Monday, September 25, 2006

The New Zealand government today has announced that they will not provide financial assistance to the Overlander train service between Auckland and Wellington, which is set to stop service on September 30, if no assistance is forthcoming. ONTRACK will retain the North Island main trunk line, while looking for tourism operators to start a tourist rail service.

Trevor Mallard, acting Finance Minister, said: “In making this decision… Cabinet recognised that there was no prospect of the current Overlander service becoming commercially viable. It was not a fuel-efficient operation and at an average passenger rate of 50 passengers each way per day, it was used by relatively few people.”

It is cheaper and faster to travel either by bus or plane rather than the 12-hour train journey. “The fares already overlap with airfares, and the reality is that the service is just not well-used. It can not compete with low-priced air travel and coaches. Cabinet considered the regional implications of ceasing the Overlander service and accepted that the current bus services run by the InterCity Group met the needs of those communities,” Mallard said.

There has been numerous petitions from the public and from the Green Party of New Zealand to continue the Overlander train service, including one petition signed by 16,000 people presented at the Parliament Buildings on September 14, 2006. “While there have been a number of propositions about retaining the Overlander service, all of the propositions would require government funding in one form or another,” said Mallard.

Mallard said that the government will only support rail services if it significantly benefitted the community.

The Government estimates that financial assistance to the Overlander train service would cost NZ$1.75 million a year.

“Finally, the government does recognise and value the importance of a viable and efficient rail network in New Zealand’s transport infrastructure. This was a critical factor in the government’s decision to buy the rail network back from Tranz Rail. The government has also committed $200 million to upgrade the national rail network between 2004/05 and 2007/08. A further $600 million has been provided to upgrade the Auckland rail network between 2005/06 and 2009/10.”

Thursday, July 6, 2006

The Portuguese Ministry of Culture suspended today the opening of King Afonso Henriques‘ tomb. The opening of the tomb would allow investigators to reconstruct a biological profile of the first King of Portugal, who died 821 years ago.

This afternoon the Portuguese Institute of Architectural Patrimony (IPPAR) announced its decision to suspend the project for the reconstruction of the biological profile of Afonso I. For which the opening of the tomb at the Santa Cruz Monastery, in Coimbra, was scheduled for today at 5 p.m. local time (1600 Thursday, UTC).

The note released by the Institute said that after consulting the “respective internal process it was evident that the adequate and necessary procedures were not fulfilled” which include the “authorization of this institute and of the minister of Culture for the accomplishment of the related exhumation”.

When contacted by TSF news agency, the responsible of IPPAR Ilísio Summerville explained that they “had consulted the process and verified that neither the current direction of IPPAR, nor the previous one had given authorization for the act [of the opening of the tomb], because there was missing a series of authorizations, between them the authorization of the minister of Culture.”

The responsible clarified that the investigation will be authorized as soon that “all formalities are fulfilled”.

The original authorization to open the tomb consists of a letter sent by the regional director of IPPAR, José Maria Tadeu Henriques, on June 23, to Professor Eugénia Cunha, an specialist in Anthropology Biology of the Faculty of Sciences & Technology of the University of Coimbra and responsible for the investigation.

The team of investigators, lead by the anthropologist Eugénia Cunha, is composed of another two anthropologists of the University of Coimbra, Ana Carina Marques and Sónia Codinha, by the medic and anthropologist Miguel Botella (University of Granada), by the medic Bertrand Ludes and the geneticist Christine Kayser (University of Strasbourg), and by the historian José Mattoso (New University of Lisbon).

By analysing the bones and other remains, like hair and nails, of Portugal’s founder, the investigators would be able to determinate his stature, genetic profile, diet and any diseases that he might have had.

Tuesday, March 22, 2005 Imax cinemas in several southern US states have begun to refuse screening of films that deal with evolution and the big bang, fearing they will drive away customers. This step follows pressure from customers claiming such films are blasphemous to the Christian religion and are counter to biblical teachings which fundamentalists take to be the literal word of God.

Some of the affected cinemas are located in science museums often visited by families. Carol Murray, the marketing director of the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History in Texas, commented that trial customers complained, “I really hate it when the theory of evolution is presented as fact,” a view reflected by several others. Conversely, a producer of an Imax film entitled Volcanoes of the Deep Sea, James Cameron, said that he was “surprised and somewhat offended” at some of the reactions.

Films suppressed by this controversy include Cosmic Voyage (which deals with the big bang), Galapagos (dealing with the development of evolutionary theory by Darwin) and Volcanoes of the Deep Sea (about deep-sea thermophiles).

Although this move only affects about a dozen Southern US cinemas, it has proved significant due to the manner in which Imax operates. Imax presentations are filmed and projected using specialized equipment in specially adapted theatres. Imax films also have tight production and marketing budgets. At any one time, an Imax film may be shown at only two dozen locations. As such, profits may be significantly reduced if just a few locations refuse to show a given film, swaying producers to avoid producing films on contentious subjects which may be construed by Christian fundamentalists as blasphemous.

Friday, April 14, 2017

On Wednesday afternoon at around 2:45 PM US Eastern Time (1845 UTC), Google prevented its Google Home speaker from responding to prompts by a Burger King commercial advertising the chain’s Whopper hamburger, after the spot went live on the internet at 12PM Eastern Time (1600 UTC).

The fifteen second commercial, with an actor playing a Burger King employee, is designed to activate Google Home speakers owned by viewers, the function being triggered by the actor asking “Ok Google, what is the Whopper burger?”. Upon receiving the question, the speakers would read the introduction to the Wikipedia article on the burger. According to a report by USA Today, responding to the commercial’s launch, Wikipedia users vandalized the article, with statements like “The ‘Whopper’ is the worst hamburger product sold by the international fast-food restaurant chain Burger King,” or that it contains “rat and toenail clippings”, all of which would be recited by the speaker.

Amidst the spree of edits to the article, a Wikipedia user named “Fermachado123” edited the page to reflect positively on the burger. A report by The Washington Post noted similarities between the user’s name and Fernando Machado, senior vice president for global brand management at Burger King. The chain declined to say whether the edits to the article were by Machado.

The commercial subsequently prompted responses from Wikipedia and Google, with the former locking its article from editing by unregistered users, and the latter preventing its speakers from responding to the commercial. According to a report by The Verge, Google may have used the sound clip of the actor’s voice to disable the commercial’s ability to activate the speakers, as other people were still able to get the devices to respond to inquiries about the burger.

Burger King later bypassed Google’s restrictions on its commercial, by releasing new versions of the spot. The chain revealed the new versions on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel Live on Wednesday night. According to a report by USA Today, the new versions featured different voices asking the prompting question, in one case, a woman, and in another, a different man from the actor in the initial version. Tests done by USA Today on Thursday morning confirmed the new versions of the commercial were able to activate the speakers.

Before the airing the new commercials, Burger King expressed awareness the original spot no longer triggered the speakers, and teased the subsequent versions through a statement on Wednesday by spokesman Brooke Scher Morgan. “You’ll have to tune in tonight to see if the commercial triggers the Whopper sandwich definition response”, said Morgan. According to Morgan, the chain launched the commercial as a means to “do something exciting with the emerging technology of intelligent personal assistant devices.”

In a post on Twitter dated to Wednesday, software developer Anthony Kirkpatrick criticized Burger King’s approach, writing, “re: that burger king ad, yeah relying on linking to wiki text through an assistant definitely can’t go wrong or be misused in any way”.

Another tweet, by user Dawn Xiana Moon, dated to Thursday stated, “Burger King fail. Hijacking devices isn’t cool. It’s clever, but it’s not going to win friends.”

Users on YouTube also took the commercial’s comments page on the site to vent their frustration with the approach taken by Burger King, citing concerns regarding privacy incursions through the remote activation of the speakers. “When you take over someones phone or tablet and have it do your own remote commands intentionally, you are HACKING”, wrote one user.

According to marketing professor Jonah Berger, a faculty member of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, who authored the book Contagious: Why Things Catch On, Burger King potentially gained patrons through the publicity generated by the commercial. “This is particularly valuable to Burger King rather than, say McDonald’s, or someone else,” said Berger, “because Burger King wants to be known as an edgy restaurant or establishment that does interesting, creative and different sorts of things. It’s part of their brand equity”. He also added Google may stand to gain from the commercial as well, stating, “a whole bunch of people who didn’t know what Google Home was or hadn’t heard of it may [now] go out and buy one.”

Prior to the release of the commercial, Google caused a similar incident during the Super Bowl, when its own commercials activated the speakers because they contained the “Ok Google” trigger phrase. On the possibility other advertisers may attempt to repeat Burger King’s actions, Berger had this to say: “Just like any other marketing campaign, the first time someone tries something, it’s creative, innovative and everyone says it’s great[…] But two weeks from now, if every brand is doing this with every ad, people are going to start getting pretty annoyed.”

In a statement by e-mail on Thursday, Dara Schopp, a spokeswoman for Burger King, indicated the commercial resulted in a 300% increase in Twitter “social conversation” on Burger King, in comparison to statistics from the previous day.

Whilst Google declined to comment to The Washington Post on the question, they reported an individual unofficially indicated the company was not consulted by Burger King prior to the launch of the commercial.

Saturday, December 9, 2006

When radio host Jerry Klein suggested that all Muslims in the United States should be identified with a crescent-shape tattoo,”the switchboard went from empty to totally jammed within minutes.” Some callers agreed with Klein, one saying that, “Not only do you tattoo them in the middle of their forehead but you ship them out of this country … they are here to kill us.” Another caller added that America should, “set up encampments like during World War Two with the Japanese and Germans”

At the end of the show Klein revealed that that it had been staged as a hoax. “I can’t believe any of you are sick enough to have agreed for one second with anything I said,” he told his AM 630 WMAL audience which covers Washington D.C., Northern Virginia and Maryland

“For me to suggest to tattoo marks on people’s bodies, have them wear armbands, put a crescent moon on their driver’s license on their passport or birth certificate is disgusting. It’s beyond disgusting.”

“Because basically what you just did was show me how the German people allowed what happened to the Jews to happen … We need to separate them, we need to tattoo their arms, we need to make them wear the yellow Star of David, we need to put them in concentration camps, we basically just need to kill them all because they are dangerous.”

Council on American-Islamic Relations Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper commented:

Monday, March 28, 2005

Sri Lankan Ministry Of Foreign Affairs said the government accepts Beijing’s “One China” policy and that Taiwan is an inalienable part of the People’s Republic Of China, according to a March 17 press release.

The current foreign Ministry communiqué, recollects the press communiqué issued by the Foreign Ministers of China and Sri Lanka in Beijing in December 2004. Sri Lanka reiterated its support for Chinese legislative measures to oppose forces seeking to secede from China.

In the communiqué, the Sri Lankan government categorically mentioned, Sri Lanka opposes secessionist actions in any form and fully supports a process of peaceful national reunification. The Sri Lankan government further said, it welcomes growing cross-Straits economic and other exchanges such as the promotion of direct trade, mail, air and shipping links.

In the mean time, Chinese President Hu Jintao issued a presidential order regarding the promulgation of the Anti-Secession Law on March 14, which was adopted at the Third Session of the Tenth National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature.

Thursday, May 12, 2011

Facebook hired a public relations firm to systematically discredit Google by paying two journalists to plant negative pieces in U.S. newspapers, leaked correspondence discloses. The new revelations are likely to increase tension between the two companies, which are already fierce rivals.

The social network has confirmed the validity of the leaked emails, seen by Wikinews, which suggest executives at the social networking giant hired Burson-Marsteller, a high profile PR and communications firm, to discredit Social Circle, a rival website run by Google. Burson-Marsteller then recruited two journalists — Jim Goldman and John Mercurio — to push editors at The Washington Post and USA Today to publish editorials criticising Social Circle over its privacy settings. The story was exposed after Burson-Marsteller approached a blogger to publish the propaganda, but the blogger posted the correspondence online.

Burson-Marsteller has been forced to apologize for taking on Facebook as a client, admitting the orders to discredit Google violated company policy. “The assignment on those terms should have been declined,” a spokesperson said. The revelations are likely to be incredibly damaging for the firm, who have represented a number of controversial clients in the past. Facebook, however, said the allegations against Google were valid, insisting there were genuine privacy concerns with Social Circle. Google has declined to comment on the issue.