Tag Archives: over
Patriots Kraft And Russian President Putin Battle Over SB Ring
It’s one of the oddest stories you will ever hear.
An owner of an NFL team and a Russian president at odds over a Super Bowl ring.
It sounds like a Hollywood movie, and it’s likely that at some point one will be made.
In 2005 Patriots owner Robert Kraft went on a trip with businessmen to meet with Russian president Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg.
Kraft was wearing his Super Bowl XXXIX ring on his finger but when he left – he did it without the ring.
“I showed the president my most recent Super Bowl ring,” Kraft said at the time, per The Boston Globe. Putin “was clearly taken with its uniqueness … at that point, I decided to give him the ring as a symbol of the respect and admiration that I have for the Russian people and the leadership of President Putin.”
Years later, Kraft has now changed his tune, stating that Putin took the ring, worth upwards of $ 25,000.
“I took out the ring and showed it to (Putin),” Kraft said this week, per the New York Post. “And he put it on and he goes, ‘I can kill someone with this ring,’ I put my hand out and he put it in his pocket, and three KGB guys got around him and walked out.”
Kraft didn’t panic, but did call the White House, in which a George W. Bush handler told him: ” ‘It would really be in the best interest of U.S.-Soviet relations if you meant to give the ring as a present.’ ”
Putin’s spokesman says the ring was a gift from Kraft, telling CNN that Kraft’s comments were “weird.” “I was standing 20 centimeters away from him and Mr. Putin and saw and heard how Mr. Kraft gave this ring as a gift,” the spokesman said Sunday.
The Patriots did their best to try and put the story to bed on the matter without it going any further.
“It’s a humorous, anecdotal story that Robert re-tells for laughs,” Patriots spokesperson Stacey James said. “He loves that his ring is at the Kremlin and, as he stated back in 2005, he continues to have great respect for Russia and the leadership of President Putin. In particular, he credits President Putin for modernizing the Russian economy. An added benefit from the attention this story gathered eight years ago was the creation of some Patriots fan clubs in Russia.”
BMI sues Pandora over terrestrial radio station purchase
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Mozilla Science Lab encourages scientists to share ideas over open web
Even though scientists created this glorious internet you see before you, current scientific practice is still based more on publishing academic papers than sharing ideas online. As one of the more prominent proponents of the open web, Mozilla stepped in to offer a solution with a new open science initiative called Science Lab. It’s designed to bridge the gap between the open web community and researchers so that they can share ideas, tools and best practices on how the web can be used to solve problems and improve research techniques. Led by Kaitlin Thaney, a long-time open science advocate, the Lab will initially focus on bringing digital literacy to the scientific community with the help of Software Carpentry, a program that teaches basic computer skills to researchers. From there, the group hopes to foster a global conversation on how to encourage the use of the web in science. It’s great to see that the internet has a lot more to offer the field than just Foursquare check-ins.
[Image credit: Håkan Dahlström, Flickr]
Filed under: Alt
Source: The Mozilla Blog, Mozilla Science Lab, Kaitlin Thaney
Video: Daily Show’s Lewis Black mocks Google Glass, Xbox One over privacy
EU investigating Google over Android licensing
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Battle over Waze to reportedly end with $1.3 billion Google deal
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Hulu reportedly receives 3 bids over $1bn
Hulu has been reportedly entertaining bids for some weeks now, with Yahoo! having been the latest company to hit the rumor mill. Various prices have been tossed around, such as the $ 800 million Yahoo is said to have bid for the video service, but none of them have reached the level of three alleged bids leaked by unnamed sources: $ 1 billion. While two of the bids were from companies unknown, one is said to be from Directv.
The information comes from people who are said to be “familiar with the bid.” Reportedly, the powers that be behind Hulu have been looking into seven bids for the service, with the next month or so being used to whittle those down to three or four. While most of those bids fall below the $ 1 billion mark, three are said to meet or exceed that figure.
Needless to say, such a figure could certainly increase the odds of Hulu’s board agreeing to a sale, something that hasn’t been set in stone. Directv would benefit from the service for obvious reasons, having another platform of content to offer the viewing public that expands beyond what it currently offers. It isn’t the only company to aim at grabbing the company, however.
In early April, we heard rumor from sources that former president of News Corp. – one of Hulu’s owners – Peter Chernin bid on Hulu for $ 500 million. Rumor of other bids began surfacing soon after, with bidders including Time Warner Cable, William Morris Endeavor Entertainment, Guggenheim Digital, and KKR & Co.
It was announced in late April that Hulu experienced massive growth in its first quarter, tacking on a million subscribers and seeing 1 billion videos streamed over a three-month period. That brought the total number of subscribers to over 4 million.
SOURCE: Bloomberg
Hulu reportedly receives 3 bids over $ 1bn is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
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Judge orders Google to hand over personal user data to the FBI
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Major brands pull Facebook advertisements over hateful content
Facebook has once again come under fire for its content policy, which many organizations, companies, and users say is too lax in light of hate speech and violent content. Earlier this month, the social network finally banned videos of decapitations, but has still allowed large quantities of controversial content – many of it gender-based, according to some organizations – to persist. For this reason, more than a dozen big-name companies have pulled their advertisements from the social network.
Yesterday, Facebook announced that, in light of the latest round of criticism, it will be making changes to its content policy immediately, which includes revising the materials its review team uses to evaluate content, training its team on the new guidelines, establishing a better communication with organizations, and holding users more responsible for controversial content that is allowed to remain on the site.
While such changes are welcome and are earning it praise from some organizations and users, it is presently a case of “too little, too late,” with over 12 advertisers removing their advertisements from the social network because they were being displayed next to offensive, controversial, and hateful content. Nissan is perhaps the most notable company on the list, with the auto maker saying it will put ads back on the website when Facebook implements the changes it announced yesterday.
According to the Associated Press, many Facebook advertisers were slammed with in excess of 5,000 emails collectively on the behest of a campaign started by Women, Action and the Media. According to the organization, much of the objectionable content on Facebook being allowed to remain focused on endorsing and mocking violence of various natures against women and children, among others.
Women, Action and Media’s Executive Director Jaclyn Friedman said of Facebook’s announced changes yesterday: “We are thrilled with the commitment [the social network] made. It’s about stepping up and being the industry leader that they already are.” According to Facebook, the changes it outlined are going into effect immediately.
SOURCE: Yahoo!
Major brands pull Facebook advertisements over hateful content is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
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AT&T to allow FaceTime, other video chat apps over cellular for all customers
AT&T on Monday said it plans to more broadly enable the use of Apple’s FaceTime for users over its cellular network in the next few weeks, and by year’s end plans to allow video chat apps use over its network by all customers. This latest position on FaceTime and similar apps represents total shift from its position almost a year ago.
AT&T’s statement to the Verge on Monday notes that “by mid-June, we’ll have enabled those apps over cellular for our unlimited plan customers who have LTE devices from [Apple, Samsung and BlackBerry].” Besides FaceTime, Samsung and BlackBerry’s pre-installed video chat apps will also be included.
And more will be coming for all of its customers before the end of the year: “Throughout the second half of this year, we plan to enable pre-loaded video chat apps over cellular for all our customers, regardless of data plan or device; that work is expected to be complete by year end.”
When Apple updated its mobile video chat app to work over cellular last summer, AT&T came under fire when it announced subsequently that only customers who subscribed to one of its Mobile Share plans could use it. Several open internet groups threatened to file complaints with the FCC, calling the carrier’s policy a violation of net neutrality. Several months later, AT&T opened the service to anyone with an LTE device.
Based on broadness of the statement, it sounds like video chat apps like Google’s new Hangouts app, available for both iOS and Android, will also be free to operate over AT&T’s network later on this year.
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