Jan 30
An AV-8B Harrier jet sits on the flight deck of amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island, somewhere on the South China Sea on January 26th 2015. Waiting, and ready.
Jan 30
Before we start, we know that crime is wrong and that theft is a serious issue. That said, the lengths some people will go to steal a few DVDs is pretty entertaining. Thieves at a Walmart-owned ASDA supermarket in Cheshire, England managed to evade s…
Jan 30
It’s been a few months since ASUS revealed its vision for a small PC box in the VivoMini, but now it is starting to turn that vision into reality, albeit in a less impressive and slightly disappointing way. The VivoMini PC that is now for sale on Newegg does indeed bear a 4th generation Intel Haswell chip, but only of … Continue reading
Jan 30
Perhaps there is no greater cliche when it comes to mixing music and exercise than having Eye of the Tiger blaring out while you do your training. While you’ve always been able to do that in a myriad of ways and combinations, RunKeeper is now giving you the lazy way (which is ironic, since you’re supposed to be not-lazy for … Continue reading
Jan 30
Samsung wants to have the lion’s share of every smartphone market from the top to the bottom and to do that it has plenty of offerings. Samsung smartphones run the gamut from high-end devices like the Galaxy S series to low end devices. One of Samsung’s lines that hadn’t been updated in a long time is the XCover range. The … Continue reading
Jan 30
8 Things You Didn't Know About The Super Bowl, Even If You Watch Every Year
Posted in: Today's ChiliAlthough you watch it every year, what do you really know about the Super Bowl?
This Sunday, the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks are facing off in Super Bowl XLIX. The Super Bowl has a long history of memorable moments, and, with Marshawn Lynch’s Skittles and the Patriots (maybe) deflated balls alone, even more memorable moments are certainly bound to happen this weekend.
But before everything goes down this time around, here are eight things you can learn about the game and share at your viewing party … even if your favorite part is actually the commercials.
1. Someone has snuck into over 30 Super Bowls including the very first championship.
Dion Rich has gate-crashed many, many big events including the Oscars and Olympics, but he has snuck into the Super Bowl the most. In a 1993 Los Angeles Times profile, Rich explained his motives, “It was my hobby. The guys at home expected me to be on the tube or in the papers every year. I couldn’t let them down. I made it on TV or in some publication in 21 of the first 22 Super Bowls.” In the photo above, you can see rich even hoisting Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry after they won Super Bowl XII.
Unfortunately, security knows his face these days, checkpoints have increased since 2001, and Rich is no longer able to crash the Super Bowl. According to NY Daily News, his last successful attempt was the New Orleans Super Bowl XXXVI in 2002. Even in the ’90s, Rich told the Los Angeles Times:
After so many years it gets to be a real job. People see me on the sidelines all the time and think it’s easy. It’s not easy, it takes a lot of conniving and ingenuity and contacts. Every year they made it tougher … It just wasn’t that much fun anymore.
Image: Confessions of the World’s Greatest Gate-Crasher
2. The first person to say, “I’m going to Disney World!” really didn’t want to do it at first.
USA Today’s For The Win caught up with former Giants quarterback Phil Simms in 2014 to talk about how this first Disney plug came together. Perhaps surprisingly, Simms didn’t have much interest in being a part of the campaign: “I didn’t want to do it,” he said. “I just thought that was wrong trying to do something like that.”
Simms was named MVP of Super Bowl XXI in 1987 and he remembered just being happy about winning the game when the cameras caught him to do the commercial. “Of course I’m smiling because we won, and the other reason is because I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Simms told For The Win.
For his role in the commercial, Simms was paid $50,000 and Disney did in fact send his family to Disney World.
In 2008, SF Gate profiled Mark Allan, the camera person who typically rushes on to the field to get the line from the Super Bowl winner, including the first one with Simms. Apparently the person in the commercial has to repeat the line a few times and says both Disney Land and World so the commercial can be targeted to each coast. While trying to capture the players, Simms basically just keeps saying, “Look in the lens.”
3. Joe Montana once calmed his team down before a Super Bowl-winning drive by pointing to the stands and joking, “Isn’t that John Candy?”
It was the 1989 Super Bowl and Joe Montana’s San Francisco 49ers were trailing the Cincinnati Bengals with time running out. According to legend, the 49ers offense were understandably nervous as they had to trek down almost the entire field to score. As Rolling Stone recounted, Montana apparently knew the right words to say to his team to calm their nerves. In a huddle, Montana began pointing to the crowd, saying, “There, in the stands, standing near the exit ramp … Isn’t that John Candy?”
It hasn’t been confirmed whether John Candy was truly in the stands during that game, but, in any case, Montana led the offense 92 yards down the field to score a winning touchdown with just 34 seconds left on the clock.
4. Both “Little Giants” and “Space Jam” were created out of successful Super Bowl commercials.
Ad people Jim Ferguson and Bob Shallcross created a McDonald’s advertisement for the 1992 Super Bowl about pee wee football that ended up catching legendary director Steven Spielberg’s attention. In a 1994 Baltimore Sun article, it was said that Ferguson came into the office one day and was simply told to give Spielberg a call. Ferguson thought it was a practical joke at first, but ended up getting Spielberg on the line. Spielberg apparently said, “I want that commercial made into a movie. I want my ‘Home Alone.'”
In 1994, Ferguson also told the Chicago Tribune, “Ninety seconds and Steven Spielberg changed our lives,” referring to himself and his partner Shallcross. Both of them ended up working with Spielberg to develop “Little Giants.”
The Nike and MCI commercial “Hare Jordan” was another Super Bowl commercial that led to a movie. At the end of “Hare Jordan,” Bugs Bunny tells Michael Jordan, “This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship!” This obviously ended up being the case as the two were together again for the movie “Space Jam.”
Image Right: WikiCommons
5. During the first Super Bowl, NBC accidentally missed the taping of a kickoff and so the whole play was reset for the cameras.
During Super Bowl I, in 1967, both NBC and CBS had television rights to the game since NBC had a deal with the AFL and CBS the NFL. The game was between the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs and would have to be partially reset at one point due to a screw up by NBC.
As Rolling Stone recounted, the problem happened when the game was coming back from half time and NBC was still televising an interview with comedian Bob Hope. NBC failed to switch to the game fast enough so it was decided that the kickoff Green Bay had just completed would be entirely redone.
Green Bay would end up winning the game and as mentioned before, Dion Rich’s gate crashing ways enabled him to see it all go down.
6. A star player missed the Super Bowl due to a cocaine binge the night before.
The previously mentioned 1989 Super Bowl, in which Joe Montana apparently spotted John Candy in the crowd, had another notable aspect to it. Montana might not have even gotten the chance to make a comeback though if the Cincinnati Bengals offense had had all their players to begin with.
Stanley Wilson was a running back for the Bengals who had already had two strikes from the league for drug use. He had made it through this preceding season without a problem, getting tested multiple times a week. This self control unfortunately only lasted until the night before the Super Bowl as Wilson succumbed to what Rolling Stone described as a “crack-cocaine binge.”
A Cincinnati Enquirer article from 1999 looked into the night surrounding Wilson’s decision and detailed how it almost didn’t even happen. Wilson,on his way to a team meeting with other players, stopped and said, “I forgot my playbook. I’ll meet you guys downstairs.” Wilson headed back to the room and didn’t return.
As this was Wilson’s third strike, he was given a lifetime ban from playing in the NFL.
7. The Baltimore Ravens ended up winning the Super Bowl after referring to the game as “Festivus” the whole season instead.
Festivus might be for the rest of us, but, in 2001, the “Seinfeld”-created holiday was especially for the Baltimore Ravens.
As the book Festivus: The Holiday for the Rest of Us details, the superstitious head coach of the Ravens, Brian Billick, forbade his team from referencing the Super Bowl and playoffs throughout that season. Since logistically this became a problem, offensive lineman Edwin Multialo proposed calling the big game “Festivus Maximus” instead. The term stuck and then the Ravens went on to win “Festivus Maximus” in what was probably one of the biggest celebrations of the holiday yet.
Later in 2001, The Baltimore Sun even referred to the event as “Festivus Ravenous!”
8. The referees that officiate the Super Bowl also get rings.
These referee rings aren’t quite the same as the rings that players get, but they’re certainly still a point of pride. Mike Pereira of Fox Sports explained in a 2014 article:
The Super Bowl ring. The officials get Super Bowl rings just like the players do. They aren’t as big as the players’ rings, but they are still valuable pieces of jewelry. These rings mean the world to the officials and they wear them with such pride.
The American Profile also wrote about Super Bowl referees in 2012 and had retired NFL referee Jim Tunney show them his three Super Bowl rings. Referee Gerald Austin was quoted in that article as saying these refs aren’t given much advance notice they’ll be officiating the Super Bowl. “They called me about 11 days before the Super Bowl XXIV,” said Austin.
BONUS: According to legend, the Super Bowl got its name from the “Super Ball” toy.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame has had a super ball (shown in the photo above) on display to commemorate Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt’s apparent coining of the game name after his children’s toy. According to Henry D. Fetter of The Atlantic, when Fetter was asked how he originally came up with the name, he said, “My own feeling is that it probably registered in my head because my daughter Sharron and my son Lamar Jr. had a children’s toy called a Super Ball and I probably interchanged the phonetics of “bowl” and “ball.”
But Fetter doesn’t believe that Hunt actually came up with the name. Going by Hunt’s account, by the time he said “Super Bowl,” the term was already starting to take off in newspapers to refer to the previously unnamed championship game. Fetter believes that there is no clear person to point to as the origin and instead the name was sort of collectively decided.
For what it’s worth, according to the Chiefs media page, Hunt is also credited with coming up using Roman numerals in the name and putting Coach Vince Lombardi’s name on the trophy.
Image: Flickr user Matt McGee
All images Getty unless otherwise noted.
Jan 30
Advertising executives have recently realized something that those of us in the LGBT community have long known: That recognizing our families is meaningful. And it doesn’t just mean something to us; the overture affects our friends and family and, even more importantly, helps those who don’t understand us to recognize themselves in our lives.
Many have seen the new Tiffany’s ad that features a gay couple. Before Tiffany’s, there was Cheerios. And before Cheerios, there was Chevrolet, Honey Maid and Coca-Cola. Many, if not all, of these ads feature (gasp!) gay or lesbian couples living lives exactly the same as straight couples. It is as if there were regular magazine pieces titled “Gays — They’re Just Like You!”
Although the Tiffany’s ad received significant publicity (and social media buzz), there was another quieter but, in my opinion, more significant ad that was released last week in Illinois. The ad — sponsored by Get Covered Illinois — tells the story of Jake and Allen who got married in Illinois last year, shortly after the state began recognizing same-sex marriage. As a married couple, they signed up for health insurance as a family. After they signed up, Jake got appendicitis. Watch their story here:
Why does this matter? To my knowledge, Illinois is the first marketplace to develop and run paid TV ads that feature and target members of the LGBT community. The implication is awesome: state officials were not only seeking to recognize same-sex couples, but they also wanted to celebrate them. What this ad tells us–loud and clear–is that LGBT families should be part of the mainstream discourse, and a recognized part of Illinois’ community. It was less than one year ago that the state of Illinois asserted the equality of same-sex marriages in their state with a legislative vote. Now, they are including our stories in their advertising campaign about one of the most important and highly-visible public policy issues in the state and nation.
Beyond the symbolism, the substance and topic of the ad are also critical. Our community remains far more likely to be without health insurance. Last year, one in four of our low and middle income LGBT family and friends were uninsured. This is far higher than the number of uninsured non-LGBT people, and continues to be one of the reasons that health is an equality issue.
It is on us to address our community’s health and wellness. With the passage of the Affordable Care Act, many institutional barriers and challenges have been eased or removed. Financial help is available to those who need it; discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity is banned, and preexisting medical conditions like depression, diabetes or HIV/AIDS do not prohibit coverage. And, perhaps most helpful for many, Obamacare recognizes our relationships. Jake and Allen would have had the same experience in any state, not just Illinois. Any couple who gets married in any state that recognizes same-sex marriage is eligible to receive financial help and enroll in family coverage through www.HealthCare.gov. This is true, even if you live in a state that doesn’t yet recognize same-sex marriage, like Alabama or Texas.
Answers for why our community is plagued with lower rates of coverage are many, and many have merit. But, regardless — each of us can help address this in our communities and in our friends’ lives simply by talking about the realities of health, wellness and health care. If you have insurance, tell your friends to get it, too. Take the one click to share Jake and Allen’s story with those you love and visit HealthCare.gov to learn what plans and subsidies you could receive.
Although Tiffany’s diamonds are pretty, health insurance can save a friend’s life.
Jan 30
Hey, listen, it’s cool. When it comes to the Super Bowl, you don’t have to pretend to be interested in the game itself anymore. Admit it, you settle in for the commercials, and when the game comes back on, that’s when you take your bathroom break.
That’s become a standard response for viewing the Super Bowl: “I just watch for the commercials.” And networks and advertisers know this, of course, which is why the cost to advertisers is around $4.5 million per 30 second spot.
Still, we don’t have to foot any of those bills, and if your team’s not in it, why not just sit back and enjoy some of the year’s best advertising efforts? And over the years, there have been some incredibly memorable ads, from the epic Orwellian Apple short to the Budweiser frogs to Betty White getting clobbered in a pickup football game.
To prepare for another year of (hopefully) memorable commercials, here’s a primer of the 50 best Super Bowl commercials of all time:
Jan 30
Mothers around the world want the best for their children. These hopes and dreams include wanting their kids to be healthy, educated, loved, respected and to also have productive and prosperous lives. However, for an alarming number of black mothers, these wishes won’t be realized. Even worse, some of these mothers will join a club that none of them want to become a member, which is: “Mothers with a son in prison.”
For example, Dr. Ivy Hylton of the Hearts Strings Project in the D.C. Metropolitan area taught her son about values, the importance of a quality education, and the necessity to have good character. Dr. Ivy’s love, shelter and guidance still weren’t enough to prevent her son from being convicted of murder. Some individuals blame mothers — like Dr. Ivy — for the increasing number of black men who follow the school-to-prison pipeline. Unfortunately, this rush to blame mothers for failing to properly raise their sons distorts the reasons that so many black men go to prison, which is primarily due to an individual’s choice(s).
Mothers can only do so much to instill values, character and decision-making skills in their children. After a certain point, each individual must make appropriate choices to avoid negative actions, behaviors, situations, environments and consequences.
According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU): “Zero-tolerance” policies criminalize minor infractions of school rules, while cops in school lead to students being criminalized for behavior that should be handled inside the school. Students of color are especially vulnerable to push-out trends and the discriminatory application of discipline.” Moreover, the ACLU advises that: “Many of these children have learning disabilities or histories of poverty, abuse or neglect, and would benefit from additional educational and counseling services. Instead, they are isolated, punished and pushed out.”
Based on the data from the ACLU’s infographic about the school-to-prison pipeline, it’s estimated that black students are about 16 percent of public school enrollments, but account for approximately 42 percent of multiple suspensions and 31 percent of school arrests. Furthermore, black students are suspended and expelled three times more than white students.
This type of punishment imbalance occurs too often for black people in the U.S., specifically black males, who are sometimes considered aggressive, difficult, or worse perceptions before there’s an opportunity to learn anything about them. Many times, these judgments are based on physical appearances related to their skin color, clothing, walking style, speech pattern or other superficial considerations. Furthermore, black men can be described as “thugs” due to stylistic expressions instead of thoughtful considerations or deliberations about a black man’s character, accomplishments, social status, income or future potential.
Imagine being negatively profiled just for walking the street, entering a store, being in a certain location or wearing certain clothes. Might these collective experiences during an individual’s or related individuals’ lifetime effect the manner in which someone views themselves or their actions and behaviors? The answer unfortunately is a resounding “yes.” Therefore, how can years of social conditioning based on these factors be reduced or eliminated?
Changes won’t occur in societies until black men are no longer considered to be a threat due to outward appearances. Furthermore, wherever there’s a history of civil, criminal or economic disparate treatment, there must be remedies and controls to provide independent oversight in an expeditious manner to prevent further injustices. Otherwise, baseless judgments related to a black man’s actions, behaviors, value and potential will continue to be diminished without any justifiable reasons, actionable changes, along with shortsighted perceptions.
Black mothers can raise their sons with all the best care, attention and love; however, black men must make appropriate choices to minimize the potential to be involved in the judicial system for things that are within their control.
Notwithstanding, black mothers must have ongoing conversations with their sons to: educate about the dangers of the streets, the power of choice and the necessity to be responsible and accountable for their actions and behaviors — while oftentimes being evaluated using a standard that many other racial groups never have to endure. Consequently, black mothers can do everything within their power to raise strong, independent, thoughtful and productive black men; however, these mothers cannot live their son’s lives or make choices for them while confronted with societal injustices and difficult decisions.
There aren’t any justifiable reasons that the alarming school-to-prison pipeline trends should continue. These systemic issues don’t just take a village to address; it takes a nation and a world to resolve any ongoing and preventable injustices. Part of the solution to resolve these challenges begins with reversing the upward trend of disproportionate criminal remedies assigned to black men and toward solutions that are targeted to support issue resolution, statistically equitable punishment assignment, character building, skill development and investments to transform the overwhelming burdens of living in economically depressed communities.
It’s time to invest in more community-based programs and organizations that move beyond traditional models of education and social services to innovative approaches, which can be better aligned to meet the challenges that face these communities. These solutions are a starting point, but there also must be a downward trend away from severely and inequitably punishing black men for actions and behaviors that in other racial groups would be addressed with solutions outside of the legal system.
American jails are filled disproportionately with black males. The significant incarceration rates for black males in the U.S. according the ACLU’s 2011 data should make many people ask tough questions about the reasons for these troubling numbers, such as: Is it the communities that these men live in that can be attributed to the increasing number of black men in prison?; is it the disproportionate harsh punishments given to black men compared to other racial groups?; are there too many societal prejudices that prevent black men from having equal opportunities to achieve success?
There aren’t easy answers to these questions, but as a society let’s collectively delve into these long unresolved issues to create better solutions and outcomes for black men, their mothers, and society.
Additional information on Dr. Ivy Hylton’s work can be obtained at:
www.serenityhealingarts.com
This post originally appeared on S. L. Young’s blog on his website at: www.slyoung.com
Jan 30
Since it was launched in 2009, NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler Space Telescope has identified more than 1,000 exoplanets and almost 4,200 exoplanet “candidates.” It’s even found entire solar systems–but never one like the system it just identified some 117 light-years from Earth.
The newfound solar system consists of five rocky, Earth-sized planets circling a star called Kepler-444, which–at 11.2 million years of age–is more than twice as old as the Sun.
Astronomers say the Kepler-444 system may help scientists pinpoint when Earth-like planets first started forming, and may have important implications for the possibility of alien life.
“There are far-reaching implications for this discovery,” Dr. Tiago Campante, a research fellow at the University of Birmingham and one of the astronomers who helped discover the new system, said in a written statement. “We now know that Earth-sized planets have formed throughout most of the Universe’s 13.8-billion-year history, which could provide scope for the existence of ancient life in the Galaxy.”
(Story continues below image.)
Artist’s conception of Kepler-444, which hosts five Earth-sized planets in compact orbits. The planets were detected from the dimming that occurs when they transit in front of their parent star, as shown here.
Campante and his colleagues detected the ancient star system system by looking at data collected by Kepler over a four-year period. They used a technique called asteroseismology, in which small changes in a star’s brightness indicate its mass, age, and diameter. They detected the five planets using what’s called transit photometry, which involves observing a star dim slightly when planets cross its face (see an animation here).
The five planets are in tight orbits around Kepler-444, which means they’re too close to fall within the so-called “Goldilocks zone,” the region of space around a star that is warm enough but not too warm for a planet to have liquid water and, possibly, life.
Though Kepler-444 can’t support life, Campante says it’s possible there are other ancient solar systems out there that might.
“Other similarly old planets could indeed harbor life,” he said in an email to The Huffington Post. “Think about a technologically advanced civilization that has a few billion years head start relative to us!”
Other scientists, who were not involved in the new research, have their doubts.
“It is not clear that planets much older than the Earth have a higher expectation of having life than the more recently formed planets,” William Borucki, a space scientist at the NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif told HuffPost in an email. “The discovery of Kepler-444 is important, but whether it implies advanced life or no life will remain a mystery until our technology advances to the point that we can get a definitive answer.”
Regardless of whether the discovery makes alien life more or less likely, Dr. Seth Shostak, senior astronomer and director of the Center for SETI Research in Mountain View, Calif., hopes the discovery will help E.T. hunters home in on where to look.
“The implication of this is that worlds of all ages are out there, and the average planet is going to be billions of years older than our own,” he told HuffPost in an email. “Complex, thinking beings required 4 billion years of evolution on Earth. If clever creatures always take a long time to appear, then older planets might be preferred hunting grounds for signals that could tell us someone’s out there.”
A paper describing the discovery has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal.
Check out the podcast below for an interview with William Borucki, and learn more about the amazing story behind NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler mission.
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