People (including myself) have been joking for years that Jennifer Lopez is on track to being the next Elizabeth Taylor, and bitch apparently took is seriously since she just got engaged to Alex Rodriguez. ARod proposed to JLo while on vacation with a $1.4 million ring, which might seem extravagant to us hobos, but if […]

The post Jennifer Lopez is Officially the New Liz Taylor appeared first on HecklerSpray.

Meander your way across a dock.

Phew.

The Londoner, The London Spy, London Centric...

Via Lori Smith, I was alerted to this claim last week by police in Cornwall that a lap dance venue license application should be rejected because such clubs 'might' cause sexual violence. As Lori points out over on BitchBuzz, this is territory I've covered before: the widely-publicised claims that lap dance clubs in Camden caused more rape turned out to be false.

Of course the statistics for a specific area of London over a certain number of years are only that: specific to London and those years. It's dangerous to take a trend for one area, at one point in time, and generalise it to all places at all times. In order to claim that "Factor X causes Outcome Y" you need a lot more data. In the book I set out some comparisons, then, with London and other locations summarising what we know from the scientific literature, national statistics, and so on.

So what's interesting is that The Sex Myth discusses not only the situation in cities like London but also specifically, as coincidence would have it, Newquay.

Guess what? The link between lap dance and sexual violence that the police claim 'might' exist? Not only does it not exist, local media in the Southwest have already reported on this.

In 2010, the Newquay Voice obtained Devon and Cornwall Constabulary’s figures of sexual assaults. They found that the total number of recorded sexual assaults (including rapes) in and around Newquay peaked at 71 in 2005, the year before Newquay's first lap dance club opened. In 2006 however,  following its opening, the number fell to 51.

In 2007, when the town’s second lap dancing venue opened, the total number of recorded sexual assaults fell again to 41, then dropped to 27 in 2008 when a third lap dancing club opened. In 2009 the number rose slightly, but with a total of 33 offences, it is still less than half the total than before the clubs appeared.

Using publically available population data, I took these figures and calculated the incidence rate (since population varies from year to year as crime stats do, if you don't calculate a rate, the numbers are not very informative). Here are the incidence rate calculations using midyear population levels for the council of Restormel where Newquay is located:

Looking at these numbers, you'd be tempted to think that lap dancing actually reduces sexual assault. In other words the opposite of what the BBC article claims.

This like the Camden data is only a single example. Making such a broad conclusion would be rash – to conclusively demonstrate that an increase in lap dancing corresponds with a decrease in rape and sexual assault, there would have to many more such results, over longer time periods, from many places. What it does do is reinforce the same thing the statistics from Camden show: lap dancing does not correlate with higher occurrence of rape. And if there is no rise in rape, then it is impossible to claim that lap dancing “causes” rape.

Unfortunately, the myth that sex work causes violence has become so deeply embedded in media and criminology storytelling that one only needs to raise that dread spectre for the city council to take such claims seriously. In spite of the fact that the real data are easy to find and analyse, and the local papers in Cornwall have already suggested the opposite to what the police claim is true, the BBC and other media outlets don't seem to notice or care.

In the end it looks as if the council rejected the application. St Austell  and Cornwall MP Stephen Gilbert tweeted that this was "a victory for people power". And indeed if the rejection was made because the majority of residents decided they did not want it, then so be it. Nothing wrong with not liking things for the simple reason that you don't like them.

But consider that the information put about by police and reported by the BBC is misleading and poorly researched. What if, instead of the council's main criterion being what residents preferred, the decision was made because of police and media scaring people with potential crimes that turn out not to be true at all?  I don't know about the good folks of Cornwall, but where I come from, that's called lying.

This morning I awoke to find a claim published in the Mail that I was not a sex worker. 


It is a direct attack on my integrity as a writer, to claim that I lied. And I have been prepared.

When the case goes to trial, I will have to present evidence that I was a sex worker. Starting with this - an Archive.org snap of my first escorting ad from October 2003 (link NSFW).

(Readers of the first book may recall this was the session with the grumpy photographer I wrote about. As I have often said, it was that experience - being made to wear terrible lingerie, awkward poses, all the rest - that first made me think, 'hey, I should be blogging this.'

And if you read the third book, I made a reference to a restaurant on Old Compton Street that has the same name as my working name - that is, of course, Taro.)

I will also be presenting my bank records from 2003-04, showing the cash deposits from the money I earned as an escort, and tax records from the same years showing that this income was declared to HMRC and tax paid. Here is a sample:

 
I also have the notebook in which I recorded details of appointments, etc. In several instances I have been able to piece together entries from the notebook, deposits to my accounts, and the corresponding entries in the book. If pressed, I will name a client, but only as a last resort.

The Mail also claims I didn't own nice enough clothes so couldn't have been an escort!


That's from December 2003, and is the same red silk top I wore to meet the manager for the first time (as written about in the first book). The next is at Henley Regatta in July 2004, suit is from Austin Reed, the bracelet was a gift from a client.



The Mail claims I was in Sheffield when writing the blog, but I moved to London in September 2003 and started escorting in October, starting blogging a few weeks later. All of which is easy - trivial, even - to prove.

Oh, and the "former landlady in Sheffield, who did not wish to be named", where I supposedly lived for three years? Who apparently saw me in 'Oxfam jumpers'? Hmm... I lived one year in university accommodation (St George's Flats),  one year in a shared flat with an absentee landlord I never met (Hawthorne Road), and one year on my own in a house let through an agency (Loxley New Road). All well before moving to London. So either the landlady is lying about the timing of my tenancy and having met me, or (shock, horror) they made it up.

There's much more but it would be boring to put it all here. It's amazing to me the MoS made no effort at all to match anything they printed against things that are easy to find and in the public domain. But that's by the by, and will come out in due course.

It matters because this is a concerted and direct attack on my work as a writer. When I was anonymous, being real was my main - my only - advantage. The Mail on Sunday have made some frankly nonsense claims, and I will be going to town on this.

Because I know people do not trust the word of a sex worker, that is why I saved everything.

I look forward to the opportunity to rebut all claims in court. (The MoS claim the trial is expected "within weeks." In fact it is scheduled for June 2015.)

Dear New Port Richey, Florida,

Hey there, it's been a while since we touched base. Soz about that. I've been away writing books and getting up to no good in the UK; you've been busy increasing your suburban sprawl to the point where there is now no clear boundary between you and the rest of the West Central Florida region (a.k.a. "the bit too far west of Disney").

Anyway, I thought we should probably catch up after you recently announced a new plan to arrest sex workers in the city limits. As I am arguably the city's best-known export, and certainly its best-known prostitute export, I'm surprised you didn't run this by me first. Because this plan of yours? I'm telling you this now, it ain't gonna work.

Just to catch up the rest of the folks reading this - the grandees of New Port Richey got tired of rigging elaborate stings to entrap sex wokers, so are giving cops free rein to arrest people who tick any three of eight "behaviours" off a list. These behaviours include asking if someone is a cop, getting into and out of cars at the same place by the road, trying to attract attention of drivers, and more.

You know who else asks if you're a cop? People who are trying to get help in an emergency. You know who else gets into and out of cars by the road every day? Students and workers waiting for their carpool. You know who tries to attract the attention of people driving by on US 19? Anti-abortion protestors. Last time I checked, New Port Richey had all of these in abundance.

That's the problem with these kinds of laws, you see. Profiling has a false positive rate greater than zero, and some of those false positives will no doubt lawyer up. Also, picking up people because you think they might possibly commit a crime in the future is not the same as detecting people who are actually breaking the law. It is - hm, how you say? - oh yeah, now I remember the word. "Unconstitutional." (My time in Florida's schools did not go to waste, as you can see.)

And while we're on the topic of what's legal and what's not, please explain to me what the point of criminalising sex workers is again? Because harassing people over a victimless crime seems like a pretty poor use of resources.

Back when I lived in Florida I knew a few women who were out there selling sex on the streets. Not one of them ever said, "you know what would change my life in a positive way? A mandatory minimum jail sentence and a thousand dollar fine." For the most part they were just trying to get by day to day, put food on the table, hoping maybe for something better someday. Jail is not that something better.

Remember how that Prohibition thing worked out with booze? The War on Drugs with drugs? Yeah, this is bound to backfire, too. The people you're trying to target - some of whom really are vulnerable - will be getting criminal records instead of a helping hand.

Meanwhile, the indoor sex workers like me who can easily dodge these ham-fisted vice moves will continue making money, because the truth is you can't stop the world's oldest profession.

Florida's an odd place, I'll grant you that, and it can be tough to set yourself apart when virtually every other town and city in the state has attracted international attention for doing strange stuff. Why, just down the road we have Clearwater, a place that's both the spiritual HQ of Scientology and the world HQ of Hooters restaurants. It's hard to compete with that kind of weird.

But this approach is not the way forward. Becoming well-known for something you didn't exactly plan on is kind of a bummer. I feel your pain. You know what? Sometimes you have to roll with the hand you're dealt. Like, maybe offering the sex workers passing through the Pasco County law enforcement system options other than going to jail? Or - if you're feeling like pushing the boat out a bit - letting adults mind their own business.

New Port Richey, you and me parted ways a while ago. But that doesn't mean there isn't still a part of you with me, and a part of me with you. I'd really appreciate it if you could do me a solid and reconsider this ill-thought idea. Otherwise I'm going to have to keep telling people I'm from this town, and from what I gather, that would probably rub you up the wrong way.

Sunshine and kisses,

Brooke

Listen to this week's podcast (September 9, 2011) Patterns For Large-Scale JavaScript Application Architecture Patterns For Large-Scale JavaScript Application Architecture is a lengthy article by Addy Osmani detailing some basic principles of writing a large-scale JavaScript application. It's inspired by a classic Nicholas Zakas talk outlining some of the same principles ...

Listen to this week's podcast (Podcast edit: I mistakenly mention Respond.js, which is actually a media query polyfill - I'm actually talking about Responsive images) Google Dart By far the biggest news of the week isn't JavaScript, but rather a language called Dart (formerly Dash?), which certain factions within Google hope will replace ...

This week's podcast (I was hoping to keep it short, but I kept talking and talking... sorry!) Libraries, frameworks, and code Cube - open-source visualization for time series data chainvas - chaining sugar for Canvas JS-Forth: Forth Interpreter in JavaScript when.js is a lightweight Promises and when() implementation (from CommonJS) MongoSpy is a MongoDB monitor that ...

Listen to this week's podcast (October 29, 2011) (23:05 minutes) I'm trying a little something different this week. I hope you guys like pictures. :) Brenden Eich + "I Like Ike" mashup by @lonnen 140 byte synthesizer A while back Jed Schmidt created a simple little project on GitHub called 140 bytes ...

Listen to the podcast for November 11, 2011 insertAdjacentHTML Mozilla has a nice overview of insertAdjacentHTML, a DOM function that's intended to supplement innerHTML. It's a bit less destructive and plays nicely with content that's already in the DOM. For instance, whereas innerHTML completely blows away whatever is inside the ...

Hello there, it's been a while! Oh dear, another year has passed. And it seems that I've been stocking up a year's supply of JavaScript tidbits to dump on the unsuspecting populace! Ok, not quite, but I do have quite a backlog, that's somewhat in chronological order, ...

Listen to this week's podcast (January 20, 2012)! iOS Orientationchange Fix jQuery Mobile's Scott Jehl has released iOS-Orientationchange-Fix (read his blog post). This has been a persistent annoyance on iOS since its release. You may be familiar with the mobile viewport tag, which allows you to properly fit sites to ...

Listen to this week's news roundup (January 30, 2012) I really should have named today's update "Planes, Trains and Automobiles", since those were all involved with my commute this unusual morning! This week's podcasts is surely enough recorded from SFO Airport, so I hope you enjoy the atmosphere and the ...

Listen to this week's podcast (February 6, 2012) psd.js psd.js is the beginnings of a Photoshop PSD parser in JavaScript! Right now it only essentially extracts metadata information - such as image size and layer information - but it's off to a good start! You can even drag and drop ...

(no podcast this week - Boo! Check back next week) Chrome for Android Google has just released a beta of Chrome for Android, which is available for those running Android Ice Cream Sandwich (aka "the 1%"). This isn't JavaScript-specific news per se, but it is HUGE news for web devs ...

Formula 1 drivers urged the operators of the Interlagos circuit to improve the new surface they laid ahead of this year's event.

In the round-up: New simulator 'like Star Wars' - Krack • Pirelli likes 'flexibility' of new C6 • Play NZ anthem when McLaren wins - Lawson

Niels Wittich's unexpected departure as Formula 1's race director recreates the circumstances in which Michael Masi was thrown in at the deep end.

What better time for some spooky music than Halloween week? And so today I am pleased to say the new m-orchestra mini-album A Blessing has been released for your listening delight! It features seven tracks, including the two singles that...

Education choice is succeeding in other states

Following our latest update on our preparations for the DMA (Digital Markets Act), we're sharing more details about what publishers can expect to see in regards to new search results in European Economic Area (EEA) countries, and how they can express interest in these experiences.

Today we announced the March 2024 core update. This is designed to improve the quality of Search by showing less content that feels like it was made to attract clicks, and more content that people find useful. We also shared that we have new spam policies to better handle the practices that can negatively impact Google's search results. In this post, we'll go into more detail for creators about both the update and the spam policies.

This post is about the new Google Trends Tutorials YouTube series. In these videos you'll learn how to use Google Trends to analyze patterns in Google Search and Youtube searches, and use them to create interesting content online.

We're sharing more information about our new search experiences in South Africa, and how South African platforms can express interest and participate.

This paper proposes a new approach to water flow algorithm for the text line segmentation. Original method assumes hypothetical water flows under a few specified angles to the document image frame from left to right and vice versa. As a result, unwetted image frames are extracted. These areas are of major importance for text line segmentation. Method modifications mean extension values of water flow angle and unwetted image frames function enlargement. Results are encouraging due to text line segmentation improvement which is the most challenging process stage in document image processing.

This paper focuses on improving the management of New-Product Development (NPD) processes within the particular context of a cluster of enterprises that cooperate through a network of intra- and inter-firm relations. Ceramic tile design chains have certain singularities that condition the NPD process, such as the lack of a strong hierarchy, fashion pressure or the existence of different origins for NPD projects. We have studied these particular circumstances in order to tailor Product Life-cycle Management (PLM) tools and some other management mechanisms to fit suitable sectoral reference models. Special emphasis will be placed on PLM templates for structuring and standardizing projects, and also on the roles involved in the process.

This paper offers an overview of the emerging domain of mobile governance as an offspring of the broader landscape of e-governance. Mobile governance initiatives have been deployed everywhere in parallel to the development of crowdsourced, open source software applications that facilitate the collection, aggregation, and dissemination of both information and data coming from different sources: citizens, organizations, public bodies, etc. Ultimately, mobile governance can be seen as a tool to promote the rule of law from a decentralized, distributed, and bottom-up perspective.

The paper explores the application of Web 2.0 technologies to support product development efforts in a global, virtual and cross-functional setting. It analyses the dichotomy between the prevailing hierarchical structure of CAD/PLM/PDM systems and the principles of the Social Web under the light of the emerging product development trends. Further it introduces the concept of Engineering 2.0, intended as a more bottom up and lightweight knowledge sharing approach to support early stage design decisions within virtual and cross-functional product development teams. The lessons learned collected from a cross-company study highlight how to further developblogs, wikis, forums and tags for the benefit of new product development teams, highlighting opportunities, challenges and no-go areas.

No Comment : un psychanaliste dans le métro new-yorkais

1. Guerre en Ukraine : Vladimir Poutine «est en train de lancer une attaque de missiles sur Kiev», avertit le chef de cabinet de Volodymyr Zelensky  CNEWS
2. Guerre en Ukraine, jour 994 : attaque massive sur Kiev, Blinken promet « une réponse ferme »  La Croix
3. Ukraine: Kiev visée par une attaque de missiles et de drones  RFI
4. Guerre en Ukraine. Alerte aérienne, soldats nord-coréens à Koursk… le point sur la nuit  Ouest-France
5. Vincent Hervouët : Trump mettra-t-il fin à la guerre en Ukraine ?  Le Journal du dimanche

1. Météo : jusqu’à quand le premier épisode de froid va-t-il durer ?  CNEWS
2. Météo : alerte à la vague de froid, la neige va tomber dans tous ces départements  Linternaute.com
3. Semaine prochaine : risque d'intempéries après 15 jours de calme  La Chaîne Météo
4. Qu'est-ce qu'une "goutte froide", phénomène météo qui touche la France cette semaine ?  Yahoo Actualités
5. Météo. Les premiers flocons sont tombés dans l’Ain  Le Progrès

1. ‘Been a long time since I felt that way’: Sexually transmitted infection numbers provide new hope  POLITICO
2. There are millions of sexually transmitted infections in the US every year, but new data shows the epidemic may be slowing  CNN
3. America's STD explosion laid bare and the shocking number of people catching one every minute  Daily Mail
4. At Long Last, the Surge in S.T.I.s May Be Leveling Off  The New York Times

1. Bev Priestman out at Canada Soccer in wake of Olympic drone-spying scandal  CTV News
2. Canada Soccer’s drone-spying redactions tell us a whole lot of nothing while it waits out the rage clock  The Globe and Mail
3. Key findings from Sonia Regenbogen's independent review into Olympic drone-spying  CP24
4. What comes next in Canada Soccer drone-scandal investigation?  Sportsnet.ca

1. John Krasinski named People magazine's 2024 Sexiest Man Alive  CTV News
2. Sexiest Man Alive John Krasinski on His 'Beautiful Life' – and Wallpapering His House with His Sizzling PEOPLE Cover  PEOPLE
3. Krasinski thought he was being 'punked'  CTV News Calgary
4. John Krasinski Reveals Wife Emily Blunt's Hilarious Response to His Sexiest Man Alive Title - E! Online  E! NEWS
5. Emily Blunt reacts after husband is named 2024 Sexiest Man Alive  The Independent

1. First Oppo Reno13 image appears online - GSMArena.com news  GSMArena.com
2. First look at Oppo Reno 13 shows an iPhone-like design  Notebookcheck.net
3. Oppo Reno13 series to arrive on November 25 - GSMArena.com news  GSMArena.com

1. Ottawa businesses brace for possible Canada Post strike before the holiday season  CTV News Ottawa
2. Tougher work conditions for postal workers at the heart of labour dispute, union says  The Globe and Mail
3. Ottawa businesses worry about potential postal disruption  CBC.ca
4. Calgary workers 'ready to go' if Canada Post, CUPW unable to reach agreement by Friday: union president  Calgary Herald
5. ‘Feeling the pinch’: Potential postal strike may be first of many, Manitoba prof says  Global News Toronto

1. Niagara Health offering free parking after delays reported  News Talk 610 CKTB
2. Implementation of new Niagara Health patient info system resulting in long wait times  St. Catharines Standard
3. Temporary delays impacting registration at emergency departments  Thorold News
4. Niagara Health Working Through Delays  101.1 More FM
5. Niagara Health experiencing temporary delays impacting registration and EDs  Niagara Health

Overwhelmed families surrendering custody of their children to CAS  CTV News Northern Ontario

1. Food bank usage in Toronto is higher than its ever been, says new report  CP24
2. More than 1 in 10 Torontonians now rely on food banks, 2024 saw highest number of visits ever recorded: report  NOW Toronto
3. 4 in 5 newcomers to Canada relying on food banks, Toronto report finds  National Post
4. One in 10 Toronto residents now relies on food banks: Report  Toronto Sun
5. Food bank use in Toronto breaks records — again  CBC.ca

1. Bear encounter recorded in Whistler Village prompts conservation officer warning  CTV News Vancouver
2. Tourists 'shocked' to see man approach black bear in Whistler  Pique Newsmagazine

1. Trump Taps Fox News Pundit to Be Secretary of Defense  Rolling Stone
2. Trump's defence choice stuns the Pentagon and raises questions about the Fox News host's experience  CTV News
3. How Pete Hegseth went from Fox News host to Trump’s Defense Secretary pick  CNN
4. Trump Puts Allies on Alert by Handing Pentagon to Fox News Host Hegseth  Bloomberg
5. House Democrat ‘very disturbed’ by Hegseth pick as Trump Defense secretary  The Hill

Based on a survey of 2548 American adults conducted by Pew Research Center in 2021, this study finds that trust in the accuracy of news circulated on X (former Twitter) is positively correlated with following news sites on X, underscoring the crucial role of trust in news accuracy in shaping news-seeking behaviour. Trust in news accuracy also positively relates to political participation via X. Those who trust in news accuracy are more likely to perceive X as an effective tool for raising public awareness about political and social issues, as well as a positive force for democracy. However, exposure to misinformation weakens the connection between trust in news accuracy and users' perception about X as an effective tool for raising public awareness about political or social issues and as a positive driver for democracy.

Aim/Purpose: This paper investigates the influence of university student multitasking on their learning success, defined as students’ learning satisfaction and performance. Background: Most research on student multitasking finds student multitasking problematic. However, this research is generally from 2010. Yet, today’s students are known to be digital natives and they have a different, more positive, relationship with mobile technologies. Based on the old findings, most instructors ban mobile technology use during instruction, and design their online courses without regard for the mobile technology use that happens regardless of their ban. This study investigates whether today’s instructors and learning management system interface designers should take into account multitasking with mobile technologies. Methodology: A quasi-experimental design was used in this study. Data were collected from 117 students across two sections of an introductory Management Information Systems class taught by the first author. We took multiple approaches and steps to control for confounding factors and to increase the internal validity of the study. We used a control group as a comparison group, we used a pre-test, we controlled for selection bias, and we tested for demographic differences between groups. Contribution: With this paper, we explicated the relationship between multitasking and learning success. We defined learning success as learning performance and learning satisfaction. Contrary to the literature, we found that multitasking involving IT texting does not decrease students’ learning performance. An explanation of this change is the change in the student population, and the digital nativeness between 2010s and 2020 and beyond. Findings: Our study showed that multitasking involving IT texting does not decrease students’ performance in class compared to not multitasking. Secondly, our study showed that, overall, multitasking reduced the students’ learning satisfaction despite the literature suggesting otherwise. We found that attitude towards multitasking moderated the relationship between multitasking and learning satisfaction as follows. Individuals who had a positive attitude towards multitasking had high learning satisfaction with multitasking. However, individuals who had positive attitude toward multitasking did not necessarily have higher learning performance. Recommendations for Practitioners: We would recommend both instructors and the designers of learning management systems to take mobile multitasking into consideration while designing courses and course interfaces, rather than banning multitasking, and assuming that the students do not do it. Furthermore, we recommend including multitasking into relevant courses such as Management Information Systems courses to make students aware of their own multitasking behavior and their results. Recommendation for Researchers: We recommend that future studies investigate multitasking with different instruction methods, especially studies that make students aware of their multitasking behavior and its outcomes will be useful for next generations. Impact on Society: This paper investigates the role of mobile multitasking on learning performance. Since mobile technologies are ubiquitous and their use in multitasking is common, their use in multitasking affects societal performance. Future Research: Studies that replicate our research with larger and more diverse samples are needed. Future research could explore research-based experiential teaching methods, similar to this study.

The EU 'General Data Protection Regulation' (GDPR) marked the most important step towards reforming data privacy regulation in recent years, as it has brought about significant changes in data process in various sectors, ranging from healthcare to banking and beyond. Various concerns have been raised, and as a consequence of these, certain parts of the text of the GDPR itself have already started to become questionable due to rapid technological progress, including, for example, the use of information technology, automatisation processes and advanced algorithms in individual decision-making activities. The road to GDPR compliance by all European Union members may prove to be a long one and it is clear that only time will tell how GDPR matters will evolve and unfold. In this paper, we aim to offer a review of the practical, ethical and constitutional aspects of the new regulation and examine all the controversies that the new technology has given rise to in the course of the regulation's application.

The European Union Rights Management Directive 2014/26/EU, provides regulatory oversight of European Union (EU) Collective Management Organizations (CMOs). However, the Directive has no provision indicating how members of EU CMOs may conduct non-financial audits of their CMO income and reporting. This paper addresses the problem of a lack of an audit method through a case study of the five writer members of the music group Duran Duran, who have been members of the UK's CMO for performing rights - the Performing Rights Society (PRS) for over 35 years. The paper argues a new audit CMO member method that can address the lacunae regarding the absence of CMO member right to audit a CMO and an applicable CMO audit method.