(United States Second Circuit) - Reversed the denial of a post-trial JMOL motion. In overturning a $1.3 million jury verdict, the appeals court held that a business owner failed to prove that two prosecutors and an investigator in the Nassau County District Attorney's Office tortiously interfered with his contracts in violation of New York law when they conducted a fraud investigation against a media company he owned but then did not ultimately file charges against him. The appeals court concluded that there was no evidence that anyone stopped performing under a specific contract because of anything said or done by the defendants.

(United States Ninth Circuit) - Plaintiff was convicted of second-degree murder, served over twenty-six years in custody, and was released in 2009 after a federal judge determined that falsified evidence had been introduced at trial and conditionally granted a writ of habeas corpus. The state then dismissed the charges against plaintiff, who subsequently filed this action against defendants, two police detectives, who plaintiff alleges fabricated police reports, investigative notes, and photographs of the crime scene during their homicide investigation. The district court's order denying absolute witness immunity to defendants is affirmed, where: 1) defendants' notes, investigative reports, and photographs of the crime scene were analogous to the sorts of documentary and physical evidence that fall outside the protection of absolute immunity; 2) policy interests behind absolute immunity for testimony do not apply to the investigative materials in this case; and 3) defendants plainly acted in an investigative capacity in producing the notes, reports, and crime-scene photographs, and qualified immunity provided sufficient protection for these activities.

(Supreme Court of California) - Reversed appeal court ruling. The parties entered into a confidential settlement agreement following a tort action. Plaintiff alleged that Defendant, counsel for the injured party in the tort action, breached the settlement agreement by making public statements. Defendant claimed he was not bound by the agreement, but only recommended his clients sign it. California Supreme Court made a factual finding that the Defendant intended to be bound by the settlement agreement.

(California Court of Appeal) - Held that plaintiff's counsel was not liable for breaching a provision in a settlement agreement requiring him to keep the settlement confidential. Upon being sued by the other settling party for speaking with the online news media about this product liability case, the plaintiff's counsel filed a SLAPP motion. On appeal, the Fourth Appellate District held that the settlement agreement's language purporting to impose a confidentiality obligation on the attorney was unenforceable in this case.

(United States Federal Circuit) - Affirming the denial of attorney fees and costs to a man who sued claiming that he developed Guillain-Barre Syndrome as the result of a flu vaccination because the Court of Federal Claims correctly concluded that there was no reasonable basis for the claim.

(California Court of Appeal) - Affirming the trial court's conclusion that Monsanto and others failed to state a claim in a suit where they averred that Proposition 65's reliance on the International Agency for Research on Cancer's determinations about which chemicals cause cancer improperly granted a foreign entity authority over domestic affairs.

(Supreme Court of California) - Reversed appeal court ruling. The parties entered into a confidential settlement agreement following a tort action. Plaintiff alleged that Defendant, counsel for the injured party in the tort action, breached the settlement agreement by making public statements. Defendant claimed he was not bound by the agreement, but only recommended his clients sign it. California Supreme Court made a factual finding that the Defendant intended to be bound by the settlement agreement.

The film will premiere on May 27 on HBO Max.

Go head and jump on the start up wagon.

...and a few reasons why he's just the man!

"The Start Up" premieres on Saturday at 8P/7C.

She spoke extensively about her relationship with Bow Wow.

The fashionistas are also giving back in a big way.

Whatever you think of Doom Eternal right now, id and Bethesda are determined to spice it up going forward. They’ve hinted at what’s coming next for the hellish shooter, starting with a preview of the game’s first free update. The simply titled Update...

Well, this one hits the sweet spot of topics I keep trying to demonstrate: both a Streisand Effect and Masnick's Impossibility Theorem. As you may have heard, a group of Republican political consultants and strategists, who very much dislike Donald Trump, put together an effort called The Lincoln Project, which is a PAC to campaign against Trump and Trumpian politics. They recently released an anti-Trump campaign ad about his terrible handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, called Mourning in America, which is a reference to Ronald Reagan's famous Morning in America campaign ad for the 1984 Presidential election. The new ad is, well, pretty powerful:

And while it's unlikely to convince Trump fans deep into their delusions, it certainly got under the President's skin. He went on one of his famous late night Twitter temper tantrums about the ad, and later lashed out at the Lincoln Project when talking to reporters. He was super, super mad.

And what did that do? Well, first it got the ad a ton of views. Earlier this week, one of the Lincoln Project's founders, Rick Wilson, noted that the ad had already received 15 million views across various platforms in the day or so since the ad had been released. Also, it resulted in the Lincoln Project getting a giant boost in funding:

The Lincoln Project, which is run by Republican operatives who oppose President Donald Trump, raised $1 million after the president ripped the group on Twitter this week – marking it the super PAC’s biggest day of fundraising yet.

Reed Galen, a member of the Lincoln Project’s advisory committee, told CNBC that the total came after the president’s Tuesday morning Twitter tirade in reaction to an ad titled “Mourning in America,” which unloads on Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. It recently aired on Fox News, which Trump often watches and praises. Galen said it was the Lincoln Project’s best single-day fundraising haul

Not only that, but it has opened up more opportunity for the Lincoln Project team to get their word out. With so much interest in the ad, it opened up opportunities for the project members to get their message in various mainstream media sources. Reed Galen wrote a piece for NBC:

What we accomplished this week was not something to be celebrated. No commercial should have the power to derail the leader of the free world.

And another Lincoln Project founder, George Conway (who, of course, is the husband of Trump senior advisor Kellyanne Conway), wrote something similar for the Washington Post:

It may strike you as deranged that a sitting president facing a pandemic has busied himself attacking journalists, political opponents, television news hosts and late-night comedians — even deriding a former president who merely boasted that “the ‘Ratings’ of my News Conferences etc.” were driving “the Lamestream Media . . . CRAZY,” and floated bogus miracle cures, including suggesting that scientists consider injecting humans with household disinfectants such as Clorox.

If so, you’re not alone. Tens of thousands of mental-health professionals, testing the bounds of professional ethics, have warned for years about Trump’s unfitness for office.

Some people listened; many, including myself, did not, until it was too late.

That's the kind of media exposure you can't buy, but which you get when you have a President who appears wholly unfamiliar with the Streisand Effect.

And that then takes us to the Impossibility Theorem, regarding the impossibility of doing content moderation at scale well. After Trump's ongoing tirade, Facebook slapped a "Partly False" warning label on the video when posted on Facebook. While the whole situation is ridiculous, it's at least mildly amusing, considering how frequently clueless Trumpkins insist that Facebook censors "conservative" (by which they mean Trumpian) viewpoints. Also, somewhat ironic in all of this: the only reason that Facebook now places such fact check labels on things is because anti-Trump people yelled at how Facebook needed to do more fact checking of political content on its site. So, now you get this.

Part of the issue is that Politifact judged one line in the ad as "false." That line was that Trump "bailed out Wall St. but not Main St." Politifact says that since the CARES Act Paycheck Protection Program has given potentially forgivable loans to some small businesses, and because the bill was done by Congress, not the President, that line is "false." And yet, because angry (usually anti-Trump) people demanded that Facebook do more useless fact checking, the end result is that the video now gets a "false" label.

Of course, this shows both the impossibility of doing content moderation well and the silliness of betting big on fact checking with a full "true or false" claim. One could argue that that line has misleading elements, but is true in most cases. Tons of small businesses are shuttering. Many businesses have been unable to get PPP loans, and under the current terms of the loans, they're useless for many (especially if they have no work for people to do, since the loans have to be mostly used on payroll over the next couple months). But does that make the entire ad "false"? Of course not.

And Rick Wilson is super mad about this. He's right to be mad about Politifact's designation, though it's really a condemnation of the religious focus on "true or false" in fact checking, rather than in focusing on what is misleading or not:

But the ad doesn’t actually claim that small businesses received zero help. Rather, it makes the point that Main Street America is still seriously struggling as the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic continues.

But Wilson is also mad at Facebook:

Speaking exclusively to Mediaite, Wilson called the decision “the typical fuckery we’ve come to expect from both the Trump camp and their tame Facebook allies.”

“Facebook is perfectly content to allow content from QAnon lunatics, anti-vaxxers, alt-righters, and every form of Trump/Russian — but I repeat myself — disinformation,” he pointed out. “This is a sign of just how powerfully ‘Mourning In America’ shook Donald Trump and his allies. Their attempt to censor our ad isn’t a setback for us; it’s a declaration of an information war we will win.”

Separately, the Lincoln Project also sent out an email to supporters, again blaming Facebook:

... it's no secret that Facebook has stood by and done little to nothing as lie after lie — from the Liar-In-Chief himself — runs wild on their platform.

(Oh, and let's also not forget the conspiracy theories, foreign disinformation campaigns and negligence that got Mark Zuckerberg questioned by the United States Congress.)

But, this? This is an entirely different and dangerous kind of collusion.

And what is Facebook's excuse for playing favorites with its recently-transferred former employees in the Trump campaign?

They say a "fact-checker" labeled our claim that "Donald Trump helped bailout Wall Street, not Main Street" was untrue.

....Really?

The email goes on to justify the "main street" line with a bunch of links, and then again argues that Facebook is "censoring the truth" to help Trump:

Is that "Partly False?" Of course not.

We told the truth about Donald Trump...

He lost his damn mind over it on Twitter...

Attacked us in front of Air Force One...

Then sent his spin machine to discredit us...

And now his allies at Facebook are doing his damage control by censoring the truth he doesn't like.

I get the frustration -- and I find it at least a bit ironic that the whole "fact checking" system was a response to anti-Trump folks mad at Facebook for allowing pro-Trump nonsense to spread -- but this is just another example of the Impossibility Theorem. There is no "good" solution here. We live in a time where everyone's trying to discredit everyone they disagree with, and many of these things depend on your perspective or your interpretation of a broad statement, like whether or not Trump is helping "main street."

We can agree that it's silly that Facebook has put this label on the video, but also recognize that it's not "Trump's allies at Facebook" working to "censor the truth he doesn't like." That's just absurd (especially given the reason the fact checking set up was put together in the first place).

But, hey, outrage and claims of censorship feed into the narrative (and feed into the Streisand Effect), so perhaps it all is just designed to work together.

I believe it is traditional to apologize when one hasn't been blogging for a while, and I am indeed sorry....

GENE SIMMONS пятого мая опубликовал в Твиттере ответ на следующее сообщение:

«Разве это не хорошие новости? Не связан ли рост случаев с увеличившимся количеством тестов, так что летальность начинает снижаться?» — ссылаясь на данные CNN, спросил у Gene'a один из подписчиков.

Gene ответил:

«Увы, но новости не лучшие. У нас порядка 3 000 новых зараженных КАЖДЫЙ ДЕНЬ. Умножьте на 365. В ближайшие пару месяцев количество умерших будет от 130 000 до 200 000 человек. Печально».

Согласно данным университета Джонса Хопкинса, в США от коронавируса умерли более 71 000 человек и более 1 200 000 человек заразились этой болезнью. #Gene_Simmons #GeneSimmons #HardRock #Hard_Rock

The CC Certificate aims to increase our global community’s expertise in open licensing and awareness of our shared, digital commons.  Our first goal is to train at least one person interested in open licensing in every country and territory, around the world. So far, we have CC Certificate graduates from 44 countries and counting! One … Read More "Creative Commons Welcomes Our 2020 CC Certificate Scholarship Recipients!"

The post Creative Commons Welcomes Our 2020 CC Certificate Scholarship Recipients! appeared first on Creative Commons.

As scientists continue to weigh in, one thing is clear: the "monster black hole" discovered in 2019 doesn't exist.

"Stoppt Gates", "Legt den Maulkorb ab", "Widerstand": In mehreren deutschen Städten haben Bürger gegen die Corona-Beschränkungen protestiert. Auf Abstandsregeln nahmen nicht alle Rücksicht.

German multinational Bayer underestimated the risks of acquiring Monsanto. Now, the company is desperately seeking to contain the damage by selling business divisions and cutting jobs. So far, though, none of these moves have helped.

George Gascón pushed L.A. County Dist. Atty. Jackie Lacey into a runoff. His challenge is to show how his progressive policies can keep us safer.

I've been doing my part to keep an eye on my older neighbors, which helps calm my own feelings of fear and helplessness.

Angels shortstop Andrelton Simmons' long-term future with the franchise remains up in the air heading into the final year of his contract.

"Never in my wildest dreams did I think it would be my brother until I saw everything the next day and saw his name," said Rosemary Gomez, 38. “I was like, ‘No, it can’t be him, it can’t be him.' Then his (estranged) wife called me. She was in a state of shock."

A positionless wonder out of Clemson, Isaiah Simmons has played edge rusher, linebacker, cornerback and safety. He might be the most NFL-ready player in the draft.

Kiss frontman Gene Simmons said his mother almost never spoke about her Holocaust ordeal, including time in Nazi camps.

Matty Simmons, who produced the comedy hits "Animal House" and the "Vacation" movies, and co-founded National Lampoon magazine, has died. He was 93.

Indianapolis native Doug Jones portrays the "Amphibious Man" in critically acclaimed film "The Shape of Water."

Christi Gibson June 28, 2017 DES MOINES- With health insurance premiums on the rise and deductibles skyrocketing, not to mention the majority of insurance companies in Iowa abandoning the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), Iowans are growing increasingly concerned about healthcare for themselves and their family members. The impending vote on […]

OBJECTIVE

A recent publication questioned the integrity of insulin purchased from U.S. retail pharmacies. We sought to independently validate the method used, isotope dilution solid-phase extraction (SPE) liquid chromatography mass spectrometry (LC-MS), and expand analysis to two U.S. Pharmacopeia (USP) methods (high-performance LC with ultraviolet detection and LC-MS).

Preserved lemons are exotic, easily prepared at home and impart a flavour and perfume like no other - they are the next best thing to a holiday in Morocco, transforming any dish from the ho-hum to the sublime. When using them cooking, only use the yellow zest, discarding any white pith, pulp and juice. It is best to preserve lemons during autumn and spring when they are in season and have maximum aroma and juice. Any lemon worth its salt can be preserved, although having preserved a number of different varieties I can report most success with the thin-skinned Meyer lemon. I also think organic lemons give the best results. When choosing lemons for preserving, ensure you choose fully ripe, very yellow fragrant fruit with unblemished skin. In the case of store-bought lemons, wash well to remove the wax that is used to make them shiny.

Food security -- Australia.

Museums -- Collection management -- United States.

Environmental economics.