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Ships in some UK port cities create more air pollution than cars
Sun, 19 May 2024 15:33:51 GMT
Milford Haven, Southampton and Immingham top the list for emissions of gases and particulates
Ships calling at the UK’s most-polluted ports produce more nitrogen oxides than all the cars registered in the same cities or regions, analysis has shown.
A report from Transport & Environment (T&E) said that ships were continuing to discharge huge quantities of air pollutants at ports, with Milford Haven, Southampton and Immingham topping the list for emissions of harmful sulphur oxides and fine particulate matter (PM2.5) as well as nitrogen oxides (NOx).
Continue reading...A state industrial strategy is needed to reduce carbon output, produce cleaner growth and redistribute jobs around the UK
Theresa May and Boris Johnson both argued for levelling up and for a state-supported green transition undergirded by an industrial strategy. Neither delivered and their successor, Rishi Sunak, has repudiated their legacy as prime minister. He looks to the City to deliver growth, with banks determining the rate of investment to meet the challenge of the climate emergency. This is a recipe for failure. The Climate Change Committee (CCC), the government’s independent advisers on cutting carbon emissions, warned last year of “worryingly slow” progress to meet net zero targets. The government is not engaging on what it will take to decarbonise.
Weaning the country off fossil fuels and on to green energy is a complex transition that should be a job for the state, not the free market. Yet Britain is bottom of the league for state spending on renewables in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. In the offshore industry alone 30,000 workers could end up with nowhere to go by 2030 without new roles in green industries. Relying on big finance to meet that gap will entrench today’s failing model, which emphasises the need to attract significant capital flows through deregulation and privatisation, strengthening the hand of boom-and-bust financial services and weakening labour rights. The flipside is a bigger trade deficit and a destructive politics of redistribution to asset holders and to London.
Continue reading...All five systems tested were found to be ‘highly vulnerable’ to attempts to elicit harmful responses
Guardrails to prevent artificial intelligence models behind chatbots from issuing illegal, toxic or explicit responses can be bypassed with simple techniques, UK government researchers have found.
The UK’s AI Safety Institute (AISI) said systems it had tested were “highly vulnerable” to jailbreaks, a term for text prompts designed to elicit a response that a model is supposedly trained to avoid issuing.
Continue reading...A school district in Houston has voted to redact chapters on vaccines and climate change, and parents and educators are worried
The wave of book bans sweeping the US, typically reserved for works of fiction deemed controversial, has hit textbooks used in public schools, marking the next step in Republicans’ war on education.
The board of trustees for the Cypress Fairbanks independent school district in Houston voted 6-1 earlier this month to redact certain chapters in science textbooks, including those about vaccines, human growth, diversity, and climate change.
Continue reading...PFAS chemicals present in air, rain, atmosphere and water in basin, which holds nearly 95% of US freshwater
Toxic PFAS “forever chemicals” are ubiquitous in the Great Lakes basin’s air, rain, atmosphere and water, new peer-reviewed research shows.
The first-of-its-kind, comprehensive picture of PFAS levels for the basin, which holds nearly 95% of the nation’s freshwater, also reveals that precipitation is probably a major contributor to the lakes’ contamination.
Continue reading...Edible oil droplets trap bugs without the harm to people and wildlife that synthetic pesticides can cause
Tiny sticky droplets sprayed on crops to trap pests could be a green alternative to chemical pesticides, research has shown.
The insect glue, produced from edible oils, was inspired by plants such as sundews that use the strategy to capture their prey. A key advantage of physical pesticides over toxic pesticides is that pests are highly unlikely to evolve resistance, as this would require them to develop much larger and stronger bodies, while bigger beneficial insects, like bees, are not trapped by the drops.
Continue reading...The powerful lobbying group is going against a Capitol Police officer who fended off January 6 insurrectionists.
The post Neither Candidate Has Much to Say About Israel. So Why Is AIPAC Pouring Money Into This Race? appeared first on The Intercept.
A donor to Dexter in the Portland congressional race tells The Intercept: “I give all my contributions through AIPAC.”
The post AIPAC and Republican Donors Raising Big Money for Maxine Dexter Against Susheela Jayapal in Oregon appeared first on The Intercept.
SEMrush and Ahrefs are among
the most popular tools in the SEO industry. Both companies have been in
business for years and have thousands of customers per month.
If you're a professional SEO or trying to do digital
marketing on your own, at some point you'll likely consider using a tool to
help with your efforts. Ahrefs and SEMrush are two names that will likely
appear on your shortlist.
In this guide, I'm going to help you learn more about these SEO tools and how to choose the one that's best for your purposes.
What is SEMrush?
SEMrush is a popular SEO tool with a wide range of
features—it's the leading competitor research service for online marketers.
SEMrush's SEO Keyword Magic tool offers over 20 billion Google-approved
keywords, which are constantly updated and it's the largest keyword database.
The program was developed in 2007 as SeoQuake is a
small Firefox extension
Features
Ahrefs is a leading SEO platform that offers a set of
tools to grow your search traffic, research your competitors, and monitor your
niche. The company was founded in 2010, and it has become a popular choice
among SEO tools. Ahrefs has a keyword index of over 10.3 billion keywords and
offers accurate and extensive backlink data updated every 15-30 minutes and it
is the world's most extensive backlink index database.
Features
Direct Comparisons: Ahrefs vs SEMrush
Now that you know a little more about each tool, let's
take a look at how they compare. I'll analyze each tool to see how they differ
in interfaces, keyword research resources, rank tracking, and competitor
analysis.
User Interface
Ahrefs and SEMrush both offer comprehensive information
and quick metrics regarding your website's SEO performance. However, Ahrefs
takes a bit more of a hands-on approach to getting your account fully set up,
whereas SEMrush's simpler dashboard can give you access to the data you need
quickly.
In this section, we provide a brief overview of the elements
found on each dashboard and highlight the ease with which you can complete
tasks.
AHREFS
The Ahrefs dashboard is less cluttered than that of
SEMrush, and its primary menu is at the very top of the page, with a search bar
designed only for entering URLs.
Additional features of the Ahrefs platform include:
SEMRUSH
When you log into the SEMrush Tool, you will find four
main modules. These include information about your domains, organic keyword
analysis, ad keyword, and site traffic.
You'll also find some other options like
Both Ahrefs and SEMrush have user-friendly dashboards,
but Ahrefs is less cluttered and easier to navigate. On the other hand, SEMrush
offers dozens of extra tools, including access to customer support resources.
When deciding on which dashboard to use, consider what
you value in the user interface, and test out both.
If you're looking to track your website's search engine
ranking, rank tracking features can help. You can also use them to monitor your
competitors.
Let's take a look at Ahrefs vs. SEMrush to see which
tool does a better job.
The Ahrefs Rank Tracker is simpler to use. Just type in
the domain name and keywords you want to analyze, and it spits out a report
showing you the search engine results page (SERP) ranking for each keyword you
enter.
Rank Tracker looks at the ranking performance of
keywords and compares them with the top rankings for those keywords. Ahrefs
also offers:
You'll see metrics that help you understand your
visibility, traffic, average position, and keyword difficulty.
It gives you an idea of whether a keyword would be
profitable to target or not.
SEMRush offers a tool called Position Tracking. This
tool is a project tool—you must set it up as a new project. Below are a few of
the most popular features of the SEMrush Position Tracking tool:
All subscribers are given regular data updates and
mobile search rankings upon subscribing
The platform provides opportunities to track several
SERP features, including Local tracking.
Intuitive reports allow you to track statistics for the
pages on your website, as well as the keywords used in those pages.
Identify pages that may be competing with each other
using the Cannibalization report.
Ahrefs is a more user-friendly option. It takes seconds
to enter a domain name and keywords. From there, you can quickly decide whether
to proceed with that keyword or figure out how to rank better for other
keywords.
SEMrush allows you to check your mobile rankings and
ranking updates daily, which is something Ahrefs does not offer. SEMrush also
offers social media rankings, a tool you won't find within the Ahrefs platform.
Both are good which one do you like let me know in the comment.
Keyword research is closely related to rank tracking,
but it's used for deciding which keywords you plan on using for future content
rather than those you use now.
When it comes to SEO, keyword research is the most
important thing to consider when comparing the two platforms.
The Ahrefs Keyword Explorer provides you with thousands
of keyword ideas and filters search results based on the chosen search engine.
Ahrefs supports several features, including:
SEMrush's Keyword Magic Tool has over 20 billion
keywords for Google. You can type in any keyword you want, and a list of
suggested keywords will appear.
The Keyword Magic Tool also lets you to:
Both of these tools offer keyword research features and
allow users to break down complicated tasks into something that can be
understood by beginners and advanced users alike.
If you're interested in keyword suggestions, SEMrush
appears to have more keyword suggestions than Ahrefs does. It also continues to
add new features, like the Keyword Gap tool and SERP Questions recommendations.
Both platforms offer competitor analysis tools,
eliminating the need to come up with keywords off the top of your head. Each
tool is useful for finding keywords that will be useful for your competition so
you know they will be valuable to you.
Ahrefs' domain comparison tool lets you compare up to five websites (your website and four competitors) side-by-side.it also shows you how your site is ranked against others with metrics such as backlinks, domain ratings, and more.
Use the Competing Domains section to see a list of your
most direct competitors, and explore how many keywords matches your competitors
have.
To find more information about your competitor, you can
look at the Site Explorer and Content Explorer tools and type in their URL
instead of yours.
SEMrush provides a variety of insights into your
competitors' marketing tactics. The platform enables you to research your
competitors effectively. It also offers several resources for competitor
analysis including:
Traffic Analytics helps you identify where your
audience comes from, how they engage with your site, what devices visitors use
to view your site, and how your audiences overlap with other websites.
SEMrush's Organic Research examines your website's
major competitors and shows their organic search rankings, keywords they are
ranking for, and even if they are ranking for any (SERP) features and more.
The Market Explorer search field allows you to type in
a domain and lists websites or articles similar to what you entered. Market
Explorer also allows users to perform in-depth data analytics on These
companies and markets.
SEMrush wins here because it has more tools dedicated to
competitor analysis than Ahrefs. However, Ahrefs offers a lot of functionality
in this area, too. It takes a combination of both tools to gain an advantage
over your competition.
When it comes to keyword data research, you will become
confused about which one to choose.
Consider choosing Ahrefs if you
Consider SEMrush if you:
Both tools are great. Choose the one which meets your
requirements and if you have any experience using either Ahrefs or SEMrush let
me know in the comment section which works well for you.
Lai Ching-te uses inauguration speech to push for peace in the region and says the future of Taiwan is important to the future of the world
Lai Ching-te has been sworn in as Taiwan’s new president, urging China to “cease their political and military intimidation against Taiwan” and to keep the world free from the fear of more war.
Lai was inaugurated on Monday morning at the Japanese-colonial-era presidential office in central Taipei, taking over from Tsai Ing-wen, whose eight years in power saw a sharp deterioration in relations with Beijing.
Continue reading...As brutal police repression sweeps campus encampments, schools have been cutting ties with pro-Palestine faculty members without tenure.
The post University Professors Are Losing Their Jobs Over “New McCarthyism” on Gaza appeared first on The Intercept.
This blog is closed. See all of our Taiwan coverage.
The Guardian’s Helen Davidson and Chi Hui Lin are at the inauguration in Taipei. They have this report:
It is a sea of bucket hats outside the Presidential Office.
Continue reading...Taiwan’s first female president has presided over big social changes, but her main legacy is the cultivation of the island’s rising prominence on the world stage
In a riot of yellow braids, glitter and spandex, garnished with a huge yellow water lily, Taiwan’s latest global celebrity danced her heart out for the island’s diminutive, softly spoken president, whose mild manners belie her outsized legacy.
Tsai Ing-wen, 67, stepped down as Taiwan’s president on Monday. Before handing over the keys, on Wednesday she welcomed Taiwan’s most famous drag queen, Nymphia Wind, for a live performance in the presidential office. After sashaying to Lady Gaga’s Marry the Night, Nymphia Wind, who recently won the 16th season of the US reality show RuPaul’s Drag Race, thanked Tsai for “all these years of making Taiwan the first in so many things”.
Continue reading...Even the English Breakfast Society has welcomed the ‘baozi’ as supermarket chains feed of interest in world food
The origin of bao buns, or baozi, goes back as far as third-century China. The legend goes that a military strategist used the wheat buns instead of human heads as a peace offering to a god for safe passage. The deity fell in love with the steamed buns so much that he parted the rough waters of the river to allow crossing.
It seems Britons have also fallen for the Asian treat. The English Breakfast Society, devoted to promoting the traditional English breakfast, this month encouraged the introduction of bao buns as part of a morning fry-up.
Continue reading... ![]() | submitted by /u/Elliottafc1 [link] [comments] |
Local authorities will be allowed to turn unsold homes from developers into affordable housing
China will cut mortgage rates and allow local authorities to turn unsold homes from developers into affordable housing, in a series of drastic measures by Beijing aimed at propping up the country’s faltering property market.
The People’s Bank of China said it would scrap the minimum rate of interest and reduce down-payment ratios to 15% for first-time buyers and 25% for second homes. It will also create a 300bn yuan (£32.8bn) facility to support local state-owned companies to buy homes at reasonable prices, it said in a series of statements on Friday.
Continue reading...Health-conscious consumers drive trend as soft drink gets added to unusual spirts and flavours
Tonic water first appeared in early 19th-century India when medicinal quinine was mixed with soda and sugar and given to British soldiers to prevent malaria. The first known record of its pairing with gin was in 1868 from the Oriental Sporting Magazine, where partygoers called for the cocktail and thin cigars at the end of a horse race in Lucknow, India.
But since then, as the popularity of non-alcoholic beverages and demand for new flavours grows, drinkers have been mixing tonics with more surprising tastes. In recent years, it has been found in everything from port and tequila to coffee, with younger drinkers and those interested in the health benefits of quinine driving the trend, according to industry experts.
Continue reading...While the number of Indian billionaires soars, growing unemployment has become a big problem for the BJP as it campaigns for a third term
It wasn’t even the real wedding, just the pre-wedding party. But that didn’t stop India’s richest billionaire, Mukesh Ambani, whose son is set to marry the daughter of a millionaire, from throwing an affair so ostentatious that no one could question just how wealthy they are.
The pop star Rihanna was paid about $8m to perform. The catering alone cost $25m and the final bill for the glittering soiree, held in March, reportedly came in at about $150m.
Continue reading...PFAS chemicals present in air, rain, atmosphere and water in basin, which holds nearly 95% of US freshwater
Toxic PFAS “forever chemicals” are ubiquitous in the Great Lakes basin’s air, rain, atmosphere and water, new peer-reviewed research shows.
The first-of-its-kind, comprehensive picture of PFAS levels for the basin, which holds nearly 95% of the nation’s freshwater, also reveals that precipitation is probably a major contributor to the lakes’ contamination.
Continue reading...From targeting humanitarian vehicles to standing by as mobs attack trucks, Israel is blocking aid from reaching Gaza.
The post The State Department Says Israel Isn’t Blocking Aid. Videos Show the Opposite. appeared first on The Intercept.
Targeting posts boasting of personal wealth appears to be part of campaign to ‘purify the internet cultural environment’
Chinese social media companies have launched a new crackdown on user content, targeting posts that show off personal wealth and financial extravagance.
In a statement posted online on Wednesday, Weibo said it had spent this month carrying out special management work on “undesirable value-orientated content”, including content “showing off wealth and worshipping money”.
Continue reading...As much as 40cm fell in less than a day in part of Seoraksan national park. Plus, a powerful tornado in Australia
There was unusually heavy snowfall this week in the highlands of the mountainous region of eastern Gangwon province in South Korea. Between 5.30pm local time on Wednesday and 9am on Thursday, as much as 40cm fell at the Socheong shelter of Seoraksan national park, while 20cm was recorded at its Jungcheong shelter.
This unexpected snowfall has caused damage ahead of a harvest on wild vegetable farms that operate on the mountains. Conditions over the next few days are expected to improve, with warmer and drier weather over the weekend.
Continue reading...Since Dobbs, state-level Republicans have sought to strip power from DAs elected in Democratic cities who won’t prosecute abortion care.
The post Republicans Can’t Decide: Do They Hate Prosecutors Because of Bail Reform or Abortion? appeared first on The Intercept.
Human-caused climate crisis brought soaring temperatures across Asia, from Gaza to Delhi to Manila
The record-breaking heatwave that scorched the Philippines in April would have been impossible without the climate crisis, scientists have found. Searing heat above 40C (104F) struck across Asia in April, causing deaths, water shortages, crop losses and widespread school closures.
The extreme heat was made 45 times more likely in India and five times more likely in Israel and Palestine, the study found. The scientists said the high temperatures compounded the already dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where displaced people are living in overcrowded shelters with little access to water.
Continue reading...“We’re continuing to work around the clock with the government of Israel and with the government of Egypt to work on this issue,” the State Department said.
The post American Medical Missions Trapped in Gaza, Facing Death by Dehydration as Population Clings to Life appeared first on The Intercept.
Ban Khun Samut Chin, a coastal village in Samut Prakan province, Thailand, has been slowly swallowed by the sea over the past few decades. This has led to the relocation of the school and many homes, resulting in a dwindling population. Currently, there are only four students attending the school, often leaving just one in each classroom. The village has experienced severe coastal erosion, causing 1.1-2km (0.5-1.2 miles) of shoreline to disappear since the mid-1950s
Continue reading...Health-conscious consumers drive trend as soft drink gets added to unusual spirts and flavours
Tonic water first appeared in early 19th-century India when medicinal quinine was mixed with soda and sugar and given to British soldiers to prevent malaria. The first known record of its pairing with gin was in 1868 from the Oriental Sporting Magazine, where partygoers called for the cocktail and thin cigars at the end of a horse race in Lucknow, India.
But since then, as the popularity of non-alcoholic beverages and demand for new flavours grows, drinkers have been mixing tonics with more surprising tastes. In recent years, it has been found in everything from port and tequila to coffee, with younger drinkers and those interested in the health benefits of quinine driving the trend, according to industry experts.
Continue reading...Even the English Breakfast Society has welcomed the ‘baozi’ as supermarket chains feed of interest in world food
The origin of bao buns, or baozi, goes back as far as third-century China. The legend goes that a military strategist used the wheat buns instead of human heads as a peace offering to a god for safe passage. The deity fell in love with the steamed buns so much that he parted the rough waters of the river to allow crossing.
It seems Britons have also fallen for the Asian treat. The English Breakfast Society, devoted to promoting the traditional English breakfast, this month encouraged the introduction of bao buns as part of a morning fry-up.
Continue reading...Costner writes, directs and stars alongside Sienna Miller and Sam Worthington in a big vain slog up familiar old west alleys
After three saddle-sore hours, Kevin Costner’s handsome-looking but oddly listless new western doesn’t get much done in the way of satisfying storytelling.
Admittedly, this is supposed to be just the first of a multi-part saga for which Costner is director, co-writer and star. But it somehow doesn’t establish anything exciting for its various unresolved storylines, and doesn’t leave us suspensefully hanging for anything else.
In fact, the ploddingly paced epic ends by suddenly accelerating into a very peculiar preview montage of part two, with Costner speeding around punching people we’ve never seen before – as if someone had accidentally leant on the fast-forward button and we got to watch the whole of the second section in 25 seconds.
It certainly starts at a gallop. The various plot strands in Montana, Wyoming and Kansas entwine around a new white pioneer settlement in the 1860s American west, called Horizon, attracting any number of hardy or naive souls who don’t know or haven’t been told that the Apaches will not surrender this territory without a fight.
After a mysterious attempted slaying of a man in a remote shack (the storyline which is subject to the most conspicuously deferred explanation) we witness, on one terrible night, apaches attacking the Horizon settlement and burning it to the ground, killing many, and making a widow of a homesteader’s wife: Frances (Sienna Miller) leaving her children fatherless. It is a genuinely gripping sequence.
A retaliatory raiding party is organised by vindictive trackers who don’t care if they capture the actual apaches responsible – just any native Americans – to get the bounty cash. They are reluctantly permitted to do by the Unionist soldiers, exasperated by the existence of the Horizon township which is situated in open country almost impossible for them to defend.
They are led by modest, handsome First Lt Trent Gephardt (Sam Worthington) who supposedly experiences a romantic connection with Frances – and Miller has to pivot her character on a dime from the grief and horror of seeing her husband killed, to a state of simpering, skittish flirting with hunky Trent.
Meanwhile, the apaches are deeply divided about how to handle the thread from the settlers; hotheaded young Pionsenay (Owen Crow Shoe) is furious at his father’s lack of direct action.
Another plot strand has a gruelling wagon train led by Matthew Van Weyden (Luke Wilson) having to deal with food and water shortages, the ever-present risk of attack and a couple of lazy entitled Brits who won’t pull their weight.
Emergency relief coordinator says famine looming as Israel’s Rafah offensive blocks vital aid routes
The United Nations’ humanitarian chief has warned of “apocalyptic” consequences due to aid shortages in Gaza, where Israel’s military offensive in the southern city of Rafah has blocked desperately needed food.
“If fuel runs out, aid doesn’t get to the people where they need it. That famine, which we have talked about for so long, and which is looming, will not be looming any more. It will be present,” the UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, Martin Griffiths, told AFP on the sidelines of meetings with Qatari officials in Doha.
Continue reading...The author on how his mission to improve our national diet began – and where it needs to go
Chris van Tulleken has suggested we meet at his local pizza place, Sweet Thursday, in Hackney, east London. If the choice seems counterintuitive for a man with a mission to improve our national diet, he puts me right when we sit down. “Pizza has become emblematic of junk food,” he says, “but proper homemade pizza is very healthy.”
At Sweet Thursday, purist Italian chefs work their fresh sourdough bases in an open kitchen (rumour has it they are so purist in this vocation that they draw the line at making salad). But it is not just authenticity that counts, it is also community. Van Tulleken lives around the corner; the owner grew up nearby and this is where local families tend to come to catch up or to celebrate. “Above all, a restaurant should never be just a way of extracting money in exchange for nutrition,” Van Tulleken says. “Or for paying dividends to offshore investors. And I think these things are actually obvious even if you don’t live, like me, in a world of nutritional studies.”
Continue reading...Our desires are an essential part of who we are – as I discovered when I lost my appetite for six months
Mostly, walking down New York streets in spring sunshine is the cinematic, euphoric ideal of what it is to be alive. It’s the thing I looked forward to for decades. It meant to me, back then as a kid in Ireland, listening to songs about Lexington and 14th Street, freedom: an almost deranged amount of freedom.
Sometimes, though, walking down New York streets in spring sunshine is agonising in both a physical and spiritual sense. This may be so, for instance, if you have no health insurance and are very stupid. Like me. That was in February 2023. I had been in increasingly acute pain for days, but because of a stubborn ability to ignore bodily breakdown and also a reluctance to spend money on healthcare in the US when I was only visiting, I kept going until I collapsed into an urgent care centre that I luckily passed one evening as I was dragging myself with manic good cheer to another dinner, despite being barely able to walk.
Continue reading...Ghofran Hamza is on a solo mission to bring glorious Syrian cuisine to lucky mid-Wales
Arabic Flavour, 4 Northgate Street, Aberystwyth SY23 2JS (01970 228 078). Starters and meze £4.75-£8.25, mains £14.50-£18.95, desserts £2.95-£7.75, wines from £21
Occasionally, during the wait for our starters at Arabic Flavour, one of us would pop off to the loo; a moment of magical thinking perhaps, in which a sudden absence from the table could somehow make the food arrive. They would stop by the kitchen door to sneak a look in through the window, willing there to be more people in there. Perhaps the rest of the brigade had simply popped out when last we looked. But no, there really was just one person in that kitchen doing everything: the compact, completely focused and utterly poised figure of Ghofran Hamza, the young Syrian refugee by way of Lebanon, who is determined to tell her 21st-century story at the stove. The lack of kitchen personnel means a dinner at Arabic Flavour is unlikely to be quick. Do not go ravenously hungry. Prepare a few conversational gambits. Perhaps do not go in a large group. But really, do go.
Continue reading...A quarter of Britain’s children live below the poverty line. Near his Fife home, the former PM shows how charities help families and says this issue must be a priority for any government
• The Observer view: Labour must tackle this scourge
• Torsten Bell: We can end child poverty
• Archbishop urges Starmer to ditch ‘cruel’ benefit cap
Outside a warehouse squeezed between a waste recycling plant, an auto parts outlet and a scaffolding company in Lochgelly, Fife, a blur of figures in hi-vis jackets are busily packing boxes into headteacher Ailsa Swankie’s car. Not for the first time, she is taking delivery of household essentials, hygiene products and food from the area’s heaving “multibank” – an institution she describes as an “absolute lifeline”.
The specific items differ with each pick-up – sometimes toilet rolls, other times washing powder or hot water bottles, donated by local businesses or sourced cheaply. But the need for each trip is always the same: an increasing number of families at her school who have found themselves struggling to afford what should be basic products. “We do have a lot of working families who work very, very hard, but they’re still really struggling,” Swankie says. “If I took nappies back to school, they’d all be gone by 3pm.”
Continue reading...From targeting humanitarian vehicles to standing by as mobs attack trucks, Israel is blocking aid from reaching Gaza.
The post The State Department Says Israel Isn’t Blocking Aid. Videos Show the Opposite. appeared first on The Intercept.
There was more business than usual and some bemused regulars after El Califa de León was rewarded for its ‘exceptional’ offering
El Califa de León, an unassuming taco joint in Mexico City, measures just 3 metres by 3 metres and has space for only about six people to stand at a squeeze. Locals usually wait for 5 minutes between ordering and picking up their food.
All that changed on Wednesday, however, when it became the first Mexican taco stand ever to win a Michelin star, putting it in the exalted company of fine dining restaurants around the world, and drawing crowds like it has never seen.
Continue reading...AI Overviews, announced this week, are the culmination of a long line of products dedicated to keeping you on Google.com
Google announced this week that it would begin the international rollout of its new artificial intelligence-powered search feature, called AI Overviews. When billions of people search a range of topics from news to recipes to general knowledge questions, what they see first will now be an AI-generated summary.
Google touted AI Overviews at its annual I/O developer conference as a way of delivering customers quick answers and simplifying the online search experience, but it also has another effect on the way that people engage with the internet: keeping users, and advertisers, on Google.com. It’s a new era in Google’s years-long quest for your attention.
Continue reading...After inquiries from The Intercept, Duane Kees stepped down from his ethics panel position.
The post This U.S. Attorney Resigned Amid an Ethics Investigation. Yet He Wound Up Overseeing Judges’ Ethics. appeared first on The Intercept.
“We’re continuing to work around the clock with the government of Israel and with the government of Egypt to work on this issue,” the State Department said.
The post American Medical Missions Trapped in Gaza, Facing Death by Dehydration as Population Clings to Life appeared first on The Intercept.
A weekly email from Yotam Ottolenghi, Meera Sodha, Felicity Cloake and Rachel Roddy, featuring the latest recipes and seasonal eating ideas
Each week we’ll send you an exclusive newsletter from our star food writers. We’ll also send you the latest recipes from Yotam Ottolenghi, Nigel Slater, Meera Sodha and all our star cooks, stand-out food features and seasonal eating inspiration, plus restaurant reviews from Grace Dent and Jay Rayner.
Sign up below to start receiving the best of our culinary journalism in one mouth-watering weekly email.
Continue reading...South Africa's case against Israel over allegations of genocide before the international court of justice has raised a central question of international law: what is genocide and how do you prove it? It is one of three genocide cases being considered by the UN's world court, but since the genocide convention was approved in 1948, only three instances have been legally recognised as genocide. Josh Toussaint-Strauss looks back on these historical cases to find out why the crime is so much harder to prove than other atrocities, and what bearing this has on South Africa's case against Israel and future cases
What is the genocide convention and how might it apply to the UK and Israel?
‘Famine is setting in’: UN court orders Israel to unblock Gaza food aid
On the last day of his Huginn mission, ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen takes us on a tour of the place he called home for 6 months: the International Space Station. From the beautiful views of Cupola to the kitchen in Node 1 filled with food and friends and all the way to the science of Columbus, the Space Station is the work and living place for astronauts as they help push science forward.
Style, with substance: what’s really trending this week, a roundup of the best fashion journalism and your wardrobe dilemmas solved, direct to your inbox every Thursday
Style, with substance: what’s really trending this week, a roundup of the best fashion journalism and your wardrobe dilemmas solved, delivered straight to your inbox every Thursday
Explore all our newsletters: whether you love film, football, fashion or food, we’ve got something for you
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Imagine a world in which you can do transactions and many other things without having to give your personal information. A world in which you don’t need to rely on banks or governments anymore. Sounds amazing, right? That’s exactly what blockchain technology allows us to do.
It’s like your computer’s hard drive. blockchain is a technology that lets you store data in digital blocks, which are connected together like links in a chain.
Blockchain technology was originally invented in 1991 by two mathematicians, Stuart Haber and W. Scot Stornetta. They first proposed the system to ensure that timestamps could not be tampered with.
A few years later, in 1998, software developer Nick Szabo proposed using a similar kind of technology to secure a digital payments system he called “Bit Gold.” However, this innovation was not adopted until Satoshi Nakamoto claimed to have invented the first Blockchain and Bitcoin.
A blockchain is a distributed database shared between the nodes of a computer network. It saves information in digital format. Many people first heard of blockchain technology when they started to look up information about bitcoin.
Blockchain is used in cryptocurrency systems to ensure secure, decentralized records of transactions.
Blockchain allowed people to guarantee the fidelity and security of a record of data without the need for a third party to ensure accuracy.
To understand how a blockchain works, Consider these basic steps:
Let’s get to know more about the blockchain.
Blockchain records digital information and distributes it across the network without changing it. The information is distributed among many users and stored in an immutable, permanent ledger that can't be changed or destroyed. That's why blockchain is also called "Distributed Ledger Technology" or DLT.
Here’s how it works:
And that’s the beauty of it! The process may seem complicated, but it’s done in minutes with modern technology. And because technology is advancing rapidly, I expect things to move even more quickly than ever.
Even though blockchain is integral to cryptocurrency, it has other applications. For example, blockchain can be used for storing reliable data about transactions. Many people confuse blockchain with cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ethereum.
Blockchain already being adopted by some big-name companies, such as Walmart, AIG, Siemens, Pfizer, and Unilever. For example, IBM's Food Trust uses blockchain to track food's journey before reaching its final destination.
Although some of you may consider this practice excessive, food suppliers and manufacturers adhere to the policy of tracing their products because bacteria such as E. coli and Salmonella have been found in packaged foods. In addition, there have been isolated cases where dangerous allergens such as peanuts have accidentally been introduced into certain products.
Tracing and identifying the sources of an outbreak is a challenging task that can take months or years. Thanks to the Blockchain, however, companies now know exactly where their food has been—so they can trace its location and prevent future outbreaks.
Blockchain technology allows systems to react much faster in the event of a hazard. It also has many other uses in the modern world.
Blockchain technology is safe, even if it’s public. People can access the technology using an internet connection.
Have you ever been in a situation where you had all your data stored at one place and that one secure place got compromised? Wouldn't it be great if there was a way to prevent your data from leaking out even when the security of your storage systems is compromised?
Blockchain technology provides a way of avoiding this situation by using multiple computers at different locations to store information about transactions. If one computer experiences problems with a transaction, it will not affect the other nodes.
Instead, other nodes will use the correct information to cross-reference your incorrect node. This is called “Decentralization,” meaning all the information is stored in multiple places.
Blockchain guarantees your data's authenticity—not just its accuracy, but also its irreversibility. It can also be used to store data that are difficult to register, like legal contracts, state identifications, or a company's product inventory.
Blockchain has many advantages and disadvantages.
I’ll answer the most frequently asked questions about blockchain in this section.
Blockchain is not a cryptocurrency but a technology that makes cryptocurrencies possible. It's a digital ledger that records every transaction seamlessly.
Yes, blockchain can be theoretically hacked, but it is a complicated task to be achieved. A network of users constantly reviews it, which makes hacking the blockchain difficult.
Coinbase Global is currently the biggest blockchain company in the world. The company runs a commendable infrastructure, services, and technology for the digital currency economy.
Blockchain is a decentralized technology. It’s a chain of distributed ledgers connected with nodes. Each node can be any electronic device. Thus, one owns blockhain.
Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency, which is powered by Blockchain technology while Blockchain is a distributed ledger of cryptocurrency
Generally a database is a collection of data which can be stored and organized using a database management system. The people who have access to the database can view or edit the information stored there. The client-server network architecture is used to implement databases. whereas a blockchain is a growing list of records, called blocks, stored in a distributed system. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, timestamp and transaction information. Modification of data is not allowed due to the design of the blockchain. The technology allows decentralized control and eliminates risks of data modification by other parties.
Blockchain has a wide spectrum of applications and, over the next 5-10 years, we will likely see it being integrated into all sorts of industries. From finance to healthcare, blockchain could revolutionize the way we store and share data. Although there is some hesitation to adopt blockchain systems right now, that won't be the case in 2022-2023 (and even less so in 2026). Once people become more comfortable with the technology and understand how it can work for them, owners, CEOs and entrepreneurs alike will be quick to leverage blockchain technology for their own gain. Hope you like this article if you have any question let me know in the comments section
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And for some reason Justice Samuel Alito can’t stop talking about this witch trial judge.
The post The Consumer Finance Protection Bureau Is Constitutional, After All appeared first on The Intercept.
A man in Glasgow woke from a coma to find US cops calling his identity into question. Plus, how DNA has reactivated cold sex cases, and Blue Lights concludes
9pm, Channel 4
Strap in for an utterly absurd true-crime story. An eccentric man known locally in Glasgow as Arthur Knight woke up from a Covid coma in 2021 and found himself surrounded by police. US authorities claimed his real identity was Nicholas Rossi who, after several rape charges, faked his own death. This four-parter follows the countless shocking reveals as, over two years in court, he and his English wife, Miranda, continued to insist he was Knight. It also speaks with journalists, legal figures involved and the women Rossi allegedly assaulted. The case led to a judge ruling that he is, in fact, Rossi, and he is now facing charges in the US – but the journey needs to be seen to be believed. Hollie Richardson
Ukrainian makes convincing case as greatest of all time after rocking the Gypsy King to unify the heavyweight division
In the final shake-up it was those 30 seconds at the end of the ninth round that determined Oleksandr Usyk would finish the night holding all four heavyweight belts, the first man to do so this century; and in the process complete an ascent to the most rarefied all-time champion air.
This was a wonderful heavyweight fight, 12 rounds of craft, heart and in Tyson Fury’s case, bloody-minded will to keep throwing punches from the edge of unconsciousness. If that half a minute was pivotal, a knockdown that ultimately shaped the judges’ cards, it also captured the wider patterns of a fight during which Usyk worked away at Fury like a man chopping down a tree with a forged steel hatchet.
Continue reading...Tigran Gambaryan faces allegations of ‘serious criminality’ on behalf of world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange
A Nigerian court has ruled that Tigran Gambaryan, the Binance executive detained on charges of tax evasion and money laundering, can face trial on behalf of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
In a judgment in Abuja on Friday – Gambaryan’s 40th birthday – the presiding judge, Emeka Nwite, denied the American national bail, saying he was likely to abscond.
Continue reading...Lawyers urge international court of justice to issue urgent measures over assault on Gaza’s southernmost city
South Africa has asked the international court of justice (ICJ) to urgently order Israel to end its assault on Rafah, halt its military campaign across Gaza, and allow international investigators and journalists into the territory.
In a court hearing, lawyers for South Africa expanded a written request for judges to issue an emergency order to stop the offensive into Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city.
Continue reading...Since Dobbs, state-level Republicans have sought to strip power from DAs elected in Democratic cities who won’t prosecute abortion care.
The post Republicans Can’t Decide: Do They Hate Prosecutors Because of Bail Reform or Abortion? appeared first on The Intercept.
From targeting humanitarian vehicles to standing by as mobs attack trucks, Israel is blocking aid from reaching Gaza.
The post The State Department Says Israel Isn’t Blocking Aid. Videos Show the Opposite. appeared first on The Intercept.
With Bowman’s challenger handpicked by AIPAC, the Israel lobby is cementing its status as the biggest player in Democratic primary politics.
The post Outside Groups Spent $285,000 Backing Jamaal Bowman. AIPAC Alone Just Dropped Nearly $2 Million to Attack Him. appeared first on The Intercept.
As brutal police repression sweeps campus encampments, schools have been cutting ties with pro-Palestine faculty members without tenure.
The post University Professors Are Losing Their Jobs Over “New McCarthyism” on Gaza appeared first on The Intercept.
After inquiries from The Intercept, Duane Kees stepped down from his ethics panel position.
The post This U.S. Attorney Resigned Amid an Ethics Investigation. Yet He Wound Up Overseeing Judges’ Ethics. appeared first on The Intercept.
The 71-year-old veteran peace activist discusses the war on Gaza, the Biden administration, and shaking up Congress.
The post Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin on Disrupting the U.S. War Machine appeared first on The Intercept.
The 22-year-old woman and her child were civilian casualties of a U.S. drone strike, but the Pentagon won't return the family's messages.
The post Pentagon Compensated Zero Civilian Victims in 2022 — Despite Evidence That the U.S. Killed a Mom and Child in Somalia appeared first on The Intercept.
A new anti-terrorism bill would allow the government to take away vital tax exemptions from nonprofit news outlets.
The post Criticizing Israel? Nonprofit Media Could Lose Tax-Exempt Status Without Due Process appeared first on The Intercept.
The powerful lobbying group is going against a Capitol Police officer who fended off January 6 insurrectionists.
The post Neither Candidate Has Much to Say About Israel. So Why Is AIPAC Pouring Money Into This Race? appeared first on The Intercept.
Antony Blinken’s report identifies “incidents that raise concerns,” but says Israel is not blocking humanitarian aid.
The post Israel “Likely” Used U.S.-Supplied Weapons in Violation of International Law. That’s OK, Though, State Department Says. appeared first on The Intercept.
Four lawsuits alleging Hamas ties against Students for Justice in Palestine, the AP, UNRWA, and a cryptocurrency exchange share many of the same plaintiffs.
The post October 7 Survivors Sue Campus Protesters, Say Students Are “Hamas’s Propaganda Division” appeared first on The Intercept.
A donor to Dexter in the Portland congressional race tells The Intercept: “I give all my contributions through AIPAC.”
The post AIPAC and Republican Donors Raising Big Money for Maxine Dexter Against Susheela Jayapal in Oregon appeared first on The Intercept.
An open letter from government attorneys questions the legal cover for arms transfers to Israel.
The post Even Biden’s Lawyers Are Urging the White House to Change Course on Gaza appeared first on The Intercept.
With Bowman’s challenger handpicked by AIPAC, the Israel lobby is cementing its status as the biggest player in Democratic primary politics.
The post Outside Groups Spent $285,000 Backing Jamaal Bowman. AIPAC Alone Just Dropped Nearly $2 Million to Attack Him. appeared first on The Intercept.
Since Dobbs, state-level Republicans have sought to strip power from DAs elected in Democratic cities who won’t prosecute abortion care.
The post Republicans Can’t Decide: Do They Hate Prosecutors Because of Bail Reform or Abortion? appeared first on The Intercept.
Pundits say rising negative feelings to other parties threatens democracy. Apart from in America, new research tells a different story
The frontrunner to be the next US president is spending his weeks in court, charged with a criminal offence related to an alleged sexual encounter with a porn star. This would normally be suboptimal from a campaign perspective, but to date is having no effect on support for Donald Trump.
Moreover, whether you think the US economy is going gangbusters or collapsing depends not on whether wages and employment are rising but on whether you side with Democrats or Republicans, with the latter currently reporting that economic conditions are worse than in the depths of Covid.
Continue reading...Republican senator’s comments come as he is considered among Trump’s top candidates for vice-president
The Republican Florida senator Marco Rubio said on Sunday he would not commit to accepting the 2024 presidential election results, insisting that “if it’s unfair” his party will “go to court and point out the fact that states are not following their own election laws”.
Rubio’s statements on Meet the Press come as he is considered among former president Donald Trump’s top candidates for vice-president. Trump has continuously said falsely that the 2020 election was stolen.
Continue reading...During a bombastic speech in Dallas, GOP frontrunner asks: ‘Are we going to be considered three-term? Or two-term?’
Donald Trump flirted with the idea of being president for three terms – a clear violation of the US constitution – during a bombastic speech for the National Rifle Association in which he vowed to reverse gun safety measures green-lighted during the Biden administration.
“You know, FDR 16 years – almost 16 years – he was four terms. I don’t know, are we going to be considered three-term? Or two-term?” The ex-president and GOP presidential frontrunner said to the organization’s annual convention in Dallas, prompting some in the crowd to yell “three!” Politico reported.
Continue reading...And for some reason Justice Samuel Alito can’t stop talking about this witch trial judge.
The post The Consumer Finance Protection Bureau Is Constitutional, After All appeared first on The Intercept.
The member for Dagenham and Rainham says he can’t wait to leave parliament. So why did he spend the past 23 years there? And what does he think he achieved?
‘Labour, to me, has always been a bit of a life sentence,” Jon Cruddas says. “I don’t get a lot of fun out of it.” The Labour MP for Dagenham and Rainham is sitting in the atrium in Portcullis House opposite the Houses of Parliament, under one of the monitors that call MPs to vote. Periodically, it clangs loudly and we fall silent and wait for the pointless noise to pass. It’s a metaphor for late-capitalist democracy. Sorry, his disaffection is contagious. He seems cheerful on it, though.
The life sentence began in 1978 when he joined the party at 16. Participating in local politics in Portsmouth wasn’t the formative experience; more important was when he went to Australia, before university, and got involved with a construction union. His dad was a sailor from West Yorkshire and met his mum in Derry. “Classic, extraordinarily socially mobile generation,” he says of himself and his four siblings. “We had free education, free health, access to housing, access to work. How much of that is still available? We were very fortunate.”
Continue reading...From targeting humanitarian vehicles to standing by as mobs attack trucks, Israel is blocking aid from reaching Gaza.
The post The State Department Says Israel Isn’t Blocking Aid. Videos Show the Opposite. appeared first on The Intercept.
Labour sees no electoral gain in flagging sector’s funding crisis – but losses cannot be sustained much longer
Why are universities in such financial dire straits? According to one sector leader, it’s because they are losing money on two of their three income streams, while their third source is under attack by the government.
“We are already in a state where teaching home students operates at a loss, doing research operates at a loss, and the international student market has been diminished by the government’s rhetoric and policy. And those are the three areas where universities get their income,” said Rachel Hewitt, chief executive of the MillionPlus association of modern universities that includes Bath Spa, Wolverhampton and Sunderland.
Continue reading...As brutal police repression sweeps campus encampments, schools have been cutting ties with pro-Palestine faculty members without tenure.
The post University Professors Are Losing Their Jobs Over “New McCarthyism” on Gaza appeared first on The Intercept.
Le Pen, Orbán and Meloni rail against socialism and ‘massive illegal migration’ at ‘great patriotic convention’ in Madrid
International far-right leaders, including France’s Marine Le Pen, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and Argentina’s Javier Milei, came together in Madrid to rail against socialism and “massive illegal migration” three weeks before hard-right parties are expected to see a surge in support in June’s European elections.
Sunday’s “great patriotic convention”, which was organised by Spain’s far-right Vox party, offered conservatives and far-right populists a chance to congregate and take aim at a variety of familiar targets, from the welfare state to “wokeness” and the agendas of Brussels-based bureaucrats.
Continue reading...Speech warmly received at historically Black college despite backlash from students in weeks leading to address over war
Joe Biden told graduating students of Morehouse College that American democracy has failed the Black community, but vowed to continue fighting “the poison of white supremacy”, in a widely watched speech to a historically Black college during an election year.
Despite a backlash from some students and alumni in the weeks leading up to Biden’s commencement address, including over the Hamas-Israel war and concerns that Biden would use the speech as a campaign event, the president’s address to the all-male school was warmly received. He used his speech to reaffirm his commitment to democracy in the wake of the January 6 insurrection, and to reiterate his call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Continue reading...The latest victims of the culture wars? Woke white goods. Because, apparently, energy efficiency and lower electricity bills are unAmerican
If you’ve ever wished your dishwasher used more water, or found your fridge too cheap to run, help is at hand. US Republicans have their sights set on one of the greatest scourges of our age: woke white goods.
You may or may not remember last year’s “induction hobs are unpatriotic” idiocy. For the mercifully uninitiated, one of 2023’s more niche culture war moments crystallised around an allegation that “the Feds” were going to “take away” gas stoves. This was demonstrably untrue: despite plentiful research demonstrating gas stove emissions are hazardous to human health, there was no proposed ban, just a statement from a consumer safety commissioner that “any option is on the table” with harmful products; the White House almost instantly clarified that it would not support a prohibition. Shame: imagine the bootleg methane speakeasies.
Continue reading...The US president Joe Biden asks at civil rights event: ‘what do you think he would have done … if Black Americans had stormed the Capitol?’
Joe Biden has launched one of his most scathing attacks yet on Donald Trump’s record of racism, suggesting that the former US president would have acted differently to the January 6 2021 insurrection if was led by Black people.
The remarks, at a dinner hosted by a civil rights organisation in a critical swing state, pointed to an intensifying battle between Biden and Trump for African American voters ahead of November’s presidential election.
Continue reading...This isn’t “politics by other means,” it’s never-ending conflict.
The post Israel Wants Endless War Without the Politics. Biden’s Going Along for the Doomed Ride. appeared first on The Intercept.
Follow the day’s news live
The NSW police minister, Yasmin Catley, was on ABC News Breakfast earlier to discuss the state’s four-day domestic violence blitz.
She said it was the sixth operation in 18 months, with “thousands of arrests” in that time.
[The operations] are scheduled about every quarter, so police have been doing this for quite some time. NSW police [utilise] the DV registry, where they accumulate information about [alleged] high-risk offenders and it’s that intelligence that they use to then go out and undertake these operations.
We will debate it when we return. I would really urge the opposition to get behind it and support those bail laws that we have before the parliament.
Everything is on the table. We are all worried about this, I’m a parent as well myself. Social media companies are not doing enough and we need to seriously look if we need to change the law in order to keep your young people safe.
We need to get all the experts in one place. The premier [Chris Minns] has called this emergency summit. We are just seeing too many cases where the worst possible thing has occurred because of bullying online. We banned phones in schools in NSW and that has worked an enormous amount in the school day inside the school gates, but we need to look beyond that now.
Continue reading...Scottish government accused of missing deadlines to take action on overfishing and effects of climate breakdown
Fragile and damaged marine life around Scotland’s coasts is not being properly protected because ministers in Edinburgh have broken their promises, environment campaigners have warned.
Prominent charities including the Marine Conservation Society and the National Trust for Scotland accuse the Scottish government of repeatedly missing its deadlines to protect vulnerable marine life from overfishing and the effects of climate breakdown.
Continue reading...Chair to share findings of investigation into NHS infection of thousands with HIV or hepatitis C over more than 20 years
The infected blood public inquiry is to publish its final report on the failings that led to the deaths of more than 3,000 people and ruined many more lives.
The report will detail how more than 30,000 haemophiliacs or transfusion recipients were infected with HIV and/or hepatitis C over more than two decades, and is seen as a seismic moment for the victims and their families.
Continue reading...Police commissioner Michael Murphy tells court he did not accept recommendation to demote the sergeant because he admitted sharing the photo and was contrite
A Northern Territory police sergeant shared a photo of a topless Aboriginal woman with a WhatsApp group of other officers in Alice Springs, but his demotion was rescinded by the police commissioner, an inquest has been told.
The inquest into the deaths of four Aboriginal women at the hands of violent partners has been examining the responses of police and the government in the NT, which has the highest rates of domestic and family violence in Australia.
Continue reading...Finance ministers will debate legality of using €270bn in frozen state assets as collateral for loan
Divisions over whether Ukraine can lawfully be handed an extra €30bn (£26bn) loan drawn from €270bn in seized Russian state assets are likely to be aired at a meeting of G7 finance ministers this week in Stresa, northern Italy.
In another test of political will over Ukraine, the US has been canvassing support for the plan, with the money intended to help with Ukraine’s reconstruction or pay for badly needed arms.
Continue reading...Police called over discovery, made several days after pair were allegedly murdered by former Jetstar pilot who has pleaded not guilty
A camper who came across the abandoned and burnt campsite of Russell Hill and Carol Clay has described the “alarming” scene in the Victorian supreme court.
Former airline pilot Gregory Stuart Lynn has pleaded not guilty to murdering Hill and Clay in the state’s alpine region in March 2020.
Continue reading...Police say the boy’s mother raised concerns after the father failed to hand over the child after an access visit
A crime scene has been established after the bodies of a man and his two-year-old son were found in a home on the New South Wales far north coast overnight, in what police believe was a murder-suicide.
Police said officers attended a unit in East Lismore about 9.45pm on Sunday due to concerns for the welfare of a man and his son.
In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. In the UK, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. Other international suicide helplines can be found at befrienders.org
Continue reading...Coroner Terry Ryan says he cannot rule Phillips’ mysterious disappearance in 1986 was caused by a Brisbane taxi driver
The Queensland coroner has found that the cause of Sharron Phillips’ mysterious disappearance in 1986, one of the state’s most high-profile cold cases, is “undetermined”.
Phillips’ surviving family did not attend court to hear Coroner Terry Ryan read out his findings.
Continue reading...‘More than three years after end of transition period, it is still not clear when full controls will be in place’
Post-Brexit border checks will cost UK businesses £470m a year, the government’s public spending watchdog has said.
Plans to bring in border checks on goods coming from the EU faced “significant issues” including critical shortages of inspectors before their introduction last month, the National Audit Office said in a report.
Continue reading...Coup leader killed and 50 people, including Americans, arrested after men reportedly attacked presidency in capital Kinshasa
The leader of an attempted coup on Sunday in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been killed and some 50 people including three American citizens arrested, a spokesperson for the Central African country’s army told Reuters.
Gunfire rang out around 4am in the capital Kinshasa, a Reuters reporter said. Armed men attacked the presidency in the city centre, according to spokesperson Sylvain Ekenge.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Vice-chancellors suggest fee rise of £2,000 to £3,500 a year, but others say that is ‘politically impossible’
Vice-chancellors and former ministers are warning that the cash crisis facing universities is so serious that the next government will have to urgently raise tuition fees or increase funding to avoid bankruptcies within two years.
They said the state of university finances was more dire than revealed in last week’s report by the Office for Students, which forecast 40% of England’s universities would end this year in the red.
Continue reading...Labour leader’s appearance on chatshow reflects politicians’ more general move away from hard news outlets to cosier, more niche settings
When Keir Starmer appeared on Channel 4’s Sunday Brunch to cook his favourite tandoori salmon recipe, host Tim Lovejoy had a question: “What on earth are you doing here? You should be on the BBC with Laura Kuenssberg.”
“This is so much nicer!” replied the Labour leader.
Continue reading...Gaza protesters wore keffiyehs as Biden tried to assure the crowd: ‘Your voices should be heard, I promise you I hear them’
It was, in the end, an artful compromise.
Joe Biden got to speak uninterrupted and renew his pitch to Black voters. Protesters got to make their point by wearing keffiyehs or raising a fist. Even the skies were merciful, hinting at but never quite unleashing rain.
Continue reading...A state industrial strategy is needed to reduce carbon output, produce cleaner growth and redistribute jobs around the UK
Theresa May and Boris Johnson both argued for levelling up and for a state-supported green transition undergirded by an industrial strategy. Neither delivered and their successor, Rishi Sunak, has repudiated their legacy as prime minister. He looks to the City to deliver growth, with banks determining the rate of investment to meet the challenge of the climate emergency. This is a recipe for failure. The Climate Change Committee (CCC), the government’s independent advisers on cutting carbon emissions, warned last year of “worryingly slow” progress to meet net zero targets. The government is not engaging on what it will take to decarbonise.
Weaning the country off fossil fuels and on to green energy is a complex transition that should be a job for the state, not the free market. Yet Britain is bottom of the league for state spending on renewables in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. In the offshore industry alone 30,000 workers could end up with nowhere to go by 2030 without new roles in green industries. Relying on big finance to meet that gap will entrench today’s failing model, which emphasises the need to attract significant capital flows through deregulation and privatisation, strengthening the hand of boom-and-bust financial services and weakening labour rights. The flipside is a bigger trade deficit and a destructive politics of redistribution to asset holders and to London.
Continue reading...A school district in Houston has voted to redact chapters on vaccines and climate change, and parents and educators are worried
The wave of book bans sweeping the US, typically reserved for works of fiction deemed controversial, has hit textbooks used in public schools, marking the next step in Republicans’ war on education.
The board of trustees for the Cypress Fairbanks independent school district in Houston voted 6-1 earlier this month to redact certain chapters in science textbooks, including those about vaccines, human growth, diversity, and climate change.
Continue reading...Mick Whelan says unacceptable offer was briefed to the media 10 minutes after it was sent to him
Mick Whelan, the head of the Aslef train drivers’ union, has never even opened an email setting out a proposed deal to end strike action 17 months ago because he realised the offer was so bad it would be rejected, he has said.
In an interview with parliamentary magazine The House, Whelan said he had not met Mark Harper, the transport secretary, since December 2022, or Huw Merriman, the transport minister whose brief covers rail, since January 2023.
Continue reading...Stephen Watson says process will be carried out ‘fairly and impartially’ in his most extensive public comments on the claims
The chief constable of the police force examining claims against Angela Rayner has defended the decision to investigate the Labour party deputy leader, vowing it would be done “fairly and impartially” and would establish whether “culpability is proven or otherwise”.
Stephen Watson, who leads Greater Manchester police (GMP), gave his most extensive public comments so far on the investigation, which was triggered by a complaint from a senior Conservative.
Continue reading...Defence secretary says RAF’s fleet stretched owing to conflicts in Ukraine and Middle East, but expects aircrafts will be found
The UK defence secretary, Grant Shapps, has ordered an urgent review after it emerged there is a shortage of planes for a mass parachute drop to mark the 80th anniversary of D-day.
The conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have left the RAF’s transport fleet stretched and defence officials are scrambling to find more aircraft for next month’s commemorations in Normandy.
Continue reading...As politicians fuss over sex education, a desperate and worsening void in special needs provision is leaving families with nowhere to turn
As an illustration of the gap between high politics and everyday reality, last week’s news stories about education policy were grimly perfect. The government was making a lot of noise about new restrictions on sex education, many of which seemed to answer entirely confected fears. On his visit to Essex, Keir Starmer launched his weirdly titled “first steps”, which included the recruitment of 6,500 new teachers for England’s schools – an indication of good intentions, but not much of an answer to the fact that, at the last count, 40,000 of them left the profession in a single year. Meanwhile, the education system’s most urgent and awful crisis continued to grind on, with barely a murmur from either of the main Westminster parties.
After long years of failure, provision for children and young people with special needs and disabilities – or Send – is now in a state of complete breakdown. On Friday, the BBC ran a report about widespread local delays in providing kids with the support they need, which was placed in news bulletins. One of its case studies centred on Freddie, a five-year-old from Staffordshire recovering from a stroke caused by complications from chickenpox, and unable to attend school full-time without proper help. One curt quotation from his mum said it all: “He’s been neglected for a year. He’s been completely forgotten about by the system.”
John Harris is a Guardian columnist
Continue reading...Anthony Olubunmi George, 61, has been refused leave to remain despite living most of his adult life in Britain
A disabled man who has lived in the UK for 38 years has been threatened with removal from the UK by the Home Office.
Anthony Olubunmi George, 61, came to the UK at the age of 24 in 1986 from Nigeria. He has not left the UK since and has no criminal convictions. In 2019, he had two strokes, which left him with problems with speech and mobility.
Continue reading...A quarter of Britain’s children live below the poverty line. Near his Fife home, the former PM shows how charities help families and says this issue must be a priority for any government
• The Observer view: Labour must tackle this scourge
• Torsten Bell: We can end child poverty
• Archbishop urges Starmer to ditch ‘cruel’ benefit cap
Outside a warehouse squeezed between a waste recycling plant, an auto parts outlet and a scaffolding company in Lochgelly, Fife, a blur of figures in hi-vis jackets are busily packing boxes into headteacher Ailsa Swankie’s car. Not for the first time, she is taking delivery of household essentials, hygiene products and food from the area’s heaving “multibank” – an institution she describes as an “absolute lifeline”.
The specific items differ with each pick-up – sometimes toilet rolls, other times washing powder or hot water bottles, donated by local businesses or sourced cheaply. But the need for each trip is always the same: an increasing number of families at her school who have found themselves struggling to afford what should be basic products. “We do have a lot of working families who work very, very hard, but they’re still really struggling,” Swankie says. “If I took nappies back to school, they’d all be gone by 3pm.”
Continue reading...Remaining health care workers won’t go until Israel stops blocking entry of new medical personnel.
The post Medical Workers Evacuated From Gaza, but 3 Americans Refuse to Leave appeared first on The Intercept.
Robberies, shootings, extortion and rapes have surged since the Rwandan-backed M23 militia cut off the eastern Congolese capital
In broad daylight on 16 April, three armed and uniformed men held up a city centre mobile phone shop.
Threatening staff, they helped themselves to about £700 worth of goods, before making off on a motorbike, disappearing into the busy streets of Goma, in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Continue reading...A Louisiana sheriff’s department has been testing the drone system, which is already used by the Israeli police and many settlements.
The post An Israeli Company Is Hawking Its Self-Launching Drone System to U.S. Police Departments appeared first on The Intercept.
The powerful lobbying group is going against a Capitol Police officer who fended off January 6 insurrectionists.
The post Neither Candidate Has Much to Say About Israel. So Why Is AIPAC Pouring Money Into This Race? appeared first on The Intercept.
Lai Ching-te uses inauguration speech to push for peace in the region and says the future of Taiwan is important to the future of the world
Lai Ching-te has been sworn in as Taiwan’s new president, urging China to “cease their political and military intimidation against Taiwan” and to keep the world free from the fear of more war.
Lai was inaugurated on Monday morning at the Japanese-colonial-era presidential office in central Taipei, taking over from Tsai Ing-wen, whose eight years in power saw a sharp deterioration in relations with Beijing.
Continue reading...While the number of Indian billionaires soars, growing unemployment has become a big problem for the BJP as it campaigns for a third term
It wasn’t even the real wedding, just the pre-wedding party. But that didn’t stop India’s richest billionaire, Mukesh Ambani, whose son is set to marry the daughter of a millionaire, from throwing an affair so ostentatious that no one could question just how wealthy they are.
The pop star Rihanna was paid about $8m to perform. The catering alone cost $25m and the final bill for the glittering soiree, held in March, reportedly came in at about $150m.
Continue reading...A donor to Dexter in the Portland congressional race tells The Intercept: “I give all my contributions through AIPAC.”
The post AIPAC and Republican Donors Raising Big Money for Maxine Dexter Against Susheela Jayapal in Oregon appeared first on The Intercept.
Going public after I was attacked was hard, but it helped me overcome the shame that so many victims feel. By Rena Effendi
Continue reading...The Christian Legal Centre is behind a number of end-of-life court cases that could be ‘prolonging suffering’, according to doctors. Josh Halliday reports
Medics treating critically ill babies and children are citing instances of “considerable moral distress” that they say is being caused by the actions of a rightwing Christian group involved in several end-of-life court cases.
The Guardian’s north of England editor, Josh Halliday, tells Hannah Moore that while the Christian Legal Centre is not be a household name it has become highly influential in high-profile end-of-life cases in recent years.
Continue reading...French forces on Sunday launched a major operation to regain access to parts of Noumea and allow the airport to reopen
French president Emmanuel Macron called a meeting of his defence and security council for Monday to discuss the deadly unrest in the Pacific territory of New Caledonia.
It is the third such meeting in less than week, the previous two having resulted first in the decision to declare a state of emergency in the French territory and then to send reinforcements to help government forces on the ground restore order.
Continue reading...Cannes film festival
Eduard Limonov’s bizarre career, from rebel émigré writer in New York to leader of a fascistic, militaristic political group, is told with gusto by Kirill Serebrennikov
Fascism, punk, euphoria and despair … it’s all here, or mostly, in this hilarious biopic of Eduard Limonov, the rock’n’roll émigré Russian writer and patriot-dissident who wound up poverty-stricken in New York at about the same time as Sid Vicious. Limonov (a pen name taken from the Russian word “limonka”, meaning lime but also slang for grenade) became an angry bohemian, a sexual outlaw, a celebrated adulte terrible in French literary circles in the 80s, railing against the prissy liberals and mincing hypocrites. Then he returned to Russia and became the leader of a violent group called the National Bolshevik Party. Tactfully, nobody here points out the similarity to “national socialist party”. It was if someone had given Michel Houellebecq a machine gun.
Ben Whishaw gives a glorious performance as Limonov - funny, dour, crazy, sexy, boiling with unhappiness and apparently bipolar (although this diagnosis is something else that doesn’t seriously occur to anyone). And maybe always, at the back of his mind, worried that his writing is not good enough to make him immortal, and that posing, PR, situationist outrage and political violence are his real vocation. Inevitably his autobiographical fictions are compared by a New York publisher to Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver (Limonov says he hasn’t seen it), but he winds up being a grizzled conflation of Ed Norton and Brad Pitt in Fight Club.
Continue reading...The former chief executive and archbishop’s confidant appears at the Horizon IT inquiry this week to explain her role in the affair that wrecked the lives of so many of her staff
When Paula Vennells was appointed chief executive of the Post Office in 2012, it felt like a true meeting of minds. The Post Office had long prided itself as the most trusted brand in Britain and here was a woman who, unusually among chief executives, was unashamed in emphasising, above all else, her personal ethical values.
Vennells was a committed Christian, an ordained minister, who gave sermons at her local parish church, in Bromham, Bedfordshire. A confidant of the archbishop of Canterbury (Justin Welby reportedly supported her – unsuccessful – candidature to become bishop of London in 2017) she had no hesitation, in her seven years as head of the 350-year-old institution, in moralising about the fundamentals of her leadership, while overseeing a billion-pound revamp of Post Office operations. As the keynote speaker for a Faith in Business forum in 2016, Vennells referenced the wisdom of King Solomon, in exercising her responsibilities as CEO (for which she was paid about £5m during her tenure): “Now, Lord my God … give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong … in administering justice …”
Continue reading...Marina Hyde: ‘So Russell Brand was baptised in the Thames, and all his sins were washed away. Cheaper than a lawyer, I suppose’; plus Jenny Kleeman meets Raffaella Spone, the woman accused of creating and circulating a damaging ‘deepfake’ video of teenage cheerleaders. The problem? Nothing was fake after all.
Tigran Gambaryan faces allegations of ‘serious criminality’ on behalf of world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange
A Nigerian court has ruled that Tigran Gambaryan, the Binance executive detained on charges of tax evasion and money laundering, can face trial on behalf of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
In a judgment in Abuja on Friday – Gambaryan’s 40th birthday – the presiding judge, Emeka Nwite, denied the American national bail, saying he was likely to abscond.
Continue reading...It is taking fast fashion to ever faster and ever cheaper extremes, and making billions from it. Why is the whole world shopping at Shein? By Nicole Lipman
Continue reading...It is the NHS’s worst treatment disaster – with 30,000 patients infected. Two survivors, Ade Goodyear and Andy Evans, explain why it took so long for it to be brought to light
Ade Goodyear was 15 when he was told he had contracted HIV. Like about 30,000 other NHS patients – including more than 300 children – who were given blood transfusions or commercial blood products before 2019, he was infected by contaminated blood. Some patients got HIV and hepatitis C from blood transfusions after childbirth or other medical procedures. Ade was infected with HIV at the medical centre of his school.
Pupils at his Treloar’s college, which had a specialist haemophilia unit, were among those given injections of a blood plasma product called factor VIII concentrate. Concerns had been raised a decade before by the World Health Organization because it was a commercial product that mixed plasma from tens of thousands of often high-risk donors. If one had an infection such as HIV, it could contaminate the whole batch.
Continue reading...Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Nedum Onuoha and John Brewin as Manchester United and Chelsea get important wins in their hunt for European football next season
Rate, review, share on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud, Acast and Stitcher, and join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and email.
On the podcast today: the race for fifth/sixth and Europa League football next season is still alive – Chelsea could still catch Spurs and only Manchester United winning the FA Cup would earn Newcastle a spot.
Continue reading...Ahead of the byelection in Blackpool South, the Guardian takes the temperature in the once prosperous northern coastal town, with many voters expressing complete apathy and disdain for the state of politics.
The area is going to the polls because the former Tory MP Scott Benton resigned after being found guilty of breaching standards rules in a lobbying scandal. Labour is hopeful of taking back the seat, which Benton won with a majority of 3,690 in 2019
Polls open in England’s local elections with Tories braced for heavy losse
Analysis: Will Tories dump Rishi Sunak if election results worse than expected?
Last week the founder of the dating app Bumble forecasted a near future dating landscape where AI ‘dating concierges’ filter out prospective partners for us. But does AI, or even science, really understand what makes two people compatible? Madeleine Finlay speaks to Amie Gordon, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, to find out what we know about why two people go the distance, and why she and her colleague associate professor of sociology Elizabeth Bruch, are designing their own dating app to learn more.
Clips: Bloomberg
Read more about Amie’s app here
Continue reading...Antony Blinken’s report identifies “incidents that raise concerns,” but says Israel is not blocking humanitarian aid.
The post Israel “Likely” Used U.S.-Supplied Weapons in Violation of International Law. That’s OK, Though, State Department Says. appeared first on The Intercept.
Four lawsuits alleging Hamas ties against Students for Justice in Palestine, the AP, UNRWA, and a cryptocurrency exchange share many of the same plaintiffs.
The post October 7 Survivors Sue Campus Protesters, Say Students Are “Hamas’s Propaganda Division” appeared first on The Intercept.
A new anti-terrorism bill would allow the government to take away vital tax exemptions from nonprofit news outlets.
The post Criticizing Israel? Nonprofit Media Could Lose Tax-Exempt Status Without Due Process appeared first on The Intercept.
An open letter from government attorneys questions the legal cover for arms transfers to Israel.
The post Even Biden’s Lawyers Are Urging the White House to Change Course on Gaza appeared first on The Intercept.
The 71-year-old veteran peace activist discusses the war on Gaza, the Biden administration, and shaking up Congress.
The post Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin on Disrupting the U.S. War Machine appeared first on The Intercept.
The 22-year-old woman and her child were civilian casualties of a U.S. drone strike, but the Pentagon won't return the family's messages.
The post Pentagon Compensated Zero Civilian Victims in 2022 — Despite Evidence That the U.S. Killed a Mom and Child in Somalia appeared first on The Intercept.
Keir Starmer appeared in Dover and Deal alongside the Labour party’s newest MP, the former Tory Natalie Elphicke, to announce the scrapping of the Rwanda deportation scheme if Labour is elected. The Guardian spoke to people in Dover to get their reaction
Continue reading...Tal Mitnick and Sofia Orr, who are in prison for refusing to serve in Israel’s military, are pleading with Biden to help stop the war on Gaza.
The post Israeli Military Refusers Appeal to Biden: “Stop Arming Israel’s War” appeared first on The Intercept.
Hundreds of protesters prevented an attempt to collect asylum seekers from a south London hotel and transfer them to the Bibby Stockholm barge. The Guardian witnessed crowds blocking the bus and the road outside the Best Western hotel in Peckham before police were able to move in and break up the protest. The bus eventually left the area after seven hours, with no asylum seekers onboard
London protesters block transfer of asylum seekers to Bibby Stockholm
Continue reading...
In the rapidly advancing landscape of AI technology and innovation, LimeWire emerges as a unique platform in the realm of generative AI tools. This platform not only stands out from the multitude of existing AI tools but also brings a fresh approach to content generation. LimeWire not only empowers users to create AI content but also provides creators with creative ways to share and monetize their creations.
As we explore LimeWire, our aim is to uncover its features, benefits for creators, and the exciting possibilities it offers for AI content generation. This platform presents an opportunity for users to harness the power of AI in image creation, all while enjoying the advantages of a free and accessible service.
Let's unravel the distinctive features that set LimeWire apart in the dynamic landscape of AI-powered tools, understanding how creators can leverage its capabilities to craft unique and engaging AI-generated images.
This revamped LimeWire invites users to register and unleash their creativity by crafting original AI content, which can then be shared and showcased on the LimeWire Studio. Notably, even acclaimed artists and musicians, such as Deadmau5, Soulja Boy, and Sean Kingston, have embraced this platform to publish their content in the form of NFT music, videos, and images.
Beyond providing a space for content creation and sharing, LimeWire introduces monetization models to empower users to earn revenue from their creations. This includes avenues such as earning ad revenue and participating in the burgeoning market of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs). As we delve further, we'll explore these monetization strategies in more detail to provide a comprehensive understanding of LimeWire's innovative approach to content creation and distribution.
LimeWire Studio welcomes content creators into its fold, providing a space to craft personalized AI-focused content for sharing with fans and followers. Within this creative hub, every piece of content generated becomes not just a creation but a unique asset—ownable and tradable. Fans have the opportunity to subscribe to creators' pages, immersing themselves in the creative journey and gaining ownership of digital collectibles that hold tradeable value within the LimeWire community. Notably, creators earn a 2.5% royalty each time their content is traded, adding a rewarding element to the creative process.
The platform's flexibility is evident in its content publication options. Creators can choose to share their work freely with the public or opt for a premium subscription model, granting exclusive access to specialized content for subscribers.
As of the present moment, LimeWire focuses on AI Image Generation, offering a spectrum of creative possibilities to its user base. The platform, however, has ambitious plans on the horizon, aiming to broaden its offerings by introducing AI music and video generation tools in the near future. This strategic expansion promises creators even more avenues for expression and engagement with their audience, positioning LimeWire Studio as a dynamic and evolving platform within the realm of AI-powered content creation.
The LimeWire AI image generation tool presents a versatile platform for both the creation and editing of images. Supporting advanced models such as Stable Diffusion 2.1, Stable Diffusion XL, and DALL-E 2, LimeWire offers a sophisticated toolkit for users to delve into the realm of generative AI art.
Much like other tools in the generative AI landscape, LimeWire provides a range of options catering to various levels of complexity in image creation. Users can initiate the creative process with prompts as simple as a few words or opt for more intricate instructions, tailoring the output to their artistic vision.
What sets LimeWire apart is its seamless integration of different AI models and design styles. Users have the flexibility to effortlessly switch between various AI models, exploring diverse design styles such as cinematic, digital art, pixel art, anime, analog film, and more. Each style imparts a distinctive visual identity to the generated AI art, enabling users to explore a broad spectrum of creative possibilities.
The platform also offers additional features, including samplers, allowing users to fine-tune the quality and detail levels of their creations. Customization options and prompt guidance further enhance the user experience, providing a user-friendly interface for both novice and experienced creators.
Excitingly, LimeWire is actively developing its proprietary AI model, signaling ongoing innovation and enhancements to its image generation capabilities. This upcoming addition holds the promise of further expanding the creative horizons for LimeWire users, making it an evolving and dynamic platform within the landscape of AI-driven art and image creation.
Sign Up Now To Get Free Credits
Upon completing your creative endeavor on LimeWire, the platform allows you the option to publish your content. An intriguing feature follows this step: LimeWire automates the process of minting your creation as a Non-Fungible Token (NFT), utilizing either the Polygon or Algorand blockchain. This transformative step imbues your artwork with a unique digital signature, securing its authenticity and ownership in the decentralized realm.
Creators on LimeWire hold the power to decide the accessibility of their NFT creations. By opting for a public release, the content becomes discoverable by anyone, fostering a space for engagement and interaction. Furthermore, this choice opens the avenue for enthusiasts to trade the NFTs, adding a layer of community involvement to the artistic journey.
Alternatively, LimeWire acknowledges the importance of exclusivity. Creators can choose to share their posts exclusively with their premium subscribers. In doing so, the content remains a special offering solely for dedicated fans, creating an intimate and personalized experience within the LimeWire community. This flexibility in sharing options emphasizes LimeWire's commitment to empowering creators with choices in how they connect with their audience and distribute their digital creations.
After creating your content, you can choose to publish the content. It will automatically mint your creation as an NFT on the Polygon or Algorand blockchain. You can also choose whether to make it public or subscriber-only.
If you make it public, anyone can discover your content and even trade the NFTs. If you choose to share the post only with your premium subscribers, it will be exclusive only to your fans.
Additionally, you can earn ad revenue from your content creations as well.
When you publish content on LimeWire, you will receive 70% of all ad revenue from other users who view your images, music, and videos on the platform.
This revenue model will be much more beneficial to designers. You can experiment with the AI image and content generation tools and share your creations while earning a small income on the side.
The revenue you earn from your creations will come in the form of LMWR tokens, LimeWire’s own cryptocurrency.
Your earnings will be paid every month in LMWR, which you can then trade on many popular crypto exchange platforms like Kraken, ByBit, and UniSwap.
You can also use your LMWR tokens to pay for prompts when using LimeWire generative AI tools.
You can sign up to LimeWire to use its AI tools for free. You will receive 10 credits to use and generate up to 20 AI images per day. You will also receive 50% of the ad revenue share. However, you will get more benefits with premium plans.
For $9.99 per month, you will get 1,000 credits per month, up to 2 ,000 image generations, early access to new AI models, and 50% ad revenue share
For $29 per month, you will get 3750 credits per month, up to 7500 image generations, early access to new AI models, and 60% ad revenue share
For $49 per month, you will get 5,000 credits per month, up to 10,000 image generations, early access to new AI models, and 70% ad revenue share
For $99 per month, you will get 11,250 credits per month, up to 2 2,500 image generations, early access to new AI models, and 70% ad revenue share
With all premium plans, you will receive a Pro profile badge, full creation history, faster image generation, and no ads.
Sign Up Now To Get Free Credits
In conclusion, LimeWire emerges as a democratizing force in the creative landscape, providing an inclusive platform where anyone can unleash their artistic potential and effortlessly share their work. With the integration of AI, LimeWire eliminates traditional barriers, empowering designers, musicians, and artists to publish their creations and earn revenue with just a few clicks.
The ongoing commitment of LimeWire to innovation is evident in its plans to enhance generative AI tools with new features and models. The upcoming expansion to include music and video generation tools holds the promise of unlocking even more possibilities for creators. It sparks anticipation about the diverse and innovative ways in which artists will leverage these tools to produce and publish their own unique creations.
For those eager to explore, LimeWire's AI tools are readily accessible for free, providing an opportunity to experiment and delve into the world of generative art. As LimeWire continues to evolve, creators are encouraged to stay tuned for the launch of its forthcoming AI music and video generation tools, promising a future brimming with creative potential and endless artistic exploration
Are you looking for a new graphic design tool? Would you like to read a detailed review of Canva? As it's one of the tools I love using. I am also writing my first ebook using canva and publish it soon on my site you can download it is free. Let's start the review.
Canva has a web version and also a mobile app
Canva is a free graphic design web application that allows you to create invitations, business cards, flyers, lesson plans, banners, and more using professionally designed templates. You can upload your own photos from your computer or from Google Drive, and add them to Canva's templates using a simple drag-and-drop interface. It's like having a basic version of Photoshop that doesn't require Graphic designing knowledge to use. It’s best for nongraphic designers.
Canva is a great tool for small business owners, online entrepreneurs, and marketers who don’t have the time and want to edit quickly.
To create sophisticated graphics, a tool such as Photoshop can is ideal. To use it, you’ll need to learn its hundreds of features, get familiar with the software, and it’s best to have a good background in design, too.
Also running the latest version of Photoshop you need a high-end computer.
So here Canva takes place, with Canva you can do all that with drag-and-drop feature. It’s also easier to use and free. Also an even-more-affordable paid version is available for $12.95 per month.
The product is available in three plans: Free, Pro ($12.99/month per user or $119.99/year for up to 5 people), and Enterprise ($30 per user per month, minimum 25 people).
To get started on Canva, you will need to create an account by providing your email address, Google, Facebook or Apple credentials. You will then choose your account type between student, teacher, small business, large company, non-profit, or personal. Based on your choice of account type, templates will be recommended to you.
You can sign up for a free trial of Canva Pro, or you can start with the free version to get a sense of whether it’s the right graphic design tool for your needs.
When you sign up for an account, Canva will suggest different post types to choose from. Based on the type of account you set up you'll be able to see templates categorized by the following categories: social media posts, documents, presentations, marketing, events, ads, launch your business, build your online brand, etc.
Start by choosing a template for your post or searching for something more specific. Search by social network name to see a list of post types on each network.
Next, you can choose a template. Choose from hundreds of templates that are ready to go, with customizable photos, text, and other elements.
You can start your design by choosing from a variety of ready-made templates, searching for a template matching your needs, or working with a blank template.
Inside the Canva designer, the Elements tab gives you access to lines and shapes, graphics, photos, videos, audio, charts, photo frames, and photo grids.The search box on the Elements tab lets you search everything on Canva.
To begin with, Canva has a large library of elements to choose from. To find them, be specific in your search query. You may also want to search in the following tabs to see various elements separately:
The Photos tab lets you search for and choose from millions of professional stock photos for your templates.
You can replace the photos in our templates to create a new look. This can also make the template more suited to your industry.
You can find photos on other stock photography sites like pexel, pixabay and many more or simply upload your own photos.
When you choose an image, Canva’s photo editing features let you adjust the photo’s settings (brightness, contrast, saturation, etc.), crop, or animate it.
When you subscribe to Canva Pro, you get access to a number of premium features, including the Background Remover. This feature allows you to remove the background from any stock photo in library or any image you upload.
The Text tab lets you add headings, normal text, and graphical text to your design.
When you click on text, you'll see options to adjust the font, font size, color, format, spacing, and text effects (like shadows).
Canva Pro subscribers can choose from a large library of fonts on the Brand Kit or the Styles tab. Enterprise-level controls ensure that visual content remains on-brand, no matter how many people are working on it.
Create an animated image or video by adding audio to capture user’s attention in social news feeds.
If you want to use audio from another stock site or your own audio tracks, you can upload them in the Uploads tab or from the more option.
Want to create your own videos? Choose from thousands of stock video clips. You’ll find videos that range upto 2 minutes
You can upload your own videos as well as videos from other stock sites in the Uploads tab.
Once you have chosen a video, you can use the editing features in Canva to trim the video, flip it, and adjust its transparency.
On the Background tab, you’ll find free stock photos to serve as backgrounds on your designs. Change out the background on a template to give it a more personal touch.
The Styles tab lets you quickly change the look and feel of your template with just a click. And if you have a Canva Pro subscription, you can upload your brand’s custom colors and fonts to ensure designs stay on brand.
If you have a Canva Pro subscription, you’ll have a Logos tab. Here, you can upload variations of your brand logo to use throughout your designs.
With Canva, you can also create your own logos. Note that you cannot trademark a logo with stock content in it.
With Canva, free users can download and share designs to multiple platforms including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Slack and Tumblr.
Canva Pro subscribers can create multiple post formats from one design. For example, you can start by designing an Instagram post, and Canva's Magic Resizer can resize it for other networks, Stories, Reels, and other formats.
Canva Pro subscribers can also use Canva’s Content Planner to post content on eight different accounts on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Slack, and Tumblr.
Canva Pro allows you to work with your team on visual content. Designs can be created inside Canva, and then sent to your team members for approval. Everyone can make comments, edits, revisions, and keep track via the version history.
When it comes to printing your designs, Canva has you covered. With an extensive selection of printing options, they can turn your designs into anything from banners and wall art to mugs and t-shirts.
Canva Print is perfect for any business seeking to make a lasting impression. Create inspiring designs people will want to wear, keep, and share. Hand out custom business cards that leave a lasting impression on customers' minds.
The Canva app is available on the Apple App Store and Google Play. The Canva app has earned a 4.9 out of five star rating from over 946.3K Apple users and a 4.5 out of five star rating from over 6,996,708 Google users.
In addition to mobile apps, you can use Canva’s integration with other Internet services to add images and text from sources like Google Maps, Emojis, photos from Google Drive and Dropbox, YouTube videos, Flickr photos, Bitmojis, and other popular visual content elements.
In general, Canva is an excellent tool for those who need simple images for projects. If you are a graphic designer with experience, you will find Canva’s platform lacking in customization and advanced features – particularly vectors. But if you have little design experience, you will find Canva easier to use than advanced graphic design tools like Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator for most projects. If you have any queries let me know in the comments section.
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