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☆ Çanakkale: Where ancient Troy sits beside the modern city
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Nick Hilden | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

CNN —An enormous wooden horse presides over the marina in Çanakkale, a small port city southwest of Istanbul. The clapboard animal is a mock-up of the Trojan Horse of mythological fame. Çanakkale (pronounced cha-na-call-ay) stands adjacent to the archaeological site that was once the ancient city of Troy, best known as the setting of the Trojan War in Homer’s “Iliad.”A giant wooden horse watches over Çanakkale. Today when you visit Truva – either via car or a short bus ride from Çanakkale – a second model of the Trojan Horse looms at the entrance. “We know that there were many wars that occurred at Troy,” Rose explains.

☆ Joined-up G7 is best China deterrent
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-08 | by ( Hugo Dixon | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

The best chance of steering between these twin evils is for the G7 to agree on a strong deterrence strategy. This would make it harder for China to hold G7 countries to ransom if they came to Taiwan’s aid. The United States is also leaning on its allies to stop China from acquiring militarily useful technology such as advanced semiconductors. CONTINGENCY PLANSThe other plank of a G7 deterrence strategy is contingency planning for what the allies would do if China invaded Taiwan. This would ideally involve building consensus about how the United States would respond to escalating tensions.

☆ Opinion | E. Jean Carroll Must Be Going Through Hell
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Michelle Goldberg | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The story is schematic and the script, by the end, turns didactic, but Comer’s blazing, magnificent performance elevates the show into greatness. I kept thinking about “Prima Facie” as I sat in the Manhattan courtroom where E. Jean Carroll is suing Donald Trump for battery and defamation stemming from a rape that she alleges occurred in the mid-1990s. “The lived experience of sexual assault is not remembered in a neat, consistent, scientific parcel,” Tessa says. Both sides rested on Thursday — the Trump camp declined to call a single witness — and closing arguments are scheduled for Monday. Two of Carroll’s friends, Lisa Birnbach and Carol Martin, testified that Carroll told them that Trump had assaulted her shortly after it happened.

Box customers testing the product have already experienced “revolutionary” productivity gains, Box CEO Aaron Levie told Reuters. He cited a Box customer whose employees were reviewing tens and thousands of files manually. The new AI features were able to do it automatically “within a matter of seconds.”Box partnered with OpenAI, the AI startup backed by Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) behind the chatbot sensation ChatGPT, to build the AI enhancements. While Box is initially building its AI offering with OpenAI’s technology, the goal is to allow customers to select among different AI providers, he said. Box said the new AI features include the ability to summarize financial documents, surface insights from customer surveys and tailor onboarding documents to a specific customer's needs.

☆ Fact Check-Aerofarms leafy greens do not contain a COVID vaccine
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Vertical farms operator Aerofarms grew protein-producing plants for research on COVID-19 therapies in 2021 in a research facility separate from its retail vegetables. Posts online, however, have misrepresented the company’s work to falsely claim its commercial leafy greens sold at Whole Foods and other businesses contain a COVID-19 vaccine. In the clip, Rosenberg referred to research involving Aerofarms plants creating ACE-2 proteins, Oshima said. Commercial greens produced by Aerofarms do not contain COVID-19 vaccines, a spokesperson for the company told Reuters. A clip circulating misrepresents separate research related to an experimental COVID-19 therapeutic, not an edible vaccine.

To report this story, Reuters contacted more than 300 former Tesla employees who had worked at the company over the past nine years and were involved in developing its self-driving system. The company requires car owners to grant permission on the cars’ touchscreens before Tesla collects their vehicles’ data. Reuters found that Tesla employees shared clips that captured sensitive and embarrassing personal moments. Tesla’s own data labelers initially worked in the San Francisco Bay area, including the office in San Mateo. According to several ex-employees, some labelers shared screenshots, sometimes marked up using Adobe Photoshop, in private group chats on Mattermost, Tesla’s internal messaging system.

Currently, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (FDIC)guarantees deposits of up to $250,000 per person, per bank. More than $9.2 trillion of U.S. bank deposits were uninsured at the end of last year, accounting for more than 40% of all deposits, according to U.S. central bank data. COULD THE GOVERNMENT RAISE THE DEPOSIT INSURANCE LIMIT? Some U.S. lawmakers have said Congress should consider whether a higher federal insurance limit on bank deposits was needed in the wake of the collapse of SVB and Signature Bank. Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, and Senator Mike Rounds, a Republican, have questioned whether the $250,000 deposit insurance limit is still appropriate.

With the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SIVB.O) and Signature Bank (SBNY.O) and the U.S. government backstopping all deposits at those firms, here is the state of play of deposit insurance in the United States:WHAT IS THE U.S DEPOSIT INSURANCE LIMIT? Currently, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (FDIC)guarantees deposits of up to $250,000 per person, per bank. Any losses to the FDIC's deposit insurance fund will be recovered by a special assessment on banks, the FDIC said. COULD THE GOVERNMENT RAISE THE DEPOSIT INSURANCE LIMIT? Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, and Senator Mike Rounds, a Republican, have questioned whether the $250,000 deposit insurance limit is still appropriate.

New York CNN —Global banks just suffered their worst week since 2008. Credit Suisse and First Republic: Two more banks wobbled but remained upright through the week. Meanwhile, First Republic bank received a $30 billion lifeline on Thursday from some of the largest banks in the United States. US-traded shares of Credit Suisse were down nearly 7% and First Republic shares plunged by about 33% on Friday. That doesn’t mean that banks taking money from the FHLB and participating in the Federal Reserve’s emergency Bank Term Lending Program, which lent out $12 billion to banks this week, are in big trouble.

☆ Meta Looks to Divest Kustomer Amid Efficiency Drive
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-11 | by ( Jeff Horwitz | Juliet Chung | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Meta said it is exploring strategic alternatives for Kustomer, a business-software company it bought last year. Meta Platforms Inc. is planning to divest Kustomer, a business-software company it bought last year in one of its largest acquisitions, as the tech company looks to refocus on its core business, according to the company and people familiar with the planned deal. “In light of Meta’s efficiency efforts, we’ve made the decision to focus on our fastest growing business messaging offerings, including the monetization opportunity for WhatsApp,” said Ryan Moore, a spokesman for the company. “We are currently exploring strategic alternatives for Kustomer and will continue to support Kustomer’s product and customer base throughout this process.”

☆ Justice Department Hiring Dozens of New Prosecutors to Enforce Russian Sanctions
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( Dylan Tokar | Ian Talley | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +5 min

The new prosecutors will work with corporations to investigate sanctions and export control evasion, and also bring criminal charges against companies when they commit violations, he said. Some of the additional prosecutors are new hires, while some are being reallocated from different sections, according to officials. The U.A.E.’s enforcement of sanctions differs between the emirates, officials say, as the separate governments treat the sanctions with varying degrees of compliance. For their part, Justice Department officials have pointed to a growing nexus between their work on corporate crime and national security. In addition to hiring more prosecutors, Mr. Olsen said the counterintelligence section would also hire a lawyer to advise on investigations involving corporations.

☆ James Comer’s Two Jobs: Probe Bidens, Manage GOP Firebrands
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-12 | by ( Natalie Andrews | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

WASHINGTON—The Republican leading several investigations related to President Biden and his administration faces the dual challenges of keeping the politically charged probes on track while also managing hard-line conservatives eager to put their own stamp on the proceedings. As part of these probes, Rep. James Comer (R., Ky.) is requesting information and planning hearings to dig into whether the president’s son, Hunter Biden , improperly used his family ties to gain wealth or influence. The chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee says the examination is long overdue, after years of Republicans’ demands for scrutiny of the family. Democrats criticize the effort as a politically motivated sideshow.

The checking is not done by individuals, but by computers in the blockchain network, often via third-party staking services. Nearly all of the major crypto exchanges offer staking services to their customers for a variety of tokens, including Coinbase (COIN.O), Binance, Crypto.com, Gemini, Huobi and OKX. The SEC has said most staking providers fail to provide customers proper disclosures about how their cryptocurrency will be used and should register their staking services with the agency. In its settlement with the SEC on Feb. 9, Kraken neither admitted nor denied the SEC's claim that its staking service should have been registered. Kraken said it would continue to offer staking to customers based outside of the United States.

☆ Republicans held a hearing to prove Twitter’s bias against them. It backfired in spectacular fashion
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Oliver Darcy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

Despite no real evidence to support this weighty and consequential claim, Republicans were unrelenting in peddling it to the American public. Republicans showed, once again, that they are married to pushing claims that Silicon Valley is intentionally and unjustly censoring conservative views, even when the facts do not contort with their narrative. Ironically, the hearing appeared to reveal that Twitter had acquiesced to Trump and changed its policies after it concluded that he had violated its rules. And the hearing hinted that the Trump White House attempted to censor the speech of at least one American: Chrissy Teigen. Strangely enough, Republicans showed no interest in drilling down on this allegation of censorship.

☆ UK watchdog proposes banning referral fees for debt advice firms
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-02 | by ( Huw Jones | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON, Feb 2 (Reuters) - Britain's financial watchdog said on Thursday it proposes to ban firms who give advice on debt from receiving referral fees from other related firms in the sector, citing an acute conflict of interest which can harm customers. It has estimated that around 52,000 of the 1.7 million people who seek debt advice every year begin with a debt packager, a figure which has likely increased due to the cost of living crisis. Debt packagers are regulated providers of debt advice, who refer indebted customers to debt solution providers - in return for a referral fee - which make formal arrangements to repay debt. Firms representing two-thirds of the market in customer numbers have either left or suspended their activities since the FCA first raised concerns in July 2021, the watchdog added. The FCA said it also proposes to clarify how unauthorised businesses, who source potential customers and recommend a particular debt solution provider to them for advice, may need to be authorised by the watchdog.

☆ These are Trader Joe’s customer’s favorite items
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-29 | by ( Ramishah Maruf | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

New York CNN —Trader Joe’s asked its customers a simple question: If you were to spend the rest of your life on a deserted island, which nine Trader Joe’s products would you take with you? The first Trader Joe’s opened in Pasadena, California, in 1967. Rolled Corn Tortilla Chips Chili & Lime Trader Joe'sSee the all-time favorites included in Trader Joe’s Hall of FameThe chips also won in the poll’s favorite snack category. Top EntreeReplacing the longtime Mandarin Orange Chicken is Trader Joe’s Butter Chicken – spiced chicken in a tomato and cream sauce with basmati rice. Indian is popular with Trader Joe’s customers.

☆ 'Bellyaching': Democratic unity defending Biden begins to see defections
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-27 | by ( Peter Nicholas | Peter Nicholas Is Senior White House Reporter For Nbc News Digital. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +7 min

WASHINGTON — A Democratic push to discredit the congressional Republicans who are launching a slew of investigations into President Joe Biden may be fracturing because of an unexpected obstacle: fellow Democrats. And former Vice President Mike Pence revealed this week that he, too, had discovered classified documents in his Indiana home. On Capitol Hill, House Republicans have opened an oversight inquiry into Biden’s handling of the records. (Both the White House and the Secret Service said they don’t keep such records for his personal residence.) The White House counsel’s office now has a communications arm to quickly respond to Republican allegations of presidential wrongdoing.

☆ LG, Whirlpool Target Customers Disconnected From ‘Smart’ Appliances
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Isabelle Bousquette | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +6 min

Whirlpool Corp. said that more than half of its smart appliances remain connected, but the company declined to be more specific. Development of these smart devices is a core priority for Whirlpool and LG, the companies said. The smart-home trend began gaining traction around 2014, according to Mr. Kim, and has grown since then. Whirlpool declined to comment on the percentage of its sales represented by smart appliances. According to Murat Genc, Whirlpool’s global data, experiences & transformation officer, smart appliances are generating data from consumers and are producing new revenue opportunities.

☆ Amazon to Wind Down Charity-Donation Program AmazonSmile
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-19 | by ( Will Feuer | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Amazon .com Inc. said it would shut down its charitable-donation program AmazonSmile next month, saying the program was spread too thin to have the impact the company had originally hoped. Through AmazonSmile, the company donates 0.5% of eligible purchases to charitable organizations of a customer’s choosing. Amazon launched the program in 2013, the company said, and plans to shut it down by Feb. 20.

☆ House Oversight chair calls for release of visitor logs from Biden’s Delaware home
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-15 | by ( Https | Media-Cldnry.S-Nbcnews.Com Image Upload Newscms Julie-Tsirkin-Circle-Byline-Template.Jpg | Julie Tsirkin | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +5 min

WASHINGTON — House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., on Sunday asked for the release of visitors logs from President Joe Biden’s home in Delaware in a letter to White House chief of staff Ron Klain. “Given the serious national security implications, the White House must provide the Wilmington residence’s visitor log,” Comer wrote in the letter to Klain. The former president’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida was searched by the FBI last year after multiple attempts to obtain classified documents. The president is cooperating with the Justice Department and National Archives amid the discovery of the classified documents, she said. "He showed no interest in investigating the far more serious situation with about 100 classified documents at Mar-a-Lago with evidence in the public domain of obstruction.

While all airlines were affected, one stood out as the grounding of domestic flights had a cascading effect on air travel: Southwest Airlines. According to the flight tracking company Flight Aware, Southwest had as many as 49% of its flights delayed as of noon Wednesday. Anuvu, another site that tracks flights, showed just 7% of Southwest flights were departing on time, compared with 15% for American Airlines, 21% for United Airlines, and 33% for Delta Airlines. Southwest is still reeling from the huge disruption it experienced over the Christmas holiday that saw an estimated 11,000 of its flights canceled. Southwest said Wednesday it would rebook customers on the next available Southwest flight with seats available to the customer’s ticketed destination, at no additional cost.

It is territory infrequently traveled when it comes to the massive and complex U.S. flight system. Instead, each airline has its own policies about what it will do for delayed passengers. The DOT advises that, if a flight is significantly delayed, customers should ask airline staff if the carrier will pay for meals or a hotel room — but neither of these are guaranteed. If a flight has been delayed for more than two hours, or canceled, many airlines have policies that will kick in that allow passengers to get a full refund for the unused portion of their ticket. Southwest Airlines is rebooking customers on the next available Southwest flight with seats available to the customer’s ticketed destination at no additional cost.

Most people are aware of gift cards for restaurants or retail stores, but the purchasing power of gift cards is nearly limitless. Throughout the year, we gifted the kids gift cards for Valentine's Day and Easter while also purchasing gift cards whenever our family budget allowed. Cash App Investing does not trade bitcoin and Cash App is not a member of FINRA or SIPC. Show more Minimum Deposit Amount $0 Editor's Rating 4 /5 A five pointed star A five pointed star A five pointed star A five pointed star A five pointed star 4 out of 5 Stars Pros & Cons Chevron icon It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options. Whether you're using gift cards to save up for your family's dream vacation or for a major purchase, buying gift cards is an ideal alternative to conventional saving.

☆ Pizza Hut is bringing back a fan favorite from the ’90s
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-10 | by ( Jordan Valinsky | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

New York CNN —Pizza Hut is bringing back a fan favorite after a nearly 25-year hiatus. Despite it being sold for a brief time in 1999, the extra large pizza quickly became a favorite, and fans have been asking for Pizza Hut to bring it back ever since. The “Big New Yorker” is indeed big: It’s a 16-inch pizza that features six oversized and foldable slices. There’s a Change.org petition begging Pizza Hut to bring it back that has collected nearly 4,000 signatures. “It was the only good pizza that Pizza Hut ever offered,” one signatory pleads.

Featured Partner Offer Cash App - Send Gift Cards to Friends and Family Instantly A tooltip *Cash App is a financial platform, not a bank. Gift cards are not separate physical cards. However, if a customer does not have a Cash App Card, they can instead convert their gift card to cash in the app. With gift cards, it's easy to make it look like everyone is getting the same gift, but since many gift cards don't state the denomination on the card, you can give anywhere from $5 to $500 and the recipients won't know how much they got in the moment. By buying gift cards from small businesses, you're essentially front-loading sales and guaranteeing income that they might not otherwise receive.

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