Rode’s tiny $149 Wireless Micro kit is designed for smartphone users
Rode’s tiny $149 Wireless Micro kit is designed for smartphone users
Rode has announced the Wireless Micro, a two-mic kit with a smartphone receiver and charging case that costs just $149. The idea is to help TikTok and other creators capture much better-quality audio than their smartphone’s microphone can offer.
The receiver unit connects to the bottom of your smartphone via a USB-C or lightning port. Meanwhile, the microphones (aka transmitters) attach to the subject via integrated clips or magnetic attachments, then capture what Rode calls “pristine” quality sound. Specifically, they offer a 20-20 kHz frequency range and 73 dB signal-to-noise ratio, with a transmission range around 330 feet.
Rode
To use it, simply connect the receiver to your iOS or Android device and it will take over as the system microphone. From there, everything is automatic, as the transmitter mics are automatically paired to the receiver and sound will be captured to your camera app of choice. Levels are automatically controlled with the company’s GainAssist technology.
The omnidirectional transmitters weigh just 12 grams (0.42 ounces) and are tiny enough to be discreet when clipped onto your subject. The built-in microphones use what Rode calls “acoustic chambers” with a patent-pending design. That supposedly lets you capture clear and intelligible audio while reducing wind noise, though a pair of windmuffs is also included in the kit.
Rode
The Wireless Micro also includes a charging case that delivers two full recharges for up to 18 hours of battery life, while giving you a secure place to store everything.
There are a few things missing, though. You can’t connect an external mic to the transmitters, unlike with other Rode wireless mics or the DJI Mic 2. There’s no smartphone Bluetooth capability, and it doesn’t offer a 3.5mm connection for cameras — a feature that will supposedly exist on the rumored DJI Mic Mini. Still, this looks like a great option for creators who primarily use smartphones. It’s now available in a two mic kit with a receiver and charging case for $150.
Source link
#Rodes #tiny #Wireless #Micro #kit #designed #smartphone #users
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Instagram AI Feature That Lets Users Generate Profile Pictures Spotted in Development
Instagram AI Feature That Lets Users Generate Profile Pictures Spotted in Development
Instagram could be working on a new artificial intelligence (AI) feature that will allow users to generate profile photos. A new ***** claims that the Meta-owned social media platform is testing a feature that will allow users to use AI models to create new profile pictures using AI. While not a lot is known about the feature at this point, similar features are reportedly being developed for Facebook and WhatsApp. Meanwhile, Instagram Head Adam Mosseri recently announced that automatic feed refreshing, which was triggered when the app is opened after a certain *******, has been abandoned by the service.
Instagram Developing AI Profile Picture Generation Feature
Developer Alessandro Paluzzi found evidence of this feature on the Instagram app, and shared details in a post on Threads. He was able to find a new menu option when updating his profile picture on Instagram that says, Create an AI profile picture. A screenshot of the menu was also shared by the developer.
While it is difficult to say how exactly this feature would work as it is still in development, it will likely be powered by one of Meta’s Llama large language models (LLMs). The feature could work in two ways — it could let users generate an AI image from scratch using text-based prompts or convert existing profile pictures in different styles using AI.
This wouldn’t be the first AI feature to arrive on Instagram. The Meta-owned platform already offers access to Meta AI, its conversational chatbot, in the form of a standalone chat as well as in group chats. The company also rolled out an AI rewrite feature for DM messages, which allows users to rephrase and change the tonality of messages being sent to another user.
Meanwhile, Meta recently announced that it testing an AI-powered facial recognition technology to detect scam ads on Facebook and Instagram. The feature will spot ads that fraudulently use public figures in their ads to lure users and block them. It also revealed its plans to use the technology to verify users via video selfies to help them gain access to their compromised accounts. Neither of these features are widely available at the moment.
For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who’sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.
Bitcoin Price Nears $90,000 After US President-Elect Donald Trump’s Victory: What’s Fuelling the Optimism Around Crypto
Source link
#Instagram #Feature #Lets #Users #Generate #Profile #Pictures #Spotted #Development
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
28% of credit card users are still paying off last year’s holiday bill
28% of credit card users are still paying off last year’s holiday bill
Americans tend to overspend during the holiday season.
In fact, some borrowers are still paying off debt from last year’s purchases.
To that point, 28% of shoppers who used credit cards have not paid off the presents they bought for their loved ones last year, according to a holiday spending report by NerdWallet. The site polled more than 1,700 adults in September.
However, this is a slight improvement from 2023, when 31% of credit card users had still not paid off their balances from the year before.
More from Personal Finance: Here are the best ways to save money this holiday season 2 in 5 cardholders have maxed out a credit card or come close Holiday shoppers plan to spend more
Growth in credit card balances has also slowed, according to a separate quarterly credit industry insights report from TransUnion released on Tuesday.
Although overall credit card balances were 6.9% higher at the end of the third quarter compared to a year earlier, that’s a significant improvement from the 15% year-over-year jump from Q3 2022 to Q3 2023, TransUnion found.
The average balance per consumer now stands at $6,329, rising only 4.8% year over year — compared to an 11.2% increase the year before and 12.4% the year before that.
“People are getting comfortable with this post-pandemic life,” said Michele Raneri, vice president and head of U.S. research and consulting at TransUnion. “As inflation has returned to more normal levels in recent months, it has also meant consumers may be less likely to rely on these credit products to make ends meet.”
Recent wage gains have also played a role, according to Paul Siegfried, TransUnion’s senior vice president and credit card business leader. Lower inflation and higher pay “may be driving consumers toward a financial equilibrium,” he said.
Still, spending between Nov. 1 and Dec. 31 is expected to increase to a record total of $979.5 billion to $989 billion, according to the National Retail Federation.
Shoppers may spend $1,778 on average, up 8% compared with last year, Deloitte’s holiday retail survey found. Most will lean on plastic: About three-quarters, 74%, of consumers plan to use credit cards to make their purchases, according to NerdWallet.
“Between buying gifts and booking peak-season travel, the holidays are an expensive time of year,” said Sara Rathner, NerdWallet’s credit cards expert. However, this time around, “shoppers are setting strict budgets and taking advantage of seasonal sales.”
How to avoid overspending
“There’s no magic wand, we just have to do the hard stuff,” Candy Valentino, author of “The 9% Edge,” recently told CNBC. Mostly that means setting a budget and tracking expenses.
Valentino recommends reallocating funds from other areas — by canceling unwanted subscriptions or negotiating down utility costs — to help make room for holiday spending.
“A few hundred dollars here and there really adds up,” she said. That “stash of cash is one way to set yourself up so you are not taking on new debt.”
How to save on what you spend
Valentino also advises consumers to start their holiday shopping now to take advantage of early deals and discounts or try pooling funds among family or friends to share the cost of holiday gifts.
Then, curb temptation by staying away from the mall and unsubscribing from emails, opting out of text alerts, turning off push notifications in retail apps and unfollowing brands on social, she said.
“It will lessen your need and ******* to spend,” Valentino said.
If you’re starting out the holiday season debt-free, you’re in a “strong position” to take advantage of credit card rewards, Rathner said.
Credit cards that offer rewards like cash back or sign-on bonuses will offer a better return on your holiday spending, she said.
However, if you are planning on purchasing big-ticket items to work towards such bonuses, make sure you’re able to pay off the balance in full to avoid falling into holiday debt, Rathner said.
What to do if you have debt from last year
People walk by ***** signs in the Financial District on the first day back for the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) since the Christmas holiday on December 26, 2023 in New York City.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images
If you have credit card debt from last year, the first thing you can do is “look for ways to lower the interest you’re paying on that debt,” said NerdWallet’s Rathner.
A balance transfer card, for example, typically offers a 0% annual percentage rate for a ******* of time, which usually spans from months to even a year or more.
If you move your debt from a high-rate credit card, it may help you save hundreds or even thousands of dollars in interest payments, depending on how much you owe, Rather said.
“That keeps your debt from growing,” she said.
But you need to pay off the debt in full before the interest-free ******* ends to fully benefit, Rathner noted.
Additionally, there are a few caveats: You generally need to have good-to-excellent credit to qualify for the balance transfer and there may be fees involved. A transfer fee is typically 3% to 5% of the balance that you transfer over, Rathner said.
While you may need to budget for that detail, “the savings on the interest might be higher than the fee you would pay,” she said.
Otherwise, you may be able to consolidate into a lower interest personal loan, depending on your creditworthiness. Similarly, cardholders who keep their utilization rate — or the ratio of debt to total credit — below 30% of their available credit may benefit from a higher credit score, which paves the way to lower-cost loans and better terms.
Subscribe to CNBC on YouTube.
Source link
#credit #card #users #paying #years #holiday #bill
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Supreme Court rejects Mark Meadows’ bid to move Georgia prosecution involving 2020 election to federal court
Supreme Court rejects Mark Meadows’ bid to move Georgia prosecution involving 2020 election to federal court
Washington — The Supreme Court on Tuesday turned away former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’ bid to move his state prosecution to federal court in the case stemming from an alleged effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia.
The court’s denial of Meadows’ appeal leaves in place a lower court decision that returned the prosecution to state court. Meadows and President-elect Donald Trump, for whom he worked, were charged alongside 17 others by Fulton County prosecutors for their alleged efforts to reverse Trump’s electoral loss in Georgia in 2020.
They pleaded not guilty to all charges. Proceedings have been on hold for months as a Georgia appeals court is set to consider in December whether to allow Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to continue prosecuting Trump and his allies.
Meadows served as Trump’s chief of staff from March 2020 to January 2021 and was a prominent figure in the president-elect’s attempts to stay in office for a consecutive term after the November 2020 presidential election.
Two counts were brought against him by Fulton County prosecutors: the first alleges that he engaged in a wide-ranging racketeering *********** with Trump, and the second alleges he participated in an effort to solicit a public officer, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, to violate his oath of office.
Meadows is portrayed in the indictment returned in August 2023 as a go-between for Trump and others involved in coordinating the strategy for contesting the 2020 election and disrupting the ****** session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021. He participated in a Jan. 2, 2021, phone call between Trump and Raffensperger, during which the then-president asked Raffensperger to “find” 11,780 votes, enough to make him the winner of Georgia’s election.
After Meadows was charged, he sought to transfer the case to federal court under a federal officer removal statute and argued that the actions alleged in the indictment related to his role as chief of staff.
The district court, however, sent the case back to the Fulton County Superior Court. While U.S. District Judge Steve Jones conceded that some of the charged conduct involved Meadows’ official duties, there was not enough evidence to establish that a “heavy majority” of the acts alleged against him related to his role as chief of staff.
“Meadows’s alleged association with post-election activities was not related to his role as White House Chief of Staff or his executive branch authority,” Jones wrote in his September 2023 decision.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit upheld the district court’s decision, finding that the federal officer removal statute does not apply to former federal officers and “his participation in an alleged *********** to overturn a presidential election was not related to his official duties.”
“At bottom, whatever the chief of staff’s role with respect to state election administration, that role does not include altering valid election results in favor of a particular candidate,” Chief Judge William Pryor wrote for the three-judge panel.
Meadows appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that whether a chief of staff prosecuted based on actions related to his work for the president can remove his case to federal court is not a close call.
Calling the 11th Circuit’s decision “miserly and counterintuitive,” Meadow’s lawyers warned in a filing that allowing it to stand would open former federal officers up to politicized state prosecutions for unpopular federal policies.
“The chief of staff is a unique federal officer, the top aide to a coequal branch of government personified by the president,” they wrote. “If former officers cannot remove at all, and if even a current chief of staff cannot remove a case arising out of acts taken in the White House in service of the president, then the floodgates are open, and ‘nightmare scenarios’ will not take long to materialize.”
Fulton County prosecutors urged the Supreme Court to ******* Meadows’ appeal and leave the 11th Circuit’s decision in place. They noted that Trump did not even move his case to federal court, and said Meadows ******* to “articulate any coherent source of authority for the president or his staff to supervise or affect a state’s administration of elections.”
Melissa Quinn
Melissa Quinn is a politics reporter for CBSNews.com. She has written for outlets including the Washington Examiner, Daily Signal and Alexandria Times. Melissa covers U.S. politics, with a focus on the Supreme Court and federal courts.
Source link
#Supreme #Court #rejects #Mark #Meadows #bid #move #Georgia #prosecution #involving #election #federal #court
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Kentucky’s keys are in the hands of a coach unlike any other
Kentucky’s keys are in the hands of a coach unlike any other
LEXINGTON, ***. — This began with a threat. Not a thinly veiled threat. No. This was about as direct as it gets.
Mark Pope, all 6 feet and 10 inches of him, stood tall, pushing his shoulders back. Considering his size, his shaved head, and his background — a decade spent ******** around the paint as a journeyman NBA center back in the late ’90s and early 2000s, when freedom of movement was a foreign concept and survival required withstanding elbows in the chest — he should be an imposing figure. Except Pope has this way of being impossibly likable. He looks and sounds like a human exclamation point. He throws around adjectives like he’s writing the latest “Hardy Boys” volume. Everything he sees or hears is brilliant! Or incredible! Or the greatest thing ever! Mixed in with the overloaded enthusiasm is the reality that Pope is, even though he’ll never admit it, an intellectual. He can spend hours discussing philosophy or theology. In a past life, he was a Rhodes scholar candidate on his way to becoming a doctor. He is, as his former coach Rick Pitino says, “smarter than 99 percent of college basketball coaches.”
Add it all up and Pope, no matter how big, isn’t intimidating.
That’s why the threat wasn’t his.
“I’m fair game, but if you say anything about the ******,” Pope warned, shaking hands inside his office at the University of Kentucky, half-smiling, eyes moving cautiously, “Lee Anne will ***** your house down.”
Welcome to the Pope Family. There’s your postcard.
Last spring, they were scattered. Each one in his or her own world. Lee Anne was in Texas, visiting a brother in the hospital. Ella, the oldest, was off embarking on early professional life. Avery, then a college junior, was heading into tennis practice at Brigham Young University. Layla, a BYU freshman, was in Salt Lake City, prepping for that night’s Utah Jazz-Houston Rockets game, her makeup half-done for a dance team performance. Shay, the youngest, was home in Provo, Utah, in the throes of high school volleyball practice.
And Dad? He was in a job interview with Kentucky athletic director Mitch Barnhart.
Soon their cell phones were buzzing. Text messages in the family group chat. Pope told his wife and four daughters he needed them on a call. He mentioned a Zoom. No, no, one of the ****** replied. Just start a group Facetime. OK. Everyone scrambled to find a quiet spot to talk, a little privacy. But then — where’s Shay? Volleyball practice wasn’t over yet. As the youngest, she is, of course, the favorite. They couldn’t start without her. Finally picking up her phone, Shay found a screen flooded with alerts. “Oh, my gosh.”
The call could hardly handle their collective wavelength. Wide eyes stared at screens, stared at one another. There was smiling, some lip-biting. Finally, Dad asked, “How do we feel if I go to Kentucky?” The tears started rolling.
This wasn’t a done deal yet. Pope told his family, “Listen, if anyone isn’t OK with this, I will stay at BYU.” He meant it. And he needed to hear from everyone on the call. He went around one by one.
Each daughter looked at her dad and saw a man who, in the moment, had somehow lassoed his whole life history and pulled it all together. Mark Pope was born in Omaha, Neb., to a family that followed his dad’s career. Don Pope took a job with Union Pacific in New York in the 1970s, when Mark was a ****. Then he took a job with Burlington Resources in Seattle. Don and his wife, Linda, raised six kids in Bellevue, Wash. Mark grew tall, starring on the basketball court, and accepted a scholarship to the University of Washington in 1991. Two years later, his coach was let go, setting off a chain of events that, you will learn, somehow led to his life unfolding with a charmed bliss he could never have imagined; and, ultimately, shaping the direction of college basketball’s winningest program — the Kentucky Wildcats.
So, yes, it was a big question.
Lee Anne went first, telling her husband she loved him and was proud of him. Yes. Then each of the ******. Yes. Yes. Yes. Go Cats.
Shay went last, sort of hiding her face from the screen. As the baby, she’s the only Pope girl who didn’t previously move around a lot as a ****, instead growing up primarily in Utah, spending her whole life in a singular world. Everyone on the call knew a move would impact Shay the most. Changing high schools, new friends, living in a huge spotlight. Hard stuff for a 15-year-old.
Shay peeked at the screen so her family could see her. Yes.
“I knew what Kentucky was, because my dad has talked about it so much, but I didn’t really get it,” Shay says now. “I was sad, but … it’s just, I love my dad, and he’s … he’s my favorite person, you know? This is, like, his actual dream. And that’s ******* than me being **** or sad about having to leave my friends, right?”
Lee Anne and Mark Pope, center, with daughters, from left, Shay, Layla, Avery and Ella. (Chet White / *** Athletics)
Outside the family, there once existed a prevailing thought that maybe Pope wasn’t the man for arguably the biggest job in college basketball. It was April, to be exact. Back when all ***** broke loose.
First, John Calipari, Kentucky’s second all-time winningest coach behind Adolph Rupp, pulled an all-time vanishing act, trading years of growing animosity for an out-of-nowhere move to Arkansas. The general feeling was shock, but understanding. Both sides — Cal and the Cats — probably needed a fresh start. If anything, those in Lexington were excited. It was assumed the program would land some big-time name. Scott Drew. Dan Hurley. Bruce Pearl. Or maybe even a demigod like Billy Donovan or Jay Wright.
But then Drew said no. And Hurley said no. Pearl and others were non-options, weighed by prohibitive contract buyouts. Donovan wasn’t willing to talk until after the NBA season. Wright was a pipe dream.
That led Barnhart to Pope. The fifth-year BYU head coach was a Kentucky legend; symbolically, maybe more so than athletically. He first arrived in Lexington in 1993, when Pitino brought him in as a transfer, hoping he’d be the glue guy for a team ready to win a national championship. Pope had started for two seasons at Washington, but would come off the bench for the dynamic, dynastic Kentucky teams of the mid-90s. A ***** hydrant in the middle of a collection of Cadillacs — Tony Delk, Antoine Walker, Walter McCarty, Derek Anderson, Ron Mercer. He was co-captain of the 1996 national title team. He set screens like a door jamb, grabbed every loose ball and defended like a madman. All told, Kentucky went 62-7 in his two seasons. Pope earned a place in Wildcat lore and was drafted with the 52nd overall pick in the 1996 NBA Draft.
But, head coach? Of Kentucky? Pope had a nice four-year run at Utah Valley, and went 110-52 at BYU, but — c’mon. He never won a league championship. He never won an NCAA Tournament game. His 2023-24 team successfully navigated BYU’s difficult jump from the West Coast Conference to the Big 12, but flamed out in the first round of the big dance, losing to 11th-seeded Duquesne.
Kentucky fans are notoriously demanding and chronically online. The response to Pope’s emergence as head coach went as follows: He’s too unproven. He can’t recruit. The job is too big for him.
All of those things could very well be true.
Barnhart hired him anyway.
Now the keys to the kingdom are in the hands of a coach unlike any other in program history. He’s a coach who is, above all else, Lee Anne’s husband, and dad to Ella, Avery, Layla and Shay. He’s a member of The ******* of ****** ******* of Latter-day Saints. He’s the first *** graduate to serve as head coach since Basil Hayden — a 1922 grad who coached the Wildcats in 1926-27. (Joe B. Hall, who led Kentucky to the 1978 national championship, transferred to, and graduated from, Sewanee.)
Sitting in his office, the 52-year-old looks around like a puppy encountering snow for the first time, and says, can you believe this? Like he wants it to feel like a shared experience.
“This is so awesome,” he adds. “And yet, believe it or not, it feels totally natural to me.”
Lynn Archibald first became aware of Mark Pope sometime in the late 1980s. He began recruiting the 6-foot-9 center from Bellevue (Wash.) Newport High School as University of Utah head coach. Then, after being let go in 1988-89, continued the recruitment as an assistant on Bill Frieder’s staff at Arizona State.
It was a long line of suitors. Pope was among the best Class of ’91 high school players in the West. Maybe a notch below Jason Kidd and Cherokee Parks, but high on the list of top recruits nationally. In November 1990, he broke hearts by choosing hometown Washington over a list including California, Arizona, Syracuse, Utah and Kentucky. Arizona State wasn’t in the picture, but Archibald still thought highly of Pope. He typed up a letter congratulating him and welcoming him to the Pac-10 Conference.
That’s how Archibald did things. Old-school. He was self-made and appreciated those who were the same. His coaching career was the byproduct of a knockabout college playing career — some time at Utah State, a year at El Camino Junior College, a degree from Fresno State. He found some work coaching in the California prep ranks in the ’60s and threw himself into it. He dutifully attended camps conducted by Long Beach State head coach Jerry Tarkanian, who eventually hired him. Archibald spent two seasons at Long Beach State, then filled an opening at Cal Poly, then reunited with Tarkanian in 1974, joining his staff at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Two years in the desert were followed by one season at USC, then five as Idaho State head coach.
This would be Archibald’s life’s work — chasing the profession. Along the way, he and his wife, Anne, had two sons, Beau and Damon, and a daughter, Lee Anne.
After being let go at Idaho State, Archibald spent 1982-83 as Jerry Pimm’s assistant at Utah. He was surprised when Pimm took a job at Cal Santa Barbara that April, and more surprised when Utah asked him to take over. At the time of Archibald’s promotion, Tarkanian told The Salt Lake Tribune, “He is the finest person I know and is a great coach. Everybody loves him.” There are reams of quotes like this about Archibald. He was handsome, funny and curious. As a ******* with a worldly view, he was a pioneer in international recruiting — tapping Yugoslavia, Venezuela, Nigeria for players.
Archibald’s family was part of every team he coached. Lee Anne saw Utah players Mitch Smith, Manny Hendrix and Kelvin Upshaw as superheroes. She changed schools every few years and rarely complained. She was a coach’s ****.
There was one last move, this time in 1994. Archibald returned to his home state of Utah, filling an assistant spot at BYU — the perfect place to settle with a family in full bloom. The Archibald kids were off chasing their own dreams by now. Lee Anne was on her way to New York City for, get this, a job as David Letterman’s personal assistant. Damon landed a scholarship to play ball at Boise State. Beau was a talented high school player, on his way to a scholarship at Washington State. Life was good.
So you understand why Lynn Archibald didn’t tell them, why he made his wife promise to keep the secret. Prostate ******* wasn’t going to define his final years. He didn’t want the kids to make their life decisions based on him being *****. He didn’t want anyone feeling sorry for him. So he wouldn’t tell them until he absolutely had to.
Archibald ***** in May 1997. Only 52. Lee Anne and her brothers were there for the final weeks. Looking back, she says now that, had she known about her father’s diagnosis two years earlier, she likely wouldn’t have lived in New York, or started her career — exactly all the things her dad didn’t want her to give up. She wonders where life would’ve taken her.
Because Lynn Archibald gave his kids the freedom to keep on living in his final years, a perfect series of dominoes all fell in order. In 1998, Damon Archibald met Mark Pope at the Pete Newell Basketball Camp. Immediately, he was floored to come across what he would describe as, essentially, the male version of his sister. Damon, who had never previously set up his sister with anyone, let alone another basketball player, wrote down Lee Anne’s phone number and gave it to Mark.
Mark, a member of the Indiana Pacers, called Lee Anne during the 1998 NBA player lockout. The two did what people did back then — phone calls on landlines and email exchanges. Around that time, Letterman told Lee Anne he needed help setting up a charity. It would be based in his home state. To get it off the ground, she’d need to take regular trips to Indianapolis.
They met later in 1998; married in 1999. Then came the ****** — Ella in winter 2001, when Pope was the starting center for the Milwaukee Bucks; then Avery, during Pope’s brief stint with the Knicks; then Layla, when he was with the Denver Nuggets, then Shay in 2009, when Pope was out of the league, in medical school.
As it turns out, in another life, Pope might have ended up as a 6-foot-10 emergency room physician. Except, one day, not long after Shay was born, while studying orthopedic surgery at Columbia, Mark came home one day to tell Lee Anne that the younger students around him felt about medicine the way he felt about basketball. Lee Anne, with ****** certainty, responded that there was only one option.
“***** the ships,” she says, 15 years later.
So at 37, with four kids, Pope dropped out of med school and took a job on Mark Fox’s coaching staff at the University of Georgia. Title: Assistant to the director of operations. Salary: $24,000 for the year.
Lee Anne understood the ride ahead. That her family was about to subscribe to wins and losses, and to sharing their dad’s time with waves upon waves of young men, and to job changes beyond their control — from Georgia, to Wake Forest, to an assistant gig at BYU in 2011, to Utah Valley in 2015, and back to BYU. She was now a coach’s wife. And she was more equipped to do that than anyone imaginable.
That joke? The one you might be thinking of? Something like, “Oh, you think coaching Kentucky is hard? Trying raising four ******.” Yeah, Pope has heard it before.
It usually plays out something like this. The family is packed in an elevator, or standing together in an airport, or waiting in line at a coffee shop, minding their own business, when the old trope comes up. Some guy sees Pope, sees the wife, sees the four daughters, and quips, “Sheesh, sorry, man,” or, “Man, got your hands full,” or whatever other empty-headed zinger seems like a good idea.
But Pope doesn’t do tropes. Instead, things get very uncomfortable, very quickly. Pope has, according to Lee Anne, never laughed, never played along. Not once. Not ever. Instead, he clenches his jaw, narrows his eyes and spits back. “Are you kidding me, man? This is the best. Do you know how lucky I am?”
It’s in that moment that old jokes go to **** and the Pope ****** are reminded who their father is. Understanding the coach requires understanding the father, and Pope is equipped with the emotional maturity that comes with balanced realities.
“All these years, he’d be with his boys all day, then home to his ******, who all adore him,” Lee Anne Pope says. “But the thing is, he’s the same guy in both settings. It’s not like he hangs it up at the door.”
They all have their stories. They usually come with tears. The Pope family isn’t one to hide emotions.
Ella, for instance. Sitting on a couch in her dad’s office, arms wrapped around a pillow, she remembers a ride to school one day in grade school. She had created a video that was to air throughout the school that day. Opening her laptop, watching it one last time on the drive, she was hit with a wave of nerves. She closed the laptop, turning ghost-white. Pope, realizing what was happening, slowed down to a stop, pointed to Ella’s stomach, all twisted in knots, and said, “That’s it. That’s the feeling. That’s when you know you care and when you know you’ve worked at something. That’s the best.” She’s never forgotten it, never forgotten that passion is worth pursuing, worth manifesting, worth feeling. She remembered it when she was the only Pope girl to pursue basketball, earning a scholarship to Ohio University.
Avery thinks of her dad’s ability to be there, right where she could see him. Those tennis matches in the deep heat of California or Arizona, the sun rippling off the court. Other parents parked as close as possible and sat in air-conditioned cars. But Mr. Pope? He watched out in the sun because Avery was out in the sun. He didn’t sit because she didn’t sit. He wouldn’t yell or make a scene or even stand out. He would instead intently watch each point, Avery says, “living and dying for every moment.” He’s always had that way of appearing from out of nowhere. Earlier this year, soon after Pope was named Kentucky head coach, she was scheduled to give a farewell talk to her LDS ******* ward in Provo in preparation for her upcoming two-year mission in El Salvador. She was scheduled to speak for, at most, 15 minutes.
“He had a million things going on, and it made no sense for him to fly across the country, but there he was,” she says. “I’ve always felt like, in my life, there have been so many different times where it would be OK if he wasn’t there. But then he’s there. And it just happens over and over and over again.”
Layla remembers coming home upset one day in the sixth grade, telling her parents a boy in school called her “the B-word.” The following morning, a surprise guest speaker was scheduled. The class door swung up at 1 p.m. and in came coach Mark Pope and six members of the Utah Valley State basketball team. “Today we’re going to talk about respecting women,” Pope said to a room of wide eyes and deep silence. They spoke to the class for nearly an hour. On the way out, Pope introduced himself to the boy who had insulted his daughter. He shook his hand, maybe offering an extra squeeze.
“I mean, we were in sixth grade!” Layla says now, laughing hard. “It was incredible. I was like, oh my goodness, this is the greatest day of my whole life. But that’s my dad. He’s, like, the most protective, loving person ever. And the only time you’ll ever really see him truly **** is if you did anything to hurt me or my sisters or my mom.”
Shay loves to tell the story of the cash advance. Back in Utah, she had the idea to order DoorDash to school, then upsell the food in the cafeteria. She called her old man. “Dad, I have this idea, but I don’t have any money.” Pope, without hesitation, responded. “Love it. You’re a genius. I’ll give you a hundred dollars to get started.” The money came via Venmo and Shay started moving product. Capitalism in action. “It worked perfectly,” she says. That is, until Lee Anne’s phone rang, with a school official saying her daughter was essentially operating a racketeering outfit in the caf.
“Apparently,” the official said to Lee Anne, “one of Shay’s parents was involved in funding this.”
“He’s just the best,” says Layla, now a 16-year-old sophomore.
The stories go on and on. The Pope women speak of their father like an amusement ride. He has a way of mastering moments, the few that he gets, to make the most of them. He’s an experience, one that blocks out all the other noise.
“Even if we have a million eyes on us,” Ella says, “my dad makes it feel like it’s just us.”
Kentucky coach Mark Pope is presented a plaque after winning his first game at Rupp Arena on Nov. 4. (Michael Hickey / Getty Images)
Over the summer, Pope met with local Lexington media for an offseason news conference. He leaned into the most relatable version of himself. The ex-NBA player who says he wasn’t much of a basketball player. The Rhodes scholar who says he isn’t very bright. In that news conference, he pressed play on the role he’s presented for as long as he can remember.
“A bit casual, maybe a little self-deprecating,” he now says. “That’s my armor.”
The media session wrapped up and, on the way out, Pope asked longtime Kentucky basketball media relations director Deb Moore for feedback. “How’d that go?” Moore told Pope that he was good, then paused, and added one passing thought. “But at some point, in this job, you’re going to have to take yourself a little more seriously,” she said.
The point — Kentucky, for as incredible and passionate and dedicated as it is, can also be ruthless. It’s a place where a vulnerable disposition is ripe to be weaponized. It’s a place where, once the wins and losses start coming, the coach with the clipboard is no longer seen as a person. He’s a target.
Pope was furious. “Deb, you don’t know me yet …” he popped back.
The two didn’t speak for the next three days. Pope continued to bake and Moore wondered if she’d gone a step too far. But then came Sunday, a trip to *******, and some time for Pope to think.
“It had sat with me and sat with me and sat with me,” he says. “I finally came to realize, this matters to people in a different way. Like, this job is ******* than me. This job is more important than me. Really, there’s a little reverence to it. But that’s a new role for me. I’ve always eschewed that a little bit. Because I just want to be reachable and connect with people. Now I need to find a balance.”
In reality, Pope understands all this more than anyone Kentucky could’ve hired. The few times Big Blue lost during his time as a player, Pope retreated to the Cat Lodge, the team’s housing facility, and cried alone. It was the pressure of being captain. It was the pressure of answering to Pitino. It was the pressure of being 2,400 miles from home, in a place so hard-wired to every bounce, every play, and every breath of Kentucky basketball.
He gets it. And he welcomes it.
“I think he will handle it better than all of us,” Pitino says of himself and other former Kentucky coaches. “Because he’s so grounded and he’s such a spiritual person. I think he’s going to handle it beautifully. He knows it so well.”
The faithful are giving Pope a chance. His return to Lexington last spring was greeted with a raucous introduction that filled Rupp Arena — all 23,500 seats — to the brim. He is, after all, one of them.
But Lee Anne knows there are still doubts. And she knows the honeymoon will only last so long. And she knows her family is in a spotlight so big that not even an amusement ride can block it out. This, though, she says, is what they’re all built for. It’s why they all said yes on that family call. It’s why they believe in the coach.
“You know, somebody said to me, he’s goofy,” Lee Anne says, a little defense in her voice. “But no. He’s not goofy. He’s just — in a world where everyone is cool, he is not too cool. And there’s a big difference. He’s brilliant. He’s authentic. And he’s going to outwork everyone. I know it.”
The office door is closed and Pope makes one last thing clear. He didn’t make his family. His family made him. The biggest job in college basketball doesn’t change that. The heat that’s coming — playing Duke, traveling to his hometown to play Gonzaga in Seattle, battles in the SEC, the second-guessing, the fans swarming to social media, the exposure — will only be granted pieces of him. Never the whole.
“Being the coach at Kentucky,” he says, “if it’s everything you are, you won’t be any good at it.”
(Illustration: Meech Robinson / The Athletic; photos: Andy Lyons / Getty Images)
Source link
#Kentuckys #keys #hands #coach
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Helldivers 2 Players are Realizing a Sad Truth in Their ****** for Democracy That’s Getting Too Real
Helldivers 2 Players are Realizing a Sad Truth in Their ****** for Democracy That’s Getting Too Real
It’s safe to say Helldivers 2 has faced its fair share of ups and downs since its release in February. Despite these challenges, the game has managed to build a dedicated playerbase that is committed to doing whatever it takes to spread democracy across the galaxy. Players are drawn to the chaotic, fast-paced combat that constantly forces them to think on their feet, making each mission feel fresh and engaging.
Players are enjoying the game with its recent updates and changes. | Image Credit: Arrowhead Game Studios
However, what truly sets the game apart is its ability to keep the player engaged without leaning too much on the microtransaction. Recently, the game has once again rejuvenated its player base with a steady stream of updates and meaningful changes. In doing so, players are starting to realize that perhaps it’s time to raise their standards when it comes to modern games.
Helldivers 2 Highlights the Regressive Reality of Modern Games
Players are slowly realizing the predatory nature of modern games. | Image Credit: Arrowhead Game Studios
It’s no secret that many modern games and franchises have shifted toward microtransaction-heavy models. Players are often expected to spend real-world money to purchase cosmetics, skins, and weapons with little or no option to earn these items through gameplay. These systems more often than not push players into a constant spending cycle.
Yet Helldivers 2 stands in contrast to this model. While there is still the option to buy Super Credits with real money, the game doesn’t force this on players. Instead, it allows them to grind for rewards in a way that feels both satisfying and fair. The system rewards players who are exploring and completing challenging missions.
With a good amount of grind, players can earn enough to buy new armor, weapons, and other cosmetics through the gameplay loop itself. Recently, a player on Reddit, admitted that the game is far from perfect but it hits a sweet spot that other live-service games often miss. This sudden realization made the player think about how they need to change their standards with games.
Comment byu/Tank9301 from discussion inHelldivers
Comment byu/Tank9301 from discussion inHelldivers
Comment byu/Tank9301 from discussion inHelldivers
The thread quickly gained traction, with players sharing similar sentiments. The comments are filled in from players who were thrilled not just with Helldivers 2‘s gameplay but with its player-first approach to rewards.
What This Means for the Future of Gaming
Players need to raise their standards for modern games. | Image Credit: Arrowhead Game Studios
The story of Helldivers 2 isn’t just about how it is not following the trend of predatory monetization models. But it’s a story of how a game can be both fun and fair. It’s proving that developers can create experiences that don’t prioritize profit over player satisfaction. This player-first approach has kept the community invested and engaged long after its release.
Recent titles like Concord, ******** Squad, and Skull & Bones should serve as a reminder that games that only try to capitalize on the trend and not focus on providing great gameplay experience will continue to flop. It’s a clear call for other game studios to rethink their approach.
In a time when “live service” has often come to mean “pay-to-play,” Helldivers 2 is proving that it’s still possible to create a game that feels like a true experience, one that values its players and offers them genuine opportunities to earn rewards without having to open their wallets at every turn.
In the end, it ******** to be seen whether or not the trend of prioritizing player experience will catch on with other games, but for now, Helldivers 2 stands as a shining example of what the gaming industry could be.
Source link
#Helldivers #Players #Realizing #Sad #Truth #****** #Democracy #GettingTooReal
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Dehumanizing child-free women in film and TV gives misogyny a stage
Dehumanizing child-free women in film and TV gives misogyny a stage
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain
“When are you giving us grandkids?” and “You’ll change your mind,” are familiar lines heard by child-free women around the table at family dinner.
Dealing with pokey questions from relatives is one thing, but seeing misogynistic female stereotypes of purposefully child-free women on screen and in the media is another.
University of South Australia Ph.D. student Belinda Lees has dedicated the past four years to researching how screenwriters could create more nuanced and complex child-free women protagonists in biopics, after uncovering the barrage of often negative portrayals in existing media.
Lees’ research comes at a time when Australia’s birth rate has hit an all-time low, with many adults under 50 saying they’re unlikely to ever have kids, mostly because they just don’t want to.
Other reasons include the state of the world, a general nonaffinity for children, or preferring to focus on their career and interests, but it’s clear that more women are opting out of motherhood—a choice that often comes with harsh criticism.
In an article published in the Journal of Screenwriting, Lees says that the negative representation of child-free women in biopics like “Blonde” (2022), “Becoming Jane” (2007), and “A Private War” (2018) could lead to image and self-esteem issues and may exacerbate the issue of aggression against women by validating harmful societal attitudes.
As a child-free woman, Marilyn Monroe in the biographical fiction film “Blonde” is depicted as mentally unwell, obsessive, and hysterical due to the loss of her unborn children, as the film touches on difficult subjects such as ********* and grief after termination.
Lees says the dramatized and strikingly negative depiction of Monroe’s life may be accepted as fact due to the nature of the biopic genre.
“On-screen, when child-free women are portrayed negatively, it marginalizes, reduces, others, and invalidates a woman’s choice to remain child-free—which may not even be a voluntary choice,” she says.
“It’s a feedback loop where harmful depictions of child-free women in film and TV strengthen these problematic attitudes in real life, which can in turn influence aggressive behaviors towards women.
“This is partly why there’s a history of prominent female figures being criticized for their lack of children, like former Prime Minister Julia Gillard who was called “wooden” and unfit to lead due to her “deliberately barren” status.
“Filmmakers need to move away from these regressive tropes towards more complex, respectful depictions—such as Sally Wainwright’s portrayal of Anne Lister in “Gentleman Jack” (2019–2022), where her admiration of Lister’s character translates to a meaningful on-screen portrayal of one of history’s first modern *********.”
The attitudes of male filmmakers and writers are often less admiring, which can lead to problematic depictions just like that of Monroe in “Blonde”.
“Almost 20% of men believe that feminism should be violently resisted, and 30% hold hostile sexist views—no doubt a contributing factor to the 71 women and ****** that have been ******* in Australia this year,” Lees says.
“Acknowledging this devastating statistic, if it’s true that on-screen objectification of women can lead to aggressive attitudes and behaviors in men, then it could also be true that more inclusive and empowering representations may influence audiences more positively, creating a safer society for women and ******.”
Lees says the film industry needs writers and filmmakers who are committed to connecting with their child-free characters on a meaningful level, and that dehumanizing child-free women by framing them in film as selfish, hedonistic, immature, and abnormal can further the beliefs that lead to physical, verbal and ******* ******.
“Finding an authentic link with these women and presenting them as complex, nuanced and complete people is an important step forwards in erasing misogynistic and harmful narratives about child-free women.”
More information:
Belinda Lees, Representing the child-free woman in the twenty-first century biopic, Journal of Screenwriting (2024). DOI: 10.1386/josc_00149_2
Provided by
University of South Australia
Citation:
Dehumanizing child-free women in film and TV gives misogyny a stage (2024, November 12)
retrieved 12 November 2024
from
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no
part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.
Source link
#Dehumanizing #childfree #women #film #misogyny #stage
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Gartner warns GenAI demand will lead to datacentre energy shortages
Gartner warns GenAI demand will lead to datacentre energy shortages
The surging demand for generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) workloads is likely to lead to operational constraints in AI datacentres due to energy shortages, according to Gartner.
The analyst is predicting that 40% of existing AI datacentres will be affected by power supply issues by 2027, because of how rapidly energy consumption is expected to rise over the coming years due to more server farms hosting AI workloads.
According to Gartner’s forecast, the amount of power needed by datacentres to run incremental AI-optimised servers will hit 500 terawatt-hours (TWh) per year in 2027, which is 2.6 times higher than in 2023.
“The explosive growth of new hyperscale datacentres to implement GenAI is creating an insatiable demand for power that will exceed the ability of utility providers to expand their capacity fast enough,” said Bob Johnson, vice-president analyst at Gartner.
“In turn, this threatens to disrupt energy availability and lead to shortages, which will limit the growth of new datacentres for GenAI and other uses from 2026.”
As previously reported by Computer Weekly, the soaring demand for GenAI offerings has been cited by various hyperscale cloud suppliers as a source of revenue growth in recent quarters, with both Microsoft and Amazon committing to building new datacentres to accommodate this demand.
However, Gartner said these facilities may take longer than expected to come online due to the power supply issues.
“New, larger datacentres are being planned to handle the huge amounts of data needed to train and implement the rapidly expanding large language models (LLMs) that underpin GenAI applications,” said Johnson. “However, short-term power shortages are likely to continue for years, as new power transmission, distribution and generation capacity could take years to come online and won’t alleviate current problems.”
And enterprises that are ******** big on GenAI for their future business growth need to take this into account, because power supply issues will likely lead to rising energy costs, he said.
“Significant power users are working with major producers to secure long-term guaranteed sources of power independent of other grid demands,” said Johnson. “In the meantime, the cost of power to operate datacentres will increase significantly as operators use economic leverage to secure needed power. These costs will be passed on to AI and GenAI product and service providers as well.”
Another complicating factor in all this for enterprises is that, to meet the growing energy demands GenAI is likely to cause, it’s likely that non-renewable sources will need to be used, and this could spell bad news for enterprises and their pursuit of net-zero.
“The reality is that increased datacentre use will lead to increased [carbon] emissions to generate the needed power in the short term,” said Johnson. “This, in turn, will make it more difficult for datacentre operators and their customers to meet aggressive sustainability goals relating to [carbon] emissions.”
Source link
#Gartner #warns #GenAI #demand #lead #datacentre #energy #shortages
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Trump selects Marco Rubio, Kristi Noem to fill Cabinet positions
Trump selects Marco Rubio, Kristi Noem to fill Cabinet positions
Trump selects Marco Rubio, Kristi Noem to fill Cabinet positions – CBS News
Watch CBS News
President-elect Donald Trump is filling his Cabinet positions and other administration roles as he prepares for a second term in office. He is expected to name Florida Sen. Marco Rubio as his choice for secretary of state. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem is Trump’s pick to become secretary for the Department of Homeland Security, sources tell CBS News.
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
Not Now
Turn On
Source link
#Trump #selects #Marco #Rubio #Kristi #Noem #fill #Cabinet #positions
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Turbulence on Argentina-to-Germany flight injures 11
Turbulence on Argentina-to-Germany flight injures 11
Eleven people have been injured when a Lufthansa flight from Buenos Aires to Frankfurt hit severe turbulence while travelling over the Atlantic, the airline says.
“Unfortunately, five passengers and six crew members suffered mostly minor injuries,” a Lufthansa spokesperson told Reuters in an email, confirming a report by the DPA news agency.
“The safety of the flight was not in jeopardy at any time,” the spokesperson added.
The injured received medical treatment immediately after the aircraft landed safely at its planned destination on Tuesday at 10.53am, according to the airline.
The Boeing 747-8 had been carrying 329 passengers and 19 crew members.
The turbulence was brief and occurred in an intertropical convergence zone, the company said.
In May, a passenger ***** of a suspected heart ******* and 30 were injured when a Singapore Airlines passenger plane was severely jolted by an air pocket over the Irrawaddy Basin in Myanmar.
Source link
#Turbulence #ArgentinatoGermany #flight #injures
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Kazuyoshi Miura: ********* soccer player, 57, set for 40th season as professional
Kazuyoshi Miura: ********* soccer player, 57, set for 40th season as professional
********* forward Kazuyoshi Miura plans to extend his professional soccer career into his 40th season.
Miura, 57 plays for Atletico Suzuka in the Japan Football League (JFL) — the fourth tier of ********* football — on loan from second-division side Yokohama FC. When he made his debut for Suzuka in July, he became the oldest player to play in the JFL.
Miura joined Suzuka a month earlier and says he plans to keep playing for them in the 2025 season. “I had a one-and-a-half-year contract (since the summer of 2024). I think it was a natural progression,” he said, via the Kyodo News press agency.
The ********* soccer calendar runs from March to November and Miura will be 58 when the new season begins next year.
Known as ‘King Kazu’, Miura’s professional career began in 1986 with Brazilian club Santos and his lengthy career has included spells with Palmeiras, Coritiba, Genoa, Dinamo Zagreb, Vissel Kobe and Sydney FC. He previously spent time on loan with Suzuka in 2022 before joining Portuguese second-tier side Oliveirense in a temporary move in January 2023.
Miura was one of the first ********* star footballers, being crowned ****** Football of the Year in 1992 and scoring 55 goals in 89 international appearances between 1990 and 2000, winning the ****** Cup in 1992 and the old Afro-****** Cup of Nations the following year.
Miura has won 18 trophies across his career including four ********* league titles with Tokyo Verdy and the top-flight of Croatian football with Dinamo Zagreb.
GO DEEPER
‘He wants to **** on the pitch’ – an audience with King Kazu, 52, the oldest professional footballer in the world
(Gualter Fatia/Getty Images)
Source link
#Kazuyoshi #Miura #********* #soccer #player #set #40th #season #professional
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Call of Duty: ****** Ops 6 Xbox Series X Review – An Instant Classic I The Koalition
Call of Duty: ****** Ops 6 Xbox Series X Review – An Instant Classic I The Koalition
Adam Vale of The Koalition writes: Recently while discussing Call of Duty: ****** Ops 6 with non-COD gamers I was asked a simple question. What makes COD games so special? The answer however is not quite as simple.
Source link
#Call #Duty #****** #Ops #Xbox #Series #Review #Instant #Classic #Koalition
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
NASA’s Roman Space Telescope Gets New Coronagraph to Spot Exoplanets
NASA’s Roman Space Telescope Gets New Coronagraph to Spot Exoplanets
In an October 2024 milestone, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory completed the integration of the Roman Coronagraph Instrument onto the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, an upcoming observatory set for launch in May 2027. This highly advanced coronagraph, capable of detecting planets up to 100 million times dimmer than their host stars, has been crafted to block out starlight to make the faint light of exoplanets visible. The integration marks a key step toward developing technology that could one day help NASA locate Earth-like planets in other solar systems.
Coronagraph Instrumentation and Technology Demonstration
The Roman Coronagraph, approximately the size of a baby grand piano, comprises an intricate system of masks, prisms, and mirrors that work in concert to obstruct starlight. According to Rob Zellem, Deputy Project Scientist for Roman Telescope Communications, the instrument aims to demonstrate technologies critical for future space telescopes like the proposed Habitable Worlds Observatory, designed to find life-supporting exoplanets. The Instrument Carrier, which houses the coronagraph, was attached to the Roman Telescope at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. This section, often described as the “skeleton” of the observatory, will soon be integrated with Roman’s primary science instrument, the Wide Field Instrument, completing the telescope’s core.
Exoplanet Imaging: Beyond Traditional Transit Detection
Currently, most exoplanet discoveries rely on a method called transiting, which measures the dimming of a star when a planet crosses in front of it. However, this technique is limited by the rare alignment of planetary orbits with Earth’s line of sight. Direct imaging, particularly through coronagraphy, is an emerging method that allows scientists to observe planets without relying on transit events. While ground-based telescopes have had some success using coronagraphs, such as imaging planets orbiting the star HR 8799, the Roman Coronagraph’s advanced design promises to achieve unprecedented sensitivity in space.
Next Steps for NASA’s New Telescope
With the coronagraph now successfully integrated, NASA’s engineering team will perform a series of system checks before installing the Wide Field Instrument later this year. Liz Daly, Lead for Integrated Payload Assembly at Goddard, emphasized the collaborative efforts of various teams in bringing the Roman observatory closer to completion. The Roman Telescope’s ability to explore dark energy, exoplanets, and infrared astrophysics will set a new standard in space observation.
Source link
#NASAs #Roman #Space #Telescope #Coronagraph #Spot #Exoplanets
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Poco X7 Pro Could Be the First Smartphone to Ship With Xiaomi’s HyperOS 2 in India
Poco X7 Pro Could Be the First Smartphone to Ship With Xiaomi’s HyperOS 2 in India
Xiaomi’s new Android skin version — HyperOS 2.0 — was announced in China last month alongside the Xiaomi 15 series. While the company did not outline a rollout plan of its latest custom skin for devices in India, a new ***** has hinted that the Poco X7 Pro will be the first to debut with HyperOS 2.0 in the country. The new Poco X series phone is rumoured to launch next month in India. The Poco X7 Pro is expected to arrive as a rebrand of the Redmi Note 14 Pro+. It is likely to offer upgrades over the Poco X6 Pro.
Smartprix, citing unnamed sources, reports that the Poco X7 Pro will be the first smartphone in India to launch with HyperOS 2.0 based on Android 15. It is expected to go official in December in the county.
In China, the Xiaomi 15 was the first to land with HyperOS 2.0 but its India launch is expected to take place only next year. Therefore, the Poco X7 Pro is believed to hit the Indian market ahead of the Xiaomi 15.
The Poco X7 Pro is speculated to come as a rebranded version of the Redmi Note 14 Pro+. It is expected to succeed the Poco X6 Pro.
Redmi Note 14 Pro+ Price, Specifications
The Redmi Note 14 Pro+ is already available in the ******** market since September this year with prices starting from CNY 1,899 (roughly Rs. 22,000). It gets a 6.67-inch 1.5K (1,220×2,712 pixels) display with up to 120Hz refresh rate and 3000nits peak brightness. It runs on a Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 chipset with up to 16GB of RAM and up to 512GB onboard storage.
Redmi Note 14 Pro+ has a triple rear camera unit comprising a 50-megapixel Light Hunter 900 sensor, an 8-megapixel ultra wide-angle sensor, and a 50-megapixel portrait telephoto camera. On the front, the handset boasts a 20-megapixel OmniVision OV20B sensor. The handset is IP68-rated for dust and water resistance and packs a 6,200mAh battery with 90W fast charging support.
Source link
#Poco #Pro #Smartphone #Ship #Xiaomis #HyperOS #India
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
2 Stocks Super Micro Computer Investors Can Swap Into
2 Stocks Super Micro Computer Investors Can Swap Into
Super Micro Computer has not fallen under major scrutiny over accounting irregularity allegations, internal controls and governance concerns.
Super Micro Computers is facing NASDAQ delisting over its ******** to file its 10-K report.
Dell Technologies and Hewlett Packard Enterprise are experiencing the AI ***** as their AI server business hits double-digit YoY growth.
The artificial intelligence (AI) ***** has ignited certain computer and technology sector stocks that are direct benefactors of AI deployment. It’s no secret that AI chipmaker NVIDIA (NASDAQ:) is a top benefactor of AI demand as its GPUs are the essential component of AI servers.
Speaking of servers, companies that assemble AI servers and AI-powered supercomputers are also some of the biggest beneficiaries of AI deployment. One of the brightest stars was Super Micro Computer (NASDAQ:), which saw its stock surge from a post-split price of $9.50 in April of 2023 to a high of $122.90 almost a year later in March of 2024.
Hindenburg Research Alleges Accounting Misconduct
Unfortunately, shares have since collapsed 80% from the highs as allegations of accounting manipulation from short-seller Hindenburg Research cast doubts on management’s credibility. Management initially denied any of the claims but then delayed its 10-K filing to investigate internal controls. To further muddy the optics, its auditing firm, Ernest & Young, resigned, citing concerns over the company’s internal financial controls, governance and transparency.
The firm stated, “We are resigning due to information that has recently come to our attention, which has led us to no longer be able to rely on management’s and the Audit Committee’s representations.” This further propelled the stock over 30%. However, it’s also concerning that Ernest & Young flagged accounting issues in July before Hindenburg’s bearish report was released on August 27, 2024.
Super Micro Cuts Forward Guidance for Fiscal First and Second Quarters of 2025
Super Micro provided preliminary lower guidance for fiscal Q1 2025 EPS of 75 cents to 76 cents versus 73 cents consensus estimate with revenues of $5.9 billion to $6 billion, falling short of $6.44 billion consensus estimates. The company cut guidance for its fiscal Q2 2025, with EPS sinking to the range of 56 cents to 65 cents versus 81 cents consensus estimates on revenues of $5.5 billion to $6.1 billion versus $6.84 billion consensus estimates.
Super Micro Attempts to Calm Investors
However, the company tried to assuage shareholders on November 5, 2024. stating, “The Special Committee has completed its investigation based on a set of initial concerns raised by EY. Following a three-month investigation led by Independent Counsel, the Committee’s investigation to date has found that the Audit Committee has acted independently and that there is no evidence of ****** or misconduct on the part of management or the Board of Directors.
The Committee is recommending a series of remedial measures for the Company to strengthen its internal governance and oversight functions, and the Committee expects to deliver the full report on the completed work this week or next. The Special Committee has other work that is ongoing but expects it to be completed soon.”
Super Micro also warned of the potential for delisting if they don’t file their 10-K or submit a plan to regain compliance by November 16, 2024.
Investors seeking an alternative to Super Micro Computer’s cloud of uncertainty can look at these 2 AI server makers also benefitting from the AI *****.
1. Dell Technologies: $3.8 Billion in Backlog for AI Servers
A major supplier of AI servers is Dell Technologies (NYSE:). The company’s NVIDIA-powered AI servers are the driving force behind its 9.1% YoY revenue growth to $25.03 billion in its second quarter of 2024. Its Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG) posted record revenue of $11.6 billion, up 38% YoY in the quarter. Its servers and networking revenue surged 80% to a record $7.7 billion, driven by AI and traditional server demand.
Dell Technologies COO Jeff Clark stated, “Our AI momentum accelerated in Q2, and we’ve seen an increase in the number of enterprise customers buying AI solutions each quarter.” Clark added, “AI-optimized server demand was $3.2 billion, up 23% sequentially, and $5.8 billion year to date. Backlog was $3.8 billion, and our pipeline has grown to several multiples of our backlog.”
The AI ***** is offsetting weakness in other segments such as Storage revenue falling 5% YoY to $5 billion. Its Client Services Group (CSG) revenue fell 4% YoY to $12.4 billion, comprised of commercial client revenue flat at $10.6 billion and a 22% YoY drop in consumer revenue to $1.9 billion. The market sees Dell stock as a viable swap out with Super Micro stock as its shares surged higher on each negative SMCI headline. DELL stock is up 75% year-to-date (YTD) compared to SMCI stock, falling 13.7% YTD.
2. Hewlett Packard Enterprise: A $171 Billion TAM from Hyperscalers and Service Providers
While NVIDIA’s next-generation Blackwell GPUs are already sold out for the next 12 months, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:) has strengthened its partnership with Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:) AI GPUs.
The company announced its HPE ProLiant Compute XD685 for complex AI model training tasks, which feature the AMD 5th Gen EPYC processors and AMD Instinct MI325X accelerators, during its first AI Day. The MI325X is AMD’s next-gen flagship high-performance AI GPU designed for (large language model) LLM inference and AI acceleration. Its AMD 5th gen EPYC processors are central processing units (CPUs) but with growing AI capabilities. Management sees a $171 total addressable market (TAM) with a 25% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) through fiscal 2027, with significant growth from hyperscalers and AI service providers.
The AI ***** is accelerating with Hewlett Packard Enterprise as they reported a 35% YoY surge in its server revenue to $4.3 billion. Operating margin improved 70 bps to 10.8%. The server business accounts for nearly 55% of total revenue, which includes high-performance computing (HPC), AI, data analytics and integrated processing. Like Dell, its other segments offset the strength in AI servers. Its Hybrid Cloud segment revenue fell 7% YoY to $1.3 billion, comprised of its GreenLake hybrid cloud and AI infrastructure as a service (IaaS), AI analytics and Alletra storage solutions.
Original Post
Source link
#Stocks #Super #Micro #Computer #Investors #Swap
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Ethics committee reopens Boissonnault inquiry in wake of new ‘******’ texts
Ethics committee reopens Boissonnault inquiry in wake of new ‘******’ texts
The parliamentary ethics committee has called ******** cabinet minister ****** Boissonnault to testify for a third time as newly disclosed text messages raise more questions about his possible involvement in a medical supply business while in office.
As part of an affidavit filed on Nov. 6 in an Edmonton court, WhatsApp correspondence shows Boissonnault’s former business partner, Stephen Anderson, texted a second client that he was updating ‘******’ on the status of another multi-million-dollar deal.
The texts have reignited the ethics controversy that has plagued Boissonnault and the Liberals since May.
On Thursday, the committee passed a motion calling for Boissonnault and a host of new witnesses to appear, effectively reopening the committee’s study into allegations Boissonnault broke conflict of interest laws by being involved in business deals while serving as a minister in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet.
Story continues below advertisement
Boissonnault and Anderson co-founded Global Health Imports (GHI) at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Boissonnault’s office said in a statement that Anderson has been using the minister’s name without his permission after Boissonnault resigned from GHI in the fall of 2021.
“As the Minister has said on many occasions, he was not involved in any of the text conversations with Mr. Anderson that have been referenced by the media, including these most recent conversations referenced in this court filing,” wrote Alice Hansen, Boissonnault’s director of communications.
Tory ethics critic Michael Barrett cited the new court documents when he put forward the motion.
More on Politics
More videos
“These text messages, WhatsApp messages, add a new dimension to what this committee is dealing with,” Barrett said.
The motion was approved in a vote of 6 to 5, with ******** MPs unanimously voting against it.
The committee did not invite Anderson back to Ottawa to testify after several MPs said they found him to be an unreliable witness during his July appearance. Anderson is expected to be found in contempt of Parliament for refusing to answer questions and turn over documents ordered by MPs earlier this summer.
The six-month-long saga began with revelations, first reported on by Global News in May, that GHI had been hit with half a dozen lawsuits, most by ********* suppliers alleging the company did not pay its bills.
Story continues below advertisement
Global News revealed the company, which Boissonnault owned 50 per cent of until June, is mired in lawsuits, including several allegations of civil ******, owes approximately $8 million in court-ordered debt, had its warehouse set on ***** by three arsonists, and bid on — and won — a federal contract while Boissonnault was in cabinet, in a possible contravention of ethics rules.
Boissonnault is not named in any of the lawsuits and Anderson denies the ****** allegations, which remain unproven in court.
Hansen said Boissonnault was unaware GHI bid on a federal contract while he was a shareholder and denied the contract broke ethics rules.
Boissonnault maintains he has had no role in GHI since he was re-elected as Edmonton Centre MP and appointed to cabinet. He has declined to answer questions regarding GHI’s business operations after that time “because he had no part in those operations,” his office said in a previous statement.
Get breaking National news
For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen.
The lone Albertan in cabinet, Boissonnault was tourism minister and associate finance minister until mid-2023, when he was promoted to the more senior position of employment minister.
Text messages Anderson sent in 2022 have been the focus for parliamentarians. That’s because ethics rules prohibit cabinet ministers from managing or operating private businesses while in office.
In those texts, Anderson repeatedly told Malvina Ghaoui, a client of GHI’s, that he was updating ‘******’ about the ***** of $17 million worth of medical gloves to Ghaoui’s company, The Ghaoui Group LLC. In all, Anderson references ‘******’ nine times in texts across two days.
Story continues below advertisement
Boissonnault denies he is the ‘******’ in the text messages.
Canada’s ethics commissioner, Konrad von Finckenstein, looked into the communications between Anderson and Ghaoui, reviewing materials submitted to his office by Boissonnault on two occasions. Both times, von Finckenstein decided against launching a formal investigation because he said he found no evidence Boissonnault broke conflict of interest laws by communicating with Anderson.
4:05
Conservatives question ****** Boissonnault over text messages with business partner
After Boissonnault answered a barrage of questions and vehemently denied any wrongdoing in his September testimony, most MPs on the ethics committee appeared satisfied with his explanation that Anderson had been using his name without his consent to lend GHI credibility.
Anderson, for his part, first told Global News he was referring to another employee named ****** at GHI. He later admitted to the committee that he lied to Global News, and instead blamed autocorrect for typing ‘******’ nine times in texts to Ghaoui.
Story continues below advertisement
The latest messages that emerged in court documents bring that count up to 11.
New ‘******’ texts
The affidavit was filed in support of The Ghaoui Group’s lawsuit against GHI, Anderson and his other company, Global Healthcare Solutions (GHS). In it, Michael R. Weber, legal counsel for California-based 4M Medical LLC, alleges Anderson was running GHI as a “fraudulent scheme.”
Weber alleges Anderson induced him into sending a refundable ******** of approximately $350,000 to secure a large shipment of medical gloves. GHI never delivered the goods and then did not return the ********, which was sent to an account held by GHS, Weber said in the document.
Prior to Weber wiring the ********, Anderson texted Weber that he had updated ‘******’ about the status of the ***** of $3.45 million worth of medical gloves to 4M Medical, according to the WhatsApp transcript attached to the affidavit.
“I just updated Felix and ****** and they said we have to move we cant fool around,” Anderson wrote Weber on Sept. 20, 2022.
Trending Now
How ********* consumers can spot counterfeit $2 coins
From 300 lbs to 100K races: How this mom of 4 took up ultramarathons
Felix Papineau handles GHI’s bids on government contracts.
Anderson had told Weber that ****** was his business partner and a member of the ********* Parliament, Weber’s affidavit reads.
According to the transcript, on Sept. 22, 2022, Weber tells Anderson he is prepared to wire the ********. Anderson replies: “Ok are you confident really I won’t tell shawna and Felix and ****** yet.”
Story continues below advertisement
Minister ****** Boissonnault’s former business partner, Global Health Imports co-founder Stephen Anderson, testifying to the parliamentary ethics committee on July 17, 2024.
Global News
Shawna Parker is Anderson’s sister who worked at GHI.
Weber told Global News in an interview that he has had no direct communication with Boissonnault, but in the fall of 2022, he obtained GHI’s corporate records, which confirmed Anderson’s claim that Boissonnault was a partner in the business.
Boissonnault’s name remained listed in GHI’s corporate records 16 months after he was appointed to cabinet, Global News previously found. Boissonnault said it was Anderson’s responsibility to update the registries, which did not happen.
“Anderson’s use of Boissonnault’s name was a major factor to induce 4M to risk the US$250,000 ********,” Weber said.
Weber wired the money to an account held by GHS on Oct. 17, 2022, court documents show.
In the affidavit, Weber said Anderson used similar tactics on him that he had employed on Ghaoui, whose company also entered into a contract with GHI to buy a large shipment of medical gloves in September 2022.
Story continues below advertisement
The Ghaoui Group wired a nearly $500,000 ******** to the same GHS account, which the company alleges in court documents was never returned when the ***** fell through.
Weber was sued by the investment company that provided 4M Medical with the $350,000 ********, according to the affidavit.
Hansen, Boissonnault’s communications director, said the minister “had no dealings with 4M Medical LLC, or Mr. Weber and had no knowledge of these business affairs at all.”
Neither Anderson nor his lawyer responded to Global News’ questions by deadline.
Both Weber and Ghaoui said they have filed police reports with the Edmonton Police Service (EPS) regarding their transactions with GHI. The EPS did not respond to Global News’ questions by deadline.
New witnesses testify
While committee members have called upon Boissonnault again, they also invited a host of new witnesses to testify: Ghaoui, Parker and Papineau. The motion did not provide a time frame for when they are expected to appear.
Ghaoui said she “looks forward to providing any information or testimony that may help clarify the matters under review.”
Neither Papineau nor Parker responded to Global News’ requests for comment.
The motion came just days after Boissonnault was grilled in the House of Commons over a National Post report that found Anderson had bid on federal contracts in 2020 claiming GHI was “a wholly owned Indigenous and LGBTQ Company.”
Story continues below advertisement
In a statement posted on Nov. 8 to X, formerly Twitter, Boissonnault wrote that he did not consent to Anderson “making any false representations to portray Global Health Imports as an Indigenous-owned company.”
Hansen told the Post Anderson had “full responsibility” for bids on contracts. She accused Anderson, again, of using Boissonnault’s name without his consent “to advance his personal interests.”
If you have information for this story, or information for another story, please contact me in confidence at *****@*****.tld
Source link
#Ethics #committee #reopens #Boissonnault #inquiry #wake #****** #texts
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Billionaire real estate magnate loses control of historic *** cinema chain
Billionaire real estate magnate loses control of historic *** cinema chain
The US billionaire real estate magnate Charles Cohen has lost control of his upmarket *** cinema chain after an escalating legal battle over unpaid debts.
Curzon, the historic arthouse chain that has 16 venues across the ***, has been snapped up by the US private equity firm Fortress Investment Group.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Fortress reportedly offered $5m (£3.9m) for the cinema group.
Curzon, which is one of the oldest cinema chains in Britain, was put up for auction earlier this year after its previous owner, Cohen Media Group, was ordered by a New York judge to sell off some of its assets.
Fortress, which owns Majestic Wine and Poundstretcher, sued Mr Cohen’s business empire after it defaulted on a $534m loan, with the tycoon also on the ***** for more than $187m in personal guarantees.
The Curzon auction included the cinema group’s distribution arm, Artificial Eye, as well as its home streaming service.
Mr Cohen’s US cinema group, Landmark Theaters, has also been put up for auction, while he has already lost control of an office tower in New York’s Midtown.
But the legal dispute has escalated in recent weeks after Fortress accused Mr Cohen of trying to shield his assets from the court order.
In a filing in the New York Supreme Court, Fortress alleged that Mr Cohen transferred $70m worth of assets to new owners. This included moving a $20m mansion in Greenwich, New York, into his wife’s name, and transferring ownership of at least four luxury yachts worth $50m.
Mr Cohen is appealing the judge’s ruling and for the $187m liability to be reversed in full. Cohen Media Group has been contacted for comment.
Mr Cohen bought Curzon in 2019, a year after buying Landmark Theaters in the US. The cinema chains were used as collateral on the Fortress loan, alongside the Manhattan tower, a design centre and a Florida hotel.
The acquisitions came shortly before lockdown forced widespread cinema closures and pushed the sector into crisis. Cinemas are also struggling with the shift to streaming, as attendance continues to fall short of pre-Covid levels.
Curzon was set up in 1934 by Harold Wingate, who opened his first cinema in Mayfair. It became known for introducing audiences to international cinema by importing and screening some of the first foreign language films in the ***.
Artificial Eye, which was founded in 1976, has been behind major hits including 2019 South Korean blockbuster Parasite. Curzon was also ahead of the curve on streaming, launching its home cinema streaming service in 2010.
In recent years, the chain has opened new cinemas in locations including Hoxton, Camden, Kingston upon Thames and Canterbury.
Story Continues
Source link
#Billionaire #real #estate #magnate #loses #control #historic #cinema #chain
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
NFL QB stock report, Week 11: Caleb Williams’ flaws have followed him from college
NFL QB stock report, Week 11: Caleb Williams’ flaws have followed him from college
The Chicago Bears’ midseason offensive regression has raised concerns over Caleb Williams’ long-term viability as a franchise quarterback.
It’s important to be measured with this assessment, especially for Bears fans who have seen this movie a few times before. First, it’s fair to be critical of Williams’ recent flaws. Second, it’s also fair to point out that the struggles are not entirely Williams’ fault. And third, let’s not be hasty in burying a 22-year-old with nine career starts.
GO DEEPER
The sky is falling on the Bears, but should we be shocked? Sando’s Pick Six
Williams has taken a league-high 38 sacks in part because he’s holding the ball too long and failing to trust his reads. But there have also been predictable issues with the offensive line, along with flaws in play designs (route spacing and timing) and play calls. Williams’ 15 sacks over the past two games are more than three teams have allowed all season — the most obvious sign of diminished confidence.
“He is doing the same things he did in college in terms of holding the ball and being inconsistent with his reads,” a rival executive said. “He could get away with running around, throwing the ball up for grabs, throwing across his body, and he had some success doing that. You don’t get away with that at the NFL level too often. I’m a little surprised they haven’t been able to clean some of this up.”
Another executive corroborated that evaluation.
“Their ability to protect him was going to be the question,” the second executive said. “He always held the ball too long, so you have to minimize pure dropback situations and support him with a run game, which improves the impact of your RPO, QB movement and play action.”
The Athletic’s Week 11 QB rankings
Williams was a magician at USC, drumming up comparisons to Patrick Mahomes with his off-schedule playmaking ability, and some of that has been on display with the Bears. Problematically, however, Williams seems to be relying too much on the improvisational stuff. It’s common for young quarterbacks to revert to their most comfortable tendencies when the pressure ratchets up, and that’s led to some of Williams’ problems.
99 + 41 = the 5th Pats sack today
: FOX pic.twitter.com/ppqt8toDbk
— New England Patriots (@Patriots) November 10, 2024
To combat that, the Bears need to proactively find ways to make Williams comfortable before things naturally become tense. The goal is to help him play without overthinking, to anticipate the throws rather than waiting to see the routes develop and to keep the offense on schedule.
That’s easier said than done, of course.
“It’s really tough, probably one of the most difficult things to do especially with a guy like that who is so used to holding it and running around to extend plays,” an offensive coach said. “It’s just repetition and emphasis. And at some point, it has to click. There’s really no easy way. It’s a process.
“They need to run some stuff that he’s comfortable with as well and give him some opportunities to extend things. It’s a huge challenge, regardless.”
The coach chalked it up primarily as “typical rookie” struggles with the timing and confidence in his reads, although the Bears’ offensive scheme needs improvement. Bears coach Matt Eberflus said Monday the team is evaluating whether offensive coordinator Shane Waldron will remain in his role as the play caller.
The defense was buzzing yesterday.@MikeDussault19 highlights the key contributors on the defensive side: pic.twitter.com/q9fL97HvpU
— New England Patriots (@Patriots) November 11, 2024
Williams’ issues have been magnified by another factor. The Bears’ three-game losing streak has included games against rookies Jayden Daniels and Drake Maye, both of whom have played very well and remain on an upward trajectory.
“The expectations on him were so high,” the coach said. “No way he was going to be able to match those.”
It’s enough for Bears fans to have flashbacks of Mitch Trubisky and Justin Fields, highly drafted QBs who didn’t pan out because of poor evaluations or bad overall situations. Williams has the talent, but it’s on the organization to fully cultivate it.
They were on the right track for a while, improving to 4-2 after posting 71 points in back-to-back wins against the Panthers and Jaguars, but the team — and the offense in particular — has been flat since Daniels beat them with a Hail Mary in Week 8. The lull has exposed issues that extend beyond the rookie quarterback.
Williams’ exciting flashes suggest enough talent exists for him to still grow into a bona fide franchise quarterback. He was the consensus No. 1 pick before the draft for a litany of reasons, so the Bears’ evaluation holds up.
But they’ve got to keep working with Williams to ensure it works out the way they envisioned.
GO DEEPER
Who’s to blame on the Bears? Accountability for such a bad loss goes through whole franchise
Hey, Darnold
Sam Darnold is delivering the best season of his career, as coach Kevin O’Connell has tapped into the potential that made the QB the No. 3 pick in 2018. In all likelihood, Darnold has been productive enough that he’ll be the top quarterback in free agency, which means a monster contract should be in his future.
However, Darnold endured the type of performance Sunday against the Jaguars that will fuel skepticism as the Vikings gear up for the playoffs. He was 24-of-38 for 241 yards passing with no touchdowns and three interceptions.
GO DEEPER
Sam Darnold’s turnovers nearly ***** Vikings in narrow win over Jaguars
The three picks were egregious. The first was just outside the red zone, while the other pair happened in the end zone. Darnold was targeting wideout Justin Jefferson on all three.
Darnold simply needs to play within himself to be successful. The Vikings have an outstanding defense, stars at the skill positions, a complementary running game and a high-level, QB-friendly scheme.
Darnell Savage brings in our third INT of the day!@darnellsavage_ | #MINvsJAX on FOX pic.twitter.com/Ch7HAtKn2h
— Jacksonville Jaguars (@Jaguars) November 10, 2024
The 27-year-old merely has to make the plays that are available to him and stay safe with the ball. His accuracy was erratic throughout the 12-7 victory in Jacksonville, and all three interceptions took points off the board.
Worse, this was against a woeful Jaguars defense that entered the game ranked third worst in points allowed and second worst in both total yards and passing yards. They had two — yes, two — interceptions all season and allowed at least 28 points in five of their previous seven games.
Maybe it was just a bad day. Everyone has them. Tom Brady had three interceptions in nine games.
But if the Vikings are going to make any noise in the playoffs against much tougher defenses than the Jaguars, Darnold has to be much better and prove this was a fluke. If that happens, he’ll land a life-changing contract in the offseason.
Ripple effects in Jacksonville
The Jaguars have lost 13 of their last 16 games, and Trevor Lawrence was regressing before the left shoulder injury that kept him out Sunday. And the defense has gotten worse after head coach Doug Pederson made some offseason staff firings, which is a combination of factors that generally results in further change.
If the Jaguars are in the coaching market after the season, a couple of rival executives agreed Jacksonville could be a prime spot.
“You get to work with Trevor and try to help him put it all back together,” one of the executives said. “He hasn’t been great, but I still think he has all the tools to be a good quarterback. That’s going to be a job people should want.”
Lawrence signed a five-year, $275 million contract before training camp, but his numbers have trended in the wrong direction for the second season in a row. There have been issues with the Jaguars’ ground game and a myriad of mistakes littered throughout the offense, including drops and penalties that have plagued the group for the better part of two years.
The point is, Lawrence shouldn’t be shouldering so much of the blame. It would be a chore for any quarterback to play well in that situation. And there’s no denying how well he played in 2022, along with how much the Jaguars continuously rallied around him from late deficits.
No, Lawrence hasn’t lived up to the pre-draft hype as a generational type of quarterback, but no one can do it alone. If the Jaguars improve the operation around him, they’ll maximize the return on investment.
GO DEEPER
What we learned in NFL Week 10: Lions pull off stunner, Bears falling apart
Short term, if Lawrence continues to miss time, this presents an intriguing opportunity for Mac Jones. He didn’t play well against the Vikings, but Minnesota defensive coordinator Brian Flores has made life ***** for Brock Purdy, C.J. Stroud, Jordan Love and Aaron Rodgers this season. You’ll have to excuse Jones for a pedestrian outing in his first start with a new team in the 10th game of the season.
Problematically for Jones, though, the Jaguars visit the Lions this week and then come out of their bye against the Texans. That’s a grueling stretch for the former first-round pick who is hoping to use this as an audition for next season.
Jones could capitalize if Lawrence’s absence lasts longer, as the Jags close the season with the Titans, Jets, Raiders, Titans and Colts. If Jones can put together some good tape, he could work his way into a camp competition against a young QB, similar to the way Baker Mayfield, Geno Smith and Darnold have recently revived their careers. Otherwise, Jones will likely remain on the backup circuit for a while longer.
Scoop City Newsletter
Free, daily NFL updates direct to your inbox.
Free, daily NFL updates direct to your inbox.
Sign Up
(Photo of Caleb Williams: ********** Petersen / Getty Images)
Source link
#NFL #stock #report #Week #Caleb #Williams #flaws #college
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Baidu announces its own pair of AI smart glasses
Baidu announces its own pair of AI smart glasses
Baidu, which is often called China’s answer to Google, has launched its own pair of AI-powered smart glasses at its annual World Conference event in Shanghai. The device will run on the company’s ERNIE generative AI technology and was designed to “become a private assistant,” according to the Financial Times. Users will reportedly be able to interact with the device using their voice and ask it questions about what it sees in their current environment. They can also tell it to play music and even track their calories consumption. And since the glasses are equipped with cameras, they can ask it to snap photos or take videos.
When the glasses start shipping sometime next year, they could become the ******** consumers’ alternative to Meta’s and Snap’s devices. Meta teamed up with Ray Ban a few years ago to release a pair of smart sunglasses that can livestream and send photos hands-free. Its latest model comes built-in with Meta’s generative AI assistant that users can talk to. However, the company’s device isn’t officially sold in China, because its servers are blocked in the country. Baidu has yet to announce how much its glasses would cost, but Meta is selling its device for $299.
The Baidu World Conference had a huge focus on the company’s AI efforts, as it takes steps to make sure ERNIE can keep up with its competitors’ technologies. It also launched a new AI image generator called iRAG that apparently experiences fewer hallucinations than its predecessor, along with a tool that enables people to create software programs even if they don’t have coding expertise. According to The Times, ByteDance’s Doubao is now the leading AI chatbot in China based on monthly active users as observed by Sensor Tower. ByteDance is also growing its hardware offerings and recently launched a pair of earbuds with access to its AI assistant Doubao.
Source link
#Baidu #announces #pair #smart #glasses
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Rising student absenteeism may be hurting teacher job satisfaction
Rising student absenteeism may be hurting teacher job satisfaction
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain
As student absenteeism reaches record highs in schools across the ******* States, new research finds that student absences are linked to lower teacher job satisfaction, raising concerns that this may exacerbate growing teacher shortages. The findings were published in Educational Researcher.
The study, by Michael Gottfried and Colby Woods at the University of Pennsylvania, and Arya Ansari at The Ohio State University, is the first to examine the connection between student absenteeism and teacher satisfaction.
Using nationally representative data from the U.S. Department of Education on 2,370 kindergarten teachers, the researchers found that when teachers have more absent students, they report feeling less satisfied with their jobs. This was true for new teachers as well as more experienced teachers.
“Our findings show that a lack of good student attendance has the potential to detract from the satisfaction teachers get from instructing and helping their students learn and grow,” said Gottfried, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education.
“This has important implications for the current educational landscape. Addressing absenteeism is critical not only for improving student outcomes, but also for bolstering the teacher workforce, which faces a host of challenges.”
The study found that student absenteeism had no link to teachers’ feelings about other aspects of school, such as their teaching ability or school climate—just job satisfaction. There was also no indication that teachers who were less satisfied to begin with were being assigned to the students who were more likely to be absent.
“We show that student absenteeism emerges as a teacher challenge, and so there is a need for a more well-rounded approach to addressing the effects of absenteeism in the classroom,” Gottfried said. “Approaches need to go beyond only those that are focused on students. Broader efforts will have the potential to yield positive impacts across teachers, contributing to a more satisfied and engaged workforce.”
Examples of effective efforts include investing in interventions that strengthen teachers’ relationships with students and families, implementing trauma-informed teaching, and professional development to support the diverse needs of students, including those at risk of absenteeism.
Absenteeism initiatives could also improve working conditions for teachers. For example, reducing administrative burdens and increasing staffing support to better address absenteeism-related challenges could bolster more regular school attendance and, in turn, improve satisfaction, according to Gottfried.
More information:
Michael A. Gottfried et al, Do Teachers With Absent Students Feel Less Job Satisfaction?, Educational Researcher (2024). DOI: 10.3102/0013189X241292331
Provided by
********* Educational Research Association
Citation:
Rising student absenteeism may be hurting teacher job satisfaction (2024, November 12)
retrieved 12 November 2024
from
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no
part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.
Source link
#Rising #student #absenteeism #hurting #teacher #job #satisfaction
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Nvidia App reaches version 1.0 milestone and exits beta — GeForce Experience may soon be deprecated
Nvidia App reaches version 1.0 milestone and exits beta — GeForce Experience may soon be deprecated
The Nvidia App has been in open beta since February 2024, but today marks the official 1.0 release of the full product. The Nvidia App has officially left beta status and represents a full replacement for both GeForce Experience and the Nvidia Control Panel. It’s also much faster to install than GFE, and it links to your browser for user login, perhaps saving an extra step and authentication.
For the time being, GFE and the Nvidia Control Panel will continue to coexist alongside the Nvidia App — which interface you get will depend on how you download your drivers. But the end goal is to unify everything into a modern interface. It’s not yet clear when that will fully occur.
Image 1 of 5
(Image credit: Nvidia)
(Image credit: Nvidia)
(Image credit: Nvidia)
(Image credit: Nvidia)
(Image credit: Nvidia)
The Nvidia App features a completely overhauled user interface compared to GeForce Experience, featuring a home screen with quick access to Nvidia advertisements, your game library, and other Nvidia-focused apps such as GeForce Now, Nvidia Broadcast, ChatRTX, and FrameView. Logging in to the Nvidia App with your Nvidia account is optional, and unlike GeForce Experience.
The left side of the interface has a new menu bar that gives access to all the main functions, with driver, graphics, system, redeem, and settings sub-menus. The driver menu offers driver updates right in the app, just like in GeForce Experience, so there’s no need to go to the GeForce website. It also gives users the option to choose between game ready drivers and studio drivers, and users can easily switch between either category.
The graphics menu is home to all the same graphical options as in GeForce Experience, with the ability for the Nvidia App to automatically optimize graphics settings based on a user-controlled slider. However, the Nvidia App has now merged select Nvidia Control Panel settings into the graphics options, including low latency mode, max frame rate, driver-based v-sync and more.
Likewise, the system menu also includes many of the main display functions ported from the Nvidia Control Panel, like G-Sync options, refresh rate, RTX Video, and display resolution manipulation. GPU overclocking, fan controls and system specs can also be viewed and adjusted from the system menu.
Another major change is the Nvidia in-game OSD (on-screen display), which has been revamped to look the same as GeForce Now’s in-game OSD. Alt+Z opens a sidebar with all the OSD functions, including highlights, game filters, photo mode, and recording functions. The frame rate counter and GPU monitoring OSD have also seen a significant overhaul, with a simplified UI that’s less cluttered, and user-customizable colors and font sizes.
Depending on what you want to do, one of the biggest features that’s exclusive to the Nvidia App is AV1 120 FPS recording. While you could use tools like OBS to capture 120 FPS gameplay, GFE ShadowPlay only allowed AVC/HEVC capture at up to 4K and 60 FPS, With the App, you can record gameplay at up to 4K and 120 FPS on supported hardware (RTX 40 series and newer). 8K support is limited to 60 FPS — not that there are many displays or games that would need more than that right now.
RTX HDR and RTX digital vibrance are also included in the Nvidia App. RTX HDR auto-converts SDR gaming content into HDR, while digital vibrance enhances visual clarity. Both can be manipulated in-game with the Nvidia app OSD.
Overall, the Nvidia App looks like it’s shaping up decently. It’s not radically different from the GFE layout, but it installs and loads faster and mostly does away with the need for the old Control Panel. We’ve been using it and testing it for a while and like some of the changes, and most of the bugs have now been squashed. How long it will continue to coexist with GFE and NCP ******** to be seen.
Get Tom’s Hardware’s best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
Source link
#Nvidia #App #reaches #version #milestone #exits #beta #GeForce #Experience #deprecated
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
What to know about Trump’s Cabinet as he forms team for his second term
What to know about Trump’s Cabinet as he forms team for his second term
What to know about Trump’s Cabinet as he forms team for his second term – CBS News
Watch CBS News
CBS News’ chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett discusses President-elect Donald Trump’s picks for major roles in his administration and Cabinet.
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
Not Now
Turn On
Source link
#Trumps #Cabinet #forms #team #term
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Exclusive: Displate Unveils Collection Of Arcane Metal Posters
Exclusive: Displate Unveils Collection Of Arcane Metal Posters
Season 2 of Arcane continues to raise the bar for what animated TV series are capable of, and if you can’t get enough of the show’s expressive art direction, you can celebrate that visual splendor with Displate. The company has revealed a new line of metal posters as part of its Arcane Brand Shop, which are available in three different styles.
Like its other posters, these are designed to be durable and easy to setup in your home or office. Simply unwrap the metal poster, peel back the adhesive covering, and place it on your wall for an instant decorative upgrade.
Arcane Displate Posters
For classic Displates, there’ll be 35 designs to choose from: Graffiti, Blue Haired ******, Piltover & Zaun, and popular character portraits. For fans of the Textra line of posters–a blend of 3D printed features combined with matte and gloss finishes–Displate will offer Vi and Jinx prints designed to capture the clashing styles of the sisters.
Finally, the Lumino line mixes holographic backgrounds with selective OLEDs to create a striking piece of art, and these are typically sold in limited quantities. For this particular release, Displate will only produce 500 Arcane Lumino posters before it’s gone for good.
The Making of Arcane + Season 1 on Blu-ray
If you’re looking for a deep ***** into how the Arcane series came to be, you can also check out The Art and Making of Arcane. This book will be released on December 3, and it shows you how the animated series was designed. It’s full of insight from the crew that worked on it, and across 224 pages, it features interviews with over 20 key animators, writers, directors, artists, game designers, and musicians.
You can also go back to the first season of Arcane, as the Blu-rays for the series were recently released. The 4K and 1080p versions have unique limited-edition steelbook covers of Jinx and Vi, respectively, and are on ***** for big discounts at Amazon.
Source link
#Exclusive #Displate #Unveils #Collection #Arcane #Metal #Posters
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Happy New Year on Mars
Happy New Year on Mars
To mark 20 years of ESA’s Mars Express, the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) team has produced a new global colour mosaic: Mars as never seen before. The mosaic reveals the planet’s surface colour and composition in spectacular detail. Credit: ESA/DLR/*** Berlin/G. Michael
12 November 2024 marks the start of a new year on Mars. At exactly 10:32 CET/09:32 UTC on Earth, the Red Planet begins a new orbit around our sun.
This is the 38th Martian year. The convention for counting years in the Martian calendar started in 1955, with the first year coinciding with a major storm named “the great dust storm of 1956.”
There are some significant differences between years on the two planets:
Days: A Martian day is called a “sol” and lasts 24 hours and 39 minutes, slightly longer than an Earth day.
Years: One year on Mars equals 687 Earth days, or 668 sols, nearly twice as long as an Earth year. If you would like to know your Martian age, divide your current age by 1.88 and tell your friends how much younger you are… on Mars, at least!
New Year: The Martian New Year begins on the northern equinox (northern spring, southern autumn on Mars).
Seasons: Like Earth, Mars has four seasons—winter, spring, summer and autumn. Unlike Earth’s seasons, Martian seasons are not of equal lengths due to Mars’ more elliptical orbit. The planet’s axial tilt causes the northern hemisphere to receive more sunlight during the northern summer, and the southern hemisphere to receive more sunlight in northern winter. Winter and summer come when the northern and southern hemispheres tilt away from the sun in turn.
Dust seasons: The second half of the Martian year is often marked by fierce dust storms that can sometimes become planet-wide. As Mars swings closer to the sun, the atmosphere heats up, causing winds to lift up very fine particles from the Martian soil. Once airborne, these brownish particles heat up and redistribute some of that warmth to the surrounding atmosphere. This process can rapidly pump a lot of dust.
Weather: Temperature swings between day and night are extreme on Mars. At noon on a summer’s day, air temperature can reach 0ºC but will plunge to -60ºC at night. In winter, night temperatures are even colder, dropping to -110ºC. A recurring weather phenomenon is the Arsia Mons Elongated Cloud, a cloud of ice crystals that can reach up to 1800 kilometers in length.
Credit: ********* Space Agency
Provided by
********* Space Agency
Citation:
Happy New Year on Mars (2024, November 12)
retrieved 12 November 2024
from
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no
part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.
Source link
#Happy #Year #Mars
Pelican News
View the full article at [Hidden Content]
Privacy Notice: We utilize cookies to optimize your browsing experience and analyze website traffic. By consenting, you acknowledge and agree to our Cookie Policy, ensuring your privacy preferences are respected.
