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Comic-Con 2026: Johnny Depp promotes 'Ebenezer'

There was a Thursday panel about vampires

Jul 24 • 11:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • spectrumlocalnews.com

Colombia Schools, Businesses Urged to Go Remote on Natural Gas Pause

Colombia’s government is urging schools and businesses to operate remotely for several days starting next week as the nation braces for natural gas rationing during planned maintenance of its sole import terminal.

Jul 24 • 10:52 AM EDT • Business • bloomberg.com

Boston Red Sox Reportedly Promote Top Prospect to Triple-A

Jul 23 • 11:04 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Mika Baur to Celtic transfer stalls over small amount

Sky Sports reports that negotiations between Celtic and SC Paderborn over attacking midfielder Mika Baur have temporarily stalled. The newly promoted Bundesliga club remain unwilling to lower their ��...

Jul 23 • 4:20 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Wilmington announces business and economic development chief

The city of Wilmington announced on Thursday the hiring of Louis Starks as its new business and economic development manager. According to a news release, the role focuses on strengthening Wilmington's business ecosystem, supporting entrepreneurship and advancing strategic economic growth. "In this role, Starks will collaborate with residents, local businesses, community groups, educational institutions and regional partners to promote investment, workforce development, and innovation for businesses of all sizes," the release stated. "He will also help connect small businesses with City procurement opportunities, cultivate public-private partnerships, and lead initiatives that promote long-term economic vitality." Starks has more than 20 years of experience in economic development, urban planning, housing finance, workforce development and public policy, according to the release. Most recently, he served as manager of business development for Oakland County, Michigan, "where he led teams focused on business retention and expansion and financial services for one of the nation's most economically diverse regions. During his tenure, his teams supported billions of dollars in business investment initiatives while helping create thousands of jobs," the release stated. He holds a law degree and master's degree in urban and regional planning from the University of Iowa, as well as a bachelor's degree from Duke University. He is also a Certified Economic Development Professional. Starks is expected to begin his Wilmington position on July 27. “Louis has built his career around helping individuals, organizations and communities reach their full potential,” stated city manager Becky Hawke in the release. “Whether supporting entrepreneurs, managing complex redevelopment projects, or bringing together public and private partners, he has consistently focused on creating opportunity and delivering results. He understands that a strong economy creates opportunities for everyone. By supporting local businesses and fostering innovation, his work will help ensure the benefits of Wilmington’s growth are felt throughout the community, creating jobs, strengthening neighborhoods, and improving quality of life for residents.”

Jul 23 • 2:03 PM EDT • Business • wilmingtonbiz.com

Monza secure Mangas from Sporting CP, fight for Asante too

Newly promoted Monza are very active, today signing Ricardo Mangas from Sporting CP, on loan with obligation to buy at certain conditions, and targeting Maccabi Tel Aviv defender Tyrese Asante.They we...

Jul 23 • 1:50 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Europe fines Google $1 billion for ‘harming’ online rivals

The European Union has fined Google €890 million ($1 billion) for breaching rules designed to promote competition in digital services

Jul 23 • 6:47 AM EDT • Business • cnn.com

Trump touts children’s investment accounts as he searches for a political win

The president promoted his “Trump accounts” program on a visit to Georgia, hoping to give Republicans an economic message that will connect with voters before the midterms.

Jul 22 • 7:08 PM EDT • Politics • washingtonpost.com

Former Wisconsin Democratic chairman writes book about protecting democracy

Ben Wikler is on a multi-state tour to promote, “This Is The Plan.”

Jul 22 • 5:25 PM EDT • Politics • spectrumnews1.com

US regulators to weigh controversial peptides backed by RFK Jr

FDA has questioned the evidence as demand surges for the compounds promoted for sleep, muscle growth, and anti-aging.

Jul 22 • 4:39 PM EDT • Health • aljazeera.com

Mice on 'godforsaken' frozen volcanoes eat toxic plants to survive conditions 'not remotely compatible with long-term human survival'

Researchers risked their lives to study Andean leaf-eared mice on the inhospitable peaks of the Puna de Atacama volcanoes in Chile.

Jul 22 • 1:54 PM EDT • Science • livescience.com

UA researcher leads global effort to promote reliable health information

UA's Rebecca Ivic anchors a global commission on health communication sponsored by Nature Medicine, a leading academic journal.

Jul 22 • 10:30 AM EDT • Health • news.ua.edu

NYC Health + Hospitals’ NYC Care Program Starts ‘Light The Way’ Truck Outreach Initiative To Promote Health Care Access

New York, NY – NYC Health + Hospitals’ NYC Care program today announced the return of the city-wide ‘Light the Way Truck’ outreach initiative. Starting in

Jul 21 • 1:23 PM EDT • Health • nychealthandhospitals.org

Echo Lake Entertainment Hires Tanayri Novoa, Promotes Shiva Kaya

Echo Lake Entertainment has two new managers: new hire Tanayri Novoa, as well as Shiva Kaya, who was promoted from coordinator.

Jul 21 • 1:00 PM EDT • Entertainment • deadline.com

Financial incentives, flexibility and safe living needed to retain remote health care workers

Appropriate housing and safety, adequate time off and financial incentives are among the key factors supporting primary health care workers in remote jobs across Australia, according to a new study by ...

Jul 21 • 11:40 AM EDT • Health • medicalxpress.com

Bills’ ‘Nightmare’ Scenario Revealed That Could Derail Josh Allen’s Season

The Buffalo Bills made a big decision this offseason when they parted ways with head coach Sean McDermott and promoted Joe Brady to the new role.Buffalo struggled to reach the Super Bowl over the last six seasons, so it needed to take action to give the Bills and their fans a boost, which meant parting […] The post Bills’ ‘Nightmare’ Scenario Revealed That Could Derail Josh Allen’s Season appeared first on HEAVY.

Jul 20 • 11:11 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Hackers are exploiting recently patched WordPress bugs, putting millions of websites at risk

Two critical security flaws in WordPress’ software have given hackers the chance to remotely take over tens of millions of websites, according to an estimate by a cybersecurity researcher.

Jul 20 • 11:35 AM EDT • Technology • techcrunch.com

Your LG TV Remote Can Control Your PlayStation 5 - Here's How

Sony offers a media remote for the PlayStation 5, but you don't need it if you own an LG TV remote. You can set it up via the Simplink function.

Jul 20 • 9:47 AM EDT • Technology • bgr.com

Shaky political "science": breakdown of the peer review process

[This article is the latest in our “Shaky Political Science” series. In our 38 page report, “Shaky political ‘science’ misses mark on ranked choice voting,” released in December 2025, we examined over 40 studies focused on ranked choice voting (RCV). Many of these studies suffered from puzzling research methodologies, poorly constructed surveys, unrealistic simulated elections, cherry picked data and faulty analyses that often were contradicted by results from real-world elections (a link to our full paper is here). Here are links to the first four articles in our series: the first one summarizing the overall results of our report; the second one analyzed a study co-authored by University of Minnesota academic Larry Jacobs, which was one of the most error-prone of all the research we reviewed in our report; a third article showing an admirable example of two political scientists holding two other political scientists accountable for their flawed, sloppy research; and a fourth article that analyzed seven studies sponsored by New America’s political reform program that deployed flawed methodology based on “simulated” elections instead of real-world elections, which when combined with some basic misunderstandings of RCV, produced odd and misleading results]. In this fifth article in our “Shaky Political Science” series, we examine two flawed studies on the impact of RCV on voter turnout authored by San Francisco State University professor Jason McDaniel. McDaniel’s research in these two papers stands out for its puzzling methodology, inadequate and cherry-picked data, and faulty analyses that not only misunderstands ranked choice voting but reflects a basic misunderstanding of politics in general. The first of the McDaniel studies actually passed through a peer review process and then was subsequently published by the Journal of Urban Affairs, despite its obvious errors. It is perplexing that a jury of peer political scientists did not catch the errors and send it back to McDaniel for a rewrite or outright rejection. This calls into question the credibility of the peer review process itself. The peer review process is supposed to represent the intellectual pinnacle of the profession – a way for academics to certify the quality of each other’s work, and to act as a check against sloppy research. In the case of the McDaniel study, the peer review process failed. Yet his flawed study has been cited dozens of times by other political scientists in their own flawed works — an unvirtuous circle of academic research. Here is the first Jason McDaniel study that we analyzed: “Writing the Rules to Rank the Candidates: Examining the Impact of Instant-Runoff Voting on Racial Group Turnout in San Francisco Mayoral Elections,” by Jason McDaniel, 2016, Journal of Urban Affairs. This study covered San Francisco’s use of ranked choice voting (RCV) in mayoral elections, purporting to show that RCV reduces voter turnout overall, increases voter errors, and has a negative impact on “marginal populations,” i.e. racial minorities, mainly as the result of the alleged complexity of RCV asking voters to rank candidates and having to be familiar with multiple candidates and related dynamics. McDaniel reached these conclusions by examining five San Francisco mayoral elections taking place in odd years (i.e. where there are no federal or state races on the ballot) from 1995 to 2011, comparing three earlier non-RCV races (in 1995, 1999 and 2003) with the later two RCV races (in 2007 and 2011). Only two RCV races were studied, and as McDaniel acknowledged, only the contest in 2011 was “competitive” (that contest in 2007 was the first mayoral election using RCV, and incumbent mayor Gavin Newsom won easily in the first round of counting, earning 74% of first choices and far ahead of the second place candidate who had just 6.3% of first choices). Yet even the allegedly competitive contest in 2011was won by an incumbent with a landslide margin of nearly 20 points. No other elections were studied by McDaniel, even though San Francisco elects 17 other offices besides mayor with RCV, including the 11 seats on the Board of Supervisors (the name for the city council) in even years, and six other citywide offices in odd years. Previous academic research has found that competitive elections can stimulate greater voter involvement and higher turnout. For unexplained reasons, this study ignored at least 34 other RCV races between the years 2004 to 2011, many of which were very competitive and had high voter turnout. Instead, McDaniel’s analysis based its conclusions on data from only a single, marginally-competitive mayor’s race using RCV. These 2007 and 2011 mayoral elections were the only two RCV elections that McDaniel used as the sole basis for his small data set to determine the impact of RCV on voter turnout. Despite having no meaningful data to inform his study, McDaniel nonetheless concluded that RCV lowered turnout when compared to the previous three mayoral non-RCV elections using two-round runoffs. Then, using the same inadequate database of San Francisco elections, McDaniel also found that “Instant-runoff voting is associated with a significant decline in Black voter turnout and White voter turnout…On average, Black voter turnout decreases by 18 points and White voter turnout decreases by 16 points …” But how could he credibly arrive at that conclusion when his study was based on voter turnout in two RCV contests that were not even remotely competitive? Beyond that, McDaniel tacitly admits that the key determining factor driving Black voter turnout was not RCV vs non-RCV elections, but the presence of a viable Black candidate. McDaniel wrote, “Black voter turnout was about 17 percentage points higher for the two elections that featured an African American candidate compared to the three elections that did not” — but one of those three elections did not use RCV. The same dynamic was present for White voter turnout, in which higher turnout was not correlated with RCV vs non-RCV elections, but the presence of a viable White candidate. Beyond that, McDaniel’s voter turnout results, whether correlated with the race of the candidates or RCV vs non-RCV elections, showed no clear patterns. In his Figure 1, he shows low Asian voter turnout in the non-RCV elections in 1999 and 2003 when there was no viable Asian candidate running, but in the 2007 mayoral election using RCV, there is still no viable Asian candidate, yet Asian turnout increases dramatically. For Latinos, voter turnout is virtually the same in 1999 (no viable Latino candidate, non-RCV elections), 2003 (leading Latino candidate, non-RCV elections), 2007 (no viable Latino candidate, RCV elections) and 2011 (leading Latino candidate, RCV elections). Meanwhile White voter turnout increased dramatically from a low in the 2007 mayoral election, in which the leading candidate was a white incumbent, to the 2011 election in which there were no leading white candidates that finished any higher than sixth place with 5.6% of the vote. Clearly other factors were determining voter turnout than either the race of the candidates or RCV vs non-RCV elections. Despite these inconsistent findings, McDaniel boldly marches forth to render conclusions about the impact of RCV on different groups of racial voters, even though his conclusions are not remotely supported by his data. This looks like the worst kind of “data cherry picking” to cover up a puzzling conclusion based on a poor data set involving only two RCV elections, neither of which were remotely competitive. McDaniel’s cherry picking didn’t stop there. In calculating voter turnout for the three non-RCV mayoral elections in 1995, 1999 and 2003, he failed to mention that in each of these years there was a two-round runoff election, with a first round election in November in which no candidate garnered a winning majority of the vote, followed by the decisive runoff in December. So there were two non-RCV elections in each election year. But McDaniel only decided to include one of the two elections in his data set, apparently the December runoff in each year (which had higher turnout in two out of the three mayor’s races, and lower turnout in the third). So he ignored the November 1995 election, the November 1999 election when turnout was only 45 percent, and the November 2003 election when turnout was only 45.7 percent. This is flawed methodology based on blatant cherry picking, since McDaniel simply omitted three elections worth of data that did not fit within his frame. His study should never have made it through a peer review process, and it is an embarrassment to political science that not only was it approved for publication, but it has been uncritically cited by dozens of other political scientists. Share A “study” without wider context or credible data Lacking a data set that included even a single competitive RCV mayoral race, McDaniel declared that RCV lowered voter turnout in 2011, when turnout was 42.5 percent. But he also ignored -- or did not realize -- that voter turnout in mayoral elections during 2011 had sharply declined in all big cities, including far more steeply in nearby Los Angeles and other cities. In fact, San Francisco’s election in 2011 had the second highest turnout of any mayoral election in the nation’s 22 largest cities from 2008-2011. Was 2011 just a particularly low turnout year all across the country, perhaps because the country was still reeling from the aftermath of the housing market collapse in 2008-2010? McDaniel ignored this factor and did not search for alternative explanations beyond his flawed thesis. Furthermore, while McDaniel suggested that RCV leads to more “overvotes” – which is an invalidated ballot in which a voter, in either a non-RCV or RCV race, makes a mistake and selects two candidates for a single choice – he failed to address that in the June 2012 US Senate primary contest, which used the typical “one-choice” plurality method and did not use RCV, there was more than five times as many overvotes in San Francisco and Oakland than in the RCV mayoral elections in those cities. Additionally, turnout had been significantly higher and more representative in RCV elections for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors races -- that McDaniel didn’t even bother to study -- as compared to previous “delayed two-round runoffs” for those offices, often higher by as much as 40% in the RCV races. Perhaps the most surprising irony was that an earlier study co-authored by McDaniel (Overvoting and the Equality of Voice under Instant-Runoff Voting in San Francisco by Francis Neely and Jason McDaniel, 2015, California Journal of Politics and Policy) found that overvotes are often more common in lower-income precincts, but that the pattern of overvoting is similar in both RCV and non-RCV contests. Wrote Neely and McDaniel: “[Overvote] errors appear to be a function of complexity in general and not IRV per se…. the pattern of overvoting is similar in both IRV and non-IRV contests…Even among votes cast in a top-of-the-ticket race like U.S. Senate, overvoting occurs in an uneven fashion” (IRV, or ‘instant runoff voting,’ is another name for ranked choice voting in single-winner contests). So McDaniel not only contradicted his own conclusion in his earlier study with Neely, but the earlier study had been an important corrective for one of the most frequently made mistakes made by anti-RCV political scientists – a continual failure to provide crucial context by pairing a comparative analysis of real world RCV elections with an analysis of real world plurality or other electoral methods. Unfortunately McDaniel’s earlier study does not get cited much by other researchers, and McDaniel did not even cite it in his own flawed study analyzed above. Incredibly, McDaniel cherrypicked McDaniel, even as his flawed study has been cited dozens of times. Despite being a textbook example of poor political “science,” featuring both inadequate as well as cherrypicked data, the shelf life of McDaniel’s study has been extended endlessly by other political scientists and media outlets who have cited it uncritically. Equally troubling, the Journal of Urban Affairs put this paper through its peer review process and published it despite its numerous flaws. McDaniel gets it wrong, Part II Not content with producing one shoddy, confused paper, McDaniel produced another one a few years later, here is the link: Electoral Rules and Voter Turnout in Mayoral Elections: An Analysis of Ranked-Choice Voting by Jason McDaniel. San Francisco State Univ. (McDaniel, 2019). In this paper, McDaniel extended his previous flawed research focused on San Francisco, about voter turnout and voter impact, to multiple RCV cities through the 2018 elections. In his data set he included San Francisco, Minneapolis, St Paul, Oakland, Berkeley, San Leandro and Santa Fe. He then compared their turnout in mayoral elections to non-RCV cities, and to mayoral elections in those cities held before first RCV usage, and concluded “a significant decrease in voter turnout of approximately 3–5 percentage points in RCV cities after the implementation of RCV.” But he replicated many of the same mistakes as his first study presented above. While in this study McDaniel attempted to distinguish between various factors, such as odd year vs. even year elections, competitive races vs. noncompetitive, contests with open seats and other factors, the analysis is superficial and inadequate. He attempts to incorporate so many often-conflicting variables that his conclusions are once again unsupported by the actual data, and ultimately unconvincing (this second study never underwent a peer review process). For example, McDaniel declared that for RCV cities “in elections that are more competitive than average (margin of victory less than 20%), there is no significant RCV effect on voter turnout.” Yet McDaniel is a professor in a city, San Francisco, in which the 2018 special election using RCV to fill a mayoral vacancy was exceedingly close, decided by a margin of only one percentage point, and resulted in the second highest turnout in San Francisco history for a mayoral election. Illustrating the complexity involved in assessing the critical factors in turnout, that special election was held on the same election day as federal and state offices, which tends to boost turnout. Yet more voters participated in that RCV mayoral election than voted on the same day in the non-RCV primary for governor in which former San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom was running. Even more puzzling, in this study McDaniel inaccurately cited his own previous study from 2015 with Neely. McDaniel wrote, “Neely and McDaniel (2015) examine individual ballot image files within a natural experiment, and find higher rates of ballot errors in RCV elections compared to non-RCV elections” (emphasis added). However, we quoted from that 2015 study several paragraphs above, and in actual fact Neely and McDaniel actually concluded the opposite -- that the pattern of overvoting – which is the most common form of ballot error – is similar in both RCV and non-RCV contests. McDaniel also ignored the fact that in Bay Area RCV elections held in even years – at the same time as federal and state elections, when turnout is highest -- the “undervote” (that is, the dropoff in ballots cast for governor or mayor) has declined, which contradicts his thesis that the act of ranking ballots in RCV elections is too complex and presents a barrier for certain demographics of voters. To his credit, McDaniel actually acknowledged another contradiction in his own paper, which found a negative RCV turnout effect in some odd-year elections but not others, admitting that “may present a challenge to the theory that increased complexity [from RCV] will have a marginal negative effect on voter turnout.” But he tried to wallpaper over that contradiction by blaming it on an unlikely source -- bad election administration. McDaniels wrote, “This would suggest that the negative impact of RCV on voter participation may be alleviated by high quality election administration,” without presenting any data or even anecdotes to support such an unfounded theory. While competent election administration of any election, whether RCV or non-RCV, is crucially important, there is no credible research that supports the far-fetched notion that the quality of election administration has much of an impact on voter turnout in US elections, whether using RCV or otherwise. Upgrade to a $5 subscription The unvirtuous circle of academic research It is puzzling how McDaniel’s first study could have survived the peer review process for the Journal of Urban Affairs. The mistakes in McDaniel’s first study above should have been obvious to anyone with a basic understanding of ranked choice voting as well as elections in general, and elections in San Francisco specifically. It undermines faith in the credibility of the peer review process to think that a jury of peer political scientists did not catch the egregious errors and reject McDaniel’s sloppy research and paper. And it remains a black mark on political science that this thoroughly discredited study has been cited dozens of times by other researchers. Indeed, in our research paper it became apparent that many political scientists cite each other’s flawed research to pad their list of citations and to legitimize their own flawed research, creating an unvirtuous circle of political science. More broadly, McDaniel’s voter turnout studies, like other studies evaluating RCV’s impact on turnout, lacked a recognition that no credible opinion or research can claim that RCV increases voter turnout merely because so many voters are excited to vote for their favorite candidates instead of “lesser evil” candidates without worrying about spoilers. Instead, with respect to turnout, the advantage of RCV has always been that, in most places where it has been used, it has eliminated a pre-November primary or post-November runoff, which usually saw about half the turnout of the November general election. This is especially true during even years when there are state and federal elections on the ballot which substantially drive turnout more than local contests. Any study that does not adequately account for this non-November primary/runoff vs November general election dynamic, or odd year vs even year election factors, is simply not credible. Both of McDaniel’s studies largely failed on those grounds. Steven Hill and Paul Haughey Share Upgrade to a $5 subscription Thanks for reading DemocracySOS…your digital portal for the pro-democracy movement. Subscribe for only $5 per month to receive full benefits and to support our work. Subscribe

Jul 20 • 9:29 AM EDT • Science • democracysos.substack.com

Arizona rattlesnake bite response: Banner Health team carries unique antivenom

Banner Air shows how its emergency teams respond to rattlesnake bites in remote Arizona locations. FOX 10's Steve Nielsen learns their response plan during a time where every second counts.

Jul 20 • 12:22 AM EDT • Health • fox10phoenix.com

Critical NGINX Vulnerability Can Crash Workers and May Allow Remote Code Execution

F5 patches CVE-2026-42533, a regex map heap overflow that crashes nginx workers and may allow RCE in specific configurations.

Jul 19 • 4:42 PM EDT • Technology • thehackernews.com

Business People: Daniel Farley promoted at U.S. Bank Wealth Management

FINANCIAL SERVICES U.S. Bank, Minneapolis, announced the promotion of Daniel Farley to chief investment officer for the Wealth Management Asset Management Group. Farley has worked for U.S. Bank since 2010, most recently as Private Wealth…

Jul 19 • 1:01 PM EDT • Business • twincities.com

Frozen for years, this tiny animal miraculously springs back to life - Futura-Sciences

Siberia’s Secret Super-Survivor In a remote corner of the world, where only the boldest humans venture and always with layers of insulation, a small amphibian takes coexistence with extreme cold to a whole new level. Deep within the boreal forests of Siberia—imagine endless spruces and a carpet of snow that...

Jul 18 • 3:00 PM EDT • Science • futura-sciences.com

WordPress Core "wp2shell" RCE flaws get public exploits, patch now

Public exploits have been released for the critical "wp2shell" remote code execution vulnerabilities affecting WordPress Core, making it imperative that administrators patch their sites immediately.

Jul 18 • 1:22 PM EDT • Technology • bleepingcomputer.com

For Singer Judy Collins, A 'Farewell Tour' Doesn't Necessarily Mean 'Goodbye'

Despite the way her 50-city tour is being promoted, the singer admitted, “I’m always working, because I love to work, and it makes me feel happy.”

Jul 18 • 8:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • huffpost.com

30-30-30 rule popularizes healthy morning routine

The 30‑30‑30 rule is a catchy idea meant to promote weight loss and overall wellness. A Maryland doctor thinks it could benefit a lot of people.

Jul 17 • 3:22 PM EDT • Health • wtop.com

Illinois takes action against new business promoted by Chicago businessman 'Brandon Mr. Finance'

The Illinois secretary of state is warning consumers about a new business being promoted by "Brandon Mr. Finance," and has issued a cease-and-desist order against the venture.

Jul 16 • 11:47 PM EDT • Business • abc7chicago.com

Illinois takes action against new business promoted by Chicago businessman 'Brandon Mr. Finance'

Jul 16 • 11:47 PM EDT • Business • yahoo.com

FBI: Motown Sports Village promoter charged in alleged multi-million dollar wire fraud scheme in Romulus

A West Bloomfield man has been federally charged with wire fraud in connection with a heavily marketed proposal to develop a sprawling youth sports and entertainment complex in Romulus.

Jul 16 • 10:08 PM EDT • Entertainment • clickondetroit.com

FBI: Motown Sports Village promoter charged in alleged multi-million dollar wire fraud scheme in Romulus

A West Bloomfield man has been federally charged with wire fraud in connection with a heavily marketed proposal to develop a sprawling youth sports and entertainment complex in Romulus.

Jul 16 • 10:08 PM EDT • Sports • clickondetroit.com

Sports without politics is a fantasy and the World Cup proves it

From ancient Greece to Nazi Germany, sport and politics have long been intertwined. Nevertheless, we still imagine that international sport can be kept above the fray and serve as a neutral arena where nations compete on merit alone. In this article, diplomacy scholar Geoffrey Allen Pigman argues the 2026 FIFA World Cup shows this is a dangerous illusion. When international sport is left entirely to revenue-maximizing private bodies like FIFA, it doesn't escape politics, but rather surrenders to its worst expressions. With the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics fast approaching, the IOC must decide whether to learn that lesson or repeat the same mistakes. The largest and most lucrative FIFA World Cup ever draws toward its climactic conclusion amidst a swirl of controversy. Team members, staff, fans, and spectators have been denied their right to enter the United States to participate, and US President Donald Trump intervened with FIFA boss Gianni Infantino to overturn a referee’s call that Trump believed disadvantaged the US national team. It is a moment to step back and reflect on what the purposes of international sport mega-events like the World Cup, and international sport more broadly, are, and what they should be. Does international sport serve public purposes? Is there a public interest? Or is it primarily a private endeavor organized by commercial enterprises to entertain the global public (and generate profit in the process), which is occasionally used by governments and leaders for raisons d’etat? Central to the idea of sport is the principle of fair play, which in the international context demands that games be free from political interference. However, it is impossible to separate sport from politics, all claims to the contrary notwithstanding. The most positive political use of international sport through the millennia has been to facilitate diplomacy. The use of international sport for diplomatic objectives has existed since at least the time of the ancient Olympic Games, around which was instituted the custom of the Ekecheiria, or Olympic Truce, between participating states to facilitate fair competition and diplomatic achievements by ensuring that participants could travel safely to the Olympiad. In his seminal work On Diplomacy (1987), diplomacy scholar James Der Derian characterized the objectives of diplomacy as overcoming alienation and mediating estrangement between governments and between peoples. One increasingly important diplomatic tool in the technology-infused media environment over the past century has been public diplomacy, under which governments and non-state diplomatic actors (e.g. transnational corporations) communicate to global publics about their international policy objectives and to shape their global brand image. Political scientist Michał Kobierecki, in his important book Sports Diplomacy (2020), views sports diplomacy as falling broadly within the ambit of public diplomacy, as international sport intimately involves the participation of global publics as spectators and consumers of global media. Diplomacy scholar Stuart Murray and this author, in a 2013 article, distinguish between international sport used for diplomatic purposes and international sport-as-diplomacy, which encompasses the range of diplomacy that occurs as teams and competitors, spectators and fans, and government officials all converge for international sporting events like the Olympic Games and FIFA World Cup. Diplomacy scholar H.E. Chehabi, in a 2001 article on US-Iran sports diplomacy, describes the interaction between spectators and fans at international sporting events as “people-to-people diplomacy,” in which relationships develop independently of governments and their objectives. Diplomacy by the aforementioned definitions is often unsuccessful. Moreover, all too often the tools of diplomacy may be employed by governments and other actors to thwart or oppose the objectives of diplomacy as characterized by Der Derian. Governments routinely use the tools of public diplomacy to disseminate propaganda, spreading misinformation in the attempt to deceive global publics about their objectives and to create misleading impressions about their brand identity. Within sports diplomacy, the term “sportswashing” has been coined recently to describe how governments invest in and promote international sport to create positive global public impressions of their nations and, in doing so, to distract the global public from their deficient records in areas such as human rights and democratic governance. Murray, in his 2018 book Sports Diplomacy: Origins, Theory and Practice, introduces the concept of sports anti-diplomacy, wherein governments intentionally use international sport to advance aggressive and nationalistic objectives. Obvious historical examples include Hitler’s use of the 1936 Berlin Olympics to glorify his Third Reich and the 1969 El Salvador-Honduras football “war.” SUGGESTED READING The beautiful game made ugly By Emily Ryall FIFA argues that it is and seeks to be apolitical in its stewardship of international Association Football (soccer). FIFA policies governing bids to host the World Cup require uninhibited and non-discriminatory access for players, team staff, and spectators of all participating countries to host nations and venues. It became clear soon after Trump returned to power in the United States in January 2025 that Trump’s political intentions and objectives to limit non-US citizens from living and working in the United States and, in numerous cases, even visiting the country, would collide with FIFA’s host nation policies. Beginning soon after the start of the second Trump administration, US federal authorities imposed restrictions on entry to the United States of citizens of between 20 and 40 countries for any purpose, with only limited exceptions. Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) began arresting non-US citizens in the United States, including persons with and without legal status, holding them in jails, concentration camps, and other detention facilities until they were deported to their home or third countries, where they faced substantive risks to their personal safety. FIFA boss Gianni Infantino, in an effort to ensure the most successful and lucrative World Cup in history, engaged diplomatically with President Trump in an attempt to facilitate entry to the US for World Cup participants. Infantino did all in his power to ingratiate himself with Trump, to the extent of creating a FIFA “Peace Prize,” which he awarded to Trump in December 2025 at a ceremony in the then Trump-controlled John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC, on the occasion of the World Cup draw. The prize was an ersatz consolation for someone who aspired in vain to win the rather more prestigious and well-known Nobel Peace Prize. And in the run-up to the World Cup, conditions became worse. In February 2026, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched a war of aggression against Iran, illegal under international law, under the false pretence that Iran’s government was preparing to attack the United States and Israel. During the US aerial bombardment of Iran, US planes bombed Azadi Stadium, the facility where Iran’s national football team trained. As the 2026 FIFA World Cup began, it was clear that Infantino’s efforts had been for naught: the Trump administration would not adhere to FIFA policies governing access to World Cup host nations. World Cup referee Omar Artan, a citizen of Somalia, was denied a US visa to enter the United States to participate in the World Cup. Trump’s government only granted US visas to Iran’s football team ten days before they were scheduled to arrive for the tournament. Numerous members of the support staff for Iran’s team were denied US visas. Iran’s team, which had been scheduled to train in Arizona, was directed to shift its training site to Tijuana, Mexico, notwithstanding that all three of their group stage matches took place at US venues. The US Department of Homeland Security only permitted the Iranian team to enter the US on the day before each scheduled match and then to return to Mexico immediately after playing. Members of Iraq’s and Switzerland’s football teams were delayed for hours by US officials at the US border, and an Iraqi team photographer was refused entry. Spectators and fans from Haïti and Iran were denied entry to the United States altogether. A large number of fans from a range of countries had their applications for US visas rejected. There were multiple off-ramps through which participants could have avoided the negative consequences of Trump’s decisions for the 2026 World Cup. Once it was clear that the Trump government intended to violate the established expectations for World Cup hosts, FIFA could have shifted the matches scheduled to take place in the United States to Mexico and Canada. The three nations were already designated as co-hosts, and host cities and venues had been selected. Once it was clear that FIFA, governed by FIFA boss Gianni Infantino’s dependent and dysfunctional relationship with Trump, would never consider this option on its own, it fell to the national football federations to act. The national federations, particularly some combination of federations of the leading contenders (France, Spain, Brazil, Argentina, Morocco, England, Germany, etc.), could have refused to participate under the US-imposed conditions or, at the least, demanded an ironclad agreement with the Trump government that FIFA policies on access would be respected. ___ International sport is inextricably entangled with diplomacy of different sorts, for good or ill, it cannot be considered to be in the purely private realm and left to revenue-maximizing private actors. ___ Why did neither FIFA nor the national football federations act to protect the interests of players, team staff, referees, fans, and spectators? In essence, the relentless engines of capitalism prevailed over norm observance, ethics, and fair play. The revenue interests of FIFA, sponsors, global media, and host cities won out. FIFA’s managers viewed hosting another World Cup principally in the United States as a veritable pot of gold for FIFA and its collaborators. FIFA has estimated its own revenue over the 2023-26 budget cycle, which includes the 2026 World Cup, at $13 billion, revised up from an initial projection of $11 billion, and 72% higher than the previous revenue cycle. Of that total, FIFA is estimated to have generated $8.9 billion from the Cup itself in revenue from TV rights ($3.92 billion), sponsorships ($2.69 billion), ticket sales ($3.1 billion), licensing rights, and other sources. A joint study by FIFA and the World Trade Organization estimates that the World Cup will contribute over $40 billion to global GDP, including nearly $14 billion in direct visitor spending in the three host countries (but principally in the United States, which hosted the lion’s share of the matches). The FIFA World Cup is now reportedly “the single most lucrative recurring commercial property in global sport.” And yet, notwithstanding the Trump government’s uses of the World Cup for sports anti-diplomacy, and the climate of anxiety that this created for participants and spectators, diplomacy that did not depend upon governments was able to thrive at the World Cup. Examples of successful people-to-people diplomacy were legion, as citizens of towns and cities across the States, as well as in Mexico and Canada, welcomed team members, their families and supporters, to training sites across North America. Fans of different teams joined together in person in stadiums for matches, at watch parties and bars, and at welcome events sponsored by host cities. The joy and camaraderie shared between the citizenry of Boston and Scotland’s “Tartan Army” of fans is but one example of how the “Beautiful Game” brings people together. Friendships forged across continents are likely to endure well beyond the Cup final. Even those achievements cannot be seen as unalloyed, however. As South African football fan Byron Pillay commented to Al Jazeera, “Football is called the Beautiful Game for a reason, for its ability to unite people. But it’s hard to believe in that magic with the politics and war rhetoric off the field of play, especially when one of the tournament hosts is central to that.” Ultimately, the experience of the 2026 FIFA World Cup illustrates that, as international sport is inextricably entangled with diplomacy of different sorts, for good or ill, it cannot be considered to be in the purely private realm and left to revenue-maximizing private actors. As long as there is the possibility of diplomatic progress in mediating estrangement between governments or between peoples, there is a broad and overarching public interest in international sport. Likewise, as it would be difficult to put on an international sport mega-event without international sporting organizations like FIFA and the International Olympic Committee (IOC), global media firms, and companies purchasing sponsorships, public and private interests in international sport must coexist, most likely somewhere on a shifting spectrum between partnership and rivalry or cross purposes. As the World Cup wraps up, the IOC needs to consider its lessons before the scheduled 2028 Los Angeles Olympics if they want to avoid a media-hyped Trump version of the 1936 Berlin Olympiad. The IOC and the National Olympic Committees need to set conditions on and make demands of Trump’s government with clearly articulated consequences for non-compliance, up to and including cancellation of the Games. Time is running out for the IOC, as unlike with the FIFA World Cup, there is no at-the-ready alternate venue for Los Angeles.

Jul 16 • 8:00 PM EDT • Politics • iai.tv

Reese Witherspoon gushes about reunion with ‘Legally Blonde’ and ‘Freeway’ costar Alanna Ubach: ‘She’s my girl’

Reese Witherspoon couldn’t stop talking about her love for ‘Legally Blonde’ and ‘Freeway’ costar Alanna Ubach as she promoted their new show ‘Lucky.’

Jul 16 • 1:05 AM EDT • Entertainment • ew.com

ZeniMax Online Studios leadership to exit as part of Xbox cuts

There are major changes happening atop Maryland-based ZeniMax Online Studios, developer of the Elder Scrolls Online, Game File has learned. Joe Burba, a 14-year veteran of the studio who was appointed to run it last July, is departing, along with ESO executive producer Susan Kath, studio game director Rich Lambert and production director Ala Diaz. Their roles were listed among hundreds of others cut last week from the Maryland offices of ZeniMax, in a WARN letter sent to the state by ZeniMax and obtained today by Game File. Tonight, BUrbam Kath, Lambert and Diaz notified Zenimax Online Studios workers of plans to “transition” to a new leadership team consisting of promoted ZOS veterans. That transition will occur “over the next few months,” they told workers, according to a copy of the notice reviewed by Game File. “We will remain in place during the transition period to help ensure a smooth handoff.” Last week, Microsoft laid off of 1,600 workers across its vast gaming teams in locations around the U.S. and abroad. Just who has been impacted and how hard various studios have been hit has been emerging day by day. Game File reported last week that Microsoft/ZeniMax notified officials in Maryland that 379 gaming jobs were being cut across the state. They tallied cuts in two locations: one for ZeniMax Media Inc. (covering Elder Scrolls/Starfield/Fallout-maker Bethesda Game Studios and central Bethesda game publishing) and one for ZeniMax Online Studios (Elder Scrolls Online). More than 200 jobs were cut at the latter. Last week’s totals did not reveal job titles, nor did Microsoft announce any leadership changes in the ZeniMax group. That has now happened. Earlier today, Game File obtained from Maryland officials a breakdown of the 379 impacted roles, which, extraordinarily, included “studio head.” Microsoft later confirmed to Game File which studio head that referred to: ZeniMax Online Studios’. Microsoft has since has notified studio employees and internally announced new leadership. ZOS will now be run by Josh Henderson, previously head of business operations at the studio, and Nick Giacomini, who was promoted to game director for ESO last August. Game File is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my journalism, please consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe Last week’s news of 200+ cuts at ZeniMax Online Studios generated public sympathy for those workers and questions about the long-term viability of the Elder Scrolls Online. ESO is a massively multiplayer online game that inherently persists on the strength of new content being developed for it. Earlier today, fans and workers in Maryland protested the cuts at the ZeniMax teams in a rally organized by the Communication Workers of America, the union that represents many of the impacted employees. Regarding concerns around the game, a community manager stated on Saturday: “The plan is still to deliver great content, and we will hopefully have an update soon.” In their note to the studio today, the outgoing leaders of ZeniMax Online Studios predicted “growth” for the game: We have tremendous confidence in Josh and Nick, the future of this studio, and the continued growth of ESO. With exciting experiences still ahead for our players as we wrap up work for Update 51 and beyond, we believe that your passion, creativity, and commitment to each other and the community will continue serving as the heartbeat of ESO. The list of jobs cut in the ZeniMax WARN notice in Maryland includes several very senior roles, including: Studio Head Studio Operations Director Studio Game Director Studio Audio Director Studio Art Manager Vice President and Controller VP, Global Sales & Business Development While some of those job descriptions match the exiting ZOS leadership team, Game File couldn’t verify if all were from that studio. The full list of cut roles shared by Maryland officials also covers workers at Bethesda Game Studios and its central publishing office. The following is an excerpt: The list of 379 eliminated ZeniMax jobs in Maryland also includes: four animators three bilingual CS (community service) leads for Chinese, Italian, and Japanese a creative director for the Elder Scrolls Online Player Life Cycle two food service workers seven producers more than 60 senior QA testers. and many others The WARN notice states that almost all of the 379 workers were notified of their layoff on July 6. In fine print, it states: “Approximately 9 employees were notified of the elimination of their position prior to July 6, 2026.” A 2021 mega-merger scaled back Microsoft announced in 2020 that it intended to buy ZeniMax and its network of game studios in 2020, and closed the $7.5 billion deal in March 2021. The purchase, which preceded Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard, added several award-winning studios to Microsoft’s portfolio, including Bethesda (Elder Scrolls, Fallout), Arkane (Dishonored), and id Software (Doom). The studios’ output since then included a 2024 Game of the Year contented from MachineGames in the form of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle along with Starfield from Bethesda and the poorly-received Redfall from Arkane Austin. In recent years, a Microsoft repeatedly in cutback mode closed ZeniMax’s Tango Gameworks (which was reconstituted by Krafton) and closed Arkane Austin. The Xbox cuts last week have hit the ZeniMax group hard, with 158 jobs eliminated in Texas, many of them at id, and 379 from the ZeniMax teams in Maryland. Xbox also said last week that it would be entering a consultation process around Arkane Lyon, a process expected to end in a sale, shutdown or other form of divestment. The Lyon team has been working on a game tied to Marvel’s Blade vampire-hunting super-hero.

Jul 15 • 7:42 PM EDT • Technology • gamefile.news

Job board ranks the top available radiologist positions

Marit Health compiled the rankings based on 5,000 job listings, separating its lists based on practice settings including academia, hospital systems, medical groups and remote reading.

Jul 15 • 3:07 AM EDT • Business • radiologybusiness.com

47 revelatory hours with Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced

To review this month’s supposed remake of 2013’s Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, I must first correct the record. Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced isn’t a game about pirates (and assassins) in the 18th century Caribbean. Sure, sure, that’s what the trailers would have you believe. They’ve go their clips of Edward Kenway swinging his swords and steering his pirate ship into cannon-blasting combat against British frigates. Is Resynced truly a pirate game? Of the 47 hours I spent playing Resynced over the past few weeks, I will admit I spent maybe 44 (?) of them collecting plunder with Blackbeard, drinking rum with Anne Bonny and debating the pros and cons of the lawless pirate-run settlement Nassau with Benjamin Hornigold. I may in fact have spent dozens of hours sailing to remote islands, reading treasure maps, opening messages left in bottles, sinking the odd Man o’ War with a well-timed broadside, collecting sea shanties for my crew, befriending a pet monkey, and hunting whales. I am nevertheless neither so Gullible nor so Narrow-Minded as to call the magnificent Resynced a “pirate remake.” Oh no. Forget any reviews of Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced you may have read. Forget what you yourself may have played, if you’ve spent any time with the game since its launch. What Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced is really about I’m here to give you the scoop (spoilers for Resynced’s Animus menu lore, which many players are probably not going to see): Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced, the new game whose development was led by Ubisoft Singapore, is set in the year 2096. It’s about a societal split, about revolution, about an old Assassin’s Creed adventure repurposed in the series’ distant future as propaganda or samizdat. It’s about the overheated future of 2096, essentially conquered by the series’ well-established nefarious Templar-run company Abstergo. (In this future, Abstergo is, among other things, remaking a 2013 pirate movie called Devils of the Caribbean, but this time in VR. The VR version will be backed by a marketing plan that involves AI influencers, a 10,000-avatar “metaverse premiere event” and that manufacturing of memes aimed at “50 million VR nodes.” See what I mean about Abstergo being evil?) Resynced is about a late 21st-century population mollified by the widespread use of Abstergo’s Animus devices which let people experience the lives of historical figures culled from “genetic memories.” It’s about an insurgent faction of Assassins. And it’s about a plan to wake the population into revolutionary fervor by showing them the memories of 18th century pirate Edward Kenway, who—as depicted in the original Black Flag and again in Resynced—gradually comes to an understanding about the Assassins of his day and their centuries old fight for freedom. Resynced is also about an AI developed within the late 21st-century Animus, called Ego. It has found a way to alter genetic memories, to create and show Animus users false ones. The game is about Ego’s efforts to tell the people experiencing Edward Kenway’s memories that Kenway was wrong, that fighting against order is folly, that we should crave a world where “compliance is rewarded with power.” Who are we in this game? We’re an unnamed Animus user in 2096 who experiences Kenway’s journey virtually. At four moments during Kenway’s exploits in the Caribbean our virtual jaunt can be interrupted for 10-15 minutes, as we explore Animus “rifts” where Ego explicitly tries to tell us how wrong Kenway was. None of this is what 2013’s Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag was about, of course. That was a different game, even if you also spent dozens of hours pirating as Kenway in that game, across missions and a map that’s been faithfully reintroduced and rebuilt for Resynced. The 2013 Black Flag was about you playing as an unnamed researcher newly hired in 2013 by Abstergo Entertainment, the video game development wing of the Templars’ evil-corp. In that game, you were assigned to use the Animus to dive into the genetic memories of Desmond Miles, a man who died in Assassin’s Creed III and who was descended from a long line of Assassins (and at least one Templar) whose adventures were featured across the prior AC games. In 2013’s Black Flag, your mission was to plumb the Edward Kenway experience for material that Abstergo could use in productions such as the motion picture Devils of the Caribbean, though the Templars had some ulterior motives for the assignment. Resynced is therefore not a remake of 2013’s Black Flag. It’s a sequel. It is a new game about a new exploration of Edward Kenway’s pirate/assassin journey, set 83 years after the framing sequences of the original game. Resynced provides a new narrative framework that, thanks to the concept of an AI that wants to alter historical memories, arrives with creative justification to tweak a now-classic 13-year old game. That makes Resynced, already a hot seller, a tantalizing hint of where Ubisoft could go with a line of Assassin’s Creed remakes. They could remake the first game, the Ezio games, even the recent ones set in ancient Egypt and Greece. And for each, they could not just modernize the graphics and controls but expand and alter their sequences of events to use them as reference points for a conflict set in the late 21st century, as rival factions try to weaponize historical memories. Game File is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, even when that work consists of ravings about Assassin’s Creed’s modern day plot, please consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe A story most players will probably miss If you didn’t know any of this, I’m not surprised. If you played the game and still didn’t catch it, I’m not a bit shocked. If Ubisoft has no plans to do more of this, I won’t fall down. Almost all of what I’ve described is optional and missable in Black Flag Resynced. I nearly missed it myself, as I planned for a breezy playthrough of an old Assassin’s Creed favorite. Instead, I found myself in a 40+ hour hunt for the “real” story, buried deeper in Resynced than any gold-filled chest. The story of 2096 is Resynced’s meta-story, told in two remote pockets of the game: 1) four optional playable “rifts” that players may find as they proceed through Resynced’s pirate fantasy , 2) in dozens of text files tucked three menus deep in the game’s barely-interactive Animus hub. Assassin’s Creed games have almost always had a meta-story about people in the 21st century (usually matching the game’s release year) and their connections to the main history portions you play. Those meta-stories have always been squeezed into the margins, though seldom as severely and as, uh, graphiaclly simple, as in recent games. Back in 2013, the modern-day exploits of you as an Abstergo Entertainment employee were prominent. They were portrayed via first-person portions that occasionally interrupted the third-person Kenway experience and could be explored for hours, complete with their own missions, side quests and puzzles. Resynced’s 2096 story—of Assassin “Watchers” vs. Abstergo/Tempar goons, of rogue AIs, of panicking scientists, of a woman wondering why her Animus-addicted husband is muttering about Mary Read (“What does he mean by Assassins?”), of a fight for the population’s hearts and minds via varying interpretations of Edward Kenway’s life choices—is mostly told through unlockable text files. The files are interesting. Offered via diary entries, intercepted chats and news reports, they present varied perspectives of a world in crisis. One set works as a narrative puzzle as it reveals the Rashomonic interpretations of a massacre, or was that a successful Assassin hit? Another favorite reveals the rising bitterness of a person who, through Edward Kenway’s journey, now shakes at the ignored evil around him. One surmises that Ubisoft is averse to putting the Assassin’s Creed’s meta-story in the way of more marketable pirate playgrounds and ninja/samurai epics. Instead, we get a better-than-nothing text-in-menus approach introduced in 2025’s Assassin’s Creed Shadows. In Shadows, players unlocked the meta-story text files largely via time-gated missions that called on the user to kill X number of enemy type Y, clear three enemy castles, re-win a three-phase fighting tournament, and other grinds. Time restrictions on accessing these missions and unlocking the files meant it could take players months to access the full story in-game. But even in the most hardcore Assassin’s Creed hangouts, the fanbase instead seemed to throw up their hands rather than grind to keep up. In Resynced, Ubisoft has shown some mercy, diminishing the amount of new text files that are tied to timed grinds. Now, most of the text-based 2096 lore are associated with “data file” collectibles that players can find in the world. That includes a batch of written entries that explain a historical link between the feudal Japan era in Shadows and the piracy adventures in Black Flag. Players who explore a lot will find dozens of data files, though the game does not appear to offer any in-game tracker for finding each one. You just need to keep looking for them. As of this writing, I have most of them, but not all. I can’t find any full guide for them online. And even Ubisoft’s optional $5 microtransaction that reveals lots of items in-game does not appear to reveal the locations of the text files (at least the official description omits them from its collectibles list). That’s not a huge bother, because tracking the data files down compelled me to re-explore the waves and islands of Black Flag. That was a thoroughly pleasant task to do for the first time in a dozen years. I expect many players, though, will be content to wait for the files to be reproduced in an online AC wiki somewhere, the easier to read on a web page. It may not seem enticing to play a video game in order to gradually unlock pages of text to read. Why not, you may ask, just read a book, where they put the pages in order? For one, they’ve not tucked this latest installment of Assassin’s Creed’s meta saga in a book. I also enjoy the unordered delivery, the dawning comprehension of a story about 2096’s desperate people and questionable tech, which I glimpsed first at its middle, then the end, then the front, then other moments in between1. I am also enamored with the idea of the Assassin’s Creed games I’ve previously played, including Black Flag, being repurposed for an information war. The ideas in Resynced’s meta-story, which builds off characters and ideas in Shadows’ chunks of text, are strong. The potential of where they could go with it is exciting. As for the pirate stuff? Looks great, controls pretty well, is fun to play and oh so speedy in terms of how much of a good time you can have with each sit-down. It never gets old to chase a new shanty page across a rooftop, bombard a fort with upgraded mortars or use a diving bell to explore sunken wrecks (hats off to the team at Ubisoft Barcelona that worked on the underwater portions in Resynced; that team is now facing layoffs, such is the misery of modern gaming and oft-troubled Ubisoft). New pirate missions in Resynced involving new ally characters are brief, dramatic and add more to Edward’s story, even if the gameplay perks they provide barely enhance the gameplay. A new denouement for high-class pirate Stede Bonnet is affecting; a new hunt for Blackbeard’s treasure is a welcome extra moment. A new epilogue to hunt down a pirate killer, on the other hand, over-complicates Kenway’s character. The ending credits remain my favorite of any game I’ve ever played. Black Flag provides great source material. The revisit is well-made and a great sign of what could be. It is offered in a different wrapper that hints at an opportunity for more interesting remakes to come, should Ubisoft choose to pursue such treasures—and as we brace to resist or comply with an Abstergo future. 1 The messages that Edward Kenway finds in bottles tell another out-of-order story, one about a man reckoning with the strange memories and voices he’s heard in his head since he was a boy. That tale was also in the 2013 game and develops into one of Black Flag’s most compelling character arcs. In Resynced, it has lost its climax, because the bottle story previously paid off in the halls of the first-person Abstergo Entertainment, which is exclusive to the older game. An altered resolution, written by the 2013 game’s lead writer is fine, doesn’t invalidate the 2013 version, but makes for an inferior final note.

Jul 14 • 3:17 PM EDT • Technology • gamefile.news

Michael Stella

After successfully leading some of DSI’s most significant industrial developments, Michael Stella has been promoted to Director of Construction at Development Solutions, Inc. (DSI).

Jul 14 • 10:37 AM EDT • Business • chicagobusiness.com

Steve Przybilla

Plante Moran Living Forward (PMLF), the senior living development advisory division of commercial real estate firm Plante Moran Realpoint, is pleased to announce that Steve Przybilla has been promoted to partner.

Jul 13 • 1:23 PM EDT • Business • chicagobusiness.com

The Ministry's "Great Purge" of Science: Can AI Help?

Publish or perish. Universities decide whether to renew researchers[1] contracts or promote them through the academic ranks largely on the...

Jul 13 • 8:07 AM EDT • Science • voxukraine.org

China-proofing European cleantech is a tricky business

Crude tariffs won’t be enough to promote EU renewable energy

Jul 13 • 7:31 AM EDT • Business • ft.com

United States Delivers Life-Saving Health Supplies and equipment to Madagascar

United States Delivers Life-Saving Health Supplies and equipment to Madagascar U.S. Chargé d’Affaires Steve Bremner presided over a handover ceremony to the Government of Madagascar, represented by President of the Refoundation Col. Michaël Randrianirina, marking the delivery of nearly one million mosquito nets, over 900,000 pieces of critical laboratory equipment, and 33 internet connectivity systems. The assistance – valued at more than $2.2 million – is part of a broader U.S.-Madagascar health partnership, outlined in our bilateral Global Health Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed in December 2025, totaling $134 million from the U.S. government from 2026 through 2030. “This assistance is clear and disciplined – it is a tool of strategic engagement, not global charity,” said Chargé d’Affaires Steve Bremner. “Every U.S. taxpayer dollar must show measurable results, reduce long-term dependence on U.S. resources, and support greater self-reliance. Stronger health systems in Madagascar help detect and contain infectious diseases before they spread across borders, protecting American and Malagasy families alike.” The assistance includes: 989,250 long-lasting insecticide-treated mosquito nets - worth $2 million – will be distributed to 63 districts and 1,661 community health centers across Madagascar. Malaria remains one of the leading causes of death in the country, claiming the lives of children and women at an unacceptable rate. The third and final delivery of these nets arrived in late June and will be distributed starting this July until mid-October, ensuring that those most at risk of mosquito-borne disease now have access to this basic but life-saving protection. U.S.-funded Global Health Supply Chain Program – Procurement and Supply Management (GHSC-PSM) project will ensure the distribution. 908,523 pieces of critical medical and laboratory equipment – valued at $180,000 – including personal protective equipment, laboratory supplies, diagnostic tools, and cold chain equipment – along with a modernized digital surveillance system to Madagascar’s Ministry of Public Health. This support through the STRIDES (Strengthening Infectious Disease Detection Systems) program bolsters Madagascar’s ability to detect and respond to outbreaks of diseases such as monkeypox, plague, rabies, polio, and Ebola before they become regional or global threats. Over $30,000 of funding for the full procurement, installation, and first year of service for 33 Starlink satellite internet systems at priority districts and regional health offices across the country. These systems will allow health workers in remote and underserved communities to transmit health data quickly to central decision-makers – enabling faster, better-coordinated responses when disease outbreaks occur. U.S.-funded Momentum Country and Global Leadership (MCGL) will implement this project. As the country’s largest bilateral health donor, the United States remains committed to the principle that a stronger, healthier Madagascar makes for a stronger, safer world – and a stronger, safer America.

Jul 13 • 4:39 AM EDT • Health • mg.usembassy.gov

When regulation is good for business

By now, I think I have established both my view that I am a fan of ESG investing and the benefits of regulating what is and isn’t a sustainable investment, and my view that in Europe, ESG regulation has gone too far and become too costly. It almost feels like the old Aristotelian maxim of doing things in moderation that leads to the best outcomes is valid in regulatory efforts as well. To give you an example, let’s look at a study by the National Bank of Belgium on the impact of the EU’s Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR) on fund flows of conventional and ESG funds. The SFDR was announced on 27 November 2019 and came into effect on 10 March 2021. It was implemented in several stages and split funds marketed in the EU into three broad categories: (i) Art. 6 funds that are basically conventional funds without any specific ESG integration, (ii) Art. 8 funds that ‘promote environmental or social characteristics’, which must provide additional reporting how they do that, and (iii) Art. 9 funds that are impact funds. The gaps between the announcement and the phased implementation give us an idea of how fund flows were affected by the regulation. It is clearly visible in the figure below that once the new regulation was announced and when it was initially implemented, fund flows in Art. 8 and Art. 9 funds increased significantly. Conventional Art. 6 funds also saw more inflows, but the increase was not statistically significant. I should add that the data below is pure fund flow, cleaned of performance effects and of any reclassified funds that moved from one classification to another. Note also that once the initial rush in ESG funds was over, additional, stricter regulatory requirements didn’t create that many new flows. This implies that with additional regulation, the funds incurred higher costs to comply but didn’t benefit in terms of new inflows and higher assets under management. Fund flows as the SFDR regulation was implemented in the EU Source: Emiris et al. (2026) When examining the drivers of these flows, the authors of the study found that institutional investors were more likely to switch to ESG funds and particularly so in countries where concerns about sustainability are culturally more accepted. In a society where buy-in into environmental and social risks is higher, private investors were shifting more of their assets into ESG funds as the regulation made it clear which funds are really green and which ones are not. And institutional investors in these countries did so as well, given the societal pressures and reputational risks of sticking with conventional funds. Meanwhile, fund managers reacted to the changing regulatory environment as well. Many funds that were mildly green before the regulation was announced became greener and more sustainable as the regulation was introduced to attract new assets and new investors. Cleverly, and unsurprisingly, these ESG funds also charge on average higher fees, which means that not only did fund managers gather fresh assets, but their profitability increased as well.

Jul 13 • 2:00 AM EDT • Business • klementoninvesting.substack.com

Single-Atom Catalysis research earns science award

As the invisible engines of modern chemistry, catalysts help produce the gasoline that powers cars, the fertilizers that promote food cultivation and the polymers used to make clothing, making them indispensable to modern life.

Jul 12 • 9:40 PM EDT • Science • chinadaily.com.cn

New SVPs, branch managers named at banks; radio station owner promotes new regional chief

Take a look at some of the recent promotions and new hires announced at south Louisiana businesses.

Jul 12 • 5:00 AM EDT • Business • nola.com

Screen time: grab the remote and embrace this remarkable sporting smorgasbord

With content-stacking and spoiler-avoiding, a fan with the right subscriptions can expect to enjoy 13 uninterrupted hours on the sofa on Saturday

Jul 11 • 3:00 AM EDT • Sports • theguardian.com

US scientists use Chinese humanoid robot to carry out keyhole surgery

The robot, nicknamed Surgie, was remotely controlled by human surgeons as it carried out the procedure on a pig.

Jul 10 • 9:00 AM EDT • Science • scmp.com

Google Photos' latest UI experiment has one job: getting CapCut on your phone

Google seems to be testing a subtle UI change in Google Photos that promotes ByteDance's CapCut video editing app.

Jul 10 • 8:49 AM EDT • Technology • androidauthority.com

Healthy Aging Expert’s No. 1 Social Activity To Promote Longevity

In TODAY.com’s Expert Tip of the Day, a renowned physician reveals his favorite social activity to promote longevity because it requires several important skills crucial for heathy aging.

Jul 10 • 8:00 AM EDT • Health • today.com

In groundbreaking first, humanoid robots performed surgery

Don't worry; humans helped remotely.

Jul 9 • 2:35 PM EDT • Science • popsci.com

Will federal changes to research funding promote ‘accountability’ or politicize science?

A retired Brown University professor says the Trump administration is weakening a system that relies on subject-matter experts to judge scientific merit.

Jul 9 • 5:00 AM EDT • Science • wgbh.org

Entertainment Business Grad José Aparicio Marquez Helps Bring the World's Biggest Artists to Mexico

Entertainment Business bachelor's graduate José Aparicio Márquez promotes major live events for OCESA, producing shows for artists including Bad Bunny, Metallica, Paul McCartney, and J Balvin across Mexico.

Jul 8 • 8:00 PM EDT • Entertainment • fullsail.edu

Downtown office vacancy dips for first time since 2022

After years of remote work trends pushing companies to shed office space faster than landlords could backfill it, stronger demand is helping offset the losses.

Jul 8 • 7:00 AM EDT • Business • chicagobusiness.com

New President of The Tatitlek Corporation

The Tatitlek Corporation promoted Executive Vice President Dick Hobbs, former president of Afognak, to become its new President.

Jul 7 • 1:22 PM EDT • Business • akbizmag.com

RADPAC launches new subcommittee dedicated to teleradiology advocacy

Kimberly Beavers, MD, a clinical assistant professor and remote breast radiologist with NYU Langone Health, will serve as inaugural chair of the initiative.

Jul 7 • 1:33 AM EDT • Business • radiologybusiness.com

Steven Preze

Steven Preze has been promoted to Market Leader and Head of PNC Commercial Banking for the Chicago market.

Jul 6 • 9:31 AM EDT • Business • chicagobusiness.com

Smithsonian's National Museum of American History promotes 'extreme political activism,' WH report alleges

A 162-page White House report accuses the National Museum of American History of ideological capture and abandoning straightforward education.

Jul 6 • 9:05 AM EDT • Politics • foxnews.com

Vandalia Health promotes AJ Hammond to vice president of external affairs and government relations

Vandalia Health promoted Albert “AJ” Hammond to vice president of external affairs and government relations, where he will lead legislative, public policy and government affairs strategy statewide.

Jul 5 • 8:22 PM EDT • Health • mybuckhannon.com

5,000-year-old wolves found on remote island rewrite what we know about domestication

Scientists discovered ancient wolves on a tiny Baltic island where they could only have been brought by humans, suggesting an unexpectedly close relationship between people and wolves thousands of years ago. Evidence indicates the wolves were fed, possibly cared for, and may even have been managed or selectively bred long before modern ideas of domestication.

Jul 5 • 8:00 AM EDT • Science • sciencedaily.com

Sky Sports: Ipswich Set To Rival Fellow Promoted Side For Ligue 1 Star

Ipswich Town Enter Emersonn Race as Premier League Newcomers Move Against Hull CityIpswich Town have moved for Emersonn, and that tells you two things straight away. First, they are not approaching th...

Jul 5 • 1:50 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Why Circulation Health Supplements Are Gaining Attention for Supporting Healthy Vascular Function and Everyday Wellness, According to PureHealth Research

PureHealth Research is highlighting growing consumer interest in circulation wellness and the role of targeted nutritional supplementation in maintaining healthy blood flow, vascular function, and overall cardiovascular wellness.Circulation health supplements commonly feature ingredients such as Omega-3 Fatty Acids, Berberine and Butcher's Broom, which are frequently included in formulations designed to promote healthy circulation and vascular health.

Jul 4 • 11:00 AM EDT • Health • finance.yahoo.com

NASCAR, New CEO Travel To Washington D.C. To Promote League

NASCAR and its new CEO Steve O’Donnell made a pit stop in Washington D.C. to amplify the impact of motorsports.

Jul 3 • 8:56 AM EDT • Sports • foxsports.com

Trump-backed organizer of America’s 250th birthday events may have duped donors, report from House Democrats alleges

Donors who intended to support a bipartisan nonprofit that’s organizing celebrations for America’s 250th anniversary were allegedly redirected – without their knowledge – to a separate nonprofit behind events being promoted by President Donald Trump, according to a report from a group of House Democrats, citing confidential, unnamed sources.

Jul 2 • 10:17 AM EDT • Politics • cnn.com

How remote patient monitoring advances affordable healthcare

As global medical costs face double-digit spikes, remote care is a clinical tool and an economic necessity.

Jul 2 • 8:40 AM EDT • Health • fastcompany.com

Croatia criticised for ‘unambitious’ changes to 2022 science law

Croatia’s science ministry has been accused of a lack of ambition, and even incompetence, over proposed changes to the country’s 2022 science law. Critics say an opportunity has been missed to fix wider shortcomings in the research and universities system.“This law, like all the previous ones, will not significantly change the current state of science in Croatia,” Vlatko Silobrčić, a member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences, told Science Business. “A small shift here and there will not have a significant impact.”The 2022 law introduced multi-year block grant financing of research, based on results, and changes intended to boost employment and career progression for researchers and lecturers. But implementation of the law has been uneven. “It became apparent that certain of its provisions were subject to different interpretations by higher education institutions and scientific institutes,” the science ministry said in its proposal for change. “This caused legal uncertainty in the system, administrative difficulties in implementation and, in certain cases, unequal treatment of teachers, scientists and students.”Most of the proposed amendments deal with technicalities in hiring and promoting staff, such as extending the committee deadlines from 60 to 90 days, or allowing applicants to cite all of their achievements and not only those since their last appointment.Both the ministry and Croatian media highlighted changes that would raise the retirement age from 65 to 67 years and allow part-time students 15 year rather than 10 years to finish their studies.The change to retirement age has been criticised for reinforcing a weakness in the system. According to Matko Marušić, professor emeritus at the University of Split, this will “allow unproductive teachers to advance and work longer, while hindering and discouraging productive ones.”A longtime campaigner for excellence-based meritocracy, he sees little hope in the new legislation. “I am not optimistic that things will improve,” he told Science Business. “As recent changes to the law in Croatia show, the legal framework is becoming increasingly hypocritical and harmful.”For Marušić, who analyses Croatia's university system in a recently published book, the situation is “unfavourable and constantly deteriorating” due to the criteria used for academic advancement.“The key criterion for advancement should be scientific productivity,” he said. “In Croatia [. . .] scientific criteria are increasingly lowered, and ineffective and absurd criteria such as waiting times for promotion and age limits for remaining in a job are promoted.” He would also like to see better criteria for the quality of teaching at universities. “In practice, teaching is not monitored or evaluated,” he said, estimating that up to a third of teaching simply does not take place. “Under the guise of university autonomy and bad laws, universities and faculties are allowed to earn additional money by increasing enrolment quotas that have nothing to do with the needs of the labour market.” Lack of ambitionDora Kršul, a reporter at Telegram.hr who covers science policy in Croatia, finds the rationale for changes “bizarre.” “The ministry responsible for supervising the uniform application of the law is changing the law because it is being implemented unevenly,” she said. “This primarily speaks to the power relationship in the sphere of science and higher education in Croatia, that is, the question arises as to who actually manages this system.”Rather than raising quality, she continued, the changes appear to be designed to help vocational and applied universities who have not been complying with the law.The Independent Union of Research and Higher Education Employees of Croatia said that the changes were “unambitious” and represent a missed opportunity for more important changes. “We think some of the changes are even negative,” it said in its statement on June 25. One of these is introduction of an “assistant” job title that allows people to be hired only for the duration of a project. Related articles: Elections to top science bodies test Croatia’s gender equality in researchSlovakia revises R&D approach to increase focus on competitivenessLatvia pilots citizen engagement in research grant evaluationsThe union’s president, Tvrtko Smital, who was part of the 15-member working group tasked with drafting the changes, told the local media there was a “worrying lack of ambition” in the process, and “lack of competence” in terms of research experience and understanding the problems in the system.“There is no clear will to deal with the problems,” said Smital, an assistant professor of marine and environmental sciences at the Ruđer Bošković Institute in Zagreb. “It’s a combination of unambitiousness and incompetence,” he went on, expressing his “deep frustration” with the situation. “There is no strategy, no clear thinking, and money is not being spent optimally.”Croatia’s science ministry has not responded to requests for comment.

Jul 2 • 8:00 AM EDT • Science • sciencebusiness.net

Match for the Marsh with Barton Health

We’re back with another awesome opportunity to transform the south end of the Upper Truckee Marsh, this time with help from our friends at Barton Health! Now that the California Tahoe Conservancy has demolished the former Motel 6 building, restaurant, and parking lot from the Upper Truckee Marsh in South Lake Tahoe, planning is underway […]

Jun 30 • 3:43 PM EDT • Health • tahoefund.org

FDA panel on peptides will include experts who promote the unproven chemicals favored by RFK Jr.

The Food and Drug Administration is meeting next month to consider easing restrictions on several peptides, a group of unapproved drugs popular with followers of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Jun 29 • 7:31 PM EDT • Health • pbs.org

Yankees Promote Cody Bellinger’s All-Star Candidacy Before Tigers Game

The New York Yankees made a social media post concerning left fielder Cody Bellinger.

Jun 29 • 5:36 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Cursor now has a mobile app for guiding your coding agent on the go

Cursor has launched a new mobile app for remote oversight over coding agents.

Jun 29 • 1:03 PM EDT • Technology • techcrunch.com

KATALIN KARIKÓ

She was met with resistance, got demoted and eventually forced to leave academia – but Katalin Karikó never lost focus, doubling-down on her work to harness mRNA for new vaccines and therapies. Karikó’s Nobel Prize-awarded discovery enabled the development of effective vaccines against COVID-19, offering protection to millions of people.

Jun 29 • 7:40 AM EDT • Science • nobelprize.org

RF Hacking A Ceiling Fan Via The Remote

[Sam Wilkinson] recently installed a Dreo CLF513S ceiling fan in his place — it’s cheap, well-sized, and blows air around as you’d expect it to. The only problem is that it only w…

Jun 28 • 1:00 PM EDT • Technology • hackaday.com

'High-strung' camels race in Australian outback

Camels with "a bit of fire in them" raced in a remote Australian outback town this weekend at an annual event celebrating the desert beasts first imported in the mid-19th century."You would want a little bit of temper, a little bit of fire in them -- a sort of splashy look in the eye," Woodhouse told AFP. "They want to be wary of you a little bit but not, like, aggressive," he added.

Jun 28 • 1:58 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

The Arts and Sciences of Judo: The New Edition Expands the Frontiers of Knowledge

The publication of Volume 6, Number 1 of "The Arts and Sciences of Judo" marks another important milestone in the development of judo research worldwide. As the International Judo Federation's interdisciplinary journal, under the supervision of Professor Sanda Čorak, it has become a recognised platform where science, education and the values of judo come together to deepen our understanding of the many dimensions of our sport. It also forms an integral part of the IJF Academy's mission to promote education, lifelong learning and the dissemination of knowledge throughout the global judo community.

Jun 27 • 10:12 PM EDT • Science • ijf.org

Strike out the Stigma initiative partners with teams for veteran mental health

A North Dakota insurance company is stepping up to the plate to promote mental health.

Jun 27 • 2:43 PM EDT • Health • kfyrtv.com

Mountain lions changed everything in this tiny California preserve

A surprising ecological makeover unfolded when mountain lions began frequenting a small preserve south of San Francisco. Deer activity dropped, plants recovered, and shifts among predators like coyotes, bobcats, and foxes followed. The study shows that powerful “trophic cascades” aren’t limited to remote wilderness—they can happen in small, suburban preserves too.

Jun 27 • 8:00 AM EDT • Science • sciencedaily.com

'Godfather of SaaS' says you can't get truly rich working from home

SaaStr founder Jason Lemkin agrees with Flexport CEO Ryan Peterson's skepticism of remote work.

Jun 27 • 5:13 AM EDT • Business • businessinsider.com

PNC Business Credit Names Brady to Southwest Region Sales Manager

PNC Business Credit promoted Eamonn Brady to Southwest region sales manager. Based in Denver, Brady will spearhead business development efforts across both

Jun 26 • 2:28 AM EDT • Business • abfjournal.com

It's Xbox's turn (again), as console prices keep going up

Microsoft announced a price hike for the Xbox Series consoles today, the third in little over a year. Effective August 1, the Xbox Series S, which launched in 2020 for $300, will cost $500 in the U.S. The Xbox Series X, which launched in 2020 at $500, will go for $800. This follows a round of PlayStation 5 price increases from Sony this spring, and a slow-motion increase for Nintendo’s Switch 2, which will kick in in the U.S. in September. (Mind you, there were also eight video game industry price hikes in six months of 2025). The chart up top shows the sudden ascent of console prices over the past year, a sudden surge in an already unusual hardware generation. Prices had been flat for years, now “up” is the new “flat.” Game console prices used to go down across the length of a console generation, but not this time around. Microsoft’s explanation for the new price hike today: We hoped another price increase would not be necessary, and we have spent the last several months working with suppliers on options. Unfortunately, console storage and memory prices have increased by more than 2.5x and we expect another doubling by the fall of 2027. The entire consumer electronics industry is struggling with the current components crisis, but the effects are particularly hard on consoles. Unlike phones, computers, speakers, and other consumer devices, consoles are typically not sold at a profit, but instead for less than they cost to make. This is an issue well beyond game consoles. Apple announced price hikes on its computers and tablets today as well. Game File is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe Item 2: Brutal Bungie cuts Bungie laid off “most” of its Destiny development team and some developers who worked on Marathon, the newest game from the struggling Sony-owned studio. A WARN notice issued by Sony to Washington State, where Bungie is based, tallied cuts impacting 292 workers, effective next month. That’s strictly for Bungie/Sony jobs in Washington and wouldn’t account for any elsewhere. The video I clipped below shows the redacted list of Bungie cuts filed to Washington State officials. As you’ll see, I had to scroll for a while… In a note emailed to PlayStation workers and published online, PlayStation game studios chief Hermen Hulst offered the following explanation for these latest cuts at Bungie: This is painful news, especially for talented colleagues whose roles have been eliminated. This decision was made only after extensive discussion and careful consideration, and I want to provide some context on how we arrived here. Over the past several months, together with Bungie leadership, we reviewed the studio’s long-term direction, development priorities, resource needs, and role within our broader portfolio strategy. We explored multiple alternatives before concluding that a reduction was necessary to align the studio’s resources with its current priorities and long-term goals. In 2022, Sony bought Bungie for $3.7 billion. The studio’s marquee game, the multiplayer live service shooter Destiny 2 was losing popularity at the time. Its next game Marathon, released earlier this year, has been well-reviewed but had a slow start. Bungie is renowned for making great shooter games, and Destiny fans have mourned the wind-down of Destiny 2. They’ve also expressed bewilderment over reports that Destiny 3 is not, per Bloomberg, immediately in the cards.

Jun 25 • 8:21 PM EDT • Technology • gamefile.news

Who is Anuk Karunaratne? Meet the Cardinals’ new President of Business Operations

The St. Louis Cardinals formally promoted Anuk Karunaratne to the role of President of Business Operations on Wednesday as the franchise unveiled changes to its organizational leadership structure.

Jun 25 • 4:38 PM EDT • Business • fox2now.com

Merck KGaA bolsters life sciences business with $11.3B Bio-Techne buy

The deal comes a matter of weeks after Kai Beckmann was promoted to CEO at Merck and signalled his intent to broaden the company's scope for M&A.

Jun 25 • 12:53 PM EDT • Business • firstwordpharma.com

‘Long-term Thinking Is Key To Ensuring Cultural Relevance’: Q’s With Gadget Entertainment Group’s Stefan Wyss

Gadget is one of Switzerland’s longest-standing promoters, having celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2024. In 2020, after already collaborating successfully

Jun 25 • 3:30 AM EDT • Entertainment • news.pollstar.com

Republic Business Credit Promotes Hebert Seghers to Vice President, Marketing Manager

Republic Business Credit promoted Katherine Hebert Seghers to vice president, marketing manager. In this role, Seghers will continue to lead the company’s

Jun 24 • 7:24 PM EDT • Business • abfjournal.com

Online violence against women in politics: what shapes political party responses to technology-facilitated gender-based violence?

Political parties have a primary role to play in tackling online violence against women and gender diverse politicians. While the prevalence and impact of TFGBV, such as coordinated disinformation campaigns, deepfake image-based sexual abuse or trolling are well documented, many parties are still building their knowledge on how to respond effectively and have not put in place internal practices and policies that respond to the rapidly evolving, poorly regulated digital ecosystem. About the ReportIn order to promote and protect fair and democratic participation in politics, this ALIGN Report explores what political parties are doing in response to TFGBV and what factors shape their action. The findings, based on existing literature and interviews with gender and politics professionals, indicate there are three sets of factors which donors, civil society and practitioners should consider when designing action to support political parties to respond to TFGBV internally. These are: (1) gender norms; (2) socio-political environment; and (3) internal party factors.Key messagesUnequal gender norms are ubiquitous across politics, shaping expectations of leaders to be strong and assertive, and practices of political parties to uphold masculinist values and sustain cultures of silence. These often lead to weak response to TFGBV against women politicians.The socio-political context can incentivise or disincentivise action, depending on the salience of gender issues, which are increasingly weaponised. Electoral competitiveness, domestic laws (i.e. quota requirements), and even the political system or global normative frameworks influence political will to act.Internal party factors that shape responses will vary across countries and contexts, but include: structures to enforce codes of conduct, policies and reporting mechanisms on (TF)GBV, political ideology, extent of centralisation of leadership, and crucially the meaningful participation of women in decision-making positions, not least through internal women’s wings.Party responses can be seen as a spectrum, with actions falling between active discouragement to address TFGBV to commitment to transform unequal norms and practices within the party.About the ToolkitTogether with the report, this ALIGN toolkit offers gender professionals and others working on democratic strengthening a set of guiding questions and reflection prompts to identify which responses could be most effective and suitable in different contexts. These actions can complement other solutions to TFGBV, such as regulations promoting safety by design. The assessment spans a broad range of factors including: (1) different manifestations of gender norms, (2) the socio-political environment and (3) internal party structures.Key messagesPolitical parties are duty-bound to take action internally to respond to the significant threats posed to women members and candidates, including from their own party colleagues, affiliates and political peers.Existing party approaches to TFGBV can be assessed along a spectrum which ranges from active discouragement and passive acceptance to minimal response and transformative change.To generate effective and context-appropriate solutions to TFGBV, it is important to consider how gender norms shape leadership expectations and internal party practices, while also analysing the impact of the socio-political environment. While actions to support women to stay safe online are very common, codes of conduct and measures to strengthen women’s voice and power in the parties are proposed as most transformative solutions.

Jun 24 • 2:08 PM EDT • Politics • odi.org

Pulsenmore Announces Strategic Partnership with Ouma Health to Expand Access to Remote Prenatal Care Across the United States

/PRNewswire/ -- Pulsenmore Ltd. (NASDAQ: PLSM) (TASE: PLSM), a pioneer in home ultrasound technology, today announced a strategic partnership with Ouma Health,...

Jun 24 • 7:00 AM EDT • Health • prnewswire.com

It Ain’t Just Sports: CPR, tennis & a second chance with Adrian Murray

In this episode: We sit down with Adrian Murray, co-founder of T.R.I.N.I.T.Y Tennis, to talk about purpose, perseverance, and using tennis to promote heart health and life-saving skills.

Jun 23 • 11:39 AM EDT • Sports • 12onyourside.com

Dodgers Promote 21-Year-Old Pitching Prospect to Double-A

The Los Angeles Dodgers are calling No. 8 prospect Christian Zazueta up to Double-A, per ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel. Zazueta is just 21 years old, and has shot up the Dodgers’ system since his arrival ahead of the 2024 season. The…

Jun 22 • 2:08 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Deepak Adwani Promoted to Executive Director of Miraj Entertainment Ltd.

Miraj Entertainment Ltd. has announced the promotion of Deepak Adwani from Vice President – P&L to Executive Director of Miraj Cinemas, effective immediately. This announcement comes in the wake of the untimely passing of Managing Director Bhuvanesh Mendiratta, and marks the next chapter in Miraj Cinemas’ journey. Adwani brings over two decades of experience in […]

Jun 22 • 10:41 AM EDT • Entertainment • boxofficepro.com

Mobile health tops early RHTP funding trends

State rural health transformation programs aim to overcome high startup costs and allow rural providers to deliver complex care locally with remote ultrasound, RPM and other mobile health technologies, says one industry expert.

Jun 22 • 9:20 AM EDT • Health • healthcareitnews.com

Dodgers minors: Chris Newell, Brooks Auger shine on Sunday

21-year-old RHP Christian Zazueta reportedly promoted to Double-A Tulsa

Jun 22 • 8:22 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

From Field to Frock: Madison festival promotes Midwest linen

Midwest Linen Revival founder Leslie Schroeder wants to revive flax-to-linen production in the region. The Field to Frock festival returns June 23–28.

Jun 22 • 6:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • captimes.com

How remote work, flexible schedules created a never-ending rush hour

Americans are using newfound flexibility to commute at weird hours, which means we're stuck in a never-ending rush hour.

Jun 22 • 4:38 AM EDT • Business • businessinsider.com

My 91-year-old mom lives independently. She pays about $2,000 a month.

Margaret Burke, 61, lives in Taiwan and is caring remotely for her 91-year-old mother in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, but wants to move back.

Jun 20 • 8:43 AM EDT • Business • businessinsider.com

Ukraine turning robots into mobile weapons to hunt Russian targets

Ukraine's Frontline Robotics makes a remote weapons station that used to be stationary but can now be put on a robot to make a "small tank."

Jun 19 • 11:02 AM EDT • Business • businessinsider.com

'Flamboyant and polite' - Williams pays tribute to Roy

Former Sunderland midfielder Darren Williams says former team-mate Eric Roy "always had a smile on his face" during his short stint at the Stadium of Light. Roy, who was managing Ligue 1 club Brest, died on Wednesday. The pair played together in the 1999-00 season, helping the newly promoted Black Cats to an impressive seventh-place finish in the Premier League.

Jun 19 • 3:16 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Businesses encouraged by demolition of Cole Manor Motel in Dallas

Neighbors say fences and demolition plans for Cole Manor Motel are changing the feel on Harry Hines after years of crime complaints.

Jun 18 • 9:40 PM EDT • Business • nbcdfw.com

Andrew Painter Left Phillies No Choice But To Demote Him

The Philadelphia Phillies decided to option right-handed pitcher Andrew Painter to Triple-A after another horrible start. Painter was the Phillies' top prospect last season and he was expected to make an impact this season for the big league team. However, the 23-year-old has struggled mightily as ...

Jun 18 • 5:39 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com