text:
Talk:Annuity (disambiguation)

Comments
Not comfortable with idea that completely wrong to buy annuities. Where is the evidence for this?. There is academic literature supporting the idea that annuities are fair value, i.e present value of market low-risk bond yields, adjusted by probability of death in any given year, plus "margin", plus additional loading for "selection bias" (the fact that annuitants choose annuities because they have a better estimate of their own mortality).

Would be happy to edit this page but have no idea how.

 * Add these things, to balance the critisism, perhaps with 'Some argue ..' where needed. - Patrick 16:29 Jan 8, 2003 (UTC)

_Annuity Functions_

Suggest:

"These vary, and depend on the contract.

Unlike a bond, the annuitant does not receive any repayment of principal. Yield is typically higher than a government bond. A standard computation takes projected annuity payments on a year by year basis, adjusts by the probability that the annuitant will be alive in that year, then discounts back using risk-free (link) rates.

Thus the expected value of an annuity, for a person who goes on to live for the exact period expected at the time the annuity calue was calculated, is approximately that of a government bond, less adjustments made for mortality drag (link) and selection bias (link)."

-

The problem with buying annuities is that, typically, a huge percentage of the payment goes to commission for the sales agent. After deducting this commission, the annuity holder is worse off than if he had just bought long-term government bonds himself.

 * Markets contradict this assertion. Many investments have commissions and charges if bought in a mutual fund.  Annuities in fact tend to pay much less commission.  Additionally when buying long term bonds, an individual does not have the cross subsidy which is one of the main points of lifetime annuities

 * Plus the annuity company can invest their very large portfolio of assets in a diversified portfolio that can easily outperform a portfolio of government bonds. They then take their profit, pay the sales agent, and can still pay the annuity holder a competitive rate of interest. Also the holder of a deferred fixed annuity is guaranteed to not lose principal at any given time, only be credited with varying levels of interest. The annuity company removes the risk amlost entirely from the annuity holder whereas the holder of long term government bonds may see significant price (and therefore principle) fluctuations as interest rates change.

Plus, an annuity contract has surrender charges. There may be a high "teaser" introductory rate, but the guaranteed rate is fairly low.

 * Most annuities cannot be surrendered.
 * once annuitized, no annuity can be surrendered that I am aware of. Almost any deferred annuity can be surrendered, sometimes with a surrender charge. - Taxman 21:51, May 13, 2004 (UTC)

Further, insurance companies do go bankrupt from time to time.

 * Not always relevant if annuity held in seperate trust

The edits by 69.158.21.244 left an extremely incorrect statement that "an annuity population can be expected to have distribution of lifespans in accordance with the mortality table used in the premium calculations". That is not correct at all. The annuity company attempts to do that for their annuitized annuties, but are guaranteed to not be exactly correct due to variability. 69.158.21.244 may be correct that the distribution is not a normal distribution, so that is how I left the fix. - Taxman 21:51, May 13, 2004 (UTC)
 * Surely the lifespans of a population of adults of the same age follow a normal distribution? I would be surprised if this was not the case and the annuity tables used were not ulitimately derived from the assumptions of such an analysis.  Dainamo 12:55, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

In my finance class, annuities are simply any asset that pays a fixed sum each year for a specified number of years. Perhaps the article is too specific? I am reading this from Brealey-Myers, the so called bible of finance. Goodralph 07:19, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
 * My opinion is he wrote that because creating a general, correct definition, is hard, and he copped out. Certainly it would not be an annuity if there were not some sort of legal basis like a contract that determined that the payments would continue over the specified period.  For example, a mutual fund account could pay a stream of payments until no money was left, but it would not really be called an annuity.  A trust (the third definition) could specify a stream of payments similar to an annuity, but I don't think that it is proper to call a stream of payments under a trust an annuity; it's basically just similar to an annuity.  For ex. a life insurance death benefit can be paid in a stream of payments, but even that is called the annuity form of payments, not called an annuity in and of itself.  I think to be called an annuity the liquidation of a sum of money over a specified period of time has to be the primary purpose of the contract, and the payments have to be actuarially determined to last the specified period, and be guaranteed to do so.  A pension's payments are actuarially determined and act just like a life annuity, but I don't think its really proper to call that an annuity either.

 * In any case, I'll try to generalize the intro, but still note the most common uses of the term. - Taxman 02:25, May 17, 2004 (UTC)

I don't know whether your definition is right or wrong, but I'm just going off of what I learned in class (Introduction to Finance). Perhaps we use annuities because they are easy to calculate and provide a simplified, but rather stylized, method of valuing assets like stocks, bonds, etc. I'm including growing annuities as well as simple annuities here. Thanks for your response.

 * You've reminded me of that usage, it is relatively common, but not as common as the primary one the article is written about, and I've included it as an alternate usage. Thanks for pointing it out.  I hope I was able to make the usages clear, but the article still needs a lot of work.

You may want to look at Capital Asset Pricing Model and Capital asset pricing model. Goodralph 21:30, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

 * Did you point that out just for general info? I didn't see any usage of the term annuity in them.  But yes, those articles should be merged into the lower case article title, as that is the convention as I know it.  It's unfortunate that different capitalization can lead to separate articles. - Taxman 03:32, May 18, 2004 (UTC)

From User talk:Enchanter:
 * Hi, you've made some good edits, but also removed some valid (as far as I know so far) information, and majorly re-arrainged the introduction to include some incorrect (also as far as I understand) information and ignore one of the most common uses of annuities. You may even be right that "The most common use of annuities is to provide a pension for people in retirement". It may in fact be correct in England, while I'm quite sure it is not in the US. In either case, true or not, removing what the article had said without backing up your statement is a bit irresponsible it seems.  More correct would be to note that in Europe/England x use is more common, and in the US, x use is more common, if that is the case. Also wouldn't an edit that changed the meaning of the entire intro that much warrant an addition to the talk page first? - Taxman 15:53, May 18, 2004 (UTC)
 * Hi there. What I was aiming to do was to emphasise the key feature of an annuity, which is that it is a series of regular payments.  I understand that in certain countries, including the US, you don't have to take the proceeds out in the form of regular payments (an annuity).  However, that misses the point that the reason that the contracts are called annuities is that they provide regular payments - the fact that you can take money out in other ways, for tax reasons or otherwise, is not central to the idea of it being an annuity.
 * So as far as the definition of an annuity is concerned, I think it is the fact that it is a series of fixed payments that should be emphasised. The use of an annuity to describe a series of fixed payments is universal, and applies in the US and elsewhere.  The specific characteristics of annuity contracts in the US, the UK, and other countries, could also be mentioned, but I think they deserve much lower placing in the article.
 * Enchanter 16:31, May 18, 2004 (UTC)

 * The aim was good, the result was not. Removing correct information is never good.  Appropiate placement of primary characteristics of a topic is of course, fine.  Annuities may be named after a stream of payments, but if their largest use is not for that, and the stream of payments concept is the only thing the article introduction references, then the article does not represent the topic well.  I could not get numbers for annuity sales in other countries, but in the US, of $170 Billion (British Milliard) through three quarters of 2002 total annuity sales, over 95% are the deferred form.  (LIMRA 2002) and supported by  (LIMRA 2004)

 * A proportion that large in the world's second largest economy does warrant promininent placement in the article that not all annuities need to be or ever are annuitized. I'll grant that maybe it does not need placement as the primary point, especially if deferred annuities do not exist in any other country.  The reason annuities are called what they are should not be the only criteria for the introductory content if the primary use is different.

 * As a side note, I have never once heard of a pension in the US being referred to as an annuity, even though the concept is similar.
 * Taxman 17:51, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

 * I've put in a comment that annuity contracts don't have to be annuitized in the section on the US tax code, based on our discussion; please check if I've got it correct.

 * The word annuity is used commonly in discussing pension plans, in the US and elsewhere; for example, it's common to hear discussion of plans giving benefits in "annuity or lump sum form".

 * Enchanter 21:05, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

Disambiguate
This page needs to be disambiguated. There should be several links on the page, one to annuity under finance theory, one to annuity financial product under US law or conventions, and one to annuity financial product under European law (or maybe even more specific.) There is a bunch of competing information, some which applies to the annuity products in the US and some of which falls under laws of Europe. There is also the annuity function in finance theory. Any person not familiar with all of these issues is going to be confused immediately. It's also way too long for a single page, an issue that should be remedied by splitting up the information. I'd be happy to edit the results for finance theory and US law, but someone else will have to put together the English or European version.

Aaron Hall, 12:00 noon, Central Time 1/13/2006
 * Yes, that's a good point. That's part of why this article is so terrible, because it's hard to accurately discuss things that overlap yet differ so much. The question would be the proper titling of the disambiguated articles. Annuity (finance theory), is a good start, but do we want a name as long as Annuity (United States product)? I created a new section here and moved the comment to the bottom because that is convention now. - Taxman Talk 18:42, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

How about Annuity (US financial products)? Let's do that. I also like Annuity (finance theory). Pensions would be a good place for the mortality tables and the rambling gaga stuff. Aaron Hall 4:00 central, 1/13/06

annuity fees
There is a price that you have to pay for any investment. If you place your money in a bank, you get a stated interest rate return - there are no fees. But the bank does have huge internal expenses that you are paying, in affect, from having them use your money. That said, fees for investments tend to make people think that they getting ripped off. This may or may not be true. You really have to make a comparison based on a project return. Some deferred annuities, like an equity index annuity, will limit a loss. There are huge fees associated with this since the annuity firm will be taking on some calculated risk and expenses to manage the investments. Is it worth it? Maybe. I have a deferred annuity and even though I pay a 1% M&E fee, I still am still doing well with it and glad that I don't have to pay taxes gains every year. If I could have placed it in an a lower fee account, like an IRA, I would have ... so this annuity was a good option for me regardless of the fee. There are other options to defer taxable gains - like holding onto ETFs.

title: Talk:Annuity (disambiguation)


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Spartacus (film)

Spartacus is a 1960 American epic historical drama film directed by Stanley Kubrick and starring Kirk Douglas in the title role, a slave who leads a rebellion against Rome and the events of the Third Servile War. Adapted by Dalton Trumbo from Howard Fast's 1951 novel of the same title, the film also stars Laurence Olivier as Roman general and politician Marcus Licinius Crassus, Charles Laughton as Sempronius Gracchus, Peter Ustinov as slave trader Lentulus Batiatus, and John Gavin as Julius Caesar. Jean Simmons played Spartacus' wife Varinia, a fictional character, and Tony Curtis played the fictional slave Antoninus.

Douglas, whose company Bryna Productions was producing the film, removed original director Anthony Mann after the first week of shooting. Kubrick, with whom Douglas had made Paths of Glory (1957), was brought on board to take over direction. It was the only film directed by Kubrick where he did not have complete artistic control. Screenwriter Dalton Trumbo was blacklisted at the time as one of the Hollywood Ten. Douglas publicly announced that Trumbo was the screenwriter of Spartacus, and President John F. Kennedy crossed American Legion picket lines to view the film, helping to end blacklisting; Howard Fast's book had also been blacklisted and he had to self-publish the original edition.

The film won four Academy Awards (Best Supporting Actor for Ustinov, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction and Best Costume Design) from six nominations. It also received six nominations at the Golden Globes, including Woody Strode‘s only career Golden Globe nomination (for Best Supporting Actor), ultimately winning one (Best Motion Picture – Drama). At the time of the film’s release, it was the biggest moneymaker in Universal Studios' history, which it remained until it was surpassed by Airport (1970).

In 2017, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

Plot
In the first century BC, the Roman Republic has slid into corruption, its menial work done by slaves. One slave, a Thracian named Spartacus, is so uncooperative in his position in a mining pit that he is sentenced to death by starvation. By chance, he is displayed to Roman businessman Lentulus Batiatus, who – impressed by his ferocity – purchases Spartacus for his gladiatorial school and instructs trainer Marcellus to not overdo his indoctrination, believing the slave "has quality". Amid the abuse, Spartacus forms a quiet relationship with Varinia, a serving woman whom he refuses to rape when she is sent to "entertain" him in his cell. The two are forced to endure numerous humiliations for defying the conditions of servitude.

Batiatus receives a visit from the wealthy Roman senator Marcus Licinius Crassus, who aims to become dictator of Rome. Crassus eventually buys Varinia, and for the amusement of his companions arranges for Spartacus and others to fight to the death. When Spartacus is disarmed, his opponent, an Ethiopian named Draba, spares his life in a burst of defiance and attacks the Roman audience, only to be speared in the back by a guard and killed by Crassus. The next day, with the ludus' atmosphere still tense over this episode, Batiatus sends Varinia away to Crassus' house in Rome. Spartacus kills Marcellus, who was taunting him over his affections, and their fight escalates into a riot. Batiatus flees while the gladiators overwhelm their guards and escape into the countryside.

Spartacus is elected chief of the fugitives and decides to lead them out of Italy and back to their homes. They plunder country estates as they go, collecting enough money to buy sea transport from Rome's foes, the pirates of Cilicia. Many slaves join the group, making it as large as an army. Among the new arrivals is Varinia, who escaped while being delivered to Crassus. Another is Antoninus, a slave entertainer who also fled Crassus' service after finding out Crassus expected Antoninus to become his sex slave. Spartacus feels inadequate because of his lack of education. However, he proves an excellent leader and organizes his diverse followers into a tough and self-sufficient community. Varinia, now his informal wife, becomes pregnant.

The Roman Senate becomes increasingly alarmed as Spartacus defeats every army sent against him. Crassus' opponent Gracchus knows that his rival will try to use the crisis as a justification for seizing control of the Roman army. To try to prevent this, Gracchus channels as much military power as possible into the hands of his own protégé, the young senator Julius Caesar. Although Caesar lacks Crassus' contempt for the lower classes of Rome, he mistakes the man's rigid outlook for a patrician. Thus, when Gracchus reveals that he has bribed the Cilicians to get Spartacus out of Italy and rid Rome of the slave army, Caesar regards such tactics as beneath him and goes over to Crassus.

Crassus uses a bribe of his own to make the pirates abandon Spartacus and has the Roman army secretly force the rebels away from the coastline towards Rome. Amid panic that Spartacus means to sack the city, the Senate gives Crassus absolute power. Now surrounded by Roman legions, Spartacus persuades his men to die fighting. Just by rebelling and proving themselves human, he says that they have struck a blow against slavery. In the ensuing battle, most of the slave army is massacred. The Romans try to locate the rebel leader for special punishment by offering a pardon (and return to enslavement) if the men will identify Spartacus. Every surviving man responds by shouting "I'm Spartacus!". Crassus has them all sentenced to death by crucifixion along the Via Appia, where the revolt began.

Meanwhile, after finding Varinia and Spartacus' newborn son, Crassus takes them prisoner. He is disturbed by the idea that Spartacus can command more love and loyalty than he can, and hopes to compensate by making Varinia as devoted to him as she was to her former husband. When she rejects him, he furiously seeks out Spartacus (whom he recognizes from having watched him at Batiatus' school) and forces him to fight Antoninus to the death. The survivor is to be crucified, along with all the other slaves. Spartacus kills Antoninus to spare him this terrible fate. The incident leaves Crassus worried about Spartacus' potential to live in legend as a martyr. In other matters, he is also worried about Caesar, who he senses will someday eclipse him.

Gracchus, having seen Rome fall into tyranny, commits suicide. Before doing so, he bribes his friend Batiatus to rescue Spartacus' family from Crassus and carry them away to freedom. On the way out of Rome, the group passes under Spartacus' cross. Varinia comforts him in his dying moments by showing him his son, who will grow up free and knowing who his father was.

Production
The development of Spartacus was partly instigated by Kirk Douglas's failure to win the title role in William Wyler's Ben-Hur. Douglas had worked with Wyler before on Detective Story, and was disappointed when Wyler chose Charlton Heston, instead. Shortly after, Edward (Eddie) Lewis, a vice president in Douglas's film company, Bryna Productions (named after Douglas's mother), had Douglas read Howard Fast's novel, Spartacus, which had a related theme—an individual who challenges the might of the Roman Empire—and Douglas was impressed enough to purchase an option on the book from Fast with his own finances. Universal Studios eventually agreed to finance the film after Douglas persuaded Olivier, Laughton, and Ustinov to act in it. Olivier was also to direct the picture. Lewis became the producer of the film, with Douglas taking executive producer credit. Lewis subsequently produced other films for Douglas.

At the same time, Yul Brynner was planning his own Spartacus film for United Artists, with Douglas's agent Lew Wasserman suggesting he try having his film produced for Universal Studios. With Dalton Trumbo's screenplay being completed in two weeks, Universal and Douglas won the "Spartacus" race.

Douglas originally offered the role of Varinia to French actress Jeanne Moreau, but she didn't want to leave her boyfriend in France. German actress Sabine Bethmann was then cast. The studio gave her the anglicized name of "Sabina Bethman" for use in the film's publicity, but she was replaced by Jean Simmons after only days of filming.

Screenplay development
Howard Fast was originally hired to adapt his own novel as a screenplay, but he had difficulty working in the format. He was replaced by Dalton Trumbo, who had been blacklisted as one of the Hollywood 10, and intended to use the pseudonym "Sam Jackson".

Kirk Douglas insisted that Trumbo be given screen credit for his work, which helped to break the blacklist. Trumbo had been jailed for contempt of Congress in 1950, after which he had survived by writing screenplays under assumed names. Douglas publicly announced that Trumbo was the screenwriter of Spartacus. Further, President John F. Kennedy publicly ignored a demonstration organized by the American Legion and went to see the film.

In his autobiography, Douglas states that this decision was motivated by a meeting that Edward Lewis, Stanley Kubrick, and he had regarding whose names to list for the screenplay in the film credits, given Trumbo's shaky position with Hollywood executives. One idea was to credit Lewis as co-writer or sole writer, but Lewis vetoed both suggestions. Kubrick then suggested that his own name be used. Douglas and Lewis found Kubrick's eagerness to take credit for Trumbo's work revolting, and the next day, Douglas called the gate at Universal saying, "I'd like to leave a pass for Dalton Trumbo." Douglas writes, "For the first time in 10 years, [Trumbo] walked on to a studio lot. He said, 'Thanks, Kirk, for giving me back my name.'

In reality, the public announcement of Trumbo's screenwriting credit for Spartacus did not come until August 1960, seven months after producer-director Otto Preminger's January 20, 1960, announcement that he had hired Trumbo to adapt Leon Uris' novel Exodus for the screen. Douglas later successfully denied Trumbo credit for the film Town Without Pity, as he worried that his continued association with the screenwriter would hurt his career.

Filming
After David Lean turned down an offer to direct Spartacus, Anthony Mann was hired. Mann was then best known for his Westerns such as Winchester '73 and The Naked Spur. Douglas fired Mann at the end of the first week of shooting, during which the opening sequence in the quarry had been filmed. "He seemed scared of the scope of the picture," wrote Douglas in his autobiography, yet a year later, Mann would embark on another epic of similar size, El Cid. The dismissal (or resignation) of Mann is mysterious since the opening sequences, filmed at Death Valley, California, set the style for the rest of the film. Large parts of the film were shot at Wildwood Regional Park in Thousand Oaks, California. Parts were also filmed at nearby California Lutheran University, where an army can be seen storming off Mount Clef Ridge.

Thirty-year-old Stanley Kubrick was hired to take over. He had already directed four feature films (including Paths of Glory, also starring Douglas). Spartacus was a bigger project by far, with a budget of $12 million (equivalent to about $0million in today's funds) and a cast of 10,500, a daunting project for such a young director. Paths of Glory, his previous film, had only been budgeted at $935,000. Kubrick immediately fired Sabine Bethmann, who had only worked two days on the film. He and Douglas felt that she wasn't right for the role, so she was paid $3,000 to go home. Bethmann was replaced with Jean Simmons, who had been campaigning for the role. Douglas had originally chosen to cast Bethmann over Simmons because he imagined Varinia having a strikingly different accent from the aristocratic Romans, who were to be played mostly by actors with British accents. Simmons was fortunately still available and took over the role in the film with only a day's notice.

Spartacus was filmed using the 35-mm Super 70 Technirama format and then blown up to 70 mm film. This was a change for Kubrick, who preferred using the standard spherical format. This process allowed him to achieve ultra-high definition and to capture large panoramic scenes. Kubrick had wanted to shoot the picture in Rome with cheap extras and resources, but Edward Muhl, president of Universal Pictures, wanted to make an example of the film and prove that a successful epic could be made in Hollywood itself, and "stem the flood of 'runaway' producers heading for Europe". A compromise was reached by filming the intimate scenes in Hollywood, and the battle scenes, at Kubrick's request, in Spain. Kubrick found working outdoors or in real locations to be distracting, and he believed the actors would benefit more from working on a sound stage, where they could fully concentrate. To create the illusion of the large crowds that play such an essential role in the film, Kubrick's crew used three-channel sound equipment to record 76,000 spectators at a Michigan State – Notre Dame college football game shouting "Hail, Crassus!" and "I'm Spartacus!"

The battle scenes were filmed on a vast plain outside Madrid. About 8,000 trained soldiers from the Spanish infantry were used to double as the Roman army. Kubrick directed the armies from the top of specially constructed towers. However, he eventually had to cut all but one of the gory battle scenes, due to negative audience reactions at test screenings. So precise was Kubrick, that even in arranging the bodies of the slaughtered slaves he had each "corpse" assigned with a number and instructions. Shooting locations also included the countryside near Guadalajara and Iriépal.

Disputes broke out during the filming. Cinematographer Russell Metty, a veteran with experience working in big pictures such as Orson Welles' The Stranger (1946) and Touch of Evil (1958) and Howard Hawks's Bringing Up Baby (1938), complained about Kubrick's unusually precise and detailed instructions for the film's camerawork, and disagreed with Kubrick's use of light. On one occasion, he threatened to quit to Ed Muhl, to which Kubrick told him: "You can do your job by sitting in your chair and shutting up. I'll be the director of photography." Metty later muted his criticisms after winning the Oscar for Best Cinematography. Kubrick wanted to shoot at a slow pace of two camera set-ups a day, but the studio insisted that he do 32; a compromise of eight had to be made. Kubrick and Trumbo fought constantly over the screenplay. Kubrick complained that the character of Spartacus had no faults or quirks.

Despite the film being a huge box-office success, gaining four Oscars, and being considered to rank among the very best of historical epics, Kubrick later distanced himself from it. Although his personal mark is a distinct part of the final picture, his contract did not give him complete control over the filming, the only occasion he did not exercise such control over one of his films.

Music
The original score for Spartacus was composed and conducted by six-time Academy Award-nominee Alex North. It was nominated by the American Film Institute for its list of greatest film scores. It is a textbook example of how modernist compositional styles can be adapted to the Hollywood leitmotif technique. North's score is epic, as befits the scale of the film. After extensive research of music of that period, North gathered a collection of antique instruments, while not authentically Roman, that provided a strong dramatic effect. These instruments included a sarrusophone, Israeli recorder, Chinese oboe, lute, mandolin, Yugoslav flute, kythara, dulcimer, and bagpipes. North's prize instrument was the ondioline, similar to an earlier version of the electronic synthesizer, which had never been used in film before. Much of the music is written without a tonal center, or flirts with tonality in ways that most film composers would not risk. One theme is used to represent both slavery and freedom, but is given different values in different scenes, so that it sounds like different themes. The love theme for Spartacus and Varinia is the most accessible theme in the film, and a harsh trumpet figure was created for Crassus.

A soundtrack album was released on LP in 1960, containing selections from the score totaling 41 minutes. This album was released on CD in 1990, to coincide with the film's restoration. Soon after, Varèse Sarabande Records attempted to re-record 75 minutes of highlights from the score personally chosen by North, to be conducted by his friend and fellow film composer Jerry Goldsmith, but the project was delayed multiple times and remained unrecorded when Goldsmith died in 2004.

In 2010, Varèse Sarabande released a limited collector's edition of 5,000 copies, containing six CDs, one DVD, and a 168-page booklet. The first disc contained all 72 minutes of the score that survive in stereo, including all music from the 1960 album. Discs two and three featured the entire score to the film, in mono. Disc four contained alternate and preliminary cues from the original recording sessions. Discs five and six contained re-recordings of the film's iconic love theme, adapted by numerous modern film composers and other musicians. The DVD contained a documentary interviewing those same musicians about the score's impact.

Political commentary, Christianity, and reception
The film parallels 1950s American history, specifically House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) hearings and the civil rights movement. The HUAC hearings, where witnesses were pressured to "name names" of communists and communist sympathizers, mirror the climactic scene as the defeated slaves, ordered by Crassus to identify their leader from the multitude, individually stand up and proclaim, "I'm Spartacus". Howard Fast, author of the original novel, had written Spartacus while in prison for refusal to name names to HUAC investigators. The fight to end segregation and to extend equality to African Americans is symbolized in the racial mixing in the gladiatorial school, as well as in the army of Spartacus, where all must battle for freedom. Another allusion to the political situation in the United States is hinted at in the beginning, when Rome is described as a republic "fatally stricken with a disease called human slavery", describing Spartacus as a "proud, rebellious son dreaming of the death of slavery, 2000 years before it finally would die". Thus an ethical and political vision becomes a philosophical framework for the ensuing action.

The introductory voice-over also describes Rome as destined to collapse with the rise of Christianity:

"In the last century before the birth of the new faith called Christianity, which was destined to overthrow the pagan tyranny of Rome and bring about a new society, the Roman Republic stood at the very center of the civilized world. 'Of all things fairest' sang the poet, 'First among cities and home of the Gods is Golden Rome.' Yet even at the zenith of her pride and power, the Republic lay fatally stricken with the disease called human slavery. The age of the dictator was at hand, waiting in shadows for the event to bring it forth. In that same century, in the conquered Greek province of Thrace, an illiterate slave woman added to her master's wealth by giving birth to a son whom she names Spartacus. A proud, rebellious son, who was sold to living death in the mines of Libya, before his 13th birthday. There, under whip and chain and sun, he lived out his youth and his young manhood, dreaming the death of slavery 2000 years before it finally would die."

Thus, Rome is described as an oppressive state suffering from its own excesses in the years before the adoption of Christian beliefs begins to end Roman oppression and slavery.

While the film's release occasioned applause from the mainstream media, it sparked protest from right-wing and anticommunist groups such as the National Legion of Decency, which picketed theaters exhibiting the film. The controversy over its "legitimacy as an expression of national aspirations" continued until newly elected US President John F. Kennedy crossed a picket line set up by anticommunist organizers to attend the film.

Release
The film opened to the public on October 6, 1960, at the DeMille Theatre in New York City after four days of invitational previews. It played just 188 theatres in the United States and Canada in its first year and played for over a year at the DeMille before moving to the RKO Palace and opening in the New York circuit theaters around Thanksgiving 1961.

The film was re-released in 1967, without 23 minutes that had been in the original release. For the 1991 release, the same 23 minutes were restored by Robert A. Harris, as were another five minutes that had been cut from the film before its original release.

1991 restoration
The idea for the film's restoration came about after the American Cinematheque asked Universal Pictures for a print of Spartacus following its then-recent tribute to Kirk Douglas. They were later informed that the original negatives had been cut twice and the colors were badly faded. Steven Spielberg gave his backing to the restoration effort and recommended that Stanley Kubrick be informed of the project. Kubrick, who had disowned the film, gave his approval to the effort and participated by providing detailed instructions through long-distance communication via phone and fax machine from London. Kubrick's print of the film, which was donated to the Museum of Modern Art, could not be used for the restoration because it was considered archival. The original studio black-and-white separation prints, used as a backup in 1960, were used, though the processing lab had to develop a new lens capable of printing the Technirama frame without losing fidelity. The restoration cost about $1 million.

A team of 30 archivists restored several violent battle sequences that had been left out because of the negative reaction of preview audiences. Among the deleted footage was a bath scene in which the Roman patrician and general Crassus attempts to seduce his slave Antoninus, speaking about the analogy of "eating oysters" and "eating snails" to express his opinion that sexual preference is a matter of taste rather than morality. The four-minute scene had been removed following an objection by the National Legion of Decency. When the film was restored (two years after Olivier's death), the original dialogue recording of this scene was missing; it had to be redubbed. Tony Curtis, by then 66, was able to re-record his part, but Crassus' voice was an impersonation of Olivier by Anthony Hopkins, who had been suggested by Olivier's widow, Joan Plowright. A talented mimic, Hopkins had been a protégé of Olivier's during Olivier's days as the National Theatre's artistic director, and had portrayed Crassus in the Jeff Wayne musical album. The actors separately recorded their dialogue.

For the 1991 theatrical re-release, Universal Pictures partnered with the American Film Institute, in which the restored film premiered at the Directors Guild of America Theater in Los Angeles on April 25, with the proceeds going towards the AFI Preservation Fund and the Film Foundation. The general release began in Los Angeles, New York City, and Toronto on the following day. On May 3, the release was expanded into an additional 31 cities in the United States and Canada.

Home media
The film was first released on VHS in 1985 by MCA Home Video in a reconstructed version that reinstated most of the footage cut from subsequent reissues. The restored version was released on VHS by MCA/Universal in November 1991, and was subsequently released on LaserDisc by The Criterion Collection the following year. Criterion would later release the movie on DVD in 2001.

The film was released on Blu-ray in 2010 by Universal Pictures, but this release was panned by critics and fans alike, mainly due to the lackluster picture quality and sound. As a result, this release was highly controversial and did poorly in sales.

In 2015, for its 55th anniversary, the film went through an extensive 4K digital restoration, from a 6K scan of the 1991 reconstruction of the film, in which Robert A. Harris served as consultant. The 2015 restoration is 12 minutes longer and the original, six-channel audio track was also remixed and remastered in 7.1 surround sound. The film was re-released to Blu-ray Disc on October 6, 2015, featuring a 1080p transfer of the 2015 restoration in 2.20:1 aspect ratio and 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio surround sound. Special features include a featurette on the 2015 restoration, a 2015 interview with Kirk Douglas, and several features from the Criterion Collection DVD.

On July 21, 2020, Universal Pictures Home Entertainment released the film on UHD Blu-ray.

The 2015 restoration had originally been scheduled to have its theatrical premiere in March 2015 at the TCM Classic Film Festival, but was pulled from the festival, and from a July 2015 engagement in Chicago, because the restoration had not been completed in time. The DCP version of the restoration played at Film Forum in New York City, November 4–12, 2015.

Box office
Spartacus was a commercial success upon its release and became the highest-grossing film of 1960. In its first year from 304 dates (including 116 in 25 countries outside the US and Canada), it had grossed $17 million, including nearly $1.5 million from over half a million admission in over a year at the DeMille Theatre. By January 1963, the film had earned theatrical rentals of $14 million in the United States and Canada. The 1967 re-release increased its North American rentals to $14.6 million.

Critical response
Variety declared in a contemporaneous review, "Spartacus appears to have what it takes to satisfy the multitudes ... Kubrick has out-DeMilled the old master in spectacle, without ever permitting the story or the people who are at the core of the drama to become lost in the shuffle. He demonstrates here a technical talent and comprehension of human values." John L. Scott of the Los Angeles Times praised the "fabulous cast," Trumbo's "expert screenplay" and "impressive" climactic battle scenes, writing, "Here young director Stanley Kubrick gives notice that from now on he's definitely to be reckoned with. His use of cameras and handling of people are very effective and skillful."

Richard L. Coe of The Washington Post wrote that the film "achieves the unlikely triumph of being intimate on a big scale, a lengthy spectacle consistently interesting for reasons that may vary from scene to scene." Harrison's Reports graded the film as "Very Good. A thinking man's star-studded spectacle." Brendan Gill of The New Yorker wrote that the protagonist's speeches "sound much more like Howard Fast ... talking to himself in the nineteen-fifties than they do like an illiterate warrior of the first century before Christ. What redeems the picture is several stretches of good acting, especially by Peter Ustinov and Laurence Olivier; the intrinsic interestingness of the physical details (accurately scaled interiors of Roman houses, Roman legions marching exactly as they must have marched); and the directorial aplomb of Stanley Kubrick, who handles his crowd scenes with extraordinary grace."

Stanley Kauffmann writing for The New Republic said of Spartacus, "entertaining if mindless show, with many well-done scenes, intimate and panoramic."

Not all reviews were positive. Bosley Crowther of The New York Times called the film a "spotty, uneven drama" that "comes out a romantic mish-mash of a strange episode in history. The performances are equally uneven. Mr. Douglas sets his blunt, horse-opera style against the toga-clad precision of Mr. Laughton and the Roman-nosed gentility of Mr. Olivier." The Monthly Film Bulletin found it "disappointing" that "in spite of enormous expenditure, technical resource and an unusually talented team, so much of Spartacus falls into the old ruts of cliché and sentiment." The review noted that Douglas "probably has fewer lines than any other hero in screen history. Unhappily he does not make up for his verbal deficiencies by mobility of countenance, maintaining the same wooden grimace through more than three hours of trial and suffering." When released, the movie was attacked by both the American Legion and the Hollywood columnist Hedda Hopper because of its connection with Trumbo. Hopper stated, "The story was sold to Universal from a book written by a commie and the screen script was written by a commie, so don't go to see it."

Roger Ebert, reviewing the 1991 restored version, gave the film three stars out of four and wrote, "Two things stand up best over the years: the power of the battle spectacles, and the strength of certain performances – especially Olivier's fire, Douglas' strength, and Laughton's mild amusement at the foibles of humankind. The most entertaining performance in the movie, consistently funny, is by Ustinov, who upstages everybody when he is onscreen (he won an Oscar)."

On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 94% based on 63 reviews, with an average rating of 8.2/10. The critical consensus states: "Featuring terrific performances and epic action, Kubrick's restored swords-and-sandals epic is a true classic." On Metacritic it has a weighted average score of 87% based on 17 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".

Awards and nominations
In June 2008, American Film Institute revealed its "10 Top 10"—the best 10 films in 10 "classic" American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community. Spartacus was acknowledged as the fifth-best film in the epic genre. AFI also included the film in AFI's 100 Years...100 Thrills (#62), AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains (Spartacus #22 Hero), AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) (#81), and AFI's 100 Years...100 Cheers (#44).

"I'm Spartacus!"
In the climactic scene, recaptured slaves are asked to identify Spartacus in exchange for leniency. Spartacus tries to identify himself, but his attempt is thwarted when each of his comrades proclaims himself to be Spartacus, thus sharing his fate. The documentary Trumbo suggests that this scene was meant to dramatize the solidarity of those accused of being Communist sympathizers during the McCarthy era, who refused to implicate others, thus were blacklisted.

This scene is the basis for an in-joke in Kubrick's next film, Lolita (1962), where Humbert asks Clare Quilty, "Are you Quilty?" to which he replies, "No, I'm Spartacus. Have you come to free the slaves or something?" Many subsequent films, television shows, and advertisements have referenced or parodied the iconic scene. One of these is the film Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979), which reverses the situation by depicting an entire group undergoing crucifixion all claiming to be Brian, who, it has just been announced, is eligible for release ("I'm Brian." "No, I'm Brian." "I'm Brian and so's my wife.") Further examples have been documented in David Hughes' The Complete Kubrick and Jon Solomon's The Ancient World in Cinema.

The audio of the scene was also played at the start of each The Wall Live (2010–2013) tour show as an introduction to the song "In the Flesh?".

In an episode of the U.S. version of The Office, Michael Scott inadvertently reveals he does not understand the point of the "I am Spartacus!" moment. He says, "I've seen that movie half a dozen times, and I still don't know who the real Spartacus is" which he says is what makes the film a "classic whodunit."

The scene is referenced in the Starz television series, Spartacus: War of the Damned (2013), where many of Spartacus' lieutenants claim to be him while raiding separate areas of the Italian countryside. However, the purpose behind the line is different in this case, as Spartacus and his comrades are attempting to confuse their Roman adversaries about the rebel leader's whereabouts.

In the film That Thing You Do! (1996), drummer Guy Patterson (Tom Everett Scott) uses the catch phrase (as "I am Spartacus") numerous times to identify himself. He later spontaneously names his signature jazz solo "I am Spartacus" in the studio and then jams to it with Del Paxton (Bill Cobbs). The jazz drum solo was composed by Tom Hanks, the film's director.

In other media
In the American TV Show M*A*S*H, Hawkeye and BJ play charades, in which Spartacus is referenced. However, M*A*S*H* takes place during the Korean War, which ended in 1953, a full seven years before Spartacus was released, thereby making BJ's reference to "Spartacus" an historical impossibility.

Comic-book adaptation

 * Dell Four Color #1139 (November 1960)

Films

 * Il Figlio di Spartacus (The Son of Spartacus; English title: The Slave) is a 1962 Italian unofficial sequel to the film.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Spartacus (film)


text:
Livor mortis

Livor mortis, postmortem lividity , hypostasis  or suggillation, is the second stage of death and one of the signs of death. It is a settling of the blood in the lower, or dependent, portion of the body postmortem, causing a purplish red discoloration of the skin. When the heart stops functioning and is no longer agitating the blood, heavy red blood cells sink through the serum by action of gravity. The blood travels faster in warmer conditions and slower in colder conditions.

Livor mortis starts within 20–30 minutes, but is usually not observable by the human eye until two hours after death. The size of the patches increases in the next three to six hours. Fixation will begin to occur during this timeframe, causing the patches to be unaltered due to movement. Maximum lividity will occur between eight and twelve hours after death. Areas of blood pooling in contact with the ground will blanch, or remain white. The blood pools into the interstitial tissues of the body. The intensity of the color depends upon the amount of reduced haemoglobin in the blood. The discoloration does not occur in the areas of the body that are in contact with the ground or another object, in which capillaries are compressed.

Applicability
Coroners can use the presence or absence of livor mortis as a means of determining an approximate time of death. It can also be used by forensic investigators to determine whether or not a body has been moved. For instance, if the body is found lying prone, but the pooling is present on the deceased's back, investigators can conclude that the body was originally positioned supine. The colour of the pooling can help in determining cause of death. Carbon monoxide poisoning causes a red colouration.

Among coroners and other investigators, such as homicide and forensic detectives, livor mortis is not considered an exact way to measure time of death, but rather as a method of approximating it. Livor mortis, along with algor mortis, rigor mortis, and practices such as forensic entomology are frequently combined by investigators to more accurately pinpoint the estimated time of death.

title: Livor mortis


text:
999 (emergency telephone number)

999 is an official emergency telephone number in a number of countries which allows the caller to contact emergency services for emergency assistance. Countries and territories using the number include Bahrain, Bangladesh, Botswana, Eswatini, Ghana, Guernsey, Hong Kong, the Republic of Ireland, the Isle of Man, Jersey, Kenya, Macau, Malaysia, Mauritius, Poland, Qatar, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Trinidad and Tobago, Seychelles, Uganda, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and Zimbabwe.

United Kingdom
999 is the official emergency number for the United Kingdom, but calls are also accepted on the European Union emergency number, 112. All calls are answered by 999 operators, and are always free. Approximately 35 million 999/112 calls are made in the UK each year, with 74% from mobiles and 26% from landlines in 2022.

Emergency services
In the United Kingdom there are four emergency services which maintain full-time emergency control centres (ECC), to which 999 emergency calls may be directly routed by emergency operators in telephone company operator assistance centres (OAC). These services are as follows, listed in the order of percentage of calls received:
 * Ambulance
 * Police
 * Fire
 * HM Coastguard

Other emergency services may also be reached through the 999 system, but do not maintain permanent emergency control centres. All of these emergency services are summoned through the ECC of one of the four principal services listed above:
 * Lifeboat
 * Mountain rescue
 * Cave rescue
 * Mine rescue
 * Bomb disposal (provided by HM Armed Forces)

History
First introduced in the London area on 30 June 1937, the UK's 999 number is the world's oldest emergency call telephone service. The system was introduced following a house fire in Wimpole Street on 10 November 1935, in which five women were killed. A neighbour had tried to telephone the fire brigade and was so outraged at being held in a queue by the Welbeck telephone exchange that he wrote a letter to the editor of The Times, which prompted a government inquiry.

The initial scheme covered a 12 mi radius around Oxford Circus and the public were advised only to use it in an ongoing emergency if "for instance, the man in the flat next to yours is murdering his wife or you have seen a heavily masked cat burglar peering round the stack pipe of the local bank building." The first arrest – for burglary – took place a week later and the scheme was extended to major cities after World War II and then to the whole of the UK in 1976.

The 9-9-9 format was chosen based on the 'button A' and 'button B' design of pre-payment coin-operated public payphones in wide use (first introduced in 1925) which could be easily modified to allow free use of the 9 digit on the rotary dial in addition to the 0 digit (then used to call the operator), without allowing free use of numbers involving other digits; other combinations of free call 9 and 0 were later used for more purposes, including multiples of 9 (to access exchanges before subscriber trunk dialling came into use) as a fail-safe for attempted emergency calls, e.g. 9 or 99, reaching at least an operator. The choice of 999 was fortunate for accessibility, because in the dark or in dense smoke 999 could be dialled by placing a finger one hole away from the dial stop (see the articles on rotary dial and GPO telephones) and rotating the dial to the full extent three times. This enables all users including the visually impaired to easily dial the emergency number. It is also the case that it is relatively easy for 111, and other low-number sequences, to be called accidentally, including when transmission wires making momentary contact produce a pulse similar to dialling (e.g. when overhead cables touch in high winds).

Hoax calls and improper use are a problem. For these reasons, there are frequent public information campaigns in the UK on the correct use of the 999 system.

Alternative three-digit numbers for non-emergency calls have also been introduced in recent years. 101 was introduced for non-urgent calls to Police in England and Wales and later extended to Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Trials of 111 as a number to access health services in the UK for urgent but not life-threatening cases began in England in 2010. The main roll-out was originally meant to be finished by April 2013 but was not completed until February 2014. In Scotland, the NHS24 service moved from 0845 424 2424 to 111 on 29 April 2014. NHS 111 Wales (formally NHS Direct Wales) can now be accessed through the 111 number. It previously used 0845 46 47 but the rollout of 111 was completed, following trials starting in 2016

In 2008–2009, Nottinghamshire Police ran a successful pilot of Pegasus, a database containing the details of people with physical and learning disabilities or mental health problems, who have registered with the force because their disabilities make it difficult for them to give spoken details when calling the police. Those registered on the database are issued with a personal identification number (PIN) that can be used in two ways. By phone – either 999 or the force's non-emergency 101 number can be used – once a person is put through to the control room, they only need to say "Pegasus" and their PIN. Their details can then be retrieved from the database and the caller can quickly get on with explaining why they have called. In person – the Pegasus PIN can be told or shown to a police officer. Pegasus is also used by the City of London Police, Dyfed Powys Police, Surrey Police & Lincolnshire Police.

The use of push-button telephones can cause problems, because it is easy to push the same button repeatedly by accident, e.g. by objects in the same pocket as the telephone (termed 'pocket dialling') or by children playing with it. This problem is less of a concern with emergency numbers that use two different digits, such as 112 and 911, although on landlines 112 suffers much of the same risk of false generation as the 111 code which was considered and rejected when the original choice of 999 was made.

The pan-European 112 code was introduced in the UK in April 1995 with little publicity. It connects to existing 999 circuits. The GSM standard mandates that a user can dial 112 without unlocking the keypad, which can save time but also causes some accidental calls.

Silent solution 55 is the name given to the initiative that allows people to call 999 when they are not able to speak. If the caller does not initially respond to opening questions, the operator will then ask the caller to cough, tap their handset or make another audible sign that indicates they are in need of emergency assistance. In some instances where there is still no clear response, the call may be put through to an automated system which asks the caller to press 55 if in danger.

Procedure
999 or 112 is used to contact the emergency services upon witnessing or being involved in an emergency. In the United Kingdom, the numbers 999 and 112 both connect to the same service, and there is no priority or charge for either of them. Calls to 911, North America's emergency number, may be transferred to the 999 call system if the call is made within the United Kingdom from a mobile phone.

An emergency can be:
 * A person in need of immediate medical assistance, or an immediate danger to life
 * Suspicion that a crime is in progress, or that an offender is in the area
 * Structure on fire
 * Another serious incident which needs immediate emergency service attendance

All telecoms providers operating in the UK are obliged as part of their licence agreement to provide a free of charge emergency operator service. emergency calls made on any network in the UK are handled by BT. BT operates seven call centres nationally to take 999/112 calls. When 999 or 112 is dialled an operator will answer the call and ask, "Emergency. Which service?" Previously operators asked "Which service do you require?" (approximately up to the mid-90s).

The operator will then transfer the call to the appropriate service's own call-taker. If the caller is unsure as to which service they require, the operator will transfer the call to the police, and if an incident requires more than one service, for instance a road traffic accident with injuries and trapped people, one service will alert the others. (The operator has to contact each service individually, whether or not the caller remains on the line.) The caller will be connected to the service which covers the area that they are (or appear to be) calling from.

On 6 October 1998, BT introduced a new system whereby all the information about the location of the calling telephone was transmitted electronically to the relevant service rather than having to be read out (with the possibility of errors). This system is called EISEC (Enhanced Information Service for Emergency Calls). Before it, the operator had to start the connection to the emergency service control room by stating their own location, then the caller's telephone number, e.g. "Bangor connecting 01248 300 000". It was common for the caller to be confused why the operator was talking to the emergency service, and frequently talked over the operator. Only around half of the emergency authorities have EISEC, although the number is ever increasing.

Although the initial response to all 999 calls is in English, callers who reply in Welsh are transferred to the Bangor control room where the call will be taken by Welsh-speaking operators.

The rooms in which operators work are called operator assistance centres (OACs). There are six BT OACs. The rooms in which emergency response operators work are called emergency control centres (ECCs) and are operated by local authorities.

In some situations there may be specific instructions on nearby signs to notify some other authority of an emergency before calling 999. For example, railway bridges may carry signs advising that if a road vehicle strikes the bridge the railway authority (usually Network Rail) should be called first on a given number. Network Rail has its own procedures to alert trains to the emergency and to stop them if necessary. The instructions on the signs state 999 should then be dialled and that the police should be requested.

Access to the 999/112 service is provided for the hearing-impaired via Textphone and use of the Text Relay service, run by BT to cover all telephone providers, and previously known as the RNID "Typetalk" relay service. The number is 18000.

999 is also accessible via SMS for pre-registered users. The service is open for anyone to register and works with all major providers in the UK.

Location
The caller's location will not be passed onto the emergency services immediately, but it is possible to trace both landline and mobile telephone numbers with the BT operator; the former can be traced to an address. The latter can be immediately traced to a grid reference according to the transmitter being used. However, this is only accurate to a certain wide area – for more specific traces, authority must be sought and an expensive operation can be conducted to trace the mobile phone to within a few metres. A number of smartphone apps can now be downloaded that assist with caller location by using the smartphone's satellite navigation features.

Since 2014, smartphones which implement Advanced Mobile Location will detect that an emergency call is being placed, and use any available location services (WiFi or GPS based location) to send an emergency SMS containing an identifier for the call and the phone's location, accurate to 30 metres. This is intended to be received by the mobile operator whilst the call is in progress.

On some occasions callers will be put through to the wrong area service – this is called a "misrouted nines". The most common reason for this is when a mobile phone calls 999 and is using a radio transmitter that is located in another force area; most frequently these are calls that are made within a few miles of a border. Upon establishing the incident location, the emergency service operator will relay the information to the responsible force for their dispatch. In most areas, forces will respond to incidents just beyond their border if they could get there quicker, assist, and then hand over to other forces when they arrive.

On strategic routes like almost all motorways and some major A roads in the United Kingdom, National Highways have placed blue driver location signs with the location printed on them, at approximately 500-metre intervals. Although emergency SOS phones are placed along the hard shoulder on all motorways (and in emergency refuge areas on smart motorways) which automatically send location information to the National Highways regional control centre (RCC), most people involved in a road emergency call from their mobile phones and so need another way to identify their location. These signs contain a code which can be given to the emergency operator or the RCC. For example, a sign may say "M1 A 100.5". This translates as the M1 motorway, on the "A" carriageway, at 100.5 kilometres from the M1's nominal start at Staples Corner. The "A" and "B" carriageways are designated by Highways England to each carriageway, dependent upon which direction it travels; these normally refer to whether the carriageway goes "Away from London" or "Back to London". On circular motorways like the London Orbital M25 and M60 Manchester Outer Ring Road, the clockwise carriageway is the A carriageway and the anti-clockwise carriageway is the B carriageway. Letters J, K, L and M refer to slip roads at junctions. These signs are in addition to the pre-existing 100m distance marker posts alongside the carriageway.

Abandoned and hoax calls
An abandoned call is when a caller, intentionally or otherwise, rings 999 and then ends the call or stays silent. Abandoned calls are filtered by emergency operators BT and Cable & Wireless, and are either disconnected or passed on to police.

They are normally disconnected by the operator repeating "Emergency. Which service?", then if no response is given, the operator will say "Do you need police, fire or ambulance?". If there is still no response, the operator will sometimes ask the caller to press the keypad or make a noise if they need assistance. If no response is given, they will confirm they are clearing the line.

For abandoned calls, if the caller requests the police and the call is routed to police and then the line is dropped, either while waiting for connection or on the line with police, they are checked by police and called back. If there is no answer, the police service are likely to attend and if the line is disconnected without the caller telling the operator which service they need, they then make a decision to filter the call to police (if suspicious background noise) or clear the line.

The most common reasons for abandoned calls include:
 * Accidental dialling of 999 on mobile phones. As a GSM standard, mobile phones still allow emergency calls to be made even with the keypad locked.
 * Faulty phone lines.
 * Believing an urban myth that says dialling 999 charges mobile phone batteries.

Ireland
In Ireland, 999 (and the European and GSM standard 112) are the national emergency numbers. The 999 and 112 service is able to respond in English, Irish, Polish, French, German and Italian. 999 and 112 operators in Ireland answer the calls in under one second and say "Emergency, which service?". The caller may then request the Gardaí (the Irish police), ambulance, fire service, coast guard, or cave and mountain rescue service. The caller is then transferred to the emergency dispatcher for the appropriate service.

Bangladesh
In Bangladesh, 999 is the national emergency number. It officially launched on 12 December 2017. This number is toll-free. Calling this number connects the caller to an operator, who then connects the caller to the police, ambulance or fire service.

The services are provided under a national emergency help desk operated by the Bangladesh Police, which has been set up at a cost of Tk 60.50 crore. Although the 'National Emergency Service 999' is operated by the Bangladesh Police, fire service and civil defense personnel and the ambulance service dispatchers of the Department of Health also work closely with the police 24/7 to ensure proper service.

In the past, dialling 100 would connect to Bangladesh Police, 101 to Rapid Action Battalion, 102 to fire services, 103 to ambulance service and 104 to the Access to Information Programme under the Prime Minister's Office.

Hong Kong and Macau
999 was introduced to Hong Kong for emergency services (Police, Fire-fighting Services and Ambulance Services) during British rule and continues to be used following the transfer of sovereignty.

Macau also adopted the 999 number; it also introduced two emergency hotline numbers: 110 (mainly for tourists from mainland China) and 112 (mainly for tourists from overseas).

The worldwide emergency number for GSM mobile phones, 112, also works on all GSM networks in the territories. Calls made to this number are redirected to the 999 call centre.

Malaysia
The 999 emergency services in Malaysia is staffed by about 138 telephonists from Telekom Malaysia. Like Singapore, the number was inherited from British rule and continued after independence. Ongoing upgrading works are taking place to introduce the Computer-Telephony Integration (CTI) for hospital exchanges, digital mapping to track the callers' locations and Computer Assisted Despatching (CAD) for online connectivity among the agencies providing the emergency services in the country. All calls to the number are made free of charge. In the late 90s, the number 994 was adopted as a direct connection to fire stations, but use of the number has been discontinued due to cost-saving measures taken by the government. 991 connects to civil services.

The worldwide emergency number for GSM mobile phones, 112, also works on all GSM networks in the country. Calls made to this number are redirected to the 999 call centre.

Mauritius
Mauritius uses the 999 emergency number for police contact only. The other emergency numbers in use are 114 for emergency medical assistance and 115 for the fire service.

Poland
The 112 emergency number is an all-service number in Poland like in other EU states, but old numbers that were traditionally designated for emergencies are still in use parallel to 112. Those are 999 for ambulance, 998 for fire brigade and 997 for police.

United Arab Emirates
In the United Arab Emirates, the 999 service is used to contact the police who are also capable of forwarding the call as appropriate to the ambulance or fire services. The number 998 connects directly to the ambulance service and 997 to the fire brigade.

Singapore
In Singapore, the number 999 was inherited from British rule and continued after independence. The number is attributed more to requesting for the police, with the number 995, established in 1984, used for direct lines to the fire brigade and ambulance services of the Singapore Civil Defence Force. Because most of the population of Singapore is Chinese, it is likely that 995 was adopted because the Chinese pronunciation for that number (九九五, jiǔ jiǔ wǔ) sounds similar to the Chinese phrase for 'Save me' (救救我, jiù jiù wǒ).

Eswatini
The Kingdom of Eswatini uses the 999 emergency number for police contact only, and 975 for human trafficking reports. The other emergency numbers in use are 977 for emergency medical assistance and 933 for the fire service.

Trinidad and Tobago
In Trinidad and Tobago, 999 is used to contact the police only. The number 811 is used for the ambulance service and 990 for the fire brigade.

Uganda
In Uganda, callers can call the police on either 112 or 999.

Canada

 * In 1959, Winnipeg, Manitoba (16 municipalities) used 9-9-9 as the first North American deployment of a local unified emergency number. North America later standardised on 9-1-1, with +1-204-999-xxxx eventually reassigned as a standard mobile telephone exchange. Even in 2022, dialling 9-9-9 in certain areas of Canada, e.g., Gatineau, QC, may be transferred to the 999 call system.

title: 999 (emergency telephone number)


text:
User talk:Pedreco

Hi Pedreco,

please see this mail for a suggestion to reorganize the List of micronations. This will likely be done soon. --Eloquence

Image copyrights
Hi! Thanks for uploading Image:PC AmericadoSul.gif. I notice it currently doesn't have an image copyright tag. Could you add one to let us know its copyright status? (You can use if you release it under the GFDL, or  if you claim fair use, etc.) If you don't know what any of this means, just let me know where you got the images and I'll tag them for you. Thanks so much,   — Edwin Stearns | Talk 22:09, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

title: User talk:Pedreco


text:
Mottram in Longdendale

Mottram in Longdendale is a village in Tameside, Greater Manchester, England. At the 2011 census, the population for the ward of Longdendale, which includes Mottram and the surrounding area, was 9,950.

Historically part of Cheshire, it lies in the valley of Longdendale, on the border with Derbyshire and the Peak District near Broadbottom and Hattersley. Mottram in Longdendale Parish was one of the eight ancient parishes of the Macclesfield Hundred of Cheshire. The larger Mottram parish was incorporated into Longdendale in 1936, remaining part of Cheshire, then incorporated into Tameside by the Local Government Act 1972 in 1974.

History
In 1795, Aikin in his book, Forty Miles around Manchester, wrote
 * Mottram is situated twelve miles from Manchester and seven for Stockport, on a high eminence one mile to the west of the Mersey, from which the river ground begins to rise; half the way being so steep as to make it difficult to access. It forms a long street well paved both in the town and some distance on the roads. It contains 127 houses, which are for the most part built of a thick flag stone, and covered with a thick, heavy slate, of nearly the same quality, no other covering being able to endure the strong blasts of wind which occasionally occur. Of late, many of the houses in the skirts of the town are built of brick. About fifty years ago, the houses were few in number, and principally situated on top of the hill, adjoining the churchyard, where is an ancient cross, and at a small distance the parsonage house, now gone much to decay and occupied by working people. It is only of late years that the town has had any considerable increase, which has been chiefly at the bottom of the hill, but some latterly on the top.

In the 18th century the River Etherow was known as the Mersey. The River Tame has been a border from the earliest times between the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of Northumbria and Mercia. The ancient parish was the most northerly in Cheshire. Mottram came to prominence as a transport hub. It lies on two pack horse routes used to carry salt from Cheshire to South Yorkshire over the Pennines and carry lime for soil improvement from Chapel-en-le-Frith. It was on the Manchester to Sheffield stage coach route, and had a flyer service to Manchester. Before the Industrial Revolution Mottram and Ashton had been the most significant towns in the area, the manor and manorial court house were in Mottram, but other towns eclipsed Mottram in size and importance. Mottram was active in the early stages of industrialisation, and there were significant cotton spinning mills in Wedneshough Green and the Treacle Street areas of Mottram Moor, and printing and dyeing works on the Etherow at Broadbottom which until recently was part of the parish.

The smaller early mills in Mottram became uneconomic and harder to run. Stalling industrialisation led to social conflict and hunger during 1812 Luddite riots that led to the smashing of labour-reducing machines. The Luddites secretly drilled on Wedneshough Green. In 1842 local Chartists met on the green, and planned the closure of Stalybridge factories in the Plug Riots. By 1860 the population had peaked. The 1844 railway passed through the valley with stops at Hattersley and Broadbottom in the parish but not at the Mottram township.

A Polish pilot, Josef Gawkowski, was killed on 19 July 1942 when his aircraft crashed near Mottram on a training flight from RAF Newton in Nottinghamshire. A memorial plaque commemorating him is in Mottram Cemetery.

Geography
Mottram occupies an elevated site straddling the A57 trunk road from the end of the M67 to the junction with the A628 trunk road. It is 10 mi east of Manchester, on land between 150m to 250m above mean sea level. The geology is mainly boulder clay above millstone grit, but there are small outcrops of coal at the edge of the Lancashire Coalfield. To the south and east of Mottram is the River Etherow and to the west is the Hurstclough Brook.

Longdendale bypass proposal
The A628 trunk road connects the M67 motorway from Manchester to the M1 motorway in South Yorkshire. The road is single-carriageway through Mottram, Hollingworth and Tintwistle and through the Peak District National Park, it is used by large numbers of heavy goods vehicles. It is one of the most congested A-road routes in the country, with high volumes of traffic (including HGVs) using a road which is totally unsuitable for the volume and nature of traffic it carries The A628 through Mottram carries traffic from the A57 road linking Manchester through Glossop to Sheffield over the Snake Pass, another major Trans-Pennine route. Congestion at peak times backs up through Glossop and Hadfield rendering local journeys impossible. To solve these problems the Longdendale Bypass was approved in December 2014, but has not yet been started. There is considerable local feeling that there is no viable alternative to a bypass.

Landmarks
St Michael and All Angels Church dates from the late 15th century. The church is a Grade II* Listed Building, built in the Perpendicular Gothic style. The interior of St. Michael's was remodelled in 1854 but the exterior remains intact from the 15th and 16th centuries. The church stands high up on Warhill overlooking the village. In 2010, vandals destroyed the church's windows which led to cork boards being used as replacements.

Mottram Old Hall is a country house in Old Hall Lane which dates to 1727 and was once occupied by the Hollingworth family.

Sport
Mottram Cricket Club plays in the Greater Manchester Cricket League. The club was founded in 1860.

Notable people

 * Sir Edmund Shaa was a goldsmith, and Lord Mayor of London in 1482, dying there 20 April 1488. He appeared as a character in William Shakespeare's play Richard III, and a bequest was used to found Stockport Grammar School.
 * Lawrence Earnshaw (c.1707–12 May 1767) was an inventor and machine-maker, who made an astronomical clock, and a machine to spin and reel cotton in one operation.

Famous former residents also include Kathy Staff (aka Nora Batty from the sitcom Last of the Summer Wine) and Harold Shipman, the UK's most prolific serial killer.

title: Mottram in Longdendale


text:
Talk:Cost

1st edition, untitled one

 * In economics, a cost is a price paid as part of an economic transaction

The trouble with this definition is that "price" doesn't always have anything to do with what economists mean by cost. Your opportunity cost in buying a house, for example, may have little relation to the price of the house. --Ryguasu

Cost versus price
I removed the definition 'cost is a price' because it is confusing two distinct things (price and cost). Production cost is the value of what has been lost in the form of inputs. It is important to see that the input has not necessarily physically disappeared, but most often the labor would have just gone away. In case of physical goods, some inputs can be recovered if so wished. That is, it would be problematic to define cost as the 'loss' of input incurred to produce something.

But to compute cost, one must see it as the loss of the input in the sense that the same input is not available to produce something else too. This gives a palpable sense of scarcity: cost is a reflection of scarcity.

The good that has been produced is indeed intended to contribute to utility, and the usual idea is that the value of the product is larger than the value of the factors, that value has been added. The idea is that price in reality is larger than cost. New income is created by adding value to a stock of previously existing inputs. If cost is defined as price, then by definition income creation is impossible. Price must be defined as cost-plus-proft to permit the addition of value that goes into income creation.

Neoclassical economics cannot allow the equilibrium price to be larger than marginal cost, because it cannot set up an exchange model properly. The failure of the neoclassical school to understand reality does not mean that reality is wrong; it only means that the neoclassical models are inept to understand market reality. The reality is that the market price is higher than the cost of production. (The buyer incurs further costs to acquire something in addition to paying a price for the good.) Gani 15:14, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Cost versus price 2

 * The term 'cost' differs for consumers and producers, doesn't it? The price of a good is part of the cost to the consumer (other costs to the consumer in relation to buying the good is travelling to the shop, the opportunity cost of the time he spent in driving to the shop and selecting the good). But, cost to the producer is the manufacturing cost of the good. The price of the good cannot be the cost to the producer (as currently implied in the article -- please check to see if this should be corrected -- see part about private costs and external costs), because it contains in it both the manufacturing cost + profit (profit for value added by transforming raw inputs into a usable good -- a conversion of things in a relatively 'useless' high entropy state to a thing in a 'useful' low entropy state). Correct me if I am wrong. AppleJuggler 10:39, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Unit of measure
Is cost measured in $(₤€¥ etc), $/time or $/unit? These would be quite distinct units of measure, but fundamental to the definition. Of course, that assumes a financial or economic definition. But some sources of confusion may stem from this - somewhere a cost-allocation approach converts the $/hour of direct labour into the $/unit of unit cost.

Trevithj (talk) 03:56, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

 * cost —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.192.11.6 (talk) 12:45, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Evidence
"Cost" is unknowable, immeasurable. With specific aims and specific inputs in mind, one can make reasonable assumptions that some inputs will be given over to meeting that aim. For example, driving to the next town might take a gallon of petrol. That is about the extent of it...a subjective, expected exchange of something for something else. Not particularly useful, but massively overemphasised by the pseudoscience of economic mainstream quackery.

The TOTAL cost of a particular action is unknowable to the agent making the decision. Therefore it is not used as input to the decision. There is no point in hoping that animals are rational agents that operate according to some simplified algorithm involving cost, because even in simple scenarios, such as being faced with 20000 products in a large supermarket, we don't have the computational capacity to make rational cost based choices. Supercomputers do not have the computational ability.

When observing humans, behavioural analysis suffices. It is enough to know that under certain conditions people will be likely to perform an action or unlikely to perform an action. There is no need to make attempts to find and compute 'costs'. 90.179.192.118 (talk) 21:55, 14 September 2009 (UTC). Moved to its chronology place, here; ... · — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.179.192.118 (talk) 22:03, 14 September 2009 (UTC) ). ~ by: --Pla y Grande Covián (talk) 12:14, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

Cost price
In this AfD I have suggested that cost price could be merged here. Any thoughts on the merits and practicalities of this would be welcome. Curb Safe Charmer (talk) 11:23, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Cost


text:
Substance intoxication

Substance intoxication is a transient condition of altered consciousness and behavior associated with recent use of a substance. It is often maladaptive and impairing, but reversible. If the symptoms are severe, the term "substance intoxication delirium" may be used. Slang terms for the state include: getting high (generic), and being stoned, cooked, or fried (usually in reference to cannabis).

Substance intoxication may often accompany a substance use disorder (SUD); if persistent substance-related problems exist, SUD is the preferred diagnosis.

The term "intoxication" in common use most often refers to alcohol intoxication.

Classification
The ICD-10 Mental and Behavioural Disorders due to psychoactive substance use shows:
 * F10. alcohol
 * F11. opioids
 * F12. cannabinoids
 * F13. sedatives and hypnotics
 * F14. cocaine
 * F15. caffeine
 * F16. hallucinogens
 * F17. tobacco
 * F18. volatile solvent
 * F19. multiple drug use and use of other psychoactive substances

Caffeine
The discussion over whether the coffee (caffeine) "buzz" counted as intoxication or not was hotly debated during the early to mid 16th century.

Contact high
Contact high is a phenomenon that occurs in otherwise sober people who experience a drug-like effect just by coming into contact with someone who is under the influence of a psychoactive drug. In a similar way to the placebo effect, a contact high may be caused by classical conditioning as well as by the physical and social setting.

The term is often incorrectly used to describe the high obtained from passive inhalation of marijuana.

Slang terms
Slang terms include: getting high (generic), being stoned, cooked, or blazed (usually in reference to cannabis), and many more specific slang terms for particular intoxicants. Alcohol intoxication is graded in intensity from buzzed, to tipsy then drunk all the way up to hammered, plastered, smashed, wasted, destroyed, shitfaced and a number of other terms. The term rolling is a common word used to describe being under the influence of MDMA and for LSD the phrases frying or tripping have been used. "Tripping" is a term that is considered applicable to virtually all hallucinogens which includes psychedelics, dissociatives, deliriants and possibly certain types of hypnotics.

title: Substance intoxication


text:
User:Nicolas Delahaye~enwiki

fr:Utilisateur:Nicolas_Delahaye

Hello,

I come from France, but currently live in San Francisco, a great city :-) I just discovered Wikipedia, and am interested in participating in translation dictionaries (content and framework).

I also like Photography.

My user on Meta.

title: User:Nicolas Delahaye~enwiki