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 S70How Generative AI Will Change Sales   Sales teams have typically not been early adopters of technology, but generative AI may be an exception to that. Sales work typically requires administrative work, routine interactions with clients, and management attention to tasks such as forecasting. AI can help do these tasks more quickly, which is why Microsoft and Salesforce have already rolled out sales-focused versions of this powerful tool.
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S59"Swing State" and "Dig" Put Down Roots Off Broadway  Technically, there are only four characters in Rebecca Gilman's "Swing State," a melancholy new drama, now at the Minetta Lane. There's a retired guidance counsellor, Peg (Mary Beth Fisher); her troubled young neighbor, Ryan (Bubba Weiler); the local sheriff, Kris (Kirsten Fitzgerald); and Kris's niece and deferential new deputy, Dani (Anne E. Thompson). They all cause problems for one another, even as they try their clumsy best to offer help. But the fifth characterâand the one we should really be worrying aboutâis Wisconsin. Is anyone doing anything for Wisconsin? In 2021, the swing state of the title is teetering, both socially and ecologically, and Gilman deposits us in that trembling landscape, even though her play takes place entirely indoors.Peg's sprawling house sits on more than forty acres of so-called remnant prairie, a rare sliver of the tallgrass Plains, an endangered ecosystem that dates back roughly ten thousand years. "There used to be millions and millions of acres of it, all down the middle of the country, but there's only about four per cent left now," she tells Dani. Sheriff Kris hankers after the untilled propertyâshe's dying to see it "put to good use" as productive croplandâbut Peg is committed to protecting her wild remnant from the corn and soybean monocultures that threaten it on all sides. A biome doesn't necessarily obey boundary markers, however, and nitrates from huge farms are leaching into Peg's groundwater, as pesticides drip over her fence line.
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S57Will taxing short stays boost long-term rental supply? Other policies would achieve more  The Victorian government, like many governments around the world, has announced new regulations on short-stay accommodation. The government says Victoria has more than 36,000 short-stay places, which are reducing the number of homes available for long-term rental. Other states have capped the number of nights a dwelling can be used for short-stay accommodation. The Victorian response has been to introduce a levy set at 7.5% of the short-stay platform’s revenue.
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S62House Republicans Refuse to Host Zelensky Because They're Too Busy Fighting One Another  In an age when absolutely anything can be politicized, perhaps it was inevitable that the attire of John Fetterman would become a cause célèbre in the Republicans' culture wars. The hulking Democratic senator from Pennsylvania, who suffered a campaign-season stroke during his 2022 race, has since then preferred to wear an unorthodox uniform of baggy gym shorts and hoodies, even in the august halls of the U.S. Senate. After it was revealed this past weekend that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer had quietly decided he would no longer enforce the chamber's long-standing but unofficial dress code, thus permitting Fetterman to vote on the floor and even preside over the Senate in his informal getup, numerous hyperventilating op-eds, tweets, and Fox News segments followed. (A sampling: "Fetterman dress code fail begs big question about America's deep decline"; "Does John Fetterman really want to be a senator?") Senator Susan Collins, of Maine, threatened to wear a bikini on the Senate floor in protest. Senator Bill Hagerty, of Tennessee, accused Democrats of trying to "transform America."Soon enough, Fetterman was selling campaign merchandise making fun of his sanctimonious critics, touting a fifty-dollar "I vote in this hoodie" sweatshirt, among other slouchy apparel. When Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor whose Republican Presidential campaign has been foundering in the polls, attacked Fetterman for "dumbing down" the country, the Pennsylvania senator clapped back: "I dress like he campaigns." By Wednesday, Fetterman clearly was having too much fun to let the story die. In a tweet seemingly designed for maximum viral impact, Fetterman made an offer: "If those jagoffs in the House stop trying to shut our government down, and fully support Ukraine," he vowed, "then I will save democracy by wearing a suit on the Senate floor next week." (A jagoff, according to Dictionary.com, is Pittsburgh slang, used to refer to "a jerk, idiot, or really any kind of irritating or unlikeable person.")
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S63The Real Message of "The Real Housewives"  They gathered twenty miles outside our nation's capital. Many of the attendees were dressed in the traditional fashions of India: gauzy lehengas and bright saris. Other guests wore clothes that represented the diverse dress of the African continent: caftans made from atiku cloth, kufi hats, and braided turbans for women. Bhangra rhythms and African drums played late into the night, as the guests squealed with pleasure, their faces illuminated by the torches of fire eaters. This was the twentieth wedding anniversary of Ray Huger, known as the Black Bill Gates, and his wife, Karen, styled the Grande Dame of Potomac, a title bestowed on her, according to her. The couple are African American (not African or Indian), but Karen, a cast member of the Bravo series "The Real Housewives of Potomac" ("R.H.O.P.") stated that the theme of the night was "exotic." "It's inclusive," she told the cameras filming her for the show's Season 2 finale.The evening was, to put it mildly, a bit over the top, and some wondered if that was not the point. "Karen is trying to distract us from the fact that she moved to the middle of bumfuck," Ashley Darby, another "R.H.O.P." star, speculated. The show is set around Potomac, Maryland, a tony suburb of Washington, D.C., and features a cast of affluent Black women, including the wives of former N.B.A. players and megachurch pastors. But Karen and Ray had hosted the party at their new fourteen-thousand-square-foot home in the relatively less exclusive town of Great Falls, Virginiaâcoördinates that, previously unknown to me, were suddenly fused with new, dramatic meaning.
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S56Khartoum's burning tower: architects on the destruction of a city - and what it'll take to rebuild  Amira Osman: The 18-floor skyscraper was constructed in 2010, the first of two towers originally proposed by the local Alsunut Development Company. As architect Hassan Mahmoud told me, “It’s the headquarters of the Greater Nile Petroleum Company, the consortium that in 1997 led the exploration and export of oil in Sudan. Its glass sides and dramatic, curved bullet shape made it a distinctive building. The design was meant to be iconic, with the steel structure and glazing shaped to resemble a flame representing the oil blaze in the fields.” Another local architect, Arwa Ahmed, said: “Since its construction, there was hardly a photo, painting or a graphic design piece about Khartoum that did not include this building in its skyline. It had become a symbol of the region … I remember the day when I was an architectural student and our lecturer introduced us to the Alsunut project as a vision for new hope for the Sudan.” Akram Elkhalifa: The tower lies in the heart of Khartoum in the area known as Al-Mogran (The Meeting Points) as it’s located at the confluence of the White and the Blue Nile rivers. It was one of the few high-rise buildings in the city and reflected the stylistic direction taken by the modern architecture in Khartoum in that era.
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S64'Ahsoka' Easter Egg Redefines Everything We Know About Star Wars  After five fateful weeks of Ahsoka, Professor Huyang (David Tennant) might just be the series’ most valuable player. He’s proven his worth in battles, mentored Ahsoka Tano (Rosario Dawson) and Sabine Wren (Natasha Liu Bordizzo), and provided much-needed moments of levity. And though he doesn’t appear in the series’ sixth episode for very long, one casual line ensures we’ll be thinking about Huyang — and his role in the Star Wars saga — long after Ahsoka ends.When we catch up with Ahsoka and Huyang in Episode 6, they’re on their way to the fabled planet of Peridea. They have a long journey ahead of them, even with the help of the lightspeed-capable purrgil, so the duo’s been filling the hours with idle chitchat. When their conversation steers to less comfortable topics, Ahsoka changes the subject by asking Huyang for a story. The millennia-old droid has the entire history of the Jedi Order in his memory archives, so he’s happy to oblige. As Ahsoka settles in, Huyang recites a preamble that any Star Wars fan knows as well as their own names: “A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...”
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S54No, the RBA review won't mean handing the bank's decisions to part-time outsiders  Misinformation is circulating about recommendations concerning the Reserve Bank board made by the RBA Review, of which I was a member.Among the claims are that the new monetary policy board we have proposed would “weaken” incoming governor Michele Bullock’s power over interest rates, and that giving part-time appointees majority control over important decisions would be a “dangerous mistake”.
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S665 Years Ago, Netflix Released Its Most Audacious Sci-Fi Series -- And Never Topped It  In its race to conquer Hollywood, Netflix has produced more movies, TV shows, and limited series than it’s known what to do with. While some of those originals have been given the chance to shine and endure, many have been lost or forgotten in the decade-long grind of the platform’s constantly churning release machine. Even seemingly high-profile, acclaimed limited series like Unbelievable and Maid have failed to secure lasting places in the pop cultural conversion.The same fate has befallen Maniac. The ambitious, Emma Stone-led sci-fi miniseries premiered on Netflix five years ago to near-universal acclaim, but it’s since been forgotten by most viewers. That’s a shame because Maniac is a rare thing. It’s a big-budget, star and filmmaker-driven sci-fi series that’s messy, ambitious, uneven, visually stunning, and shockingly moving — and it’s all of those things at once.
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S50S61Sikh Separatism and the Brewing Conflict Between Canada and India  On Monday, Justin Trudeau, the Prime Minister of Canada, accused India’s government of having a role in the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen and Sikh separatist who was gunned down in Surrey, British Columbia, in June. Sikhs make up less than two per cent of the population of India, but are a majority in the northwestern state of Punjab. During the past half century, the struggle for a Sikh homeland—usually referred to as the Khalistan movement—has occasionally turned violent, and has been met by an equally violent response from the Indian authorities. But an assassination on foreign soil would constitute a serious escalation of the campaign against Sikh separatists.India’s Ministry of External Affairs has denied having anything to do with the murder, but also said that Canada’s approach to terrorism, which it characterized as laissez-faire, would “continue to threaten India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.” Trudeau’s allegations coincide with an attempt by Narendra Modi, India’s Prime Minister, to portray the country as an increasingly important player on the global stage; this era, in his words, marks “the first time the world has come to know that India can take a stand for herself.” The allegations also coincide with a general willingness by the Biden Administration to overlook India’s worsening human-rights record during Modi’s nearly decade-long premiership, in part because the U.S. values India’s role as a counterweight to China.
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S55S60Rishi Sunak's Self-Serving Climate Retreat  Since Rishi Sunak became Britain's Prime Minister, almost a year ago, in the middle of a national financial breakdown, his premiership has been defined by trying to make things go away. He wants inflation to halve. He wants the gigantic waiting lists for treatment on the National Health Service to shrink. He wants refugees to stop risking their lives by crossing the English Channel in unsafe inflatable boats. He wants to make the climate crisis somebody else's problem. On Tuesday evening, the BBC reported that Sunak was preparing to either renounce, or soft-pedal, some of the country's most important policies to reduce its carbon emissions: a ban on the sale of new gas- and diesel-driven cars would slide to 2035, from 2030, while other plans to phase out gas-and-oil-fired boilers would be relaxed. In an unusual, late-night response to the leaked information, Sunak insisted that Britain was still committed to reaching "Net Zero by 2050 . . . but doing so in a better, more proportionate way."If Sunak's track record on climate is anything to go by, then "proportionate" means new licenses for oil-and-gas exploration in the North Sea; Britain's first new deep coal mine for thirty years, which was approved last December; and the scrapping of a range of incentives to improve home insulation or to switch to electric vehicles, which Sunak oversaw as Boris Johnson's Chancellor of the Exchequer. Sunak has never seemed to take the future of the planet seriously. Johnson, to give him his due, brought his customary, shallow bluster. In 2021, Johnson treated the COP26 climate-change summit, in Glasgow, to the joys of his egomania and manic charm. In 2022, weeks after becoming Prime Minister, Sunak had to be shamed by party colleagues and international criticism into attending COP27, in Sharm el-Sheikh, at all.
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S53S659 Years Ago, John Wick Resurrected an Underrated Movie Genre -- and Saved its Stars  More than a comeback vehicle for Keanu Reeves, John Wick became a launch pad for the greatest DTV stars.DTV, or direct-to-video, films don’t have the most glowing reputation. Often, they’re films you’ll find at Walmart or RedBox, where you can see stars of days gone by, like Nicolas Cage or John Travolta, swinging guns for a paycheck. But what many might not realize is that the DTV market is home to some of the finest action around.
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S46S70'Mortal Kombat 1' Review: A Near-Flawless Victory for the Iconic Series  I’ve grown up with the Mortal Kombat series. Mortal Kombat 9 was the first fighting game I actually learned combos in. Mortal Kombat X is the first one I won a tournament for. Once I went into the training room for Mortal Kombat 1, I realized that this would be the next game that steals hundreds of hours from my life. (Yes, I purposefully didn’t mention Mortal Kombat 11.)Mortal Kombat 1 does everything we’ve been wanting fighting games to do for a long time. And it does it all nearly flawlessly. NetherRealm’s latest takes notes from every success and failure of the series thus far and creates something new, yet very familiar. This is the first time in decades we’ve seen so much love shown to characters, storylines, and stages. That love also shows up in the form of a new single-player adventure mode, Invasion, which is similar to Konquest in Deadly Alliance and Armageddon.
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S67'Ahsoka' Episode 6 is the Show's Best For One Cinematic Reason  For most of its run, Ahsoka has looked like a live-action cartoon. That was somewhat inevitable: the Disney+ series is a quasi-sequel to Rebels that continues where the series left off while bringing many of its characters to live-action for the first time. From its slightly cartoonish sets to its bright, vibrant color palette, aspects of Ahsoka have further heightened its animated roots.That’s part of why Ahsoka Episode 6 stands out so much from the five installments that preceded it. Not only does “Far, Far Away” finally pay off the initial two promises of Ahsoka’s space race premise, but it also looks and feels decidedly different from every other chapter. In short, it’s the first episode of Ahsoka that doesn’t look like a live-action cartoon.
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S69'Ahsoka's Most Controversial Retcon Just Backfired  Romance isn’t a concern in the Star Wars series, but it might be just what Ahsoka needed to sell its biggest moment.From the moment Ahsoka brought Sabine Wren (Natasha Liu Bordizzo) and Ezra Bridger (Eman Esfandi) into live-action, there was one question on everyone’s minds. Were Sabine and Ezra ever romantically involved? Whether you worship at the church of Rebels or consider yourself a true novice of the animated series, it seemed like there was something going on between the star-crossed characters — even if Ahsoka itself was quick to make their relationship platonic. Why else would Sabine be so reluctant to let go of Ezra, and so determined to find her missing friend?
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S68'Ahsoka' Episode 6 Theory Introduces a Canon-Destroying Star Wars Villain  Baylan Skoll has been a mysterious character from day one of Ahsoka. He’s gone from a hooded murder machine, to a master persuader who captured Sabine and brought her to Peridea without a fight, to a philosopher opining on the Jed Order. But it’s still not clear why he’s hanging out with Morgan Elsbeth. As neither Jedi nor Sith, he doesn’t really have a vested interest in Thrawn coming back, and for all the talk of him being a mercenary, he doesn’t exactly seem motivated by money. In Episode 6, we finally got an inkling of his true agenda: he’s searching for “a new beginning.” But what form will that take? Once Baylan and Shin arrive in the new galaxy, Shin asks exactly how helping Morgan will advance his agenda. “What I seek is the beginning, so I may finally bring this cycle to an end,” he says, referring to the constant power struggle between the Empire and the Republic, the Jedi and the Sith. “And that beginning is here?” Shin asks. “If the old stories are true,” Baylan says.
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S51Why is Rupert Murdoch stepping aside now and what does it mean for the company?  At age 92, media mogul Rupert Murdoch is stepping down as chairman of Fox Corporation and News Corp but will stay on in the role of chairman emeritus, presumably to help guide his eldest son Lachlan as the new head of the firm.In many ways, the news was inevitable. The company is clearly planning its succession and how it manages Rupert’s decline. It has one eye on the market and one on ensuring the company maintains its direction.
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S34S15Traffic tickets can be profitable, and fairness isn't the bottom line in city courts where judges impose the fines  But police represent only one aspect of this revenue-generating system. Judges and their courts also use traffic citations to generate money for the cities that employ them.Traffic violations are common. Whether drivers fail to signal a turn or drive a few miles per hour above the speed limit, it is not difficult for police to find someone who violated a traffic law. Officers have the discretion to pick and choose when to ticket and can adjust the number of tickets they issue based on factors that are not related to whether someone broke the law.
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S49Doug Ford reverses Greenbelt plans: Construction would never have provided affordable housing  Ontario Premier Doug Ford has announced a reversal of his government’s decision to allow developers to construct residential properties on parts of Ontario’s Greenbelt. While this is a positive outcome for an ongoing saga, let’s be clear: paving Ontario’s Greenbelt was never actually about providing affordable housing. Sure, there would have been houses where farms once stood, adding to the province’s overall supply. While housing experts would agree that our housing supply needs to grow as our population grows, we also need to ask questions: What kind of housing do we need? For whom? And where?
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S11Sex Education review: this 'kind comedy' climaxes with its most mature and progressive series yet  Netflix’s hit show Sex Education is back for its much-anticipated fourth and final series. The show follows Otis (Asa Butterfield) as he reluctantly becomes his school’s resident sex guru – despite having little experience himself – thanks to years of second-hand sex education from his mum, Jean (Gillian Anderson), a sex therapist.Over the past three seasons, we’ve watched as Otis and his friends navigate their awkward teenage years as love, life and sex present them with all sorts of obstacles.
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S6Almuerzo and the super-sandwiches of Valencia  It is 11:00 on a Tuesday at Bodega Casa Flor, a 130-year-old restaurant in the Cabanyal neighbourhood of Valencia City, Spain, and noise levels have reached a peak. Waiters zip around bearing huge paper-wrapped sandwiches to tables strewn with peanuts and sipped beers. It's a scene that plays out daily in cafes and bars across the province of Valencia, as people take a break for this uniquely Valencian ritual.Considered a late breakfast or an early lunch (actual lunch starts around 14:30), the almuerzo in Castilian Spanish (esmorzaret in Valencian) happens between 09:00 and 11:30 on Mondays through Saturdays and always features a massive sandwich.
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S48Carbon removal: why ambitious 'no nonsense' plans are vital to limit global heating to 2  2023 is proving to be a year of climate and weather extremes. Record-busting global air and ocean temperatures, unprecedented low levels of Antarctic sea ice, and devastating fires and floods have been reported across the world. Less discussed by the world media is the continuing rise in atmospheric greenhouse gases driving these changes. Carbon dioxide (CO₂) is at a level not seen since the hothouse world of the Pliocene, 3 million years ago. On top of that, an El Niño event is now likely, so widespread extreme events may intensify in coming months.
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S58Honest Wedding-Dress Styles  Follow @newyorkercartoons on Instagram and sign up for the Daily Humor newsletter for more funny stuff.By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
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S13S40S10Russell Brand allegations are leading to renewed scrutiny of the endemic bullying and harassment in the TV industry  Principal Academic in Media Production, Faculty of Media & Communication, Bournemouth University The presenter, comedian and actor Russell Brand is at the centre of a joint investigation by The Times, The Sunday Times and Channel 4 Dispatches, which has reported allegations of abuse made against him by four women, which include emotional abuse, sexual assault and rape. Brand has denied these allegations, saying his relationships have been “always consensual”, and they have not been tested in any court of law. However, this investigation focuses attention on a problem at the heart of the culture of the UK’s television industry.
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S9S12Invasive alien species are a serious threat to the planet: 4 key messages for Africa  Climate change has negatively – and irreversibly, in some cases – affected ecosystems around the globe. Sadly, though, it is not the only phenomenon that’s altering our natural world.In 2019, the Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) Global Assessment Report confirmed invasive alien species as one of the five most important direct drivers of biodiversity loss. The others were climate change, land and sea use, direct exploitation of species, and pollution.
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S44S47S28The Canterville Ghost: Oscar Wilde's ghost story gets new life in this funny and stylish animated adaptation  Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost feels quite ghostly itself, doomed to walk the earth through its many adaptations. There have been at least 14 television versions, the most recent in 2021, and it has not been long since cinemagoers encountered director Yann Samuell’s French-Belgian version, Le Fantôme de Canterville (2016). Yet Oscar Wilde’s comic ghost story of 1887 was something of a late developer in this respect. While there was a comic opera in 1905 (Das Gespenst von Matschatsch) and a Spanish play in 1929 (El Fantasma de Canterville), no film version appeared until MGM’s loosely-adapted 1944 production.
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S14G20 summit proved naysayers wrong - and showed Global South's potential to address world's biggest problems  Interim Director of the Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future, Boston University Skepticism was running high ahead of the 2023 summit of the Group of 20, or G20, held in New Delhi in early September. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping announced that they would not attend. At one moment, it was touch and go whether U.S. President Joe Biden – whose wife, Jill, was ill with COVID-19 – would make the trip. The general consensus was the group would fail to come up with a final declaration, largely because of differences over the war in Ukraine.
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S39Why we should stop using acronyms like BIPOC  When I first heard the acronym BIPOC, my stomach tightened and I immediately felt resistance. It was a gut reaction at having my identities seemingly collapsed into an acronym. Exploring this discomfort, I read an article by American author Kearie Daniel. She shared similar unease from her perspective as a Black woman. Reading Daniel’s words, I knew I was not alone in my reaction to the abbreviation.
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S29How BookTok trends are influencing what you read - whether you use TikTok or not  If you’ve been in a bookshop recently, you may have seen references to BookTok – whether it’s stickers on books or whole tables dedicated to “BookTok favourites”.BookTok is a community on the social media app TikTok. Creators make short videos recommending, reviewing, or just generally chatting about books. This community has become one of the biggest on the platform and its hashtag (#BookTok) has been used on over 60 billion videos. BookTok’s influence over the publishing industry and what young people are reading is staggering.
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