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Jefferies: Boeing may have to shore up about another $15 billion in capital at some point

Sheila Kahyaoglu of Jefferies discusses the biggest issues facing Boeing right now, with much of production still halted due to the coronavirus pandemic.




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Rystad Energy: Global crude storage capacity may reach the top in about 3-4 weeks

Bjørnar Tonhaugen of Rystad Energy discusses what could potentially happen to oil prices when the U.S. and the world is projected to run out of viable physical storage capacity, potentially sometime in May.




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Fed's Harker warns about reopening the economy too quickly

"Not only would this be a health catastrophe, but it would reverse the recovery as well," the central bank official said in a speech.




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Cramer says his most trusted indicator 'makes me concerned' about the market's trajectory

Stocks on Wall Street have reached levels that are "too hot" for Jim Cramer's liking.




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Cramer's lightning round: I am worried about Twilio

"Mad Money" host Jim Cramer rings the lightning round bell, which means he's giving his answers to callers' stock questions at rapid speed.




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5 things you don't know about your 401(k)

Investing in a 401(k) is vital for us to make sure we are set for the future but here are some things you may have not known about your 401(k). CNBC's Landon Dowdy zeros in on what you need to know.




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Plans to reopen US economy must 'talk about worker safety,' says AFL-CIO president

"If they don't feel safe, they're not going to go back to work,"AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka told CNBC.




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Billionaire Barry Diller says bail out everyone and 'worry about paying the bills later'

"The damage that is being done every day is enormous," Expedia and IAC Chairman Barry Diller told CNBC on Thursday.




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Bill Gates: Coronavirus may be 'once-in-a-century pathogen we've been worried about'

"I hope it's not that bad, but we should assume it will be until we know otherwise," Gates wrote in an article published Friday in The New England Journal of Medicine.




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Trader bets gold about to get its shine back

Bullion bounces back. Can gold shine again? With CNBC's Seema Mody and the Futures Now traders, Jim Iuorio at the CME and Anthony Grisanti at the NYMEX.




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What the B2B numbers tell us about the economy

Cortera Founder and CEO Jim Swift on how states are doing with their business reopening plans.




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Seven things you never knew about Scrabble

In honor of Scrabble Day, CNBC has compiled the most important numbers on the world-popular board game. Did you known approximately 150 million sets have been sold worldwide?




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Didi is 'even more confident' about entering global markets now, says president

Didi Chuxing is now "even more confident and more committed" to the idea of entering global markets in the wake of the coronavirus crisis, says Jean Liu, president of the mobile app-based transportation firm.




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US, China trade negotiators talk about phase one deal as uncertainty looms

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer spoke to Chinese Vice Premier Liu He late Thursday Eastern time.




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Cramer: I wasn't hopeful about Covid vaccine but Fauci's optimism could change my mind

CNBC's Jim Cramer said Thursday that he has gained confidence in Moderna's potential coronavirus vaccine due to recent comments from Dr. Anthony Fauci.




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Is the ECB stimulus program legal? A German court is about to decide

European debt holders are cautiously awaiting a ruling from a German court, which could impact how the ECB faces the ongoing economic crisis.




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'Not the economy, stupid': A majority of Americans say 2020 election will be about other issues

A majority of Americans think a recession is likely in the next year, but amid historically low unemployment and a record stock market, most voters say the 2020 election will not be about the economy, according to a new CNBC Invest In You survey on money and politics released Monday.




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It's not all about impeachment. These bills could impact your finances

Washington can feel pretty gridlocked these days. Still, there's a number of bills underway with bipartisan support that could impact your wallet.




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11 attorneys general sound alarm about meat industry

A group of state AGs are raising concerns about the meat industry. CNBC's Ylan Mui reports.




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'Concerned and confused' about the future, young adults try to navigate through the coronavirus crisis

From a drop in income to the inability to pay bills, young adults are facing obstacles they weren't necessarily expecting.




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Here's what you need to know about rent relief during the pandemic

Many renters across the U.S. don't have to worry about being evicted during the pandemic. Yet they can find themselves in a lot of trouble when the relief expires.




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Are you having second thoughts about that PPP loan? You have until May 14 to pay it back

If you had other sources of liquidity available to your company, and applied for the Paycheck Protection Program anyway, now might be the time to think about giving the cash back. You have just over a week to act.




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India primed: what Amazon's vast new Hyderabad campus reveals about its plans

Amazon have arrived in force in rapidly expanding Hyderabad, with designs on the currently almost non-existent Indian e-commence market

The futuristic lobby of the new Amazon building in Hyderabad feels as though it should have a permanent orchestra blasting out Also Sprach Zarathustra. The scale is intended to awe. A large slogan on a wall suggests the company is “Delivering smiles”. The only sound that rises above the hush is a synthesised beep, coming from a giant screen playing a video of the campus at various stages of its construction.

Built on nine acres in this Indian city’s financial district, it is Amazon’s single largest building globally and the only Amazon-owned campus outside the US. It can house over 15,000 employees, but its size is its main architectural feature: it resembles the same cube of glass steel and chrome seen in corporate offices across Hyderabad, though a flash of magenta reflected in one of the top floor windows, from a billowing sari across the road, is a nice Indian touch.

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European schools get ready to reopen despite concern about pupils spreading Covid-19

Germany’s top coronavirus expert says children play as big a role as adults in spread

More countries across Europe are preparing to reopen schools in the coming weeks despite conflicting advice from scientists, some of whom caution against underestimating children’s potential to spread the coronavirus.

Some schools and nurseries in Denmark and Norway have already reopened, and grandparents in Switzerland are allowed to hug grandchildren under 10, following a ruling by the health ministry’s head of infectious diseases that it is safe to do so.

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Worried about Zoom's privacy problems? A guide to your video-conferencing options

From FaceTime to Houseparty, there is no shortage of platforms for work and play as you shelter in place

With offices and schools around the world temporarily shut amid the coronavirus crisis, the video platform Zoom has seen overnight success. But growing concerns over security across the platform have many consumers wondering about tech alternatives.

Privacy-minded consumers should consider video chat options carefully, said Arvind Narayanan, an associate computer science professor at Princeton University who has been outspoken about the security concerns surrounding Zoom.

Related: ‘Zoom is malware’: why experts worry about the video conferencing platform

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Julie Andrews: 'I was certainly aware of tales about the casting couch'

The celebrated actor had a turbulent upbringing before becoming world-famous for playing two perfect nannies. Now she’s bonding with a new generation of children through her storytelling podcast

“I’ll tell you what, shall I go outside?” Julie Andrews asks. We are talking by phone, but, alas, the reception inside her home on Long Island is, she says, “always terrible”. Torturous minutes pass in which I can hear only fragments of her conversation, and if anyone knows of a sweeter agony than being barely able to hear Andrews’ still lovely, melodious voice, I don’t want to know what it is. Eventually, I have to tell her this phone conversation isn’t working.

“I can stand out in my garden, although it is a bit nippy …” Andrews suggests.

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'It's a mistresspiece!': the 14-hour film about forgotten female directors

Mark Cousins’ latest encyclopedic romp is a glorious enterprise that unearths footage from some of the greatest film-makers ever – all of them women

A perfect lockdown gift has landed, one which might have sounded daunting in ordinary times: a 14-hour documentary about female directors, which goes live from next week on BFI Player. This glorious enterprise unearths footage from some of the greatest movie-makers of this century and the last – all of them female. At the same time, the BFI is showing 36 of the hundreds of films mentioned, so that viewers can enjoy full immersion over weeks, possibly awarding themselves a degree in, say, The Cinema of the Second Sex afterwards.

Narrated by women including Tilda Swinton and Thandie Newton, Women Make Film – A New Road Movie Through Cinema is the latest encyclopedic romp from the Northern Irish film historian and documentary-maker Mark Cousins, who previously directed the 15-hour television series The Story of Film: An Odyssey, in 2011. The new documentary will be released in palatable chunks over five weeks from 18 May, and aims to open a conversation on the lost legacy of women behind the movie camera.

Related: Angry young women: how radical, female film-makers defined the spirit of '68

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Dickie Felton interviewed on Talksport about his love of Morrissey and The Smiths




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What we learned from Hank Green about building community online

Tech Exchange is a student exchange program between Google and 11 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs). During the program, students spend a semester at Google’s Mountain View Campus, taking computer science courses and learning about professional development. With Tech Exchange students now learning from home, we brought in a speaker who has made a name for himself by engaging with people online: Hank Green, author and YouTube creator. 

Hank began his journey as a YouTube Creator in 2007 when he and his brother John decided to communicate with each other through video blogs every day for a year. As more people started watching the Vlogbrothers, Hank and John went on to create 32 YouTube channels including Crash Course and SciShow. In a virtual Q&A with Tech Exchange students, Hank shared his insights on how to build community online. Here’s what we learned.

Understand the problem that you’re trying to solve

Hank is often asked, “How does one become a YouTuber?” He says the first step is to understand the question you’re actually trying to solve. “Is it that I want to have a job where I get to be creative all day? Is it that I want to make a specific kind of content that I know is going to be high impact ? Is it that I want to have an audience or that I want to have influence?”

Once you actually know that answer, think about the first step on that path (this applies to content creation but also in everything in life!). It’s important to understand what tools you bring to the table. Put the problem that you’re trying to solve in a bucket with your tools and see what falls out. 

There are other people like you in the world, create for them.

Hank shared three strategies that he and John learned when building the Vlogbrothers community. The first is to find common values and interests. “You just have to say, ‘What is the stuff that I would like to see made in the world?’ There are other people who, it turns out, are somewhat like you in the world, and they will be there for it.” The second is to build a feeling of actual connection and the third piece is what I call the "touchstone," which is the YouTube creator building a relationship with the viewer. You have to make people feel like this person is worthy of being the nexus of a community.

Put the problem that you’re trying to solve in a bucket with your tools and see what falls out.

Create content that represents various perspectives

Through Hank’s channels, he hopes to put out more content that is representative of a variety of voices and perspectives. To do this, he says you have to find hosts who don’t all look the same. But you have to go beyond that too, and give them full ownership of the creative process. The writing, the editing, the style need to be informed culturally all the way through. 


For more tips on building community, check out YouTube Creator Academy and Hank’s YouTube Channel, Vlogbrothers.




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Scientific American: As Trump Touts Dangerous Cures, Here's What We Know About COVID-19 Drug Tests

President Trump dangerously suggested injecting disinfectants could help patients sick with the coronavirus, then said he was being "sarcastic." But his remarks led to a spike in calls to helplines about taking disinfectants. We look at "What We Know About the Most Touted Drugs Tested for COVID-19" with Tanya Lewis, associate editor for health and medicine at Scientific American.




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Antimatter Discovery Reveals Clues about the Universe's Beginning

New evidence from neutrinos points to one of several theories about why the cosmos is made of matter and not antimatter

-- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com




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Diet Cig - Do You Wonder About Me? [2020]

Дата релиза: 01.05.2020

uploaded by st.liar

Список треков:
01. Thriving
02. Who Are You
03. Night Terrors
04. Priority Mail
05. Broken Body
06. Makeout Interlude
07. Flash Flood
08. Worth The Wait
09. Stare Into The Sun
10. Night Terrors (Reprise)

Скачать и обсудить альбом здесь




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WTF Am I Quarantining About

quarantine is lame.




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Everything You Knew About Dinosaurs Was WRONG

Misconception: T-Rex was king of the dinosaurs. WRONG. Dinosaurs had no king. Rather than establishing a traditional monarchy, they adopted a parliamentary republic with citizen-initiated referenda.




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Covid-19: Doctor speaks out about Iran's handling of pandemic

We continue our coverage of the Covid-19 pandemic in the Middle East. Iran is one of the worst-hit countries in the region – authorities there have reported more than 6,000 deaths. But observers and health experts say the numbers are in reality much higher. After weighing up economic risks against health ones, the country's leadership decided to reopen businesses in late April, followed by schools and mosques. We speak to a doctor from Tehran, who has been on the frontlines of the battle against Covid-19. He has asked for his identity to be concealed.



  • Middle East matters












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What You Need to Know About How California's New Law AB-5 Affects Writers


Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware®

Scroll down for updates

Last year, California passed a new law, AB-5, intended to make things better for gig economy workers, such as Uber and Lyft drivers, by forcing these companies to provide employee protections and benefits for their freelance workers.

However, the narrowly-written law, which went into effect on January 2, has created unintended consequences for freelance writers, most of whom are independent by preference. If they sell 35 or more pieces to the same company in a year (which can easily happen with short blog posts or  product reviews), the company must treat them as employees rather than freelancers and pay payroll taxes as well as unemployment and other insurances. Even before the law went into effect, companies were laying off California freelancers and seeking replacements in other states.

Book writers may be affected too, under certain specific circumstances.

The article below was originally published by the Authors Guild; I'm re-printing it with permission. This is an issue all writers need to be aware of, as similar laws are under consideration in other states, including New York and New Jersey.

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We have been receiving inquiries about California’s new law AB-5 and similar pending legislation in other states that require companies hiring individuals on a freelance basis for labor or services to treat them as employees, unless the individual’s work falls within one of several exceptions. Laws like AB-5 (which goes into effect on January 2) are meant to aid gig economy workers, such as Uber and Lyft drivers, who work for a single company and have no employee protections. They are well-intentioned pieces of legislation, but unless they are narrowly written, they can go beyond protecting gig workers and disadvantage many traditional freelancers who wish to remain independent by overriding existing state agency law.

To be clear, the Authors Guild fully supports employment protections for freelance journalists and authors, and will be lobbying for collective bargaining rights in 2020. Like Uber drivers, writers have no benefits and are often paid less than minimum wage. But forcing writers to work as employees, especially on a state-by-state basis, is not the way to go about it. The situation in California speaks to the importance of deliberation, careful drafting, and getting buy-ins from the various industry groups. Similar “gig worker” bills are in the works in New York and New Jersey. The new draft NJ bill includes a strict, sweeping version of the ABC test. Those working closely on the bill are concerned that freelance journalists will in many cases be treated as employees. We will watch the bill and do our best to ensure that the necessary protections for freelance journalists are added.

* The NY bill attempts to exclude freelance journalists, and we have provided comments to the drafters to make it clearer.* (correction 12.30.19)

AB-5’s 35-Submission Cap

As many of you are aware by now, much of the debate surrounding AB-5 comes down to its 35-submission cap applying to the contributions of freelance journalists, editors, and photographers. When the bill was being negotiated, a coalition of writer and photographer groups, including the Authors Guild, was able to get an exception for freelance writers. Unfortunately, Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, who sponsored the bill, added a cap of 35 pieces per company—meaning that once a freelance journalist or editor submits 36 articles or jobs for the same company in one year, the freelancer must be treated as an employee and the employer must pay California State unemployment and employee insurances.

Many full-time writers today patch together a living from different sources—and they want to keep it that way. Because of AB-5, California freelance journalists writing 35 or more pieces for a single company fear losing clients to writers in states with laxer laws. Indeed, some publications have already stated that they will not hire California freelance writers because of the new law. 35 articles might seem like a lot, but there are plenty of writers who write more than that. Writing a short weekly blog piece for a client could easily put a writer over this limit.

Another problem with treating writers as employees and not freelancers is that employee-writers do not own the copyright in their work; instead, the employer is considered the “author” under copyright law and automatically owns the copyright in its creation. Of course, as most major publications today insist on an assignment of copyright anyway, the practical effect, unfortunately, is the same: the writer gives up copyright. Still, freelance writers who assign copyright can reclaim it after 35–40 years, which is a benefit that employee-writers lack.

Does AB-5 Apply to Book Contracts?

Authors have raised alarm that AB-5 will apply to book writers as well. The Authors Guild has been reviewing the bill from that perspective since it was first introduced. We were assured by those working on the bill that trade book authors are not covered, and we do not see a basis for disagreeing since the bill clearly states that AB-5 applies only to “persons providing labor or services” and authors provide neither “labor” nor “services” under standard book contracts—they instead grant copyright licenses or assignments. Additionally, royalties—even in the form of advance payments—are not considered wages. It is difficult to imagine how a court would conclude that a typical book contract is for labor or services.

Writers with Service-Like Obligations Should Get a Legal Opinion

There are, however, some book-writing agreements that could be considered service agreements and arguably would fall under AB-5, such as work-made-for-hire agreements and contracts where the author has ongoing obligations and the publisher has greater editing ability or control over the content. Authors and writers working under multi-book contracts are most likely to encounter such a situation. These authors’ contracts should be reviewed by an attorney to determine whether they are subject to AB-5. Publishers and authors who want to be certain to retain a freelancer relationship should be careful to make sure the contracts are written as simple license grants and not as services agreements. For instance, the agreement should be written as a copyright grant of a defined work without interim or ongoing obligations, and remuneration should be in the form of royalties and advances against royalties. The writer should also have full control over their work and use their own workspace and tools. As a general rule, it is also recommended that freelance editors and journalists have written contracts that allow them to work when and where they want with no oversight other than approval of the finished work product.

If you have such a contract and are an Authors Guild member, remember that we do review members’ contracts for free. You can send us the agreement using our online form, and our legal team will get you comments and let you know if you need to revise the agreement.

UPDATE 1/16/20: Washington (State, not DC) is contemplating a bill like this as well. From the comments, below:
WA should be on your watchlist, too. An AB5-like bill was just re-introduced in the Senate there, even though it had been defeated last year. It, too, requires writers and other freelancers and independent contractors be hired as employees when their works contribute to the normal business of their clients. The bill ignores a study of independent contractors that was prepared by the Dept of Commerce after the bill's defeat. The study documents that 3/4 of the independent contractors in WA don't need or want the employee benefits touted by the bill's advocates. Between their own efforts and those of their families and friends, they're doing fine. Read the study yourself then write to Sen. Karen Keiser about your opposition to being made employees against your will.

The study: https://app.leg.wa.gov/committeeschedules/Home/Documents/26113?//20902
Senator Keiser: karen.keiser@leg.wa.gov
A similar law may be in the works in Illinois.

UPDATE 1/20/20: This article from Digiday explores the negative impact that AB-5 is already having on freelancers and publishers in California.




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Ohio isn’t an anomaly—the anti-choice movement is about punishment

Earlier this month, the Ohio state House passed a bill that would ban abortion with virtually zero exceptions when the fetus develops a heartbeat at about six weeks, which is before many women realize they’re pregnant. And as of last week, Ohio’s state House is considering another bill, HB 565, which would confer personhood upon […]




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What Backlash Against “Political Correctness” is Really About

The last few weeks have seen Virginia racked by government scandals, including Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring’s histories with blackface, and allegations of sexual assault against Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax. Democratic Party leadership has since swiftly called for the resignations of Northam and Fairfax — demands that some on both sides of the aisle […]




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“It’s about heart! Specifically a heart that stopped beating, because of cancer”

Comics Curmudgeon readers! Do you love this blog and yearn for a novel written by its creator? Well, good news: Josh Fruhlinger's The Enthusiast is that novel! It's even about newspaper comic strips, partly. Check it out! Funky Winkerbean, 5/7/20 OK, I am ashamed to admit this, but: I genuinely do not have a handle […]