Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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Church of England faces clergy calls to divest from ExxonMobil
 The Church of England should “show moral leadership” and immediately sell its investments in the oil giant ExxonMobil, according to a group of bishops and other clergy.

ExxonMobil is accused of misleading the public for decades over the dangers of climate change – the oil company denies the allegations – and has funded climate change denial, making its presence in the church’s £7.9bn investment fund of particular concern, the group argues. Investment funds worth more than $5tn have already committed to divest from fossil fuels.

Archbishop Justin Welby, the leader of the Church of England who worked for a decade in the oil industry before becoming a priest, described climate change as a “moral crisis” on Saturday. “Climate change is pushing us toward disaster,” he wrote in the New York Times. “It is not a distant danger – it is already with us. As we continue to burn fossil fuels, its effects will only grow.”

The latest UN climate change negotiations began in Bonn on Monday and Welby also sent a personal message to Fijian prime minister, Frank Bainimarama, who is overseeing the talks. Welby said the 85 million people in the worldwide Anglican communion that he leads “support your work to ensure that issues of climate change are recognised as an urgent priority requiring immediate attention”.

However, the Church of England argues it should remain an ExxonMobil shareholder so it can continue to engage with the company and influence it to change.

In a letter to the Guardian, also sent to the church, a group of five bishops and dozens of clergy said: “While many of us believe that the Church of England should divest from all fossil fuel companies for ethical reasons, we are especially concerned about the Church’s continued investment in US oil and gas company ExxonMobil.”

They cite a recent journal paper analysing ExxonMobil’s activities from 1977-2014 that concludes: “ExxonMobil contributed to advancing climate science – by way of its scientists’ academic publications – but promoted doubt about it in advertorials. Given this discrepancy, we conclude that ExxonMobil misled the public.” The company is facing legal action in the US over the issue. The company’s directors have also advised shareholders to vote against all resolutions on climate change since 1990, the letter’s authors said.

“The Church of England is uniquely placed to show moral leadership through its investment policies,” says the letter. “Now is the time for decisive action. We call on Church of England investors to take the lead and immediately divest from ExxonMobil.”

Bishop Michael Doe, one of the letter’s signatories, said: “By divesting from Exxon, the Church of England would send a hugely positive signal at a time when a rapid shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy is urgently required.”

The Church of England divested in 2015 from companies involved in the extraction of coal and tar sands, the most polluting fossil fuels, but continues to hold significant oil and gas investments.

“Clearly we share concerns about ExxonMobil,” said a spokesman for the Church of England. “We firmly believe however that active investors have a role to play and strategic corporate engagement is too powerful a tool to be rendered ineffective by divesting. We remain in private engagement with the company.”

The spokesman said concerns raised by the church and others led to the successful passing of a resolution at ExxonMobil’s 2017 annual general meeting that requests disclosure of its analyses of how global warming will affect the company from 2018.

The church also launched a new policy on investing in extractive industries on Monday. It acknowledges the industries can make a positive contribution to development but also highlights that “extractives companies are particularly vulnerable to poor governance and ethical controversy, and harmful, long-lasting impacts on communities and the environment”.

The Bishop of Manchester, David Walker, acting chair of the church’s Ethical Investment Advisory Group said: “Strong returns to support our beneficiaries can go hand in hand with robust and transparent ethical investment policies.” The new policy says: “As a last resort, and on a case by case basis, the [church] may disinvest from companies where engagement is rebuffed or is clearly not leading to progress.”

Output: The Church of England should demonstrate “moral leadership” by divesting from ExxonMobil, according to a letter from a collection of bishops and other clergy published in The Guardian. The group argues accusations that ExxonMobil misled the public and funded climate change denial make its presence in the church’s £7.9bn ($10.4bn) investment fund inappropriate. A spokesman for the Church argued that it should remain a shareholder in order to exert influence on the company. On Monday, the church also launched new guidelines on investment in extractive industries, highlighting the potential harm such industries can cause to communities and the environment.


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Securities Commission Malaysia reviews rules on cryptocurrencies
 KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 6): Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) said it is working closely with Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) in coming out with a framework on cryptocurrency, and expects to launch it in the next few months.

SC chairman Tan Sri Ranjit Ajit Singh said the commission is also involved in discussions at the International Organisation of Securities Commissions with regards to this matter.

Different positions have been taken by different regulators around the world, but SC wants to ensure recent developments in its global network are weighed properly, Ranjit told reporters at the sidelines of Synergistic Collaborations by SC (SCxSC) Digital Finance Conference 2017.

“We note the growing interest of Malaysian investors in trading cryptocurrencies and digital assets. To facilitate such activities in our market and put in place investor safeguards, we are reviewing relevant regulations and guidelines to allow functional and effective use cases of digital assets in the capital market, including the seconding market trading of established cryptocurrency and digital assets,” he said.

Ranjit said SC will have the appropriate cryptocurrency posture and framework that would allow some qualified cryptocurrency exchanges.

“Together with BNM, we will look at the area carefully and as SC is in charge of the secondary market, we would craft regulations to ensure that the trading values have the right conditions in place for market integrity and investor projection purposes,” Ranjit said.

There are several operating exchanges that have come to talk with SC, and once the framework is on, it would be in a position of seeing which exchanges are registered, he added.

Meanwhile, Ranjit said through its Alliance for FinTech (aFINity) programme launched in 2015, SC has included innovation labs to test new digital innovations in the industry.

The programme has started a pilot project to explore the use of distributed ledger technology (DLT) or blockchain technology in the unlisted and over-the-counter (OTC) market space, he added.

“The findings from the pilot would be published as an industry blueprint that would elaborate the technology architecture, key software functions, and development standards in the capital market segment.

“This would form the building blocks for interested parties to create a DLT-based network for unlisted and OTC markets,” Ranjit added.

The aFINity programme, set up to build the local digital finance ecosystem, has over 100 industry participants.

Output: Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) has said it is "reviewing relevant regulations and guidelines" relating to cryptocurrencies as it works on a framework alongside the Bank Negara Malaysia. SC chairman Tan Sri Ranjit Ajit Singh said the two organisations were studying the "functional and effective use cases of digital assets in the capital market, including the secondary market trading of established cryptocurrency and digital assets". He added the Alliance for FinTech programme had begun a pilot project to provide an industry blueprint for a blockchain-based network.


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Universities team up to promote blockchain in southern California
 The Los Angeles Blockchain Lab, a partnership with the UCLA Blockchain Lab and the USC Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and The Internet of Things, is an unprecedented collaborative community on a mission to advance blockchain. The LA Blockchain Lab, a partnership with the UCLA Blockchain Lab, the USC Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and The Internet of Things, is creating a community of blockchain advocates on a mission to increase awareness, advance progress and foster the development of blockchain technology. Members agree to increase civic engagement among all citizens; advance technological progress; link classrooms to burgeoning careers; and foster economic opportunities across Southern California. The Lab’s strength comes itself from associated forms of vigorous difference or diversity: they are intellectual, cultural, and economic––to name but three.

Each project allows for overlapping potentials and include:

Non-profit initiatives for improved social welfare

Training for cutting-edge developers, engineers, and designers for ethical innovation

SoCal companies ready to employ blockchain technology for greater social impact

Los Angeles universities and their students for superior career opportunities

Local governments to reshape public policy

Events hosted by the Lab are intended to educate the community in blockchain, elevate the blockchain ecosystem, and provide a place to innovate applications in blockchain. Lab events include:

Certificate Program — the 1st university-accredited blockchain certificate programs in software development and management for matriculated and non-matriculated students

— the 1st university-accredited blockchain certificate programs in software development and management for matriculated and non-matriculated students MeetUps — educating the community through case-specific discussions led by expert leaders from academia, businesses, startups, government, and nonprofits

— educating the community through case-specific discussions led by expert leaders from academia, businesses, startups, government, and nonprofits Verticals — positioning LA as a blockchain hub and promoting partnerships, profit acceleration, job placement in four verticals: Entertainment, Real Estate, FinTech/Investments, and BioMedical Industry

— positioning LA as a blockchain hub and promoting partnerships, profit acceleration, job placement in four verticals: Entertainment, Real Estate, FinTech/Investments, and BioMedical Industry Bootcamps, Conferences, and Seminars — providing hands-on education and training for CEOs, CTOs, CIOs, university deans, asset managers, high-ranking civic officials, VC investors, etc. taught by world-class thought leaders

— providing hands-on education and training for CEOs, CTOs, CIOs, university deans, asset managers, high-ranking civic officials, VC investors, etc. taught by world-class thought leaders Hackathons — bringing attention to greater social impact issues and how blockchain could address issues including “Ocean Conservation,” “Real News,” and “Depression”

— bringing attention to greater social impact issues and how blockchain could address issues including “Ocean Conservation,” “Real News,” and “Depression” Speaker Series — taking the education to companies, organizations, and investment firms through case specifically designed set of presentations

In addition, the Lab promotes community and economic development through job placement and networking opportunities. In collaboration with member partners, it offers blockchain training for high school students with a specific focus on low-income neighborhoods. Through UCLA Extension, the Lab will provide blockchain certification programs for deprived women throughout the Developing World.

The Board of Directors and Member Organizations include thought leaders from universities, local government, enterprise, nonprofits, startups, investors, and the community at large. A few institutions that have joined the Lab thus far include, but are not limited to UCLA, USC, World Economic Forum, DApperNetwork, BNY Mellon, Deloitte, E&Y, Bloq, Charles River Ventures, Chamber of Digital Commerce, Global Business Blockchain Consortium, World Bank, etc. A place to incubate the concepts innovated at the Lab and set to launch in early 2018, the LA Blockchain Accelerator in partnership with the UCLA and US Venture Funds and local Venture Capital firms provides hands-on mentorship, skills development, and partnership opportunities to propel startups from ideation to success.

Output: Universities in southern California have formed the Los Angeles Blockchain Lab to promote distributed ledger technology in the region. The partnership of the UCLA Blockchain Lab, the USC Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and The Internet of Things aims to "increase awareness, advance progress and foster the development" of blockchains. As well as offering training initiatives, hackathons and seminars, the Lab also plans to launch an incubator next year.


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Retailers shift focus to relevant placing for Christmas campaigns
 The right views on YouTube rather than the most views will be on the Christmas lists for many retail advertisers this year.

All eyes will be on the U.K.’s biggest retailers over the next few days as many, including Sainsbury’s, Asda and John Lewis, reveal their seasonal ads. But the specter of the brand-safety crisis casts a long shadow over those campaigns, forcing some retailers to reassess whether cookie-based targeting is good enough to ensure the safety and effectiveness of these ads. Cookie-based targeting ignores the context of YouTube content, which can lead to irrelevant ad placement.

Relevant ad placement has been discussed separately by marketers at Aldi, Marks & Spencer, Sainsbury’s and Tesco following their own audits on the risks associated with misplaced ads on YouTube. All four advertisers questioned how they would buy the most views for their own Christmas ads after discovering that some of the inventory they had bought previously had been placed next to a safe yet irrelevant video, according to three separate industry sources with knowledge of the plans.

Each of the four advertisers either declined to discuss their YouTube plans for the holidays or did not respond before this article was published. However, the industry sources confirmed that while relevance is still second to brand safety, the focus on relevance is growing. “A lot of retailers desperately want to fully return to YouTube [after the brand-safety crisis],” said one of the sources, “but realize they have to be more cautious about how they will buy ads on it if they return.”

That view was backed by the The7stars media agency, which is working with retailers such as Iceland and HMV in the U.K. Advertisers, particularly at Christmas, are increasingly using first- or third-party data to either build their own segments within a data-management platform or build customer match lists, said Chris Gilfoy, the strategy director at The7stars. “Christmas is such a competitive time that advertisers are leaning on their data more to reach the right audiences rather than broadcasting too far and wide,” he said.

Retailer Argos, which pulled spend on YouTube when it discovered its own ads ran against inappropriate content, is paying closer attention to the type of views it buys over the holidays. The retailer unveiled its Christmas campaign last week. Rather than focus on the context of its ad placements, which could force it to pay more to run alongside more relevant videos, Argos is combining its own customer data with YouTube’s to identify the videos most likely to be watched by the audiences it wants to reach this Christmas.

For the long tail of viewers, those who may be suitable for the ad, Argos is buying Google Preferred inventory across YouTube’s most popular channels, said Argos advertising controller Nicki Brown. Essentially, the retailer is using its data to reduce the number of irrelevant videos its Christmas ads appear against before bundling in Google Preferred ads to bulk up the buy with more relevant inventory. Buying ads this way won’t ensure Argos’ ads appear against the relevant content, but it will improve the chances that they are viewed by more of the right people.

That Argos is putting more time and resources into finding quality inventory on YouTube reflects how its view of paid views at Christmastime is changing. A YouTube campaign’s success at Christmas is not as dependent on paid views as it is at other times because more people are searching for ads. Google searches for Christmas ads in the U.K. increased 40 percent year over year last November, with Sainsbury’s, John Lewis and Marks & Spencer at the top of rankings. Brown explained: “Christmas is a time of year where you hope people might come to your [YouTube] page and seek out your ad in an organic fashion, which is rare at other points in the year.”

There is a perception that the success of a video is determined by the amount of views it receives, said Elijah Lawal, a YouTube spokesperson.

But that perception has changed as more advertisers learn how to better balance reach and relevance on YouTube, particularly after many had boycotted it. Whereas before, media agencies felt that content had to be proven as bad before it was taken off advertising schedules, several media executives have noted in recent months that the video site now takes a “bad until proven innocent” approach.

“There is absolutely nothing to say that if a brand creates an innovative, culturally relevant, audience-captivating campaign, it cannot get amazing watch time and a high number of views, too,” Lawal said.

Output: Advertisers are giving priority to getting a more relevant audience for their Christmas YouTube campaigns, rather than just the most views. Large retailers including Aldi, Marks and Spencer, Sainsbury's and Tesco have reviewed their strategy to try to prevent their adverts appearing next to irrelevant videos, while all continue to prioritise brand safety after controversies about ads being placed next to inappropriate content on YouTube. Argos is using its own customer data along with that of YouTube to achieve better targeting and other brands are similarly looking for ways of getting the "right" views.


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ClientEarth sues UK government over pollution for third time
 The UK government is being sued for a third time over the widespread illegal levels of air pollution, which cause 40,000 early deaths every year.

Environmental lawyers ClientEarth have already defeated ministers twice in court, forcing a new pollution plan to be drawn up in July. But ClientEarth believes even the latest strategy does not meet the legal requirement of banishing toxic air in the “shortest possible time”, as EU law requires.

“The UK government’s stubborn failure to tackle illegal and harmful levels of pollution in this country means that we have no choice but to take legal action,” said James Thornton, ClientEarth’s CEO. “We need clarity from the government and for that we’ve been forced to go back to court.”

ClientEarth sent ministers a pre-action legal letter setting out their concerns in October but deemed the government’s response inadequate. They have now applied to the courts for a legal hearing. The government has already spent £370,000 of taxpayers’ money in failed attempts to fight air pollution court action.

Nitrogen dioxide pollution, mostly produced by diesel vehicles, has been illegally high in most urban parts of Britain since 2010. The government’s latest plan was condemned as “woefully inadequate” by city leaders and “inexcusable” by doctors.

Air pollution causes an estimated 23,500 early deaths every year from NO2, rising to 40,000 when other pollutants are considered. In September, the UN’s special rapporteur on pollution said the government was “flouting” its duty to protect the lives and health of its citizens and in October a major pollution report estimated the number of premature deaths in the UK at 50,000 per year.

Oliver Hayes, at Friends of the Earth, said: “It’s shameful that the government has to keep being taken to court to try to force it to protect the health of its citizens.”

ClientEarth believes there are several grounds for judicial review, including backtracking in the latest plan on “clear air zones” in Birmingham, Derby, Leeds, Nottingham and Southampton. These zones, which would use charges to deter polluting vehicles from city centres, were mandatory in previous plans but are now only “expected” to be implemented.

ClientEarth also say it is unacceptable that the plan requires no action in 45 local authorities with illegal levels of air pollution. These include Leicester, Oxford, Liverpool, Cheltenham and Sunderland, with the government arguing toxic air will fall to legal levels without enforced action.

However, Leicester and Oxford city councils have written to ministers saying that the government has seriously underestimated pollution levels and that by requiring no action, they are stopping the councils getting access to funding to cut pollution. Oxford is planning to ban all petrol and diesel vehicles in the future.

Some motoring groups are campaigning against a crackdown on diesel cars, but the latest data shows car buyers are abandoning the technology, with sales down by 30% in October year-on-year. The government’s own analysis shows charging zones to deter dirty cars are by far the most effective policy but ministers have told councils they should only be the option of last resort.

“It’s time ministers came clean about the size of the problem and the difficult decisions needed to solve it,” said Thornton. He said the forthcoming budget should use tax changes to make diesel cars less attractive and that the motor industry should be made to contribute funding.

“The car industry helped get us into this mess so they should be helping get us out of it by contributing to a clean air fund, as they have done in Germany,” Thornton said. The German government recently secured €250m (£220m) from the car industry to help cities reduce pollution.

A spokeswoman for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: “We have put in place a £3bn plan to improve air quality and reduce harmful emissions. We will also end the sale of new diesel and petrol cars by 2040, and next year we will publish a comprehensive Clean Air Strategy which will set out further steps to tackle air pollution.”

The decision to take the government back to court came as four air pollution protesters were jailed for staging a series of direct action demonstrations against toxic air in the capital.

The fouractivists are from the environmental group Stop Killing Londoners, which has been stepping up its campaign calling on the government and the mayor of London to do more to tackle air pollution.

Camberwell magistrates court heard on Tuesday that the group had spray-painted “Cut Air Pollution” on City Hall on Monday night before sitting down and waiting to be arrested for criminal damage.

Roger Hallam, 51, Stuart Basden, 34, Ian Bray, 50, and Genny Scherer, 71, were under strict bail conditions not to go within 50m of the building after they graffitied it earlier this week. The four all deny criminal damage.

In a statement released after the hearing, the group said at least two of those imprisoned would go on hunger strike while being held on remand.

It said Monday’s arrests were the fifth action in the past week by the campaign amid growing anger at the air pollution crisis. They have demanded a meeting with environmental secretary Michael Gove and London mayor Sadiq Khan.

In a statement they added: “Today, the four of us are being sent to prison because we apparently care too much. We care about the 25 people who are killed every day in London by the illegal levels of air pollution. We care about the children who will endure a lifetime of suffering due to shrunken lungs. We care, because each breath we take is harming us, and puts even more strain on the NHS as it struggles to cope with unnecessary cuts.”

The chairwoman of the bench, Finola Gowers, remanded the protesters in custody for seven days and said they faced a possible custodial sentence if convicted.

Output: Environmental lawyers ClientEarth are suing the UK government for a third time over illegal and dangerous air pollution, which causes for 40,000 premature deaths annually. The group has already inflicted two prior legal losses on the government, forcing the introduction of a new pollution plan in July. However, ClientEarth claims that these latest proposals do not meet the requirement of European Union law that toxic air be combated in the “shortest possible time”. The group has also criticised the fact that the proposals do not require action in 45 local authorities with illegal pollution levels.


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Adopting autonomous vehicle earlier could save thousands of lives
 Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Autonomous vehicles should only have to be moderately better than human drivers before being widely used in the United States, an approach that could save thousands of lives annually even before the technology is perfected, according to a new RAND Corporation report.

Allowing wide use of autonomous vehicles when they are just 10 percent better than current American drivers could prevent thousands of road fatalities over the next 15 years and possibly hundreds of thousands of fatalities over 30 years, researchers found, compared to waiting until they are 75 percent or 90 percent better.

Given the many uncertainties about the future of autonomous vehicle performance and use, the calculations were made by estimating road fatalities over time under hundreds of different plausible futures and different safety requirements for autonomous vehicle introduction.

"Our work suggests that it is sensible to allow autonomous vehicles on America's roads when they are judged to be just moderately safer than having a person behind the wheel," said Nidhi Kalra, co-author of the study and director of RAND's San Francisco office. "If we wait until these vehicles are nearly perfect, our research suggests the cost will be many thousands of needless vehicle crash deaths caused by human mistakes. It's the very definition of perfect being the enemy of good."

Developers of autonomous vehicles are testing the cars in cities such as San Francisco and Pittsburgh, while federal lawmakers are considering a variety of new regulations and updates to existing regulations to govern their deployment and encourage their use. But what remains unknown is how good the vehicles have to be before they are made available for use to all consumers.

The allure of driverless cars is based partly on convenience and partly on the potential to eliminate costly human errors, such as driving when drunk, tired or distracted. More than 90 percent of crashes involve such driver-related errors, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Researchers acknowledge that even if autonomous vehicles are proven safer than the average human driver, the vehicles would still cause crashes. They remain vulnerable to other hazards, such as inclement weather, complex traffic situations, and even cyber-attacks.

"This may not be acceptable because society may be less tolerant of mistakes made by machines than of mistakes made by people," said David Groves, study co-author and co-director of RAND's Water and Climate Resilience Center. "But if we can accept that early self-driving cars will make some mistakes—but fewer than human drivers—developers can use early deployment to more rapidly improve self-driving technology, even as their vehicles save lives."

Kalra hopes the study will enable policymakers and the public to better weigh potential risks and benefits of autonomous vehicles. Key considerations include how to measure the safety of the vehicles and what should constitute a passing grade.

The report builds upon past research that found road testing under real traffic conditions is impractical for proving autonomous vehicle safety prior to deployment because it would take decades or longer to drive the requisite miles.

There is no question that traffic accidents pose a public health crisis. Citing figures from the National Safety Council, the report notes that crashes caused more than 35,000 fatalities and 2.4 million injuries in 2015. The council projected 2016 would be deadlier, with 40,200 fatalities.

More information: "The Enemy of the Good: Estimating the Cost of Waiting for Nearly Perfect Autonomous Vehicles," www.rand.org/

Output: Autonomous vehicles should be allowed on the road once they are 10% better than human drivers, and waiting until they are 75% or 90% better would cause needless deaths during the interim, according to the RAND Corporation. About 90% of crashes are caused by driver error, it said.


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Facebook lets businesses directly target people via messenger
 Facebook has said it will open sponsored messages on Messenger to all advertisers ‘in the coming months’, after giving more businesses the ability to send relevant promotions directly to people who they have already communicated with.

Sponsored messages were first introduced to Messenger almost a year ago to the day as part of the launch of Messenger Platform v1.3. Initially, the ad format was only available to a small number of businesses, including Australian airline Qantas and charity-driven US apparel brand Love Your Melon.

“Many businesses use click-to-Messenger ads every day to start conversations with customers; generating leads, driving transactions and offering customer support,” said Facebook in a blog post. “Now we’re making it easier for advertisers to reengage those conversations using sponsored messages.”

Facebook reports that Qantas found Messenger to be its most efficient digital channel for driving traffic during its spring flight sale. Its five-day campaign saw its sponsored messages have a 4.5 times higher click-through rate than its Facebook link ads.

Meanwhile, Love Your Melon use sponsored messages to promote a new line of hats with previous customers. It achieved 14 times return on ad spend from the campaign.

Join us at the 2017 Effective Mobile Marketing Awards Ceremony, taking place in London on Thursday 16 November, to mix with the industry's best and brightest, and raise a glass to the year's best campaigns and solutions. To find out more, and to book your place, click here.

Output: Facebook is opening up its sponsored messages feature to all advertisers, following positive results from early testers Qantas and Love Your Melon, according to a blog post by the social media giant. Qantas, an Australian airline, said a five-day campaign on sponsored messages resulted in a click-through rate that was 4.5 times better than its Facebook link ads. In addition, US brand Love Your Melon reported an increase of 14 times return on ad spend. Facebook said the feature would be expanded in the coming months.


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Cars Insider reaches 45 million monthly video views on Facebook
 Cars and the auto industry is the latest vertical that Business Insider is looking to grow significantly off the back of Facebook.

Launched on July 31, the Cars Insider Facebook page, which has 490,000 followers, received 38 million video views in September, according to Tubular Labs. Ashley Lutz, deputy business editor for Business Insider, said Cars Insider content reaches 45 million people per month on Facebook. (Tubular Labs does not have Facebook video viewership data for October yet.)

“We had all these great videos of cars and so forth, and we thought our audience would enjoy having all of this in one place,” said Lutz. “So we created the page, and overnight we had 20,000 followers.”

Today, Business Insider produces as much as a dozen pieces of daily content — mostly short videos designed for Facebook, though the number of videos Cars Insider puts out on a daily basis varies based on the news cycle, Lutz said. A dedicated 10-person team, which includes video producers, editors, photographers and social media experts, oversees the content. Business Insider’s 10-person transportation team, which includes editors and reporters with a long background in covering the auto and transportation industries, also supports Cars Insider’s output.

Most of the videos for Car Insider are quick, Facebook-friendly profiles of different types of vehicles. Some of the videos are explanatory and designed for a potential car buyer — such as a breakdown of features on a new electric car from Nissan — while others are more aspirational, covering vehicle prototypes and other expensive cars that most people have no intention of buying. Basically, Cars Insider is designed to be all things auto, from the practical to the aspirational, Lutz said.

“We’re not just showing the super cars that no one will get their hands on,” Lutz said. “We’re also showing cars that are also within your reach, even if some might take a few years and a promotion at work to afford.”

Lutz said Business Insider’s content team produces a majority of Cars Insider videos in-house. The publisher invites automakers to bring their cars — such as the Ferrari GTC4 Lusso — to an area nearby its offices in New York City so Cars Insider content producers can make quick social video profiles or longer Facebook Live breakdowns.

Cars Insider hasn’t monetized its growing Facebook reach yet; monetization is a “work in progress,” according to Lutz. The company has previously said it’s finding revenue opportunities through sponsored content, which Cars Insider will look to do by utilizing its existing relationships with different automakers and personalities.

For the immediate future, the focus is on continuing to use Facebook to grow Cars Insider, a strategy that Business Insider’s distributed-media brand, Insider, has used for every niche topic from art to cheese.

“Social is our front page,” Lutz said. “We’re very committed to [BusinessInsider.com], but we also want to get people to come to us on social, which is why we’ve created a lot of sub-verticals [on Facebook].”

Image via Business Insider

Output: US news website Business Insider has revealed its Car Insider Facebook page reaches an audience of 45 million people per month, an assertion partially backed by analytics firm Tubular Labs, which said the site gained 38 million video views in September. The page, which launched on 31 July, has yet to generate revenue, and Ashley Lutz, deputy business editor for Business Insider, said the company was looking at monetisation opportunities from sponsored content and existing relationships with partners.


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Facebook enabling peer-to-peer transfers in coming weeks
 Facebook is leveraging its scale to muscle in on the banking sector by enabling peer-to-peer payments in the UK for the first time.

Facebook flexes financial muscles with new payments service

Users of its Messenger app will be able to transfer cash directly from their phones or computers over the coming weeks after first linking their account to a debit card, enabling fee-free payments of £2,500 to be made.

Output: Facebook is entering the world of peer-to-peer payments in the UK for the first time in the company's history, allowing users of its Messenger app to transfer up to £2,500 with zero fees. To prevent fraud, Facebook has set a limit of £10,000 of transfers every 30 days, though data from the US suggests most users transfer £38 or less.


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YouTube struggles to stop troubling videos from reaching children
 YouTube is under fire for allowing troubling videos to get past its filters on an app designed specifically for younger viewers, according to a report this weekend by The New York Times.

The Google -owned website is the largest video site in the world, with more than a billion people visiting a month. The affected service, YouTube Kids, was launched in 2015 to be a family-friendly version of the site.

But the kids service reportedly has a dark side. One video showed Mickey Mouse in a pool of blood while Minnie looks on in horror. In another video, a claymation version of Spider-Man urinates on Elsa, the princess from "Frozen." The videos were knockoffs depicting the beloved Disney and Marvel characters.

Representatives from The Walt Disney Company, which owns Marvel, didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

YouTube called the content "unacceptable," but said it isn't rampant. In the last 30 days, less than .005 percent of videos viewed in the app were removed for being inappropriate, the company said. YouTube is trying to reduce that number.

"The YouTube Kids team is made up of parents who care deeply about this, so it's extremely important for us to get this right, and we act quickly when videos are brought to our attention," a YouTube spokeswoman said in a statement. "We use a combination of machine learning, algorithms and community flagging to determine content in the app as well as which content runs ads. We agree this content is unacceptable and are committed to making the app better every day."

The videos made it onto YouTube Kids by getting past safety filters, either by mistake or by trolls gaming the software.

The controversy comes as tech giants find themselves under intense scrutiny from Congress over the power and influence they have over what billions of people see online. Google, Facebook and Twitter spent last week in marathon Senate and House hearings over the way Russian trolls abused their platforms to meddle in last year's US presidential election. Lawmakers grilled the tech companies over accountability for the algorithms they used.

This isn't the first time YouTube has faced a backlash for unsavory content. Earlier this year, advertisers boycotted YouTube after their ads appeared next to extremist and hate content because of YouTube's automated advertising technology. Major brands including AT&T and Johnson & Johnson ditched advertising on the platform.

As for the issues with YouTube Kids, the company said parents can use additional controls to limit what their kids see. The controls allow for blocking specific videos or channels and turning off search. YouTube said the app was never meant to be a curated experience, and that parents flagging inappropriate videos would make the app better over time.

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Output: YouTube is failing to prevent inappropriate content appearing on its dedicated children's service, according to an investigation by the New York Times. The video platform launched its "YouTube Kids" service in 2015, with videos appearing on the service supposedly filtered for their content. However, a number of "troubling" videos, showing cartoon characters in violent or crude situations, have been found on the site. The company agreed that the videos were "unacceptable", saying that it relies on machine learning, algorithms and user reports to police the service's content.


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Netflix adds more debt as profitability remains distant prospect
 Netflix is again going deeper into hock.

In the streaming service’s latest move to cover its massive global content costs, Netflix this week closed $1.4 billion in new debt financing, adding to its $3.37 billion in existing long-term obligations. It’s the third time in a little more than two years that Netflix has raised more than $1 billion in debt financing.

But the company’s mounting debt and content-payment obligations have raised a new question on Wall Street: When will Netflix take its foot off the gas pedal?

“You can’t spend like this on programming forever,” said Michael Nathanson, principal at MoffettNathanson, who expects Netflix to shell out $8 billion in cash for content in 2017. “When do they feel they’ve built the perfect scale and can slow it down?”

The company has reassured investors that it isn’t excessively leveraged, noting in its first-quarter letter to shareholders that it has a debt-to-market-cap ratio of less than 10%, far smaller than that of industry peers.

But that doesn’t account for Netflix’s content obligations — the billions in payments for programming over a period of several years. That figure stood at $15.3 billion at the end of the first quarter, more than double that of the same quarter three years earlier. A whopping $8.4 billion of that $15.3 billion isn’t reflected on Netflix’s balance sheet.

Netflix is betting subscriber growth will keep pace with its growing debt load and content commitments. * Excludes $1.4 billion in new debt expected to close May 2 ** Bulk of payments due within three years

Sources: Company reports, SEC filings

To finance the latest debt offering, a Netflix representative said the company is targeting non-U.S. lenders because European interest rates are attractive. Moreover, the rep said, “Netflix is a global company, and we want to have access to global capital markets.”

The company’s hypothesis: It needs to spend big now to keep the customer-growth engine humming before it can reach cruising speed and live within its means. So far, execs have sold that story to the investment community, and nobody on Wall Street is worried that Netflix is becoming over-leveraged. “The market is surprisingly comfortable with Netflix’s balance sheet,” Nathanson said.

With access to cheap credit, and investors not expecting big profit margins, Netflix has an advantage over traditional media companies that need to worry about the bottom line. To Nathanson, Netflix’s current investment mode is akin to the U.S. cable sector’s heavy capex spending two decades ago when operators built out fiber-optic networks to set the stage for growth.

Netflix shareholders are fans of the debt-fueled strategy for one key reason: “The correlation between content spending and subscriber growth is strong,” said CFRA Research senior analyst Tuna Amobi.

To be sure, Netflix’s long-term debt has not been a huge drag on earnings, as it continues to grow the top line. The company reported $46.7 million in interest expense for the first quarter of 2017, on revenue of $2.67 billion (up 35% year over year). But in addition to the content itself, Netflix will have to promote it, which the company expects will gobble up more than $1 billion.

It all makes sense if Netflix successfully signs up millions more users (and keeps them). If subscriber levels start to taper off, though, in a worst-case scenario Netflix would be forced to raise prices again.

While that would obviously stifle subscriber growth, hiking rates by $1 per month would generate an incremental $1.2 billion in cash per year, giving the company enough money to cover content obligations and pay down debt over a few years, said Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter. The analyst (who has a “sell” rating on the stock) doesn’t see extreme risk in Netflix’s model per se. The danger, he said, is that the pricey content won’t resonate with customers.

“I think they’re spending way too much,” he said, “and have way too little to show for it.”

Output: Netflix has sold $1.4bn of debt, adding to its $3.37bn of outstanding obligations, as the company continues to invest in content across the globe. Netflix recently told investors that its debt-to-market capitalisation ratio of 10% is lower than most industry peers. However, it had $15.3bn of content obligations at the end of the first quarter, double a year earlier. About $8.4bn of that isn't reflected on Netflix's balance sheet. “You can’t spend like this on programming forever,” said Michael Nathanson, principal at MoffettNathanson. "When do they feel they’ve built the perfect scale and can slow it down?”


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Salesforce teams with Google to connect marketing, analytics data
 Technology vendors strike new alliance that will see integration between Salesforce Marketing Cloud and GSuite, Google Analytics 260

Salesforce and Google have teamed up under a new strategic partnership that will see the pair bring together marketing, sales and advertising data from the CRM vendor’s platforms with Google Analytics 360 for real-time interaction.

The extended alliance, announced at the Dreamforce conference, focuses on four key areas, all designed to more deeply integrate and develop the two technology offerings. The first is expansion of the GSuite and Salesforce partnership to provide deeper integrations between the two product sets.

These include the already available integration of Salesforce Lightning and Gmail to surface relevant CRM data in Gmail and vice versa; plus the ability to surface customer and account details, service case history and other CRM insights into the Hangouts meet interface during real-time interactions.

Secondly, a fresh alliance with the Google Analytics team will see data from the Salesforce Marketing Cloud and Sales Cloud seamlessly connected to Google Analytics 360 for the first time. The intention is to give users more extensive consumer insights that can also then be leveraged through Google’s ad platforms.

As an example, the companies said marketers will be able to create customised audiences in Analytics 360 then push them into Marketing Cloud to orchestrate activities across digital channels. Analytics 360 data will also be now available directly through the Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

“We’re taking the number one marketing analytics platform and marrying it with number one marketing engagement platform,” Salesforce CEO of Marketing Cloud and chief analytics officer, Bob Stutz, said in a press conference. “That benefits both customers and consumers today.”

The deal represents the first time Google has directly integrated with a marketing platform provider, Stutz said.

“Today for customers to take a segment from analytics and put it into the Marketing Cloud is a little tough. This integration will make it seamless to bring those audiences into our platform,” he said.

Google VP display, video and analytics, Paul Muret, said advertisers and marketers have different lenses to sales and other internal teams, but all want and need those insights to be based on a common data foundation.

“Seamlessly flowing data across those systems is super important,” he said. “We‘re blending anonymous and known data together and data will flow back and forth.”

In response to how the Krux data management platform (DMP) could fit in this scenario, Stutz noted a DMP is just one data set in multiple sources constantly now being used to engage customers.

“There’s no one database, there are multiple databases that reside out in cloud infrastructure,” he explained. “It’s bringing data together in real-time way – whether it’s analytics, DMP, Marketing Cloud, or insights feeding into Google Analytics. It’s about all that data flowing in real time to give customers the right offers at the right time.”

The third element of the partnership is to use Google Cloud a preferred public cloud provider for Salesforce. This decision will see the latter using Google’s cloud platform for core services as it further extends internationally. These new regions have not yet been named, but a spokesperson confirmed the relationship doesn’t change Salesforce’s current relationship with rival cloud provider, Amazon Web Services, who is also a preferred partner for regions such as Australia.

The fourth pillar and final pillar is Google standardising on the Salesforce CRM platform.

To mark the deal, Google will offer Salesforce customers not currently using its productivity tools a free licence for the first year.

Speaking at the keynote opening, Google SVP of cloud, Diane Greene, said technology is such an amazing industry to be in and the game-changing opportunities just keep emerging.

"We’re able to bring so much to the world through all our technologies," she said. "Cloud is such an incredible revolution, allowing companies to seamlessly partner together. The more we work together, the more easy, seamless and powerful things become for our customers."

Salesforce chairman and CEO, Marc Benioff, said the partnership with Google represents the best of both worlds for respective customers.

“There has never been an easier way for companies to run their entire business in the cloud – from productivity apps, email and analytics, to sales, service and marketing apps," he said. "This partnership will help make our customers smarter and more productive.”

Output: Salesforce, the customer relationship management (CRM) software company, is partnering with Google to integrate the two firms' technological offerings. The deal includes the first-ever connection of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud and Sales Cloud to Google Analytics 360, while Salesforce will use Google’s cloud platform for core services as part of its international expansion, in addition to the firm's CRM platform being standardised by Google. A spokesperson confirmed the partnership does not affect Salesforce's existing agreement with cloud provider Amazon Web Services.


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AppNexus unveils 'programmable' demand-side platform
 AppNexus is adding machine learning to its ad-buying software, making the company the newest in a series of ad-tech firms to add artificial intelligence to its platform.

Today, the company is debuting what it says is the first programmable demand side platform, which could help media buyers manage and customize their campaigns. The AppNexus Programmable Platform (APP)—which launches after three years of research involving more than 200 buy-side engineers, data scientists and developers—will be ready for 2018 campaigns.

So

Output: After three years of research, AppNexus has unveiled what it has called the world's first programmable demand-side platform. The AppNexus Programmable Platform (APP) features machine learning capability, with beta testers including Xasis, OMD and WPP-owned Greenhouse Group. The latter firm said APP, set to be ready for 2019 campaigns, demonstrated a 73% reduction in trade times alongside a 13% improvement in performance. Rocket Fuel and IBM have both also launched artificial intelligence-powered advertising platforms.


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Education Department taps Benetech to build digital library
 BENETECH, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based nonprofit that “build[s] software for social good,” according to its website, has received a five-year, $42.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education. That check will go to support Bookshare, an online library of digital books that are accessible to learners with print reading disabilities such as dyslexia and blindness. More than 500,000 students currently use Bookshare, claims the nonprofit, in districts including Los Angeles Unified School District.

This is ED’s third grant to Bookshare, and the funding helps keep the digital library free for U.S. students, educators and school districts. (Others can pay $50 a year or $6 to $10 per digital book.) Benetech aims to use the funding to reach another 200,000 students.

TechCrunch has an exhaustive look at Benetech founder Jim Fruchterman and the origins of Bookshare in a four-thousand word profile.

Output: California-based non-profit Benetech has received its third grant from the US Department of Education. The $42.5m grant will be used to support Benetech's Bookshare initiative, which brings digital versions of texts to disabled readers and is free to students, teachers and school districts. Benetech said that more than 500,000 readers currently use the service, and aims to increase its reach by 200,000 with the funds.


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EU and California to partner on emissions trading and transport
 Building on concrete efforts by both California and the EU to implement carbon markets and zero-carbon transportation policies, and in light of the global momentum generated by the Paris Agreement, European Commissioner for Climate Action and Energy Miguel Arias Cañete and Governor of California Jerry Brown met today in Brussels and agreed to step up cooperation on emissions trading and zero-carbon transportation.

On carbon markets, the EU and California will hold regular political and technical dialogues on the design and implementation of their carbon markets, including cooperation with other carbon markets such as China. Hosted by China's Special Representative on Climate Change Affairs, Commissioner Arias Cañete and Governor Brown will open a high-level event on carbon markets and the role of carbon pricing in China on 14 November at COP 23 in Bonn.

The EU and California will also work together to scale zero-carbon transportation solutions globally, including by bringing new commitments and new partners to the Global Climate Action Summit which California will host 12-14 September 2018.

The Global Climate Action Summit will bring together leaders from all around the world and in every walk of life – from government to business, from science to faith, and from students to investors to non-profit leaders – who believe that climate change is an existential threat and are committed to rolling back the forces of carbonisation. The Summit will emphasise how subnational actors have already contributed to emissions reductions, spur bold new commitments, and galvanise a global movement for everyone to do more.

Following today's meeting, EU Climate Action and Energy Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete said: "The EU and California are natural partners in the fight against climate change and have been pioneers in the early years of carbon markets and clean mobility. Today we agreed to strengthen our cooperation so that we remain leaders in these areas – both of which will be key for achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement."

"We are truly facing a challenge unprecedented in human history," said Governor Brown. "If we come together and we see the truth of our situation, we can overcome it. We've fought great battles before and I hope that the European Union and California will be able to inspire the rest of the world."

The European Union is the largest carbon market in the world, with its emissions trading system a key part of the EU's policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while California also has a well-established carbon market, that is linked with markets in Quebec and Ontario.

The EU's low-emission mobility strategy for the transport sector is also a key element of the bloc's climate policy, with a major new proposal on CO 2 emission standards for cars and vans to be considered by the Commission tomorrow. California introduced its first regulation to accelerate the uptake of zero-emissions vehicles in 1990 and its current standards have been adopted by nine other US States. The state also has a goal to put more than 1.5 million zero-emission vehicles on its roads by 2025.

California climate policies and programmes have cut carbon emissions, helped create clean technology jobs and spurred partnerships across the United States and around the world to fight climate change.

The state has created more than 2.6 million new jobs since 2010, and the unemployment rate has declined by more than half. Climate leadership in both the public and private sectors has played a key role in the state’s economic growth, with the state now home to more than 500,000 advanced-energy jobs. In 2015, at the end of a ten-year period in which state per capita carbon emissions fell by 12 percent, the sector created jobs at six times the rate of the overall state economy, showing that economic growth and climate ambition go hand-in-hand.

Output: The European Commission and the US state of California have announced that they will cooperate on emissions trading and zero-carbon transportation. European Commissioner for Climate Action and Energy Miguel Arias Cañete, and California Governor Jerry Brown, met in Brussels. The pair will open a high-level meeting on carbon markets and carbon pricing in China at COP 23 in Bonn next week. Representatives from the Commission and California will also hold regular meetings on the design of their own carbon markets and on cooperation with other markets, including that in China.


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World must end debt-fuelled growth model: BIS
 The organization commonly known as the central bank of central banks has called for an end of boom-and-bust cycles that have plagued the global economy, urging lawmakers quickly to adjust current policy. "The global economy cannot afford to rely any longer on the debt-fueled growth model that has brought it to the current juncture." the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) warns in a new annual report published on Sunday.

Debt levels are too high, productivity growth is too low, and the room for policy maneuver is too narrow, the BIS warned. Adding that the most "conspicuous" sign of this predicament is interest rates that continue to be persistently and exceptionally low.

$8 trillion with negative yield

Image Source | Getty Images

Central banks around the world have leapt into action following the global financial crisis of 2008 and the sovereign debt crisis in the euro zone. Several institutions have introduced bond-buying programs and cut benchmark rates in an effort to stimulate lending. Some have even pushed rates below zero with a negative rate effectively charging banks who park cash at a central bank. The European Central Bank (ECB), the Danish National Bank (DNB), the Swedish Riksbank, and the Swiss National Bank (SNB) have all pushed key short-term policy rates into negative territory. This has suppressed bond yields in wider asset markets with BIS estimating that a record of close to $8 trillion in sovereign debt was trading at negative yields at the end of May.

Nonetheless, the Basel-based BIS - which was one of the few organizations to foresee the 2008 crash - says that this monetary policy has been "overburdened for far too long."

"Prudential, fiscal and, above all, structural policies must come to the fore," it said in the report Wednesday, adding that it's essential to avoid the temptation to succumb to "quick fixes or shortcuts."

"The measures must retain a firm long-run orientation. We need policies that we will not once again regret when the future becomes today," it added.

Upbeat on growth?

Output: The world needs to reduce its reliance on debt-driven growth if it is to end the boom and bust cycles that have characterised the global economy, according to the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). Debt levels are too high, productivity growth is too low, and the room for policy manoeuvre is too narrow, the BIS said. The most conspicuous sign of this predicament is interest rates that continue to be persistently and exceptionally low, it said.


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Pollution causes public health emergency in Delhi
 A public health emergency has been declared by doctors in Delhi as air quality in the world’s most polluted capital city plunged to levels likened to smoking at least 50 cigarettes in a single day.

Slow winds and colder temperatures have been blamed for a surge in airborne pollutants beyond what instruments in the city could measure with some recording an Air Quality Index (AQI) maximum of 999.

The Indian Medical Association said the country’s capital was suffering a health emergency and called for an upcoming half-marathon to be cancelled to avoid “disastrous health consequences”.

Residents were warned to avoid leaving their homes as smog enveloped streets and landmarks on Tuesday, sparking road, rail and airport delays and renewed calls for Indian state and federal governments to act.

The Delhi chief minister, Arvind Kejriwal, said the city was a “gas chamber” as his government met on Tuesday afternoon to consider a response to the crisis. Primary schools, already asked to keep students indoors, will be shut on Wednesday and possibly longer if the poor conditions persist.

Belgium’s King Philippe inspects a military guard of honour at the Indian presidential palace in Delhi on Tuesday. Photograph: Manish Swarup/AP

Most dangerous to health are concentrations of fine pollutants smaller than 2.5 micro-metres – tiny enough to evade the body’s natural filters and permeate the blood-brain barrier.

Tests by Greenpeace have shown these fine pollutants – called PM2.5 – can include carcinogenic chemicals such as lead, arsenic, cadmium and mercury. Levels of PM2.5 in Delhi on Tuesday reached 710 micrograms per cubic metre, more than 11 times the World Health Organisation’s safe limit.

“It has terrible effects on every part of your body,” said Dr Arvind Kumar, the chest surgery chairman at Sir Ganga Ram hospital, who compared the 999 AQI level recorded in the RK Puram area to smoking 50 cigarettes in a day. “ICUs are full of pneumonia patients. Lots of my patients are coming with coughs today. They are breathless.

“It can precipitate an acute asthma attack and in the long run it will increase their risk of lung cancer,” he said.

00:31 Delhi smog declared public health emergency – video

Those who work outside – such as the city’s fleet of rickshaw pullers – are hardest hit. Vikas Yadav, an immigrant from Bihar state, said he used to welcome the colder months when the threat from disease-carrying mosquitoes subsides.

Now, “my eyes get a burning sensation”, he said. “I fell sick last year. I don’t know whether it was from the air but I felt breathless and my eyes were itching. Doctors told me not to work early morning during winters.”

The smog was unsparing of Delhi’s wealthier set and its community of expatriate workers, many of whom gathered on Tuesday morning on the lawns of the Australian high commission for an annual champagne breakfast to celebrate the Melbourne Cup horse race.

“It was like being in Europe in the middle of winter on a misty morning,” said one reveller, Elizabeth Pennell, a lawyer for an international fund. “It would have been romantic had the mist not been PM2.5.”

The crowd paired their race-day dresses and suits with pollution masks but Pennell said the foul air failed to dampen the mood. “You tuck up your children inside where the air is purified and for these few hours you risk your health to let your hair down,” she said.

“And then you can go back and lock yourself inside your apartment and breathe clean air – unlike most Indians.”

Delhi’s air quality is extremely poor for most of the year due to road dust, open fires, vehicle exhaust fumes, industrial emissions and the burning of crop residues in neighbouring states.

But conditions worsen in winter months when slow winds and cool temperatures trap pollutants closer to the ground.

As awareness of the problem in Delhi has grown, various methods have been tried to clear the atmosphere including shutting down a local coal-fired power station, traffic rationing and banning firecrackers during Diwali, the annual Hindu festival.

But any lasting solution would need to simultaneously tackle the myriad sources of pollution and involve dozens of state and municipal governments in a country where law enforcement is notoriously patchy.

Though Delhi gets most attention, toxic air afflicts the entire north Indian plain, including parts of Pakistan. A study last year found the holy city of Varanasi had among the worst air in the country.

Airtel, the leading sponsor of the upcoming Delhi half-marathon, urged the city government to ensure the safety of runners, indicating that it may pull out of the event next year.

“Air pollution poses serious health risks and it is important that these concerns are addressed urgently and appropriately by the authorities for Airtel to continue associating with the event next year and beyond,” it said in a statement.

Labourers work on a Delhi construction site. Photograph: Dominique Faget/AFP/Getty Images

Research published in the Lancet last month found about 2.5 million Indians die each year from pollution, the highest number in the world.

Unprecedented levels of pollution this time last year forced schools to shut as authorities scrambled to contain the crisis.

The World Health Organisation in 2014 classed Delhi as the world’s most polluted capital, with air quality levels worse than Beijing. A 2015 study showed about half the Indian capital’s 4.4 million schoolchildren had compromised lung capacity and would never totally recover.

Output: Doctors in the Indian capital of Delhi have declared a public health emergency as air quality deteriorated to levels equivalent to smoking 50 cigarettes a day. Cold temperatures and slow winds meant that airborne pollutants in the city, already the world’s most polluted capital, exceeded the measurement capacity of many recording instruments. On Tuesday, levels of fine pollutants known as PM2.5s, which can contain carcinogenic chemicals, reached more than 11 times the safe limit set by the World Health Organisation. Each year, 2.5 million Indians die from pollution.


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Blockchain interoperability identified as the next frontier
 Join top executives in San Francisco on July 11-12, to hear how leaders are integrating and optimizing AI investments for success. Learn More

In the beginning was Bitcoin, the only blockchain we thought we’d need. Then Ethereum came along and launched us into a multi-blockchain world. Since then we’ve seen many new blockchains emerge with their various different protocols, financed by their various different tokens.

One of the the key doctrines of this era was Joel Monegro’s seminal “fat protocols” post, in which he explained that value creation in a protocol world happens in a very different way than in the Internet world. Specifically, in the Internet world, the protocols (think TCP/IP and HTTP) were conduits and not holders of value; it was the applications built on top of them that held the value. In the blockchain world, he argued, it’s the protocols that hold the value.

His post, in some ways, helped provide the fuel and justification for the protocol/ICO excitement we have witnessed over the past 6-8 months.

But the explosion of protocol ICOs (as well as ICOs that claim to be protocols) and the “fat protocols doctrine” have accelerated the timetable for a new layer of innovation for the decentralized economy. This new layer has been on the minds of many in the industry for quite some time, but on the proverbial backburner in terms of broader awareness. That’s now beginning to change.

The layer? Blockchain interoperability.

Fat protocols, thin protocols, and interoperability

Monegro’s core thesis is now coming under scrutiny. Teemu Paivinen argues in his recently posted essay on “Thin Protocols” that “[while] protocols in aggregate will continue to capture most of the value, individual protocols will in fact be quite thin and tend towards capturing minimal value, due to the combined effects of forking and competitive market forces.”

Meanwhile, blockchain blogger Evan van Ness wrote that “there’s no such thing as ‘fat protocols’” — for a few reasons. First off, he writes, Monegro doesn’t clarify what is an app and what is a protocol. Second, he points to examples blockchain platforms like Gnosis and Steem and reasonably asks, are they apps? Protocols? Or both?

Van Ness then refers us to a post by Stephan Tual, a leader within the Ethereum community who now is at Slock.it (and who has as more first-hand experience with decentralized innovation than most, since he was at ground zero of “DAO-gate”). Tual challenges conventional wisdom further by sharing his Web 3.0 Abstracted Stack.

You do not have to be a seasoned blockchain architect to see that these are not, in fact, fat protocols. Rather, they are a series of thin component protocols that work in harmony to deliver decentralized applications.

Paivinen, Tual, and van Ness are far more technical and knowledgeable than I am, but the basic gist as I read it is as follows:

The combination of the speed of innovation within the decentralized world, the ability to fork open source projects at will, and the economic incentive to serve more niches as the overall market opportunity grows is going to lead to an explosion of blockchains.

We are already seeing this occur. Given the strengths of each team and their vision, each blockchain-based protocol is going to do something really, really well, but no one blockchain can do EVERYTHING really well.

Bitcoin has a strong trust layer. Storj, Sia, and FileCoin have created strong storage layers. Replicating those strengths would take a lot of time and become redundant, and there is the well known adage “don’t roll your own crypto,” when it comes to security.

As a blockchain developer, you want to be able to take the best of everything and put it together so you can build the best application possible. That’s why interoperability is critical and why the market for it is starting to heat up.

The multi-blockchain world has created a lot of value and excitement, but moving between them can be challenging. If you own Numeraire currency, for example, and you want to get Bitcoin for it, you have to use a tool like ShapeShift or sell it on an exchange. You can’t just send Numeraire to your Bitcoin address without, at the moment, going through someone else. (Well, you can, sort of through something called cross-chain atomic swaps, but it’s still immature. Still, Decred and Litecoin pulled it off recently).

Another example is identity. Say you want to log into trading platform EtherDelta to trade your tokens. You’ll need a MetaMask extension to verify your identity. But what if you want to use the Civic verifier instead? You can’t. On the other hand, if you want to log into Prism, you need Civic and can’t use MetaMask. You need two “identity wallets.” Frustrating.

In an interoperable world, EtherDelta and Prism would each set up an identity requirement layer that can accept either Civic or MetaMask … or UPort or PeerMountain, or any other that’s created.

As an end user, you can use whatever identity provider you want, and the decentralized app doesn’t have to code for 10 different log-in possibilities. That’s value.

The cross-chain protocols and their approach

We’re seeing the first generation of interoperability players emerge to take on the task of intermediating between chains. Make no mistake about it, we are really early in this phase of development.

While it will take time for this segment to see maturity, what should get you excited is the fact that there are numerous projects out there aggressively making their case for becoming an interoperability standard. All of the innovation happening now may be a bit murky, but the arrival of hardened technology is going to enable public blockchains to work with each other and for private-public blockchain bridges to work better, while affording each organization the flexibility to choose the set of blockchain protocols best suited to its needs.

One of the key players in this cross-chain space, Polkadot, has a roadmap that puts its own genesis block in 2019. In the meantime, it has already raised $140 million to make it possible, so unless the team is out ordering caviar and Dom Perignon every day, they should have enough cash to deliver.

ICON is another big name in this field. The Korea-based group closed a $42 million token sale in just six hours in September.

Other players include Cosmos (which calls itself the “Internet of Blockchains”) and new entrants like Aion, Lamden, Metronome (focused on cross-blockchain currency), and a totally open protocol put forth originally by Ripple called the InterLedger Protocol.

If you want to get really deep on the tech side of cross-chain protocols, check out Jackson Palmer’s great explanatory video. He does a really nice job. Using Polkadot as an example, here’s roughly how they work:

Polkadot has three main components.

A relay chain to coordinate consensus and transactions between separate chains Parachains — these are the constituents (let’s call them the chains that have “bought into” the interoperability solution offered) Bridges, which are links to blockchains, like Ethereum, that have their own consensus mechanism

Such a system requires the same type of game theory and mechanism design that a regular blockchain would and needs to account for ways to:

Cryptographically secure a new block to the chain

Ensure members of the network are honest

Uncover and remove dishonest actors

It is not too difficult to foresee an academic or professional discipline that studies “blockchain interoperability protocol design” and certifies that such protocols function as they should. We are definitely going to need that.

When will we see the first cross-chain protocols?

My crystal ball is as unclear as anyone else’s in this industry, but the one thing that consistently surprises those of us in the middle of it all is the pace of innovation.

If the Polkadot roadmap is any indication, we are about 18 months out from the first deployment. That gives all of us plenty of time to think critically about what the components are of a solid interoperability standard and which one is most likely to emerge victorious.

We also have time to begin developing plans for even more robust, dynamic, and powerful decentralized applications that leverage the “best of the best.”

The lag time until we see that first deployment also provides adequate warning to the establishment that decentralized technologies are maturing and, once bolstered by interoperability, are going to get closer and closer to mainstream use cases and adoption.

Jeremy Epstein is CEO of Never Stop Marketing and author of The CMO Primer for the Blockchain World. He currently works with startups in the blockchain and decentralization space, including OpenBazaar, IOTA, and Zcash.

Output: Blockchain interoperability is vital for mainstream adoption of distributed ledger technology, wrote Never Stop Marketing CEO Jeremy Epstein in an editorial for VentureBeat. There is likely to be an explosion in blockchains thanks to the speed of innovation, economic incentives to serve niche markets and the ability to fork open-source projects. But while having multiple blockchains has created a lot of value, moving between them can still be challenging. Epstein estimates that the first deployment of cross-chain protocols will happen within about 18 months, giving the establishment adequate warning that decentralised technologies are getting closer to mainstream usage.


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Regus Warsaw has 84,000 sq m of flexible work space in 95 locations

 POLAND Warsaw has 84,000 sqm of flexible work space in 95 locations, including serviced offices (office space leased on a temporary basis) and co-working space, claims Savills.

Of this, serviced offices space accounts for 44,000 sqm while co-working space accounts for 40,000 sqm. Kraków is the second biggest market (25 locations with almost 15,000 sqm of such space), followed by Poznań, with a stock of more than 8,200 sqm in 18 locations.

“It is getting harder to tell the difference between co-working space and serviced offices. Both formats have more and more features in common and the flexible workplace sector is developing at a very rapid pace. What’s more, even traditional offices are increasingly resembling co-working areas with chill-out zones and activity based workplace solutions,” says Jarosław Pilch, the head of office tenant representation at Savills.

The last two years have seen the largest increase in the number of new co-working providers entering the Polish market. Business Link, opened in Warsaw’s Zebra Tower in 2011 and was the first large co-working centre in Poland. In the mid-1990s, Regus opened its first serviced office at the Sheraton Hotel in Warsaw. At present, the largest developers operating on the Polish market are working with flexible workplace providers. In addition to Business Link, partnered by Skanska, Echo Investment has also entered this market with CitySpace, while Ghelamco is planning to develop co-working space in its new project The Warsaw Hub. There are a number of flexible office providers with at least 3,000 sqm in total in at least two locations including Brain Embassy, Business Link, CitySpace, Dago, InOffice, Office Hub, OmniOffice and Regus and their share in total office take-up rose from 0.4 pct in 2010 to 1.9 pct in 2016. Poland’s largest co-working centre is Business Link (5,000 sqm) at the PGE National Stadium in Warsaw, while the biggest serviced office is InOffice at Warsaw’s Lumen building (2,700 sqm).

“Poland has a lot of potential and is an attractive destination for high-tech businesses. Moreover, large international providers such as WeWork, The Office Group and i2 Office have not entered the Polish market yet,” said Jarosław Pilch, head of office tenant representation at Savills.

Output: Flexible working space in the Polish capital, Warsaw, now totals around 84,000 square metres, according to property company Savills. The offices are spread across 95 locations and comprise 44,000 square metres of serviced offices and 40,000 square metres of co-working space. In recent years a number of co-working providers have opened in Poland, including Regus, Business Link and CitySpace. Despite this increase, Savills noted that other international office providers such as WeWork and the Office Group have not yet entered the market in the country.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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Redrow Properties on affordable rent scheme in Liverpool reach completion
 Tenants have been welcomed into Liverpool Mutual Homes’ brand-new Leighton Dene development in Liverpool 9 – the largest new affordable rent scheme to be completed as part of the ground-breaking Liverpool Housing Partnership (LHP).

It brings the total number of affordable rent homes created by LMH under the LHP umbrella to 149 and follows on from recent completions at Hewitson Road (Tuebrook), Everton Road (Everton) and Tetlow Street (Kirkdale).

Set up to build 1,500 new homes over a five-year period, the innovative collaboration between Liverpool City Council, Redrow Homes, LMH and contractor Willmott Dixon sees receipts from land sales ring-fenced and reinvested into affordable housing schemes.

Leighton Dene, which occupies the corner of Lower Lane and Long Lane, Fazakerley, was one of several challenging sites earmarked for affordable rented homes.

This previously neglected site had lain vacant for a number of years. It now hosts 34 contemporary family houses and apartments, following a £4.6 million investment delivered in partnership with main contractor Willmott Dixon.

All homes benefit from off-road parking and a range of energy efficient products, including new boilers, new central heating systems and double glazed windows and doors, while the high quality modern kitchens and bathrooms further add to the living experience.

LMH Development Director Chris Bowen said, “Leighton Dene is a great example of our joint commitment to create high-quality affordable homes for people in housing need.

“This striking scheme benefits from high-end finishes and a range of energy-efficient products designed to keep tenants’ fuel bills down.

“LMH is already developing another 225 units on live, or committed, Liverpool Housing Partnership sites, including 145 properties on Edge Lane where works could start as early as January 2018.”

Stuart Belfield, Operations Director at Willmott Dixon, said, “Willmott Dixon is pleased to work in partnership with Liverpool Mutual Homes to develop these much-needed new homes in Fazakerley.

“This is the most recent project delivered through the Liverpool Housing Partnership. We’re delighted to play our part in ensuring local people can enjoy Christmas in their brand-new homes.”

Councillor Frank Hont, Cabinet member for housing, said: “The Liverpool Housing Partnership is helping deliver high quality homes for sale and rent.

“It is great to see this previously developed site being used to provide fantastic accommodation for tenants.

“The partnership of LMH, Redrow, Willmott Dixon and the city council is helping us to invest in affordable social housing and is a win-win for all concerned.”

Output: Thirty-four properties on an innovative affordable rent scheme in Liverpool are now available for tenants. The completion of the Leighton Dene development by Liverpool Mutual Homes (LMH) brings the total number of affordable homes under the Liverpool Housing Partnership (LHP) scheme to 149. LHP aims to build 1,500 new homes over five years as part of a collaboration between the city council, Redrow Homes, LMH and contractor Willmott Dixon. The Leighton Dene site had lain vacant for several years and has now been developed after a £4.6m investment, delivered in partnership with Willmott Dixon.


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Regus WeWork announces opening of workspace in Dublin for 2018
 WeWork opens Dublin space Trade

Workspace provider WeWork has announced the opening of a new location for Dublin’s Iveagh Court, to open in 2018.

The new space is the company’s latest in Europe, where the it already has 23 locations.

WeWork has expanded rapidly across Europe in recent years, launching first in the UK, Germany and the Netherlands, before moving into France and Spain earlier this year.

The company recently announced that, in 2019, it will the world’s largest collaborative workspace in Waterloo, London.

Eugen Miropolski, managing director, WeWork, Europe & Israel said: “Dublin’s tech credentials and community of start-ups and established companies make it an obvious choice for our next WeWork location, and we’re looking forward to growing our community here in Ireland.

“Beyond best-in-class buildings, staffed by local teams providing support, networking opportunities and events, we know our members value access to wider networking and business opportunities, as well as excellent locations and transport connections.”

WeWork operates 170 spaces across 18 countries.

TechCentral Reporters

Output: New York-based flexible office provider WeWork has revealed its latest acquisition: Dublin’s Iveagh Court. The workspace provider is set to open the branch in 2018. The company was attracted by Dublin's "tech credentials and community of start-ups and established companies", said Eugen Miropolski, managing director for WeWork, Europe & Israel. It is the latest addition to WeWork's portfolio of 23 European locations, and follows the announcement of a project to create the world's largest collaborative workspace in London by 2019.


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BOC Hong Kong to buy Vietnam, Philippines businesses from parent
 BEIJING - BOC Hong Kong Holdings Ltd, a unit of Bank of China Ltd, said on Monday it had agreed to acquire the Vietnamese and Philippine businesses from its parent for about $238 million, the latest step in the bank's restructuring in Southeast Asia.

The proposed transfer is $152 million for the Vietnamese business and 4.40 billion pesos ($85.9 million) for the Philippine business, the bank said in a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange.

The transactions are part of BOC's push to expand its presence in the ASEAN region and improve customer service, product innovation and marketing capability.

In February, BOC Hong Kong bought the Indonesian and Cambodian operations from BOC for about $377 million.

Goldman Sachs acted as financial adviser to BOC Hong Kong for the two acquisitions.

Output: A unit of Bank of China, BOC Hong Kong Holdings, is to buy its parent's Vietnamese and Philippine businesses for about $238m as the bank looks to reorganise its southeast Asia interests and expand its presence in the region. The announcement followed BOC Hong Kong's purchase in February of the Indonesian and Cambodian businesses from its parent for $377m.


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Insurance laws to be changed in response to self-driving cars
 The Government is confident that it will press ahead to change the law surrounding motor insurance in order to ensure that all parties are covered in the event of an accident involving self-driving cars.

Chris Grayling, the Transport Secretary has said that he expects the first autonomous vehicles to arrive on the UK’s roads by 2021, which will require the creation of a new compulsory insurance framework that covers motorists when they are driving, and when the driver has legitimately handed control to the vehicle.

“This will ensure that victims have quick and easy access to compensation and that insurers can recover costs from the liable party, which in the majority of cases is anticipated to be the manufacturer,” said Grayling, speaking to a group of insurers at an event in the City of London.

“It will allow consumers to buy insurance in the same way they do today.”

As things stand he said, policyholders may not be covered for collisions caused by autonomous vehicles, because only the driver’s use of the vehicle is insured.

“Victims might have to take vehicle manufacturers to court, which would be time consuming and expensive, undermining the quick and easy access to compensation that is a cornerstone of our insurance system,” he said.

“If we fail to address this beforehand, we risk jeopardising consumer protection, and undermining the competitiveness of our automotive industry.”

Grayling added that premiums will be expected to go down in price as self-driving cars will make the UK’s roads a lot safer, so reducing the number of claims.

He added that the new insurance measures, contained in the Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill, would help provide certainty to the insurance industry – and clarity to the public – about the changes ahead.

Paul Ridge, a banking and insurance specialist, at SAS UK & Ireland said that the Government’s decision to change motor insurance meant it was “pedal to the metal” time for insurers.

Ridge suggested that the insurance sector could use the new driving technology to its advantage by using the data that autonomous cars could provide.

“More insurers need to appreciate the value of data and real-time insight these connected cars can provide,” he said.

“There is a torrent of potential data sources being streamed from technologies [that]help customers’ vehicles stay in lane and brake in an emergency, for example, and also collect information from installed cameras to continuously update maps that self-driving cars will use. Insurers must be willing to adapt to these changes through product innovation. Traditional risk pools could reduce, but new areas of demand emerge. If an autonomous car is involved in an accident with another vehicle while the car and not the driver is in control, then who is at fault? What new risk do autonomous vehicles present? These are the key questions that insurers need to explore.”

Output: The UK government is intending to alter the law to acknowledge the arrival of autonomous vehicles on the roads. Its proposed changes would ensure all parties, including drivers, were covered in the event of an accident involving a self-driving car. Autonomous vehicles are anticipated to be on the UK's roads by 2021, at which point the new compulsory insurance requirements will be introduced. The current law is inadequate since it only covers drivers' use of vehicles and doesn't account for cars being operated autonomously. The measures are contained in the Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill.


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Catalonia is a problem for the whole of the EU, not just Spain
 The EU countries may be right that Catalonia is legally a matter of Spanish constitutional law. But they should also be frightened. Catalonia is Europe’s problem.

The imprisonment on remand of eight Catalan politicians, on blatantly political charges, and the Belgian asylum sought by its president, appears to be an engineered confrontation.

Two days ago, the Madrid government reneged on an agreement that it would not suspend the Barcelona government if it did not declare independence and agreed to new local elections next month. Madrid then proceeded with suspension, and Catalonia duly proceeded with declaration – though with no mention of implementation. Madrid immediately arrested those Catalan politicians (and officials) it could find, on charges of rebellion and treason.

So far, so absurd. No poll has yet delivered a clear majority of Catalans for independence. Barcelona has proceeded within accepted democratic norms and without recourse to violence – unlike Madrid in the government’s efforts to stop the recent referendum.

Never in the long and far bloodier fight of the Basques for independence was the Basque leadership ever imprisoned. Catalonia now faces an election next month with the prospect of its entire independence leadership in prison.

Catalonia is being watched, with varying degrees of intensity, by Basques, Bretons, Flemings, Scots, Bavarians, Silesians, Ukrainians, Transylvanians, Venetians, Corsicans and others. Its struggle resonates among increasingly nationalist Poles, Bohemians, Hungarians and Greeks, across Europe’s patchwork of regional sensitivities and long-harboured grievances. Old feuds are rekindled and jealousies revived. Hypocritical Britain cannot talk. It long opposed Irish separatism and denied devolution to Scotland and Wales, while it sent soldiers to aid the break-up of Yugoslavia.

It is hopeless to seek recourse from these woes in statute books and legal niceties. Self-determination has been the essence of Europe’s stability since Woodrow Wilson’s 14-point programme for Europe’s future in 1917. How such determination is defined may be moot: what of the self-determination of Spaniards against that of Catalans? But it is in Europe’s interest to seek that definition, to formulate protocols whereby separatism can be resolved into grades of autonomy. European statehood has long been a “vale of tiers”.

Since the EU itself is inherently centralist, it makes sense for the Council of Europe, the 47-nation organisation which deals with democracy and human rights across the European continent, to undertake such a task, urgently. The EU has worked itself into a political straitjacket, such that few of its member nations would dare hold a referendum on continued membership. This cannot be healthy for the EU or for Europe. The rising tide of identity politics is now the greatest threat to Europe’s free development. Catalonia is not a little local difficulty. It is an awful warning.

Output: The rise of identity politics is now the biggest threat to the European Union and its free development, columnist Simon Jenkins has warned, meaning that Catalonia is not just Spain's problem but the EU's. Its struggle for independence is reverberating among nationalist Poles, Bohemians, Hungarians and Greeks, and across the whole of Europe, triggering long-felt grievances and igniting old feuds. The EU needs to rethink fast how it recognises autonomy in what Jenkins calls a European "vale of tiers", with the Council of Europe well placed to take on the job.


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Paytm and WhatsApp poised for chat-and-payments rivalry in India
 The Indian mobile apps space is in for some curious crossovers.

On Nov. 03, the country’s largest e-payments firm, Paytm, announced the launch of a mobile chat app called Inbox that will let users transfer money alongside chatting with each other. The app will debut on Android phones, with an iOS version following soon.

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“We have realised that besides making payments, our users and merchants also like to communicate with each other,” Deepak Abbot, a senior vice-president at Paytm, said in a statement. “There is a need for social messaging, commerce, and payments seamlessly blending into one another.”

The announcement comes amidst speculation (paywall) that chat messenger WhatsApp was working on a person-to-person (P2P) payments feature, reportedly set for a December debut. Paytm, which is backed by Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, currently operates only in India (and in Canada just for bill payments), while Facebook-owned WhatsApp has users in over 109 countries.

Locked in

Smartphone users today depend on phone calls or separate messaging apps to confirm their e-transactions. A platform that combines the facility to transact and the ability to instantly confirm the transaction would, therefore, make life easier.

Such convergence can have a tremendous synergistic effect, explained Anindya Ghose, the Heinz Riehl professor of business at New York University’s Stern school. “Users will increasingly message because of the presence of payments on the same platform, and they will increasingly use payments because of the presence of messaging on the same platform,” Ghose said.

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While details of WhatsApp’s payments feature are not yet known, Inbox includes all the usual chat features. Like WhatsApp, the new Paytm platform is encrypted end-to-end, so conversations will remain tamper-proof and, importantly, off surveillance. Inbox also lets users initiate private conversations, create group chats, send photos and videos, share live locations, and play games.

Inbox is part of Paytm’s attempt to lock customers into its ecosystem and spark more monetary activity, Ashutosh Sharma, research director at Forrester Research, told Quartz. But the Indian startup shouldn’t try to do it all, and, instead, focus on its strong suit. ”Paytm should attempt to limit WhatsApp to P2P payments only and build out its business around merchant transactions,” said Sharma. The company has on-boarded over 1.5 million merchants already and aims to raise this to five million by the end of 2017. Its strong offline presence through QR codes could steadily convert into e-transactions if customers and businesses are able to communicate remotely from within the app.

“Paytm is in pole position in India to be able to do that,” Sharma added, “but it has been surprisingly slow at it.”

On Paytm’s main app, customers can already purchase products, movie tickets, flight tickets, and more. The company also has an established e-commerce business through its arm, Paytm Mall. Its instant messenger, Inbox, is already integrated with these.

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“I think Paytm’s direction is to become WeChat of India in the future,” Pavel Naiya, an analyst at Counterpoint Research, told Quartz, referring to the Chinese app that lets users play games, make P2P transactions, make video calls, order food, read the news, book doctors’ appointments, and more. It is, according to FastCompany, China’s “app for everything.”

If that is indeed Paytm’s ambition, it is making the right noises. In May this year, it launched the Paytm Payments Bank, which is part of the Indian central bank’s move to boost financial inclusion in the country. The bank cannot lend money, issue credit cards or give advances, and each account can only have up to Rs1 lakh ($1,540). It can, however, issue cheque books and debit cards—and once integrated with the entire Paytm ecosystem, can potentially turn into the world’s largest digital bank.

Output: Paytm and WhatsApp are set to compete in India, with each poised to launch crossover chat and payment services. Electronic payments firm Paytm is to unveil mobile chat app Inbox, which will let users transfer money while engaging with other users and merchants. Meanwhile, messaging platform WhatsApp is reportedly working on a peer-to-peer payments feature, set for launch next month.