Sprinkle the sequins, spark up the disco lights and get ready for battle — it’s time for the Eurovision Song Contest , a celebration of kitsch and cheesy pop with an undercurrent of politics and patriotism. More than a singing contest, it’s diplomacy in dancing shoes.

This week musical acts from more than 40 countries are taking the stage in Kyiv to vie for the Eurovision crown, watched by some 200 million television viewers. The 62nd annual contest has clean-cut crooners, electro beats, yodeling Romanians and even a dancing gorilla. But there is also a big absence: Russia, whose participation has been scuttled by the country’s diplomatic and military conflict with neighbor Ukraine.

Russia is one of Eurovision’s heavy hitters, tied with Sweden for the most top-five finishes this century. But this year’s Russian entrant, Yuliya Samoylova, was blocked by host Ukraine because she had toured in Crimea after Russia’s 2014 annexation of the peninsula.

In response, Russia’s state-owned Channel 1 television is refusing to broadcast the contest, replacing Saturday’s final with a screening of the film “Alien.”

Russia has been angry since last year, when Ukrainian singer Jamala won the contest with “1944.” The song described the deportations of Crimean Tatars to Central Asia under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, but also hinted at their recent treatment under Russian President Vladimir Putin.

As the 2016 winner, Ukraine is this year’s Eurovision host.

John Kennedy O’Connor, author of Eurovision’s official history, said Ukraine has long used Eurovision as a way to annoy Russia.

“Last time the contest was in Kyiv it was a song about the Orange Revolution and it was allowed to compete,” he said. “Ukraine has been needling away for a long time and now the contest is going to be in a real crisis.”

The Moscow-Kyiv split is a headache for Eurovision’s producer, the European Broadcasting Union, which strives mightily to keep pop and politics separate. Overtly political flags and banners are banned, and lyrics are monitored for provocative content. In 2009 the EBU nixed the Georgian entry “We Don’t Wanna Put In,” a dig at Putin. The union has been criticized for not barring “1944” last year, allowing Russia-Ukraine tensions to fester.

The acrimony is ironic, since Eurovision was founded in 1956 to bring the recently warring countries of Europe together. It launched a year before the foundation of the European Economic Community, forerunner of the European Union.

“Eurovision, like the EEC, was born out of this passionate belief that we mustn’t have another war in Europe,” said Chris West, author of “Eurovision!” — a history of the contest and the continent. “Both institutions were driven by this sense of ‘never again.’”

From its launch with seven countries, Eurovision has grown to include more than 40, including non-European nations such as Israel and — somewhat controversially — far-off Australia.

The contest helped launch the careers of Sweden’s ABBA — victors in 1974 with “Waterloo” — Canada’s Celine Dion, who won for Switzerland in 1988, and Irish high-steppers Riverdance, the half-time entertainment in 1994.

Eurovision has a huge gay following and has become a symbol of optimistic liberalism — this year’s motto is “celebrate diversity.” Victories by transgender Israeli singer Dana International in 1998 and bearded Austrian drag queen Conchita Wurst in 2014 were hailed by liberals and condemned by conservatives — notably in Russia, where nationalist politicians cited the contest as evidence of Western degeneracy.

Onstage, many Eurovision-watchers expect this year to bring resurgence for western Europe after years of eastern and Nordic dominance. The bookies’ favorites are Portuguese balladeer Salvador Sobral with the syrupy “Amar Pelos Dois” (”Love For Both of Us”) and Italy’s Francesco Gabbani , who is accompanied by a dancer in a gorilla suit on “Occidentali’s Karma,” (”Westerner’s Karma”), a cheekily sardonic look at human evolution.

O’Connor says the Italian song has the qualities of a Eurovision classic.

“It’s so out there and it’s so outrageous and it’s so silly,” he said. “But it’s also very, very catchy.”

One country not expecting a first-place finish is Britain. The U.K. has not won since 1997, and many Britons suspect politics lies behind the country’s poor showing. Winners are decided by the votes of viewers and national juries, and regional alliances are often evident. Greece and Cyprus routinely give each other maximum points, as do the Nordic and Baltic states.

Britain is seen as having few allies, and some worry the country’s decision to leave the EU may further harm the chances of U.K. contestant Lucie Jones , performing the ballad “Never Give Up On You.”

West says the truth is simpler: Recent British entries just haven’t been very good.

“Bloc voting won’t make a rubbish song win,” he said. “I think a song’s got to be decent in order to win.

“It’ll be helped by bloc voting, and that is a problem for Britain because we don’t really have a bloc. But I think if Adele or Ed Sheeran entered the competition they could still win it.”
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From: MeNeedIt

China’s President Xi Jinping initiated the ambitious Belt and Road development plan but it has become a world plan not tied to his presidency, the Commerce Ministry said Wednesday, days before Xi hosts a global forum on the initiative.

The forum in Beijing next week will draw heads of state to discuss Xi’s plan to expand trade links between Asia, Africa and Europe through billions of dollars in infrastructure investment.

Representatives from more than 100 countries will attend China’s biggest diplomatic event of the year, though only one leader from the Group of Seven (G7) industrialized nations, Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni, is set to join.

China says that between 2014 and 2016, its businesses signed projects worth $304.9 billion along inland and maritime corridors of the plan, also known as the New Silk Road. But some of the projects could be in development for years.

Judging by recent precedent in China’s political system, Xi is slated to step down from the presidency in early 2023 at the end of his second five-year term.

Asked what guarantee the world had that the initiative would go on after Xi’s second term, Vice Minister of Commerce Qian Keming told a news briefing that its vitality lay in countries’ hopes for development and not in the idea of “who proposed it or what term in office there is later.”

“The Belt and Road initiative was proposed by President Xi in 2013, but this initiative is not an individual proposal, or merely left at a proposal level. Rather it is an initiative that has been widely received by the whole world. It is jointly owned by everyone,” Qian said.

China has repeatedly rebuffed concern that the plan is part of a grand strategy to expand its economic interests for selfish gain and to seek global dominance, saying that anyone can join the plan to boost common prosperity.

Xi has used the initiative to help portray China as an open economy, distinct from a rising wave of global protectionism.

However, the government has faced criticism from foreign business groups and governments alike, who say it has done little to remove discriminatory policies and market barriers that favor Chinese companies.

Foreign business groups have questioned whether multinational companies would be able to compete with Chinese firms through the plan in transparent bidding processes.

Zhang Xingfu, an official from the Commerce Ministry’s cooperation department, played down such concerns.

“Chinese enterprises conducting investment and cooperative business in countries along the Belt and Road initiative will … actively participate in project bidding, and cooperate and compete with international enterprises in the same industries on the same platform,” Zhang said.
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From: MeNeedIt

Electric carmaker Tesla has added another product to its lineup: Solar roof tiles.

As of Wednesday, customers worldwide could order a solar roof on Tesla’s website. Installations will begin next month in the U.S., starting with California. Installations outside the U.S. will begin next year, the company said.

The glass tiles were unveiled by Tesla last fall just before the company merged with solar panel maker SolarCity Corp. They’re designed to look like a traditional roof, with options that replicate slate or terracotta tiles. The solar tiles contain photovoltaic cells that are invisible from the street.

Guaranteed for life of home

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said one of the drawbacks to home solar installations has been the solar panels themselves: They’re often awkward, shiny and ugly. Buyers will want Tesla’s roof, he said, because it looks as good or better than a normal roof.

“When you have this installed on your house, you’ll have the best roof in the neighborhood. The aesthetics are that good,” Musk said in a conference call with media.

The roof is guaranteed for the life of the home, which is longer than the 20-year lifespan for a typical, nonsolar roof, Musk said. It has gone through the same hail, fire and wind testing that normal roofs endure.

Tesla’s website includes a calculator where potential buyers can estimate the cost of a solar roof based on the size of their home, the amount of sunlight their neighborhood receives and federal tax credits. They can also put down a refundable $1,000 deposit to reserve a place in line.

$42 per square foot

Tesla said the solar tiles cost $42 per square foot to install, making them far more costly than slate, which costs around $17 per square foot, or asphalt, which costs around $5. But homes would only need between 30 and 40 percent of their roof tiles to be solar; the rest would be Tesla’s cheaper nonsolar tiles, which would blend in with the solar ones.

It would cost $69,100 to install a solar roof with 40-percent solar tiles on a 2,600-square-foot roof in suburban Detroit, according to Tesla’s website. That includes a $7,000 Tesla Powerwall, a battery unit that stores the energy from the solar panels and powers the home. The roof would be eligible for a $15,500 federal tax credit and would generate an estimated $62,100 in electricity over 30 years. Over that time period, Tesla estimates, the homeowner would save $8,500.

Tesla said the typical homeowner can expect to pay $21.85 per square foot for a Tesla solar roof. The cost can be rolled into the homeowner’s mortgage payments and paid for over time, the company said.

Sales to be slow at first

Musk wouldn’t say how many orders the company expects to get this year. He expects the initial ramp-up to be slow.

“It will be very difficult and it will take a long time, and there will be some stumbles along the way. But it’s the only sensible vision of the future,” Musk said.

Palo Alto, California-based Tesla Inc. is making the solar tiles at its Fremont, California, factory initially. But eventually all production will move to a joint Tesla and Panasonic Corp. factory in Buffalo, New York. Panasonic makes the photovoltaic cells used in the solar tiles.

Tesla said it would be installing equipment in the Buffalo factory over the next few months.
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From: MeNeedIt

Earlier this year, engineers at Wal-Mart Stores Inc. who track rivals’ prices online got a rude surprise: the technology they were using to check Amazon.com several million times a day suddenly stopped working.

Losing access to Amazon.com Inc.’s data was no small matter. Like most big retailers, Wal-Mart relies on computer programs that scan prices on competitors’ websites so it can adjust its listings accordingly. A difference of even 50 cents can mean losing a sale.

But a new tactic by Amazon to block these programs — known commonly as robots or bots — thwarted the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer.

Its technology unit, @WalmartLabs, was unable to work around the blockade for weeks, forcing it to retrieve Amazon’s data through a secondary source, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to speak publicly.

The previously unreported incident offers a case study in how Amazon’s technological prowess is helping it dominate the retail competition.

Now the largest online retailer in the world, Amazon is best known by consumers for its fast delivery, huge product catalog and ambitious moves into areas like original TV programming. But its mastery of the complex, behind-the-scenes technologies that power modern e-commerce is just as important to its success.

Dexterity with bots allows Amazon not only to see what its rivals are doing, but increasingly to keep them in the dark when it undercuts them on price or is quietly charging more.

“Benchmarking against Amazon is going to become hard,” said Guru Hariharan, a former Amazon manager who now sells pricing software to retailers as chief executive of Mountain View, California-based Boomerang Commerce.

A Wal-Mart spokesman declined to discuss the January episode but said the company improves its technology regularly and has multiple tools for tracking items. He said the company offers value not only through pricing but from discounts for in-store pickup and other benefits.

A spokeswoman for Amazon said the company is aware of competitors using bots to check its listings and denied any “campaign” to stop them. “Nothing has changed recently in how we manage bots on our site,” she said. Still, she said, “we prioritize humans over bots as needed.”

Bots can slow down a website, a big motivator for retailers to block them.

Reuters interviewed 21 people familiar with bots and how they are deployed, including current and former Wal-Mart employees, former Amazon employees and outside specialists. Many spoke only on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issues publicly.

Most pointed to Amazon’s leadership in the burgeoning bot wars.

The company’s technological edge has been good for its profit margin, and it’s proving a winning formula for investors.

Shares of the internet powerhouse have risen about 15-fold since the market’s bottom in March 2009, while the S&P 500 has more than tripled in value. Amazon hit $100 billion in annual sales in 2015 — faster than any company in history, it said.

Brave new world

Bot-driven pricing has represented a massive change for the retail industry since Amazon helped pioneer the practice more than a decade ago.

Traditionally, brick-and-mortar stores changed prices no more than weekly because of the time and expense needed to swap labels by hand.

In the world of e-commerce, though, retailers update prices with ease, sometimes multiple times a day, helped by algorithms that consider inventory levels, sales forecasts and rivals’ pricing data.

To stay in the game, companies such as online wholesaler Boxed, based in New York, depend on a variety of methods including bots to ensure they do not lag others’ price moves for even 20 minutes.

“That’s like a lifetime during Christmas,” said Chief Executive Chieh Huang, whose company sells bulk staples like toilet paper and pet food. “If we’re not decently priced, we’ll see it almost immediately” in sales declines.

Disguised as humans

Using bots to view massive amounts of data on public websites — a process known as crawling or scraping — has many purposes. Alphabet Inc.’s Google, for example, constantly crawls the Web to gather information for its search engine results and to sell ads.

In e-commerce, though, the use of bots has developed into a cat-and-mouse game. Companies try to thwart the practice on their own websites while aiming to penetrate their competitors’ defenses. Third-party services abound to help less-savvy retailers.

To protect data from rivals, some retail websites use what’s known as a “CAPTCHA” — typically a distorted string of letters and numbers that humans can read but most bots can’t. Amazon shies away from the practice because it annoys some customers.

For merchants seeking to evade such defenses, disguising their computer programs as real shoppers is key. Some pricing technology experts have programmed computer cursors to meander through a Web page in the way a person might, instead of going directly to the prized data. Another technique is to use multiple computer addresses so that retailers cannot track a barrage of clicks to a single source.

“It is an arms race,” said Keith Anderson, a senior vice president at e-commerce analytics firm Profitero, based in Ireland. “Every week or every month, there’s some new approach from both sides.”

Amazon’s maneuver that halted Wal-Mart in January took aim at a specialized Web browser called PhantomJS. Unlike, say, Internet Explorer, this browser is designed specifically for programmers — a telltale clue that its users are not typical shoppers. Amazon put up a digital curtain to hide its listings from PhantomJS users, according to three people familiar with the situation.

It was unclear how the move, which was not aimed at Wal-Mart in particular, affected other companies.

Tests conducted in recent weeks for Reuters show that among major U.S. retail chains, Amazon had by far the most sophisticated bot detection in place, both for its home page and for two popular items selected by Reuters because they change price frequently — a De’Longhi coffee maker and a Logitech webcam.

The tests were run by San Francisco-based Distil Networks, which sells anti-bot tools. In one of the tests, Distil programmed bots to hit each retailer’s website 3,000 times, but slowly enough to mimic a person clicking through listings. This tricked most retail behemoths, but not Amazon.

Blocked bots would not have seen, for instance, that Amazon’s price for the De’Longhi espresso machine changed four times in a single 24-hour period starting on the morning of April 25, according to price tracking website camelcamelcamel.com. During that time, the price swung by more than 10 percent, from a low of $80.06 to $88.16.

Swarming with bots

Despite Amazon’s capabilities, the sheer volume of crawling on its site is staggering. At times, as many as 80 percent of the clicks on Amazon product listings have been from bots, people familiar with the matter say, compared with just a third or more of the traffic on other large sites.

In addition to rivals seeking price data, that traffic includes bots from university researchers studying competition, search engines, advertising services and even fraudsters trying to break into Amazon accounts.

For Wal-Mart, a small group in Silicon Valley directs its automated pricing strategy while dozens of engineers in India and around the world handle the code, current and former Wal-Mart employees said.

Amazon had about 40 engineers who would covertly extract and organize rivals’ data with bots as of several years ago, one of the people interviewed said. Amazon did not discuss the size or structure of its teams working with bots.

According to one U.S. patent application, Amazon is working on encryption technology that would force bots, but not humans, to solve a complicated algorithm to gain access to its Web pages.

“Amazon has both the competency to detect bot traffic and the wherewithal to do something about it,” said Scott Jacobson, a former Amazon manager and now managing director of Madrona Venture Group. That “isn’t the case for most retailers.”

 
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From: MeNeedIt

Modern history. Political change. Urbanization, emotion, and the colors of Washington, DC. For Ukrainian-born photographer Val Proudkii, it’s all filtered through the lens of his camera. In his repertoire: numerous photography competition awards and one printed image signed by former president Barack Obama. After spending a day looking at the nation’s capital through his eyes, VOA’s Iuliia Iarmolenko and Dmytro Savchuk have more.
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From: MeNeedIt

Pressure is mounting on the U.S. administration to remain committed to the Paris agreement on climate change. European Union leaders, a former United Nations chief and former U.S. President Barack Obama have joined the chorus of voices emphasizing the need for action to reduce greenhouse emissions worldwide. On Tuesday, the White House announced that President Trump is postponing his decision regarding the climate treaty for the second time. Zlatica Hoke has more.
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From: MeNeedIt

New York University researchers have developed a system combining virtual reality with a pressure sensing mat they say could help people with vestibular dysfunction, which affects parts of the inner ear and brain and results in problems with balance, or those suffering from vertigo or dizziness as a result of a brain injury. Faith Lapidus reports.
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From: MeNeedIt

Jimmy Kimmel zinged his critics as he returned to late-night TV and resumed arguing that Americans deserve the level of health care given his infant son.

Back on ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” Monday after a week’s absence, he said baby Billy is recovering well from open-heart surgery for a birth defect and thanked well-wishers. Then he charged back into the fraught topic.

“I made an emotional speech that was seen by millions, and as a result of my powerful words on that night, Republicans in Congress had second thoughts about repeal and replace” of the Affordable Care Act, he joked. “I saved health insurance in the United States of America!”

“What’s that? I didn’t save it? They voted against it anyway?” Kimmel said. The House approved the American Health Care Act last week.

He dismissed those who labeled him an elitist — as a youngster, his family bought powered milk because they couldn’t afford fresh, he said — and pretended to repent for his previous comments.

“I’d like to apologize for saying that children in America should have health care. It was insensitive, it was offensive, and I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me,” Kimmel said.

He took on former Rep. Newt Gingrich, saying his claim that all children would receive the same surgery as Kimmel’s son in an emergency fell short of addressing what follows.

“That’s terrific if your baby’s health problems are all solved during that one visit. The only problem is that never, ever happens. We’ve had a dozen doctor’s appointments since our son had surgery,” Kimmel said.

Kimmel brought on a current GOP lawmaker, U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a physician, who had suggested that the Senate’s upcoming health care legislation should have a “Jimmy Kimmel test” of covering pre-existing conditions but in a fiscally conservative way.

During a satellite interview with Cassidy, Kimmel asked about his position on issues including uninsured workers and protection of children under a revised health care bill.

The senator called on viewers to contact their representatives and urge support of final legislation that fulfills President Donald Trump’s promise to lower premiums combined with coverage that passes the Kimmel standard.

Kimmel called for his namesake test to guarantee that no family be denied medical care, emergency or otherwise, because they can’t afford it.

“You’re on the right track,” Cassidy said, but the country has to be able to pay for it.

“Don’t give a huge tax cut to millionaires like me,” Kimmel replied.

On last Monday’s show, the host detailed how Billy’s routine birth April 21 suddenly turned frightening when he was diagnosed with a hole in the wall separating the right and left sides of the heart and a blocked pulmonary valve, a condition known as tetralogy of Fallot with pulmonary atresia. He successfully underwent surgery, but will face more as he grows.

Using his son as an example, Kimmel called for health care for all and for pre-existing conditions to remain covered as provided by the Affordable Care Act passed under President Barack Obama.

“If your baby is going to die and it doesn’t have to, it shouldn’t matter how much money you make. … Whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat or something else, we all agree on that, right?” he said.

The video of Kimmel’s tearful monologue went viral, drawing praised by some, including Obama, and harsh criticism from others.
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From: MeNeedIt

The scientific team that made headlines in 2015 by unearthing a previously unknown ancient human relative says its latest discoveries could change the way we look at human evolution.

The findings, which are being published this week in the scientific journal ELife, include the discovery of a second chamber of fossils of the small-brained hominin Homo Naledi  — and the surprisingly young age of the fossils.

‘Young’ bones

The bones found in these fossil-rich caves northeast of Johannesburg were originally thought to be more than 2 million years old, making them a candidate as a possible human ancestor — maybe even, some in the scientific community mused, the elusive “missing link” between higher apes and humans.

However, independent tests of the first group of fossils put them between 236,000 and 335,000 years old, which means that they lived at the same time as ancient humans. Scientists say they believe this species originated much earlier, and survived for more than 2 million years.

The team’s leader, paleoanthropologist Lee Berger of Johannesburg’s University of the Witwatersrand, said that could mean some artifacts and actions attributed only to early humans — things like tools, adornments and burial of the dead — might not be our work after all.

 “That date corresponds with when most archeologists and paleoanthropologists — and genetics — is suggesting we see the rise of modern humans,” he said. “And a lot of people argue that that rise was right here in southern Africa. But now there’s another species here. Everything is very complex from this moment onward.”

The ‘Chamber of Secrets’

Scientists also hailed the discovery, just 100 meters from the original cave where fossils were found, of a similar narrow, hard-to-access chamber containing remains — raising the tantalizing possibility that Naledi may have methodically disposed of its dead.

“This likely adds weight to the hypothesis that Homo naledi was using dark, remote places to cache its dead,” said anthropologist John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “What are the odds of a second, almost identical, occurrence happening by chance?”

Among the cache of fossils in the second chamber, Berger says, is a nearly complete adult skull, which scientists nicknamed Neo — the SeSotho word for “gift.”  

“Neo gives us a real look at what the body and face of this incredible new species looks like. It tells us we were a little bit wrong,” he said. “We had guessed there was a little bit more nose. Actually Homo Naledi has a little flatter, even more primitive face than we thought, which is one of the reasons we placed it further back in the family tree of relatedness to early hominids. It’s clear that parts of Homo Naledi from Neo are very, very, very primitive, amongst the most primitive we’ve seen in hominids. And other parts are surprisingly advanced. They, in fact, are comparable mostly with us, as humans.”

A ‘Golden Age’

Hawks, an author on all three of this week’s scientific papers, says this discovery could start a new era in his field.

“There is so much unexplored territory out there; there are so many discoveries yet to be made that we’re now just beginning what I think is the golden age,” he told VOA. “We’re going to see more chambers like this, more fossil discoveries, and they’re going to tell us things we don’t expect to see now.”
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From: MeNeedIt

Cambodia’s rapidly normalizing economy will receive an additional boost when it hosts the regional World Economic Forum (WEF) for the first time this week with business leaders looking for opportunities to diversify the country’s fledgling industries.

American lawyer and chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Cambodia, Brett Sciaroni, said Cambodia’s economy remained the fastest growing in Southeast Asia with annual GDP growth exceeding seven percent year-on-year.

Garments, tourism, construction and agriculture are key planks in the local economy, but he said he would prefer to see the number of industries substantially broadened.

“Well, we’re very hopeful that we’ll be getting more light manufacturing in the future because we do need to diversify the economy. Right now we have a strong agricultural sector and we have a strong garment sector but we want to graduate that light manufacturing from garments to other things,” he said. 

Sprucing-up Cambodia’s image

Across the capital, buildings are getting a lick of paint, parks are being cleaned-up and gardens manicured ahead of the arrival of 700 delegates from 40 countries for the May 10-12 forum with its focus on technology, growth and youth.

Sciaroni said the WEF, which Cambodia will host on behalf of the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), would help improve Cambodia’s image and an international reputation that is often maligned by corruption and issues like human rights.

“Old views of Cambodia are frequently hard to change. So, I think there’s still an impression out there of Cambodia as a war-torn country with genocide and Khmer Rouge and land mines and so on,” he said. “But once people come here, scales fall from their eyes. They see all of the new buildings going up, they see so many developments going on.”

The economy has been a strong point for the ruling Cambodia People’s Party (CPP) and Prime Minister Hun Sen, who is facing commune elections next month and a national election in July of next year.

His heavy-handed autocratic style – often criticized – has characterized the government since three decades of war ended in 1998 when Cambodia was still struggling to shake off its image as a failed state. Since then, Hun Sen has been credited with ensuring national security that has underpinned an unprecedented period of economic growth.

Sciaroni’s sentiments were echoed by David Totten, the Phnom Penh-based director of Emerging Markets Consulting, who said the WEF was a great idea.

“Cambodia isn’t a perfect country, but not being perfect is not the same as being bad. In many industries, in many sectors, you will find vibrant, entrepreneurial communities setting up and running successful businesses and growing them year-on-year,” he said. 

Not everyone is happy with the Forum

Nevertheless, the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) and human rights activists are far from convinced that Phnom Penh is an ideal venue to host the WEF.

Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, said “Cambodia is one of the last places that a major meeting like the WEF should be held” adding that the human rights situation here is “in free fall”.

He also noted Cambodian authorities were prone to rounding-up poor people, the homeless and sex workers, who in the past have been thrown into detention as part of a so-called ‘beautification campaign’ ahead of major events in the capital.

Hun Sen has also faced international criticism for a crackdown on the CNRP over the past 18 months. Party supporters have been jailed for criminal defamation and other charges while senior leaders have also been threatened with prison terms and legal maneuvers which could bar them from holding public office.

Robertson said the WEF should speak out on such issues while Mu Suchua, a senior CNRP figure, said human rights should be a part of the world economy and country’s like Cambodia should be required to significantly improve before being given the privilege of hosting the WEF.

Spokespeople for the WEF and the government were unavailable for comment.

Cambodia’s youth

Cambodia’s demographics are changing as rapidly as its economy with post-war baby boomers maturing. WEF organizers noted the median age here is 23.8 years and young people are demanding higher pay and skilled work alongside life’s luxuries.

At elections in 2013, the youth vote sided with the CNRP resulting in Hun Sen being returned to office, but with a substantially reduced majority.

Despite the political issues, Muoy Piseth, a spokesman for the Federation of Cambodian Intellectuals and Students, said Cambodia was ready to hold the WEF event and it should improve the country’s reputation and lead to further economic partnerships and investment.

“Cambodia needs investment and cooperation. The lack of human resources and modernization, when compared to other ASEAN member countries, is still a challenge that needs to improve,” he said.

Molyny Pann contributed to this story.
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From: MeNeedIt

It’s not a movie set, but visitors to Disney World’s new Pandora-World of Avatar land are in for a cinematic experience.

The 12-acre land, inspired by the “Avatar” movie, opens in Florida in late May at Walt Disney World’s Animal Kingdom. It cost a half-billion dollars to build.

The marquee attraction is Flight of Passage, where a 3-D simulator plunges riders into a cinematic world. You feel like you’re riding on the back of a banshee, a bluish, gigantic, winged predator that resembles something out of the Jurassic era. Wearing 3-D glasses and straddling what resembles a stationary motorcycle, you’re strapped in, then the lights go out, a screen in front lights up and you’re swooped into a world of blue, gigantic aliens called Na’vi, with moon-filled skies, plunging waterfalls, jumping marine animals and towering ocean waves.

The ride provides an enchanting and intoxicating five minutes that touches all the senses. Blasts of air and spritzes of mist hit your face, and as you fly through a lush forest, a woodsy aroma wafts through your nostrils. A visitor could go on the ride 20 times and not catch half the visual details.

Disney designers are quick to say the new land is the star of the action, not the backdrop. “The character is being portrayed and played by the place itself and that’s different than a set,” said Joe Rohde, the design and production leader of Pandora — World of Avatar.

Flight of Passage is ride’s highlight

Other aspects of Pandora can’t quite compete with the excitement and immersion of Flight of Passage. Much of Pandora, at least during the daytime, is hard to distinguish from the rest of Animal Kingdom, Disney’s almost 20-year-old zoological-themed park with lush landscaping, an emphasis on conservation and a Noah’s ark range of animals.

At night, though, Pandora transforms into a sea of color with glowing lights on artificial plants and even in the pavement.

The enormous blue Na’vi aliens from the “Avatar” movie appear sparingly, really just on Flight of Passage and a second attraction called Na’vi River Journey. Before going on Flight of Passage, visitors walk through a tunnel in a faux mountain until they stumble upon a laboratory that includes a Na’vi floating in a tank.

“It’s not as simple as a guy in a costume painted blue walking around out here,” Rohde said of the aliens. “We know they are culturally present around us but we will meet them when we go on an excursion.”

Indoor river ride

The other main attraction, Na’vi River Journey, is an indoor river ride in the dark, lit up by glowing creatures and plants. The ride culminates with a Na’vi animatronic woman beating on drums as a chorus of voices reaches a crescendo. Images of the Na’vi riding horse-like creatures appear behind lush foliage, glimpsed in the distance from the river.

Disney has been building attractions themed on movies since Disneyland opened in 1955 with rides inspired by Snow White, Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland. Often, as with Pandora, the attractions open years after the movies debut. “Avatar” came out in 2009. Director James Cameron’s sequel isn’t due out until 2020. Lands based on “Star Wars” are scheduled to open in Disney parks in California and Florida in 2019.

Pandora-World of Avatar isn’t tied to a narrative from the film but rather tells a story set in the future, after humans degraded the jungle through industrial folly and a resurgence of nature overtakes the human-built environment. That theme is a recurring architectural motif, for example with a beverage stand and cantina made to look like they were built for industry by humans but then overrun by plant life.

A mix of real and artificial plants

Throughout Pandora, real plants intermingle with artificial plants that resemble alien pods or Dale Chihuly glass sculptures. It’s difficult to distinguish what is real.

“We were trying to get as close as possible to fool the eye,” said Zsolt Hormay, a Disney creative executive.

At the entrance, visitors hear a cacophony of bird chirps and animal cries. A circle of drums connected to faux tree roots allows visitors to drum and then get a response of drumming or pulsing lights.

The focal points are a 135-foot (41-meter) mountaintop where Flight of Passage is located as well as “floating mountains” that appear to be suspended in air but are actually made of concrete. Engineers use tricks to make the park appear bigger than it is. The artificial foliage gets smaller as it goes higher on the mountain to give it the illusion of distance.

New way to order food

Disney also is testing out a new way to order food at Pandora. Before going to the park, visitors can pull up a menu on the My Disney Experience mobile app, order lunch and go about visiting the park. When it’s time to eat hours later, they can go to the canteen, tap on an app a button that notifies the cooks they are present. Several minutes later their food will be ready in a special line.

Jon Landau, the executive producer of the original movie, says he hopes Pandora does for visitors what the film did for movie-goers.

“I hope when people come to Pandora and their eyes will be open and they will look at the world a little differently when they go back across the bridge,” Landau said.

 
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From: MeNeedIt

Life expectancy in the United States depends on what county one lives in, a new study suggests.

According to the study from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington in Seattle, “The gap between counties with the highest and lowest life expectancies is larger now than it was back in 1980 – a more than a 20-year difference in 2014 – highlighting massive and growing inequality in the health of Americans.”

For example, in Owsley County, Kentucky, one of the poorest counties, life expectancy fell from 72.4 in 1980 to 70.2 in 2014, researchers said.

In some counties, such as Oglala Lakota County, South Dakota, which is home of a Native American reservation, the life expectancy is lower than that of Iraq. The county’s life expectancy was 66.8 in 2014 compared to 67.7 in Iraq.

Some of the counties with the highest life expectancy were in the state of Colorado. Summit County topped the list at 86.8 years, followed by Pitkin County (86.5) and Eagle County (85.9), the study showed. These were better than the country of Andorra, which has the highest life expectancy in the world at 84.8.

“These findings demonstrate an urgent imperative, that policy changes at all levels are gravely needed to reduce inequality in the health of Americans,” said Dr. Ali Mokdad, an author on the study. “Federal, state, and local health departments need to invest in programs that work and engage their communities in disease prevention and health promotion.”

More money doesn’t appear to buy more life expectancy, the study showed.

The U.S. invests more per person on health than many developed countries, spending $9,237 per person in 2014. That compares to $4,032 spent by Australia with a life expectancy of 82.3 and Japan, which spent $3,816 and has one of the highest life expectancy in the world at 83.1.

“The inequality in health in the United States – a country that spends more on health care than any other – is unacceptable,” said Dr. Christopher Murray, the IHME director. “Every American, regardless of where they live or their background, deserves to live a long and healthy life. If we allow trends to continue as they are, the gap will only widen between counties.”

Separately, all counties saw deaths before the age of 5 drop and differences among counties with the highest and lowest levels of under-5 mortality narrowed.

“Looking at life expectancy on a national level masks the massive differences that exist at the local level, especially in a country as diverse as the United States,” said lead author Laura Dwyer-Lindgren, a researcher at IHME. “Risk factors like obesity, lack of exercise, high blood pressure, and smoking explain a large portion of the variation in lifespans, but so do socioeconomic factors like race, education, and income.”

The study was published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine.
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From: MeNeedIt