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15 Brilliant Quotes That Show The Genius Mind Of Box CEO Aaron Levie

Box CEO Aaron Levie’s idea to turn an ordinary file-sharing software into the next big collaboration enterprise platform has made him one of the most-watched Valley CEOs in recent years.

Since its founding in 2005, Box has raised over $564.1 million in funding, which now values the company at roughly $2.4 billion. Box is expected to go public by early next year.

Although there’s been some concerns around Box’s delayed IPO, there’s no question that Levie’s vision and leadership have made his company one of the hottest startups in the Valley.

We rounded up some of his best quotes from interviews, tweets, and other sources, which will help you better understand his genius mind.

On speed and efficiency: "I'm obsessed with speed. I'm always asking myself, 'Why can't we do things faster? Why can't it happen more efficiently? Why is this requiring three meetings instead of one?'"

On Box’s working culture: "One of our core values is 'Get s*** done.' We have a very execution-oriented culture. … Another one of our values is 'Take risks. Fail fast.' If we fail fast, we can correct mistakes quickly."

On cloud technology: “There are phases in technology. Mainframe to PC, PC to cloud, to cloud and mobile. These things come around every 10 to 15 years, and we’re in one right now.”

(h/t The Washington Post)

Elon Musk Thinks Sci-Fi Nightmare Scenarios About Artificial Intelligence Could Really Happen

Elon Musk at MIT

Tesla CEO Elon Musk isn't the biggest fan of artificial intelligence, an initiative he called "our biggest existential threat" in comments at the MIT Aeronautics and Astronautics department's Centennial Symposium on Friday.

Musk, who called for some regulatory oversight of AI to ensure "we don't do something very foolish," warned of the dangers.

"If I were to guess what our biggest existential threat is, it’s probably that. So we need to be very careful with the artificial intelligence," he said. "With artificial intelligence we are summoning the demon."

Artificial intelligence (AI) is an area of research with the goal of creating intelligent machines which can reason, problem-solve, and think like, or better than, human beings can. While many researchers wish to ensure AI has a positive impact, a nightmare scenario has played out often in science fiction books and movies — from 2001 to Terminator to Blade Runner — where intelligent computers or machines end up turning on their human creators.

"In all those stories where there’s the guy with the pentagram and the holy water, it’s like yeah he’s sure he can control the demon. Didn’t work out," Musk said.

The symposium wasn't the first time Musk raised concerns. In August, Musk tweeted: "We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially more dangerous than nukes."

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Here Are Some Of The American Adults Who Started Live-Action Role Playing And Never Stopped

LarpPort (3 of 6)

A few weeks ago, I visited Alliance, one of the oldest live-action role-playing (or LARPing) groups in the US, where I met people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s who've made LARPing a central part of their lives.

The LARPers included both diehards and the newbies. Every year, Pennsylvania-based Alliance sees around 50 to 100 new faces. According to Todd, a higher-up in Alliance, new players tend to be college-age or recent graduates. These players usually stick around for three or four years before dropping the hobby, but about 10% become “lifers” — people whose dedication can be measured in decades, not years.

For the lifers, LARPing becomes their main social outlet. According to Michael Ventrella, a founder of Alliance, dating is common among LARPers and there have been more than a few weddings of people who met there. Some of the veterans have been around for so long their kids sometimes come to events.

While visiting Alliance, I met players who work in biomedical engineering, tech, insurance, cybersecurity, law, healthcare, and accounting.

Here are few of the people I met:

Joe, Technologist

LarpPort (4 of 6) Joe has played the same character at Alliance for 20 years. He has played in so many different LARP “systems” — from medieval to sci-fi — that “it intimidates other players,” he says. In addition, he participates in Revolutionary War reenactments, playing a drum major in the British Army.

Joe is a character even without his costume, prone to a mischievous smile, a high-pitched cackle, and a sense of humor that amounts to asking yourself constantly, “Is he messing with me?”

He’s coy about his profession, though he says he’s a technologist who works on government contracts in the Washington, DC area. When asked if that means cybersecurity, he shrugs and says, “You could call it that.”

At some LARPs Joe attends, every player is an IT professional with government security clearances. Others are dominated by college students.

Lauren, Safety Professional

LarpPort (6 of 6)

When I introduce myself to a woman named Lauren who works at a major tech company, she tells me, “I wear pretty things and hit my fellow nerds.”

Lauren grew up in Pennsylvania and attended nearby Binghamton University. At college, Lauren was heavily involved with Humans vs. Zombies, a popular live-action game played at colleges across the US. Humans vs Zombies is basically a complicated, weeks-long version of tag that spans an entire campus. It's kind of like entry-level LARP, allowing players to act out a zombie takeover using sock balls, marshmallows, and foam-dart guns.

“Humans vs. Zombies was huge at Binghamton," Lauren says. "Everyone gets involved, even the police. One time, we had a police officer get out of his car and tell us to try to make him a zombie. We were like, 'Should we try? We might get arrested.'”

After college, Lauren met a few guys who told her about Alliance while attending an anime festival in Baltimore.

“Grown men and women fighting in a remote woods … what could go wrong?” Lauren jokes.

In a short time, Lauren was hooked on the game, making fast friends and constructing elaborate characters. She met her boyfriend Colin at Alliance.

Scott and Tim, Insurance Analyst and Warehouse Supervisor

LarpPort (1 of 6) Scott (right) is an insurance analyst who has been playing for nearly 20 years, and Tim is a warehouse supervisor who's been playing for about eight.

Both have arguably nerdy pasts. Scott originally played "Dungeons and Dragons" in high school and college before a cousin introduced him to LARPing. Meanwhile, Tim found out about LARPing from coworkers at a gaming store. He was initially skeptical but quickly got hooked.

“There’s nothing like being in character the whole time. You get fully immersed,” Tim says.

Both Scott and Tim have since convinced their wives to join in on the fun, after years of trying to get them to play games like "Dungeons and Dragons."

“My wife always thought 'Dungeons and Dragons' was really boring," Tim said, "but when she realized what LARPing actually was — playing a part, sneaking around, fighting and trading, having fun — she was like, ‘This is something I could get into.’”

For Scott, Alliance has helped him learn skills he uses every day.

“I’ve learned leadership skills, resource management, and public speaking,” Scott says. “Before I started playing, I hated public speaking, but my character was a Duke. I had to make speeches. Public speaking quickly got way more comfortable.”

Akiva, Graduate Student at Binghamton

LarpPort (5 of 6) Akiva is a graduate student at Binghamton University, studying Healthcare Systems. He’s been playing since his freshman year of college when he helped start the college’s LARPing club. Before he started the LARPing club, he said, he had “the typical nerd background.”

“I played 'World of Warcraft,' 'Dungeons and Dragons,' read sci-fi books, but when I heard about LARPing, I knew I wanted to do it. It’s a chance to play the game in real life,” Akiva says.

Although Akiva has attended Alliance for several years, like many other students, he saves money by being a non-playable character — someone who attends for free in exchange for being a cast member for the game designers.

“Every time I come, people ask me, ‘When are you going to make a character?’ I give them the same answer every time. When I get a job,” Akiva says.

It's expensive to create a character, according to Akiva, who says a costume can cost thousands of dollars.

“You have to buy in-period clothing, armor, nice boots, bracers, greaves, chain mail, weapons, scabbard, belts, pouches. It all adds up.”

Microsoft's PR Boss Had A Funny Response To Google's Big News (MSFT, GOOG)

Sundar Pichai

Google dropped some big news to employees Friday.

Sundar Pichai, the executive in charge of Android and Chrome, got a promotion that makes him the boss of all of Google's core products: search, Google+, apps, advertising, Android, Chrome, and so on.

The news of Pichai's promotion leaked late in the afternoon when Re/code's Kara Swisher and Liz Gannes obtained an internal memo to Google employees announcing his new role.

One Google rival, Microsoft's PR boss Frank Shaw, reacted to the news with a subtle jab on Twitter:

I think Friday afternoons are a good time to make news.
— Frank X. Shaw (@fxshaw) October 24, 2014

To be fair, Google will probably make a formal, public announcement about Pichai's new job soon. And Microsoft doesn't exactly have the best track record with releasing news when people are around to pay attention. It announced the Nokia acquisition late in the evening at the end of the long Labor Day weekend last year, likely frustrating some reporters who just wanted to go to bed.

Meet The Investor Funding Game-Changing Startups Run From College Dorms

Peter Boyce II, an associate with General Catalyst Partners, and co-founder of Rough Draft Ventures, was recently interviewed by OneWire CEO Skiddy von Stade.

In the interview, he explained how he got into the startup business by founding Rough Draft, a company that seeds student startups.

When he was studying applied math and computer science at Harvard, he noticed his friends struggled to find funding for their great startups.

They basically had two options. One was to enter a small business competition to win whatever was offered, even as little as $500. The other was to try and raise so much money that it made sense to drop out and run the business full-time.

There was nothing in-between these two.

That's why he co-founded Rough Draft, to scout for students running potentially game-changing startups from their dorm rooms, and expose them to the resources they need to grow.

"There’s the $500 business plan competitions that you can enter into and win, then there’s the 'raise a million dollars and drop out of school,' but there’s really nothing in between and there’s really no network of students that were able to empower other students to pursue creating startups. That’s really what we created with Rough Draft Ventures. We have a team of students that basically helps identify and empower entrepreneurs at the university level, something that we’re insanely excited to do, something that we’re increasingly seeing - folks are going to continue to build amazing companies in their dorm room.

Boyce also runs the New York office of General Catalyst Partners and is expanding its footprint here. He's convinced that he's in the right city too. In the raging debate on the better coast for tech startups, he's Silicon Alley all the way.

"We’ve staked our careers here in New York, voted with our feet in a way. But I think from a diversity perspective of just being able to interface with so many different industries, whether that's banking, marketing, fintech, I think there’s a lot of really great industries and a lot of great entrepreneurs that are going to build companies that [are] technology, that's going to empower and change these existing industries. And New York has been the epicenter for a lot of these industries for a long time ... I’m personally very biased towards this eco-system here in New York."

Watch the full interview above and subscribe to the Open Door series to receive upcoming interviews.

Larry Page Is Taking A Step Back At Google To See The 'Bigger Picture,' And Sundar Pichai Is Getting A Lot More Responsibility (GOOG)

Larry Page

Google is reorganizing its executive structure.

Former Android and Chrome head Sundar Pichai will lead all of Google's core products.

CEO Larry Page taking a step back to focus on the "bigger picture," Re/Code's Kara Swisher and Liz Gannes report. Google sent an internal memo to employees this afternoon to explain the changes.

Pichai will now head up research, search, maps, Google+, commerce and ads, and infrastructure, in addition to Android, Chrome, and Google Apps. The six executives leading each of those product areas will now report directly to Pichai instead of Page. YouTube, run by Susan Wojcicki, will not be under Pichai's domain.

Re/Code's sources say that this switch-up seems to come from Page's concern that Google is becoming less innovative as it gets older. He wants to focus on the "bigger picture" and didn't feel like he could do that with so many direct reports and duties.

This is a big promotion for Pichai, but certainly not his first. He's been a rising star at Google and Page's right-hand man for a while now. Originally, he only managed Chrome, but took over Google Apps in 2012 and Android in March 2013. He first started working at Google in 2004.

NOW WATCH: We Put iPhone's Time-Lapse Video To The Test — With A Sleeping Baby

CHART OF THE DAY: Cell Phone Bills Are Up 50% Since The iPhone Was Invented

Despite some recent company efforts to help pay for customers' phone bills through promotions and subscription programs, the telecommunication industry largely relies on customers using more phone data each year — through new applications and innovations — to keep its sales growing, according to The Wall Street Journal. And this is no more apparent than when you see how cell phone bills have risen since the dawn of the smartphone.

Based on data from the Labor Department charted for us by BI Intelligence, US households are spending 50% more on their phone bills than they did in 2007, the year the iPhone launched and Google introduced the Android operating system for mobile devices. Households spent an average of $913 on phone bills in 2013 — and a fifth of those households spent more than $1,400 that year. According to Verizon Wireless, the average monthly phone bill is about $161.24, which is a 3.5% rise from last year.

bii sai cotd household cell spending

Sam Biddle Is Leaving Valleywag

sam biddle

Sam Biddle, editor of Gawker's technology site, Valleywag, is leaving the publication and transitioning to another role at Gawker Media.

Biddle will spend November on sabbatical. When he returns in December, he will be named Senior Writer at Gawker, focusing on subjects related to the Internet, including cybersecurity, cryptography, activism and politics. (Gawker employees who have been with the company four years are encouraged to take a one month paid sabbatical.)

"I expect it will evolve from there, and I fully expect him to write about a wide range of topics that have nothing in particular to do with the Internet," Gawker's Editor-in-Chief Max Read told Business Insider in an email. "Sam is one of the great pure bloggers — fast, sharp, opinionated, funny — and I want to run his work on the front page no matter what it ends up being about."

Nitasha Tiku, who was named co-editor of Valleywag in December, will be taking over Biddle's responsibilities. She'll continue to build out the team alongside Kevin Montgomery in San Francisco. Biddle is located in New York, where Gawker is headquartered.

Gawker Media is Nick Denton's network of sites, which include Jezebel, Deadspin, Gizmodo and Lifehacker. It draws about 64 million monthly unique visitors.

Biddle and Gawker say his transition away from Valleywag has been planned for months. Importantly, they insist the decision preceded Gamergate, a loose online movement that recently targeted Gawker and Biddle specifically, and appears to have damaged the company's relationship with some advertisers.

Gamergate, which arose in recent months out of an attempt to challenge what proponents consider the poor ethical standards of videogame journalism, steadily morphed into a digital mob scene marked by misogyny and intimidation. By Gawker's definition, it is "a campaign of dedicated anti-feminist internet trolls using an ill-informed mob of alienated and resentful video game-playing teenagers and young men to harass and intimidate female activists, journalists, and critics."

Biddle and Gawker became a target for Gamergate protesters when he tweeted a series of statements he insists were sarcastic. One read:

Bring Back Bullying
— Sam Biddle (@samfbiddle) October 16, 2014

If we understand it correctly, his point, which was highly nuanced for Twitter, was to voice support for the mostly female targets of Gamergate by suggesting that the hardcore videogame fans attacking them were the sort of people — geeks, basically — who would have themselves been bullied in an earlier era.

Of course, nobody — feminists, videogamers, or anyone else — deserves to be bullied.

The Gamergate community responded by posting a list of Gawker's advertisers online, and urging supporters to contact the brands directly to ask if they support bullying too.

Biddle is known in the technology community for his snark; his writing occasionally puts Silicon Valley on blast. But the Gamergate community clearly didn't appreciate his sense of humor.

"I have literally not seen a single person who is not a Gamergate supporter who did not get that I was very obviously joking,” Biddle told Re/code in an email. “Not a single one.”

A source says Biddle's snark wasn't appreciated by all of Gawker's management team, either, though, which may have added a certain urgency to the editorial shuffle. The response by Adobe, which promptly distanced itself from bullying, and from Gawker, in a tweet, was an ominous sign, which may have made a full-scale advertiser exodus all too easy to imagine. But according to Read, no one at Gawker "encouraged" Biddle to move and his writing is appreciated both internally and externally.

nitasha tiku

"I told Max this was what I wanted months ago," Biddle told Business Insider in an email. "That is to say, I am 100% not being 'moved.'"

In September, Biddle was approached by former Gawker editor A.J. Daulerio to work for his forthcoming site, Ratter, which may also have sparked conversations about his position at Valleywag.

"I've been anxious for several months now to make use of Sam's formidable talents as a writer and reporter on Gawker proper — and he's ready to broaden his horizons and expand his scope to non-tech industry subjects," Read added.

Valleywag is here to stay, Gawker Media insists, although Denton has shut down the publication before. Read says it will continue to operate under Tiku, whom he notes has broken more exclusive stories this year than any other writer at the company. Tiku's reporting was largely responsible for the firing of G Chahal, RadiumOne's founder who allegedly beat a former girlfriend more than 100 times in one evening. She also unearthed leaked revenue figures for $18 billion car company, Uber, and discovered how much money Snapchat's founders pocketed during a massive round of financing.

"Under Nitasha and Sam, Valleywag became compulsory daily reading for everyone in tech; its reporting and writing has been as strong and smart as ever; its days are not numbered," Read told us. "It will continue to operate similarly (that is to say: excellently!) under Nitasha and Kevin with the significant and exciting difference that both of them are based in San Francisco and can increase the amount of on-the-ground Silicon Valley reporting and writing."

"Sam is smart, fast, and has a strong voice," Tiku told Business Insider of her Valleywag counterpart. "It will be a huge bummer not to be in a chatroom together all day just shaking our heads at whatever tweetstorms, but he's just a Slack chat away and I'm excited to see him on his new beat."

Tiku says Valleywag is well positioned to continue driving conversations around key issues in technology, including diversity, brogrammers, and Silicon Valley's "awkward transition from the underdog to power central."

Apple Made A Move That Could Shake Up The Wireless Industry, But AT&T Is Making That A Little More Difficult (AAPL)

AppleSIM2

When Apple unveiled its new iPads last week, it also quietly announced a new technology that will enable you to switch between wireless carriers at your own will.

The cellular version of Apple's new tablets will come with the company's own SIM card rather than a pre-programmed carrier SIM card.

This means you would be able to switch between networks whenever you want without having to commit to a specific carrier.

AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile are all on board, but AT&T's offering will work a little differently than the others.

When you buy a new iPad Air 2 or iPad mini 3 from the Apple Store, you will not be able to switch to a different carrier on the same SIM card once you start using the tablet on AT&T's network. MacRumors received this tip in its user forums on Friday, and Business Insider has independently confirmed it with AT&T.

You'll still be able to switch carriers, but you would need to get a new SIM card. Sprint and T-Mobile, however, allow you to switch between carriers when you're using an Apple SIM card that comes with the tablet.

There's also another catch that's worth noting: Apple SIM only works this way if you purchase the tablet from an Apple Store. If you were to buy a new iPad Air 2 from T-Mobile, for instance, you wouldn't be able to switch from T-Mobile's network using that same SIM card either.

AT&T's policy differs in that once you choose AT&T, even if you bought the tablet directly from Apple, you still wouldn't be able to switch without buying a new SIM card.

It's not too surprising to see that one carrier is already placing restrictions on Apple's universal SIM card. If such a system were to ever roll out to the iPhone, it could create problems for carriers. For example, customers might be inclined to purchase a phone directly from Apple so that they could switch data plans without committing to a specific carrier. Essentially, this would give consumers less motivation to buy phones from carriers and it could make it harder for carriers to keep customers on their networks.

On the other hand, it could force carriers to offer better pricing for consumers in order to remain competitive.

With a device like the iPad, the effect on carriers likely won't be that significant. Many users opt for the Wi-Fi-only version of the iPad, and tablets aren't as heavily subsidized as phones on a two-year contract.

How Cellphone Data Could Help Fight Ebola

Mobile-phone records are an invaluable tool to combat Ebola. They should be made available to researchers.

With at least 4,500 people dead, public-health authorities in west Africa and worldwide are struggling to contain Ebola. Borders have been closed, air passengers screened, schools suspended. But a promising tool for epidemiologists lies unused: mobile-phone data.

When people make mobile-phone calls, the network generates a call data record (CDR) containing such information as the phone numbers of the caller and receiver, the time of the call and the tower that handled it--which gives a rough indication of the device's location. This information provides researchers with an insight into mobility patterns. Indeed phone companies use these data to decide where to build base stations and thus improve their networks, and city planners use them to identify places to extend public transport.

But perhaps the most exciting use of CDRs is in the field of epidemiology. Until recently the standard way to model the spread of a disease relied on extrapolating trends from census data and surveys. CDRs, by contrast, are empirical, immediate and updated in real time. You do not have to guess where people will flee to or move.

Researchers have used them to map malaria outbreaks in Kenya and Namibia and to monitor the public response to government health warnings during Mexico's swine-flu epidemic in 2009. Models of population movements during a cholera outbreak in Haiti following the earthquake in 2010 used CDRs and provided the best estimates of where aid was most needed.

ebola phone

Doing the same with Ebola would be hard: in west Africa most people do not own a phone. But CDRs are nevertheless better than simulations based on stale, unreliable statistics. If researchers could track population flows from an area where an outbreak had occurred, they could see where it would be likeliest to break out next--and therefore where they should deploy their limited resources.

Yet despite months of talks, and the efforts of the mobile-phone operators' trade association and several smaller UN agencies, telecom operators have not let researchers use the data (see "Ebola and big data: Waiting on hold").

One excuse is privacy, which is certainly a legitimate worry, particularly in countries fresh from civil war, or where tribal tensions exist. But the phone data can be anonymised and aggregated in a way that alleviates these concerns. A bigger problem is institutional inertia. Big data is a new field. The people who grasp the benefits of examining mobile-phone usage tend to be young, and lack the clout to free them for research use.

It's an old problem

This needs to change. Governments should require mobile operators to give approved researchers access to their CDRs. The data will obviously not by themselves prevent this outbreak from turning into a disaster. That will take an extraordinary combination of new drugs, careful prevention and patient care, among other things. But the health workers dealing with Ebola on the ground need all the help they can get.

Click here to subscribe to The Economist.

This Simple iPhone Trick Is Perfect For Reading In The Dark

iphone bed

Ever turn down the brightness on your iPhone and wish it could go even darker?

Well, you're in luck — there's even an easy shortcut so you don't have to poke around in your iPhone's menu the next time you're browsing in bed or in a movie theater.

Here's how it works, courtesy of Snazzy Labs.

First, you'll need to head over to your iPhone's Settings. Once there, navigate to General > Accessibility > Zoom, and toggle Zoom on.

Next, you'll need to take three fingers and triple tap anywhere on the screen, like so.

iPhone brightness hack GIF

Next, tap Full Screen Zoom and then drag a finger on the slider to zoom all the out.

You'll then need to tap Choose Filter and then tap Low Light, which will darken your screen.

You've now set up your iPhone so when you have Zoom enabled it acts as a dimmer switch, but now we need to make a shortcut so it's lightning fast to darken your phone.

To do this, go back to Accessibility and scroll to bottom and tap Accessibility Shortcut. Now, just tap Zoom and you're all set!

Now, when you triple tap your iPhone's home button, it will act as a dimmer switch and darken your phone. Remember, if you find your screen is too dark to see anything, just triple click the home button to turn the dimmer off.

If you have any questions, Snazzy Labs offers a full video tutorial below.

Beats Music Will Become Part Of iTunes Next Year (AAPL)

apple beats

Apple will shut down Beats Music and relaunch it next year under the iTunes brand, according to The Wall Street Journal's Hannah Karp.

Last month, Apple denied rumors that it would be shutting down Beats Music, but it was widely understood that the streaming service would somehow be incorporated into iTunes.

Also related: Apple SVP Eddy Cue has been in talks with record labels to lower the cost of Beats Music, which currently sits at $9.99 per month or $99.99 per year, according to Peter Kafka of Re/code.

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10 Awesome Cases For Your New iPad Air 2 (APPL)

ipad air 2

Apple may make one of the best tablets in the world, but that doesn't mean it's the most durable.

If you plan on tossing your new iPad in your bag for your commute, you'll probably want to get a case that's both durable and thin.

Many accessory makers are still working on new cases and sleeves for the iPad Air 2, but there are already plenty to choose from.

Here's a look at some of the best iPad Air 2 cases so far.

Some of them are already available, while others will be up for sale in the coming weeks.

Apple Smart Case ($79.99)

Apple's sleek leather case comes in five different colors and also doubles as a kickstand. The company also says the cover's interior is lined with microfiber to help keep your iPad's display clean.

Speck Style Folio ($39.95)

Speck's new folio style case for the iPad Air 2 is both durable and slim. Not only does it come in a wide variety of colors, but you can also customize it with specific patterns. The kickstand is also adjustable, so you can prop up your iPad at various viewing angles.

Belkin Chambray Cover ($39.99)

If you're looking for something other than leather or silicon for your new iPad, try Belkin's Chambray cover. The material is designed to feel similar to a T-Shirt, and gives your iPad a notebook-style look. Belkin also says the adjustable viewing angles make it easier to type on the iPad's touchscreen. It comes in purple or gray.

A Google Exec Just Beat The World Record For Highest-Altitude Jump From The Stratosphere

Alan Eustace

Google senior vice president Alan Eustace just beat the world record for highest-altitude space jump, The New York Times reports.

A helium-filled balloon carried him 135,908 feet to nearly the top of the stratosphere — more than 25 miles — above the ground, before he cut himself loose and plunged toward the earth at speeds that peaked at more than 800 miles per hour.

Observers on the ground heard a small sonic boom, though Eustace says he did not hear or feel it.

Eustace did two backflips in the air before his small parachute righted him, The Times reports. After four-and-a-half minutes, he opened his main parachute, eventually landing 70 miles from the launch site.

"It was amazing," he told The Times. "It was beautiful. You could see the darkness of space and you could see the layers of atmosphere, which I've never seen before."

The previous altitude record was set by Austrian Felix Baumgartner, who jumped from 128,100 feet in 2012 as a stunt for Red Bull.

Here's Eustace preparing to lift-off:

Alan Eustace

Eustace, who is 57 and has been at Google since 2002, had been planning the jump in secret for nearly three years and working with a small group of technologists specializing in spacesuit design, life-support systems, and parachute and balloon technology.

Eustace's suit didn't have a cooling system, so he barely moved on his ascent to keep from over-heating and had to acknowledge communications from ground controllers by slightly moving one of his legs.

Alan Eustace

“It was a wild, wild ride,” Eustace told The Times.

Although Google offered to help fund the jump, Eustace refused because he didn't want it to seem like a marketing stunt.

Watch the video:

In the report, BI Intelligence looks at the drivers of programmatic adoption, sizes up the programmatic market, and outlines the barriers that some advertisers and publishers face when adopting programmatic technologies.

THE PROGRAMMATIC ADVERTISING REPORT: Mobile, Video, And Real-Time Bidding Will Catapult Programmatic Ad Spend

Real TimeBiddingDigitalAdSales

Programmatic platforms are on pace to fundamentally reshape the entire digital advertising landscape.

These platforms are automating much of the ad buying and selling process and increasing the accuracy of execution. Programmatic technologies are helping ad buyers find the right audience at the right price at the right time.

A new report from BI Intelligence finds that real-time bidding (RTB), a key piece of the programmatic ecosystem, will account for over $18.2 billion in U.S. digital ad revenues in 2018, up from just $3.1 billion in 2013.

Access The Full Report By Signing Up For A Free Trial

Here are some of the key takeaways from the report:

Programmatic and real-time bidding (RTB) ad spend is growing fast. RTB will account for over $18.2 billion of U.S. digital ad sales in 2018, up from just $3.1 billion in 2013, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 42%.
Mobile and video ads will be a major driver of this growth, with RTB sales for these formats topping $6.8 billion and $3.9 billion in 2018, respectively.
A number of companies are already cashing in on the growing programmatic market. Top programmatic ad companies include Criteo, Rocket Fuel, the Rubicon Project, and AOL. These four companies pulled in more than $1.5 billion in combined global ad revenue in 2013, accounting for more than one-tenth of global programmatic ad dollars.
Prices for programmatic ads are increasing for almost all ad types, as demand outpaces supply. The effective cost per thousand impressions (eCPM) for social ads was up by 64% between January through April 2014, compared to the same time period one year earlier, according to Turn.
There are still a number of barriers to adoption. Top barriers include brand worries that they will lose control over where their ads will appear, internal resistance at ad agencies, and lack of transparency in the industry over methods and results.

The report is full of charts and data that can easily be downloaded and put to use.

In full, the report:

For full access receive to all BI Intelligence's analysis, reporting, and downloadable charts on the digital media industry, sign up for a free trial.

Ralph Nader letter to Apple

RALPH NADER: Hey Apple, Stop Listening To Carl Icahn And Pay Your Workers Instead (AAPL)

Ralph Nader

Ralph Nader has a clear message for Apple: pay your workers more money.

In a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, Nader, a multiple-time Presidential candidate, wrote that Apple should stop catering to the demands of activist investors like Carl Icahn, and use its cash to pay workers more instead of buyback its stock.

In his letter, which was first published by The Wall Street Journal, Nader walks through a scenario where Apple halves the hours and doubles the salary of its Foxconn workers, costing the company $5.4 billion annually.

"If instead of buying back stock," Nader wrote, "Apple had used its excess $130 billion to endow a foundation to achieve these reforms, it would have paid out at a conservative five percent interest $6.5 billion annually, enough to double wages and ensure a 40 hour workweek for hundreds of thousands of iPhone workers, while leaving a $1.1 billion surplus as an annual budget for ensuring topnotch health, safety and environmental standards at Apple factories... Finally, some of Apple’s Chinese factory workers may become able to buy the iPhones they manufacture."

"'Designed by Apple in California' has a nicer ring to it than 'Assembled by workers paid about a dollar per hour, working 11 hour shifts, and sleeping eight to a room in the Jabil Circuit corporate dormitories in Wuxi, China,'" Nader wrote in his letter. "But, no matter how you spin it on the iPhone packaging, you continue to turn away."

Nader says the "corporatist" argument regarding pay for factory employees is that that's the price of cheaper iPhones. "This could be the case, if Apple was just barely profitable," Nader wrote. "But, as revealed in a recent letter responding to Carl Icahn's call for more stock buyback (you respond to [a] billionaire's pleas much more often than workers' pleas), Apple is planning to have repurchased $130 billion of its own shares by the end of next year. In short, Apple is so profitable that it does not know what to do with $130 billion except buy back stock from its shareholders to maybe boost its share price."

Now, admittedly, Apple spends like, a lot of money buying back stock, but it's also sort of hard to take Nader's math and implementation at face value and say that it would definitely work.

But as we've highlighted before, even some of the big investors that Nader takes aim at know that the aggressive returning of money to shareholders, rather than employees or for investment in their business, is not advisable corporate behavior.

And as Business Insider's Henry Blodget has written before, there is no "law of capitalism" that says a company must pay its employees as little as possible.

In its latest quarter, Apple took in $42 billion in revenue, sold more than 39 million iPhones, and had $155 billion in cash at the end of the quarter.

Which, at the very least, seems like a lot.

You can read Nader's full letter, embedded below.

Watch This South Korean Robot Fly A Plane

PIBOT-1

Okay, it's a South Korean robot flying a plane — on a flight simulator.

And later, it's a robot flying a ... toy plane.

However, this Reuters video does show the effect of actually putting a humanoid robot in a cockpit, even if it's a virtual flight deck.

And it might remind a few folks of Otto Pilot, the inflatable autopilot from "Airplane!" — the disaster movie spoof from the 1980s.

Actually, it's a bit strange that we would need to see a robot with arms, legs, and head operating the controls of a plane. Robots already routinely fly planes, they just don't look like robots. They look like computers, and they're built into the aircraft's control technology.

However, the South Korean robot — called "PIBOT" (Get it?) — isn't designed to be a humanoid autopilot. It's intended to fly aircraft, planes and helicopters, that we designed for humans to operate. PIBOT is reverse-engineered from a human aircraft interface, rather than integrated with it.

PIBOT-2

As the Reuters report notes, PIBOT's creators hope that a game-time-ready version of the robot will be able to fly planes and helicopters into environments too dangerous for human pilots.

The idea is that you grab your PIBOT and put him at the controls if your puny human pilots have reservations about flying over a nuclear reactor that's melting down.

PIBOT-4

Maybe PIBOT doesn't look all that impressive now. But give him some time. He certainly looks more competent than Otto Pilot.

Otto Pilot

Here's the entire Reuters video:

7 Of The Coolest Secrets In The Game 'Destiny' And How To Find Them

destiny moon guardian

"Destiny" has been revered as one of the best video games of the year.

It made $325 million in its first five days. The game was an instant hit, even before it was officially released.

Now that it's been out for awhile, people are finding some pretty cool hidden things in the game, called Easter eggs.

In fact, Bungie is no stranger to hiding Easter eggs in its games. In its contract with Activision, there's even a stipulation that it must provide Activision with a list of all the Easter eggs.

Bungie pays homage to its roots with a little nod to the man who started it all, Master Chief.

Go to Mars and do the Garden's Spire mission. When you're done with the mission and get to the Iron Line door, clear all the bad guys, but don't go through the red door. Instead, go to the left and go through a big glowing blue door. Walk down the hall until you reach another door, called Trenchworks. Kill more bad guys and then walk outside. You'll see a command tower. If you walk around to the other side of it and look up, the tower looks like Master Chief's helmet.

(Via IGN and Redditor SmokingGhost)

You can play soccer!

When you're not busy saving the world, go to the Tower hub. On the left side of the map, under some stairs, you'll find a soccer ball that you can kick around.

But a soccer ball isn't the only ball in the game.

There's also a large purple ball in the Tower hub. This time it's on some crates to the right of Bounty tracker. When you interact with it, it flies up in the air like a balloon.

This isn't the first time a ball has been spotted in a Bungie game. A soccer ball was an Easter egg in "Halo 2," and was later seen in other "Halo" titles.

iTunes Music Sales Are Plummeting (AAPL)

Apple-Cook-Tim-iTunes-Festival

iTunes music sales have fallen 13% since the beginning of the year, The Wall Street Journal's Hannah Karp reports.

The decline in sales is not a surprise for Apple — sales were down 2.1% in 2013 — but the news underscores how consumers have steadily moved away from a-la-carte offerings like iTunes toward streaming services like Pandora and Spotify.

Apple is believed to have purchased Beats Electronics in part because of its streaming service, Beats Music, to integrate a streaming option into iTunes.

Apple is reportedly in talks with record labels to lower the cost of Beats Music, which runs users $9.99/month or $99.99/year.

Last month, Apple denied rumors it would shut down Beats Music, saying instead that a rebrand was likely.

As you can see, iTunes music revenue has been bumpy but essentially flat since 2010. Consumers are much more interested in iTunes for its app offerings.

iTunesRevenueLine

Late Telecom Entrepreneur's $35 Million Hamptons Estate Sells After Just 2 Months

Treibick hamptons house

The Hamptons home of late cable and telecommunications entrepreneur Richard Treibick has sold after just two months on the market, according to Candace Taylor at The Wall Street Journal. It had been listed for $34.99 million in August.

The home is located on 31 acres of beachfront property in Sagaponack, in the Hamptons. The buyer remains unknown.

Treibick, the former chairman of Cable Holdings and Cellular Information Systems, died earlier this year. The Sagaponack property was his summer home, with his primary residence in Greenwich, Conn.

Gary DePersia of the Corcoran Grouphadhas the listing.

The estate is made up of two parcels: a 6,000-square foot house and 23 acres of adjacent farmland. Treibick leased part of the land to local farmers, using the rest to grow vegetables and berries. A barn, greenhouse, and shed sit on the property.With seven bedrooms and multiple decks, the house itself is gorgeous.

treibick hamptons house The pool deck is a great place to relax with family and friends.

treibick hamptons house And there are plenty of options for dining outside when the weather permits.

You're never too far from the beach on this property. A private boardwalk leads down to the sand.

And there are plenty of ways to enjoy the view.

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Ford CEO: We've Driven The Tesla Model S, Torn It Apart, And Put It Back Together (TSLA)

saleen tesla model s prototype

There's no question that Tesla is the most interesting car company in the world.

Morgan Stanley lead auto analyst Adam Jonas has gone a step further and declared that Tesla is the most important car company in the world.

So a lively moment was generated on Friday when, after Ford reported its third-quarter earnings, CEO Mark Fields fielded questions from Wall Street. Jonas suggested that Ford had probably obtained a Tesla Model S sedan and ... investigated its secrets.

Fields was quick to affirm Jonas' suspicions.

"We have driven the Model S, torn it down, put it back together, and driven it again," said Fields, who moved into the big chair at Ford in July. "We're very familiar with that product."

"How," you might ask, "could Ford do such a thing?"

Teardowns in the consumer-electronics realm are pretty routine. Anyone with the right tools can take their iPhone or iMac apart. A key follow-up feature of new product launches from Apple and everyone else is the near-immediate teardowns that happen as soon as the new stuff hits the market.

Obviously, you need a bit more space, some more tools, and a fair amount of expertise to take apart a $100,000 luxury sedan (And put it back together!).

But then again, Ford builds cars for a living, so it's safe to assume that its engineers know what they're doing.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk isn't going to be terribly shocked to hear Fields acknowledge that Ford is a fan of the Model S, at a deeply gearhead-y level. Every other major carmaker that can get a Model S is going to tear it apart, as well. Teslas surely lie in pieces in the top-secret skunkworks garages of every automaker on earth.

But what about Tesla? Do Musk & Co. tear apart competing vehicles?

They really don't have to. Tesla is the electric car industry at this point. Its startup competition has fallen by the wayside, and the major carmakers have limited their electric-vehicle ambitions. Tesla can simply keep doing more of what it has been doing. Repetition — and continued execution on promises — is its own version of success, as long as the company doesn't forget the scrappy days of the 2008-2009 period, when it almost went under.

Additionally, beyond its battery technology — which at this point is well understood — Tesla's innovation is more on the software and electric-charging infrastructure side. Big carmakers already know how to build a very expensive car that runs on electricity.

It's also worth noting that Tesla isn't particularly invested in protecting its intellectual property from potential competitors. Earlier this year, Musk made the very unusual announcement that Tesla would be opening up its patents for all to see.

Still, it's amazing to hear that a carmaker like Ford, with a history stretching back 100 years, is still intrigued enough by the new kid on the block to get one of that kid's cars and rip it to pieces, just to learn exactly how it works.

NOW WATCH: 7 Reasons Why The New Tesla Is Such A Big Deal

THE INTERNET OF EVERYTHING: 2014 [SLIDE DECK]

IoE

The age of Internet ubiquity has arrived.

The world is moving beyond standalone devices into a new era where everything is connected.

We've created a slideshow highlighting the key trends and forecasts for the entire Internet-connected ecosystem, including connected TVs, connected cars, wearable computing devices, and all of the consumer and business tools that will soon be connected to the "Internet Of Things."

BI Intelligence is a new research and analysis service focused on mobile computing, digital media, payments, and e-commerce. Only subscribers can download the individual charts and datasets in Excel, along with the PowerPoint and PDF versions of this deck. Please sign up for a free trial here.

#GrammarGate Is A Hilarious Take On The Latest Twitter Controversy

kelsey grammer

By now you may have heard of an awful controversy sweeping the gaming community known by its Twitter hashtag #GamerGate.

Now there's a new, nicer, funnier controversy, gathering around the hashtag #GrammarGate.

#GamerGate, to sum it up, started when some video game fans said journalists and game developers are too close, and called into question the ethics of video game journalists. It quickly devolved into harassment of women in the industry. Supporters of the movement have rallied behind the "GamerGate" hashtag on Twitter and elsewhere.

Let's just say this is about as ugly as any internet fight has ever been.

Enter the kinder, nicer #GrammarGate. It began eons ago as a hashtag about funny grammar mistakes but is now being used to express outrage over the mistreatment of commas.

Here are a few of the people sounding off on #GrammarGate

I don't understand all this fuss about #GrammarGate. Too many typos in game reviews?
— Ed Bott (@edbott) October 23, 2014

@tvoti @djoneson @RowanKaiser #GrammarGate doesn't support Satanism! We just want publications to taking spacing seriously!
— Andrew L Daar (@AndrewDaar) October 21, 2014

Wrong preposition welcomes passengers to #Brussels airport. C'est a scandale! #Grammargate pic.twitter.com/sYME5gORd6
— Richard Medic (@Happeningo) October 24, 2014

By the way, as anyone in the #GrammarGate camp will tell you, this is not the same thing as #GrammerGate, which is a combination of people misspelling "grammar" and a spoof about #GamerGate centered on actor Kelsey Grammer.

#GrammerGate pic.twitter.com/0Sf8Qg7wR9
— The Ghost Of Santa (@theleanover) October 23, 2014

#GRAMMERGATE pic.twitter.com/6p2qhfQLKM
— Cody Goins (@codygoins) October 20, 2014

@tvoti @RowanKaiser #GrammarGate, not to be confused with #GrammerGate, about the female characters on Frasier.
— Andrew L Daar (@AndrewDaar) October 20, 2014

This time next year we'll all be arguing over journalistic syntax. #GrammerGate
— Josh Langland (@TheHorrorGuru) October 15, 2014

The Next 'Avengers' Movie Might Demonize Artificial Intelligence All Over Again

age-of-ultron-art

Billionaire investor Peter Thiel recently said progressive technologies like artificial intelligence tend to get vilified in Hollywood.

"You know, our society, the dominant culture doesn’t like science. It doesn’t like technology. You just look at the science-fiction movies that come out of Hollywood — 'Terminator,' 'Matrix,' 'Avatar,' 'Elysium.' I watched the 'Gravity' movie the other day. It’s like you would never want to go into outer space. You would just want to be back on some muddy island."

In that case, Thiel probably won’t be thrilled with the next “Avengers” movie.

For years, there have been dozens of movies warning about an apocalypse brought on by evil robots. But this movie might have a bit more resonance since we’re actually approaching the point where we’ll have AI in our smartphones, and in our homes.

Earlier this year, Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk — two of the greatest minds in science and technology, respectively — warned about what might happen if artificial intelligence systems were somehow programmed to be malicious.

Musk described a "Terminator" scenario that would be "more dangerous than nukes," while Hawking offered a more nuanced understanding of the impact:

One can imagine such technology outsmarting financial markets, out-inventing human researchers, out-manipulating human leaders, and developing weapons we cannot even understand. Whereas the short-term impact of AI depends on who controls it, the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all.

So basically, unless we're careful about how we program AI, we could have killer robots on our hands. This also happens to be the plot for "Avengers: Age Of Ultron." The trailer for the film was released Wednesday.

In the film, billionaire playboy genius futurist Tony Stark, a.k.a Iron Man — whose movie character is actually inspired by Musk — "tries to jumpstart a dormant peacekeeping program" and inadvertently creates a maniacal AI named "Ultron." In the trailer, you can see what looks to be the first carnation of Ultron, which looks like one of those dilapidated peacekeeping robots (notice the Avengers logo on the chest).

ultron-1

ultron-2

The rest of the trailer includes lots of explosions and lots of shots of a sad and beaten Bruce Banner. And if the Incredible Hulk is overwhelmed by evil AI, maybe we should be a little skittish, too.

The potential for AI to be "evil" isn't a new concept — and it's not a crazy prospect, either — but Disney and Marvel are influential enough to bring this topic back into the mainstream, now that AI is finally here.

Since IBM's Watson supercomputer beat a bunch of Jeopardy! winners at their own game in 2011, big tech companies have begun to bet big on AI: Google purchased DeepMind for hundreds of millions of dollars earlier this year, social networks are using AI for facial recognition, AI is used to regulate traffic and train schedules, and several car companies, including Musk's Tesla Motors, are working on autonomous vehicles.

boston dynamics

Artificial intelligence is all about creating machines that can make decisions by themselves based on logical objectives. There are good intentions, obviously, since smart robots can help us get work done more efficiently. The problem is what happens if we program robots to choose their own objectives, and what happens if humans simply become an "obstacle" between the robot and its objective.

Hopefully, this movie will inspire companies and governments to be more careful about how we develop artificial intelligence, since so many believe the propensity for AI to go horribly, horribly wrong, is "inevitable." On the bright side, at least there's one scientist who knows how to stop the robot uprising.

Renault chief sees Europe auto market slowing in 2015

French President Francois Hollande is shown the inside of a newly presented Renault Espace by CEO of Nissan-Renault Carlos Ghosn (R) during an official visit to the Paris Motor Show on October 03, 2014

Shanghai (AFP) - French carmaker Renault chairman, Carlos Ghosn, said Saturday that he expects slower growth in Europe's auto market next year as it continues to recover from the global economic crisis.

Ghosn, who is also Renault's chief executive officer, said the European market was growing at six percent so far this year -- the best since the 2007 crisis.

"I'm expecting in 2015 this recovery to continue," Ghosn told journalists on the sidelines of an industry forum in China's commercial hub Shanghai.

"I don't see another six percent increase. I think the increase will probably be more moderate than six percent... in line with GDP (gross domestic product) growth," he said, but gave no estimates for Renault alone.

Ghosn is also president and chief executive officer of Japan's Nissan Motor Co. through an alliance between the companies.

Many foreign carmakers turned to China, the world's largest auto market, in the wake of the global crisis as their home markets in the United States or Europe collapsed.

China's auto market is now slowing as well, as weaker domestic economic growth and a corruption crackdown take their toll.

But Ghosn said Renault and Nissan were committed to adding production in China.

In late 2013, Renault signed an agreement with Chinese company Dongfeng to set up a joint venture that will start production in 2016 with initial capacity of 150,000 vehicles a year.

Nissan has an existing partnership with state-backed Dongfeng, China's second largest automaker. The two companies last month announced they plan to produce Infiniti luxury cars along with their current offerings.

"We're adding capacity (in China)," Ghosn told business executives after a speech at the China Europe International Business School.

"We don't believe the slowdown in China is going to be long-term because the fundamentals are still pointing towards a very good development of the industry," he said.

China's auto sales rose just 2.5 percent year-on-year in September, the slowest growth for any month this year, to 1.98 million vehicles.

Last year, auto sales in China reached 21.98 million vehicles.

Hong Kong's Umbrella Movement gets computer game makeover

Mobile phone app designer Fung Kam-keung, CEO and founder of Awesapp Limited, holds a smartphone with one of his latest games, 'Yellow Umbrella', seen at the Awesapp Ltd. office in Hong Kong, on October 23, 2014

Hong Kong (AFP) - How do you defend yourself against scores of tear gas wielding police while manning the barricades at Hong Kong's protest camps? Unleash the wrath of Chinese deity Guan Yu.

That's just one of the options available to players of a new smartphone game which has swiftly become a hit among gamers and protesters in the southern Chinese city.

"Yellow Umbrella" has been downloaded more than 40,000 times from Google Play's store since its release on Monday, the game's developers told AFP, although it has yet to receive approval from Apple and is noticeably absent from Google's online store in mainland China.

The game puts players on a protester barricade as it is charged by lines of police officers, triad thugs, angry locals and even the city's leader Leung Chun-ying dressed as a wolf.

Incense sticks, stacks of money and durian fruit can all be placed in front of the attackers to slow them down in a tower defence format similar to the wildly popular Plants vs Zombies.

And when things get really tough, protesters can call down Guan Yu -- a popular Chinese deity prayed to for protection.

"They (the protesters) like Guan Yu very much because they want to resolve the problem but they don't know how to do it. They don't want to use violence, so they just ask the god to help," the game's creator Fung Kam-keung told AFP.

The game itself is filled with cultural references inspired by nearly a month of mass rallies and roadblocks calling for Beijing to rescind its insistence that Hong Kong's next leader be vetted by a loyalist committee ahead of elections in 2017.

Yellow umbrellas and ribbons are used as defensive tools as student leader Joshua Wong, who has become something of a local celebrity and heart throb, cheers from the barricades.

- Big bad wolf -

Leung's canine appearance is a nod to a common insult thrown by detractors at the city's leader, whose name sounds similar to the Cantonese word for a wolf.

But in keeping with the protest movement's non-violent ethos protesters cannot attack their assailants.

"I wanted to make a game not only for fun but also to show our support to the students and to let others know that they are very peaceful in asking for real elections," Fung, the 31-year-old founder of game developer Awesapp, said from his office in an industrial park in the city's Sha Tin district.

"After the tear gas, after the violence from gangsters and even police, I thought we needed to do more to show our support," he added.

The democracy movement was galvanised in late September after police used tear gas 87 times to clear protesters who took over a major road opposite the government headquarters.

As the protest spread into other parts of the city, demonstrators have clashed over the weeks with angry locals, thugs and police -- though the rallies have for the most part been largely peaceful.

Student leaders held talks with the government on Tuesday. But the discussions made little headway and there are fears a full breakdown in talks could lead to further clashes.

The game was developed in just five days, and so far reviews are positive.

"We play this game in order to keep ourselves reminded of our struggle for freedom and democracy. Fight for freedom!" one user Zux Kev, who gave the maximum five star rating, commented on the Google Play store.

"If you're a Hong Konger and love democracy, play it," user Yeung Tim-wing, who also gave a five-star rating to the game, said.

Brazil poll rivals clash over corruption claim

Brazilian presidential candidates Dilma Rousseff (R) and Aecio Neves wait for the start of a televised debate in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on October 24, 2014

Rio de Janeiro (AFP) - Brazil's presidential candidates clashed over corruption allegations in a final debate, as incumbent Dilma Rousseff rejected a report that she knew about a kickback scheme at state oil giant Petrobras.

The last debate before Sunday's run-off election was heated from the start as the report in conservative newsweekly Veja dominated opening exchanges before the candidates moved on to the economy and political reform.

Center-right challenger Aecio Neves demanded to know what his leftist rival knew about Veja's claim that she and her predecessor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva were personally aware of embezzlement within Petrobras, whose board Rousseff once chaired.

Rousseff insisted she was not and repeated a vow made prior to the debate that she planned to sue Veja for "slander and libel."

She chided Neves for repeating the claim and insisted voters could see through a Veja attempt to influence the poll outcome.

"Veja magazine has presented no proof -- this magazine has a habit of trying to pull off an electoral coup right at the end of campaigning," Rousseff stormed as both candidates prepared to field questions from undecided voters from around the country.

Neves said the ruling Workers' Party (PT) had a record of corruption dating back to the "mensalao" Congressional vote-buying scandal during Lula's 2003-2011 administration, in which lawmakers received cash to vote for PT legislation.

An investigation did not censure Lula but derailed some political careers, while a close Lula advisor was jailed.

But Rousseff hit back, accusing Neves of "wanting to take Brazil backwards" and reminding him there had been a scandal over vote buying in the state of Minas Gerais where he served as governor and where 10 accused were never tried.

And Rousseff went for the jugular in adding that one of the best-known of that group "is the coordinator of your campaign in Minas Gerais."

Neves retorted: "The best measure against corruption would be to take the PT out of power."

- Face-off on economy -

After tackling the Veja fallout, Rousseff and Neves moved onto Brazil's current economic recession and an inflation rate which has pushed through the government's own ceiling target of 6.5 percent.

Rousseff, who latest opinion polls going into the weekend gave a lead of between six and eight percent, in her defense pointed to record-low joblessness and rises in the minimum wage.

But business-world favorite Neves derided the leftist incumbent for excessive reliance on state intervention.

Both candidates agreed education required huge investment but disagreed on each other's record on improving schools.

Neves complained that the PT had not sufficiently addressed poor infrastructure and public services, issues that brought more than a million protesters onto the streets a year ago, saying millions of households lacked proper sanitation.

Rousseff concluded by saying nothing would deflect her in her aim of building a better Brazil for all, while Neves insisted he was the candidate of much-needed change.

Momentum building on pan-Pacific trade deal

Australian Trade Minister Andrew Robb (L) and US Trade Representative Mike Froman attend the talks as part of the negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, in Sydney, on October 25, 2014

Sydney (AFP) - Momentum is building towards a pan-Pacific trade agreement, representatives of Australia and the United States said Saturday as talks between trade ministers began in Sydney.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which would encompass 40 percent of the global economy and include 12 nations, has been the subject of negotiations for years.

US President Barack Obama said in June he hoped to have an agreement on framing the deal, which has been slowed by debate on key details between the US and Japan, by November.

Australian Trade Minister Andrew Robb, hosting the Sydney talks, told the opening plenary that reports from negotiators were that "there does seem to be a real head of steam".

"I think a lot of progress has been made," he said.

"Clearly I think we are working now to try and conclude this agreement by the end of this year."

Robb admitted trade ministers had a "very big programme" during the three-day talks, which attracted a small group protesting against the "secret deal".

"I do think this agreement is starting to take some real shape," Robb said.

"We are at a point where we are trying to make as many final decisions as we can and bring this thing to completion."

US Trade Representative Mike Froman said since the last TPP meeting in Singapore in May, trade ministers had been in "almost constant" negotiations.

"Going into this weekend we are enjoying a great deal of momentum and focus across the board, and it's up to us to seize that momentum and make sure that this meeting is maximally productive," he said.

The negotiations had been slowed while the United States and Tokyo debate key details, including Japanese tariffs on agricultural imports and US access to Japan's auto market.

"The issues left at the end are often times the most challenging but now is the time to start working through those and finding solutions," Froman said.

"We've got some work to do and the table is set in a way that will allow us to make progress on these difficult remaining issues."

- 'Within our grasp' -

Froman said there was now an opportunity to narrow differences ahead of leaders meetings in Asia in coming weeks. The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Beijing and G20 summit in Brisbane will both take place next month.

"It's very much within our grasp," he said.

Proponents of the TPP say any agreement will free up trade in goods and services across the region, reduce regulation and improve opportunities for jobs and for members generally.

But critics say the pact will favour corporate rights over those of the public, and could result in higher medicine prices, greater damage to the environment and fewer Internet freedoms.

They have also criticised the lack of details about the talks, which Australia joined in 2008.

Ahead of the meeting, Robb dismissed the criticisms and said the biggest risk was for the TPP to be stalled.

"Every country's got its sensitivities, as we do, and the biggest risk is that those things prevent this agreement being concluded," he told the ABC.

"Now, this weekend, three days of more consultations, hopefully will move us to a point where this thing can be completed sometime next year for the benefit of the region."

The 12 prospective TPP members are Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam.

Here's The First Canceled Show Of The Fall TV Season

manhattan love story

We have our first canceled TV series of the fall season and it's ABC's "Manhattan Love Story."

The rom-com followed two individuals (Jake McDorman and Analeigh Tipton) set up on a blind date. The twist? You could also hear everything going on in both individual's head.

It was one two dozen new shows to premiere on network TV this fall.

We're not surprised, but we had our money on NBC's "Bad Judge" going first since it was plagued with behind-the-scenes issues.

"Manhattan Love Story" premiered to 4.7 million viewers. The latest episode had 2.6 million tune in to watch. The show went from having a 1.5 rating to a dismal .7 in the key 18-49 demo.

The show was becoming a rough lead-in for Marvel's "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." which have slowly been decreasing since the season's start.

The series has accrued a majority of poor reviews that suggested the two lead actors had little to no chemistry. The Hollywood Reporter's Tim Goodman called it "sexist and stupid." Most were annoyed with hearing the main character's every thoughts.

Despite the cancellation, ABC has one of the strongest lineups right now with the fall's number one new drama series, "How to Get Away With Murder," from Shonda Rhimes ("Scandal," "Grey's Anatomy") and the number one new comedy, "Black-Ish."

It's pretty late in the year for the first TV show to get the axe.

Entertainment Weekly reports that's because TV execs have wanted to give more time to allow for DVR data to come in. EW also says the networks aren't as confident in their midseason replacement series which isn't a good sign.

AND: The only fall TV shows to watch

War-scarred Ukraine counts down to key vote

A man walks in front of election placards in the center of Kiev on October 24, 2014

Kiev (AFP) - Ukraine voters will go to the polls Sunday in elections set to dramatically reshape parliament, after a year of upheavals in which a deadly pro-Russian uprising has threatened to splinter the ex-Soviet state.

Campaigning ended on Friday for the polls called by President Petro Poroshenko in August.

Poroshenko is under pressure to purge parliament of lawmakers tied to the old regime of Viktor Yanukovych, ousted in February after a wave of bloody protests.

While Poroshenko may succeed in creating a pro-Western coalition in parliament, he is falling short of his other aim of bringing the separatist east under control and out of the reach of an increasingly assertive Kremlin.

Russian President Vladimir Putin -- accused of stirring up the uprising after seizing Crimea in the wake of his ally's ouster in Kiev -- said he respected Ukraine's territorial integrity but questioned how its frontier with Russia was set.

"The history of Ukraine's formation and its current borders -- this is a rather complex process," Putin said in the Black Sea resort of Sochi.

Putin highlighted Moscow's involvement in Ukraine's affairs when he acknowledged for the first time that Russia had helped Yanukovych flee his country following his ouster.

"I won't hide the fact that we helped him seek refuge in Crimea. At the time, Crimea was a part of Ukraine," Putin told Russian and foreign experts at an annual event in Moscow on Friday.

"I'm telling you frankly, Yanukovych asked to be brought to Russia and we did that," he added.

Ukraine had 36.5 million voters, but lost about 1.8 million after the annexation of Crimea in March.

Almost three million others live in separatist-controlled areas of Lugansk and Donetsk regions, where insurgent leaders are boycotting the polls and holding their own votes a week later.

- 'Ballots not guns' -

Kiev has nevertheless vowed to organise polling stations in government-controlled areas of the rebellious east, with Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk promising to ensure security on election day.

"It's difficult to hold elections in a country that has seen military aggression from Russia," Yatsenyuk said Thursday, warning that anyone seeking to disrupt the process will be punished.

"The choice should be made not with a gun but with a ballot."

Poroshenko said Thursday he hoped to be able to form a Westward-leaning coalition to enact all needed reforms and rebuild Ukraine's economy, despite the insurgency in the country's coal and steel belt.

He added that such a coalition would start by modernising the economy -- notoriously corrupt and burdened by a cumbersome tax system -- to meet the demands of international lenders behind a $27 billion rescue deal aimed at averting bankruptcy.

His eponymous Petro Poroshenko Bloc is leading in opinion polls with up to 30 percent of the vote.

However he is not likely to command a majority in the 450-seat parliament and will need to ally with nationalist forces such as wild card radical Oleg Lyashko, whose party has been polling on 13 percent.

Poroshenko said that despite the continuing violence, and the rebels' refusal to accept his offer of temporary self-rule, the war will not become a post-Soviet frozen conflict similar to Moldova's breakaway Transdniestr region or Georgia's Abkhazia, whose independence is recognised by Moscow.

"There is not going to be a frozen conflict because Donbass cannot survive without Ukraine," Poroshenko said.

- Violence 'down' in east -

A Moscow-backed truce Kiev and the separatists signed on September 5 has calmed the worst fighting, but continues to be broken on a daily basis around the largest rebel-held city Donetsk.

A defence official in Kiev accused the fighters of planning another major raid on the city's disputed airport this weekend.

More than 3,700 people have been killed in the conflict since April, according to UN figures, and at least 824,000 displaced.

And the threat of Ukraine's breakup still looms large, with the rebels who declared their own "people's republics" in Donetsk and Lugansk earlier this year planning to defiantly break away from Kiev's authority with elections of their own on November 2.

Kiev is also at pains to find a solution to its latest gas dispute with Russia as temperatures on Friday plummeted below zero in the capital.

With the failure of latest talks between Kiev and Moscow, which is demanding that Ukraine settles an unpaid gas bill of $5.3 billion, the country is under pressure to pay up while funds run dry.

The so-called anti-terrorist operation against the pro-Russian separatists was estimated by Poroshenko in the summer months to cost the budget about $5.4 million a day.

Messi targets record as Suarez debuts in Spanish El Clasico

A file photo shows Luis Suarez poses after receiving the 2014 Golden Boot award on October 15, 2013 in Barcelona. He is free to make his long-awaited debut for Barcelona

Madrid (AFP) - Luis Suarez is free to make his long-awaited debut for Barcelona when the La Liga leaders travel to face Real Madrid in the first El Clasico of the season on Saturday.

Suarez has been restricted to a few friendly games for club and country since sealing a £75 million ($127 million, 95 million euros) move from Liverpool after receiving a four-month ban for biting Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini at the World Cup back in June.

The Uruguayan's temperament will be tested by the red-hot atmosphere at the Santiago Bernabeu, but even on his debut Suarez could be overshadowed by teammate Lionel Messi.

The four-time World Player of the Year is just one goal away from matching the 251 goals Telmo Zarra scored for Athletic Bilbao between 1940 to 1955 to become the all-time leading goalscorer in La Liga.

And midfielder Andres Iniesta is hoping both will shine to continue Barca's fine recent record at the Bernabeu, where they have won four of the last six league meetings.

"I hope Messi scores two because it would be a great sign for us," said the Spanish international on Thursday.

"It is difficult to know what you will come up against because the details make the difference. It can swing to one side or the other in any moment, but we want to make the most of our strengths, be effective and try to play very well to win the game. It is never easy to win at the Bernabeu.

"Fortunately the time has come and the moment has arrived when Luis can play. He is very happy and it is important for the rest of the group too. We hope that he performs just as well as he has always done."

Madrid have a World Cup star of their own making his bow in the Clasico in Golden Boot winner James Rodriguez.

"It is going to be a hard game. I want to approach it calmly, responsibly and be really up for it to help the team get the victory," said the Colombian.

More responsibility will be placed on Rodriguez's shoulders as Gareth Bale misses out through injury.

However, the 23-year-old has begun to show signs of his form from Brazil in recent weeks, including a lovely assist for Cristiano Ronaldo's opening goal as Madrid sealed their eighth consecutive win in all competitions with a 3-0 win over Liverpool on Wednesday.

"I am in good form, as is the rest of the squad," he added. "We have a strong group and mentally we are all united."

Defender Sergio Ramos is a doubt as he has missed the last four games for club and country with a calf strain, but did return to training alongside his teammates on Thursday.

Barcelona's only injury doubt is Sergio Busquets. The Spanish international missed Tuesday's 3-1 win over Ajax due to a knock on his hip, but is expected to recover to take his place in the starting line-up.

Elsewhere, Sevilla, Valencia and Atletico Madrid will be hoping to take advantage of the points dropped by one of or both Barca and Madrid.

Valencia have the easiest task on paper and could hand a debut to Alvaro Negredo when they host struggling Elche at the Mestalla on Saturday

Defeat for Barca at the Bernabeu would allow Sevilla to go joint top with victory at home to Villarreal on Sunday.

Meanwhile, champions Atletico will be looking to round off a fine week after thrashing Malmo 5-0 in the Champions League when they travel across Madrid to take on Getafe.

Fixtures (all times GMT)

Friday

Celta Vigo v Levante (1900)

Saturday

Almeria v Athletic Bilbao (1400), Real Madrid v Barcelona (1600), Valencia v Elche (1800), Cordoba v Real Sociedad (2000), Eibar v Granada (2000)

Sunday

Malaga v Rayo Vallecano (1000), Espanyol v Deportivo la Coruna (1500), Sevilla v Villarreal (1700), Getafe v Atletico Madrid (1900)

Zellweger 'new face' highlights Hollywood aging taboo

Actress Renee Zellweger arrives at ELLE's 21st Annual Women In Hollywood at Four Seasons Hotel Los Angeles at Beverly Hills on October 20, 2014 in Beverly Hills, California

Los Angeles (AFP) - The storm over Renee Zellweger's new-look face has thrown the spotlight on one of Hollywood's eternal questions: how do you grow old in Tinseltown?

The "Bridget Jones" star, who won a best supporting actress Oscar in 2004 for "Cold Mountain," appeared unrecognizable at a women in Hollywood awards show earlier this week.

Gone were the sulky pout and rounded cheeks from her turn as the eternal singleton Jones in the 2000 and 2004 movies, replaced by the 45-year-old's impressively wrinkle-free and slimline face.

She became an instant water-cooler and Twitter trending topic, with endless comments about what plastic surgery or botox she has had done, while others worried about her health.

Some denounced Hollywood itself for the pressure it imposes on actresses to meet traditional ideals of beauty.

"In Hollywood it's strange not to (have plastic surgery) if you are a woman. You can't get work. Movie casting directors won't hire you if you look old," said Sasha Stone, founder of www.awardsdaily.com.

It is a Tinseltown taboo, not to be allowed to age naturally, in contrast to places like Britain and France, Stone told AFP.

"It's an American phenomenon, an American obsession," she said.

There is a long list of actresses who have gone under the knife to maintain their youthful appearance: Demi Moore, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Jane Fonda, Melanie Griffith... to name but a few.

Some have gone a little too far in this pact with the devil, finding themselves with slightly over-rounded cheeks or "trout lips," with a little too much padding around the mouth.

"When they do their face, they hope to keep getting the A-list parts. They don't want to play grandmothers. They want the leading roles," said Stone.

- Eternal youth -

The ideal they are striving for is embodied for example by Jennifer Lawrence, the "Hunger Games" star who won an Oscar at the tender age of 22 last year for "Silver Linings Playbook."

The obsession with youth is less strong for men, who continue to win leading roles into their older years, including romantic and action parts.

Mickey Rourke's and John Travolta's cosmetic surgery is more the exception than the norm.

In 2013, there were about seven million cosmetic surgery operations on women in the US aged 40-54. Botox injections and eyelid reconstruction were the most popular.

Plastic surgeon Ashkan Ghavami, whose Beverly Hills office sees many celebrities, said modern technology only adds to the pressure on actors and actresses.

"Right now we have high definition movies and TV shows where they show you the make-up and the wrinkles. So there's a lot more pressure on people to look good in real life," he said.

In his view, Zellweger's surgery wasn't a success because her eyelids are too stretched and she has too much botox.

The actress -- who has not confirmed she had work done on her face -- called the storm triggered by her latest look "silly."

"I'm glad folks think I look different! I'm living a different, happy, more fulfilling life, and I'm thrilled that perhaps it shows," Zellweger told People magazine.

Tom Nunan, a professor at the UCLA School of Theatre, Film and Television, said it was "sad" that a star as big as Zellweger can't admit to her personal choices publicly.

"Everybody understands a little botox here and there, a little eye lift," he said.

Setting+The+Record+Straight

Whisper Responds To Damaging Accusations And Places Employees Involved On Leave

whisper michael heyward

Anonymous secret-sharing app Whisper has placed some of its employees on administrative leave following a report that called some of its business practices into question.

Whisper hasn't said which employees are on leave, however Zimmerman has hardly sent any public messages on Twitter in a week.

Heyward also says Whisper is launching an internal investigation into The Guardian's report. From his statement:

Michael Heyward
Co-Founder and CEO, Whisper

Here's all of Heyward's answers to The Guardian's questions, below.

WHO eyes mass Ebola vaccines by mid-2015

A man shows the front page of a local newspaper while reading in the subway on October 24, 2014 in New York City

Geneva (AFP) - Hundreds of thousands of Ebola vaccine doses could be rolled out to West Africa by mid-2015, the World Health Organization said Friday, after new cases of the virus were reported in New York and a two-year-old girl died in the first case in Mali.

Two American nurses were declared cured of Ebola and one -- Dallas-based Nina Pham -- hugged President Barack Obama at the White House to prove it.

But the states of New York and New Jersey ordered mandatory quarantine for medics who had treated victims of the disease in West Africa.

Steps include mandatory quarantine 21 days of any individual who has had direct contact with an Ebola patient while in Guinea, Liberia or Sierra Leone, including medics who treated Ebola patients.

Additionally, anyone who has travelled to the affected regions but not had direct contact with an Ebola patient will be actively monitored by public health officials and quarantined if necessary.

Europe's main stock markets fell on Friday over concerns about New York's first case, in a doctor who tested positive after returning from treating sufferers in Guinea, one of the countries at the epicentre of the world's worst outbreak of the disease.

The search for an effective vaccine to fight the disease took on fresh urgency as the WHO said several hundred thousand doses could be available in the "first half" of 2015.

"All is being put in place to start efficacy tests in the affected countries as early as December," WHO assistant director general Marie-Paule Kieny said.

Kieny's comments came after closed-door talks to try to find a vaccine to beat a disease that has killed almost 4,900 people and ravaged the west African nations of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

- 'Real-world' tests -

Experts are pinning their hopes on the experimental vaccine rVSV, with doses arriving in Geneva for a new round of trials, and ChAd3, made by Britain's GlaxoSmithKline.

Five other potential vaccines are in the pipeline.

Whichever proves effective in trials, WHO hopes to send huge numbers of doses to Africa for "real-world" tests.

"The pharmaceutical companies developing all these vaccines are committing to ramping up the production capacity to millions of doses to be available in 2015," said Kieny.

There is currently no licensed cure for Ebola, which is transmitted through close contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person or someone who has died from the disease.

New York's mayor said America's biggest city was fully equipped to handle Ebola as authorities moved to shut down fears of the virus spreading after a 33-year-old doctor, Craig Spencer, became the first American case of the virus outside Texas.

He was rushed to a Manhattan hospital Thursday with fever and gastrointestinal symptoms, a week after returning from treating Ebola sufferers in Guinea with the charity Doctors Without Borders.

His fiancee and two of his friends are in quarantine but appear healthy, officials said.

"There is no cause for alarm," Mayor Bill de Blasio told a news conference. "New Yorkers need to understand the situation is being handled and handled well."

There was better news when Pham -- the first US healthcare worker to contract Ebola -- was declared free of the virus.

"I am on my way back to recovery even as I reflect on how many others have not been so fortunate," Pham said before meeting Obama.

She and her nursing colleague Amber Vinson, who was also given the all-clear, caught the disease while treating a Liberian Ebola sufferer, Thomas Eric Duncan, at a Dallas hospital. He later died.

- First death in Mali -

But in the West African nation of Mali, a two-year-old girl who recently returned from a trip to neighbouring Guinea with her grandmother died from the virus.

The toddler's condition had shown signs of improvement earlier, but a source in the prime minister's office said she had succumbed to the virus in the western region of Kayes.

The Malian government advised residents to avoid all non-vital travel to affected areas.

The WHO said the Malian authorities were tracing everyone who had contact with the girl and her grandmother and 43 people had been placed under observation.

In Ivory Coast, which has escaped Ebola until now, a desperate search was on for a health worker from Guinea who may have fled across the border after having contact with a patient who died of the disease.

The man had still not been tracked down after 48 hours late Friday.

Meanwhile, European Union leaders agreed to boost aid to combat Ebola in west Africa to one billion euros ($1.3 billion).

African countries have pledged to send more than 1,000 health workers to the most severely-hit countries.

The African Union said Friday Ethiopia was sending 200 doctors, nurses, field epidemiologists, environmental health personnel and public health specialists.

With almost 10,000 people now infected, AU chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said the regional bloc was responding to an urgent need for reinforcements.

Liverpool manager warns Reds to plug leaky defence

Liverpool's Philippe Coutinho (C) celebrates scoring a goal with teammates during their English Premier League match against Queens Park Rangers, at Loftus Road in London, on October 19, 2014

London (AFP) - Brendan Rodgers concedes Liverpool's season is destined to end in frustration unless his side can plug the gaps in their leaky defence.

The Reds have kept just one clean sheet in their last 18 matches and Rodgers' pre-season overhaul of the defence, which saw the Liverpool manager splash out on Dejan Lovren and Alberto Moreno, has so far failed to solve the problem.

This season Liverpool have shipped 19 goals and a weakness dealing with set-pieces has contributed to several defeats, including Wednesday's 3-0 loss against Real Madrid in the Champions League.

Liverpool are already nine points behind Premier League leaders Chelsea heading into Saturday's clash with Hull at Anfield and Rodgers knows there needs to be an immediate improvement at the back to avoid losing touch with the top four.

"Defensively we need to be better as a team, not just the defence and goalkeeper," he said.

"We all pride ourselves on clean sheets but we need to be more competitive and aggressive in those moments as a team.

"That was the disappointment against Real Madrid and also the goals we have conceded a large number of them have been soft and it is our job to improve that quickly.

"We need to work harder and make it better."

Meanwhile, Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho says Spain striker Diego Costa could climb off his sick bed to face Manchester United on Sunday.

Costa missed Chelsea's last two matches with Crystal Palace and Maribor due to a hamstring problem and also spent a night in hospital earlier this week due to a virus, but could feature at Old Trafford.

"Diego has a little chance," Mourinho said. "I'm not saying he can (play). I'm saying that we are trying. We will see what happens between Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

"Everything happened to him. He was obviously injured and he had to go to the hospital with a viral situation that we didn't manage to resolve without being in hospital over one night."

- Chelsea won't cry over injuries -

Despite his injury problems, Mourinho is confident Chelsea can maintain their unbeaten start to the season.

"We are playing well, we are getting good results," said Mourinho. "We don't cry about injuries. We just think one injury means an opportunity for somebody else."

Sunday's match pits Mourinho against United manager Louis van Gaal, who kept the Portuguese on his staff at Barcelona after he had been first brought to the Spanish giants by former England manager Bobby Robson.

But with United, having laboured to a 2-2 draw away to West Bromwich Albion last time out, Dutch manager van Gaal knows it will take more than a detailed knowledge of Mourinho's methods for his side to beat Chelsea.

"Now we have to play against Chelsea and in the Netherlands they say 'that is another Kuche', or another 'biscuit'. By that I mean another level," van Gaal said.

Southampton may have lost several key players, as well as manager Mauricio Pochettino, to rival Premier League clubs in recent months but that hasn't stopped the Saints soaring to third in the table.

Last week they recorded their biggest top-flight win when they thrashed Sunderland 8-0.

Southampton also boast the meanest defence in the Premier League so far this term, having conceded just five goals in their opening eight matches.

Nevertheless, manager Ronald Koeman believes the south coast side, who face Stoke at St Mary's on Saturday, still have room for improvement.

"We showed them some clips from the first 20 minutes against Sunderland," said Koeman.

"That's not how I like us to start at home. They know what happened -- it wasn't a good start," the former Netherlands defender added.

That defending champions Manchester City are second in the table, five points behind Chelsea, is no surprise but West Ham in fourth place certainly is.

City travel to the London club's Upton Park ground on Saturday having let slip a two-goal lead in a 2-2 draw away to CSKA Moscow that left them in severe danger of failing yet again to qualify for the knockout stages of the Champions League.

Fixtures (1400GMT unless stated)

Saturday

Liverpool v Hull, Southampton v Stoke, Sunderland v Arsenal, Swansea v Leicester (1630GMT), West Brom v Crystal Palace, West Ham v Manchester City (1145GMT)

Sunday

Burnley v Everton (1330GMT), Tottenham v Newcastle (1330GMT), Manchester United v Chelsea (1600GMT)

Monday

QPR v Aston Villa (2000GMT)

ROUBINI: America Is A Sick, Sick Country

nouriel roubini

"American madness: a teenager is allowed to receive a rifle as a birthday gift," NYU professor Nouriel Roubini tweeted. "Sick sick country."

Roubini's words come hours after a gunman killed one person and injured several others at Marysville-Pilchuck High School near Seattle, Washington.

The gunman was later identified as Jaylen Fryberg, a freshman at the school. Fryberg, who shot and killed himself, reportedly had access to firearms, and an Instagram photo suggested that he had recently received a rifle as a birthday gift from his parents.

Much of the media attention has shifted to the mental state of Fryberg, who reportedly had been demonstrating emotional distress.

Roubini, however, argued that the focus should rather be about how easily accessible firearms are to people who may be mentally unstable.

Sadly, this is not a new argument. Lax US gun control laws have been tied to numerous tragic school shootings in recent history.

While highly publicized mass shootings are often expected to spur legislative change, little seems to actually get done.

Here are Roubini's tweets:

American madness: a teenager is allowed to receive a rifle as a birthday gift. Sick sick country.
— Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) October 25, 2014

Media idiocy: kid went on a rampage coz he was depressed. In a civilized country no one would have access to guns & be able to kill if upset
— Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) October 25, 2014

Media psycho babble on why a kid goes shooting at school. No one ask why we live in a barbaric country where anyone can have access to guns
— Nouriel Roubini (@Nouriel) October 25, 2014

15 Brilliant Quotes That Show The Genius Mind Of Box CEO Aaron Levie

Box CEO Aaron Levie’s idea to turn an ordinary file-sharing software into the next big collaboration enterprise platform has made him one of the most-watched Valley CEOs in recent years.

Since its founding in 2005, Box has raised over $564.1 million in funding, which now values the company at roughly $2.4 billion. Box is expected to go public by early next year.

Although there’s been some concerns around Box’s delayed IPO, there’s no question that Levie’s vision and leadership have made his company one of the hottest startups in the Valley.

We rounded up some of his best quotes from interviews, tweets, and other sources, which will help you better understand his genius mind.

On speed and efficiency: "I'm obsessed with speed. I'm always asking myself, 'Why can't we do things faster? Why can't it happen more efficiently? Why is this requiring three meetings instead of one?'"

On Box’s working culture: "One of our core values is 'Get s*** done.' We have a very execution-oriented culture. … Another one of our values is 'Take risks. Fail fast.' If we fail fast, we can correct mistakes quickly."

On cloud technology: “There are phases in technology. Mainframe to PC, PC to cloud, to cloud and mobile. These things come around every 10 to 15 years, and we’re in one right now.”

Beers At New York Stadiums Are Outrageously Expensive

The average cost for a small draft beer at NHL games this season is $7.45, according to data collected by Team Marketing Report from each team. That's up just 1.5% from the 2013-14 season when the average price was $7.34.

The New York Rangers still have the most expensive beer in the NHL where the cheapest beer at Madison Square Garden now costs $10.50, up from $9.50 a year ago. At the other end, the Pittsburgh Penguins offer the cheapest beer in the NHL at $5.25.

Of course, not all arenas offer the same sizes. If we consider the size of the beer, the best bang for your buck comes at Washington Capitals games where fans can get a 24-ounce beer for $8.00 or $0.33 per ounce. The worst deal in the NHL is the 12-ounce beer in Winnipeg that will cost fans US$7.36 ($0.61 per ounce).

NHL Beer Prices Chart

Data via Team Marketing Report based on information reported by each team during a survey.

The Single Most Important Risk To Stock Market Investors

max drawdown

It may sound obvious. But when you invest in stocks, you're at risk of getting wiped out.

That really is the single most important risk to investors.

Even when you think you're well-diversified, you could see the value of your investments quickly plunge or perhaps slowly bleed 90% of its value over years as the Greek stock market did during the eurozone crisis.

Citi's Jonathan Stubbs addresses this in a recent research note about asset allocation. He included a chart highlighting some of the ugliest maximum drawdowns of in the global stock market.

"Figure 45 shows various markets and industries which have suffered severe losses in relatively short order in recent decades, e.g., the UK (1972-74), the Nasdaq (2000-03), Greece (2008-12) and Mining (2008-09)," he writes.

"Hence, buyer beware."

Because many of these stocks are of companies that don't go bankrupt, the losses are just paper losses that you don't realize until you sell. If you have a long investment time horizon, you might think it wise to wait for the value to come back.

topix However, an investor must be willing to be extraordinarily patient if he hopes to recoup his losses.

"It can sometimes take many years for investors to make their money back after suffering big losses," Stubbs writes. "For example, US equities only made it back to the peak 1929 total return levels in 1945, more than 15 years after the Great Crash. Kenji Abe, Citi’s Japanese strategist, highlights that Japanese equities are still a long way short of end-1989 peak levels."

These are all things investors need to consider very carefully before they commit their life savings to the stock market.

(h/t The Washington Post)

Elon Musk Thinks Sci-Fi Nightmare Scenarios About Artificial Intelligence Could Really Happen

Elon Musk at MIT

Musk, who called for some regulatory oversight of AI to ensure "we don't do something very foolish," warned of the dangers.

"In all those stories where there’s the guy with the pentagram and the holy water, it’s like yeah he’s sure he can control the demon. Didn’t work out," Musk said.

The symposium wasn't the first time Musk raised concerns. In August, Musk tweeted: "We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially more dangerous than nukes."

NOW WATCH: 7 Reasons Why The New Tesla Is Such A Big Deal

IMF fights negative interest rates

The International Monetary Fund headquarters is seen June 5, 2011 in Washington, DC

Washington (AFP) - The International Monetary Fund on Friday announced a minimum interest rate on its unique SDR currency as it fights off the impact of sagging interest rates and deflation from major economies.

The IMF said that from Monday it would maintain a floor rate of 0.05 percent, or five basis points, on its special drawing rights or SDR currency, which represents a basket of the currencies of its largest members.

Currently the rate the Fund pays on the money its members lend to it is 3 basis points. That is also the basis for the global crisis lender's loan rate to borrowers.

With short-term rates for key SDR components the euro and the yen now running below zero, and the dollar and pound rates barely above zero, that risked pulling the SDR rate down to a negative level as well, a senior fund official explained.

"Under the current rule there is nothing to stop the SDR rate from going negative," he said.

"Financially, it would be a somewhat perverse situation because our creditor members would be paying for providing us resources."

But it also acknowledges a worry the IMF, top central bankers, and bond market traders have been expressing of major economies sinking toward deflation.

"This is a reflection of the fact that central banks have set very low interest rates, or even negative," the official said.

To meet the challenge of historically low rates as well, the official said, the IMF will round its rates to three decimal points instead of two as in the past.

The Failure Of A Major Mission In Afghanistan In Two Charts

Opium poppy cultivation sprawled to more than a half-million acres in Afghanistan last year, a record according to a report by the Inspector General responsible for overseeing Afghanistan's reconstruction.

Two charts in the report convey the sheer depth of the US's failure to end a globally illegal industry that directly funds the Taliban.

One of the report's charts used UN data to show how market forces appear to hold sway over the country's opium production levels.

That market paid amazingly little heed to over a decade of external efforts to crush it.

The US has spent $7.6 billion to date in Afghanistan to eradicate poppy crops and incentivize farmers into growing alternatives. But as the chart shows, the troughs in Afghanistan's total poppy production follow low opium prices while opium yields exploded after a crop disease destroyed half of the country's poppy fields in 2010.

When poppy yields declined, it was because of market forces and a literal act of God — not US efforts. And the overall level has risen substantially since 2002.

SIGAR Graph Afghanistan Opium Production and Events

A map created for the report gives an additional, national-level picture of where opium production has actually increased.

Taken as a whole, the Afghan poppy industry is worth $3 billion in opium and its derivative products (such as morphine and heroin). This is actually a $1 billion increase since 2012, according to the Inspector General's report.

This map shows that the increase was a national phenomenon. It's not as if a couple of regions enjoyed a bumper crop. Opium is a growth industry everywhere:

SIGAR Afghanistan Poppy Cultivation Change Responding to the report, an official at the American embassy in Kabul notes that "well over 80 percent of the world's illicit opium" comes from Afghanistan. It's "a windfall for the insurgency, which profits from the drug trade at almost every level."

It also shows how one of the central US objectives in Afghanistan has failed. After 13 years and over $7 billion, the country's economy, and its armed groups, are as dependent on the narcotics trade as ever.

Meanwhile, the Taliban are resurgent in Afghanistan's north, just months before US combat operations are scheduled to conclude at the end of 2014.

Here's The Average SAT Score For Every College Major

student sat test studying

Students who plan on majoring in multi/interdisciplinary studies tend to do better on the SAT than those who major in engineering or math, according to the College Board's 2014 SAT Report on College and Career Readiness.

Multi/interdisciplinary courses typically combine two or more academic disciplines, such as economics and history, in the study of a particular subject.

College Board took students' SAT scores and compiled them into a table showing how different prospective majors did on critical reading, writing, math, and overall.

The results are not too different from the College Board's 2013 report. Here we've ranked majors in order of highest combined, critical reading, math, and writing scores, respectively.

While the SAT is not a perfect test, some notable trends emerge. Students planning to major in multi/interdisciplinary studies have the highest combined reading and writing scores, which makes sense as this major encompasses a wide array of talents.

Students with an interest in the physical sciences (chemistry, physics, etc.) had the second highest combined scores, which also makes sense as the physical sciences tends to be a highly demanding field that draws in some of the most disciplined students.

Here is a ranking by combined scores:

Now, a ranking of majors by critical reading score. Notably, physical sciences scored higher than humanities.

reading

Next, a ranking of majors by math scores. Unsurprisingly, prospective math majors won this one.

Finally, a ranking of majors by writing score. Multi/interdisciplinary majors ranked the highest on this, too.

writing

Here Are Some Of The American Adults Who Started Live-Action Role Playing And Never Stopped

LarpPort (3 of 6)

While visiting Alliance, I met players who work in biomedical engineering, tech, insurance, cybersecurity, law, healthcare, and accounting.

Here are few of the people I met:

Joe, Technologist

Joe is a character even without his costume, prone to a mischievous smile, a high-pitched cackle, and a sense of humor that amounts to asking yourself constantly, “Is he messing with me?”

At some LARPs Joe attends, every player is an IT professional with government security clearances. Others are dominated by college students.

Lauren, Safety Professional

LarpPort (6 of 6)

When I introduce myself to a woman named Lauren who works at a major tech company, she tells me, “I wear pretty things and hit my fellow nerds.”

After college, Lauren met a few guys who told her about Alliance while attending an anime festival in Baltimore.

“Grown men and women fighting in a remote woods … what could go wrong?” Lauren jokes.

In a short time, Lauren was hooked on the game, making fast friends and constructing elaborate characters. She met her boyfriend Colin at Alliance.

Scott and Tim, Insurance Analyst and Warehouse Supervisor

LarpPort (1 of 6) Scott (right) is an insurance analyst who has been playing for nearly 20 years, and Tim is a warehouse supervisor who's been playing for about eight.

“There’s nothing like being in character the whole time. You get fully immersed,” Tim says.

Both Scott and Tim have since convinced their wives to join in on the fun, after years of trying to get them to play games like "Dungeons and Dragons."

For Scott, Alliance has helped him learn skills he uses every day.

Akiva, Graduate Student at Binghamton

“I played 'World of Warcraft,' 'Dungeons and Dragons,' read sci-fi books, but when I heard about LARPing, I knew I wanted to do it. It’s a chance to play the game in real life,” Akiva says.

“Every time I come, people ask me, ‘When are you going to make a character?’ I give them the same answer every time. When I get a job,” Akiva says.

It's expensive to create a character, according to Akiva, who says a costume can cost thousands of dollars.

“You have to buy in-period clothing, armor, nice boots, bracers, greaves, chain mail, weapons, scabbard, belts, pouches. It all adds up.”

Microsoft's PR Boss Had A Funny Response To Google's Big News (MSFT, GOOG)

Sundar Pichai

Google dropped some big news to employees Friday.

Sundar Pichai, the executive in charge of Android and Chrome, got a promotion that makes him the boss of all of Google's core products: search, Google+, apps, advertising, Android, Chrome, and so on.

The news of Pichai's promotion leaked late in the afternoon when Re/code's Kara Swisher and Liz Gannes obtained an internal memo to Google employees announcing his new role.

One Google rival, Microsoft's PR boss Frank Shaw, reacted to the news with a subtle jab on Twitter:

I think Friday afternoons are a good time to make news.
— Frank X. Shaw (@fxshaw) October 24, 2014

This Crazy Chart Perfectly Illustrates Why You Should Never Expect 'Average' Returns

We hear frequently from folks like Wharton professor Jeremy Siegel about the long history of the stock market outperforming other financial asset classes.

Investment advisors often put it simply, saying that annual returns average around 10% and about 3% less than that on an inflation-adjusted, or real, basis.

"Real US equity returns have annualized 6.8% since the 1870s, ahead of the 2.7% return from US government bonds," Citi Research's Jonathan Stubbs writes.

In reality, we rarely see a year when returns are average.

In a new report examining asset allocation, Stubbs presents this bar chart showing the average annual returns for stocks and Treasury bonds by decade. As you can see, most average annual returns swing far from average levels during these 10-year periods. This makes it very challenging to a be an investor strategizing for the long-term.

"Equities have had three decades of negative real returns vs. five decades for bonds," Stubbs noted. "Real equity returns have beaten real bond returns in 12 out of the last 15 decades."

real returns

Meet The Investor Funding Game-Changing Startups Run From College Dorms

Peter Boyce II, an associate with General Catalyst Partners, and co-founder of Rough Draft Ventures, was recently interviewed by OneWire CEO Skiddy von Stade.

In the interview, he explained how he got into the startup business by founding Rough Draft, a company that seeds student startups.

When he was studying applied math and computer science at Harvard, he noticed his friends struggled to find funding for their great startups.

There was nothing in-between these two.

That's why he co-founded Rough Draft, to scout for students running potentially game-changing startups from their dorm rooms, and expose them to the resources they need to grow.

Watch the full interview above and subscribe to the Open Door series to receive upcoming interviews.

A Guy Who Walks Around Dressed As Darth Vader Is Running For Parliament In The Ukraine

One candidate in Ukraine's parliamentary elections is hoping to bring voters... to the dark side. Meet Darth Alekseyevich Vader.

Produced by Matt Johnston. Video courtesy of Associated Press.

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The Great Swedish Sub Hunt is over.

Sweden's Epic Hunt For A 'Russian' Sub Shows Europe Is Terrified Of Putin

Nearly a week after a potential Russian submarine was spotted in the Stockholm Archipelago, the Swedish authorities are calling off their search, ending a saga in which the Scandinavian country's anxieties towards Russia were clearly on display.

It's not that the Swedes were chasing something that wasn't there. Throughout the effort, Swedish military officials expressed utter certainty that a foreign vessel had violated its territorial waters, with the country's top military commander going as far as to call the situation "f--ed up."

The search's inevitably fruitless conclusion owes more to the simple fact that locating and capturing an enemy submarine is one of the most difficult battlefield feats of all. Sweden predictably came up empty-handed. But the incident is significant even in spite of its inconclusive ending — and even though the Swedes never even discovered what kind of vessel they were actually hunting, never mind its purpose or destination.

Russia Dodges A Bullet

Let's assume the Swedes were actually hunting a Russian submarine, something they never said explicitly but which anonymous Swedish officials strongly implied.

In recent months, Russia has tested the sovereignty of a number of its neighbors and geopolitical rivals. It's abducted an Estonian intelligence agent and had its ships interfere with the mission of a Finnish research vessel in international waters. Its jets have gotten into unusually tense confrontations with the American, Estonian, and even Japanese militaries.

These incidents led to varying levels of alarm. But the Swedish Sub Hunt was the Scandinavian country's largest mobilization since the Cold War. It was a tangible, full-scale military reaction to a possible Russian violation of a European nation's sovereignty.

And if the Swedes had actually captured the sub, the anti-Putin block would have had invaluable and even unprecedented pieces of leverage over Moscow. It may have captured high-ranking Russian military or intelligence personnel, along with whatever equipment or information was onboard.

And it would have proven beyond all doubt that Russia is recklessly violating the sovereignty of a European state that it does not even border.

A Possible Win For Putin?

But the sub hunt didn't end in embarrassment for the Kremlin. If anything it revealed the degree to which certain European countries have internalized the threat that they believe Moscow may pose to them.

Sweden is so jittery about Russian policy that even the mere possibility of a foreign submarine in its waters was enough to trigger a week-long search. There's no proof that what they were hunting was Russian and little concrete proof that what they were searching for was even a submarine. But Putin is responsible for the anxieties that obviously underlie the entire incident.

Putin can get European military commanders sputtering expletives simply by seeming to violate their country's territory. Even Reuters began referring to Swedish efforts to locate the sub as "farce," given the gap between Swedish concerns and actual evidence or progress in the search. As a psychological operation, the Swedish Sub Hunt may have been an unintended masterstroke.

How Long Can He Keep It Up?

Putin has had an uncanny ability to turn potentially crushing defeats into tangible victories — or at least to impose his will in a way that reverses earlier setbacks.

Putin countered the overthrow of Kremlin client Viktor Yanukovych from the Ukrainian presidency this past February by invading and annexing Crimea. The shoot-down of MH17 by Russian-backed separatists with Russian-supplied weaponry earned Moscow international scorn but it didn't stop Putin from sending a 5,000-strong invasion force to Eastern Ukraine. A largely pro-western leader was elected to power in Kiev over the summer, but Putin responded by turning the Donbas into his latest "frozen conflict."

The Swedish sub hunt is a microcosm of this larger pattern. A possible setback turned to Moscow's advantage. But it only happened by luck this time and the Kremlin's winning streak doesn't have to last indefinitely. One of Putin's gambits could boomerang back on him — even if that hasn't seemed to happen yet.