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Seniors: John Lemp, 70
Has been working for more than 50 years in the business — M. Lemp Jewelers in Syracuse — that his great-grandfather started in 1890 By Mary Beth Roach Don Lemp owns and represents the fourth-generation of the family business, M. Lemp Jewelers, but he still calls himself “a counter guy.” “I love interacting with couples. It’s a wonderful business. You’re celebrating marriages, engagements, births, anniversaries — all these different significant moments that people invite you into their lives for whatever brief period of time it might be to help them celebrate whatever their important occasion is,” he said. This is one of several reasons why Lemp, at 70, has been working for more than 50 years in the business that his great-grandfather started in 1890. Always located in the downtown Syracuse area, the store has been situated in the building that the family owns on East Fayette and Warren streets since 1971. He jokes that he’s been in the business so long he is now selling engagement rings to the second generation in some families. He also loves the opportunity to learn about the ever-changing industry and gemstones. “You have to know not only diamonds, but all the colored stones, from A to Z, from andalusite to zircons,” he said. Lemp said he had originally thought he wanted to become an attorney, but while working part-time in the store while attending college at Syracuse University, he decided to follow in the family business. His father, Walter D. Lemp Sr., and his mother tried to discourage their son from pursuing retail, reminding him of the hectic hours and lifestyle intrinsic in this business. But the younger Lemp [whose full name is Walter D. Lemp Jr.] prevailed. So, over the years, father and son got to work together in the family business for 35 years. And while many other jewelers retreated from downtown to suburban malls in the 1970s, the Lemps decided to stay downtown. And it’s a decision that Lemp Jr. feels it has worked out well. As he explained, downtown Syracuse is seeing a rebirth. One website, Point2Home.com, has noted that more than 6,000 people live there and the median income is about $62,000. In addition, according to the website that Lemp built years ago, the store can cater to customers throughout the country. His customers, whether from across the country or across Onondaga County, are just one reason that Lemp stays engaged in the business. His employees, the opportunity to continue to learn in an industry, and the challenge to continue to improve business are all other reasons, he noted. He’s also been able to travel to India to buy diamonds and he enjoys buying and selling estates. “I’d rather gallop in the corral than ride into the sunset,” Lemp said.
‘I jumped at it’: Australia’s new CDC chief on trust, misinformation and never being surprised by a health threat
Zoe Wainer’s parents started the country’s first public abortion clinic. Now she is making history too, as the inaugural head of the Australian Centre for Disease Control
Americans wait overnight for access to free healthcare as costs soar ‘out of reach’
Some Americans are sleeping in their cars for days to receive free healthcare from Remote Area Medical's volunteer pop-up clinics across the country. CEO Chris Hall shares details.
See inside the first night of Hondo Rodeo: Cowboys, ropers, Lynyrd Skynyrd take on NOLA
This country extravaganza had it all.
Iraq elects Kurdish politician Nizar Amidi as president amid war fallout
BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq’s parliament voted Saturday to elect Nizar Amidi, a political official with one of the country’s two main Kurdish parties, as president, five months after a parliamentary election that didn’t produce a bloc with a decisive majority.
France Kicks Windows to the Curb, Pivots to Linux OS
David Amiel, France’s Minister of Public Action and Accounts, said his country must 'break free' and 'become less reliant on American tools.'
What does American politics look like beyond Trump?
Introducing America, Actually — a new kind of political podcast for a country redefining itself.
Trump Likes to Back Winners in Foreign Elections. the Upcoming Vote in Hungary Will Test His Clout
WASHINGTON (AP) — In Hungary, President Donald Trump and his top officials used social media and an election-eve trip to Budapest to promote the country’s far-right prime minister in his reelection campaign. In Argentina, the U.S. administration worked to prop up the country’s financial markets to ...
DC leads the nation in first-year business failures
Washington, D.C. is the toughest place in the country to launch a new business right now. One in three businesses will fail in the first year, according to a new survey from Lending Tree.
AP report: Trump administration admits a glaring error in its New York health fraud accusations
The error, which the administration admitted first to The Associated Press, prompted health analysts to question how many of the Republican administration’s sweeping anti-fraud efforts around the country were based on faulty findings.
North Carolina Republicans Are Trying to Give One of the Country’s Most Partisan Judges a Frightening New Power
Over the past several years, the state’s Republicans have attempted—with varying degrees of success—power grab after power grab.
Trump’s Pakistan gamble: Can talks produce peace?
Iran will approach these meetings pretending it’s the power at the table. That’s what they do. But the boastfulness conceals a country that has just been hammered militarily, in shambles economically, and without the support of its own people.
Trump admits error in accusations about New York health care fraud
The error prompted health analysts to question how many of the Republican administration’s sweeping anti-fraud efforts around the country were based on faulty findings.
Peru's Dysfunctional Politics Are an Economic Time Bomb
Peru has gone through three presidents since October, yet markets have largely yawned: Country risk has edged up only marginally, credit default swaps remain well below their five-year average and the currency has even gained against the dollar.
20 years after passing nation-leading health care law, Mass. braces for new challenges
A landmark health coverage law passed 20 years ago gave Massachusetts among the lowest uninsured rates in the country. It inspired the sweeping federal overhaul known as the Affordable Care Act. Now many are wondering whether that period of intense negotiations and compromise offers lessons for today's urgent health care challenges.
The nation’s cartoonists on the week in politics
Every week political cartoonists throughout the country and across the political spectrum apply their ink-stained skills to capture the foibles, memes, hypocrisies and other head-slapping events in the world of politics. The fruits of these labors are hundreds of cartoons that entertain and enrage readers of all political stripes. Here's an offering of the best of this week's crop, picked fresh off the Toonosphere. Edited by Matt Wuerker.
China’s Huatai Is Seeking to Start Securities Business in Japan
Huatai Securities Co., one of China’s largest brokerages, is preparing to start a securities business in Japan as a revival in the country’s financial markets draws firms from around the world.
Cuban president urges US dialogue without conditions of political change
Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel told NBC News that the country has asked U.S. President Donald Trump's administration to engage in dialogue without demanding changes from Cuba's political system or imposing other conditions, the network said on Thursday.
Exclusive: DraftKings, FanDuel, Fanatics, Bet365 fund sports gambling super PAC
Several major sportsbooks have contributed tens of millions of dollars to a super PAC to support sports betting throughout the country, Axios has learned.
The Science Behind the Pain of Losing a Beloved Pet
Earlier this year, one particular Reddit thread struck a nerve with dog owners across the country. The original poster reportedly lost their dog and asked their boss for a couple of days off to grieve...
‘A clear and present danger to the country": Democratic Congresswoman on calls for Pres. Trump to be removed from office
A record-breaking field: What to expect from Peru’s presidential election?
Crime and corruption are top issues for voters as the country struggles to cope with persistent political instability.
A deal or a mirage? Trump’s Iran ceasefire collides with chaos on the ground
Less than three hours before President Donald Trump’s 8 p.m. deadline for Iran to make a deal or face his apocalyptic warning of death and destruction, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine, the country’s top two military officials, were summoned to the White House.
ACM Awards 2026 Nominations: Megan Moroney, Miranda Lambert & More Nominees
Find out which country stars are up for awards at the May 17 show.
Megan Moroney, Miranda Lambert and Ella Langley lead 2026 ACM Awards nominations dominated by women
Megan Moroney leads the 2026 Academy of Country Music Awards with nine nominations | Talk 1370
Megan Moroney, Miranda Lambert and Ella Langley lead 2026 ACM Awards nominations dominated by women
Megan Moroney leads the 2026 Academy of Country Music Awards with nine nominations | 1010 WINS
Megan Moroney, Miranda Lambert and Ella Langley lead 2026 ACM Awards nominations dominated by women
Megan Moroney leads the 2026 Academy of Country Music Awards with nine nominations | KNSS Radio
Rep. Seth Moulton picks: Josh Shapiro or Gavin Newsrom?
Democratic Rep. Seth Moulton, who launched a primary challenge against Sen. Ed Markey to represent Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate, answered rapid-fire questions on his decision to return money from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), his past comments about trans athletes and his stance on ICE. With the 2026 elections underway, The Post's Anna Liss-Roy is grilling candidates in races across the country, pressing Democrats and Republicans to share their takes at high-speed.
Navy Sports Information Office Named one of the 11 Best SID Offices in the Country for the Ninth Time and for the Seventh Time in the Last Eight Years
DALLAS (FWAA) – One first-time winner and 10 previous ones comprise the 17th Super 11 Awards, presented annually by the Football Writers Association of America to the best performing College Sports Communicators departments in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision. The awards announced today are for the 2025 season.
Elissa Slotkin is testing whether winning in Trump country is a winning message for Democrats
Sen. Elissa Slotkin knows how to win in Trump country. She’s trying to show her fellow Democrats the way.
Rays announce country singers for summer concert series at Trop
The Tampa Bay Rays have announced three country music performers as part of the Rays Concert Series at Tropicana Field.
RFK Jr. says he's launching a podcast to expose 'lies' that have made Americans sick
The show will launch next week and feature Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaccine crusader who has reshaped the country’s health policy, in conversation with doctors, scientists and agency staff.
College of Health Professions’ Audiology Program Achieves No. 18 in Country
The Doctor of Audiology (AuD) program at the University of Tennessee Health Sciences ranked No. 18 in the nation in U.S. News & World Report.
County supervisors fielding complaints about controversial Winneshiek County Fair entertainment
The Winneshiek County Board of Supervisors is receiving complaints from the public regarding a musical group scheduled to perform at this year’s Winneshiek County Fair. The fair announced late last month the southern country-rock band Confederate Railroad would be part of this year’s musical lineup, along with Kayley Green and headliner Travis Denning. Online responses
Country Thunder is no friend of sea turtles, or following protocol
Event promoters are already selling tickets even as the event's status remains in question.
People visiting Japan are too scared of breaking rules, says local
As a resident of Japan, I've seen tourists to my country scared to break rules or make etiquette mistakes. But respect matters more than perfection.
A new generation of politicians of colour is emerging in France. The backlash speaks volumes
Local elections have led to a surge of racism in a country that still struggles to see itself as anything other than white, says Guardian Europe columnist Rokhaya Diallo
Texas talk of swallowing eastern New Mexico is an old impulse
A legislative directive to study a merger with eastern New Mexico is the latest example of secessionist sentiments around the country. The breakaway notions are fanciful but the discontent is real.
Rosenberg: Viola, Liza, and two more audiobooks with showbiz roots
New works from two EGOTs – that’s Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony winners Viola Davis and Liza Minnelli – along with a fine novel set in the country-music world and
Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Ray Stevens recovering after breaking neck
i a e n celebrity country-music music grammy-awards entertainment u-s-news general-news | Talk Radio 1210 WPHT
D. Wayne Lukas, Louis Cella To Be Inducted Into Arkansas Sports Hall Of Fame
For decades, Oaklawn Park’s Arkansas Derby has served as one of Thoroughbred racing’s most important proving grounds, where champions sharpen their form before heading to Churchill Downs. Today, the Arkansas track hosts one of the richest racing meets in the country, drawing many of the sport’s ...
Ohio State competition prompts students to put business skills to work
Students from across the country gathered at The Ohio State University’s Columbus campus recently to participate in the annual Fisher Invitational Case Competition.The Fisher College of Business hosted the competition with Battelle, a Columbus-based nonprofit, private company that applies science and technology to solve challenges in the envir...
Marketplace - Business News & Economic Stories for Everyone
Marketplace raises the economic intelligence of the country through the unorthodox story, casual conversations and unexpected angles on the news.
Inside Iowa Politics: Candidate Jim Carlin doesn’t want American troops on the ground in Iran
Jim Carlin, a former state senator who is running for the U.S. Senate, said that he supports the U.S. strikes on Iran but doesn't want to see the country engaged in a long war.
Inside Iowa Politics: Candidate Jim Carlin doesn’t want American troops on the ground in Iran
Jim Carlin, a former state senator who is running for the U.S. Senate, said that he supports the U.S. strikes on Iran but doesn't want to see the country engaged in a long war.
Inside Iowa Politics: Candidate Jim Carlin doesn’t want American troops on the ground in Iran
Jim Carlin, a former state senator who is running for the U.S. Senate, said that he supports the U.S. strikes on Iran but doesn't want to see the country engaged in a long war.
Bourbon demand is down and tariffs aren't helping. But distillers keep building.
Like many whiskey distillers, Heaven Hill Brands is rolling back bourbon production this year, as demand lags. Yet, as the American spirit faced a tumultuous market in 2025, the Kentucky company built a new, $200 million distillery in the heart of bourbon country, adding 155,000 barrels of capacity.
MIT graduate engineering and business programs ranked highly by U.S. News for 2026-27
U.S. News and World Report ranked MIT’s graduate engineering program No. 1 in the country for 2026-27. The MIT Sloan School of Management is ranked as the nation’s No. 6 business school.
MHR Roundup: Monday, 4/6
Your end-of-day recap for 4/6/2026 of everything worth reading, watching, and talking about in Broncos Country.
Elite EDGE Mekai Brown down to five schools
The Northeast’s top high school football prospect is down to five schools. Greenwich (Conn.) Country Day four-star EDGE Mekai Brown has been consistently on the road since the fall, getting a look at myriad high-profile programs. After his latest swing of spring trips, Brown is ready to narrow his focus. The 6-foot-6, 235-pounder told Rivals’ […]
Iran rejects latest ceasefire proposal as Trump’s deadline approaches
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran on Monday rejected a 45-day ceasefire proposal and said it wants a permanent end to the war, while President Donald Trump appeared to widen his threat from civilian targets to the whole Islamic Republic and his ultimatum ticked closer. “The entire country can be taken out in one night, and […]
Country artists Big & Rich to headline Coralville 4thFest
Country music duo Big & Rich will headline a free concert at Coralville’s 4thFest on July 3, 2026, with special guest KC Bruner. The concert is open to all ages.
Bridging Gaps in Mental Health Care: A Multi-country Research Initiative
By combining cutting-edge digital technologies with rigorous evidence across countries, BRIDGE-MH aims to transform how mental health needs are identified and addressed in humanitarian settings.
‘Marshals’: All the Details on Riley Green’s Acting Debut
How Luke Grimes helped the country music star audition for the part, plus when his episode airs.
Foley Entertainment Group, hotels appoint sales, marketing leaders
A number of hotels—as well as Foley Entertainment Group—have appointed sales and marketing leaders in recent weeks. | Hotels and resorts across the country have new sales and marketing leaders.
The Science Behind Fish Markets And DNA Tracking In The Arabian Gulf
Scientists in Bahrain are building the country’s first DNA reference library for sharks and rays using fish market samples, unlocking the full potential of environmental DNA to identify species in one of the hottest and most understudied seas on Earth.
Country music star and husband planning to have kids: ‘Little ones say that it is OK’
The singer has been opening up about his life around he release of his new memoir.
Recognizing the value of generational work
The Lesser Prairie Chicken habitat in southeastern Colorado is a swath of prairie that begins in Cheyenne and far-southeastern Lincoln counties and moves south and east into Kiowa, Prowers and Baca counties. This is cattle country where the short grass is nutrient dense, and a little bit of rain makes the prairie explode. A little […]
On plant health and embracing new plant-breeding techniques in South Africa
The major challenge currently confronting South Africa’s agriculture is the spread of foot-and-mouth disease. For many farmers across the country, the most urgent tasks are both securing sufficient vaccines and rolling them out quickly in the coming months, particularly as the beef and dairy industries continue to suffer big losses. There is also pressure on sheep, goats, and other livestock to prevent the disease from spreading. As efforts to get the country through this monumental challenge continue, I believe it is important to sharpen our focus on the broader task at hand: strengthening biosecurity. This covers both animal and plant health. In recent years, we haven’t focused much on plant health, except a few times, such as when we had a goss’s wilt scare in the maize industry, a few cases of citrus black spot, or cases of sclerotinia in sunflower seeds. But the fact that South Africa managed to control the outbreaks of these particular diseases when they occurred a few years ago was due to organized agricultural and government scientific capabilities, and, most importantly, the availability of crop protection or agrochemicals necessary to address some of them. Therefore, as the animal health division in the Department of Agriculture focuses on the pressing challenge of the day, the foot-and-mouth disease, there is an opportunity for the plant health division to assess if they have all the requirements to tackle any outbreak that may occur on fruits, vegetables or crops in future. The challenge with crop diseases is that they can spread quickly and cause much more rapid damage in the field than we typically see with livestock. Therefore, speed is everything in ensuring the appropriate controls are available. I raise this as an important area, particularly given the drastic climate variation we observe across the country. The production conditions in some areas have changed noticeably over time, which may introduce new risks. The other essential part is ensuring that South Africa has access to the best crop protection technology available in the market. Many technology developers worldwide have operations in South Africa. Therefore, the Department of Agriculture, along with the Agricultural Research Council, must continuously interact with technology developers to assess the various crop protection technologies they are releasing globally and determine their suitability and need in South Africa. This will require a proactive approach from the government, unlike the current approach, in which technology developers typically approach regulators with new technologies. The government, recognising the food security risks, must take a proactive approach to ensure that South African farmers have access to the latest crop protection technologies, thereby safeguarding the country’s food security. Beyond crop protection, we must never forget that South Africa’s agriculture is key to ensuring that the country is the most food-secure country at the national level in sub-Saharan Africa. South Africa is also the only African country in the top-40 global agricultural exporters, having more than doubled since 1994 on the back of the adoption of high-yielding seed cultivars. South Africa has been the only African country to adopt a bold approach to embracing science and adopting genetically engineered seeds for grains and oilseeds in the early 2000s. Since then, we have seen crop yields improve noticeably, contributing to the gains we mentioned above. But ensuring that South Africa improves further is not a given. The key lies in South African regulators’ attitudes towards new technologies. We have to maintain a progressive approach and not give in to the politics of non-food and non-scientific voices that shout on the sidelines. Food security is national security, and the government must ensure we progress, leaning on science. Therefore, the registration of high-yielding new genomic techniques is required. South Africa cannot afford to fall behind the EU, the USA, South America, and many of its competitors in global agriculture. The Department of Agriculture’s crop science division must adopt a progress-and-science-embracing approach for the good of the country. Thanks for reading AgriView! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Subscribe Share
WHO commends Indonesia’s leadership in One Health action to reduce risks from priority zoonotic diseases
On World Health Day, the World Health Organization (WHO) highlights Indonesia’s progress in reducing health risks from zoonotic diseases through a strengthened One Health approach. One Health recognizes that the health of people, animals and the environment are closely connected and must be addressed together. Led by the Government of Indonesia and supported by WHO and partners, the country has expanded joint prevention, surveillance and response efforts across sectors.
Sunday Sports: A coach retirement, a trip to Florida, and the Red & Black are back
Here’s a recap of your North Country sports this Sunday.
Birthplace Museum hosts speaker on old-fashioned recording
BRISTOL — The Birthplace of Country Music Museum invites the public to its April Speaker Session for a one-of-a-kind experience with musician and historian Martin Fisher on Tuesday, April 14
‘Sheriff Country’: Matt Lauria Addresses Possible Mickey & Boone Romance
'Boone really gets tested towards the end of the season.'
Lebanon’s political elites are using displacement and humanitarian crisis to delay elections again
With the return of Israeli forces, the Lebanese parliament scrapped elections scheduled for May. The move is a recurring theme in the country’s fractured politics.
Iran Executes Two Over Political Protests
Iran executed two men linked to recent anti-regime protests, according to a government statement. Authorities in the country have carried out death sentences for at least 13 political prisoners since the war’s start, according to the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, a Norway-based group that mo
New Owner of Shopping Plaza in Kansas City Pitches a $1.5 Billion Rescue Plan
The Country Club Plaza’s sale and turnaround plans come at a consequential economic time for Kansas City, Mo., which will soon lose the Chiefs football team.
Saturday Sports: Lacrosse, baseball, and more from around the North Country
Here’s a recap of your North Country sports this Saturday.
Chris Cagle brings country hits to Hard Rock Tulsa May 8
TULSA – Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa will welcome the electrifying country music artist Chris Cagle at 8 p.m., Friday, May 8, at Hard Rock Live inside the casino.
Bangor councilor makes controversial comments on hot mic
The Bangor School Department issued a statement in response to Mallar’s comments: “As a public school system, we accept all students regardless of their background, country of origin, immigration status, religion, or family circumstance.”
‘Fire Country’: Max Thieriot Teases Someone From Bode’s Past Coming Up
'May not be the best thing, but ...'
Album Review: 6WA by BigXthaPlug & 600 Entertainment
BigXthaPlug spent eight months in Nashville making a country-rap album that debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard 200, put “All the Way” with Bailey Zimmerman at No. 4 on the Hot 100, got him a Rolling Stone cover, and filled arenas with Jelly Roll. And then he came back to Dallas, rounded up four of his signees, and made a gangsta-rap record with N.W.A’s Straight Outta Compton on the cover. 6WA is the second group release from 600 Entertainment, named after the 600 block of Meadowridge Street in Ferris, Texas, where BigX and his people grew up. The whole thing is loaded with West Coast samples. From N.W.A.’s “8Ball,” Eazy-E’s “Real Muthaphuckkin G’s” and “Boyz-N-The-Hood,” Ice-T’s “6 in the Mornin’,” Snoop Dogg’s “Nuthin’ but a ‘G’ Thang” and more. BigX is staking his name on the lineup he built—Rosama, MurdaGang PB, Yung Hood, KevanGotBandz, KaineMusic—and claiming a lineage from 1,400 miles away while insisting Dallas is its own thing. A million dollars in cash, split and handed straight to his mother. That’s the first place BigX goes on “From the Bottom.” He’d probably still be in the streets if he didn’t have his son and daughter. He only started rapping to make life better for Carter. Couldn’t start his car back then, now people get starstruck at Starbucks, and he throws the whole field away in one sentence: “How you think we competin’? You on the same bag, I just made me some millions off country.” Goyard bags off a Nashville payday, and he wants you to know exactly how far he’s come from everybody else. “Safe to Say” does something similar but looser. It’s a straight Ice Cube “It Was a Good Day” flip, and BigX nails it. Wakes up, checks both phones, nobody’s locked up, kid accounts look good. Gets pulled over, only catches a warning. Pulls up on the squad to liquor, ladies, and haze. Rosama takes the second verse and matches him. Wakes up to his girl cleaning his cuticles, twins playing peekaboo, pays off his car, calls a cousin, sees the opps and they don’t trip. Lawyer calls, he beat his case. Rosama is the strongest voice in the 600 camp after BigX, and “Life of a Gangster” is why. Third person, riding low, blacked-out windows, snub-nose revolver. A character who chose sticking people up over selling dope. “Quick eraser like a number-two pencil.” He never breaks character, and his delivery drops lower and slower than anything he does on the group cuts, like he’s telling you something at a cookout that he probably shouldn’t. Then on “Long Live Fre$h” he’s a completely different rapper. “Short-bus diamonds, these bitches retarded,” wide-body Durango he can’t even park. That kind of range matters on a group record. MurdaGang PB’s best verse is on the title track. Feds at his door at 6 AM, cameras busted, flushing dope, ram truck putting everybody on the floor. Yung Hood on “The Hottest” just lays out four reasons to keep hustling. Who wants to be broke, women cost money, you need bail, and home has to be straight. It’s funnier and more honest than most rappers get when they’re trying to explain why they sell drugs. KevanGotBandz on “Ain’t Never Slowin’ Down” talks about his father getting caught on the dope while he’s sitting on $300K somewhere in the hills, which is a specific kind of guilt that doesn’t usually make it onto crew tapes. KaineMusic, the newest signee, takes the back half of “Who Dunnit” and introduces herself in third person—“Took flight just to show these hoes how to perform”—but it’s too short to know if she can hold a full song. The flex tracks fill the middle of the LP and mostly run together. “I Go” is Rosama and PB trading brands, guns, and food punchlines. Rosama’s “anemic, my iron tucked low in this shirt” is a slick gun bar, PB fires back with “.223 with a clip ‘bout as big as a toddler” and “I go Burger King, stay with that whopper.” Quick, funny sometimes, but it’s all shopping lists. “Dopeman” is a chant. “6ixer Party” brings Snoop Dogg, who does exactly what you’d expect Snoop Dogg to do. BigX contributes the night’s wildest overshare: “She say she brought a friend too, well, I’m tryna put sausage on her dental.” These songs move fast and don’t overstay, but three or four of them could trade verses and nobody would catch it. Midway through, The D.O.C. shows up for a spoken-word interlude. Tracy Curry. West Dallas native, former N.W.A affiliate, co-writer on a lot of the records getting sampled on this very album. He thanks BigX for the tribute and then gets direct: “This your time, this DFW time. You need to do it like we do it down here.” Leave bread crumbs so everybody behind you can eat. Keep God in your life. It’s fatherly and generous, and it does raise the question of whether 6WA follows that advice. The album borrows heavy. The cover art, the Eazy-E samples, “Amerikkka’s Most Wanted” opening with a direct “Boyz-N-The-Hood” lift, Yung Hood rapping “Flag on my left side, Crip until I die.” But the stuff that actually stays with you is Dallas. BigX talking about Pleasant Grove, Rosama calling himself a country boy, PB recounting a raid that could’ve been last Tuesday. The record smells most like itself when it smells like Ferris, Texas, and least like Compton. BigX on “The Hottest” says his father was the first person he knew who had chickens. Not the way rappers usually wave at the drug trade. He means his actual father, his actual family. On “600 Degrees,” Rosama compares his chopper’s stutter to a speech disorder, PB claims he still has the block on his back even after leaving the city. BigX closes that one saying he used to spin and smack, and now the plaques are platinum. Thirty-two minutes was right for this. Nobody overstays, Tony Coles and Rance and Charley Cooks keep the production punchy, and BigX gives his signees real room instead of crowding every song. 6WA doesn’t reinvent anything. Five rappers, good beats, short clock. Most of what they say you’ve heard before. Some of it—the million to his mother, the cuticles and peekaboo, the four reasons to hustle—you won’t forget. Solid (★★★½☆) Favorite Track(s): “Safe to Say,” “From the Bottom,” “The Hottest” Subscribe
Small Business Cybersecurity Training Program Scales Nationwide
The national Small Business Development Center is taking a program that was started in Delaware and offering it through its full 1,200-center network across the country.
MassLive: Boston, Springfield land on top 10 list of best cities for STEM professionals
Boston and Springfield were among the "Top 10 best metro areas for STEM professionals" in 2018, according to statistics compiled by WalletHub, a personal finance website. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Boston was ranked second and Springfield eighth on the list. Worcester came in at 18th. The full results can be found here. "We made another good list," Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno said. "Glad to see our educational and workforce development are starting to pay off - this is all about a good four-letter word - jobs!" The 100 largest metropolitan areas in the country were ranked in 17 key metrics, WalletHub said. The evaluation ranged from "per-capita job openings for STEM graduates to annual median growth for STEM jobs, to projected demand for STEM workers by 2020," according to the summary. Seattle was top-rated, followed in order by Boston; Pittsburgh; Austin, Texas; Minneapolis; Madison, Wisconsin; Salt Lake City; Springfield; Chicago; and Atlanta. Original article: https://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2018/11/springfield_makes_top_10_natio.html
Former U.S. ambassador speaks about Iran at UMaine
Nicholas Burns, who served as ambassador to China, NATO and Greece, shared his thoughts on the Trump presidency, U.S. relations with China and the war in Iran: “When you conduct a war, the whole reputation and future of the country is on the line."
Gemma 4 and what makes an open model succeed
Having written a lot of model release blog posts, there’s something much harder about reviewing open models when they drop relative to closed models, especially in 2026. In recent years, there were so few open models, so when Llama 3 was released most people were still doing research on Llama 2 and super happy to get an update. When Qwen 3 was released, the Llama 4 fiasco had just gone down, and a whole research community was emerging to study RL on Qwen 2.5 — it was a no brainer to upgrade. Today, when an open model releases, it’s competing with Qwen 3.5, Kimi K2.5, GLM 5, MiniMax M2.5, GPT-OSS, Arcee Large, Nemotron 3, Olmo 3, and others. The space is populated, but still feels full of hidden opportunity. The potential of open models feels like a dark matter, a potential we know is huge, but few clear recipes and examples for how to unlock it are out there. Agentic AI, OpenClaw, and everything brewing in that space is going to spur mass experimentation in open models to complement the likes of Claude and Codex, not replace them. Especially with open models, the benchmarks at release are an extremely incomplete story. In some ways this is exciting, as new open models have a much higher variance and ability to surprise, but it also points at some structural reasons that make building businesses and great AI experiences around open models harder than the closed alternatives. When a new Claude Opus or GPT drops, spending a few hours with them in my agentic workflows is genuinely a good vibe test. For open models, putting them through this test is a category error. Something else to be said about open models in the era of agents is that they get out of the debate of integration, harnesses, and tools and let us see close to the ground on what exactly is the ability of just a model. Of course, we can’t test some things like search abilities without some tool, but being able to measure exactly the pace of progress of the model alone is a welcome simplification to a systematically opaque AI space. Share The list of factors I’d use to assess a new open-weight model I’m considering investing in includes: Model performance (and size) — how this model performs on benchmarks I care about and how it compares to other models of a similar size. Country of origin — some businesses care deeply about provenance, and if a model was built in China or not. Model license — if a model needs legal approval for use, uptake will be slower at mid-sized and large companies. Tooling at release — many models release with half-broken, or at least substantially slower, implementations in popular software like vLLM, Transformers, SGLANG, etc due to pushing the envelope of architectures or tools. Model fine-tunability — how easy or hard it is to modify the given model to your use-case when you actually try and use it. The core problem is that some of these are immediately available at release, e.g. general performance, license, origin, etc. but others such as tooling take day(s) to week(s) to stabilize, and others are open research questions — with no group systematically monitoring fine-tunability. In the early era of open models, the days of Llama 2 or 3 and Qwen pre v3.5, the architectures were fairly simple and the models tended to work out of the box. Some of this was due to the extremely hard work of the Llama, Qwen, Mistral, etc. developer teams. Some is due to the new models being genuinely harder to work with. When it comes to something like Qwen 3.5 or Nemotron 3, with hybrid models (either gated delta net or mamba layers), the tooling is very rough at release. Things you would expect to “just work” often don’t. I’ve been following this area closely since we released Olmo Hybrid with a similar architecture, and Qwen 3.5 is just starting to work well in the various open-source tools that need to all play nice together for RL research. That’s 1.5 months after the release date! This is just to start really investing more into understanding the behavior of the models. Of course, others started working on these models sooner by investing more engineering resources or relying on partially closed software. The fully open and distributed ecosystem takes a long time to get going on some new models. All of this is lead-in for the most important question for open models — how easy is it to adapt to specific use-cases? This is a different problem for different model sizes. Large MoE open-weight models may be used by entities like Cursor who need complex capabilities in their domain, e.g. Composer 2 trained on Kimi K2.5. Other applications can be built on much smaller models, such as Chroma’s Context-1 model for agentic search, built on GPT-OSS 20B. The question of “which models are fine-tunable” is largely background knowledge known by engineers across the industry. There should be a thriving research area here to support the open ecosystem model. The first step is to understand characteristics of different base and post-trained models to understand what they look like. The second step is to tune pretraining recipes for open models so they’re more flexible. Interconnects AI is a reader-supported publication. Consider becoming a subscriber. Subscribe For The ATOM Project and other Interconnects endeavors, we’ve put in substantial effort to measuring adoption trends in the open ecosystem. Everything takes a long time to unfold after a model is first publicly available — and adaptability is why. What we know for sure now, when Qwen has been going from strength to strength with its releases, is that technical staff across the industry has gotten comfortable working with Qwen models. Countless research methods and datasets were made to work with Qwen. It’ll take patience for any other model family to get to this point — a patience I’m not sure many open model builders have. This takes us to Gemma 4, Google’s latest open models. Gemma 3 was released more than a year ago, in March of 2025, and is a bit underrated. Gemma 4 comes in 4 sizes for now, with a bigger, MoE model of over 100B total parameters rumored but not released yet. The models we have today come in sizes of ~5B dense, 8B dense, 26B total 4B active MoE, and 31B dense. I’m most excited that they’re finally adopting a standard Apache 2.0 open source license. This’ll massively boost adoption. The standard of better licenses for strong open-weight LLMs was set by mostly Chinese open model labs in the last 1-2 years, and now U.S. companies are following suit. I will personally be so happy if the horrible Llama licenses and Gemma terms of service were an ~18-month transient dynamic of the industry being nervous about releasing strong open models. The Gemma 4 scores look very solid, the small models have incredible benchmark scores (especially in general domains like LMArena) and the 31B model rivals the recent Qwen 3.5 27B, which is the leading member of that class. The ~30B size range is an important one, as it’s accessible both to researchers and to enterprises looking to deploy the model in real use-cases. Where the 7B model scale is the default for tinkering and research, a 30B model is the default for seeing if an open model can unlock substantial value in your specific workflow — a good mix of intelligence, low price, tractability for downstream training, etc. This takes us back to the above adoption criteria I mentioned for open models and the bigger question — do I think Gemma 4 will be an overwhelming success? Previous Gemma models have been plagued by tooling issues and poorer performance when being finetuned. Gemma 4’s success is going to be entirely determined by ease of use, to a point where a 5-10% swing on benchmarks wouldn’t matter at all. It’s strong enough, small enough, with the right license, and from the U.S., so many companies are going to slot it in. I’m cautiously optimistic that Gemma 4 is going to work better here. Winds are shifting for open models built in America. We saw GPT-OSS go through a bumpy launch to become an overwhelming success. There’s a collective energy around the likes of Reflection, Arcee, Nemotron, Gemma, Olmo, and peers that show substantial demand for building new stacks around open models. There’s capital to be spent on AI stacks across the economy by those who want more ownership of everything, including the model. After launching The ATOM Project 240 days ago, the conversation is shifting into the next stage. Summer of 2025 was a crisis moment where the U.S. AI scene realized it can’t wait and figure out open models after building AGI. The two markets will capture different areas and proceed in parallel. Now that more companies in the U.S. are releasing strong models, we need to improve the ecosystem so that these models are easy to use, understand, and build value around. It’s the hard work to build another inflection point in these adoption plots I’ve been updating consistently, but that’s the work to be done. Join me in it. More data coming soon! Here’s a sneak peek:
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