Virus: Sandals Closing All 19 Caribbean Resorts – The St. Kitts-Nevis Observer

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MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica The Caribbeans leading hotel chain, Sandals Resorts International says it is closing all Sandals and Beaches Resorts for the period March 30 to May 15, 2020, to protect guests and staff against COVID-19.

In a statement, Sandals founder and Chairman Gordon Butch Stewart described the decision as difficult, but said it will use the time to make further enhancements to its resorts, so that we will continue to surpass your expectations and provide you with the luxury-included vacation you so well deserve

Therefore, we will not be able to accept new arrivals as of March 23, 2020. We also want to alleviate any additional worry you might have about your upcoming vacation. Our dedicated team will be reaching out to you personally to assist with rescheduling your future plans. This way, you can spend less time trying to reach us and more time with your loved ones, Stewart said.

The Caribbean is resilient. We have always come back better, stronger and more passionate than ever. We promise this time will be no exception, Stewart added.

When the time is right, you can trust us to be here, ready to welcome you back with open arms and a warm smile. Soon come back, he said.

The brand, which operates 19 properties in the Caribbean (10 of which are in Jamaica), are responsible for thousands of jobs, particularly on Jamaicas north coast. The temporary closure of these and other hotels means that thousands of hospitality workers will possibly be without an income.

Just last week, three RIU Hotel properties in western Jamaica announced their closure due to low visitor arrival. Some 1,000 workers are expected to be left without jobs during the period of closure at the three affected properties: RIU Palace Jamaica, RIU Negril and RIU Montego Bay.

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Virus: Sandals Closing All 19 Caribbean Resorts - The St. Kitts-Nevis Observer

Government urged to halt implementation of public charge rule against Caribbean immigrants – NYCaribNews

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NEW YORK, Mar 23, CMC A coalition of 18 attorneys general from around the United States have called on the Trump administration to delay implementation of its Public Charge Rule against Caribbean and other immigrants as the coronavirus (COVID-19) progresses nationwide.

The Public Charge Rule drives immigrants and their families away from accessing the health benefits to which they are entitled by threatening their eligibility for green cards and visas.

As the coronavirus spreads across the US, the attorneys general said immigrants should be encouraged to access health insurance and medical care, but the Trump administrations rule does the opposite.

Every person who doesnt get the health coverage they need today risks infecting another person tomorrow, said New York Attorney General Letitia James, the lead attorney general on the issue.

More and more individuals across the nation become infected with the coronavirus every day, yet the Trump administration refuses to assure immigrants that getting the tests and health coverage they need will not be used against them, she added.

At this time, we should all be working to make testing and health coverage available to every single person in this country, regardless of immigration status. Our coalition will continue fighting to protect the health and well-being of our nation by halting this rule.

The attorneys general said US federal law allows lawful immigrants to apply for public benefits if they have been in the country for at least five years.

But they said that the new Public Charge Rule creates a bait-and-switch and that if immigrants use the public assistance to which they are legally entitled, they would jeopardize their chances of later renewing their visa or becoming permanent residents.

As a result, since the spread of COVID-19 began in the United States, immigrants may now be afraid to seek out the health coverage they need to remain healthy, the coalition said.

Earlier this month, the coalition of attorneys general sent a letter to the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) seeking to suspend the Public Charge Rule as coronavirus infections began increasing in the United States.

Though neither agency responded to the initial letter, the attorneys general said USCIS last week posted what they described as a confusing and contradictory alert claiming to offer a resolution for immigrants.

According to the attorneys general, the alert said the government would not consider any form of testing or care related to COVID-19 in immigrants public charge assessment, even if such treatment is provided or paid for by one or more public benefits, as defined in the rule (e.g. federally funded Medicaid).

In response, the coalition has now sent another letter to DHS and USCIS again calling for a halt of the rule, pointing out that last weeks alert contains confusing and contradictory statements about the impact that using Medicaid would have on non-citizens.

If DHS is attempting to ensure noncitizens in our communities remain enrolled in Medicaid so they can use Medicaid services should they have symptoms of COVID-19, the Alert fails to achieve this, the attorneys generals letter said, adding likewise, if DHS is attempting to ensure that noncitizens seek testing and treatment for COVID-19 without fear of public charge consequences, the Alert also utterly fails to achieve this.

The Alert fails to recognize that, in order to receive adequate health services, our residents need adequate health insurance benefits.

To achieve DHSs stated goal of encouraging noncitizens to seek testing and treatment for COVID-19, noncitizens must be encouraged to enroll or remain enrolled in health insurance programs, including Medicaid, and they must be assured that such enrollment during this dire national health emergency will not be considered in any future public charge determination, the letter added.

The attorneys general said the conflicting statements could cause Caribbean and other immigrants to forgo medical treatment during this national crisis, which could be critical to protecting communities from the spread of COVID-19.

Given the grave danger facing our nations health and economy, it is imperative that DHS not chill immigrants from enrolling in Medicaid or using Medicaid benefits for any purpose until the COVID-19 crisis is over, they said.

Under the Alert, however, noncitizens who remain enrolled in Medicaid continue to risk their green cards and visas. As DHS previously conceded, this will prompt immigrants to disenroll from Medicaid and lead to an increased prevalence of communicable diseases, as the nation is now experiencing at a horrifying rate.

To protect the residents of our states and the rest of the country, we ask that DHS immediately announce that the Rule is stayed pending successful containment of COVID-19, the attorneys general continued.

Short of that, however, it is imperative that DHS at least make clear that enrollment in Medicaid and the use of Medicaid benefits for any reason will not be considered in the public charge assessment.

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Government urged to halt implementation of public charge rule against Caribbean immigrants - NYCaribNews

Five Caribbean words that were spawned by coronavirus – Loop News Cayman

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The last time the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) updated its lexicon it added words like Jafaican and awesomesauce. Apparently the OED does updates four times a year and the next update might have a few new words associated with Coronavirus.

Coronavirus is shaping up to be a cultural phenomenon with wide-ranging impacts on almost every facet of our daily lives, including the way we talk. Since the crisis began, we have seen words such as isolation, quarantine, vaccine and asymptomatic, just to name a few. But coronavirus has also given way to brand new words, conceived in direct response to the crisis.

Some of these words are entertaining and others are brow-raising but they all might just be here to stay.

Here are the 5 most popular words and terms spawned by Coronavirus so far:

Rona

Rona is a nickname given to the virus. Persons have been overheard making reference to Rona as she and her which for some reason makes this nickname even scarier to me.

How Caribbean people can use Rona in a sentence:

Cover yuh mouth bredrin, Rona is no joke, she nah play.

COVidiot

Apparently a COVidiot is someone who hoards things like toilet paper and ignores warnings during a pandemic.

How Caribbean people can use COVidiot in a sentence:

The way dem buy toilet paper you would think it can eat, one bunch a COVidiot dem.

Quarantine n Chill

Apparently this is a play on the popular phrase Netflix N Chill and it refers to singles declaring that although there is quarantine they are still willing to socialize.

How Caribbean people can use Quarantine n Chill in a sentence:

Man, I tell she to let us Quarantine n Chill and she tell me not call back her blasted phone.

Quarantine Baby

This refers to any child born as result of increased intimacy during quarantine period.

How Caribbean people can use Quarantine baby in a sentence:

If there is one good ting to come out a dis crisis is mi quarantine baby.

Quarantini

An alcoholic beverage made and consumed during quarantine. This is a combination of the words quarantine and martini but can refer to any alcoholic beverage.

How Caribbean people can use Quarantini in a sentence:

Come over so we can drink some quarantini, but stay 6 feet away and DOAN TOUCH mi toilet paper.

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Five Caribbean words that were spawned by coronavirus - Loop News Cayman

Valve Talks Half-Life: Alyxs Big Ending: You Could Say The Team Is Issuing A Challenge – UploadVR

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Half-Life: Alyx has been available for a few days now and, although its quite a lengthy adventure, no doubt a lot of avid fans have already reached the mind-bending ending.

So, what the heck, huh?

After we completed Alyx we had the chance to sit down with Valve to talk about a lot of different aspects of Alyx. Well have the full interview up later in the week, but we couldnt not ask the company about the games big ending. If you dont know what were talking about, we laid out the ending here (obviously it sort of spoils everything).

Valves Greg Coomer had some interesting contributions about the different aspects of the ending and what it means for the future. Weve got our excerpts of those questions below. If you dont want to know what happens then check back here after finishing the game.

FULL SPOILERS FOR HALF-LIFE ALYX ENDING BELOW

Upload: So Im glad I finished the game because I would be remiss if I couldnt talk about the end with you guys. To me, that ending seemed like a bold, definitive statement that the next Half-Life game will be in VR.

GC: Valve is not quite ready to say that. We havent made actually any plans about medium [VR]. So I think weve obviously we get that question from many people. Also like, what exactly is coming next for VR? Also whats coming next for Half-Life? We really weve been working on this for four years and were really excited because the reception before the game is out seems to be really quite positive, so far. I know our playtesting is good.

But really the entire team and the company is in a mode where we really want to see what the reaction to this title is before we make plans about what exactly we will do next.

Upload: Having said that, the decision to have this ending in the game is undoubtedly a confidence thing. When did you feel you had the confidence to put this ending in the game? Was it always going to be there or was there a point where you said I think we can do this?

GC: It was definitely an ending Im not on the writing team but its definitely an ending that has been a core part of the plan for most of the development of the game. So it wasnt like we built the game as youve now experienced it and then thought hard about what should we tack on to the end. It definitely was something that was integral in the thing about how you get there and what the earlier stages of the product are.

Upload: Does Alyx remember the last moments of the game in Half-Life 2 through to Episode 2?

GC: We definitely get why youre asking the questions, but thats one of the things that the ending is really designed to leave unanswered, I believe.

Upload: Theres an interesting idea to Gordon picking up the crowbar at the end of the game. That could go down as a very iconic moment. And its interesting you decided to do that having not used melee weapons in the rest of the game. And so I wonder if theres any kind of notion of what youll be able to do going forward in that handing of the crowbar or passing of the torch, if you will.

Its like, This is what we can do with VR tech today, by the time maybe another game rolls around Im not asking you to say theres going to be an Index 2 but the industry is obviously naturally going to progress on and it feels like you guys are already thinking about the kind of designs that will go along with it.

GC: We definitely are. You could look at I mean a lot of the development of Alyx was done in concert with the team that was simultaneously building the Index. And I wouldnt say, though, that the ending of the game was done deeply in concert with the people who are thinking about next-gen VR, but you could say that the Alyx team is issuing a challenge to the part of Valve which is working on next-gen VR solution to say This is what we want from you, give us solutions that will let us build something like this.

I havent heard someone else say that, but your question sort of made me think of the ending to our game in a different light.

So there you have it.

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Valve Talks Half-Life: Alyxs Big Ending: You Could Say The Team Is Issuing A Challenge - UploadVR

How Long Do You Want to Live? This Technology Could Potentially Help People Live Forever – Interesting Engineering

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The coronavirus may have you thinking about your mortality. At the end of the day, humans only have one life on this planet. Even more so, we are pretty fragile, prone to disease, destructive, and a bit stubborn. Since the beginning of time, humans have longed for eternal life," - the ability to extend ones life and youth far beyond its current limits. Nevertheless, you have to give humans their props for increasing their species life expectancy across the board over the last 200 years.

For the uninitiated, life expectancy is the expected number of years of life remaining at a particular age. Yet, as you are probably already wondering, how long can humans live? According to Our World in Data, the average life expectancy is 72.6 years. Yet as you are probably aware, there are select groups of people across the world, especially in wealthier nations, that have well exceeded this number. Some people have gone on to live 100 years, 110 years, and even beyond, with Jeane Calment of France living 122 years and 164 days.

But can humans live even longer? If you could, how long would you want to live? 200 years? 500 years? Maybe a full millennium? Though this might seem like a bit of science fiction, technology could advance to the point where humans could live forever. In fact, some futurists argue that if you make it to 2050, you are probably not going to die. So, stay inside, please.

Futurist Dr. Ian Pearson has gone on to argue that by using the power of technology, humanity might be able to merge our minds with machines, making our bodies obsolete. You could end up attending your own body funeral. Pearson paints the picture of this future,stating, One day, your body dies, and with it, your brain stops, but no big problem, because 99% of your mind is still fine, running happily on IT, in the cloud. Assuming you saved enough and prepared well, you connect to an android to use as your body from now on, attend your funeral, and then carry on as before, still you, just with a younger, highly upgraded body.

And this is just the beginning, beyond 2050, there could be many different ways you may be able to preserve your mind and consciousness. Humans might just switch to different humanoid bodies after a certain period the same way you might buy a new car with new features. Or thanks to projects like Neuralink, your mind may just be a few simple clicks away from downloading yourself into a computer or robotic body. Maybe thousands of years from now, all of humanity may decide it is better for humans to live in a massive megastructure that practically generates our own reality.

Today that is what we are going to explore. There is plenty of technology out there that could potentially change the entire direction of humanity, posing the question; will humans eventually be able to live forever?

Like most of the things on this list, this sounds like something out of a science fiction film. Yet people like University of Southern Californias Theodore Berger, Duke Universitys Mikhail Lebedev, and Alexander Kaplan of Moscow University, all believe its possible. There are already companies out there working on ways to link our minds to machines. At the moment, there are more practical reasons for this. like offering those who have mobility disabilities the ability to live more normal and fulfilling lives.

However, it can go even further than that. The mind will be in the cloud, and be able to use any android that you feel like to inhabit the real world,says Pearson. It could get to a point in which you can hire an android body for the day. Rather than travel to Jamaica, just upload your brain to an android stationed in Jamaica. Or maybe there is a great concert that you want to see, but the band is in another city thousands of miles away. You may be able to simply upload yourself to experience the show. The result of this is that humans may never need a fleshy body again.

3D printing has come a long way, virtually impacting almost every major industry across the world, including healthcare. Just in the past couple of years, researchers from separate organizations and private institutions have found ways to 3D print organs. A team of researchers from Tel Aviv University in Israel unveiled a 3D printed heart with human tissue and vessels just last year.

Companies like Skorpio Medical have gone as far as to begin research in the realms of 3D printed limbs. In the near future, you may be able to simply renew a body part when it goes bad. Your body gets more and more limited as you get older. Advances in biotechnologies could put an end to this. Even more so, genetic engineering could eventually prevent the aging of cells or completely reverse it altogether. Lose a finger? Simply print a new one? Need a new arm? Call up a doctor and have them reinstall one.

Cryogenic freezing has its fair share of skeptics, but over the years, the scientific community has slowly embraced the idea. Now, you cannot freeze yourself yet and wake up, but there could be a future in which you simply put your body on ice for extended periods of time to be awakened on a given date or time.

This could come in handy during trips to distant planets hundreds of light-years away. Nevertheless, cryogenic freezing is simply an option for people who want to freeze their bodies when they pass away with the aims of bringing them back during a time period where science makes it possible. However, there is some research that centers around using cryonics to slow tissue aging.

You have probably heard it before, but we are probably living in a virtual world, at least that is one people who buy into simulation theory believe. However, in the coming age of electronic immortality, living in the virtual world may become an alternative to living in the current one. Think of it like that episode of San Junipero from the popular Netflix series Black Mirror. Perhaps in the future, androids are extremely expensive, but the cheaper alternative is to have some humans uploaded into a cloud-based virtual reality system, a place where you could spend all eternity living in peace with an avatar of your choosing. Most people already live on the internet, so in most cases, it is just a matter of time?

But, what could come after creating a virtual world? Though this could happen far beyond 2050, we are talking thousands of years; it could be possible. In short, humanity might be able to simulate reality on a universal scale using what is known as a matrioshka brain. Based on the Dyson sphere, a matrioshka brain is a hypothetical megastructure proposed by Robert J. Bradbury. The idea was proposed when imagining the type of highly advanced civilizations that are out there in the universe as this would be an impressive Class B stellar engine, employing the entire energy output of a star to drive computer systems.

Our entire species could be uploaded on this computer system able to simulate reality and remake the universe as we know it. Though this idea may seem far from reality, the idea of uploading the mind to a computer seemed like a distant fantasy at some point.

One of the lesser-known projects that Elon Musk is working on centers around the star-up Neuralink. The company has ambitious plans to directly link brains and computers using a simple, noninvasive device that we can install in our brains. The current fascination with brain-computer interface centers around helping those with neurological mobility issues. However, Musks project extends far beyond that. The eventual goal is to create a "digital superintelligence layer" to link humans with artificial intelligence. As stated in the Neuralink San Francisco presentation, "Ultimately, we can do a full brain-machine interface where we can achieve a sort of symbiosis with AI."

But why stop there? Developments in robotics and prosthetics could open the gates to human-robot hybrids. You may be able to simply go in for a procedure to get bionic eyes, a robotic arm, new legs, etc., all with features that suit your needs and wildest dreams. Just like a toolbox, you could be able to switch out different arms, fingers, and legs for different activities.

Do you think it will be possible for humans to live forever? Share your opinion in the comment section.

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How Long Do You Want to Live? This Technology Could Potentially Help People Live Forever - Interesting Engineering

How fast does your internet need to be to survive quarantine life? – Mashable

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Thanks to the novel coronavirus, we're at a pivotal moment in the history of the internet. People need it more than ever because they're stuck at home, but it might not be fast enough to meet everyone's daily needs.

Multiple studies released over the past week have shown that home internet is slowing down in parts of the U.S. In some cases, adequate internet isn't available at all. We don't know what your personal internet situation is, but we do know roughly how much speed you need to do common tasks.

Below is a rundown of how fast your internet should be in order to do things like stream videos, play online multiplayer games, and work remotely. All you have to do to test your internet is go to Speedtest, which we must disclose is owned by Mashable's parent company, J2. For most cases, the download speed (measured in megabits per second, or Mbps), is the golden number. That's the rate at which your network can bring data to you.

If you're able to work remotely during our de facto quarantine, your daily routine is probably going to involve lots of emailing, Slacking, and maybe video calling depending on what you do. We'll address video calls a little later, but for everything else included in this category, you don't need to ride the bleeding edge of internet speeds to get by.

BroadbandNow has some basic guidelines for things like this and they recommend a minimum of 1Mbps to 5Mbps for web browsing and checking your email. You might not have the best time doing either of those things if your speed is that low, but you should be able to get things done...eventually. At the risk of editorializing, in my experience, it's tough to accomplish much of anything if your download speed isn't at least 10Mbps.

Other factors can come into play here, as well. Your WiFi signal strength might not be able to deliver ideal speeds because your router is old or needs to be moved, for example. You'll get better results over WiFi if your router is in a central location, there are no walls interrupting the signal, and you make sure there aren't too many devices connected at once.

Regarding that last point, it should be noted that these recommended minimums will probably only work if there isn't much network traffic. If there are multiple people trying to use the same network at once, single-digit download speeds likely won't cut it. That goes for all online activity, not just web browsing.

You need all the megabits you can get to watch 'Tiger King' on Netflix.

Image: Courtesy of NETFLIX

Everyone who's cooped up inside needs a way to pass the time. It's reasonable to assume every major streaming service is going to get a workout over the next several months, so you should make sure your internet is good enough to stream movies and TV shows at a watchable level of quality.

Each service has its own guidelines for this, but generally speaking, you don't need super fast internet to stream video. Netflix and Amazon Prime Video both recommend a minimum of 5Mbps for HD content, while Hulu has a blanket 3Mbps minimum for all non-live content. Obviously, you could still experience buffering or quality drops if you're streaming with speeds that low, which might be why BroadbandNow recommends at least 15Mbps to 25Mbps instead.

Coincidentally, that's about the range Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu recommend for 4K content. Hulu says 16Mbps is required, while Netflix and Hulu suggest 25Mbps. BroadbandNow, however, recommends at least 40Mbps for 4K viewing. And depending on where you are, Ultra HD streaming might not even be possible right now anyway.

So far, we've relied exclusively on download speed because it's the most important factor for web browsing and streaming. Online gaming is another matter, though. Whether you're visiting your friends' islands in Animal Crossing or battling for supremacy in Call of Duty, you need to get acquainted with a little something called "ping." It's one of the other metrics in a Speedtest result.

In the context of online gaming, ping is a measurement of how long it takes for your inputs to register with the game's server. It's typically measured in milliseconds and PC Gamer recommends a ping of 100ms or less for an optimal gaming experience. You can probably get away with up to 150ms depending on the game, but high a ping will create lag that makes online games nigh-unplayable.

Don't forget about download speed, though. You might want to pair your low ping with a download speed of at least 40 to 50 Mbps for games to feel right. We recommend using ethernet cables for gaming, if possible.

Socializing in the time of social distancing.

Image: Jim Craigmyle / getty images

Since people can't see their friends in person, more and more folks are turning to Google Hangouts, Zoom, FaceTime, and other forms of video chat to socialize. The good news is you don't need supersonic internet speeds to make these work.

Zoom, for example, only asks for 1.8Mbps to send and receive 1080p video in a 1-on-1 video call. That goes up to 2.5Mbps to 3Mbps for group calls. Of course, by now it should go without saying that you should do whatever you can to be in a faster network than that while video calling. If you can get at least 10Mbps to 20Mbps, you'll deal with a lot less stuttering and dropped calls.

Google Hangouts has similarly low network requirements, though it notes that the burden goes up as more people are on a call. Video calling is going to be more important than ever in the coming months, so it's somewhat comforting to know that it can be done without screamingly fast internet.

Anyone who wants to become an amateur filmmaker during quarantine will need to understand how upload speed works. While download speed is a measurement of how fast your network pulls information to you, upload speed measures how fast you can send information to the network.

If you tried out Speedtest on our recommendation, you probably noticed that your upload speed is much lower than your download speed. This is by design. Residential ISPs tend to cap upload speed at a lower number than download speed because, well, most people don't have a need for it; it doesn't really come into play for most daily tasks.

With all that in mind, there isn't necessarily a hard minimum upload speed required to put things on YouTube. It'll help to have double-digit upload speeds, for sure, but a number lower than that can still work for you. It just might take a long time to upload a lengthy HD video.

We hope your internet is able to meet (or ideally far exceed) all of the figures listed above during your time at home. You can't go anywhere, so it would sure be a bummer if you couldn't browse the web, play online games, or stream movies, too.

Link:

How fast does your internet need to be to survive quarantine life? - Mashable

‘Star Trek: Picard’: Jean-Luc Picard may upload his mind to a synthesized being, bringing the show full circle – MEAWW

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Spoiler alert for 'Star Trek: Picard' Season 1 Episode 9

In 'Star Trek: Nemesis,' Data (Brent Spiner) attempts to upload his mind to a less sophisticated version of himself, named B-4. He was unsuccessful, as we find out in the pilot episode of 'Star Trek: Picard,' but now Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) is attempting to do the same thing himself- bringing the entire show around in interesting ways.

The very first moments of 'Star Trek: Picard' open with 'Blue Skies' playing in the background - the very song Data sung at the beginning of 'Star Trek: Nemesis,' was meant to tease the idea that he had successfully been uploaded into B-4's body. The last time Picard saw Data, of course, was when Data had sacrificed himself to save Picard in 'Star Trek: Nemesis,' and Picard's been carrying that survivor's guilt ever since.

It's that guilt that drives him throughout the season, as he attempts to find Data's daughter, Soji (Isa Briones) from the Zhat Vhash, but the story is bigger than that. As Dr Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill) explained, Data was the first real synthetic being to ever be created, and the news of that is what had Commodore Oh (Tamlyn Tomita) infiltrate Starfleet in the first place, setting the events of 'Star Trek: Picard' off. Data's legacy is that of all artificially created life, and whether or not humanity can allow them to exist.

When Picard and his crew find the community of synthetic beings, they discover living among them is Dr Olton Inego Soong, played by Brent Spiner himself. It's a legacy role, as Olton's father was none other than Dr Noonien Soong, the man who created Data in the first place. Given that Brent Spiner plays both roles, it's obvious that Noonien created Data in his biological son's image, making Olton and Data brothers, of a sort, which extends to B-4.

This episode brings up two things of significance, though it doesn't connect them - it reminds the audience of Picard's brain abnormality and it's the fatal diagnosis, and the golem created by Olton Soong. The golem is a synthetic body - but it's a blank slate, meant to be occupied by the mind of an organic being. Soong hasn't perfected it yet, but if he does, it may be Picard's last hope. If successful, Picard will be able to upload his mind to another body - much in the way Data failed to do in 'Star Trek: Nemesis.'

The implications of that might be what brings peace between organic life and synthetics, as a person raised as an organic being, but now alive in a synthetic body, Picard would truly be a bridge between two worlds. He would be a new sort of life form, the missing link between man and machine and finally make up for his failure in stopping the banning of synthetic life, 14 years ago, causing his retirement from Starfleet.

It's all coming together, on several levels, and the connections are fascinating. There's a lot riding on whether or not Picard finds new life in the season finale, setting up a grand moment with decades of history behind it.

The next episode of 'Star Trek: Picard' airs March 27, on CBS All Access.

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'Star Trek: Picard': Jean-Luc Picard may upload his mind to a synthesized being, bringing the show full circle - MEAWW

Coronavirus making you work from home? We tried these 6 free apps to break the monotony – YourStory

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The COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic has forced several countries into lockdown, imposing remote working, or work from home, for millions of us. And by now, you must have realised how isolating and monotonous working from home can get.

So weve listed a few tried and tested apps that will help break the monotony and bring out your hidden talents.

(Source: Shutterstock)

Snacking much? Work from home does that to you. But with little else to do, you can surely explore cooking as an activity for yourself. Even Zomato suggests, kabhi kabhi ghar ka khana kha lena chahiye (you should cook and eat at home sometimes).

Enter Recipe Book, a recipe discovery app that curates recipes across cuisines like Indian, Korean, Italian, Mexican, Thai, Malaysian, Arabian and German. While recipe apps have been around for a while, Recipe Book was listed on Googles Editors Choice apps for its search facility, which lets you find Indian and global recipes, as well as save them for offline and online use.

It has the provision of following international chefs, food critics and food blogs via curated feeds using Follow your interests feature.

You can also upload your recipes for regular contests announced on the app. Recipe Book is also available in Hindi, making it accessible to large parts of India.

The biggest issue while working from home and staying indoors for long periods is that you start slouching, gaining weight, start having sleep issues, and dont do enough workout. So if you want to start with yoga, then you can download the Down Dog app.

Down Dog was started by two developers, Ben Simon and Carlos Ormachea, who share a passion for yoga. Ben and Carlos met in college, and in February 2015, quit their jobs to work full-time on building the app in Seattle. They eventually launched the iOS version of the app in August 2015 and the Android version in March 2016.

This app focusses on modern Vinyasa yoga, a style of yoga characterised by stringing postures together so that you transition from one to the other seamlessly. This is also known as flow yoga. The app has more than 30,000 configurations to ensure that you never repeat the same workout flow or get bored.

It also lets you personalise your yoga routine in impressive ways. You can choose the duration from five minutes to 90 minutes. You can also set difficulty level introductory, beginner, or advanced along with type, pace, relaxation period etc.

The app also has amazing music playlists and clear vocal instruction with high-quality video. If this doesnt encourage you to practice yoga, nothing will.

With leaving home becoming a luxury, the longing for socialising and travelling is an all-time high. If you have the wanderlust bug, Ablo is for you. Ablo is a chat app that lets you connect, discover, and have one-on-one conversations with users from around the world, with a real-time translation for text as well as video chats.

A social networking app, Ablo lets people connect through a complementary user interface (UI) that ensures you feel like you are virtually globetrotting for friends. It welcomed us with 125 miles (miles is a metric the app uses to rank a user).

It also shows your location on the world map and indicates where it is taking you on the map itself. The app is unique as it simulates a feel of travelling without leaving your home or device. If making friends from across the world is something that excites you, you will find great value in Ablo, which is free for use.

At least eight out of 10 friends have told me that the stay-at-home lifestyle has caused them anxiety, stress and restlessness. This is the time to practice meditation. Insight Timer, a free meditation app, promises to calm your mind, reduce anxiety, manage stress, enhance deep sleep, and improve happiness.

The app offers around 24,000 free meditation routines to choose from under categories like guided and unguided meditations, calming music, talks, sleep, beginners, stress etc. It has a large free library of guided meditations by top meditation and mindfulness experts, neuroscientists, psychologists, and teachers from Stanford, Harvard, the University of Oxford and more.

It features music tracks from renowned artists and also has talks by Sadhguru. On the App Store, Insight Timer says it adds more than 100 free guided meditations every day.

We used a host of meditation apps, but found such expansive customisation available only on Insight Timer. The app has courses such as how to restore sound sleep, and getting over overeating. While the app is free for basic courses, a Rs 5,000-per-year subscription unlocks a special catalogue of courses and will allow you to download meditation routines offline.

Whats common among Netflix The Kissing Booth, Hulus Light as a Feather, and Anna Todds New York Times best-selling series After? All these stories were discovered on social storytelling platform Wattpad. With a community of more than 80 million people who spend over 22 billion minutes a month, Wattpad also made it to theEditor's Choice list in the Play Store because of the stories and community feedback being its backbone.

Wattpad has over four million writers, who post an average of 300,000 pieces a day. The app has a vast range of categories, including fanfiction, romance, teen fiction, fantasy, and others.

It has partnerships with publishers such as Penguin Random House India, Macmillan Publishers, Anvil Publishing, and others. So, a user can read author-generated stories as well as books and stories by these publishers.

The best part? You can see your works momentum building as you write, which is hugely motivating for a writer.

Apart from being a great launchpad for writers, Wattpad is also extremely reader-friendly. There are a variety of books and stories, albeit, without being well proofread.

Interestingly, Wattpad helps users turn their stories into books, films, TV shows, and digital projects. Alongside, it works with production houses to discover untapped, unsigned, and talented writers. The company works with partners such as Sony Pictures, Syfy, Hulu, and others. It also has entertainment partners across Asia, including a 26-film deal with Iflix.

Wattpad makes you a member of an international community of storytellers and story lovers. You can even create reading lists, share your library, and read with your friends. The app is the perfect way for authors to connect directly and instantly with readers.

Amazon, one of the worlds Big Four tech companies, launched Audible Suno, created exclusively for Indian listeners, in December last year. The free streaming service gives you unlimited access to Audible's exclusive audio entertainment.

The app streams hundreds of hours of entertainment and learning sessions featuring many of Indias celebrities such as Amitabh Bachchan, Katrina Kaif, Karan Johar, Anil Kapoor, Farhan Akhtar, Mouni Roy, Anurag Kashyap, Tabu, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Diljit Dosanjh, Vir Das, and Vicky Kaushal.

At a time when most of us have no idea of how many accounts we have across multiple apps, Audible Suno offers a huge advantage: it lets you use the app without any account. Just download, and immediately start using it. It does not have any ads (so far), is free, and features exclusive content. The content on Audible Suno is spread across categories such as romance, thriller, comedy, talk shows, self-help, spirituality, drama, business, and others.

The range of fiction series includes romance and relationships (Matrimonial Anonymous and Piya Milan Chowk), suspense (Thriller Factory), horror (Amitabh Bachchan in Kaali Awaazein), and comedy (The Unexperts by Abish Mathew). The non-fiction series showcase intimate interviews with some of the countrys biggest stars (Kissa Khwabon Ka, Picture Ke Peechhe with Katrina Kaif and Karan Johar), and socially relevant series that explore topics like mental health, sex education, and LGBTQ rights (Azaad Awaaz, SentiMental).

(Edited by Kanishk Singh)

How has the coronavirus outbreak disrupted your life? and how are you dealing with it? Write to us or send us a video with subject line 'Coronavirus Disruption' to editorial@yourstory.com

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Coronavirus making you work from home? We tried these 6 free apps to break the monotony - YourStory

2AM’s Jo Kwon Talks About How Musicals With EXO’s Xiumin, Yoon Ji Sung, And More Helped Him During Military Service + His Future Plans – soompi

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Following his military discharge, Jo Kwon has shared his experience in the army and his future plans.

After enlisting in August 2018, Jo Kwonwas discharged from the military on March 24 due to their COVID-19 protocol and personally announced his return with a letter.

In an interview with OSEN, Jo Kwon shared, I still cant believe it. I still feel like Ill have to return every evening. When I open my eyes in the morning, I feel restless, and my memories as a soldier run through my mind all day. I had only imagined the day of my discharge, so it feels like a dream, and I am so happy. For awhile, I think Ill have the post-discharge blues.

Although on a break from promotions while enlisted, Jo Kwonperformed in musicals Shinheung Military Academy and Return: The Promise of the Day (literal title). He commented, The military is a place where a really diverse group of people gatherand create a special bond. Thats why the memories I have with soldiers I met while participating in musicals Shinheung Military Academy and Return: The Promise of the Day are most memorable.

He continued, If not now, I wonder when I would ever get to eat, sleep, and train with Lee Jin Ki (SHINees Onew), Yoon Ji Sung, Cha Hak Yeon (VIXXs N), Kim Sunggyu, Kim Min Seok (EXOs Xiumin), actor Kim Min Seok, Go Eun Sung, Lee Jae Kyoon, Lee Sungyeol, Kim Min Ho, Kang Ha Neul, and Ji Chang Wook. With that in mind,I remember encouragingeach another throughout our service.

Despite being newly discharged, Jo Kwon is ready to jump right back into promotions. He is already scheduled to appear on JTBCs Ask Us Anything alongside 2PMs Wooyoung, Block Bs P.O, and WINNERs Song Mino.

When asked whathe wants to do first following his discharge, Jo Kwon answered, The thing I wanted to do most was communicate often with my fans through social media. I am glad I can now upload content in real-time. Starting from this morning, I gave all my unit executives a phone call and have been spending each day busily, with interviews and V Live broadcasts. Im going to leave my hairstyle until today and plan to transform my style tomorrow.

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2AM's Jo Kwon Talks About How Musicals With EXO's Xiumin, Yoon Ji Sung, And More Helped Him During Military Service + His Future Plans - soompi

Meet the GIF Makers Who Craft Art out of Pinpoint Gameplay – EGMNOW

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For decades now, the biggest-budget games have striven to capture the masterful blocking and choreography of action cinema at its best. From the gritty, artless fisticuffs of The Last of Us to the superpowered clashes between literal deities in 2018s God of War, the people who make video games have become quite adept at casting acts of sudden violence as spectacles unto themselves, particularly in cutscenes and button-mashing quick-time events. Once you actually wrest control back from the game, however, your flailing attempts to vanquish your foes pale in comparison to the pinpoint timing and perfect accuracy your protagonist flaunts when theyre unmoored from your sweaty fingers. Its hard enough to beat the Big Bad Monstrosity in the first place, let alone to get it done with grace and verve.

Thats what makes Sunjeev SunhiLegend Kumars work so impressive. If youve spent any time in online gaming spaces in the past few years, youve probably scrolled past one of his creations, perhaps without even knowing its author. Kumar specializes in crafting short snippets of visually appealing gameplay, usually from titles that feature ornate combat systems, like Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, Devil May Cry, or God of War, and crunching them into GIF files that can be easily shared on social media. And despite some of the obvious limitations of the forma lack of audio, for onehis output has garnered quite a lot of attention on social media, including personalized responses from some of the developers who make the games that he loves to show off.

Of course, high-level players have loved to flaunt their stuff to an audience before the advent of online videothere are notable Devil May Cry 3 combo videos that are more than a decade old at this pointbut Kumar brings a level of precision and production quality that makes his work stand out even in meme-choked gaming subreddits. From the position of the camera to the exact sequence of moves, his work exudes the same sense of authorship of a well-directed fight scene, of two or more actors practicing the same steps over and over until they get the perfect take. In Kumars case, however, that can mean wrestling with the troublesome AI of a dragon who wont quite do the right attack pattern in Monster Hunter World, or reinputting a dropped combo in a Platinum game.

Kumar first learned how to make GIFs a decade ago, when he bought a PS3 to play Gran Turismo 5. At first, he would cut segments from YouTube videos and compress them in GIF form. Over time, however, he became frustrated with the quality of the footage on offer. Since he wanted to control both the player vehicle and the lighting himself, as well as remove the pesky HUD from the screen, he eventually decided to buy his own capture card and take the directors chair for himself. From there, he discovered that creating footage that lived up to his standards could be quite difficult at times, but ultimately very fulfilling.

Over the years, Kumars process has grown more elaborate, but also much more consistent. Early on, he said, he would go days without posting anything, then record 10 GIFs of random gameplay and upload them all at once. Today, he tries to stick to a more regimented schedule, while still keeping up what he calls a certain standard of quality. When he first played Horizon: Zero Dawn, he began to experiment with its robust photo mode to create more dynamic camera angles. Though he was initially concerned that the process of entering photo mode would cause the footage to lose frames, over time, he began to use the photo modes of games like Spider-Man and God of War to create unexpected juxtapositions, or as a transition to cut from clip to clip.

Every now and then I do try to come up with something new that I havent done before, Kumar said. A lot of the time it just doesnt work for me, but when its something I like the look of, I keep it in mind, so I can go back to it when needed.

Kumar said that the amount of time he has to invest to make a single GIF varies wildly from project to project. For example, in Devil May Cry 5, he told me he sometimes spends two to three hours practicing a combo, and then a few more hours trying to capture the mayhem with the right lighting and camera angles. But in a game like Monster Hunter: World, where enemy behavior varies heavily due to randomization, hell often have to fight the same monster six or seven times for the right capturethough hes learned to spread the clashes out over a week or two so he doesnt grow frustrated in the process. Every now and then, however, hell play a game normally and luck into some great raw footage. It all just depends on the day.

That said, Kumar noted that game developers could institute a few small tweaks that would make his life a lot easier. For example, since he often has to replay the same sections of games over and over for the perfect takewithout a HUD, mind youhe wishes that hardware manufacturers would make it easier to make backup saves on consoles. And although this is less of a concern on PC, some devs on that platform still take great pains to hide the save files from crafty players. (Looking at you, FromSoftware.) Kumar also sometimes uses cheats to enhance his footage, such as infinite ammo or slow motion, and when developers dont give him those options, hell rely on mods created by the fans instead. Most of Kumars clips are enhanced by filters and special effects that he achieves through editing software, but he said having more raw options in-game is always helpful.

Kumars work has triggered other GIF makers to come to the fore, such as fellow Sony fan Much118x. According to Much, Kumar not only served as his inspiration, but also personally instructed him in the process of making GIFs in the first place. Much has become well-known for crafting GIFs that feature several different scenes or games by utilizing match cuts to achieve smooth transitions. Much credited his steady improvement to Kumars guidance and his own simple perseverance, along with the inspiration he derives from cinematic forerunners like Quentin Tarantino. Muchs work tends towards Sony games, especially God of War and Horizon Zero Dawn, and he cited their detailed animation work as a definite advantage, along with the simple fact that theyre his favorite games to play. These are the games that I typically love the most too, mainly for the narratives they tell, and so it essentially becomes inherently enjoyable just to make something creative for a game you love, he said.

When you look at compilations of both Kumar and Muchs work, one thing in particular stands out: the sheer volume of slicing, stabbing, and shooting on display. Though Much noted that hes dabbled in non-violent GIFs in the past, he personally thinks that video is a better medium to convey the distinct and expansive atmospheres of less-combat-driven games like Death Stranding, especially given the role that ambient music plays in stirring those moods. Still, Much said that he primarily makes GIFs to show off the superior fluidity of animation that some triple-A games exhibit, and that primarily comes in the form of their combat, with only a few notable exceptions. In that sense, hes just capturing what excites him about these games.

Though theres no doubt that these GIFs are a new form of art created by and for video game players, for Kumar, theyre also a way to highlight a games high points or bombastic moments, similar to the sizzle reel that might accompany a teaser trailer for an upcoming game. Much offered a slightly different rationale: For him, making GIFs is just a way to spend more time with a game that he loves, soaking up the scenery, and enjoying the particulars of its soundtrack.

I believe that I enjoy making content for these games simply just because I love the amount of clear dedication that the teams behind these games put into their work, in addition to how much I loved the games myself, Much says. To be recognized by people in the industry for making GIFs is nothing short of motivating and heartwarming.

Header image: Capcom

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The Best Ways to Virtually Stay in Touch During the COVID-19 Pandemic – Training.com.au

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In the darker times of our lives we often seek out the comfort of loved ones who are reassuringly familiar and within reach, but what can we do when were discouraged from social interaction?

Losing a job and financial hardship are considered some of the most stressful life events.

In this period of uncertainty and heightened stress it is crucial to stay connected to your social circle.

Enforced isolation, voluntary social distancing and community lockdowns, though proven to reduce the spread of coronavirus, can impact your mental health, causing feelings of loneliness and depression.

Thankfully, in the world of modern technology there are still ways to virtually stay connected to family, friends and loved ones during this period.

Social media, phone calls, Skype, Google Hangouts and FaceTime are tried and true methods of staying connected but there are a few new and innovative ways to catch up and have fun together.

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The Best Ways to Virtually Stay in Touch During the COVID-19 Pandemic - Training.com.au

Why Networking is So Important in the Legal Industry – Legal Reader

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Connections can uplift your career in the legal profession because you place yourself in the minds of potential employers. It is a way to ensure that your skills, strengths, and accomplishments will not be ignored.

In order to sustain a successful law practice, there are two main goals that have remained intact over the last decades: maintaining current clients by answering effectively to their concerns and acquiring new clients.Now, these objectives around how to develop a prosperous practice might not have changed, but the means and ways of getting there are a different matter. Heres where networking comes in.

Networking is

Networking is the process by which professional contacts are gained by interacting with people at business-related events, exchanging contact details according to common interests, and developing connections within existing networks. Networking is about building and managing relationships with the purpose of developing business and/or acquiring clients, either to your own practice or referring to someone elses.

This is not about using others. Its not gossiping. Its not a show off move or a bluff. Networking involves an honest and constant effort in helping others, in the hopes that maybe, but not necessarily, you might receive help as well.

Beyond legal practices and firms, networking is at the basis of any business development activity. Here, we can recognize it each time a lawyer looks for advice on a specific issue and in return offers their aid for any possible future concern that involves his field of expertise.

This article will take you through the meaningful qualities networking has to offer inside the legal industry and the steps that should be followed to display competent networking skills.

Networking Effectively, a Step-by-Step handbook

As we mentioned above, networking is about establishing and maintaining fruitful professional relationships and contacts. Imagine you meet someone with a given specialization and, later on, you realize that this persons knowledge and expertise can help someone else you know from your professional environment. All you need to do is connect both contacts to facilitate opportunities to obtain useful advising.

Lets bring this down to actionable items. Here are some footsteps that are suggested when it comes to starting your networking agenda:

Make a list of all those people:

Get in contact with them, to share experience and advice. They might actually suggest people from their network to reach out to. Consulting your universitys careers service is also a smart move (sometimes, you might even find seminars on how to network).

Describe why networking is important to you.

Identify yourself. What are your goals? What are your areas of interest? Take awareness of where you stand out, where you perform best and the abilities you have to offer.

Defining possible contacts according to your networking purpose will take time and energy. Firms need to be specific about who theyd like to incorporate as new clients and list current and future network contacts.

Make a strategy to target those youre interested in meeting. List events that can help you reach those contacts. In college, its common for law students to come across some opportunities like conferences, workshops, research projects, and even publishing articles. The effects of this are twofold. First, it helps you improve your skills and knowledge. Second, it pushes you to get out there to receive credibility and recognition from people.

Develop a 30-second pitch on yourself, describing who you are and what area of law youve specialized in. Check the Twitter feed of law firms for posting events, as well as the national and local law society, and try to attend any events they arrange.

At all times, on any event, interview, or presentation, be kind. Complimenting others work and being considerate of their concerns is also fundamental for productive networking because its based on trust.

Additionally, its important to be an effective communicator. Speak calmly and clearly. Be confident in what you have to offer and listen. A good listener who lets the other person speak makes a good conversation too. Anyone talking to you will know youre interested in them and will feel comfortable.

You need to be reachable. The whole point of networking is making sure that youre accessible to others as a reliable contact. How? There are three elementary tools: blogging, social networking to stay connected (for instance, being active on Linkedin as a professional platform), and participating in internships. If youre interacting, youre networking. This includes school committee reunions or participating in nonprofit activities.

A distinctive habit would be that of having your own blog to regularly upload your understanding and appreciation of legal matters. This will open your network to those who share similar interests.

Plan annual meetings with clients, invite people to semi-annual luncheons or holiday parties, make regular phone calls to prospective clients, maintain one-on-one recognition, exchange business information in breakfast meetings, forward articles of interest and express your interest in learning more about your contactss business.

Doors are always open to finding additional networking opportunities, so keep this search in mind and dont worry if certain interactions didnt turn out to be as productive as you mightve expected. Keep going and look for new options.

The nuances of Networking

Networking has several indisputable benefits that other forms of presentation cant guarantee. Sure, your Curriculum Vitae will certainly include your experience, the period of time youve been committed to a project, the set of skills youve obtained, but thats still not your voice. The impression caused by your personality and the references made about you is what raises awareness of your expertise.

To most employers, a good recommendation coming from his closest circles of qualified professionals has a very compelling weight since they verify your integrity and competence. Networking is a way of marketing your professional profile.

The importance of networking today focuses on helping professionals in the legal industry to sustain a successful law practice through connections: the more related you get with different specialists, the wider your scope for potential clients gets. Plus, youll build your own name. Networking is a tool for differentiating your work from others in the competitive legal market.

Connections can uplift your career in the legal profession because you place yourself in the minds of potential employers. It is a way to ensure that your skills, strengths, and accomplishments will not be ignored.

Another reason for networking is that it keeps you updated. In order to build a lasting professional relationship, channels of communication like social media, videoconferencing, even publications in a professional blog, are vital.

This way, you can also find services you need thanks to networking. A perfect example can be legal interpreting. If youre in need of this service, knowing lawyers whove worked with a legal interpretation team will give you a reference for the qualification of their work, especially if those are contacts whose criteria you can rely on.

Lastly, if helping others is a big part of your vocation, networking will suit you just fine. As weve mentioned before, its not all about getting what you need from others. Youll engage people who have their own searches and needs and you can commit to helping others through a productive network.

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Why Networking is So Important in the Legal Industry - Legal Reader

How COVID-19 is highlighting the need for Canada to embrace digital signatures – BetaKit

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The COVID-19 pandemic has affected every aspect of our lives, from how we spend our time, to how we run our business, to how we take care of daily tasks.

With most of Canadas population either social distancing, self-isolating, or quarantined, taking care of tasks that typically require an in-person or offline element have become increasingly difficult or even impossible, and it has highlighted the need for legal and regulatory change in order to support more online processes, primarily digital signatures.

The government is also recognizing the need for digital signatures during COVID-19.

As the CEO of estate planning startup Willful, which helps Canadians create wills and Power of Attorney (POA) documents online, the limitations in our business have always had nothing to do with technology, and everything to do with the law.

In 2020, you can buy a home using a digital signature, but you still have to print and sign your will/POA for good reason, many would argue, since the purpose of witnesses to your will is to ensure an individual created those legal documents in sound mind without duress. Thats hard to do with Docusign since its easy to forge a signature which is the larger issue with any digital signature, whether its on a will, contract, or any other legal documents. How do you verify that a specific person is really signing a specific document online?

The United States (US) is ahead of Canada when it comes to adopting digital signatures on wills, as profiled in a New York Times article last fall. Nonprofit organization Uniform Law Commission drafted the Uniform Electronic Wills Act, which can act as a model for individual states to adopt. Several states including Nevada and Indiana already allow e-signatures, with more expected to follow suit in 2020.

Trust & Will, a partner of ours based out of San Diego, executed the first digital will in the US in Nevada in January 2019.

Digital signatures are important not just for wills; think of any document that needs to be notarized, including real estate transaction documents or auto insurance claims. Right now going in-person to a notary is difficult if not impossible.

The US allows digital notarization of wills and other documents through Notarize, a Washington, DC-based company that has a distributed team of notaries who notarize through a series of steps. Users upload or take a photo of the document that needs to be notarized, enter the last four digits of their social security number, answer five identity verification questions within two minutes, and submit a photo of their photo ID. After being verified, users connect with a notary via video and they finish the process by adding their signature and stamp.

The Law Society of Ontario issued guidance about virtual commissioning for the first time.

Notarizes CEO Patrick Kinsel said on Twitter that COVID-19 has led to an explosion in their business, with 30 percent growth per day. He said theyre hiring hundreds of notaries across the country to meet demand.

Canadian companies like Vaultie are tackling identity verification for digital signatures by using a verified photo tied to your government-issued photo ID. Vaultie launched in January, and CEO Meyer Mechanic said the service is used for everything from digital notarization to rental agreements to legal documents. Due to the spread of COVID-19, theyve seen an increase in demand, and the Law Society of Ontario issued guidance about virtual commissioning for the first time. The Law Society still advises that in-person is best practice, but its a step in the right direction.

Documents signed with Vaultie are tied to a verified selfie using compliance grade facial recognition and government identification testing. Anchored on a blockchain, documents are tamper-proof and instantly verifiable by any third party, Mechanic said in an email. Using this method we can provide a higher level of fraud prevention by linking a physical person (instead of their account) to a digital document.

The government is also recognizing the need for digital signatures during COVID-19. In the Economic Response Plan unveiled last week, the CRA announced it would be recognizing digital signatures as having met the signature requirements of the Income Tax Act, specifically on T183 or T183CORP. The CRA state that its a temporary measure due to COVID-19, but this may also lead to lasting change.

While COVID-19 will have a lot of negative lasting effects on our lives, one positive change it could inspire is the adoption by lawmakers and regulatory bodies of digital signatures. Whether its because we have to or because we want to, Canadians should have the ability to easily sign documents online.

Image source Unsplash. Photo by Kelly Sikkema

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How COVID-19 is highlighting the need for Canada to embrace digital signatures - BetaKit

Grammarly vs Ginger: Which Is the Best Grammar Checker – Guiding Tech

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In all forms, grammatical errors are embarrassing. Be it a school essay, a letter, an email, or what have you, the desired end-result of any write-up is for it to come out error-free. With grammar and spellchecking tools, perfection in your writing vocabulary is easily achievable. In this post, we compare two brilliant grammar checkers (Grammarly and Ginger) to see which one does a better job.

Both Grammarly and Ginger are popular names in the spellchecking and grammar correction ecosystem. If you're looking to improve your writing, or you need a tool to 'catch' incorrect grammar and punctuation in your texts, but you're caught in between choosing Grammarly or Ginger, this guide should help you make a better decision.

Note: We are recommending apps only because these apps are better at picking up common grammatical errors quickly. These apps are not the absolute tools to fix grammar in text for grammar is quite subjective at times.

What devices would you be writing on the most? Is it a computer or on a mobile device? Also, what operating system do your devices run? The answer to these questions goes a long way in determining which of the grammar checker you should settle for.

For Grammarly, the tool is available as a keyboard app for Android and iOS devices.

Grammarly Keyboard for Android

Grammarly Keyboard for iOS

For PC, Grammarly currently has an app available for Windows devices.

Grammarly for Windows

Alternatively, you can use the Grammarly's grammar and spelling checking services on your Windows computer via web browsers. Grammarly has extensions for the following browsers: Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Safari, and Mozilla Firefox.

Get Grammarly Extension for Chrome

Get Grammarly Extension for Firefox

Get Grammarly Extension for Microsoft Edge

Get Grammarly Extension for Safari

If you aren't a fan of browser extensions, you can use the Grammarly web app to check and edit your writing.

Ginger has a dedicated keyboard app for Android devices that double as grammar and spell checker. There's no iOS version of the Ginger keyboard as the development of the app was discontinued in June 2015 and replaced with the Ginger Page app, which encompasses all of Ginger's writing and grammar checking tools. However, it is worth noting that Ginger Page (for iOS) is a paid app.

Install Ginger Keyboard App (Android)

Install Ginger Page App (iOS)

To use Ginger on a Windows computer, you can either rely on the dedicated app or use the service on the Chrome browser by installing the 'Grammar and Spelling checker by Ginger' extension.

Download Ginger for Windows App

You can only use Ginger's grammar checking services and features by installing its extension on your Chrome or Safari browser.

Install the Ginger Chrome Extension

Install the Ginger Safari Extension

Interestingly, like Grammarly, Ginger also has a dedicated web app/editor that can be used for quick grammar check without installing any app or extension on your computer.

As mentioned earlier, both Ginger and Grammarly have web apps that can be easily be accessed online via a web browser without having to install any app or extension on your device. We take a look at the web app of both platforms.

Note: The grammar and spellchecking functionalities of both Grammarly and Ginger require an internet connection. That applies to usage on mobile and PC.

I constructed some sentences and intentionally messed up punctuation to see which of the duo would identify and correct the errors.

Ginger was able to detect the incorrect capitalization and suggested a change of "WHy did you change your mind." to "Why did you change your mind." While this is decent, there's more that could have been done to make the sentence better. Check out Grammarly's correction for more context.

Grammarly was smart enough to detect both wrongs in the sentence: capitalization and punctuation errors. Grammarly editor suggested that I should change the "WHy" to "why", the grammar checking algorithm was also smart enough to detect that "Why did you change your mind." is a question and suggested that I changed the punctuation (full stop) at the end of the sentence to a question mark. It's the little details that matter, right?

One inadequacy I noticed with the Grammarly web editor is that it doesn't correct your document title. In the image below, I spelled "Article" wrongly in the document title and also punctuated wrongly, but Grammarly didn't pick these errors.

It seems as though Grammarly only checks and corrects the body (content) of your document, not the title.

Want to proofread or edit a previously-created document? Grammarly lets you upload a document you typed or created on other apps and edit within the web app. Supported file formats are .DOCX, .ODT, .RTF, and .TXT. Simply tap Upload file in the web app menu section and select the document you want to proofread from your computer.

When you are done, you can export the corrected document to your computer. Mind you, Grammarly can only export documents in the .DOCX format.

Presently, Ginger doesn't support document upload on its web app. You can only (manually) paste the content you want to proofread into the editor.

Note: To use the Ginger web editor, you need to have the extension installed in your browser. You can use Grammarly's web editor without installing the extension.

At the top-right corner of the Ginger editor, you'd find the Translation and Synonyms sections. If some part of the document you are working on isn't written in English, you can copy the foreign text, paste it in the translate box, and hit the green translate button. Ginger would auto-detect the language and provide the English translation in the second box.

Finding synonyms of words is also easy with Ginger. Tap the Synonyms section, enter a word, and its synonyms would be provided.

While Grammarly doesn't offer text translation services at the moment, it does let you check for word synonyms in a pretty cool way. When writing in the Grammarly app or on a web browser with the Grammarly extension, simply double-tap a word and its synonyms would be displayed.

One thing I noticed while using both grammar checkers is that Ginger's thesaurus provides a larger collection of synonyms than Grammarly.

Both Grammarly's and Ginger's mobile keyboard apps are decent and work just as they should. Ginger seems to be more featured-packed. Here's why.

Using the Grammarly keyboard, you can only type in English. It does let you choose/switch your language preference to different forms of English writing styles, though: American English, Australian English, British English, and Canadian English.

The Ginger keyboard app only lets you choose between two English writing styles (American and British English). Still, there are about 58 different languages that you can type in using the keyboard. Navigate to Settings > Keyboard settings > Languages, then proceed to select the language input options. You can choose multiple languages. To switch input languages when typing, tap, and hold the space button and select the new preferred language.

Note: The Ginger keyboard app spell checker detects incorrect spellings and other grammatical errors only when the language input is set to English.

The Ginger app also comes with a dedicated writer tab where you can compose or paste text for spellchecking and proofreading. When you select a word in the writer, Ginger lets you translate the word to another language, find its synonyms, or look up its meaning in the built-in Ginger dictionary.

The Grammarly mobile keyboard app doesn't have a dedicated writer.

Just like on its web editor, the Ginger mobile app also comes with a Translate and Synonyms section for, obviously, translating words from one language to another and finding the synonyms of words, respectively.

You cannot translate words or check synonyms with the Grammarly mobile app.

When you download the Ginger app on your Android device, you get a dictionary as a bonus. Launch the app, tap the hamburger menu icon at the top-left corner, and select Define. That launches the app's dictionary, where you can search for the definition(s) of English words.

The dictionary provides voice pronunciation of words and also lets you check for synonyms and related words.

Both Grammarly and Ginger are available for free but are limited in feature offerings. To access the whole (advanced) features of both grammar checkers, you'd have to subscribe/upgrade to paid premium plans.

Ginger offers its premium plans in three (3) tiers:

Some premium features of the Ginger grammar checker include sentence rephrase, error analysis, text reader, etc. You can learn more about Ginger's premium plans via the link below.

See Ginger Premium Plans

Grammarly premium plans are as follows:

There's also a premium Grammarly plan designed for teams and businesses with members ranging from 3 to 149. The Business plan costs $12.50/month for each team member and is billed annually.

Some features you'd gain access to as a premium Grammarly member include plagiarism detector, vocabulary enhancement suggestions, readability checker, genre-specific writing style checks, etc.

See Grammarly Premium Plans

Ginger's premium plans are cheaper than Grammarly's. However, Grammarly's plans are a lot better feature-wise and that justifies the price difference.

Next up:Grammarly and Gboard are two of the most used keyboard apps out there. Which one should you use? Check our comparison in the article linked below.

Visit link:

Grammarly vs Ginger: Which Is the Best Grammar Checker - Guiding Tech

Unequal Justice: Where Are Impeachment and the 25th Amendment When We Need Them? – Common Dreams

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On March 13, in the midst of a deadly pandemic, President Donald Trump was asked if he took responsibility for the nation's lack of preparedness. Hisreply: "I don't take responsibility at all."

Where are impeachment and the Twenty-Fifth Amendmentthe two mechanisms provided by the Constitution for removing an unfit Presidentwhen we need them the most, as we do right now?

On February 5, Trump wasacquittedin his impeachment trial as a result of GOP cronyism and cowardice, so that door is shut. And theTwenty-Fifth Amendment, which requires action by the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet or Congress to initiate removal, is a non-starter, given the obsequiousness of Mike Pence and the intractable corruption of Senate Republicans.

Meanwhile, just when you thought Trump couldn't get any crazier or more incompetent in his handling of the coronavirus crisis, he took another wild leap into bizarro land with comments at Tuesday's White House press conference, and in remarks he uttered the same day on Twitter.

The press conference was called to update the public on the health emergency and to announce the administration's stimulus package to revive the economy, which is now likely inrecession. In anexchange with reporters, Trump was asked by NBC's Kristen Welker whether he had changed his once-dismissive attitude about the perils posed by the virus. Trump responded:

"I have seen that where people actually liked [my tone during a press conference held the day before], but I didn't feel different. I've always known this is a realthis is a pandemic. I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic. . . . I've always viewed it as very serious."

During the conference, Trump alsopraisedDemocratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, with whom he has often clashed over other kinds of policies and programs, stating that he and Cuomo had a "good talk this morning," and that he and the governor were "both doing a really good job."

But Trump delivered a very different message to his millions of social media followers just a few hours earlier, upbraiding Cuomo in aracist tweet: "Cuomo wants 'all states to be treated the same.' But all states aren't the same. Some are being hit hard by the Chinese Virus, some are being hit practically not at all. New York is a very big 'hotspot,' West Virginia has, thus far, zero cases. Andrew, keep politics out of it . . ."

By any rational standard, Trump's comments qualify as either some of the most egregious political lies of the twenty-first century or as yet another indication that he suffers from apersonality disorderthat allows him to dissociate from reality and disclaim responsibility for any of his actions. Instead, he blames others for any harm to the public, shocks to the stock market, or damage to the wider economy.

In truth, of course, the coronavirus isn't a Chinese disease, even if the initial outbreak occurred in China's Hubei Province and its capital city, Wuhan. The virus has since spread across the globe, fueled by community transmission, and is now firmly entrenched in the United States.

All Americans, regardless of race or ethnicity, are equally susceptible to the disease and equally capable of infecting others. And late Tuesday, belying Trump's tweet, West Virginiareportedits first coronavirus case. The disease is now in every state in the nation.

If anything, there is even less truth in Trump's press conference claim that he anticipated the pandemic before anyone else. To the contrary, Trumpdownplayedthe severity of the virus from the very outset, erroneously comparing it to the flu (which is far less lethal), denouncing media coverage of the malady as a "hoax," andpredictingthat "one dayit's like a miracleit will disappear."

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In arecent column,The New York Times' David Leonhardt catalogued many of Trump's most misleading statements. Here's a taste:

President Trump made his first public comments about the coronavirus on Jan. 22, in a television interview from Davos with CNBC's Joe Kernen. The first American case had been announced the day before, and Kernen asked Trump, "Are there worries about a pandemic at this point?"

The President responded: "No. Not at all. And we have it totally under control. It's one person coming in from China, and we have it under control. It's going to be just fine."

By this point, the seriousness of the virus was becoming clearer. It had spread from China to four other countries. China was starting to take drastic measures and was on the verge of closing off the city of Wuhan.

In the weeks that followed, Trump faced a series of choices. He could have taken aggressive measures to slow the spread of the virus. He could have insisted that the United States ramp up efforts to produce test kits. He could have emphasized the risks that the virus presented and urged Americans to take precautions if they had reason to believe they were sick. He could have used the powers of the presidency to reduce the number of people who would ultimately get sick.

He did none of those things.

Perhaps the most loathsome of all of Trump's lies was his oft-repeatedclaimthat test kits for the virus were widely available to anyone who desired one.

In fact, as other countries rolled out thousands of testing kits, the Centers for Disease Controlwas slow to act, and resisted using tests produced by the World Health Organization. Kits manufactured in the United States are only now being provided on a large scale to hospitals around the country, but at a pace that continues to lag that achieved by many other nations.

The paucity of kits prevented the United States from enacting early and effective containment initiatives, which in turn has resulted in undercounts of the U.S. infection rate, and no doubt will ultimately lead to a higher overall incidence of mortality from the illness.

If the first duty of a President is to level with the American people and tell the truth in times of crisis, Trump has been a colossal failure. Whether that failure is due to ineptitude, malfeasance, a psychological impairment or some combination of factors, the country needs to remove him from office.

In the absence of impeachment and the fortitude to invoke the Twenty-Fifth Amendment, we are left with one alternativeto oust him next November. That's provided, of course, that the coronavirus doesn't arm Trump with a pretext to suspend the election and declare martial law.

Think that couldn't happen? I would have thought so, too, but that was before the virus shut down life as we knew it in America.

Read this article:

Unequal Justice: Where Are Impeachment and the 25th Amendment When We Need Them? - Common Dreams

Does the Takings Clause Require Compensation for Coronavirus Shutdowns? – Reason

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In general, I am a big supporter of strengthening protection for private property under the Takings Clause, and have written many works arguing the case for doing so. In this situation, however, it is unlikely that the Clause mandates compensation in all but a few cases. At the very least, there is no such requirement in current Supreme Court precedent, andon this pointthat precedent is unlikely to change in the near future.

While court decisions have long recognized that the Takings Clause requires compensation in at least some situations where the government restricts property rights without actually seizing the property in question, they have also long held that many exercises of the "police power"government's authority to protect public health and safetydo not qualify as takings. The most famous case of this type is the Supreme Court's decision in Miller v. Schoene (1928), where the Court ruled compensation is not required in a case where a state law required destruction of the owner's cedar trees in order to protect other trees in the area from the spread of a disease. Protecting large numbers of people from the spread of a disease is, of course, a much stronger police power imperative than protecting apple trees. This description is based on the conventional interpretation of Miller, which I have some reservations about. But, for present purposes, what matters is that the conventional view is the one embraced by courts.

Perhaps more relevantly, large numbers of businesses were forcibly shuttered by state and local governments during the influenza epidemic of 1918-19, the last time the US faced a public health crisis comparable in scale to this one. To my knowledge, none of them were ever held to be takings requiring compensation.

Not all exercises of the police power are exempt from the requirements of the Takings Clause. For example, a federal court recently ruled that compensation was owed in a case where the government deliberately flooded some property owners' land in order to protect others. I and a number of other commentators have been highly critical of another recent decision where an appellate court ruled that the government need not pay compensation in a case where the police virtually destroyed an innocent owner's home in order to smoke out a suspected shoplifter who had holed up inside.

But these types of cases differ from epidemic shutdowns in the important sense that they are not situations where the owner's use of the land in and of itself poses any threat to public health. Rather, the government decides to destroy a perfectly innocent property right in order to protect the public against threats emanating from elsewhere. By contrast, the continued operation of businesses that risk spreading a deadly disease during an epidemic do indeed pose a threat. The Takings Clause generally does not provide compensation in such cases. Doing so would risk creating a serious moral hazard by incentivizing owners to engage in dangerous uses of their property in order to get paid to stop.

Some state courts have interpreted their state constitutional takings clauses as requiring compensation when a local government changes zoning rules to forbid previously lawful businesses. But I doubt that these "amortization" precedents require compensation in cases like the Covid-19 shutdowns. Among other differences, amortization cases involve permanent rather than "merely" temporary bans on the enterprises in question.

Assume, for the sake of argument, that the plaintiffs in one of these cases somehow get past the police power issue. Even then, their prospects are likely to be bleak. Current Supreme Court precedent holds that only a few types of government actions qualify as automatic "per se" takings: most notably permanent physical occupation of property and regulations that completely destroy all of the property's economic value. Most other regulations are evaluated under the three factor test laid out in the 1978 Penn Central decision, which requires courts to consider 1) the economic impact of the regulation in question, 2) whether and to what extent, the owner suffered the loss of "investment-backed expectations," and 3) the "character" of the government action (if the government physically occupied or damaged the property in question, it is more likely to be a taking).

To make a long story short, the Penn Central test is often unclear and confusing, but is usually applied in ways that tilt the outcome in favor of the government. In this case, the fact that the shutdowns are "only" temporary and that there is no physical invasion of the owners' land are likely to be sufficient to enable the state to win most caseseven if the police power issue is set aside.

There might be some unusual cases where the impact of the government's actions is so severe that it does effectively destroy the entire economic value of a given piece of land, and therefore could be a per se taking. But such cases are likely to be rare, sinceagainthe restrictions are temporary and the owner couldin theorystill use the property for other purposes.

I am one of many takings scholars who have argued that the Penn Central test is a mess and that it should be replaced by something clearer and more protective of property owners' rights. So far, however, we have failed to persuade a majority of Supreme Court justices to agree with us. And that is unlikely to change in the near future, except in incrementally. If the justices do overrule Penn Central or revise its rules to provide stronger protection for property owners, a Coronavirus shutdown case strikes me as a highly unlikely vehicle for such a shift.

That gets me to final reason why courts are unlikely to rule that Coronavirus shutdowns qualify as takings: no judge will want to be seen as impeding an effort to save large numbers of lives in the midst of a grave menace to public health. As a general rule, I am not a "legal realist"a person who believes court decisions are primarily the product of judges' personal values and political commitments. But it would be naive to imagine that such commitments never play a role. And few if any judges want to be remembered for having endangered large numbers of lives. That might not matter if the legal arguments were overwhelmingly in favor of the plaintiffs. But, as we have seen, they are at best a stretchat least under current doctrine.

To be sure, a ruling that the government must pay compensation to owners of shuttered properties would not actually prevent the shutdowns, as such. It would merely require the state to pay for the privilege. I routinely make this point when critics argue that takings liability should not be expanded in other contexts, for fear that doing so would stop supposedly valuable government actions. But, in this case, the urgency of the crisis combined with the enormous scale of the compensation that would be required make it more likely that an adverse judicial ruling really would impede the government's policypotentially even shutting down the shutdown, so to speak.

The Takings Clause might still require compensation in situations where the government physically appropriates property in order to combat the epidemic. For example, it could potentially seize currently empty hotels or college dormitories in order to use them as temporary hospitals to treat Covid-19 patients. In such a case, there would be an actual physical occupation of property. And the police power exception would not apply, because the mere existence of an (unoccupied) hotel or dorm does not pose any threat to public health. But such cases are likely to be rare. If the need arises, owners of such structures would probably be happy to rent them to the government for fairly modest prices, given that they are unlikely to bring in much other revenue while the pandemic continues.

It gives me no pleasure to write any of the above. In an ideal world, I think at least some shutdown burdens should be compensable under the Constitution. But the Takings Clause is unlikely to be a vehicle for such compensation in all but a few marginal cases.

That said, I do think the principle underlying the Takings Clause points the way towards a moral rationale for compensation, even if such compensation is not legally required. As the Supreme Court put it in Armstrong v. United States (1960), "[t]he Fifth Amendment's guarantee that private property shall not be taken for a public use without just compensation was designed to bar Government from forcing some people alone to bear public burdens which, in all fairness and justice, should be borne by the public as a whole." That is exactly what is happening in the coronavirus shutdowns: owners and employees of the shuttered enterprises are bearing a hugely disproportionate share of the burden of protecting the population as a whole against the virus.

Moreover, the people in question haven't done anything wrong. They simply own and operate businesses thatin normal timesare not only innocent but actually make important contributions to the community.

I am not sure what the best way to compensate them is. But I do think there is a strong case for providing at least some substantial relief. On that score, I agree with much of what co-blogger Keith Whittington says here. As he points out, "the government itself has ordered businesses to stop operating" and "[i]n such circumstances, the government should compensate individuals for the damage it has wrought and relieve individuals from the unforeseen burdens that they have been asked to assume."

But, if the shutdowns continue for any significant length of time, I am not optimistic that even the best designed relief program can compensate for more than a fraction of the enormous losses large numbers of people will suffer. The only truly effective relief would be to figure out a way to safely end the shutdowns as soon as possible, while moving to something like a South Korean-style regime, under which freedom of movement is restored, but the virus is kept in check by a combination of widespread testing and effective quarantines of infected individuals until the need for it is obviated by the development of a vaccine.

But I readily admit I lack the expertise needed to figure out how to achieve that goal. In this post, I have tried to achieve the much humbler task of explaining why the Takings Clause is unlikely to relieve the distress of property owners suffering enormous losses due to the coronavirus shutdowns.

See the rest here:

Does the Takings Clause Require Compensation for Coronavirus Shutdowns? - Reason

My New "Atlantic" Article Making the Case for Strengthening Protection for Property Rights – Reason

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The Atlantic has just published my new article making the case for expanding protection for constitutional property rights. Here is an excerpt:

Alexander Hamilton said at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 that "one great obj[ect] of Gov[ernment] is the personal protection and security of property." James Madison, similarly, wrote that "government is instituted to protect property of every sort." Madison tried to ensure that the new Constitution would honor that principle, in part by authoring the takings clause of the Fifth Amendment, which restricts the government's power to take private property.

This should concern anyone who cares about protecting the rights of minorities and the poor. These groups are the primary victims when property rights are violated. They have seen the state condemn their homes for dubious private "development" projects. They have seen law enforcement seize their assets even when they have never been charged with any crime, much less convicted. And they have been shut out of housing and job opportunities by onerous zoning laws that block housing construction. These groups have the most to gain from stronger protection for property rights, which would enforce tighter constraints on government's power to take property and block development.

The article goes through several areas where protection for constitutional property rights remains weak, while also noting some recent improvements, and potential avenues for further progress.

This article was in the pipeline since before the coronavirus crisis. I understand why many readers might find it difficult to care about other issues right now. I sometimes feel that way myself!

At the same time, however, the crisis will end eventually, and it behooves to think about how to make a better society in the aftermath. Stronger protection for property rights can make a useful contribution to that task, and I hope my article can at least help stimulate further discussion on that point.

UPDATE: For those interested in property rights issues directly related to the coronavirus situation, see this post, in which I explain why courts are highly unlikely to rule that the Takings Clause requires the government to compensate owners of enterprises shuttered as a result of "shutdown" orders.

Go here to see the original:

My New "Atlantic" Article Making the Case for Strengthening Protection for Property Rights - Reason

Letter to the Editor: Will Republican Leadership Stand Up to Murphy in Wake of Coronavirus Crisis? – TAPinto.net

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Editor's note: This letter is addressed to the Republican leadership and urges them to "stand up to the authoritarianism of Governor Murphy" and to assert constitututional rights.

To: Chairman Doug Steinhardt, Esq.; Senate Republican Leader Tom Kean, Jr.; and Assembly Republican Leader Jon Bramnick, Esq.

Dear Republican Leaders:

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We are writing to you as both concerned American citizens and members of the clergy. We are circulating this letter to other citizens and clergy across New Jersey.

A civil rights attorney recently made the point that our founders were intimately familiar with pandemics, viruses and plagues, living at a time before the life-extending science that we benefit from today. Nevertheless, there is not one word in the Constitution about plagues or pandemics to exempt the government from any of our Bill of Rights. The founders of our Republic did not allow for a health crisis or medical emergency as an excuse to suspend our Constitutional liberties.

Our Bill of Rights is under attack by a number of misguided state executives including Governor Phil Murphy who are embracing authoritarian measures under color of law. Our Constitution is being quarantined as if a virus has made it irrelevant. Can a virus do that? Can a panic stoked by the media negate every protection we enjoy as citizens of a Republic? Is this the way democracy dies?

Every citizen should be concerned about how quickly and with gusto this Governor has moved to forcibly strip us of our freedoms. Where is the American Civil Liberties Union? Where are the liberal voices of good conscience in Governor Murphys own party?

As leaders of the opposition party in New Jersey, the Republican Party, we ask that you provide the checks and balances needed at a moment like this. We ask that you aggressively press Governor Murphy and hold him to account for his attack on the Bill of Rights and the Constitution of the United States of America.

Governor Murphy has suspended the First Amendment by issuing lock-down orders and curfews that prohibit obtaining a petition for public protest or public assemblies. He has infringed on the free practice of religion. These are black letter violations of the Law of this Republic.

Governor Murphy has suspended the Second Amendment under the guise of a mandatory shut-down of all nonessential businesses and by barring citizen access to the online means to obtain legal permits. Worse still, he has done so while releasing thousands of convicted criminals from prison, at a time of food shortages, in the midst of a crisis that has stretched law enforcement readiness and increased response times.

Governor Murphy has suspended the Fourth Amendment by asking neighbor to spy upon neighbor and using taxpayer funds to create a system by which reports may be filed and acted upon outside the normal legal process, which has been severely curtailed. Under color of law, the Governor has employed his appointed Attorney General to threaten, coerce, and compel individuals and communities into ceding their protected liberties to the government. He has criminalized heretofore everyday private and peaceful activities, and has done so with the knowledge that every interaction between law enforcement and citizens carries with it the possibility of a fatality. Just ask Eric Garner.

Governor Murphy has suspended the Fifth Amendment the right to property without deprivation by due process of law, and the obligation of government to compensate for such takings. He has issued authoritarian mandates destroying the means of legal commerce, that close businesses without appeal, making workers redundant, and leaving families without the means of survival. Worse, he has done so while continuing to collect taxes on the property and extant funds left to those made unemployed and whose lives will soon be unsustainable.

As religious leaders who both suffer and who minister every day to those suffering, we urge the opposition party to stand up to the authoritarianism of Governor Murphy and to assert our rights under the Constitution of the United States of America and the Bill of Rights. There must be checks and balances in place to the Governors reckless and ruinous abuse of power.

Please hear our prayer.

Respectfully,

Pastor Philip Rizzo

Rev. Gregory Quinlan

Original post:

Letter to the Editor: Will Republican Leadership Stand Up to Murphy in Wake of Coronavirus Crisis? - TAPinto.net

NCLA Commends the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit for Not Deferring to FDAs Attempt to Circumvent FOIA – Yahoo Finance

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Amicus Brief in Support of Appellants in Goldwater Institute v. U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services

Washington, D.C., March 25, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The New Civil Liberties Alliance, a nonpartisan, nonprofit civil rights organization commends todays decision of the Ninth Circuit in Goldwater Institute v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. In a victory for NCLA, the Ninth Circuit concluded that the district court erred in allowing the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to rely on its own regulations in withholding disclosure of the process it used in speedily approving the drug ZMapp for treatment of Ebola-infected patients in 2014. Instead, the Court concluded that the agency should be required to meet its burden of showing that a particular FOIA exemption applies to the records it withheld.

NCLA filed an amicus brief in support of the plaintiff-appellant in this case calling out the district court for extending judicial Auerdeference to legal interpretations that federal agencies provide in affidavits to the court as one of the litigating parties.In its ruling the Court states, FDAs blanket refusal to produce any records from the IND file does not warrant summary judgment in its favor and that the agency has failed to meet its burden of establishing that the documents it withheld are exempt from disclosure under [FOIA] Exemption 4.

Deferring to the interpretations of federal agencies requires judges to abandon their duty of independent judgment and violates the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by commanding that the judiciary display systematic bias in favor of agencies whenever they appear as litigants.

The Supreme Court created a new Step Zero toAuerdeference last summer inKisor v. Wilkie, which requires courts first to use traditional tools of statutory construction and evaluate other factors to determine whether there is a need to resort toAuerdeference. UnderKisor, there should be no need to defer to agencies legal interpretations in most cases going forwardvery much including this one.

The FDA had refused to release records of the process it used to approve ZMappat the time, an experimental drugwithin days of hearing about the Ebola outbreak in Africa. The FDA drug-approval process usually takes years. The Goldwater Institute had asked FDA to disclose what process it used for emergency approval; knowing the fast-track process could help others seek emergency approval during future pandemics (like the one currently plaguing the world).

NCLA released the following statement:

While the court does not mention deference, its instruction to the district court to look to the FOIA and not the agencys self-serving regulations is clear and welcome. NCLA will continue pushing the courts to acknowledge their duty to provide independent judgment, to protect the due process of law for all litigants, and to bolster the confidence of the people in the courts. Adi Dynar, Litigation Counsel, NCLA

ABOUT NCLA

NCLA is a nonpartisan, nonprofit civil rights group founded by prominent legal scholar Philip Hamburger to protect constitutional freedoms from violations by the Administrative State. NCLAs public-interest litigation and other pro bono advocacy strive to tame the unlawful power of state and federal agencies and to foster a new civil liberties movement that will help restore Americans fundamental rights.

For more information visit us online at NCLAlegal.org.

Judy Pino, Communications DirectorNew Civil Liberties Alliance202-869-5218media@ncla.legal

Here is the original post:

NCLA Commends the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit for Not Deferring to FDAs Attempt to Circumvent FOIA - Yahoo Finance

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg: Their Case, Trial and Death – Biography

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The story of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage in 1951, reads like something out of a John le Carr novel with its components of shadowy spies, corrupted trial proceedings and family betrayal.

It also captures the real-world dangers that were rife in these days of Cold War paranoia, the threat of a Red Scare powerful enough to bring about the controversial executions of the couple that left their young children orphaned.

READ MORE:Charlie Chaplin and 6 Other Artists Who Were Blacklisted in Hollywood During the Red Scare

Ethel Greenglass and Julius Rosenberg were both born into immigrant Jewish families in New York City during World War I. Their time at high school intersected briefly Ethel was nearly three years older but they became acquainted through their devotion to the Young Communist League and were married in 1939.

Julius became a civilian engineer with the U.S. Army Signal Corps and cut formal ties with communist organizations, but by late 1942 he was working with Soviet intermediaries to relay military secrets to the then-American ally.

By 1945, he had assembled an espionage ring of engineers, scientists and machinists that included his old City College classmate Morton Sobell. It also included his brother-in-law David Greenglass, who was then involved with the Manhattan Project the creation of the atomic bomb at a facility in Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Ethel and Julius Rosenberg following their arrest by the FBI in New York City for espionage, 1950.

Photo: Kypros/Getty Images

The first shoe to drop in the case came with the arrest of German-born British physicist Klaus Fuchs on February 2, 1950. Fuchs had also worked at Los Alamos and passed along information to the Soviets independently of the Rosenbergs, though they shared a crucial link with their courier, Harry Gold.

In May the FBI hauled in Gold, who pointed his finger at another common denominator, Greenglass. The dominoes continued to fall with Julius' apprehension in July and Ethel's arrest in August, with Sobell discovered to be hiding in Mexico at that time.

After Greenglass pleaded guilty, the trial for the Rosenbergs and Sobell began on March 6, 1951, in the Southern District of New York. Making little attempt to portray himself as impartial, Judge Irving R. Kaufman opened the proceedings by declaring: "The evidence will show that the loyalty and alliance of the Rosenbergs and Sobell were not to our country, but that it was to Communism."

The case against the Rosenbergs largely hinged on the testimonies of Gold and Greenglass. Gold recalled how he had met Greenglass in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in June 1945, with the passcode "I come from Julius." After each confirmed the shared allegiance by producing a "passport" of a cut-off Jell-O box top, Gold paid $500 for information on the atomic bomb.

Greenglass testified that the Rosenbergs began lobbying his wife, Ruth, to get her husband involved in the espionage ring by November 1944. He returned to New York City on furlough in January 1945, at which point he showed Julius his notes and a sketch of a high-explosive lens.

Even more damning, Greenglass described another meeting at the Rosenbergs' New York City apartment in September 1945, during which time Ethel typed up his shoddy, hastily scribbled notes.

To this point, the government's case against Ethel was largely nonexistent; now, her brother had portrayed her as a willing co-conspirator. Chief prosecutor Irving H. Saypol leaped all over this account, dramatically telling the jury how she "sat at that typewriter and struck the keys, blow by blow, against her own country in the interests of the Soviets."

Julius and Ethel took the stand in their defense, but other than denying the charges, they largely evoked the Fifth Amendment on matters of espionage and their involvement in the Communist Party, their silence amplifying the testimony against them.

Ethel and Julius Rosenberg at the courthouse

Photo: Bettmann/Getty Images

On March 29, 1951, the jury returned a verdict of guilty against the trio charged. Judge Kaufman imposed the death penalty on Julius and Ethel, telling them, "I consider your crimes worse than murder." He spared the life of Sobell, who was not involved in the passage of atomic secrets and sentenced him to 30 years in prison.

A death sentence, especially for the parents of two young boys, became a major source for debate, with Albert Einstein and Pope Pius XII among the influential figures who urged the U.S. government to show mercy. However, the legal appeals and requests for clemency, to President Truman and then-President Eisenhower, all fizzled.

After a last-minute stay of execution was overturned, on June 19, 1953, Julius and Ethel were electrocuted at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, New York, making them the first American civilians to be executed for espionage during peacetime.

The case remained a source of intrigue for scholars who argued about the evidence against the Rosenbergs, the clear bias of the presiding judge and the harshness of the verdict.

But there were more twists to be uncovered. In 1995, the National Security Agency released a half-century-old trove of decrypted Soviet messages from the Venona Project which provided clear evidence of Julius' espionage.

Four years later, Sam Roberts' The Brother: The Untold Story of the Rosenberg Case contained new bombshells from the reclusive Greenglass, including the admission that his wife possibly typed up the notes during the infamous September 1945 meeting, and that he told a different story on the witness stand to protect his immediate family.

The release of grand jury testimony in 2008 seemingly confirmed that account, while also providing inconsistencies between what Gold said in private and in public. That year, Sobell also went on record to confess to his and Julius' involvement with the Soviets, though he insisted that his colleague's information was useless to the Eastern power, and that Ethel was guilty only of "being Julius' wife."

The various revelations have prompted the Rosenbergs' surviving sons, Michael and Robert Meeropol, to launch an effort to have their mother formally exonerated. They were unable to win over President Obama, but there may be more chapters to come in this long-running Cold War saga.

Originally posted here:

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg: Their Case, Trial and Death - Biography