What a troubled power plant says about the future of nuclear energy

Nuclear energy in the United States is at an impasse.

American reliance on nuclear power has steadily increased from 11 percent to 30 percent of the country’s electrical output since the 1970s. However, three decades have gone by without a successful attempt to build any modern reactors, a fact that threatens the country’s position as world’s largest producer of nuclear power.

And that matters in the battle against global warming. According to some proponents of nuclear energy, if the U.S. pulls back even more on nuclear power, it’s possible that efforts to curb climate change could fall flat.

“We need all renewable technologies. If the U.S. lost nuclear, it would be a global loss in the fight to mitigate against climate change,” nuclear engineer Todd Allen said in an interview.

Nuclear power, unlike most things in the U.S., is a talking point that both sides of the political spectrum champion, even though members of the public are less enthusiastic about it, polls show.

Republican and Democratic senators alike support expanding nuclear power, and even President Donald Trump has stated his support for it.

So why then, with all of this federal support, is nuclear in the United States an endangered energy source? The answer might lie in Georgia.

Plant Vogtle is a 2-unit nuclear power plant located in Waynesboro, Georgia.

Between 2006 and 2008, the Nuclear Regulatory Committee approved the construction of four brand new nuclear reactors. The plan was to add two reactors each to the Alvin W. Vogtle Plant in Waynesboro, Georgia and Virgil C. Summer in Jenkinsville, South Carolina.

The projects were supposed to be America’s attempt at building a brand new style of advanced nuclear power reactors called the AP1000 — the first of which was successfully built by China at the end of September 2018.

Instead, the projects have become a stain on the country’s otherwise outstanding reputation in nuclear energy; one that may never come out.

In July 2017, the South Carolina project failed.

Project owners SCANA and Santee Cooper realized how behind schedule the project was and effectively tossed out the $16 billion investment, scrapping the power plant and triggering an FBI investigation in the process.

Georgia’s Plant Vogtle is not faring much better.

Investigations through the Georgia Public Services Commission — which oversees telecommunications, electric, and natural gas services — revealed that Georgia Power claimed that 60 percent of Plant Vogtle was complete, when the project was truly only 36 percent complete nearly a decade into construction.

Plant Vogtle is also $13 billion over the proposed budget. Bringing the project’s price tag to a staggering $27 billion and counting.

Vogtle was meant to be the site of the rebirth of nuclear power, but the project has been riddled with issues.

Early on in the Georgia investigation, chairman Stan Wise admitted that abandoning the project was on the table, saying in a statement that “it’s possible…that Plant Vogtle just doesn’t get finished at all.”

Opponents of nuclear power have long held that the power source is too expensive and takes too much time.

In the case of Vogtle and Summer, that seems to be true.

“You can’t ignore the time and the cost it takes to develop a new nuclear reactive design. There’s no cheap and dirty way to build nuclear power,” physicist and nuclear expert Edwin Lyman said in an interview.

He and his colleagues at the Union of Concerned Scientists have become some of the leading voices against nuclear energy expansion.

“There are a lot of people out there saying we need nuclear power to mitigate climate change. But we are already in such a deep hole with carbon emissions that what it would take to divert the degree increases… you’ve gotta say we’re not going to get there by building nuclear power plants,” Lyman said.

“How are you going to build 1,000 [reactors] around the world in the next 20 years?” Lyman asked.

And we might not even have that much time.

A report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that we have less than 20 years to avert the worst effects from climate change.

According to the report, carbon pollution would have to be cut by 45 percent by 2030 to keep the planet from warming 2 degrees Celsius — a temperature that scientists warn will devastate ecosystems. Electricity production accounts for the largest portion of carbon pollution at 32 percent in the United States.

In theory, nuclear energy expansion is one of the best options to reduce carbon emissions since it releases almost no CO2. In practice, it’s more complex.

Construction of the new reactors could be the first step to the modernization of nuclear energy in the United States.

When it comes to big power plant projects, at least in the United States, there has to be public support since consumers pay for a portion of the project costs. But Americans do not have the stomach for anything nuclear near their homes, even if it is the safest form of energy production.

Adding more time and more money to a project that has teetering public support is dangerous. Georgians may not have the stomach for another 10 years of construction.

And if the plant isn’t finished, the public will certainly turn against undertaking any more projects of this magnitude. The Atlanta Journal Constitution, a local news source, has found that residents are already starting to turn their backs now.

Also, nuclear power plants provide well-paying jobs. If Vogtle fails, the 7,000 promised jobs will fall through, leaving those who traveled the country to work stranded, according to a tweet from state governor Nathan Deal.

In a larger sense, a failure would signal to leadership both here and around the world that the United States is not able to modernize its nuclear capabilities.

“We would be proving that we can’t build a plant on time. Which means that if we can’t figure it out ourselves, we will have to buy them from another country,” Allen said.

That country could be China, which is poised to open another 15 nuclear facilities in the next decade and has been licensed to begin building another 30.

So in a sense, the future of nuclear energy in the United States depends on Plant Vogtle’s success.

“There’s a lot of money committed to Vogtle. They’ve got loans from DOE. It’s the last nuclear new build project in the U.S. and everything seems to be back on track. [The co-owners] all seem to be committed,” Allen said.

If they finish, no one is going to look back and think the project was pretty, he said, but at least it will be done.

Plant Vogtle already has two older generation nuclear reactors in operation.

Despite all of the bad, Vogtle is meant to be good.

“Each of the power plants should be able to roughly be able to supply electricity to roughly 1.75 million houses,” nuclear and radiation engineer Steve Biegalski said.

The energy from Vogtle would help to displace energy from coal-fired power plants, which is the third largest energy source in Georgia.

“Over the lifetime of the power plants, 300 million tons of CO2 admissions will be displaced from the atmosphere,” Biegalski said.

Nuclear energy emits even less carbon than other renewables like solar power. And if we plan on stopping climate change, we will need every tool in the tool shed, Allen explained.

“Climate is the issue, not technological favoritism,” Allen said. “There’s no need to throw out renewable sources totally.”

“In order to go low carbon, you can’t ignore any [renewable] source… There is market space for all sources,” Allen explained.

As projects become successful, companies will be able to learn from other mistakes and projects will take less and less time Biegalski explained.

Basically, there is hope.

Even Lyman, who is skeptical of nuclear energy, believes there is a chance.

“If [Plant Vogtle] can really reign in the management problems and construction issues, they might finish building,” he said.

But if they don’t do it now, Waynesboro, Georgia could be the final resting place of nuclear power in the United States.

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Lewd, Vulgar UFC Knockout Artist Derrick Lewis Couldn’t Care Less What You Think

Derrick Lewis deservedly thumping his chest at UFC 229.B/R

How can I explain why I recently spent a rainy Saturday in Houston with UFC heavyweight Derrick Lewis, his coach, Bob Perez, his mountainous strength coach, Jimmy Gerland, and a Michael Myers Halloween costume?

We’ll come back to that later. Promise.

The point is, if I had to give an explanation, I guess I would say: Lewis is tired of answering stupid questions.

He’s faced a lot of stupid questions since the world found out he’s fighting Daniel Cormier for the heavyweight title on Saturday, November 3 at UFC 230 in New York. His team and the UFC have been inundated by demand for a few minutes of Lewis’ time since he beat Alexander Volkov on October 6 to punch his ticket to the Cormier bout. The media swarmed Lewis after the fight, but not to discuss the matchup itself.

Oh, they pretended they wanted to know more about his win over Volkov and the way Lewis rallied from near-certain defeat, because it was awesome. But most of them viewed questions about the fight as a conduit to the thing they really wanted to talk about.

What they really wanted to talk about was Lewis’ balls.

Lewis finishing off Alexander Volkov.John Locher/Associated Press/Associated Press/Associated Press

So here’s the scene: Lewis is waiting for Joe Rogan to interview him. He’s just pulled an improbable comeback and beaten Volkov for the biggest win of his career. We’re talking the stuff of legend. It had been the kind of fight where you sat on your couch at home and begged the referee to stop it because it had gone on too long. Lewis is done, done, done—right up until he isn’t.

It’s kind of Lewis’ thing. He’s made a career of it, and he does it once more against Volkov and shrugs it off like it is something any other person could do. It is surprising, but not really. There is a thing that’s surprising, however: Lewis’ shorts are gone.

Somehow, in the minute or two that passed since the end of the bout, he’s relieved himself of his fight shorts. He’s wearing his underwear and nothing else, right there in front of God and everybody.

Rogan walks over to discuss Lewis’ incredible comeback win but hits the most important topic right away. He asks Lewis about his shorts and where they ran off to, and Lewis, sweating profusely and gasping for air, looks at Rogan and gives him what might be the best one-line response in UFC post-fight interview history.

“My balls was hot.”

It’s the way Lewis says the line that makes it land.

He has the best deadpan voice and facial expression. The best. He can say something absurd and hilarious with the straightest of faces. It is a talent few possess. Rogan takes the answer in stride. “I understand,” the comedian says. I’m still not sure how he kept a straight face.

Oh, and this sort of thing happens all the time with Lewis. When you ask a question, he’ll give you an answer. He’s not a liar. Not even a little bit. And he doesn’t do fake promotional hype or anything like that. It’s just that, well, he’s tired of answering the same questions from one reporter after another. It’s boring. And when he’s bored, things happen. Things like the bit I mentioned at the top, with the Michael Myers mask.

We’ll get to that part. I promise.

There are plenty of things Lewis says that can’t be included in this story, at least not without someone (me) getting fired. But even when he’s not forcing the UFC’s media department to work overtime to censor his language, Lewis keeps the media on its toes by answering questions with outrageous stories the interviewer knows are false. And even when the person knows he’s fibbing, Lewis sells it so well that doubt starts creeping in.

“Derrick, I saw you on TV a couple of nights ago at the basketball game. Was that fun?”

“Nah, I wasn’t at a basketball game. I was in Thailand training with monkeys and s–t.”

When Lewis started fighting in the UFC, the only thing the media wanted to talk about was his time in jail. He told MMA Fighting’s Chuck Mindenhall in 2014 that he was partying one night in high school when he ran into the ex-husband of a woman he had been romantic with. Things went south, and Lewis beat the guy, who had a shotgun, senseless. It was bad, and Lewis was charged with aggravated assault.

He got two years’ probation but then violated its terms and was sentenced to five years in prison. He served three-and-a half years. It was a hot topic for a while. He answered a lot of questions about it back then, and he doesn’t have anything new to add.

Lewis showing off the incredible power in his right hand.John Locher/Associated Press/Associated Press

After the part about the balls, Rogan asks if Lewis wants a title shot.

It makes sense. He just scored a high-profile win and then followed it with a classic line, sending his marketability through the roof.

But Lewis shoots it down, saying he needs to work on his cardio.

“F–k what you talking about right now,” Lewis says. “I ain’t trying to fight for no title.”

And, look. He is telling the truth. He does want to take some time off. He wants to heal his body. He wants to drive his new Mercedes-AMG GT R, an expensive, monstrous car that can make a passenger regret asking for a ride. He is building a new house, too, not too far from his current one. He opened a beauty shop a few years back, and it was successful enough that he’s planning a second location. He’s expanding his business empire, brick by brick.

So there are a lot of things Lewis could be doing instead of preparing for a fight. But what usually happens after Lewis says he wants time off is the UFC will call him a week or two later, and suddenly, he’ll find himself getting ready for a short-notice bout, which is not the same thing as relaxing and healing his body.

But a new fight means a new chance to make money. Now that he’s on a guaranteed flat-rate contract and not his old win/show deal, it’s even easier to cut short his vacation. Winning is still important, but not having to worry about getting his pay halved if he loses lessens the pressure.

About a week after Lewis said he wasn’t ready for a title fight, UFC matchmaker Mick Maynard—who has known Lewis for years and has helped shepherd the fighter’s career while promoting bouts in Houston and with the UFC—calls Perez, who has a feeling he knows what Maynard wants when he sees the call come in.

Maynard asks if Lewis can be ready for a fight on November 3, the UFC’s Madison Square Garden show. He’s intrigued, but Perez replies that they aren’t interested unless it is for the title. Maynard can’t (or more likely, won’t) confirm if it is a title fight against Cormier. Instead, he repeats the question: Can Derek be ready for November 3? Perez gets the hint.

And, well, that changes things. Vacation can wait.

The UFC doesn’t try to lure Lewis into taking the fight by giving him a huge boost in pay. The promotion doesn’t need to. He’s not receiving pay-per-view points—the system whereby UFC champions and others (Conor McGregor) get a portion of the UFC’s profits from a show they headline—so a big buyrate won’t pad his bank account in the way it does for other main event stars, or in the way it will pad Cormier’s coffers.

For Lewis, what this fight represents—and the reason he accepted it with zero hesitation—is opportunity.

If he beats Cormier, he’ll be the heavyweight champion. That’s a cool thing, but it’s not something Lewis cares about. The real opportunities are the money and visibility that come with being the heavyweight champion. As the titleholder, he’ll receive pay-per-view points, and he might get to step into Cormier’s expected fight against Brock Lesnar next year.

And if Lewis beats Cormier and then headlines a pay-per-view against Lesnar?

Oh, man. Hoo, boy. At that point, he’s pulling in forever money, which means the rest of us should enjoy him while we can. Because once Lewis has enough money to consider himself financially secure, he’s done with fighting. It’s a dangerous way to make a living.

“Once I know I’m set for life, I’m done,” he says.

Lewis and strength coach Jimmy Gerland pushing through training for Saturday’s fight.Photo by Jeremy Botter

It’s a Saturday morning in Houston when I walk into the gym Perez owns with former boxer Lou Savarese.

The gym is just a few blocks from the Toyota Center and looks like the sort of place that’s well-suited to defend itself against the hipster foodie spots and craft beer bars that started taking over the city a decade ago. It’s a real gym, the kind of place where pugilists have earned their spots. It has that smell you look for in a real gym: sweat mixed with an unidentifiable something else, all partially masked by the lemon cleaning product used more for killing germs than tidying up.

Perez greets me at the door and lets me know Lewis is running late, which does not surprise me; in my experience, no fighter in history has mastered the concept of time. But he also tells me Lewis is tired and a little worn down, and that today would be an easy day. Some cardio. Some stretching. Which is both fine by me and understandable. Cramming an eight-week fight camp into three weeks is not a good idea.

I already know he’s sick and tired of answering questions, I tell Perez, which works out great because I have no questions for him. Perez raises his eyebrows in suspicion. Seriously, I tell him. I don’t want to sit down and turn on a recorder and interview Derrick. I don’t want to ask him about his fight camp, because that’s boring, but also because it’s less than a month in duration.

I just want to hang out, be a fly on the wall, observe and hopefully do all of that in a way that is not weird or off-putting.

A few minutes later, Lewis walks through the front door. Perez introduces us even though we’ve met at least 30 times (this is great for self-esteem, by the way) and then relays what I told him about not wanting a typical interview and how I just want to hang out and watch.

Lewis raises his eyebrows in suspicion. I assure him I have no ulterior motive. I can tell he does not believe me.

Lewis doing his usual post-win celebration.Josh Hedges/Zuffa LLC/Getty Images

Gerland leads Lewis through some easy stretching before giving him a massage. The previous day, Lewis had gone through four hours of hard training, which is not a thing the human body enjoys. He looks worn but OK. He also looked worn (or almost dead?) against Volkov, and we saw how that turned out.

Regardless, today is a light day, so we all hop into Gerland’s truck and head toward the skate park where Lewis likes to do his cardio.

“It’s where he prefers to do his cardio, not likes to do it,” Perez says. The implication is that Lewis, like many people, merely tolerates cardio.

For the first half-hour, Gerland drives us around and pretends he knows where he is and where we’re going. I am certain we are lost. We finally make it to the park. But this is Houston, and it is still raining. It’s been raining for seven days, and Lewis is apprehensive about running on wet stairs. “I’ll slip and fall,” he says.

We sit in the truck for another half-hour and watch the rain. There will be no running today.

But then I discover a lifelike Michael Myers mask on the floorboard of the truck, and the overalls to go with it.

And there are a lot of people milling around at the park for a food truck festival. A lot of unsuspecting people. Strolling through a wooded park. On a rainy day.

This is how bad ideas become reality.

Lewis’ strength coach, Jimmy Gerland, having some Halloween fun.Photo by Jeremy Botter

So, that’s how I find myself at a Houston park on a rainy Saturday, watching and crying from laughter while a giant Michael Myers lumbers around and startles people who do not deserve it.

It starts with Gerland, who’s wearing the mask in the truck and staring at the people walking by. He cranks up the soundtrack from Halloween and just stares and stares, waiting for people to react. But they don’t because they are doing what humans do, which is do everything in our power to not see or interact with strangers.

Lewis is filming everything with his phone because he is an Instagram master and you just never know when you might need a certain kind of footage (seriously, if you don’t follow him, I don’t know what to say to you). But he is hunkered down in the seat to avoid being recognized; people recognize him a lot these days, and it’s a hassle.

“You ain’t gonna see me coming up out of this truck,” Lewis says with a shake of his head. “Nope.”

We decide to drive around downtown Houston to see if we can get reactions that way. The idea is Gerland will wear the mask and stare at the cars next to us when we pull up to the stoplights. I tell the guys I’m feeling a little bit of regret about my decision to join them on this excursion, and they laugh. I wasn’t trying to be funny.

We don’t get any reactions from other drivers, thank the Lord, so we go back to another part of the park where crowds of Houstonians old and young are ambling to the food truck festival.

Gerland waits until the coast is clear and then gets out of the truck and dons the full Michael Myers costume. Lewis turns the truck stereo to its highest setting. Gerland starts slowly, so very slowly, walking over to a group that’s heading up the hill toward us.

The first woman who spots him does almost a physical manifestation of someone saying nope before pulling a 180-degree turn and vanishing back from whence she came. I can’t blame her a bit. I know the guy under the mask, and I’m still ready to bolt if he heads my way.

“Oh no, you don’t,” a man at the front of the group says to Gerland, who has the look, size and beard of WWE’s Braun Strowman. “Come over here. I dare you. I got something for your ass.”

Lewis at a UFC 230 media appearance.Ed Mulholland/Zuffa LLC/Getty Images

Here’s a confession.

In the time I spent with him, Lewis didn’t train a bit. Not once. He didn’t break a sweat, but what he did was laugh. A lot. Huge, booming laughs.

We all did. We filmed a lot of it on our phones, except for the bits where we were hiding because we thought someone would see us cackling at their misfortune. It felt like we laughed for hours until tears streamed down our faces.

And it was important. Just as important as the training. “Days like this are good for Derrick. They heal his soul,” Perez said when we got back to the gym. Lewis sat next to me, nodding slowly. “They heal his soul, and that’s just as important as days like yesterday, when he puts in hours of training. It’s about balance.”

He’s right. Because what can you really do to prepare for a fight like this, against a fighter like Cormier? In three weeks? You can’t do much of anything. He’s one of the greatest fighters ever. There won’t be a big “aha” moment where you make a breakthrough in training and figure out a surefire way to win or to make an aspect of your game that much better.

All you can do is go through the motions that remind your mind and body of the stuff you’ve learned and then go in and take your shot.

Perez says—no, Perez guarantees—that Lewis will knock out Cormier. He says Cormier doesn’t have a chin, which I’m skeptical of, and that he has never been hit by anyone like Lewis, which I am sure of.

But Perez is oozing confidence, as though this outcome has already happened and we’re just playing a part in it. He is blissfully unaware, or just doesn’t care, that the rest of the world thinks Cormier will walk right through Lewis. He’s behind his guy in the way all great coaches are. He’s Derrick’s guy and has been from day one. He gets passionate when he’s talking about Derrick, about where they’ve come from and where Perez is sure they’re going.

Lewis? He’s sitting next to me, thumbing through funny videos on his phone. He’s trying to find his next Instagram post. When he chimes in, after what seems like an eternity of silence, it’s not the usual kind of confident, brash boast you hear from a fighter who is sure he’ll decimate his opponent.

“Win or lose, it’s a big opportunity,” Lewis says. “Win or lose.”

That’s Derrick Lewis. Calling it like he sees it, the same way he always does.

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Inside Mac Miller’s Benefit Concert: Moving Tributes, Surprise Guests, And A Tearful Ending

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On September 6, the day before Mac Miller‘s untimely death, he tweeted out a link to buy tickets for his Swimming tour, promising, “This show is going to be special every night.” The 26-date trek was slated to kick off on October 27 in San Francisco before touching down at Los Angeles’ Greek Theatre on October 31. And while we’ll never get to see what Mac had in store for that live show, a formidable lineup of his hip-hop family assembled at the Greek on Halloween to fill the date with a benefit concert that honored Miller’s life in stunning, spirited, and certainly special fashion.

—

“Ob-la-di, ob-la-da, life goes on, brah! / Lala how the life goes on.” As fans filed into the Greek on Wednesday evening for “Mac Miller: A Celebration of Life,” The Beatles’ classic White Album blasted from the outdoor venue’s speakers. There were plenty of Halloween costumes in the crowd — a skeleton, a Pikachu, an angel, a devil — but even more Miller-emblazoned tees and Pittsburgh gear. The merch tables sold black hoodies with the phrase “’92 til infinity” printed on the front, commemorating Miller’s birth year. In line at the concessions stand, a couple from Phoenix and two girls from Hawaii chatted about their long-but-“worth it” trips there.

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When the lights finally dimmed around 7 p.m., a montage of home videos appeared on the big screen, showing a young, smiley Mac dancing and blowing out birthday candles. Miller’s childhood best friend, Dylan Reynolds, took the stage a few minutes later to perform an acoustic cover of “Come Back to Earth,” the cathartic opening track from the rapper’s fifth and final album, Swimming. His sweet, simple performance kicked off three hours of musical tributes from Miller’s friends and collaborators — from J.I.D., who was supposed to open on the Swimming tour, to NJOMZA, who debuted a new song with the heartbreaking hook, “I miss you / I do / It’s true.”

But as inherently grim as the evening’s agenda was, it ended up being a largely celebratory occasion that only got more adrenalized with each performance. Action Bronson lit up a joint while rapping, “I’m just out here livin’ my best life.” Ty Dolla $ign smashed a guitar and bounded through the crowd during “Blasé,” which he said was one of Mac’s favorite songs. Anderson .Paak got behind the drum kit for a funk-fueled set that included his Mac collab, “Dang!,” while Thundercat‘s groovy contribution featured cameos from Vince Staples and John Mayer, the latter of whom later returned to cover Mac’s “Small Pools.”

By the time Rae Sremmurd made a surprise appearance for “No Type” and “Powerglide” — with a shirtless Swae Lee proclaiming, “Let’s turn up, we on a good vibe” — the crowd was in full-on hype mode. Schoolboy Q kept the energy up with “That Part,” revealing that Mac was in the studio with him the night he wrote the track’s first verse. SZA reminded us that we’ll be all right “long as we got love,” while Chance the Rapper‘s set ran the gamut from sentimental (“Blessings”) to swaggering (“No Problem”). It helped that any lag time between performers was filled with something, whether it was a collection of video tributes from the likes of Lil Wayne and Donald Glover, to a moment of silence for the victims of last weekend’s Pittsburgh shooting.

Travis Scott was tasked with delivering the finale, and he ended his two-song offering (“Goosebumps” and a truncated but fiery “Sicko Mode”) by delivering one of the evening’s most moving speeches.

“We all know Mac is watching over us. I just want everybody to just stay strong,” he said, pacing the stage as a photo of a young, toothless Miller appeared behind him. “If you have a friend with you, always tell them you love them. Always give your mom a kiss, always give your dad a hug. No matter if you’re mad at somebody, the next day, just check on them. Everybody is somebody. We all one, no matter your skin color, your hair, if you’re a rapper, a basketball player. The key word to this whole shit is motherfucking love.”

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Motherfucking love was, undeniably, the spirit of the evening. Proceeds from the event benefitted the newly launched Mac Miller Circles Fund, which his family and the Pittsburgh Foundation posthumously established in his honor. It supports the enrichment of youth arts education in underserved communities, and it’s impossible not to think Miller would’ve loved his name being used to inspire new generations of budding artists.

Mac was actually the last person fans heard from at the end of the night. After all of the evening’s performers gathered onstage for one final goodbye, Miller’s voice blasted through the speakers, saying, “Thank you guys so much. Have a great night, everybody.”

Damn… and just when we thought we’d get through the night without crying.

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A global Google staff walkout over harassment and inequality has kicked off in London and Dublin

Staff at Google offices in Granary Sqaure, London stage a walkout as a part of a protest over the company’s treatment of women. (Photo by Images via Getty Images)

Image: Stefan Rousseau/PA Images via Getty Images

By Rachel Thompson2018-11-01 12:41:07 UTC

Google employees walked out of offices in London and Dublin on Thursday morning in a protest over harassment and inequality.

It’s expected that thousands of Google staff will participate in a walkout of its 70 offices worldwide over the company’s handling of sexism complaints, abuse of power, pay inequality, and racism in the workplace.

The protest comes just days after a New York Times report alleged that Andy Rubin, the creator of Android, was given a $90 million payout from Google “while keeping silent” about a string of sexual misconduct claims. Per the NYT story, Rubin had multiple relationships with Google employees and “coerced” oral sex from an employee in 2013 — a claim that the company investigated and found credible. In a statement, Rubin denied the allegations, claiming the NYT story contained “numerous inaccuracies” and he states he “never coerced a woman to have sex in a hotel room.”

Protestors are calling on Google’s parent company Alphabet Inc to share pay equity data internally and to make its process for dealing with harassment claims fairer.

Protestors are making formal demands to the tech giant’s management, including a public sexual harassment transparency report, a clear process for safely and anonymously reporting misconduct and harassment, the appointment of an employee representative to the board of directors, and an express commitment to ending pay inequality.

By my calculation, this means women at Google effectively started working for nothing on October 29th. If they’re walking out today, they might as well not come back until January

— Rowland Manthorpe (@rowlsmanthorpe) November 1, 2018

According to a BBC report, staff participating in the walkout will be leaving a note on their desks to inform colleagues that they are protesting. “I’m not at my desk because I’m walking out with other Googlers and contractors to protest sexual harassment, misconduct, lack of transparency, and a workplace culture that’s not working for everyone,” reads the note.

The first office to protest was Google’s Singapore location.

Staff in Google’s Dublin office began the walkout at around 11 a.m. GMT.

Meanwhile, crowds gathered outside Google’s office in Granary Square, London.

“I’m here protesting against harassment in the workplace to make sure that we don’t protect or support those perpetrators of harassment,” one Google employee told Sky News.

Protests also happened inside the Google offices. A Google employee tweeted a photo from inside one of Google’s four locations within London.

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Dumbledore’s Army is real and ready for the midterm elections

Harry Potter Alliance chapter organizers show support for undocumented immigrants at #FamiliesBelongTogether march.

Image: New York Dumbledore’s Army

By Victoria Rodriguez2018-11-01 12:00:00 UTC

Dumbledore’s Army is a powerful force in the Harry Potter books and movies, and in real-life too. In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry, Ron, and Hermione start the secret organization to teach their fellow Hogwarts students how to defend themselves against the dark arts and, most especially, Voldemort. You-Know-Who is a fictional character, but Donald Trump is real, and worse than the Dark Lord, according to Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling.

Fans who feel the same way and want to be activists can join The Harry Potter Alliance, a nonprofit that helps Potterheads channel their energy into social justice issues. It offers chapter programs and training programs like the Wizard Activist School, which helps fans develop skills regarding conflict-resolution, engagement, and event-planning. The Granger Leadership Academy is a semi-annual four-day conference where members attend workshops and hear from keynote speakers.

The organization has chapters in over 25 countries, and in addition to local challenges, they focus on the seven critical issues outlined in their plan for resistance, which include climate change, LGBTQIA+ equality, and racial justice. Everyone who takes part in the nonprofit’s efforts becomes part of Dumbledore’s Army, a parallel to the one featured in the books and movies.

“We consider ourselves Dumbledore’s Army for the real world because we are all young people or formerly young people who decided a long time ago that it wasn’t up to just the people who are considered leaders in the country, and in our world, to make change,” Katie Bowers, campaigns director for The Harry Potter Alliance, told Mashable. “It’s really up to all of us, and if folks feel like they don’t have the skills to make that change yet, we are here for them.”

Since 2005, The Harry Potter Alliance has engaged with millions of fans, but following the 2016 election, the organization experienced a spike in sign-ups. Nearly 200 new chapters were created, and in total, over 1,000 new members joined. The Harry Potter Alliance is now rallying its members for their latest undertaking: the midterm elections.

On Thursday, Nov. 1 at 8 p.m. EST., The Harry Potter Alliance will host a livestream event, in partnership with Latinx Geeks and the #NoOn105 campaign, in order to defeat ballot measure 105 in Oregon. If passed, the measure will repeal the state’s sanctuary law and allow local law enforcement to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement in potentially racially profiling and detaining suspected undocumented immigrants.

To mobilize support against the measure, fans will learn how to make calls to Oregon voters to remind them to vote no and to help them locate ballot drop sites. (Oregon has all-mail elections, which means voters must mail their ballots or drop them off at an official drop box.)

Fans will also hear from creative professionals, including documentary filmmaker and director Annalise Ophelian (Looking for Leia), actor and undocumented activist Bambadjan Bamba (Black Panther, The Good Place), and comic creator Edgardo Miranda Rodriguez (La Borinqueña).

The Harry Potter Alliance will also team up with The Women’s March Youth Empower Coalition and take part in its #VoterUp initiative. The goal is to help members put a voting plan into place, and provide information about where and when to vote, as well as which races and ballot measures to study. In addition to sharing messages on social media, The Harry Potter Alliance will reach out to their chapter organizers and list-serves to share resources.

No matter the election results, The Harry Potter Alliance will continue organizing and fighting for marginalized communities.

“Obviously we’re hoping for some really wonderful outcomes, but whatever happens, we’re going to have an action immediately following that is dedicated to making the point that refugees and immigrants are welcome in our communities and always will be,” Bowers said.

The ongoing action is known as Owls of Hope, a call to members to write letters to refugees. It’s a response to the Trump administration’s decision to reduce the number of refugees allowed in the U.S. in 2019, from 45,000 to 30,000. The campaign was also inspired by the Hogwarts letters Harry Potter received via messenger owls.

“Those were sent to Harry, who was … a victim of the first wizarding war and grew up in some pretty rough circumstances, who was able to come to the wizarding world and start an entirely new life,” Bowers said.

The Harry Potter Alliance, in partnership with For the Nations Refugee Outreach, the Northwest Community Center, and Any Refugee, will deliver the letters to refugees on Nov. 10.

But that’s not all. This fall, The Harry Potter Alliance launched Dumbledore’s Army Fights Back, a campaign that will continue to support marginalized communities throughout fall 2018 and into 2019. In the past, the campaign called attention to the migrant children still separated from their parents, and released an anti-bullying toolkit, Don’t Be a Dursley, to educate members about the sources of bullying, the different types of bullying, what to do if they themselves are being bullied, and why not to be a bystander.

The hashtag #StoptheSnatchers is a major component of the campaign. It was originally created by the NYC chapter, New York Dumbledore’s Army, in summer 2018, in response to the Trump-led family-separation crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border. As many Potterheads know, the hashtag is a reference to the snatchers (essentially bounty hunters) introduced in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. They bear a striking resemblance to ICE, considering they roamed the country, trying to catch Muggle-borns because they were deemed illegal by Voldemort and his administration … I mean the Ministry of Magic.

To help support The Harry Potter Alliance, consider donating to Resistance is Magic, an Indiegogo fundraiser that will fund Dumbledore’s Army Fights Back. It ends on Saturday, Nov. 3. Perks include Harry Potter posters, shirts, and more. You can also start or join a chapter, join the mailing list, or volunteer. Whether you’re a brave Gryffindor, a loyal Hufflepuff, a witty Ravenclaw, or a cunning Slytherin, this is a movement you’ll want to be a part of.

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Brazil’s Bolsonaro wants Israel embassy moved to Jerusalem

Brazil would become the second major country after the United States to move its embassy to Jerusalem [Reuters]

Brazil’s President-elect Jair Bolsonaro has told an Israeli newspaper he intends to defy the Palestinians and most of the world by moving his country’s embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Asked in an interview with Israel Hayom published on Thursday if he would move Brazil’s embassy, as he had indicated during his campaign, Bolsonaro said Israel should decide where its capital is located.

“When I was asked during the campaign if I’d do it when I became president, I said ‘yes, the one who decides on the capital of Israel is you, not other nations’,” he told the paper, which is a firm backer of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Is Brazil’s democracy under threat?

Brazil would become the second major country after the United States to do so.

Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its “united” capital, and its annexation of occupied East Jerusalem in 1967 effectively put the entire city under de-facto Israeli control.

The Palestinians, however, see occupied East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state.

The international community does not recognise Israel’s jurisdiction and ownership of the city.

The status of Jerusalem

Palestinians say that moving the embassy would prejudge one of the most sensitive issues in the conflict – the status of Jerusalem – and undermine the US’ status as an honest mediator.

In December, President Donald Trump reversed long-standing US policy and recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, prompting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to boycott his administration.

The embassy was officially transferred on May 14, with Guatemala and Paraguay following suit, though the latter announced last month it would return its embassy to Tel Aviv.

Bolsonaro, 63, who won a runoff election on Sunday, has outraged many with his overtly misogynistic, homophobic and racist rhetoric.

Following his victory, Netanyahu told Bolsonaro he was certain his election “will lead to a great friendship between our peoples and the tightening of links between Brazil and Israel.”

An official in Netanyahu’s office told AFP the Israeli prime minister was “very likely” to attend Bolsonaro’s inauguration ceremony in January.

SOURCE:
AFP news agency

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Should I let my kids play ‘Fortnite: Battle Royale’ or ‘Minecraft’?

By Lisa A. Goldstein2018-11-01 11:00:00 UTC

Welcome to Small Humans, an ongoing series at Mashable that looks at how to take care of – and deal with – the kids in your life. Because Dr. Spock is nice and all, but it’s 2018 and we have the entire internet to contend with.

There are a lot of things kids and parents fight over, and video games are often high on the list. Many parents, especially those who don’t play video games themselves, may be reluctant to let kids play games over concerns about safety, violence, or even simple screen time. The good news is that there are plenty of resources to move your family game discussions away from a reflexive “no” and toward a more nuanced articulation of house rules.

The information below will help you understand more how your kid’s favorite games are played and what kind of content they include. This is distinct from a family policy on gaming as screen time or coming after other activities. Once you choose what games you’ll allow, then you can create a framework for how and when they’re played.

This vast and growing world of gaming can feel overwhelming, but there are a variety of resources and tools to help make informed decisions, says Eric Watson, primary contributor to Pixelkin, a website that bills itself as providing honest gaming news for families. “Use the Internet!” he says.

The content of games, especially those with violence, can make some parents wary. But there are many popular games don’t require first-person shooting by players. Whole categories of mobile games, which are often overlooked as being “video games,” are relatively violence-free.

A good place to start an evaluation of a game is the Entertainment Software Rating Board – the ESRB rating assesses age appropriateness, content, and interactive elements. It’s a bit of a blunt instrument, but it’ll give you a rough sense of the content of the game. The nonprofit Common Sense Media includes recommendations for a variety of games for all ages of kids. If you have a more specific questions, try the database on Ask the Mediatrician.

In addition to calling upon these resources, David Bickham, PhD, staff scientist at The Center on Media and Child Health and an instructor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, suggests playing the game to see how it works if possible. Otherwise, he says, watching online videos about the game can be helpful. Your kid can help you here – streams abound on YouTube and Twitch.

Safety precautions

If parents are worried about their kids’ safety while playing a video game, a key question to ask is if the game has an open chat (like Minecraft). “This is a large concern for many parents and likely a valid one,” says Dr. Bickham, “because it puts children in a real-time potentially non-moderated conversation with unknown children, teens, and adults. There’s a possibility for sexist, violent, and harassing language.”

Even if the game doesn’t have an open chat, other pieces of software provide chat opportunities that are typically unmonitored, Dr. Bickham adds. He recommends talking to your child about concerns you might have and looking for settings that allow playing without the chat feature.

Some games are predicated on large groups of players engaging simultaneously, meaning kids are playing with strangers online in default settings. Fortnite: Battle Royale is perhaps the best current example of that genre. It is possible to set some game servers to friends-only.

“The best way to know exactly who your kids are playing with is to limit online interaction altogether and encourage local play with real friends,” says Watson. The Nintendo Switch system fosters this kind of play with several games with local multiplayer options, like Splatoon 2, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and the upcoming Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

Watson lays out some other details to consider:

Is the game primarily played online (like Wizard101)?
Are there any in-app purchases or microtransactions (small payments which allow users to purchase in-game currency and speed up progress; Tiny Tower has this). You can restrict these in your phone settings for mobile games.
What parental controls are available for the game and/or console or platform it’s played on?
Can certain features – like voice or text chat – be turned off, and if so, can they easily be turned back on when you leave the room?

The important thing to remember is that you know your children better than anyone, Dr. Bickham says. “Be alert for aspects of games that you know might upset, frighten, or otherwise negatively impact your child,” he says. “The app store is full of games that will match interest and ability level of kids, so if you don’t like one that your child wants to play, look around for a game that meets a similar need using a different approach.”

Read more great stories from Small Humans:

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Instagram adds ‘I voted’ stickers to Stories

Instagram will let you brag about whether or not you voted.

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By Karissa Bell2018-11-01 11:00:00 UTC

With less than a week to go before election day, Instagram is adding a new feature it hopes will give users a little extra incentive to vote.

The app is adding “I Voted” stickers to Stories, and will create “We Voted” Stories showing you everyone you follow who has voted and used the stickers.

Both the stickers and the Stories will appear in the app next week. The stickers will start to show up two days before election day, on November 4, and the Stories will appear on election day November 6. When you add an “I voted” sticker to your Story, it will also link out to polling locations (via Get to the Polls) so your follower can find local polling stations.

If three or more of your friends use the stickers, then Instagram will create a “We Voted” Story, which will appear at the top of your feed, showing you the posts from everyone who has voted.

Instagram's voting stickers. — Instagram’s voting stickers.

It may sound like a small feature, but it could end up having a significant impact. Facebook has been urging users to vote on election day for years, and those efforts have paid off, according to the company. Facebook found, as far back as 2010, that people who saw “I voted” posts and stickers from their friends were actually more likely to vote themselves. (Facebook’s researchers published a study on their findings in Nature.)

Facebook still has its own “I voted” feature, along with a host of other election-related features. But, considering that Instagram is now the social media platform of choice for so many young people, the new stickers and Stories could end up having an even greater impact on the group.

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Afghan government continues to lose ground to Taliban: SIGAR

The US-backed Afghan government has lost control of a number of districts to the Taliban, while casualties among security forces have reached record levels, a US watchdog agency has said.

The latest quarterly report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) underlines the heavy pressure on the government in Kabul even as the United States has opened initial contacts with the Taliban on possible peace talks.

“The control of Afghanistan’s districts, population, and territory overall became more contested this quarter,” the agency said in its report.

The Taliban have still not succeeded in taking a major provincial centre despite assaults on Farah in western Afghanistan and Ghazni in the centre this year but they control large stretches of the countryside.

Data from Afghanistan’s NATO-led Resolute Support mission showed that government forces had “failed to gain greater control or influence over districts, population, and territory this quarter”, the agency said.

As of September, it said the government controlled or influenced territory with about 65 percent of the population, stable since October 2017, after a year of heavy fighting in Farah and Ghazni as well as other provinces like Faryab and Baghlan in the north.

However, it reported that only 55.5 percent of the total 407 districts were under government control or influence – the lowest level since SIGAR began tracking district control in 2015.

“While the districts, territory, and population under insurgent control or influence also decreased slightly, the districts, territory, and population ‘contested’ – meaning under neither Afghan government nor insurgent control or influence – increased,” it said.

Six months before presidential elections, the figures are a sign of the degraded security situation in Afghanistan, even as the US special envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, has met Taliban officials to map out possible peace talks.

As the Taliban have kept up pressure on the government, SIGAR quoted the Resolute Support mission as saying the average number of casualties among Afghan security forces between May 1 and October 1 was “the greatest it has ever been during like periods”.

The Afghan government no longer releases exact casualty figures but this month General Joseph Votel, head of US Central Command, said Afghan casualties were increasing from last year and were an issue “we are paying very, very close attention to”.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), which has documented civilian casualties in Afghanistan since 2009, said in its latest October report that there were 8,050 civilian casualties during the first nine months of the year, including 313 deaths and 336 injuries caused by US and Afghan air attacks.

The Taliban, who were removed from power by US-led forces in 2001, has been waging a bloody armed rebellion to defeat the Western-backed government in Kabul.

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Looking after a Tamagotchi for a week made me realise how I really feel about technology

Disclosure

Every product here is independently selected by Mashable journalists. If you buy something featured, we may earn an affiliate commission which helps support our work.

Image: mashable

By Laura Byager2018-11-01 10:15:43 UTC

It’s 2018, and what we all really want — and need, for that matter — is to be weaned off our screens. We’re desperate to regain control of our attention span and free ourselves from the number one time thief and stress factor of modern life.

Digital wellness, as it’s been dubbed, is all about being mindful with our use of apps, limiting notifications and disturbances on our phones. It’s about “time well spent” as Zuckerberg would say. We’re asking our apps and devices to loosen their grip on us and save us from ourselves.

Not me, though. I’ve gone in the complete opposite direction and got myself a small, noise-making device with no other purpose in life than to claim – or rather, demand – my time with incessant beeping. That’s right; I got a Tamagotchi.

I named my Tamagotchi Minka after my beloved, deceased childhood dog and later regretted it.

The Tamagotchi — a retro Generation Two Tamagotchi that was relaunched by Bandai America this autumn — was bestowed upon me by a co-worker. We wanted to explore how the people who grew up with Tamagotchis and experienced the original frenzy feel about them now.

I named mine Minka after my beloved, deceased childhood dog (and later regretted it, when it turned out to be such a bore. RIP.)

It was nostalgia that made me accept taking on the Tamagotchi in the first place. While the grown-up me has trouble seeing the point of owning a tiny, beeping, egg-shaped monster of a device, the 7-year-old me absolutely loved it. I remember the initial thrill of having a device that responded to me, interacted with me, relied on me for nurturing.

A Tamagotchi was what all of us ’90s kids wanted most of all; a toy that comes to life. However pixelated, noisy, and difficult they were, they were our pets. We fed them, picked up their poop and played with them all on their terms. The games on classic Tamagotchis are so mind numbingly simple that they cannot have been designed with the owner’s amusement in mind.

We were in awe of them and we loved them. They were a part of our social lives with other kids, always a topic of conversation, not to mention a perfect pre-phone social distraction for surly preteens not wishing to engage with their surroundings.

Minka the Tamagotchi makes noise. That is the first thing you notice about it, but it also happens to be the worst aspect of it. As a millennial, my phone has been on silent since, well, forever. I’m never that far away from my phone that I need it to make noise, nor do I ever really want it to. So, when the Tamagotchi started beeping in a crowded rush hour Tube carriage, I was mortified. It’s not just a text ping, you know. It’s a series of high-pitched beeps. This must be why our phones now favour the smooth ‘ping’ sound over the grating ‘beep.’ Beeping is stressful.

“The Tamagotchi is going berserk!” my editor wrote on Slack one day when I’d left it on my desk while I was out for lunch. It had indeed descended into a beeping frenzy. “It was probably just hungry,” I wrote back, apologetically.

What was once a novelty now feels like a chore. Nearly two decades after I got my first Tamagotchi, I push its buttons unenthusiastically, mainly just to shut it up. Now and again I play the built-in game which, in all simplicity, is about guessing whether the next number will be higher or lower than the previous one. I’m a diligent feeder and cleaner of Tamagotchi poop. But honestly, I’m not getting anything from this relationship. I’m pretty detached, let’s put it that way.

I know, of course, what had changed. Yes, I’ve aged a couple of decades, but we’re also living in the smartphone age where our lives are so consumed by, and saturated with, tech to the point where we’re beyond all curiosity and novelty. What used to excite us, the demand for our attention, the reliance on our response, is now something we perceive as annoying at best, but problematic and detrimental to our mental health at worst.

Smartphone addiction is real, and it’s a problem. A 2017 Deloitte survey found that 38 percent of smartphone users feel like they use their phones too much. For 16-24-year-olds, that number is 56 percent. A lot of us are caught in what a former Facebook executive Chamath Palihapitiya described as “dopamine-driven feedback loops” in a statement of penance in 2017. It is draining our brains of energy.

I don’t know about you, but I rank the different screen-related activities in my life in order of how wholesome they feel and how worthwhile they are. One one end, there is the quality screen time that I genuinely enjoy and that I firmly believe enriches my life. At the other end, there is the purposeless waste of time, the dumb stuff that makes my brain tired, the guilty pleasures that aren’t really pleasures at all. To me, streaming on Netflix is both virtuous and wholesome, the same is any and all reading, FaceTime, and texting with the people I love. At the other end of the spectrum are the socials; Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, all YouTube content, and aimless browsing.

The Tamagotchi breaks the scale. The Tamagotchi – a primitive screen activity, but a screen activity nonetheless – takes all the annoying, attention-grabbing aspects of smartphone life and magnifies them. You find push notifications distracting? Your Tamagotchi will beep at you until you press one, any, of its buttons (add to that a layer of tech mortality, your Tamagotchi will straight up die on you if you don’t fulfil its wishes.) And having to pay attention to a pixelated blob stands in sharp contrast to how we think of our screens today, how aware we have become of the power they have over us. And, at least for me personally, how badly you need to rid your life of noise and notifications.

“The Tamagotchi – a primitive screen activity – takes all the annoying, attention-grabbing aspects of smartphone life and magnifies them.”

When Apple launched iOS 12, and with it the screen time function, they did it “to help customers understand and take control of the time they spend interacting with their iOS devices.” The buzz words and phrases in their press release were all more-or-less synonymous with put your fucking phone down. “Reduce interruptions,” “Stay in the moment,” “Do Not Disturb,” “Manage device usage.” The ones who installed the screens in our lives are trying to make up for it, though with little evidence to confirm that these now wellbeing tools actually change our behaviour. But it shows what way we’re headed.

Taking that into consideration, the timing of the Tamagotchi relaunch is weird, and probably a little off. Granted, not everyone feels the same way about the Tamagotchis as I do. There are still die-hard Tamagotchi enthusiasts out there, people for whom the Tamagotchis – both in the form of classical eggs or the more recent app Tamagotchis smartphones – are a real hobby, and who publicly mourn their digital pets when they die.

Perhaps it’s just be me who has outgrown the Tamagotchi as I’ve a) grown older and b) become more and more exasperated with technology in my own life. But I don’t think so. What the Tamagotchis had going for them was never that they were particularly entertaining. It was that they, for many of us, were our first pieces of “intelligent” tech that wanted something from us; interaction, response. They were our first taste of portable, interactive gadgets with a linear lifespan.

I’m sorry to report that as the weekend rolled around, Minka died (Tamagotchi Minka, that is. Dog Minka died in 2012). As I was out enjoying screen free time in the autumn sun, she passed away in my bag. I wasn’t even around to hear her final beeps. When I dug her out of my bag, she had been replaced by a display of flashing UFOs.

I don’t miss her, but she did manage to prove a point in her lifetime – that the last thing I want in my life is another screen. I look at a laptop for 8 hours a day, and at my smartphone two and a half additional hours (thank you for the stats, Screen Time). By inviting another stupid, beeping screen into my life I realised what I already knew, and what Silicon Valley are now busy telling us and their anxious shareholders; that I need to put my fucking phone down.

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