text:
Peoples' Global Action

Peoples' Global Action (PGA) was the name of a worldwide co-ordination of radical social movements, grassroots campaigns and direct actions in resistance to capitalism and for social and environmental justice. PGA was part of the anti-globalization movement.

History
The initial inspiration for the formation of PGA came from a global meeting called in 1996 by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). They had started a grassroots uprising in the impoverished Mexican state of Chiapas on New Year's Day 1994 when the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) came into effect.

The Zapatistas called for a gathering, called an 'encuentro' (encounter), of international grassroots movements to meet in specially constructed arenas in the Chiapas jungle to discuss common tactics, problems and solutions. Six thousand people attended, from over 40 countries, and declared that they would form "a collective network of all our particular struggles and resistances... an intercontinental network of resistance against neoliberalism... (and) for humanity".

In August 1997, the European Zapatista support network called for a Second 'Encuentro' in Spain, which it had planned with the Zapatistas during the 1996 encuentro. Delegates came again of movements from around the world, such as the Brazilian Landless Workers' Movement (MST) who occupies unused land to create farms, and the other Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha-KRRS (Karnataka State Farmers Association) from India, renowned for their "cremate Monsanto" campaign, which involved burning fields of genetically modified crops. Here some of the primary objectives and organisational principles of the emerging network were drafted.

In February 1998, movements from all continents met again, this time in Geneva, where Peoples' Global Action was launched.

Horizontalist Structure and Organizing Model
The PGA used a horizontalist form of organizing, influenced by anarchist political models that saw the means and the ends as aligned. In part its structure and mode of organizing was developed as a critique of ‘vertical’ or authoritarian movements.

Major activities
Peoples' Global Action had three main types of activities. Global Days of Action, Intercontinental/International and Regional Conferences, and Caravans through which activists from one part of the world, would travel to another part of the world to build solidarity.

Global Days of Action
So far, PGA's major function has been to serve as a political space for coordinating decentralised Global Action Days around the world, to highlight the global resistance of popular movements to capitalist globalisation. The first Global Action Days, during the 2nd WTO ministerial conference in Geneva in May 1998, involved tens of thousands of people in more than 60 demonstrations and street parties on five continents.

Subsequent Global Action Days have included the Carnival Against Capital (June 18, 1999), the 3rd World Trade Organization summit in Seattle, USA (November 30, 1999), the International Monetary Fund / World Bank meeting in Prague, Czech Republic (September 26, 2000), the G8 meeting in Genoa, Italy (June 21, 2000) the 4th WTO summit in Qatar (November 9, 2001), etc.

Conferences
Groups involved in PGA have also organised global and regional conferences, workshops and other events in many regions of the world. Since the 1998 event in Geneva, Global PGA conferences have been held before WTO ministerials: in Bangalore, India (1999), and in Cochabamba, Bolivia (2001). Regional Conferences have been held in Europe (Athens, Milan, Belgrade, Barcelona, Dijon, Leiden), Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Brazil, Bangladesh, New Zealand (Aotearoa) and the United States.

European Conference in 2008
A Peoples' Global Action gathering in Europe took place from August 19 to September 3, in France, in a decentralised fashion in 2006. The first nine days were distributed over five sites, each with specific themes, while the last five days took place in a central location, the autonomous space « Les Tanneries » in Dijon.

Caravans
In 1999, the PGA organized an Intercontinental Caravan that brought 450 representatives of grassroots movements from the Global South (particularly India, but also Brazil, Mexico, Bangladesh and Chile) to visit 12 European countries, meet with grassroots European movements and conduct joint solidarity actions. The "Totally Crazy Project" was initiated by MD Nanjundaswamy and European activists. An interview with an Indian participant from Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha (KRRS), explained, "We took part in 63 direct actions and 85 public meetings, and visited 38 farms ending at the G8 summit in Köln, Germany. In France we uprooted a GM rice trial with René Riesel and José Bové of the radical Confédération Paysanne (French Farmers Union), who were arrested and sentenced to 6 months imprisonment. In Geneva we marched at the WTO office, shouting “Kill the WTO”. In Rome we protested at the FAO headquarters, and at the G8 Summit in Germany we engaged in a laughing protest as part of a global day of action."

In 1999, there were two caravans of activists in the leadup to the anti-World Trade Organization (WTO) conference in Seattle One travelled across the U.S., including activists from Chiapas, Mexico, the other across Canada. The later ended at the congress organised by the non-partisan International Forum on Globalisation, described by De Fabel van de illegaal as a right-wing elite think tank.

Right Wing Anti-Globalization
The first version of the first PGA hallmark called for "A very clear rejection of the WTO and other trade liberalisation agreements (like APEC, the EU, NAFTA, etc.) as active promoters of a socially and environmentally destructive globalisation;)" This was critiqued for being too broad, and allowing the participation of right wing/nationalist movements within the PGA. Some criticized the participation of Mike Dolan, who worked for Ralph Nader's Public Citizen consumer watchdog group, who raised funds for the PGA Caravan, and who later spoke in support of the right-wing presidential candidate Pat Buchanan. Dolan sent around a newspaper article in which Buchanan openly says: "American workers and people first." When Dolan's actions and viewpoint were criticised from the grassroots level, Michael Morrill, the coordinator of the American PGA caravan, took his side. "Let's work together when we can, work in parallel when we must, but never work against each other when our goal is the elimination of the WTO and its corporate benefactors."

As a result, the PGA Hallmarks were edited in order to make opposition to capitalism, colonialism, racism and patriarchy more explicit.

Nonetheless, until at least 2004, PGA events continued to attract right wing anti-globalist activists. The 2004 European PGA conference in Jajinci, Belgrade agreed that "a fascist coming as an interested individual, respecting the hallmarks and whose behaviour during the conference was fine wouldn't be a problem." Although a rider was subsequently added, this controversy was fuelled by the sympathies held by Leonid Savin (the co-ordinator of the Ukraine PGA info-point) with politics of Alexander Dugin. After Savin was shown to be an activist associated with the Eurasia Party, the PGA Ukraine info-point was removed from the PGA website. See also National anarchism.

Racism
The PGA, like the global justice movement more generally, was criticized for racism and Eurocentrism. One important intervention argued that people of color were marginalized in the Seattle mobilisation against the World Trade Organization. In 2001, Raj Patel and Kala Subbuswamy discussed the problem of groups like the PGA in dealing with issues of race:

 * The principles of decentralisation and autonomy adopted by many within radical movements can also, unintentionally and remediably, be exclusionary. Many radical groups have anarchist principles behind them - non-hierarchical, consensus decision-making, often no formal structure. One problem with this is that it is often used to dismiss talk of what 'the movement' can do about issues of race and gender, on the grounds that we're not a movement, we're a collection of individuals and so we can't make decisions about the 'movement'. But UK EF!, or Peoples' Global Action, for example *are* movements, or at least networks with informal hierarchies and structures and unwritten rules. Every action involves a decision and a choice and it is important that these are open. For example, saying that we cannot exclude fascists from gatherings involves a choice - if people are allowed to say overtly racist comments, you exclude people of color, or at least prevent any chance of us feeling comfortable. This why at its last conference made explicit moves to overtly condemn discrimination

In 2002, Maria Theresa Santana, Chairperson of Moyo wa Taifa (UK) - Pan-Afrikan Women's Association attended the European PGA Conference in Leiden and expressed her anger at the Eurocentric standpoint of the PGA discussions.

At the PGA regional conference in Panama (August 2003), further concerns were raised that despite anti-hierarchical intentions, a leadership was emerging which only occasionally "got down the informations to their bases", that decisions were being made by meetings in Europe "that Europeans were imposing their political reality and way to work", and that prominent activists were promoting sexist attitudes rooted in religious fundamentalism.

Participating organizations
The following organizations were amongst those who participated in PGA conferences, caravans or global days of action.

Asia
Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha, KRRS Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) Narmada Bachoa Andolan Bangladesh Krishok Federation (BKF) All Nepal Women’s Association Assembly of the Poor, Movement for National Land and Agricultural Reform (MONLAR) - Sri Lanka Borneo Indigenous Peoples’ and Peasants Union (Panggau), Sarawak, Malaysia.

Latin America
Brazil -Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST), CAVE - Coletivo Alternativa Verde, Movimento Negro Unificado, Rede Libertária da Baixada Santista, O Centro de Cultura Social de São Paulo, Ação Local por Justiça Global

Ecuador - CONFEUNASSC-CNC, CONAIE, Movimiento de Mujeres Negras de Quito

Bolivia - Coordinadora Defensa del Agua y la Vida, COCAMTROP (El Comité de Coordinación de las seis Federaciones Campesinas de los Trópicos), Confederación Latinoamericana de Trabajadoras del Hogar.(FENATRAHOB)

Colombia - El Proceso de Comunidades Negras (PCN), SINTRAEMCALI Sindicato de Trabajadores de las Empresas Municipales de Cali (Workers Union of Cali Municipal Enterprises);

Honduras ONECA/ODECO

Canada/US
Canada - CLAC- Montreal: Convergence des Luttes Anticapitalistes, Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW), Polaris Institute, Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Pauktuutit - National Association of Inuit Women, Canada

US - Direct Action Network, Tampa Bay Action Group (TBAG), Student Alliance to Reform Corporations (STARC), Santa Cruz, Indymedia,

title: Peoples' Global Action


text:
Reversed field pinch

A reversed-field pinch (RFP) is a device used to produce and contain near-thermonuclear plasmas. It is a toroidal pinch that uses a unique magnetic field configuration as a scheme to magnetically confine a plasma, primarily to study magnetic confinement fusion. Its magnetic geometry is somewhat different from that of a tokamak. As one moves out radially, the portion of the magnetic field pointing toroidally reverses its direction, giving rise to the term reversed field. This configuration can be sustained with comparatively lower fields than that of a tokamak of similar power density. One of the disadvantages of this configuration is that it tends to be more susceptible to non-linear effects and turbulence. This makes it a useful system for studying non-ideal (resistive) magnetohydrodynamics. RFPs are also used in studying astrophysical plasmas, which share many common features.

The largest Reversed Field Pinch device presently in operation is the RFX (R/a = 2/0.46) in Padua, Italy. Others include the MST (R/a = 1.5/0.5) in the United States, EXTRAP T2R (R/a = 1.24/0.18) in Sweden, RELAX (R/a = 0.51/0.25) in Japan, and KTX (R/a = 1.4/0.4) in China.

Characteristics
Unlike the Tokamak, which has a much larger magnetic field in the toroidal direction than the poloidal direction, an RFP has a comparable field strength in both directions (though the sign of the toroidal field reverses). Moreover, a typical RFP has a field strength approximately one half to one tenth that of a comparable Tokamak. The RFP also relies on driving current in the plasma to reinforce the field from the magnets through the dynamo effect.

Magnetic topology

The reversed-field pinch works towards a state of minimum energy.

The magnetic field lines coil loosely around a center torus. They coil outwards. Near the plasma edge, the toroidal magnetic field reverses and the field lines coil in the reverse direction.

Internal fields are bigger than the fields at the magnets.

RFP in Fusion Research: comparison with other confinement configurations
The RFP has many features that make it a promising configuration for a potential fusion reactor.

Advantages

 * 1) Superconducting Magnets:
 * 2) * RFPs may not need superconducting magnets, providing a significant advantage over tokamaks.
 * 3) * Superconducting magnets are delicate, expensive, and must be shielded from the neutron-rich fusion environment.
 * 4) Shell as a Magnetic Coil:
 * 5) * Some RFP experiments, like the Madison Symmetric Torus, use a close-fitting shell as a magnetic coil.
 * 6) * Driving current through the shell itself is attractive for reactor design.
 * 7) * A solid copper shell could be robust against high-energy neutrons compared to superconducting magnets.
 * 8) Surface Instabilities:
 * 9) * RFPs are susceptible to surface instabilities, necessitating a close-fitting shell.
 * 10) Beta Limit:
 * 11) * There is no established beta limit for RFPs.
 * 12) Ignition Possibility:
 * 13) * There's a possibility that a reversed field pinch could achieve ignition solely with ohmic power.
 * 14) * This involves driving current through the plasma and generating heat from electrical resistance rather than through electron cyclotron resonance, potentially simplifying reactor design compared to tokamaks.
 * 15) * However, it may not be operated in a steady state.

Disadvantages
Several key areas present challenges in the development of RFP reactors. Researchers are actively working on solutions for these issues:

 * Current Drive Mechanisms: Current RFP devices rely on a method known as ohmic current drive, which has limitations. Researchers are exploring alternative current drive techniques to improve efficiency and control.
 * Tearing Mode Mitigation: RFP plasmas are susceptible to tearing modes, which can negatively impact performance. Development of active control methods for these modes is crucial for achieving stable plasma confinement.
 * Plasma Confinement Optimization: Current RFP devices achieve lower plasma confinement times compared to tokamaks. Research is ongoing to optimize plasma confinement in RFPs, including investigating the impact of device size through projects like the Madison Symmetric Torus (MST).
 * Shell Design Considerations: The RFP design necessitates a conductive shell positioned close to the plasma, which presents engineering challenges for reactor design. Research is focused on optimizing the shell configuration to balance performance and practicality.
 * Maintenance Strategies for Plasma Control Systems: Certain RFP designs utilize complex coil systems for plasma control. The proximity of these coils to the high-temperature plasma environment necessitates the development of robust maintenance strategies to ensure their long-term functionality.

Plasma Physics Research
The Reversed Field Pinch is also interesting from a physics standpoint. RFP dynamics are highly turbulent. RFPs also exhibit a strong plasma dynamo, similar to many astrophysical bodies. Basic plasma science is another important aspect of Reversed Field Pinch research.

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

title: Reversed field pinch


text:
American Water Spaniel

The American Water Spaniel (often abbreviated to AWS) is a breed of spaniel which originated in the United States. It was developed in the state of Wisconsin during the 19th century from a number of other breeds, including the Irish and English Water Spaniels. The breed was saved by Dr. Fred J. Pfeifer, who set up the breed club and standard, and whose work led to recognition for the breed by the United Kennel Club, and later, the American Kennel Club. While they are the state dog of Wisconsin, they remain a rare breed.

They are medium-sized dogs, and have a double layered coat, which comes in a variety of brown related shades. A versatile hunting dog, they are also suitable for apartment life due to work by breeders to develop a breed with an even temperament. The AWS may have been involved in the development of the Boykin Spaniel.

History
Originating in Wisconsin, the American Water Spaniel is the Wisconsin state dog. The breed originated in the areas along the Fox River and its tributary the Wolf River during the early 19th century. Hunters needed a dog that could work on both land and water, a versatile hunter skilled at bringing in a variety of game. Hunters also wanted a hunting dog compact enough to be transported in a small skiff, one that was able to withstand Wisconsin's cold water temperatures. Breeds involved in the creation of the American Water Spaniel are thought to have included the English Water Spaniel, Irish Water Spaniel, Curly Coated Retriever, native Indian Dogs, the Poodle, and either the Sussex Spaniel or another type of field spaniel.

This little brown dog created was known at the time as the American Brown Spaniel, and weighed around 40 lb. It had a thick curly coat that protected it from the cold temperatures of the water and winter. It was used to hunt waterfowl, ruffed grouse, greater prairie chicken and a variety of fur–bearing animals. Over the years the numbers of the breed began to dwindle due both to a reduction in the duck population through those valley areas, and because of a switch in hunting – from a means to gather food for survival to that of recreation. Additionally, following World War II, new types of dogs became available in Wisconsin such as setters, pointers and other spaniels, allowing additional specialization in hunting.

Dr. Fred J. Pfeifer, from New London, Wisconsin, set up Wolf River Kennels in order to save the breed. Numbers held by the kennel fluctuated but at times went up to 132 dogs. He advertised the dogs widely across the country, selling male dogs for $25 and females dogs for $20. Part of a sales pitch that Pfeifer mailed to prospective dog owners read, "The American Brown Spaniel is distinctively an American production. Hunters have known this type for years and it was through their efforts that this dog was propagated.... For years we have bred only selective stock, breeding for gameness, stability, courage, intelligence, and beauty. They are dogs to admire and trust under all conditions whether in the home circle or in the field with the outdoor man."

Due to Pfeifer's work, the breed was recognized by the United Kennel Club (UKC) as the American Water Spaniel in 1920, and by the Field Dog Stud Book in 1938. Pfeifer's own dog, named "Curly Pfeifer" was the first American Water Spaniel to be registered with UKC. John Scofield of Missouri and Thomas Brogdan of Rush Lake, Wisconsin worked together with the American Water Spaniel Club (AWSC), gaining the breed recognition with the American Kennel Club (AKC) in 1940. Prior to recognition by the AKC, the breed had not been shown in the show ring.

The breed has links to the Boykin Spaniel, and is thought to have been the main breed used to develop the Boykin. The differences between the Boykin and the AWS are negligible with some dog historians suggesting that the original Boykin, called "Dumpy", who was found on the streets of Spartanburg, South Carolina, was actually an American Water Spaniel who had been misplaced in transit. However the breed clubs for the Boykin do not agree with this account.

The breed was made the state dog of Wisconsin in 1985. The American Water Spaniel remains a rare breed. During 1998 only 233 puppies were registered with the AKC, with an estimated 3,000 dogs in existence mostly around the Midwestern United States, in particular in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan. In 2010, the breed was ranked 143rd most popular breed in the United States, out of 167 breeds. This is a decrease since 2000, when the breed was ranked 125th. The dogs are not classified specifically as either retrievers or as spaniels and so may not compete in AKC field trials, but may compete in AKC hunt tests (spaniel and retriever tests) and retriever hunting tests sponsored by the AWSC, the breed club in the United States. The American Water Spaniel Field Association was set up in 1993 by breed enthusiasts supporting AKC Spaniel classification and looking to provide field training opportunities to owners of the breed. In a vote held of members of the AWSC in 1999, they chose to keep the breed unclassified.

Appearance
The limited popularity of the American Water Spaniel restricted development, resulting in the breed being relatively unchanged since its origins in the 19th century. They are a medium-sized dog, with a curly liver, brown, or chocolate colored coat. The average height at the withers for the breed is 15 - 18 in, and their weight around 25 - 45 lb. They have similar features to the Irish Water Spaniel, but the Irish breed is larger at between 21 - 24 in and weighing 55 - 65 lb. The coat of the American Water Spaniel can fall in two different patterns, either tightly curled or in the "marcel pattern" where the fur falls in waves. Working and show lines have not diverged as with some other breeds of spaniel, and both appear the same, with show dogs of this breed being rare.

The coat has a coarse outside layer which keeps water away and protects the dog from foliage such as briers. The inside layer provides insulation to keep the dog warm. The coat has an oily feel to it, which gives off a "doggy smell". The breed standard specifies color of the eyes should harmonize with the color of the coat, and should never be yellow. The skull is broad, and carries long, wide ears. The tail is not typically docked.

Temperament
In the field, the AWS is less exuberant than the English Springer Spaniel, but it is as skilled in retrieval as Labrador or Golden Retriever. It is versatile regardless of the type of terrain, and in the water it is not the fastest swimmer but has a high level of endurance. The breed is also good at agility and flyball, with the first of the breed receiving a flyball championship title in 1993.

Members of the breed enjoy being the center of attention, and can be quite vocal at times. It is a one family dog, and will often bond with one particular individual. For many years the breed was "pack bred", where they were allowed to live in a group. Since these times, breeders have been working to breed even tempered dogs that are suitable for both hunting and family life.

The AWS has a mind of its own at times and reaches peak performance with the owner who is dedicated to teaching the dog just what is expected of it. The breed takes well to training, and especially excels at training that offers some variety rather than routine training drills. However, members of the breed can may have issues with food possessiveness. They can be stubborn, and mentally are slow to mature from puppyhood. Some lines of the breed still retain dominant and aggressive temperaments; other than these lines, the AWS gets on well with children and enjoys playing with them. Even though they were originally bred to hunt, due to their size, they are suitable for apartment living as long as they receive enough exercise.

Health
Pack breeding early in its development led to a level of genetic variation, so the hereditary conditions of more popular breeds are not common in the AWS. The breed however is known to suffer from eye issues including cataracts and progressive retinal atrophy. Inheritance is suspected in both conditions, with the average age of cataract onset at under one year old.

Additional concerns are hypothyroidism, allergies, epilepsy, diabetes and glandular disorders which may cause baldness. The hair loss occurs at around six months of age, affecting the neck, thighs and tail; however the frequency has been reduced through work conducted by the breed clubs. Hip dysplasia is seen in around 8.3% of the breed, according to surveys conducted by the Orthopedic Foundation for Animals over a twenty five-year period between 1974 and 1999. This was one of the lower results of the sporting breeds, with Greyhounds coming lowest with 3.4%, and the related Boykin Spaniel coming in second highest at 47%. There was no evidence of elbow dysplasia found. The breed has an average life span of 10–13 years.

title: American Water Spaniel


text:
File:Ash-Trailer.jpg

Summary
Ash - Trailer album cover. Copyright 1994 Infectious Records. Image uploaded under fair use doctrine.

title: File:Ash-Trailer.jpg


text:
Trailer (album)

Trailer is a mini album by the band Ash featuring their first three singles. An expanded edition also includes four B-sides. The album was released in October 1994 through Infectious Records. The band considered it a "trailer" for their future debut album proper, and named it accordingly.

"Uncle Pat" was featured in a Heineken advert, which helped to raise the profile of the band, both in Ireland and Britain.

Background
Trailer was produced by Mark Waterman. Tim Russell mixed "Season", "Intense Thing", "Uncle Pat" and "Get Out".

Composition
Musically, the sound of Trailer has been tagged as groove rock, noise rock and pop-punk. AllMusic review Ralph Heibutzki suggested listeners should "imagine classic punk maneuvers crossed with Nirvana- and Dinosaur Jr.-style leanings, goosed by a bolt of Mega City Four". Author Dave Thompson wrote in his book Alternative Rock (2000): "A hint of Brit-pop savvy, a dash of older Indy-American fuzz, beaten and blended into something which cites The Buzzcocks as an influence, but can also sound like Black Sabbath." Dialogue was culled from Oscar Wilde and Patrick the Brewer for the recordings.

"Season", the opening track to Trailer, discusses the topics of love and suicide. Heibutzki said "Jack Names the Planets", alongside the bonus track "Punk Boy", "could give Green Day a run for its pop-punk roses". "Uncle Pat" details an exploration to a grave site via woods; Chris Molanphy, writing in CMJ New Music Monthly, remarked that the group "shows admirable restraint by pulling back the feedback at key points and letting the pretty notes ring out." Hot Press writer Liam Fay called "Petrol" an "unleaded geyser of melody, attitude and general weirdness". "Day of the Triffids" is named after the 1963 film of the same name, which Heibutzki felt "points to the band's love of all things extraterrestrial". Kayley Kravitz of Vanyaland said the chorus section, which includes elements of doo-wop, serves as a "stark contrast to a song that is otherwise about the annihilation of planet Earth by alien lifeforms."

The 'noise' at the end of the track "Get Out", when reversed, slowed down and the pitch altered, is a low quality demo version of the song "Intense Thing". This track wasn't discovered until June 2006 by 2 fans experimenting around with running different effects through Ash songs.

Release
Trailer was issued in October 1994, during the emergence of Britpop; Wheeler said they were instead labelled under new wave of new wave. One vinyl repressing of it was issued with a 7" containing BBC recordings of "Silver Surfer" and "Jazz 59". Around this, Marshall was attended a CMJ convention in New York City, looking for potential options for the band in the United States. Of the various labels, Marshall said Tim Carr, the A&R vice-president of Reprise Records, was enthusiastic about the group "from Day One," going as far to fly to the UK to watch the band perform thrice. By May 1995, Ash had signed to Reprise; the deal only covered North and South America, which differed from typical major label contracts with indie labels in the UK. It was intentional on Infectious Records' part, who wanted to boost their brand by licensing their artists to labels for particular markets. Prior to the US release of 1977, Trailer had sold 7,162 copies in that territory. "Jack Names the Planets" was released as a single there on August 15, 1995, to promote the soundtrack to the film Angus (1995). Trailer was released in the US on 12 September 1995. They re-recorded "Jack Names the Planets" again for their 2011 The Best of Ash compilation.

Reception
Several critics complimented the songwriting. Heibutzki praised Wheeler's "relentlessly catchy confections" for "stand[ing] up to the Britpop vanguard's finest hours", and mentioned that the band "emphasizes stripped-down velocity over finesse." Fay added to this, saying that it served as a "measure of these three guys’ confidence and musical acumen that they manage to transform such workaday ingredients into such a tasty and inspired brew." He said that the album "proves conclusively that, by any standards, Ash are a rock band of genuine stature", regardless of the members' ages. Imran Ahmed of The Guardian said it offers a valuable snapshot of a growing songwriting talent." Consumable Online write Tim Mohr added to this, saying said it "yielded a catch of sloppy punk-pop songs, loud, fast, and fun ... certifying that the album was made by real teenagers and that certain songs were written in 5 minutes." Joachim Hiller of Ox-Fanzine noted that they were "a bit punky, a bit noisy, but they can't hide the fact that they're just another boring band from the island."

Other reviewers commented on it in the context of Ash's influences. Scott Hefflon of Lollipop Magazine wrote: "Starting with a pleasant pop/punk formula similar to the Buzzcocks and adding a flavoring of Dino Jr-esque guitar noise, Ireland’s Ash are a band on the move." CMJ New Music Report Cherly Botchick wrote that despite the band's geographical origins, Trailer "couldn't be more steeped in delightfully familiar American rock traditions. She added that they created an album "packed with enough books and melodies to make" their US contemporaries "green with envy." Molanphy said "for all the (not unfounded) comparisons Ash has drawn to the Buzzcocks, its better numbers ... display a formidable talent for weaving hummable tunes and picaresque lyrics in the sonic assault." Fay felt that the references to other bands were a "little overly deferential" and said that the lyrics were "too often trite and predictable".

Track listing
Writing credits per booklet.

 * 1) "Season" (music and lyrics: Tim Wheeler) – 3:00
 * 2) "Jack Names the Planets" (music and lyrics: Wheeler) – 3:10
 * 3) "Intense Thing" (lyrics: Wheeler; music: Mark Hamilton, Rick McMurray, Wheeler) – 4:34
 * 4) "Uncle Pat" – (music and lyrics: Wheeler) – 3:12
 * 5) "Get Out" (lyrics: Hamilton; music: Wheeler) – 1:29
 * 6) "Petrol" - (lyrics: Wheeler; music: Hamilton, Wheeler) – 4:24
 * 7) "Obscure Thing" (Hamilton, McMurray, Wheeler) – 4:18

US and Japan bonus tracks
 * 1) "Hulk Hogan Bubblebath" (Hamilton, McMurray, Wheeler) – 5:05
 * 2) "Different Today" (Wheeler) – 2:50
 * 3) "Punk Boy" (Helen Love cover) – 2:05
 * 4) "Day of the Triffids" (Wheeler) – 3:33

Tracks 8–11 only appear on the US and Japan versions of the album. "Different Today" and "Hulk Hogan Bubblebath" appeared on the B-side of "Uncle Pat". "Day of the Triffids" originally appeared as a B-side of "Kung Fu" – (20 March 1995).

Singles

 * "Jack Names the Planets" was released in February, 1994 with "Don't Know".
 * "Petrol" was released 15 August 1994 with "The Little Pond" and "Things".
 * "Uncle Pat" was released 17 October 1994 with "Different Today" and "Hulk Hogan Bubblebath".

Personnel
Personnel per booklet.

Ash
 * Mark Hamilton – bass
 * Tim Wheeler – guitar, vocals
 * Rick McMurray – drums

Production and artwork
 * Oscar Wilde – dialogue
 * Patrick the Brewer – dialogue
 * Ade Britteon – sleeve art
 * Ash – sleeve art
 * Smike – photography
 * Mark Waterman – producer
 * Tim Russell – mixing (tracks 1 and 3–5)

title: Trailer (album)


text:
User:Suriel~enwiki

New Wikipedian, with one article to my credit thus far!

title: User:Suriel~enwiki


text:
Talk:CYK algorithm

I don't like the article
I don't like this article because it gives an example about categorizing NP(noun phrase) VP(verb phrase) and so forth, and this would be useful for someone who wanted to build a POS tagger. However, this article is not about POS taggers, it's about CYK, so examples should be given with that in mind. Just give a grammar, and a word, and have various states of the matrix P for the example. Not that complicated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.26.48.167 (talk) 12:56, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

 * The example given is for parsing sentences into NP, VP and so on, which is more than part-of-speech tagging. It may be more common to introduce CYK with artificial examples, but I don't see anything wrong with using an example from an application area. Computational linguistics is one of the areas where CYK is applied, and CYK is sometimes studied as part of a CL curriculum. But I've reconstructed the grammar from the example and added it to the article. It should now make more sense. -- UKoch (talk) 17:25, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

I think there is still much room for improvement
The fact that binary form (no RHS longer than 2) should be used, rather than CNF has been known for about 40 years. It was not published, because it was considered obvious, as the complexity results from the length of right-hand sides. It is also the only way to preserve conveniently the shape of parse trees. Beau Shiel had a nice paper about it at Coling 76. The empty word is a problem that cannot be escaped, if parse-trees are to be preserved, which is implied by the name parser (but sometimes not described with the algorithm). If no parse tree is kept, it is a recognizer.

The size of a grammar should be defined explicitly, or a reference given.Teetooan (talk) 20:32, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

The proper way to write for an encyclopedia is to give the modern and simpler description first. Then to give some historical details such as the use of CNF in the first versions. On the other hand, the CNF is easier to explain. It should be noted that it loses infinite ambiguity.

In 1974, Valiant used the Strassen algorithm (1969) to reduce the complexity, but the complexity of matrix multiplication was reduced since then, first by Coppersmith–Winograd (1990), then by Williams (2011). It should be better to discuss usability on the basis of Strassen's algorithm, which is the only one that has a chance of being meaningful. Teetooan (talk) 00:49, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

It might be nice to underscore that CYK is the only cubic algorithm that can run directly on the grammar (up to the binary transformation, that is both trivial an unescapable).Teetooan (talk) 13:09, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Parsing weighted context-free grammars is not specific of CYK and is available in a similar way to all general CF parsers. It is a special case of decorating the rules with values from a semi-ring.Teetooan (talk) 20:45, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Explain practical parse tree generation!
Original threadstarter did not title this thread. Also: linebreaks added to original threadstarter's post. --131.234.234.12 (talk) 11:56, 23 January 2009 (UTC) anyone please help is there any proper algorithm to show that how the string is enabled. Example: given a string,the algortithm could give how it comes from the start S, show how many ways it can be ,or even give the shortest way. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.7.20.106 (talk • contribs) 02:32, 21 July 2003
 * It sounds like you're asking about parse trees... the page mentions that the algorithm is easy to modify to find a parse tree (or several). This would show you how to construct the string from the rules. I *think* that with Chomsky normal form, all derivations are the same length, but I'm not really an expert...
 * —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.21.186.8 (talk • contribs) 18:40, 9 July 2004

Give examples!
Original threadstarter did not title this thread. --131.234.234.12 (talk) 11:59, 23 January 2009 (UTC) This page is great. However - it would incredible with a few examples to lead readers through the process. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.134.42.169 (talk • contribs) 13:01, 10 May 2007

Another article on CYK

 * Done. Ceroklis 10:01, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

What does C stand for in CYK?
So far, I have come across three different names for letter C: Which one is correct? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.133.45.42 (talk • contribs) 21:36, 21 June 2007
 * Cook
 * Cocke
 * Coke
 * Cocke, according to the Jurafsky and Martin book. Ealdent 15:26, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Mistake in the Algorithm?
I'm almost sure there is a mistake in the algorithm, but I'll write it here first just in case... The line: "Let the grammar contain r terminal and nonterminal symbols R1 ... Rr." should be: "Let the grammar contain r nonterminal symbols R1 ... Rr." There is no need to consider the terminals also. Sararkd (talk) 02:37, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Change algorithm indexing
Is there any objection to changing the algorithm indexing from 1-indexed to 0-indexed? This would make converting from pseudocode to real code much easier. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jhm718 (talk • contribs) 11:40, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Why "Carlos"
Is there any good reason for naming the input string Carlos? It seems silly and irrelevant to me. Sigurdmeldgaard (talk) 08:34, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Seems to be corrected - thanks Sigurdmeldgaard (talk) 19:08, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Citation from 2009?
Is that paper from 2009 really notable enough to warrant a citation in Wikipedia? It is used to make a fairly technical point. Since all other sources (besides Knuth, which is a reference work) are from the 60s, 70s, it makes the impression as if the latest paper would be the only continuation of the study of this algorithm, which is difficult to believe... that is, IMO it inflates the importance of the paper and the reference should be removed.
 * I support this removal Teetooan (talk) 00:56, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
 * While I understand your feelings about giving undue weight to that paper, I would suggest to add more references of recent date about the CYK algorithm. For instance, the CYK algorithm, as well as Valiant's improvement have been recently generalized from context-free grammars to the case of Boolean grammars. Removing content from the article would certainly be a step into the wrong direction, given the size of the article. If there are any recent papers that deserve to be included, please be bold and just go ahead. I am confident that the article will further expanded over time, given that the article's subject is covered in many textbooks and courses on automata theory. Hermel (talk) 21:29, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
 * While I understand your feelings about giving undue weight to that paper, I would suggest to add more references of recent date about the CYK algorithm. For instance, the CYK algorithm, as well as Valiant's improvement have been recently generalized from context-free grammars to the case of Boolean grammars. Removing content from the article would certainly be a step into the wrong direction, given the size of the article. If there are any recent papers that deserve to be included, please be bold and just go ahead. I am confident that the article will further expanded over time, given that the article's subject is covered in many textbooks and courses on automata theory. Hermel (talk) 21:29, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

There is no reason to add recent references on CYK if there was no significant change in know-how regarding this algorithm. The best would rather be an account of actual use, and of current role. Some references could be added from the nineties that give original results on the relationship between all the general CF parsers (and some non CF ones).Teetooan (talk) 07:57, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

In the previous comment, do you mean the Lange & Leiß paper? I just read that paper, without going deep into the math, and found it incredibly informative, since the main aim is pedagogical.
 * So are lots of other papers on the web. But it is no significant contribution Teetooan (talk) 00:56, 26 February 2014 (UTC))

The paragraph in this article summarizing this paper is weak, and would benefit from being written in more specific terms concerning the three operations (BIN, DEL, UNIT) necessary to transform to CNF, the effect of ordering these operations on size explosion (exponential if DEL precedes BIN), and that DEL and UNIT can be internalized into the CYK algorithm at no extra cost, leaving only a linear transformation on grammar size into 2NF form (BIN). This papers omits TERM because it offers no advantage for the CYK algorithm.

Why so concerned about importance? Clarity often comes at remove from original research and should be valued for its own sake. — MaxEnt 11:27, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, the previous comment was about the Lange & Leiß paper. Please, be bold and go ahead if you want to improve that section. Hermel (talk) 14:59, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

403 Access Forbidden
External Link to "CYK parsing demo in JavaScript" (http://homepages.uni-tuebingen.de/student/martin.lazarov/demos/cky.html) is broken.

A short search didn't result in any alternative location.

I haven't removed the link, since maybe it's a temporary problem (don't think so) and maybe someone else might come up with something. --84.109.241.65 (talk) 05:08, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Mistake in the Algorithm?
I think it should be

set P[i,1,j] = true

instead of

set P[i,i,j] = true

if the second index denotes the length of a span. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.138.47.91 (talk) 00:58, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

|G| in time complexity
I'm not aware of any literature that mentions |G|. Of course the actual time the algorithm takes depends on the "size" of the grammar (I assume |G| is supposed to be the number of productions), but in this kind of problem, I've only ever seen n mentioned. In particular, in the pseudocode given, the loop over all productions is unnecessary, or at least unnecessarily specific: One would implement that as a hash table lookup, which is much faster. -- My point: If nobody disagrees, I'll erase the |G| part. -- UKoch (talk) 22:14, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Most efficient parsing algorithm?
In the article, the CYK algorithm is called the most efficient parsing algorithm in terms of worst-case asymptotic complexity. Where does that come from? As discussed above, the time complexity is $$O(n^3)$$, and Hopcroft and Ullman mention Earley parsing, which has the same time complexity, and they write that there's an algorithm whose time complexity is $$O(n^{2.8})$$, and another one whose time complexity is $$O(n^3/\log n)$$. (Of course, they give sources for all of these.) I'll remove the "ost efficient" part if no-one objects. -- UKoch (talk) 17:38, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

 * I changed "the most efficient parsing algorithm" to "one of the most efficient parsing algorithms". -- UKoch (talk) 14:08, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Pseudocode Difficult to Read
Aside from the fact that one-letter variable names obfuscate meaning and are difficult to follow, having a lowercase letter L in a font where it looks nearly identical for the numeral for "one" (cf. l and 1) only compounds the issue. Antigravity711 (talk) 17:06, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

title: Talk:CYK algorithm


text:
Wei Jingsheng

Wei Jingsheng (born 20 May 1950) is a Chinese human rights activist and dissident. He is best known for his involvement in the Chinese democracy movement. He is most prominent for having authored the essay "The Fifth Modernization", which was posted on the Democracy Wall in Beijing in 1978. As punishment for writing his manifesto, Wei was arrested and convicted of "counter-revolutionary" activities, and he was detained as a political prisoner from 1979 to 1993. Briefly released in 1993, Wei continued to engage in his dissident activities by speaking to visiting journalists, and as punishment, he was imprisoned again from 1994 to 1997, making it a total of 18 years he has spent in various prisons. He was deported to the United States of America on 16 November 1997, on medical parole. Still a Chinese citizen, in 1998 Wei established the Wei Jingsheng Foundation in New York City (now based in Washington, D.C.) whose stated aim is to work to improve human rights and advocate democratisation in China.

Early years
Wei was the oldest of four children, brought up by Chinese Communist Party cadres. In 1966, Wei joined the Red Guards as a 16-year-old student during the Cultural Revolution. He lived in remote rural areas in Northern China and was able to speak with peasant farmers about the widespread famines that had occurred a few years before, during the Great Leap Forward. He uncovered the role that the communist government under Mao Zedong played in causing the famines, and it forced Wei to start questioning the nature of the system under which he lived. Wei would later write about this period: "I felt as if I had suddenly awakened from a long dream, but everyone around me was still plunged in darkness." In 1973, he began working as an electrician at the Beijing Zoo.

Democracy Wall
Wei did not publicly voice his feelings until 1978, when he decided to take part in the newly emerging Democracy Wall movement which was then taking place in Beijing. On 5 December 1978, he posted an essay which he authored on the wall. Entitled "The Fifth Modernization," Wei's essay was a response to paramount leader Deng Xiaoping's essay, the Four Modernizations. The basic theme of Wei's essay is that democracy should also be a modernization goal for China along with the other four modernizations which were proposed by Deng (industry, agriculture, science and technology, and national defense).

Wei signed the essay with his real name and address. The essay immediately caused a stir because of its boldness and because its author was not anonymous. It was also the only essay which addressed Deng Xiaoping by name, and it was also the only essay which referred to him as a dictator. "Of course, internal problems cannot be solved overnight but must be constantly addressed as part of a long-term process. Mistakes and shortcomings will be inevitable, but these are for us to worry about. This is infinitely better than facing abusive overlords against whom there is no redress. Those who worry that democracy will lead to anarchy and chaos are just like those who, following the overthrow of the Qing dynasty, worried that without an emperor the country would fall into chaos. Their decision was to patiently suffer oppression because they feared that without the weight of oppression, their spines might completely collapse! To such people, I would like to say, with all due respect: We want to be the masters of our own destiny. We need no gods or emperors and we don't believe in saviors of any kind...we do not want to serve as mere tools of dictators with personal ambitions for carrying out modernization. We want to modernize the lives of the people. Democracy, freedom, and happiness for all are our sole objectives."

Wei differed from the mainstream of the Democracy Wall movement (which believed that the primary conflict was between a bureaucratic class and the people) because unlike the majority of movement participants, he argued that a totalitarian political system was the source of the people's grievances. He was one of the few activists who explicitly argued against Marxism and the leadership of a Marxist party.

Arrest and imprisonment
Wei is also known for his editorial work in the short-lived magazine Explorations (探索) in 1979. He published a letter under his name in March 1979 in which he denounced the inhuman conditions which existed in Beijing's Qincheng Prison, where the 10th Panchen Lama was imprisoned.

His dissident writings eventually led him to be tried and imprisoned. Orville Schell, a writer and academic who specializes in China, wrote:

Wei ultimately spent a total of 18 years in different prisons in China. During this time, he wrote letters explaining his views which were compiled into a book, The Courage to Stand Alone: Letters from Prison and Other Writings. Some of the letters were directly addressed to Deng Xiaoping, other letters were addressed to different family members of Wei. He remained imprisoned until 14 September 1993, when he was released just one week before the International Olympic Committee held a vote over whether it should award the 2000 Summer Olympics to Beijing or Sydney. Wei continued to speak out, despite the threat of arrest.

On 27 February 1994, Wei met with United States Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights John Shattuck to discuss human rights conditions in China, and he also met with journalists. Wei was arrested the following week along with fifteen other democracy and labor activists. Although he was released shortly afterward and sent into exile in Tianjin, Wei was arrested once more on 1 April 1994 when he tried to return to Beijing. Charged with plotting against the state, he was sentenced to 14 years in prison, but he would only remain in prison until 16 November 1997, when he was released, ostensibly for medical reasons, and promptly deported to the United States. He was sent to the United States due to international pressure, especially the request by US President Bill Clinton.

COVID-19
In a September 2021 documentary titled What Really Happened in Wuhan by Australian journalist and author Sharri Markson, Wei claimed that he attempted to warn American authorities about COVID-19 in October 2019 after being informed of an outbreak by contacts in Beijing. He also claims that China was aware of the virus much sooner than they admitted and intentionally spread the virus during the World Military Games in Wuhan when they were held between 19 and 27 October 2019.

Recognition
In 1996, Wei Jingsheng was awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought. He is a winner of numerous other human rights and democracy awards, including the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award in 1996, the National Endowment for Democracy Award in 1997, the Olof Palme Memorial Prize in 1994, and the International Activist Award by the Gleitsman Foundation in 1993.

title: Wei Jingsheng


text: User talk:195.92.67.74

title: User talk:195.92.67.74


text:
Apache SpamAssassin

Apache SpamAssassin is a computer program used for e-mail spam filtering. It uses a variety of spam-detection techniques, including DNS and fuzzy checksum techniques, Bayesian filtering, external programs, blacklists and online databases. It is released under the Apache License 2.0 and is a part of the Apache Foundation since 2004.

The program can be integrated with the mail server to automatically filter all mail for a site. It can also be run by individual users on their own mailbox and integrates with several mail programs. Apache SpamAssassin is highly configurable; if used as a system-wide filter it can still be configured to support per-user preferences.

History
Apache SpamAssassin was created by Justin Mason, who had maintained a number of patches against an earlier program named filter.plx by Mark Jeftovic, which in turn was begun in August 1997. Mason rewrote all of Jeftovic's code from scratch and uploaded the resulting codebase to SourceForge on April 20, 2001.

In Summer 2004 the project became an Apache Software Foundation project and later officially renamed to Apache SpamAssassin.

Methods of usage
Apache SpamAssassin is a Perl-based application (Mail::SpamAssassin in CPAN) which is usually used to filter all incoming mail for one or several users. It can be run as a standalone application or as a subprogram of another application (such as a Milter, SA-Exim, Exiscan, MailScanner, MIMEDefang, Amavis) or as a client (spamc) that communicates with a daemon (spamd). The client/server or embedded mode of operation has performance benefits, but under certain circumstances may introduce additional security risks.

Typically either variant of the application is set up in a generic mail filter program, or it is called directly from a mail user agent that supports this, whenever new mail arrives. Mail filter programs such as procmail can be made to pipe all incoming mail through Apache SpamAssassin with an adjustment to a user's procmailrc file.

Operation
Apache SpamAssassin comes with a large set of rules which are applied to determine whether an email is spam or not. Most rules are based on regular expressions that are matched against the body or header fields of the message, but Apache SpamAssassin also employs a number of other spam-fighting techniques. The rules are called "tests" in the SpamAssassin documentation.

Each test has a score value that will be assigned to a message if it matches the test's criteria. The scores can be positive or negative, with positive values indicating "spam" and negative "ham" (non-spam messages). A message is matched against all tests and Apache SpamAssassin combines the results into a global score which is assigned to the message. The higher the score, the higher the probability that the message is spam.

Apache SpamAssassin has an internal (configurable) score threshold to classify a message as spam. Usually a message will only be considered as spam if it matches multiple criteria; matching just a single test will not usually be enough to reach the threshold.

If Apache SpamAssassin considers a message to be spam, it can be further rewritten. In the default configuration, the content of the mail is appended as a MIME attachment, with a brief excerpt in the message body, and a description of the tests which resulted in the mail being classified as spam. If the score is lower than the defined settings, by default the information about the tests passed and total score is still added to the email headers and can be used in post-processing for less severe actions, such as tagging the mail as suspicious.

Apache SpamAssassin allows for a per-user configuration of its behavior, even if installed as system-wide service; the configuration can be read from a file or a database. In their configuration users can specify individuals whose emails are never considered spam, or change the scores for certain rules. The user can also define a list of languages which they want to receive mail in, and Apache SpamAssassin then assigns a higher score to all mails that appear to be written in another language.

Apache SpamAssassin is based on heuristics (pattern recognition), and such software exhibits false positives and false negatives.

Network-based filtering methods
Apache SpamAssassin also supports:
 * DNS-based blacklists and DNS-based whitelists
 * Fuzzy-checksum-based spam detection filters such as the Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse, Vipul's Razor and the Cloudmark Authority plugins (commercial)
 * Hashcash email stamps based on proof-of-work
 * Sender Policy Framework and DomainKeys Identified Mail
 * URI blacklists such as SURBL or URIBL which track spam websites

More methods can be added reasonably easily by writing a Perl plug-in for Apache SpamAssassin.

Bayesian filtering
Apache SpamAssassin reinforces its rules through Bayesian filtering where a user or administrator "feeds" examples of good (ham) and bad (spam) into the filter in order to learn the difference between the two. For this purpose, Apache SpamAssassin provides the command-line tool sa-learn, which can be instructed to learn a single mail or an entire mailbox as either ham or spam.

Typically, the user will move unrecognized spam to a separate folder, and then run sa-learn on the folder of non-spam and on the folder of spam separately. Alternatively, if the mail user agent supports it, sa-learn can be called for individual emails. Regardless of the method used to perform the learning, SpamAssassin's Bayesian test will help score future e-mails based on this learning to improve the accuracy.

Licensing
Apache SpamAssassin is free/open source software, licensed under the Apache License 2.0. Versions prior to 3.0 are dual-licensed under the Artistic License and the GNU General Public License.

sa-compile
is a utility distributed with Apache SpamAssassin that compiles a SpamAssassin ruleset into a deterministic finite automaton that allows Apache SpamAssassin to use processor power more efficiently.

Testing
Apache SpamAssassin is designed to trigger on the GTUBE, a 68-byte string similar to the antivirus EICAR test file. If this string is inserted in an RFC 5322 formatted message and passed through the Apache SpamAssassin engine, Apache SpamAssassin will trigger with a weight of 1000.

title: Apache SpamAssassin


text:
Thomas Sheridan (actor)

Thomas Sheridan (1719 – 14 August 1788) was an Irish stage actor, an educator, and a major proponent of the elocution movement. He received his M.A. in 1743 from Trinity College in Dublin, and was the godson of Jonathan Swift. He also published a "respelled" dictionary of the English language (1780). He was married (1747) to Frances Chamberlaine. His sons were the better known Richard Brinsley Sheridan and Charles Francis Sheridan, while his daughters were also writers - Alicia, a playwright, and Betsy Sheridan a diarist. His work is very noticeable in the writings of Hugh Blair.

Life
Thomas Sheridan was the third son of Dr Thomas Sheridan, an Anglican divine, noted for his close friendship with Jonathan Swift, and his wife Elizabeth McFadden His parents' marriage was notoriously unhappy, and they lived apart much of the time. Thomas attended Westminster School in 1732–1733 but, because of his father's financial problems, he had to finish his initial education in Dublin. In 1739, he earned his BA from Trinity College, Dublin and he went on to earn his MA from Trinity in the early 1740s. He had his début in acting when he played the title role in Shakespeare's Richard III in Dublin. Soon after, he was noted as the most popular actor in Ireland, being compared often with David Garrick. Not only an actor, but he also wrote The Brave Irishman or Captain O'Blunder which premièred in 1738. He became the manager of the Dublin theatre sometime in the 1740s.

Sheridan left his acting career, although he continued to manage theatre companies and occasionally play bit parts, and moved permanently to England with his family in 1758. There, his time was spent as a teacher and an educator offering a very successful lecture course. In 1762 Sheridan published Lectures on Elocution. Following that work, he published A Plan of Education (1769), Lectures on the Art of Reading (1775), and A General Dictionary of the English Language (1780). Each of these works was based on some form of an argument taken in an earlier work ''British Education: Or, The source of the Disorders of Great Britain. Being an Essay towards proving, that the Immorality, Ignorance, and false Taste, which so generally prevail, are the natural and necessary Consequences of the present to defective System of Education. With an attempt to shew, that a revival of the Art of Speaking, and the Study of Our Own Language, might contribute, in a great measure, to the Cure of those Evils'' (1756).

He lived in London for a number of years before moving to Bath where he founded an academy for the regular instruction of Young Gentlemen in the art of reading and reciting and grammatical knowledge of the English tongue. This venture apparently proving to be unsuccessful, he returned to Dublin and the theatre in 1771. Thomas's son Richard became a partial owner of the Theatre Royal in London in 1776. Two years later Thomas was appointed manager of the theatre, a position he held until 1781.

Beliefs
Sheridan attempted to supply the willing student with a guide to public speaking that was correct, appropriate, and successful. What he actually wanted was a total reform of the British education system, as he saw it disregarding elocution and/or rhetorical delivery. In his work British Education, Sheridan claimed that poor preaching was negatively affecting religion itself.

Sheridan's belief in the valuable effects of strong and correct public speaking was so strong that he was sure studying elocution would help ensure perfection in all of the arts. In British Education, Sheridan writes that preaching from the pulpit "must either effectually support religion against all opposition, or be the principal means of its destruction".

Convinced that English preaching was not done as well as it should be, Sheridan focused on delivery as the principal avenue toward delivering effective messages to an audience: "Before you can persuade a man into any opinion, he must first be convinced that you believe it yourself. This he can never be, unless the tones of voice in which you speak come from the heart, accompanied by corresponding looks, and gestures, which naturally result from a man who speaks in earnest." Sheridan believed that elocution was not restricted to the voice, but embodied the entire person with facial expressions, gestures, posture, and movement.

A Course of Lectures on Elocution
Published in 1762, this work is considered by many to be Sheridan's most well-known. He established a niche for his insights through decrying the current state of public speaking, as he often did: "so low is the state of elocution amongst us, that a man who is master even of these rudiments of rhetoric, is comparatively considered, as one of excellent delivery". Besides establishing the points previously mentioned, the quote also offers a more narrow definition of rhetoric that seems to be influenced by Peter Ramus.

Central to Sheridan's work was his emphasis on the importance of tones to eloquence. These tones, which correlated with the expressive effects one can give to their speaking, were something Sheridan considered an important part of persuasion. He stated, "The tones expressive of sorrow, lamentation, mirth, joy, hatred, anger, love, &c. are the same in all nations, and consequently can excite emotions in us analogous to those passions, when accompanying words which we do not understand: nay the very tones themselves, independent of words, will produce the same effects". For Sheridan, how a message was communicated was apparently as important as the message itself. He uses the example of someone saying in a calm demeanour, "My rage is rouzed to a pitch of frenzy, I can not command it: Avoid me, be gone this moment, or I shall tear you to pieces" to show the importance of tones to a message.

Because of this, Sheridan set out to address what he thought John Locke had left out in his treatment of language: "(t)he nobler branch of language, which consists of the signs of internal emotions, was untouched by him as foreign to his purpose".

Selected plays

 * Captain O'Blunder

title: Thomas Sheridan (actor)


text:
Voyager program (Mars)

The Voyager Mars Program was a planned series of uncrewed NASA probes to the planet Mars. The missions were planned, as part of the Apollo Applications Program, between 1966 and 1968 and were scheduled for launch in 1974–75. The probes were conceived as precursors for a crewed Mars landing in the 1980s.

Originally, NASA had proposed a direct lander using a variant of the Apollo Command Module launched atop of a Saturn IB rocket with a Centaur upper stage. With the discovery by Mariner 4 in 1965 that Mars had only a tenuous atmosphere, the mission was changed to have both an orbiter and lander. This required the use of a Saturn V to launch two probes at once. The orbiter would have been a modified Mariner probe identical to that employed for Mariner 8 and Mariner 9, while the landers would have been Surveyor moon probes modified with the use of aeroshells and a combination parachute/retrorocket landing systems.

Funding for the program, like that of the entire AAP, was cut in 1968 and the mission itself was cancelled entirely in 1971, mainly on the grounds that launching both probes on a single rocket was both risky and expensive. Voyager was the first major space science project to be cancelled by the U.S. Congress.

Despite the cancellation, the planning and development of the Voyager Mars program was eventually carried out by NASA's Viking program in the mid-1970s. Cheaper and simpler than the Voyager Mars program (using the same Mariner 8/9 design for the orbiter, but with an automobile-sized lander with a very expensive microbiology lab), the Viking 1 and Viking 2 probes were launched to Mars on separate Titan IIIE/Centaur rockets in 1975 and reached Mars in 1976.

After the cancellation, the "Voyager" name was recycled for the Mariner 11 and Mariner 12 probes to the outer planets, with the latter probe, Voyager 2 (Mariner 12), completing another ambitious post-Apollo project, the "Grand Tour". The Saturn V had also been planned at one point as the launch vehicle for an upscaled probe for this mission.

title: Voyager program (Mars)


text:
Alaskan Malamute

The Alaskan Malamute is a large breed of dog that was originally bred for its strength and endurance, to haul heavy freight as a sled dog, and as a hound. It is similar to other arctic breeds such as the husky, the spitz, the Greenland Dog, Canadian Eskimo Dog, the Siberian Husky, and the Samoyed.

Lineage
Although it is believed that the first dogs arrived in the Americas 12,000 years ago, people and their dogs did not settle in the Arctic until the Paleo-Eskimo people 4,500 years ago, followed by the Thule people 1,000 years ago, with both originating from Siberia. Malamutes were thought to be bred by the Malimiut Inupiaq people of Alaska's Norton Sound region.

The Malamute has been identified as a basal breed that predates the emergence of the modern breeds in the 19th century. A study in 2013 showed that the Alaskan Malamute has a similar east Asian origin to, but is not clearly related to, the Greenland Dog and the Canadian Eskimo Dog, but contains a possible admixture of the Siberian Husky.

In 2015, a study using several genetic markers indicated that the Malamute, the Siberian Husky, and the Alaskan husky share a close genetic relationship between each other and were related to Chukotka sled-dogs from Siberia. They were separate from the two Inuit dogs, the Canadian Eskimo Dog and the Greenland Dog. In North America, the Malamute and the Siberian Husky both had maintained their Siberian lineage and had contributed significantly to the Alaskan husky, which showed evidence of crossing with European breeds that was consistent with this breed being created in post-colonial North America. DNA extracted from a 9,500-year-old dog, Zhokhov, named after the Siberian island, was found to have shared a common ancestor with the Greenland sledge dog, the Alaskan Malamute and the Siberian Husky.

Appearance

The American Kennel Club (AKC) breed standard describes a natural range of size, with a desired size of 23 in tall and 75 lb for females, 25 in tall and 85 lb for males. Heavier individuals (90 lb) and dogs smaller than 75 lb are commonly seen. There is often a marked size difference between males and females. Weights upwards of 100 lb are also seen.

The Alaskan Malamute is double-coated. The undercoat has an oily and woolly texture and can be as thick as two inches. The outer guard coat is coarse and stands off the body longer at the withers but not more than one inch off the sides of the body. Ears are small in proportion to the head and stand firmly erect when at attention. The Alaskan Malamute is a heavy dog, with a more formidable nature and structure than the Siberian Husky, which is bred for speed. The Alaskan Malamute is bred for power and endurance, which is its original function and what the standard of the breed requires of Alaskan Malamute breeders.

The usual colors are various shades of grey and white, sable and white, black and white, seal and white, red and white, or solid white. There are a wide range of markings in the breed including face markings, blazes, a splash at the nape of the neck, and a collar or half collar. White is often the predominant color on the body, parts of the legs, feet, and part of the markings of the face. In terms of color variants, some Malamutes exhibit a dark grey to buff-colored undertone around their trimmings and white areas, presenting with a color-linked gene known as Agouti. Two agouti alleles, with the possibility of a third, appear to be found in Malamutes: aw (Agouti Pattern or Wolf/Wild Pattern), at (Tan Point Pattern or Black Pattern), and awat (Heterozygous Agouti or Dark Agouti).

The eyes of the Alaskan Malamute are almond-shaped and are varied shades of brown; however, the darker eye is preferred. Purebred Alaskan Malamutes will not have blue eyes. The physical build of the Malamute is compact and strong with substance, bone and snowshoe feet.

According to the AKC breed standard, the Malamute's tail is well furred and is carried over the back like a waving plume. Corkscrew tails are occasionally seen but are faulted in the AKC breed standard (a corkscrew tail is commonly seen in the Akita). The Malamutes well-furred tails aid in keeping them warm when they curl up in the snow. They are often seen wrapping the tail around their nose and face, which presumably helps protect them against harsh weather such as blowing snow. Their ears are generally upright, wedge-shaped, small in proportion to the head and set to the side of the skull. The muzzle is deep and broad, tapering slightly from the skull to the nose. Nose and gums are black but some Malamutes have a snow nose, which is black with a pink undertone that can get darker or lighter, depending on the season.

Temperament
Alaskan Malamutes are still in use as sled dogs for personal travel, hauling freight, or helping move light objects; some, however, are used for the recreational pursuit of sledding, also known as mushing, as well as for skijoring, bikejoring, carting, and canicross. However, most Malamutes today are kept as family pets or as show or performance dogs in weight pulling, dog agility, or packing. Malamutes are generally slower in long-distance dog sled racing against smaller and faster breeds, so their working usefulness is limited to freighting or traveling over long distances at a far slower rate than required for racing. They can also help move heavy objects over shorter distances. An adult male Alaskan Malamute can pull around 500 - 1500 kg of weight, depending on build and training.

Malamutes, like other Northern and sled dog breeds, can have a high prey drive, due to their origins and breeding. This may mean that in some cases they will chase smaller animals, including other canines, as well as rabbits, squirrels, and cats. While Malamutes are, as a general rule, particularly amicable around people and can be taught to tolerate smaller pets, it is necessary to be mindful of them around smaller animals and small children.

Malamutes are very fond of people, a trait that makes them particularly sought-after family dogs, but unreliable watchdogs as they do not tend to bark. Malamutes are nimble around furniture and smaller items, making them ideal house dogs, provided they get plenty of time outdoors meeting their considerable exercise requirements. Alaskan Malamutes also often participate in animal therapy programs, like visiting patients in hospitals, due to their soft nature.

In general like many other breeds, these dogs are strong pack animals. They need to have a pack leader.

Malamutes are usually quiet dogs, seldom barking. When a Malamute does vocalize, it often appears to be "talking" by vocalizing a "woo woo" sound. A similar-looking Spitz dog, the Siberian Husky, is much more vocal.

Health

A 2024 study in the UK found an average life expectancy of 11.3 years compared to an average of 12.7 for purebreeds and 12 for crossbreeds.

The most commonly reported health problems of Alaskan Malamutes, in the 2004 UK Kennel Club survey (based on a sample size of 64 dogs) were musculoskeletal (hip dysplasia), and hereditary cataracts. There are additional health issues in the breed, the origins of which are unknown, including seizure disorders, found in young puppies as well as adults, epilepsy, congenital heart problems, kidney problems and skin disorders.

Other health issues in Malamutes include elbow dysplasia, inherited polyneuropathy, osteochondrodysplasia, cerebellar hypoplasia, heart defects, and eye problems (particularly cataract and progressive retinal atrophy). A growing problem among arctic dog breeds, including the Alaskan Malamute, is canine diabetes, with onset occurring typically in middle age (5 to 7 years).

Another health issue with Malamutes is zinc deficiency. This breed cannot easily absorb zinc, and infections, skin, and coat problems can arise.

Thyroid disorders are the most common hormonal issue in dogs, and hypothyroidism is common in Malamutes.

History
The Alaskan Malamute had a prominent role with their human companions as a utilitarian dog, working, hunting, and living alongside humans. The dogs were renowned for their excellent hunting abilities and were used to hunt large predators such as bears. They also aided their owners in finding seals by alerting them to seal blowholes. The interdependent relationship between the Malamute and their dogs fostered prosperity among both and enabled them to flourish in the inhospitable land above the Arctic Circle.

For a brief period during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1896, the Malamute and other sled dogs became extremely valuable to recently landed prospectors and settlers and were frequently crossbred with imported breeds.

The Malamute dog has had a distinguished history; aiding Rear Admiral Richard Byrd to the South Pole, and the miners who came to Alaska during the Gold Rush of 1896, as well as serving in World War II primarily as search and rescue dogs in Greenland, although also used as freighting and packing dogs in Europe. This dog was never destined to be a racing sled dog; it was used for heavy freighting, pulling hundreds, perhaps thousands of pounds of supplies to villages and camps in groups of at least four dogs for heavy loads.

The University of Washington's Husky mascot is an Alaskan Malamute. In 2010, the Alaskan Malamute was named the official state dog of Alaska. Lathrop High School in Fairbanks, Alaska uses a Malamute as its official mascot.

title: Alaskan Malamute


text:
Kosova (disambiguation)

Kosova is the Albanian name of Kosovo, a partially recognised state in Southeastern Europe.

Kosova may also refer to:

Places

 * Kosova, Maglaj, a village in the Maglaj Municipality, Bosnia and Herzegovina
 * Kosova, Foča, a village in the Foča Municipality, Bosnia and Herzegovina
 * Kosova, Estonia, a village in Põlva Parish, Põlva County, Estonia
 * Kosova, Belarus, a town in the Ivatsevichy District, Brest Region, Belarus

Other uses

 * Kosova Airlines, an airline
 * Kosova Press, a news agency
 * Kosova, a ship of the Ottoman Navy
 * Kosova (1932 newspaper), an Albanian newspaper of 1932–1933
 * Republic of Kosova (1991–1999), an unrecognized secessionist state before the Kosovo War

title: Kosova (disambiguation)


text:
Home directory

A home directory is a file system directory on a multi-user operating system containing files for a given user of the system. The specifics of the home directory (such as its name and location) are defined by the operating system involved; for example, Linux / BSD (FHS) systems use  or   and Windows systems since Windows Vista use.

Description
A user's home directory is intended to contain that user's files; including text documents, music, pictures, videos, etc. It may also include their configuration files of preferred settings for any software they have used there and might have tailored to their liking: web browser bookmarks, favorite desktop wallpaper and themes, stored passwords to any external services accessed via a given software, etc. The user can install executable software in this directory, but it will only be available to users with permission to execute files in this directory. The home directory can be organized further with the use of sub-directories.

The content of a user's home directory is protected by file-system permissions, and by default is accessible to all authenticated users and administrators. Any other user that has been granted administrator privileges has authority to access any protected location on the file system including other users' home directories.

Benefits
Separating user data from system-wide data avoids redundancy (the same system files can be used by between different users) and makes backups of files that are important for a specific user simpler.

Furthermore, Trojan horses, viruses, and worms running under the user's name and with their privileges will in most cases only be able to alter the files in the user's home directory, and perhaps some files belonging to workgroups the user is a part of, but not actual system files, reducing the chances of harming the functioning of the operating system.

Subdirectories
The file /etc/xdg/user-dirs.defaults on many Linux systems defines the subdirectories created for users by default. Creation is normally done with the first login by Xdg-user-dirs, a tool to help manage "well known" user directories like desktop, downloads, documents, pictures, videos, or music. The tool is also capable of localization (i.e. translation) of the folders' names.

Unix
In Unix, the working directory is automatically set to a user's home directory when they log in. In many built-in commands, typing the ~ (tilde) character is equivalent to specifying the current user's home directory.

The Unix superuser has access to all directories on the file system, and hence can access home directories of all users. The superuser's home directory on older systems was /, but on many newer systems it is located at /root (Linux, BSD), or /var/root (Mac OS X).

VMS
In the OpenVMS operating system, a user's home directory is called the root directory, and the equivalent of a Unix/DOS/Windows/AmigaOS root directory is referred to as the Master File Directory.

Single-user operating systems
Single-user operating systems simply have a single directory or partition for all user files, there is no individual directory setup per user (though users can still setup and maintain directories inside this main working directory manually).
 * AmigaOS versions 2 and up have "System" and "Work" partitions on hard disks by default.
 * BeOS (and its successors) have a /home directory which contains the files belonging to the single user of the system.
 * Versions of Windows prior Windows 95 OEM Service Release 2 did not have a user folder but, since that release, C:\My Documents became in-effect the single user's home directory.
 * NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP in a single-user, non-networked setup, /me is used, as well as /root when logged in as superuser.

title: Home directory


text:
Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star

Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star is the eighth studio album by American experimental rock band Sonic Youth, released on May 10, 1994, by DGC Records. It was produced by Butch Vig and recorded at Sear Sound studio in New York City, the same studio where the band's 1987 album Sister was recorded. Unlike its predecessor Dirty, Experimental Jet Set features a more low-key approach and references the band's earlier work on the independent record label SST Records. The album contains quieter and more relaxed songs that deal with personal and political topics.

Upon release, Experimental Jet Set reached No. 34 on the US Billboard Top 200 chart and No. 10 on the UK Albums Chart. It was the band's highest peak on the US charts until their 2009 album The Eternal reached No. 18. The song "Bull in the Heather" was released as a single and as a music video featuring Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill. The album received generally favorable reviews from music critics, who highlighted the band's ability to create both noise and melody. However, some felt that the album's anti-commercial style was difficult to appreciate.

Background and recording
Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star is the follow-up to Sonic Youth's 1992 album Dirty, which was released by DGC in the wake of Nirvana's breakthrough into the mainstream. Dirty became one of the band's most commercially successful albums, selling around 500,000 copies worldwide as of May 1994. The album also reached No. 83 on the US Billboard Top 200 chart and No. 6 on the UK Albums Chart. After Dirty, Sonic Youth decided to step away from major-label alternative rock acts, which singer and guitarist Thurston Moore thought the media associated the band with. Touring with indie rock bands like Pavement, Sebadoh, and Royal Trux inspired Sonic Youth to write a quieter and more subtle album.

Like its predecessor, Experimental Jet Set was produced by the band and alternative rock veteran Butch Vig. According to the band, "The idea this time was to cut as much of it live as we could, and not labor over polishing and overdubbing in the usual big-rock manner." Similarly, guitarist Lee Ranaldo explained that the band wanted to achieve a more lo-fi approach: "None of [Experimental Jet set's] music was labored, some of it was done in people's bedrooms, even. [... We wanted] to write the songs and record them simply and basically." Additionally, the band ordered Vig to refrain from his desire to apply a buzz remover to several tracks. The album was engineered by John Siket and recorded at Sear Sound studio in New York City, the same studio where the band's 1987 album Sister was recorded. The band claimed that the album was recorded over the master tapes of Sister to save costs, and it is possible to hear some parts of Sister during quiet sections of the final recording. The album was recorded on a two-inch 16-track analog tape recorder through antiquated equipment.

Music and lyrics
Unlike Dirty, which features a loud and "dense blast of noise", Experimental Jet Set was considered warmer and more relaxed. Singer and bassist Kim Gordon described the sound of the album as "art-core" and Bradley Bambarger of Billboard noted that the album references the band's earlier work on the independent record label SST Records, stating that it features "a sparse, bracingly dichotomous work of 'quiet noise' that, with its wayward tonalities and laconic grooves, speaks to the future while thinking of the past." In fact, the song "Screaming Skull" is about the band's nostalgia for their days on SST Records, which is mentioned frequently throughout the song. It also references fellow bands Hüsker Dü and The Lemonheads. The song was inspired by a conversation Moore had with film director Dave Markey about the SST Superstore, a shop located on Sunset Strip which supplies SST records and skateboard-related products.

Most of the lyrics on Experimental Jet Set deal with political and personal topics. Gordon explained that the song "Bull in the Heather" is about "using passiveness as a form of rebellion—like, I'm not going to participate in your male-dominated culture, so I'm just going to be passive." Similarly, the song "Androgynous Mind" addresses traditional gender roles, while "Self-Obsessed and Sexxee" is an observation on an anonymous riot grrrl. Moore explained that the latter is not about Courtney Love of Hole or Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill; it is about "being attracted to somebody who's obviously out of control with self-obsession in the high-profile alternative-rock world." The track "Quest for the Cup" deals with a person who desires more than it is needed. The opening track, "Winner's Blues", alludes to the pressure of fame and has been described as an acoustic and sad lullaby. The song was originally intended to be an outtake designated for the compilation DGC Rarities Vol. 1, but the band ultimately decided to include it in the album at the last minute during the mixing sessions. Another outtake, "Compilation Blues", was instead included on the compilation.

Experimental Jet Set was also the first Sonic Youth album to feature a hidden track on the CD release; just over a minute after the closing track "Sweet Shine" finishes, there is 1:30 of "bonus noise" featuring a looped speech of a Japanese gas attendant. Unlike on previous Sonic Youth albums, Ranaldo did not write or sing any songs because he did not like how his compositions were treated and assembled for Dirty and its predecessor Goo. David Browne, author of Goodbye 20th Century: A Biography of Sonic Youth, remarked that "a sense of ambivalence and impermanence hung over [Experimental Jet Set], even down to the cover", which "for the first time since Sonic Youth in 1982, featured their faces instead of a piece of art."

Promotion and release
To promote the album, the song "Bull in the Heather" was released as a single in April 1994. The single features an outtake, "Razor Blade", which was recorded at the same sessions as "Winner's Blues" and "Compilation Blues", and an alternate version of "Doctor's Orders" as B-sides. The song reached No. 13 on the US Modern Rock Tracks and No. 24 on the UK Singles Chart. The track "Self-Obsessed and Sexxee" was intended to be the second single from the album. A promo CD was issued, but plans for a regular release were eventually canceled. The remaining copies were sold off through the Sonic Death fan club magazine. The CD includes the same B-sides as "Bull in the Heather". A music video featuring Kathleen Hanna was made for "Bull in the Heather" under the direction of Tamra Davis.

Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star was released on May 10, 1994, by DGC, which also released the band's previous two albums. The album peaked at No. 34 on the US Billboard Top 200 chart and No. 10 on the UK Albums Chart. It was the band's highest position on the US charts until their 2009 album The Eternal reached No. 18. The album also charted in several other countries, including Australia, New Zealand, The Netherlands and Sweden. The band did not support the album with a tour due to Gordon's advanced pregnancy at the time. As of 2005, the album had sold 246,000 copies in the US according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Critical reception
Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star received generally favorable reviews from music critics. Barbara O'Dair of Rolling Stone felt that the album was "quietly confident; more ambitious and weirder than Dirty". However, she remarked that the band "saved their integrity at the expense of quality; with a little more grease, their grit might get across better." Lorraine Ali, writing for the Los Angeles Times, praised Gordon's dynamic singing and the guitar playing for giving the album a sleepy and dreamy mood, concluding that Sonic Youth "transcends the confining roles of pretentious art-rock band or palatable alternative group, and instead offers a penetrating album that's all its own." Billboard also praised the album, saying that it offered both noise and melody that "cohabitate exceedingly well".

In a mixed review, AllMusic reviewer Jason Birchmeier criticized Experimental Jet Set for its stripped-down sound, saying that the album only contains "odd lyrics and unique guitar nuance." Similarly, Evelyn McDonnell of Entertainment Weekly noted that the songs "never quite emerge from the sketch stage" and that newcomers may find it difficult to appreciate. In contrast, Alternative Press highlighted the album's anti-commercial aesthetic, claiming that "It doesn't get much cooler than this". The Advocate criticized the album and the band for not taking risks, concluding: "Sonic Youth is stuck repeating the same experience. And this time around, the songs don't stick." Mike Rubin, writing for Spin, described Experimental Jet Set as a "low-key, mellow affair", but highlighted the guitar playing and the audio feedback on some songs.

In a positive review for The Village Voice, Robert Christgau highlighted the band's ability to create unexpected noises, which he described as "marks of flesh-and-blood creatures thinking and feeling things neither you nor they have ever thought or felt before. If they can't quite put those things into words, that's what unexpected noises are for." Unlike previous Sonic Youth albums, Experimental Jet Set was not ranked in the Top 40 of The Village Voice's Pazz & Jop critics' poll for 1994, but Christgau placed it at No. 3 in his own "Dean's List". In a retrospective review for About.com, 90s rock expert Melissa Bobbitt wrote: "Though it might not be as universally celebrated as 1988's Daydream Nation or Dirty, this record represented the triumphant rise of the Alternative Nation and its progressive nature." In 2014, Guitar World placed Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star at No. 44 in their "Superunknown: 50 Iconic Albums That Defined 1994" list.

Personnel
Credits are adapted from the album's liner notes.

Sonic Youth
 * Thurston Moore - vocals, guitar
 * Kim Gordon - vocals, bass
 * Lee Ranaldo - guitar
 * Steve Shelley - drums, percussion

Design
 * Kevin Reagan – sleeve design
 * Catherine Lewis – sleeve photography
 * Stefano Giovannini – sleeve photography

Technical
 * Butch Vig – recording, mixing, production
 * John Siket – engineering
 * Howie Weinberg – mastering
 * Bil Emmons – technician
 * Devin Emke – technician
 * Ed Raso – technician
 * Fred Kevorkian – technician
 * Ollie Cotton – technician
 * Walter Sear – technician

Charts
Album

Singles

title: Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star


text:
Psychic Hearts

Psychic Hearts is the debut solo studio album by former Sonic Youth member Thurston Moore, released in 1995 through Geffen Records. The album was remastered and reissued in 2006. The two-record vinyl version of the reissue contains bonus tracks on the fourth album side where on the original vinyl release the fourth side had a drawing by cover artist Rita Ackermann etched directly into the vinyl.

Critical reception
The New York Times called Psychic Hearts "an album of arty pop songs in which the vocals stand out more than the guitars." The Guardian noted that "'Feathers' resembles both the Replacements and New Order."

When Psychic Hearts was re-released in 2006, it was praised by critic Brandon Stosuy of Pitchfork.

Track listing
All songs written by Thurston Moore.
 * 1) "Queen Bee and Her Pals" – 2:57
 * 2) "Ono Soul" – 3:28
 * 3) "Psychic Hearts" – 3:59
 * 4) "Pretty Bad" – 3:58
 * 5) "Patti Smith Math Scratch" – 2:43
 * 6) "Blues from Beyond the Grave" – 4:35
 * 7) "See-Through Playmate" – 2:18
 * 8) "Hang Out" – 4:10
 * 9) "Feathers" – 2:20
 * 10) "Tranquilizer" – 2:06
 * 11) "Staring Statues" – 2:34
 * 12) "Cindy (Rotten Tanx)" – 3:46
 * 13) "Cherry's Blues" – 2:05
 * 14) "Female Cop" – 5:24
 * 15) "Elegy for All the Dead Rock Stars" – 19:49

2006 reissue bonus vinyl tracks

 * 1) "Teenage Buddhist Daydream" – 2:36
 * 2) "Just Tell Her That I Really Like Her" – 3:02
 * 3) "The Church Should Be for the Outcast, Not a Church That Casts People Out" – 6:47
 * 4) "Thoodblirsty Thesbians" – 6:09
 * 5) "Superchrist" – 3:10

Personnel

 * Thurston Moore – vocals, guitar, bass, composer, producer

 * Additional musicians
 * Tim Foljahn – guitar
 * Steve Shelley – drums

 * Technical personnel
 * Rita Ackermann – cover art
 * Edward Douglas – engineer, mixing
 * Frank Olinsky – art direction
 * Lee Ranaldo – engineer, mixing
 * John Siket – engineer, mixing
 * Howie Weinberg – mastering

title: Psychic Hearts


text: File:ThurstonMoore-PsychicHearts.jpg

title: File:ThurstonMoore-PsychicHearts.jpg


text: File:Big Black - The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape cover.jpg


text:
The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape

The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape is an album by American punk rock band Big Black. It was released in 1987 by Touch and Go Records. The album is a CD compilation of Big Black's Atomizer album (minus the song "Strange Things"), "Heartbeat" single and Headache EP. Atomizer is pictured on the cover artwork as an eight-track tape playing in a Panasonic TNT portable player.

The title of the album, and the liner notes by Steve Albini, show the band's low regard for compact discs, drawing parallels between CD and the 8-track tape of 1970s, preferring to release all of their material on vinyl LP records.

Track listing
All songs written by Big Black, except where noted.

 * 1) "Jordan, Minnesota" - 3:20
 * 2) "Passing Complexion" - 3:04
 * 3) "Big Money" - 2:29
 * 4) "Kerosene" - 6:05
 * 5) "Bad Houses" - 3:09
 * 6) "Fists of Love" - 4:21
 * 7) "Stinking Drunk" - 3:27
 * 8) "Bazooka Joe" - 4:43
 * 9) "Cables (live)" - 3:09
 * 10) "Heartbeat" (Colin Newman) - 3:48
 * 11) "Things to Do Today" - 1:44
 * 12) "I Can't Believe" - 1:03
 * 13) "My Disco" - 2:52
 * 14) "Grinder" - 2:23
 * 15) "Ready Men" - 3:51
 * 16) "Pete, King of the Detectives" - 2:42

"Heartbeat" is a cover of the Wire song.

title: The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape


text: File:FooFighters-FooFighters.jpg

title: File:FooFighters-FooFighters.jpg