner up with Salsa in redesigning the Horsethief.
Weagle's Split Pivot is a simple and innovative single pivot design that features a precise wheel link, brake link and control link that separates acceleration forces from braking forces. Pedaling is also independent of bump absorption, enabling the rear Fox shock to work only as a bump absorber for exceptional small bump feel. For those like me who don't understand all the nuances behind advanced suspension design, here's three points to remember about Split Pivot:
1) The rear shock is solely tasked with bump absorption, eliminating the need for excess low-speed compression damping found with other designs.
2) Pedaling performance is independent of bump absorption, which means that whether you're coasting over rocky, rooty sections of trail or pedaling through it, the rear shock performs exactly the same.
3) Braking performance is also independent of bump absorption, eliminating annoying brake chatter and vastly improving traction under braking.
Split Pivot also has outstanding anti-squat properties, meaning that the Horsethief rides higher under pedaling accelerations. In redesigning the Horsethief, Salsa engineers wanted to retain its rugged terrain capabilities while improving suspension efficiency and agility in corners.
Dave Weagle spent all week on a Horsethief and seemed to love every minute of it.
Besides incorporating Split Pivot, Salsa engineers increased rear triangle stiffness by using FEA-optimized AL-6066 tubing and a 12x142mm rear thru-axle for an impressive 18 percent improvement in lateral stiffness. The redesigned rear triangle can also accommodate tires as large as 2.4 inches. To dial in the cornering agility of the Horsethief, exceptionally short 437mm chainstays are features on all frame sizes (S, M, L, XL) – among the shortest chainstays of any full-suspension 29er.
A very relaxed 68.1 degree head tube angle paired with a 51mm offset Fox fork help the Horsethief track straight and confident at speed yet still enable it to carve tight turns with the agility of a full-suspension bike with 26" wheels.
Every Horsethief BB92 bottom bracket and tapered head tube are factory-faced and reamed after being painted, an extra step to ensure quality and precision that most other manufacturers neglect. Other little details like added cable holders for dropper posts and moto-style brake orientation help make setup cleaner and easier.
Due to its shorter chainstays, the Horsethief is set up for 1x and 2x drivetrains only.
Continue reading for Horsethief riding impressions, more information and full photo gallery.


text:
STANFORD, Calif. — For most of the 50,028 at Stanford Stadium on Saturday night, Alan Gordon was the all-conquering hero. With his first two goals of 2013, including a towering, 93rd-minute game-winning header, Gordon helped the San Jose Earthquakes complete a shocking 3-2 comeback victory against the LA Galaxy.
Yet after the game, Gordon's focus was not on his heroics. Instead, he was concerned about taking away from the performance of fellow forward Steven Lenhart, who Gordon replaced in the 64th minute after the bleeding from Lenhart's head wound couldn't be adequately staunched.
"It's always a great moment" to score a late game-winner, Gordon said and he beat a hasty exit from the Quakes' locker room at Stanford Stadium. "Lenny deserved those goals; he is always doing the dirty work for us. I feel bad coming in and stealing the glory."
Gordon needn't have worried, because his teammates are well aware that if the Quakes (5-7-6) are going to rise from their eighth-place standing in the West back into playoff position, they will need more nights like Saturday from the 31-year-old target man.
READ: Gordon's performance vs. Galaxy earn him MLS Player of the Week honors
Gordon nodded in Shea Salinas' left-wing cross at the near post in the 68th minute to get the Quakes on the board, then headed in at almost the exact same spot in stoppage time, redirecting a looping pass from Sam Cronin for the victory.
"I think people underestimate Gordon," Quakes midfielder Rafael Baca told MLSsoccer.com. "Unluckily, he hasn't had the chances [this season]. Today, he had them and he put them away. I'm really happy for him. I told him after the game I was proud of him. He deserved it."
Gordon, who tallied a career-best 13 goals in 2012, was held scoreless through the first half of the season while struggling to regain his fitness and form after two off-season surgeries and missing four games due to suspension. That was one of the biggest reasons why San Jose's high-powered offense stalled out through 17 matches.
"[Gordon] is a beast," Salinas told MLSsoccer.com. "He's shown that type of fight all year, he just hasn't been fortunate enough to get on the [scoresheet]. Hopefully, he can continue that."
READ: CCL - Quakes learn 2013-14 group stage schedule
With star forward Chris Wondolowski (US) and critical winger Marvin Chavez (Honduras) both being called in for Gold Cup duty — meaning they could miss as many as four MLS matches in July — the Quakes will be counting on Gordon to help pick up the slack, presumably alongside Lenhart on San Jose's front line.
"Any goalscorer goes through spells like that," San Jose interim coach Mark Watson said of Gordon. "He's had some physical issues this year. He's injured, but he's playing through it. That guy is a true character and true battler. I knew that, just because of the way he is, and the attitude and the work rate that he brings to practice every day, he was eventually going to get it. He got some great service, but those two goals were fantastic."
So, Gordon was asked, is this a springboard for a second-half Quakes surge?
"That's something that will usually do it," Gordon said of the comeback. "Hopefully we can put together two good performances next week to follow it up."


text:
When Pittsburgh takes the field in less than an hour for their 378th consecutive appearance in the BBVA Compass Bowl, it'll do so without the services of the most productive member of its rushing attack.
Pitt declared late Saturday morning that running back Ray Graham has been ruled out of the bowl game against Ole Miss due to injury. The senior suffered a pulled hamstring during one of the Panthers' postseason practices in December.
With Graham out, freshman Rushel Shell, who is second on the team with 562 yards, will make his first collegiate start.
Graham leads Pitt in both rushing yards (1,042) and rushing touchdowns (11). It's the second straight season Graham has led the team in both categories.
Graham isn't the only loss that will be felt by the Panthers' ground game as it was announced earlier this week that starting guard Anthony Doakes had been suspended for the bowl.


text:
Unless you were living off the grid in the summer of 2007, you likely marveled for a moment or two at the unadulterated weirdness that is Tay Zonday. Back then, he was just Adam Bahner, a graduate student in American studies at the University of Minnesota. But a music video he had uploaded to YouTube months before suddenly experienced a burst of renown. His "Chocolate Rain" quickly racked up 4 million views. In short order, John Mayer covered the song and there was a Darth Vader version, a parody called "Vanilla Snow," and a profusion of other send-ups. Soon he was invited onto Jimmy Kimmel (twice) and featured on Opie & Anthony,right after a segment about whale sperm. "I inadvertently became an icon of viral video success," Zonday says.
Face-to-face, he comes across a bit like a facsimile of a person, as if a robot or alien has not quite nailed its impersonation of a human being—the eyes excessively round and unblinking, the neck and shoulders too stiff, a grin as broad as the Cheshire cat's. And then there's the impossible voice, the Paul Robeson bass emerging from the Emmanuel Lewis face, which Zonday uses to say things like: "Mutatis mutandis, look at Nielsen ratings, a lot of these top YouTubers are getting results that are numerically higher than television and movies." He's well aware of his oddities, what he calls his "distinct brand." But where Hollywood is "eugenic" in its relentless pursuit of a specific type or look, Zonday says, YouTube allows unique artists to find their audience.
Until now, the trajectory of viral stardom has generally involved a spike of fame followed by a plunge into near-total anonymity. And from one perspective, Zonday fits that pattern: You haven't seen him on Kimmel lately, after all. But under the radar, he has figured out how to make his semi-celebrity pay, earning more money each successive year from the scores of videos he continues to post on YouTube. Like many of the other 20,000 content creators who have been invited to join the site's Partner Program, he has essentially become a full-time YouTuber, a Google company man. Although partners are contractually prohibited from revealing how much they earn from the ads running on their YouTube channels, independent estimates put Zonday's take at between $24,000 and $72,000 a year, based on a Google ad rate of $1 to $3 per thousand views (his videos are seen roughly 2 million times a month). And beyond that, Zonday says, he is able to match what he receives from Google by promoting products in his videos and by uploading advertisements himself, a capability enabled in 2009. Without anyone noticing, so-called "Internet fame" has started adding up to real money.
Perhaps inevitably, the nucleus of YouTube fame-seekers has migrated to Los Angeles. Hundreds of top-tier partners have left high-speed Internet connections in hometowns everywhere and settled here, on the periphery of the traditional entertainment industry. But for these viral stars, many of whom already pull in six figures a year from their channels, this move isn't about getting their faces seen by studio heads or their voices heard by A&R reps. Instead, they come to work with one another. They room together, appear in one another's videos, lend each other equipment and skills: camera work for special effects, say, or video editing for a song. Several have pooled resources to create mini networks, and an ancillary advertising business has materialized whereby YouTube luminaries are matched with companies scrambling to reach a young audience and build a presence online.
Zonday himself now lives in the Hollywood Hills, in a 700-square-foot bungalow that's nearly empty but for the converted bedroom crammed with tens of thousands of dollars' worth of electric keyboards, computers, video cameras, and sound recording equipment. (With the higher-end gear, he no longer has to "move away from the mic to breathe in.") He collaborates as much as possible with neighboring YouTubers, appearing in a Katy Perry parody with Shane Dawson—a 23-year-old whose comedy channel has 2.9 million subscribers—in an ensemble episode of JoeNationTV's "YouTube Assassin." Because he can't write and record songs fast enough, Zonday has created a second channel on YouTube for casual videoblogging. It started awkwardly, with some pontificating about public restrooms and farting barbers, but now he's settled into a steadier rhythm, taking viewer requests to put his basso profondo to use reading Miley Cyrus tweets or the ingredients on a box of Corn Flakes.
Most people move to Hollywood with the hope of making it big, but Zonday is helping show the way to something strange and new: making it small. He says he does recognize that (borrowing a line from Chris Rock) "you aren't really famous until someone's mama knows who you are." But a narrow, lucrative fame is the path that has opened up for him and for the thousands of others like him. After going viral, they've figured out how—against all expectation—to stay viral.
The most dramatic place to witness this digital fame machine in action is in Culver City, a mile from the ocean, at the offices of Maker Studios. An independent media company led by several prominent YouTubers, Maker oversees a large stable of partner channels. Starting out two and a half years ago with a handful of content creators and three or four people working production, the studio has since swelled to more than 200 partners and a full-time support staff of 140, with plans to ramp up to 1,000 partners in the next few months. Their offices sprawl into several buildings, as well as to two nearby rented apartments where staff and talent live and work. Maker is on the lookout for 50,000 square feet elsewhere—understandably so, since it's hard to move about the current space without having to sidestep someone lugging equipment or rushing to a set.
Maker's business model is simple. It takes a cut of the partners' share of ad revenue; in exchange, it provides emerging talents with directors, editors, extras, costumes, technical support, studio space, equipment, and help with websites and brand deals. Maker's founders see this model as comparable to United Artists, the revolutionary studio formed in 1919 by D. W. Griffith, Charlie Chaplin, and other budding stars who wanted to control their work and its distribution. And visiting the Maker offices, you feel the same sort of anarchic energy that defined Hollywood during that wild, pre-corporate era. In what was once a piano store, executive producer Nikki Fancy, an intern just two years ago, describes the "pod" of nine channels and eight to 10 weekly videos she oversees. One building over, a few dozen people stare into computers, working on postproduction and web management. A woman there posts celebrity news items to the website of Ray William Johnson, Maker's and YouTube's biggest star—his videos have been viewed 1.3 billion times and counting. While I interview Maker's three founders in a makeshift conference room, we overhear repeated cries of "Fuck! Fuck!" through the thin walls. The profaner, I find in the studio next door, is a pasty-skinned man in green tights brandishing a sword and shield. He is portraying a Legend of Zelda character, shooting a video for one of Maker's gaming channels. The director asks for another take, and the actor raises his sword in readiness.
One of the founders, Lisa Donovan—LisaNova on her channel—is also one of the few early YouTubers to have crossed over (briefly) into traditional entertainment, joining MADtv as a featured player in 2007. After her YouTube experiences, though, she found the process maddeningly inefficient: 30 people would work over a single sketch, with a producer approving every small change. So she left the offline talent mill and launched Maker with her brother, Ben, who had been helping to write her skits, and her boyfriend, Danny Zappin, a director and producer.
YouTube is the anti-Hollywood, the anti-TV, Zappin declares, because there are no decisions by committee, no casting calls, no gatekeepers to pass just to get started. Distribution is global, instantaneous, and free, and shows can't be canceled. He emphasizes that it isn't just partners benefiting from the new entertainment industry that Maker is helping to build. YouTube is bringing about a creative renaissance that is also cultivating talented directors and editors and techs who are struggling to find work in Los Angeles.
Will all of these people get rich on YouTube? Not a chance. But unlike previous waves of aspirants hitting LA's shores, Zappin insists, they aren't wasting their time waiting tables or watching someone's kids. They're working on their craft, doing what they love, and making some decent money in the bargain. In an economy without much opportunity, they're trying to join an uncharted and expanding demographic: the YouTube middle class.
As inviting as it sounds, a billion YouTube accounts still earn zilch. With an astounding 48 hours of video now uploaded to YouTube every single minute, and with real money at stake, the barrier to entry has risen significantly. The days of happy accidents like "Chocolate Rain" are largely over. To get noticed today, you need to understand the inner workings of this competitive market; that is, you need to know the YouTube rules. These can be broken down into five maxims, and all around greater LA you can find YouTube partners who are busily putting them into practice.
Rule 1:
Make a lot of content. A lot.
"By making a ton of videos, I plant a forest that I can harvest forever," says Corey Vidal, a Toronto YouTuber who travels to Los Angeles every other month or so to work with his peers. Vidal established his YouTube following with a song about Star Wars set to John Williams' instrumental score, and he points out that each of his more than 200 videos is seen thousands of times daily by the website's global audience. Every YouTuber says it's vital to post on a set schedule, and YouTube itself encourages creators to turn their viral videos into viral series, something episodic—a distinctly branded show with story lines, recurring characters, and a TV-like feel. Evidence shows that viewers of these series not only tune in more often but are also more likely to watch the high-paying skippable ads.
One of the most successfully prolific YouTubers is Shay Butler, who each week posts (as Shaycarl) a short action-adventure-fantasy video studded with hilariously low-budget special effects. On his second channel, he uploads a video a day, mostly by turning the camera on his life with his wife and four children—first as they lived in Idaho and now in LA. The Shaytards, as these videos are known, often run for 15 or 20 minutes—an eternity in YouTube time—and each is watched tens or hundreds of thousands of times, the ensuing comments often numbering 10,000 and more. At Maker, I sit down with Butler and KassemG, another prominent YouTube partner. A guileless and charming everyman, in the mold of a Kevin James, Butler wears mirrored sunglasses perched atop a backward baseball cap and sports a plunging beard that hangs down like a bib. Because of the intimacy of his videos, his fans are especially loyal, if not rabid.
"If my mom tells me on camera that I'm looking a little fat," Butler says, "my fans will be like, 'Shut up, bitch,' in the comments. I mean, come on, guys. That's my mom!"
"His mom is a huge bitch, though," KassemG interjects.
Before he created the 16th-most-subscribed channel on YouTube, with 1.8 million fans, Kassem Gharaibeh was working at Best Buy in Thousand Oaks and struggling as a stand-up comic, performing at Chinese restaurants where the three customers were annoyed that someone was interrupting their meal. In the past couple of years, though, he has uploaded 350 videos. His "AsKassem" series has him riffing off of fans' sexually sophomoric questions. In a recurring show called "Going Deep," he interviews porn stars with the pomposity of James Lipton on Inside the Actors Studio. Before the first episode, he reached out to a hundred porn actresses before one finally agreed to appear in a YouTube show. That video has received 4 million views. Now porn stars and their managers proposition him—Ron Jeremy did a recent episode. "They're banging down our door," Gharaibeh says, mugging into an imagined camera for an extra beat.
Rule 2:
Target a niche.
Before the 2010 launch of freddiew, a YouTube channel of live-action first-person-shooter videos that reached a million subscribers in the shortest time ever, Freddie Wong and Brandon Laatsch determined that they needed to identify an underserved niche. Wong and Laatsch run the channel together, and I meet them, along with Wong's 24-year-old younger brother, Jimmy, at their warehouse workspace just east of downtown LA. When I arrive, three employees—guys who moved to Los Angeles to follow their own YouTube dreams—are riding a zip line from a second-floor landing down past a bank of computers and all the way across the room. They slip on black gloves and arm themselves with replica handguns and assault rifles, kneeling behind computer boxes as they take aim at enemy targets only they can see.
Wong and Laatsch love playing videogames, they tell me, and when they looked on YouTube they saw that videos of people acting out the gaming experience all had poorly produced special effects and badly choreographed stunts. They knew they could do better. Laatsch says, "We asked, are there are a lot of people on the Internet with tastes similar to ours?" The two often finish one another's sentences, and Wong adds, "Yeah, male and nerdy."
But before going after that niche, Laatsch spent two years studying every YouTube video that had found a substantial audience, watching hours of lonelygirl15, Smosh, Fred, AtheneWins, and Shane Dawson. He and Wong figured there was a pattern to viral success, and they could deduce and replicate it. Laatsch says the secret to a YouTube hit for them turned out to be getting the delicate balance of comedy and spectacle just right. They would create action comedy. "You meet expectations and then constantly exceed them," Wong chimes in. They now have 2.5 million subscribers on their main channel and 450 million total video views. "We knew from our research that viewership would eventually snowball," Laatsch says.
Jimmy Wong, the younger brother, engineered his own YouTube hit. After a busty, blond UCLA student ranted on YouTube about the "hordes of Asians" that didn't use "American manners" in the library, Jimmy responded with "Ching Chong! Asians in the Library Song," in which he reveals to the coed the hidden messages in his chattering—"Ching Chong [It means I love you] / Ling Long [I really want you]." Jimmy appealed to what he calls a "politically conscious comic-music niche," as well as to pissed-off Asians. He says he was also one of the first and the best to react to a trend, thus jumping in front of its search traffic. "Every train needs a caboose, and that's Jimmy Wong," Laatsch teases. More like a sidecar, Jimmy corrects. Plus, he insists that he's done the same cool stuff as his brother and Laatsch. "As soon as I bust into song," he says, "I create two things simultaneously: one, the surprise that this meek Asian guy is singing, and, two, that the voice doesn't match the face. That exceeds expectation. It's partly comedic and partly spectacle." It was a deliberate and distinctly Asian take on what worked in "Chocolate Rain." Jimmy says, "I consciously planned what Tay accidentally did."
Rule 3:
Connect with your fans.
It's a truism that the Internet is about conversation, but the daily life of Olga Kay shows just how consuming it can be in practice. An effervescent former Russian circus performer, Kay now lives in the San Fernando Valley with two other YouTube partners, Joe Nation and Jessica Lizama, both of whom appear often in her videos. She runs five different YouTube channels, the first of which she started in 2006. Kay calls her followers the Moosh Army, after her cat, Mushka—a suggestion from one of the hundreds of logged-in fans who watched the live webcam shows she used to do two or three times a week. At the end of every skit, she speaks to her Moosh Army directly, offering advice as well as prizes and displaying pencil and ink drawings viewers have sent her.
Kay always closes by asking some sort of question ("Do you feel embarrassed to dance in public?") and by prompting viewers to leave a comment or a video response. (Also, of course, she asks them to subscribe if they haven't already.) On her second channel, she speaks to the audience as herself, seemingly without a filter, as the camera shows Kay moving about her house or hanging with friends. On her iPhone channel, she appears three to five times a week solely to offer advice. Her cat channel, meanwhile, has been on hiatus, but she plans soon to have Mushka teach one Russian word a day.
When I meet Kay in Beverly Hills, she is preparing to shoot a show, a weekly rundown of the best of YouTube, for the website of Relativity Media. She tells me she is halfway through the Herculean task of sending a personal note to all 450,000 people who have subscribed to her channels. She can do 250 an hour, as many as 3,000 in a week. The audience engagement isn't just virtual either. Kay has traveled around the US and to Canada for meet-and-greets with fans. Dave Days, a young musician with 1.6 million subscribers, sometimes tweets where and when he'll be shooting a video, and people come out to appear as extras. In fall 2010, Wong and Laatsch rented an RV for 30 days, driving 10,000 miles to personally interact with their fans across the country.
Rule 4:
Collaboration is where the Maker Studios model really pays off. An established star features an unknown in a video, sending legions of devoted followers to check out this unfamiliar talent. The newbie still needs skill and pluck to retain the audience, but they've already cleared the imposing threshold of discovery. One recent beneficiary of this phenomenon is Pete Shukoff, who was a struggling singer in Chicago for nine years, at times living out of his car, before he answered a craigslist ad that Maker had placed seeking a part-time songwriter. He did some funny improv street singing on KassemG's channel and had a song featured in a Shaycarl video. Now, as Nice Peter, he has one of the most subscribed channels on YouTube. His best-known videos are the seductively forwardable "Epic Rap Battles of History," a collection of lyrical donnybrooks that pit the likes of Hitler against Darth Vader, or Einstein against Stephen Hawking. (Einstein: "When I apply my battle theory, minds are relatively blown. So take a seat, Steve. Oop, I see you brought your own.")
Even for top partners, collaborations are essential, not only to cross-promote but to feed the constant demand for content. I got to witness two other leading YouTubers team up at the West Hollywood studio of Joe Penna, otherwise known as MysteryGuitarMan, whose first viral hit, in 2009, was a stop-motion short of him in signature sunglasses and emergent beard strumming a couple of chords, the images cascading, the sound looped to form a fully orchestrated piece of music. Penna puts out a new clip every Tuesday and Thursday, each one viewed around a million times. At his studio, a list of ideas for upcoming shows is scrawled on a dry-erase board: "Booty Bounce Office Walk," "1 Finger Symphony," "Beat Box Alberto." Today his guest is DeStorm Power, a recent transplant from Brooklyn who himself uploads multiple videos a week to his 1.1 million subscribers. Power is a lyric-writing savant, never committing anything to paper. On his channel, he regularly performs songs in response to challenges posed by his fans—do an anagram rap, say, or a song about how to solve the Rubik's Cube.
Power sits at a computer and opens a file of a beat he has created for the musical challenge he and Penna are going to tackle together—a song about the comments posted by their viewers, thousands of which will flash on screen during the video. They will each show a slightly different version of the video on their respective channels, prompting fans to check out the other take. Penna will handle the actual production of the video. Power takes on the lyrics. He sings a few lines, filling in gaps with placeholder phrases to get the rhythm right. He makes a second pass through, fleshing it out, and then settles into the hook. "All these haters call me fake, they call me lame. / These comments get stuck up in my brain," he begins to rap. Penna grabs his guitar and plays along.
Rule 5:
Optimize for the algorithms.
Last summer, YouTube ran a six-week Creator Institute at USC, inviting 10 novices judged to have impressive partner potential. On the day I sit in, Margaret Healy—employee 81 at Google and now a manager of the Partner Program—has flown in from San Francisco to conduct a tutorial on how to build an audience and maximize earnings. "Success depends on how hard you work and how you work the platform," she explains to the group. Healy shows them a way to assess the effectiveness of their content, displaying a chart of "attention scores" that YouTube makes available to all partners for tracking exactly when viewers stop watching their videos. She encourages them not only to respond to fans but also to reach out to bloggers and journalists who link to their clips.
One of Healy's main themes is the importance of optimizing for YouTube search: the benefits that come from tagging, titling, explaining, and annotating videos with as many specific and general descriptors as possible. By adding this metadata, she says, creators' work will appear more readily in search results, and more ads will reach their videos. To inject a bit of fun into this math lesson, Healy's PowerPoint presentation turns the search algorithms into a character with a human name. "Text is food for Al," Healy says, as "Al"—an animated robot with a boom-box head—appears on the screen. "Al can't watch a video. Al can read the words around your video."
Since this is USC, the program isn't all about search engine optimization and brand-building; it's also about filmmaking. Pablo Frasconi, the professor in charge of the summer curriculum, says it's important to think of YouTube as part of a long arc of cinematic democratization. He cites the Super 8 explosion of the '60s, the improvisational style of Jean-Luc Godard, the neglected American master Monte Hellman. Some of the guest speakers USC brings in for the Creator Institute are decidedly mass-market entertainers, like the director McG (Charlie's Angels, Terminator Salvation) and Avatar producer Jon Landau, who tells his audience that YouTube videos could launch movie careers just as music videos gave a start to directors like David Fincher.
Nevertheless, Kaitlyn Pendleton, a senior at William and Mary, says the institute has convinced her that YouTube is her future. In front of USC's Douglas Fairbanks Fountain, she grants that she has just 40 subscribers to her sketch-comedy channel, but she is raring to build on that. "New media is about to erupt," she says, "and I'm going to ride the eruption."
YouTube believes we are poised at another transitional moment in the history of broadcast. Its service, as the company sees it, will provide a nearly limitless number of personalities to speak to any audience, to reach every niche. Cable television took us from a few channels to a few hundred, but the selection offered by YouTube will be in the hundreds of thousands or millions. YouTube's challenge now is to convert its audience of casual users—27 million unique visitors every day—into real, devoted fans. When I visit YouTube headquarters, the executives there are excited about a three-person-wide slide that's being built from the third floor down to the second and about gnomes that have been surreptitiously placed in clusters throughout the building, each accompanied by a printed-out pun ("Oh gnome you didn't!"). They are also eager to present their vision of a future in which YouTube is viewed on all devices, all the time.
This future will begin with a new look: what the company calls "lean back," a site design that has been fashioned for streaming to a television. Actually leaning back on a couch beside a Chuck Norris poster is Shiva Rajaraman, the engineer in charge of the site's redesign, who shows me a continuously running set of ogre cartoons on a large flat-panel television. Basic website functions—Like, Dislike, Subscribe—can be accessed with the remote control. YouTube may already rival cable in terms of total audience size, with nearly as many people watching Maker Studio's videos each day as tune into ESPN. But YouTube viewers spend on average just 15 minutes a day on the site, compared to the five hours daily that people watch television. Part of the reason for that is formatting. YouTube's current design encourages its viewers to watch a video, and when it ends they must actively choose to watch another, or the session is over.
To remedy this problem, YouTube needs to replicate some of the passivity of TV-watching, with its long, lucrative viewing sessions. On the Test Tube section of its website, you can already opt for a new layout where content is presented as an uninterrupted playlist of related videos. Go to MysteryGuitarMan's channel, for example, and you can choose between sets of all his looping videos or stop-motion clips. Type in "James Brown" and you get a 20-video package starting with the Godfather of Soul performing "It's a Man's World" with Luciano Pavarotti.
YouTube is also refining the algorithms that match its video suggestions to your taste, by adding in your viewing and subscription history, how long you watch, what you tagged in the past, who your friends are, and which of their recommendations you click on. Someone watching "Great Depression Cooking" on YouTube, I am told, should be led to episodes of "My Drunk Kitchen," in which the host drinks a couple of bottles of wine and fails miserably and comically in her culinary efforts. Or a video of James Brown dancing in 1964 might eventually lead you to a surprisingly large stock of "tutting" videos, a dance that involves bodies contorting to look like hieroglyphs. "Our goal is not just to increase the amount of time you're watching but also to broaden the interests you have," says Cristos Goodrow, an engineering director. "We've got to incorporate that into the algorithms, otherwise you'll never get to tutting."
And better matching isn't the only improvement. In late October, YouTube announced that a hundred celebrities and media companies had signed deals to launch premium channels on the site. As these channels roll out over the next year, each will produce a few hours of original, often regularly scheduled content every week. The programming will have more of a cable feel, even as YouTube goes way more niche than cable ever could. There will be Deepak Chopra's "The Chopra Well," Madonna's "DanceOn," Shaquille O'Neal's "The Comedy Shaq Network," and more. Maker Studios will offer three premium channels—one for Hispanic viewers, another geared to mothers, and a third dedicated to musical content. Dozens of other top partners are involved as well, including Michelle Phan, Phil DeFranco, Ryan Higa, and the Vlogbrothers. Also, YouTube plans to enlist more partners as curators of a different kind: They'll put together playlists of videos they like, send their vast audiences to check them out, and get paid for the resulting views. "If I have 10 channels on YouTube that reflect niches I'm passionate about," Rajaraman says, "and they're constantly updated and increasingly curated by people I trust, then I know I'm not going to waste time. Every curator will be a new television channel in a living room."
It's a truly peer-to-peer vision for TV, a future in which individual creators cultivate their own audience and are compensated for it. Many partners actually feel a bit spooked by their outrageously good fortune, wondering whether YouTube is a bubble that might burst. A year or two or three ago they were posting videos for fun, just fooling around on the computer, and now Google is sending them checks that cover the grocery bills, the rent, and in some cases much more. So they build out their brands, ensuring that their real capital, their fans, will still be able to find them elsewhere if the site somehow falls apart. "YouTube provides a service," Brandon Laatsch says. "That service is the uploading and distributing of video, and for a select few the monetization of it. Any one site might go away overnight—but the service won't."
More important, what won't go away is this demand for an unmediated connection with performers. YouTube might host Tay Zonday's channels, but there's no question about who the fans are coming to see. In this micro-fragmented entertainment world, it's faces and voices like his—jarringly oddball but ultimately likable and utterly unique—that become brands. At Zonday's house in the Hollywood Hills, he shows me a preview of a video he plans to upload later in the week. It's an original song called "This Is You." As the clip begins, disco lights set up around us start to flash blue, red, and white, activated by the pulsating club beat. "Don't ever let the world forget that this is you," he sings onscreen, dancing jerkily in his shower, then in his bedroom studio, and, finally, atop a nearby bluff overlooking Los Angeles, his arms raised in dominion.
Ben Austen (email@example.com) is a contributing editor at Harper's Magazine. He wrote about caricatures in issue 19.08.Go Back to Top. Skip To: Start of Article.


text:
The online service materialatlas.com is a useful tool to find different materials in the field of architecture and urban planning. The website is the result of thorough interdisciplinary research work, done by practising architects and leading scholars in their respective fields and in collaboration with research institutions.
Anyone who is interested in the diversity of materials and their everyday use will find materialatlas.com a rewarding resource. With large decriptive images it presents diverse materials and background information about their respective origins and provides details concerning their texture, character and technical features (e.g. quality, applications, processing).