"I realised I could sustain the writing life, whether anyone reads it or not. It’s what separates writers from civilians. It’s probably a mental disorder."

Samantha Harvey's Orbital wins the Booker Prize. The 136-page space novel explores astronauts' reflections on Earth, touching on mourning, desire, and the climate crisis.

Apple has spent the last few days trickling releases of new Mac hardware, debuting a revamped iMac with an M4 chip and new colors, a redesigned Mac Mini that is smaller in size and now has an M4 chip, and the MacBook Pro lineup has been revamped with M4 processors as well. Each of the ... Read More

Amazon is selling the M2 MacBook Air 13″ model with 16GB RAM for just $749.99, taking $250 off the $999 retail price from Apple. Like many great Amazon deals, they tend to shift quickly, so if you’ve been thinking of getting a 16GB model MacBook Air now might be the time. To get the deal ... Read More

We hear a lot about diversity and inclusion these days, often as it relates to books for young readers. Just as publishing for children and teens has evolved over the years, so has adults’ perception of youth and what is appropriate for them.

With so few words, most of them kid-friendly, it should be a piece of cake. But it depends on who’s holding the whisk. Translator Daniel Hahn say,"I believe my job as a translator is to preserve all the dimensions of a book, not just one of them. When I find complexity, my job is to keep complexity, or more accurately to reconstruct it. And some of the most complex books I’ve reconstructed have been children’s picture books."

A new children's book transforms a sad, scared and anxious little boy into a superhero. The book is called "Cape," in honor of the bright-red cape the little boy wears and finds comfort in following the death of his father. "Cape" is Kevin Johnson's debut picture book, and it's vividly illustrated by artist Kitt Thomas.

Every year, educators worry about “summer slide,” the potential for learning loss when children are not in school. This issue is more pronounced among low-income families who don’t have access to summer camps or other enrichment activities. One way to battle summer slide is through reading for fun, which is associated with many academic and health benefits, including strengthening the brain, increasing ability to empathize, reducing stress and building vocabulary.

The best early Black Friday MacBook deals include all-time low prices on the latest MacBook Air models.

  Background When my son was nearing 14 years, I mentioned to him that I read James Clavell’s epic novel Shogun  (1136 pages) around the age of 15 i.e. his age. Reading a book like Shogun at age 15 is admittedly not typical reading for a 15-year-old. But I have always been an avid reader [...]

Meta launched AI chatbots voiced by Hollywood celebrities including Judi Dench and John Cena on Wednesday, betting its billions of users are eager to embrace artificial intelligence.

It's been just over a year since director Macon Blair premiered his new reboot of The Toxic Avenger at Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas. The new film stars Peter Dinklage as the eponymous hideously deformed creature of superhuman size and strength, along with Elijah Wood, Kevin Bacon, and more—but has unfortunately struggled to find support for a wider distribution, according to The Hollywood Reporter. — Read the rest

The post The new TOXIC AVENGER comic book is great appeared first on Boing Boing.

Bob Moesta is a dear friend, mentor, and all around original thinker. He’s helped me see around corners, shine lights on things I didn’t know were there, and approach product development from unusual angles. Every time we talk, I come away inspired and full of optimism. So when he asked me to help him with… keep reading

By JEAN-PIERRE LLEDO MABATIM Oct. 16, 2022 Toutes les informations qui nous parviennent d’Iran nous disent que cette nouvelle révolte est totalement inédite. Elle se distingue de toutes les précédentes parce que ce sont les femmes qui en ont pris l’initiative et plus encore parce que ce qui est ciblé n’est pas seulement le pouvoir, […]

Mekka Newspaper, Mecca, Saudi Arabia: Oct. 28, 2022 It was my distinct honor to Arabic receive a wonderful review by Mecca Newspaper, one of the oldest newspapers in the Middle East. I am deeply grateful and humbled to be part of the historic reformation and renaissance taking place in the Middle East. When Mecca newspaper […]

Cairo, Egypt Oct. 28, 2022 On Egyptian TV show, “Headlines,” Dr. Hossam Farouk dedicated an episode to discussing national and international coverage of the Secret Apparatus: The Muslim Brotherhood’s Industry of Death. It was a great honor having the book featured on this great show.

Presented by the Middle East Forum on Nov. 18, 2022 Panel discussion with Daniel Pipes, Cynthia Farahat, and Jonathan Schanzer:

By Walter Donway, Savvy Street originally published on Dec. 4, 2022 Book Review: The Secret Apparatus: The Muslim Brotherhood’s Industry of Death by Cynthia Farahat, Post Hill Press, Bombardier Books (2022) A grim irony of twentieth-century history (but, of course, also predating it) is that the most horrendous threats to humanity have simply been too monstrously evil […]

Book preview: Guide to Chinese Climate Policy 2022 20 October 2022 — 10:00AM TO 11:15AM Anonymous (not verified) 28 September 2022 Chatham House and Online

Join authors David Sandalow and Michal Meidan to discuss their upcoming book.

China is the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases and a key player in tackling the global climate crisis. Its stated climate policies, namely its high-level targets to peak emissions by 2030 and to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, are significant.

But while national-level ministries, local governments and businesses are setting climate roadmaps, implementation is challenging at times. In the current context of the global energy market and geopolitical turmoil, China’s need to maintain energy security can seem at odds with its climate pledges.

The authors will present the book, which examines Chinese emissions, the impacts of climate change in China, as well as China’s domestic and international climate change policies and the main implementation challenges these policies face.

Facebook's power under scrutiny as Trump ban upheld Expert comment NCapeling 6 May 2021

Keeping Donald Trump’s Facebook ban in place shows the vast power social media platforms hold, raising questions of whether that power is appropriately used.

Kate Jones

From a human rights perspective, the Oversight Board’s decision is a strong one, and not at all surprising. The board decided Facebook was right to suspend the former president’s access to post content on Facebook and Instagram, but not indefinitely.

It found Donald Trump’s posts violated Facebook’s community standards because they amounted to praise or support of people engaged in violence and that, applying a human rights assessment, Facebook’s suspension of Trump was a necessary and proportionate restriction of his right to freedom of expression.

However the board also found Trump’s indefinite suspension was neither in conformity with a clear Facebook procedure nor consistent with its commitment to respect human rights. Its decision requires Facebook to make a new decision on the future of Donald Trump’s account, grounded in its rules.

While opinions on this result will differ, the increased call for clear and accessible rules and respect for human rights in their implementation that the Oversight Board brings to Facebook’s operations is welcome.

But the Oversight Board’s powers are limited to content moderation – Facebook declined to answer the board’s questions about amplification of Trump’s posts through the platform’s design decisions and algorithms. This limitation on the board’s role should be lifted. It is in content amplification, not just content moderation, that Facebook should face scrutiny and accountability for the sake of the human rights of its users.

Fundamentally, human rights is not a veneer which can mask or legitimize underlying power dynamics or public policy – those still fall to be assessed for themselves.

The Trump/Facebook saga does highlight the vast power Facebook and other major social media platforms have over political discussion and persuasion. Through granting or denying, or through amplifying or quietening the voices of political figures, Facebook has the power to shape politics, electorates, and democratic processes. Improving content moderation through the Oversight Board, although important, does little to constrain that power.

Facebook itself, unlike a government, has no accountability to the general public, and the Oversight Board must not distract us from the need for a full conversation about the extent to which Facebook’s power is appropriately held and properly wielded.

Emily Taylor

This decision marks a coming of age for Facebook’s content moderation process. For years, decisions to take down content or ban users have been opaque, conducted by a human workforce that Facebook and other platforms have been hesitant to acknowledge. The platforms have also been worried that being seen to exercise an editorial function might put at risk the legal protections which prevent the platforms being held responsible for user-generated content.

When the Oversight Board was first posited, observers questioned whether a body funded by Facebook could properly exercise a legitimate appeals function. Now there is a reasoned decision which partly supports the decision to de-platform a serving president, but also takes issue with the indefinite nature of the ban.

Facebook specifically asked the Oversight Board to consider specific challenges involved when the person involved is a political leader. The board concluded that Trump’s ‘status as head of state with a high position of trust not only imbued his words with greater force and credibility but also created risks that his followers would understand they could act with impunity’. The storming of the US Capitol and role President Trump played in stirring up the violence underlined that political leaders’ words can motivate others to take harmful actions.

Just as the events of January 6 remain shocking, it remains shocking that private platforms have exercised the power to curb the speech of a US president. It also remains shocking that the platforms sat back and took no action over the previous four years, but waited until the final days of the transition.

The board’s decision is an evolution in private-sector content moderation, with a diverse board giving a reasoned opinion on a Facebook decision. But to fully comply with the principles of open justice, board decisions should include more detail on the individuals who have made the decision – at present, it appears all members of the board review the decision but it is not clear which individuals were involved in its drafting, or that they were clear from conflicts. If the process is to gain respect as a truly independent oversight on the platform’s decisions, greater transparency over the identity of decision-makers will be needed.

Mark Zuckerberg expressed concern about Facebook becoming an arbiter of truth or free speech and, overall, the difficulty of having private companies managing the application of fundamental rights on their platforms has not been solved. Just because companies have the financial resources to do it, does not mean they necessarily should.

Yet no other international governance or arbitration system has emerged to handle the complexities of platform power over speech. In the context of that vacuum, the Oversight Board’s decision is a welcome step.

The Supreme Court appeared skeptical that companies should be required to include past events in their risk disclosure statements during oral arguments for Facebook Inc. vs. Amalgamated Bank on Wednesday.

A team of U.S. employees at Hachette wrote an open letter to management in protest over a new conservative book imprint created in wake of last week's Donald Trump victory headed by a known far-right publisher.

Roger Dooley's Brainfluence has been translated into eleven languages, but the new Spanish reading is the first audio audio translation.

The post Spanish Audiobook for Brainfluence appeared first on Neuromarketing.

School districts are competing against each other for purchases of digital devices as remote learning expands to schools across the country.

A West Virginia official turns up the heat on financial disclosure for the state’s beleaguered schools, and ruffles feathers in the process.

But some Democrats say that could make the selection process more political.

Nov. 12—The Gonzaga women's basketball team has much to learn after a challenging loss at Stanford on Sunday. Losses have a way of exposing a team's shortcomings. And there is much to learn from the worst loss (89-58) in coach Lisa Fortier's 11 seasons. Stanford, unranked in the preseason poll for the first time since 1999-2000, is unranked no more. The Cardinal (3-0) entered at No. 24 in the ...

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has the pleasure to inform the Permanent Representatives of the launch of a series of Activity Books for young people. [...]

FAO has recently released Fish: Know it, cook it, eat it, a genre-defying cookbook that infuses international recipes with insights into the global fish trade; blends scientific facts and cultural history; melds nutritional information [...]

Artist Michael Kirby spent four days painting an image from "Falnama: The Book of Omens" in front of the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. Read more at: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/muralist-uses-the-sidewalk-outside-the-sackler-gallery-as-canvas-20678724/

You can describe what a journalist does in any number of ways. One definition that’s as accurate as any is that a journalist is someone who liked having homework back when they were in school so much that they decided to keep doing homework for a career. That certainly describes the team here at Smithsonian magazine. We’re all big readers. So we thought that before our brief winter hiatus—a time when many of us are trying to think of gift ideas to please the empathetic, curious people in our lives—we’d poll the staff of Smithsonian on their favorite books they read this year. Because we’re primarily a history and science magazine, we tried to steer them toward nonfiction published in 2023, but as you’ll hear, we weren’t sticklers for either criterion. We thought it better to let you hear from our staff about the books they were most genuinely excited to share. You’ll recognize some of these voices if you’re an avid listener, but this episode also provides the chance to hear from some of the talented staffers we haven’t been able to feature on the show before now. Find prior episodes of our show here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/podcast/) . There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Rye Dorsey, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

Watch a course video excerpt from Rise of the Superheroes: The legendary Stan Lee, creator of the Avengers, Spiderman and Iron Man, has partnered with the Smithsonian National Museum of American History to launch the first global online course about superheroes to fans around the world.

Book-banning might seem like a relic of less enlightened times, but the practice is back in a big way. The American Library Association reports (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/american-library-association-names-2022s-most-banned-books-180982048/) that 2022 saw more attempts to have books removed from public libraries than in any prior year this century — indeed, it documented more than twice as many attempted bans in 2022 than in 2021. In schools, attempts to keep certain books out of the hands of students have been even more aggressive and draconian. What’s new about these efforts is the subject that binds the most-challenged titles: Most of them address themes of LGBT+ identity or gender expression. In this episode, we talk with journalist Colleen Connolly about Thomas Morton’s New English Canaan, the first book ever to be suppressed in North America. What did the Puritans find so threatening about it, and how has this book echoed through subsequent centuries? Then we’re joined by Dr. Carla Hayden, Librarian of Congress, for a wide-ranging conversation about the history of book bans in the United States, how a resurgent wave of book bans in many states differs from those of prior eras, and why organized attempts to prevent specific people from reading specific books usually fail. A transcript of this episode can be found here (http://smithsonianmag.com/history/a-brief-history-of-banned-books-in-america-180983011) . Read Colleen’s Smithsonian story about New English Canaan here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-americas-first-banned-book-survived-and-became-an-anti-authoritarian-icon-180982971/) . Find prior episodes of our show here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/podcast/) . There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Terence Bernardo, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

Jeffersons respect for the enlightenment ideals of memory, reason and imagination shaped how he organized his library (Video: Molly Roberts). Read more at https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/on-the-hunt-for-jeffersons-lost-books-38566672/

The legendary Stan Lee, creator of the Avengers, Spiderman and Iron Man, has partnered with the Smithsonian National Museum of American History to launch the first global online course about superheroes to fans around the world. Taught by "The Dark Knight" producer Michael Uslan, students will go into the vaults of the Smithsonian collection and hear from industry experts. Register now (http://bit.ly/1DsdJ3W) and beginning May 5, 2015, you can become a certified expert on superheroes. Sign up for the verified certificate to earn an original piece of artwork from top artist Phil Jimenez (Wonder Woman, New X-Men) with Phil's, Stan Lee’s, and Michael Uslan’s signatures.

A new exhibition in New York City uses more than 200 texts and artifacts to contemplate Lincoln's rise to the nation's highest office

Some 250 volunteers transported more than 2,000 books

"Spectropia" demystified the techniques used by mediums who claimed they could speak to the dead, revealing the "absurd follies of Spiritualism"

A retired lawyer from Sault Ste. Marie has written a book that celebrates the working-class neighbourhood in which he grew up. The West End: A Magical Place Created by Giants is by Frank Sarlo, whose grandfather emigrated to Chicago from Italy, but ended up in Sault Ste. Marie with the promise of work on the railroad.

Garry Gottfriedson, who attended the Kamloops Indian Residential School for five years, drew on his own experience at residential school, as well as those of his siblings and parents, for the book. He describes the process of gathering their stories as "powerful."

The former Maple Leafs captain, Olympic and three-time world champion looks back on his illustrious hockey career in new memoir 'Home and Away'.

Laura Walker made a game-winning draw Sunday afternoon to win the Alberta women's curling playdowns and secure a berth in the upcoming national championship.

#1 3D CAD software is first in industry to be highlighted in popular series renowned for clarity, humor, and gentleness

Early Black Friday deals are in effect on Apple's 2024 MacBook Pro M4, with every configuration — retail and CTO — eligible for a coupon discount.

Apple's 1TB M4 MacBook Pro 14-inch is eligible for a material early Black Friday discount at Amazon, along with savings on the 2024 Mac mini M4 and a record low price on the 13-inch MacBook Air 16GB.