Hasta La Gadget!

There’s a promise we make to the next generation: Graduate from college and you can get ahead. Indeed, recent studies show that college graduates earn $1 million more than high school graduates over their lifetimes.

Yet, as we make this promise, public higher education institutions nationwide are facing a troubling trend of disinvestment. Even with poorly treated adjuncts and other nontenure-track contingent faculty doing the lion’s share of teaching at many colleges, tuition costs keep rising. Even with current federal and state student loans and grants, students have been saddled with crippling debt.

And then there’s another side of higher education. For-profit colleges are defined by putting profit before the public good, earnings over education, shareholders above students. At these schools–such as Corinthian Colleges Inc., which filed for bankruptcy this month, and ITT Tech, which is being investigated by the Securities and Exchange Commission for alleged fraud–students are products, faculty are afraid to tell accreditors the truth about where they work, and taxpayers foot the bill for aggressive marketing that preys on first-generation college students, veterans and students of color.

Funded largely by taxpayers, for-profit colleges get close to 90 percent of their funding from federal aid–that’s more than $30 billion annually. The industry feeds off our noble national goal to ensure higher education is a ladder of opportunity for all who want to climb. However, instead of offering an affordable path to a better tomorrow, they leave students with an uncertain future. Seventy-two percent of these for-profit schools produce graduates who earn less, on average, than high school dropouts.

Currently, for-profit schools enroll just 9 percent of all postsecondary students but account for nearly half of all student loan defaults. They allocate about 23 percent of their revenue to recruiting and marketing and just 17 percent to academic instruction. Compare that with institutions where academics are the priority, such as community colleges, which spend 80 percent or more on instruction.

How did we get to this place where promises are broken, students are held back and for-profits are using our money to fund their schemes?

The simple answer is that the for-profit college industry, through its trade association, the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities, and other lobbyists, has enormous sway in Washington. It’s used massive public relations campaigns and campaign contributions to keep politicians on both sides of the aisle from policing its institutions.

Still, we are fighting back. In Congress, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) led the charge with a groundbreaking investigation in 2012. Right now, Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) is pushing the Protections and Regulations for Our Students (PRO Students) Act, which aims to protect students from the deceptive and fraudulent practices of for-profit colleges. And as the nation’s largest union of higher education faculty and staff, the American Federation of Teachers has joined with courageous students and community organizations to demand justice.

Unfortunately, the U.S. Department of Education has been sitting on the sidelines. For instance, even though Corinthian Colleges faces a $30 million fine for falsified job placement rates and “blatant disregard” for the federal student loan program, the federal government has done little to help the 16,000 students left high and dry. In fact, the corporation is asking for a taxpayer bailout of its $143.1 million in debts.

This month, we sent a letter to Education Secretary Arne Duncan demanding that he use his authority to discharge the loans of Corinthian’s students and advocate for stricter regulations to prevent others from engaging in this abuse. And this week, 12 state attorneys general joined the call for “meaningful debt relief to all students who were the victims of Corinthian’s fraud,” and told the Department of Education to remove other for-profits under investigation from its list of students’ transfer options.

Students like Michael Adorno-Miranda, whom I met this month. Michael enrolled at Corinthian’s Everest College, where admissions personnel told him he would be prepared for a successful career in information technology. But instead of the high-quality education he was promised, he received worthless training in obsolete technology and $37,000 in debt. What he thought would launch him toward life as an independent adult “turned out to be a nightmare.”

We can’t be a country that tells Michael and millions like him that college is important but then allows predatory institutions to stick them with crippling debt, worthless degrees and an uncertain future. Students deserve better, and now is the time to act.

Join us and call Secretary Duncan at 855-534-2400. Tell him to cancel the Corinthian students’ debt because the promise of a better future through higher education is one that we intend to keep.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

This is Part 1: Broadband Scandal

For details see: “The Book of Broken Promises; $400 Billion Broadband Scandal & Free the Net”

(Map: Historical Atlases and Maps of U.S. and States)

One of my friends suggested that Verizon was buying AOL just to shut me up, so I couldn’t expose the phone and cable companies’ questionable business practices and bad acts any more on Huffington Post. It is owned by AOL after all. I seriously doubt this is Verizon’s main motivation. According to Verizon:

“AOL is a leader in the digital content and advertising platforms space, and the combination of Verizon and AOL creates a scaled, mobile-first platform offering directly targeted at what eMarketer estimates is a nearly $600 billion global advertising industry.”

Should this merger even be considered? Hell no!

While there are those who care about editorial issues and what will happen to Huff Po, Techcrunch and Endgadget if Verizon takes over, as a telecom analyst, I have different concerns.

Why Should the Merger be Blocked? Three Reasons

First, Verizon has a monopoly over the phone networks and thus controls critical infrastructure of most of America’s East Coast, from Massachusetts to Virginia, (with the exception of most of Connecticut, formerly SNET). And this control isn’t simply the phone and broadband (including DSL), networks, but also the ‘secret’ ‘special access’ networks that are used to handle wireless services, as almost all wireless, ‘hot’ spots or WiFi traffic ends up using a wire.

Note: Verizon originally controlled Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont as well, but sold off the state utilities because it didn’t want to bother with rural areas. It has also been selling off the GTE territories it obtained during the merger that created “Verizon”; most recently the telecom properties in Florida and California.)

Second, allowing the company to continue to grow larger in areas like advertising and digital content diverts attention and resources away from properly upgrading and maintaining the wired networks that people, cities and businesses depend on.

Case in point; Verizon has failed to properly upgrade and maintain the majority of the states’ critical infrastructure, especially in rural areas, and there are major gaps in every city — even though the company got paid billions per state in rate increases and tax perks for the work.

Third, Verizon only allows their own Internet, (ISP), cable, and broadband service over the wire coming into your home or office and can block or harm competitors. Commonly known as ‘vertical integration’, Verizon also can and does fund the company’s other services by charging local phone customers or having them pay additional expenses, commonly known as ‘cross-subsidization’. (And this even includes expenses like the fiber optic wires to the cell towers.) Adding new lines of business that get advantages over all other competitors is therefore a given.

Bottom Line: Divestiture. If Verizon wants to go into the content and advertising business, great. Let them divest all of the wires that customers paid to have upgraded – i.e., all of the wires to homes and businesses, including FiOS, as well as the special access wires, the wires to the cell towers, and all enterprise-business wires.

I’ll be addressing why we need to divest the companies’ control, subsidiary cross-subsidies and content from the wires in future articles (assuming… well you know).

Addressing Verizon’s Broadband Scandal

NOTE: This is not about history, but current and future affairs, though some background would be useful.

It’s 1991 and one of the Clinton-Gore presidential ticket’s main objectives is what then-Senator Al Gore dubbed the “Information Superhighway”, which was a plan to have America’s state utilities replace the existing copper wires with a fiber optic wire to make America the first, fully fiber optic nation by 2010.

From 1991-1995, Verizon, (which was created out of the companies, NYNEX, Bell Atlantic and GTE), had teams of lobbyists, etc. barnstorm the FCC, Congress, and the states’ legislatures and state commissions, claiming that they would bring America a fabulous fiber optic future. And note that now-AT&T and CenturyLink worked with what is now Verizon and ran identical campaigns and lobbying throughout America.

First, the companies had to get the approval of the FCC and filed ‘video dialtone’ applications to be able to offer video and cable services over the phone lines, which wasn’t allowable at the time. They even took the FCC to court to get permission to do this. In 1994, the FCC released its first video competition report which detailed that the Verizon’s territories would have at least 4.5 million homes wired with fiber optics and capable of cable TV and video by 2000. (Excerpt from “Annual Assessment of the Status of Competition in the Market for the Delivery of Video Programming FIRST REPORT”, September 28, 1994 CS Docket No. 94-48)

“GTE has requested permanent authorizations to serve 90,000 homes in Virginia, 476,000 homes in Florida, 122,000 homes in California and 296,000 homes in Hawaii. Bell Atlantic has requested permanent authorizations to serve 1.2 million homes in the Washington DC metropolitan area and 2 million in the Baltimore-New Jersey-Philadelphia-Pittsburgh area. NYNEX has requested permanent authorizations to serve 63,000 homes in portions of Rhode Island and 334,000 homes in portions of Massachusetts.”

Note: The FCC’s 16th video competition report was released in April 2015.

These video dialtone deployments dovetailed with the changes in state regulation.

Next, though the flavor of ‘commitments’ varied by state, Verizon went state to state and submitted almost identical plans to do upgrades in each state.

The Book of Broken Promises detail’s one state’s complete broadband history, through 2015. New Jersey was supposed to be the first fully, totally fiber-ized state. In 1991, Verizon went to the state legislature, claiming that if the company was granted ‘deregulation’ and was allowed to raise rates and get tax perks, Verizon would use this extra cash for construction. By 2010, 100% of Verizon NJ should have had the copper wire replaced with a fiber optic wire. And this was not only to homes and businesses, but schools and libraries.

And speed? Verizon New Jersey’s 1993 Opportunity New Jersey state law contains this definition of broadband — 45 Mbps in both directions, which was the standard speed in America for broadband.

And the hype lasted for years. This Bell Atlantic press release from 1996 details that Bell Atlantic (now-Verizon) would have 12 million ‘homes and small businesses’ wired with fiber-optic upgrades by 2000, starting in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.

“Bell Atlantic plans to begin its network upgrade in Philadelphia and southeastern Pennsylvania later this year. The company plans to expand this Full Service Network deployment to other key markets over the next three years. Ultimately, Bell Atlantic expects to serve most of the 12 million homes and small businesses across the mid-Atlantic region with switched broadband networks.”

Instead, while profits doubled, Verizon pulled a bait-and-switch, and rolled out DSL over the old, existing copper wires. By 2004, there were no fiber optic wires to homes; not in New Jersey or anywhere on the East Coast.

Around 2005-2006, the company started to deploy FiOS, a fiber optic service, (and applied for local cable franchises, not to mention lobbied for and received state-wide franchises in some of the states they offer phone service. But, by 2012 Verizon announced they would be stopping FiOS deployments, leaving most of their territories incomplete, at best. (In New Jersey, there were still some lingering commitments.)

And, as I said, this is not about history. In 2014, Verizon NJ and the NJ Board of Public Utilities (BPU) cut a ‘stipulation agreement’ to erase the state law and commitments, allowing Verizon to replace the original commitment with expensive wireless at the speed of only DSL, not the higher 45 Mbps. The NJ Rate Counsel, the state advocate’s office, appealed the decision, and as of May 2015, it is still in court.

Unfortunately, this is a model of what happened in every Verizon state along the East Coast and throughout America in the states controlled by what are now AT&T and Centurylink.

Cross Subsidies and Shutting Off the Copper Utility Networks

But it gets worse. Notice that in the opening quote, Verizon is talking about ‘wireless’. Verizon now plans to ‘shut off the copper networks’ claiming that they are ‘uneconomical’ and force customers onto more expensive wireless.

In New York we tracked how Verizon NY has been engaged in a massive financial shell game to move the monies that were supposed to be dedicated to the wireline networks to pay for the deployment of their wireless networks. Moreover, regular phone customers in New York, including seniors and low income families, were hit with 84% rate increases since 2006 to fund a ‘massive deployment of fiber optics’ and losses; the losses being created in a large part, by this shell game, which also includes the dumping of corporate expenses into the state utility accounting and giving the subsidiaries of Verizon financial advantages.

For example, in 2011, Verizon NY claimed that it spent over $1 billion on network construction. The NY State Attorney General’s Office found that this was “misleading” as the budgets had been shifted, diverted to fund the wireless business and FiOS, which is a cable TV service.

“Verizon New York’s claim of making over a ‘billion dollars’ in 2011 capital investments to its landline network is misleading. In fact, roughly three-quarters of the money was invested in providing transport facilities to serve wireless cell sites and its FiOS offering. Wireless carriers, including Verizon’s affiliate Verizon Wireless, directly compete with landline telephone service and the company’s FiOS is primarily a video and Internet broadband offering…Therefore, only a fraction of the company’s capital program is dedicated to supporting and upgrading its landline telephone service.”

Considering Verizon has announced it is no longer doing FiOS build outs, where’s all the money going, exactly?

The Cup Half-Empty & Swiss Cheese Broadband Deployments

Based on Census and FCC data, Verizon covers about 34 million housing units and businesses. According to Verizon’s Annual Report for 2014, the company claims it has 15 million customers capable of FiOS TV, or only 44% coverage, and 19.8 million, total, of any available FiOS product, or 58% of their territory.

However, based on the holes in deployments reported in New York City and other locations, while an area may be listed as completed, this doesn’t mean the service is ‘available’.

Take this caveat, which is a footnote to Verizon Pennsylvania’s calculations of its broadband coverage. Verizon PA is required to have 100% of their territory completed by the end of 2015, and the company claims it has 96% completed. (I’ll get back to this.) But, they are simply making it up as Verizon put in this caveat, that ‘deployed’ has nothing to do with a customer being able to get the service.

Let’s Take a Ride Down the Coast and Highlight a Few States’ Broadband Scandal

• Massachusetts — By 2000, Verizon was to have 330,000 fiber optic lines completed. After the law was changed in 1995, while the company claimed it would immediately start work, it just pulled a bait-and-switch and rolled out DSL in 1998. The company eventually started to build out FiOS TV, but Verizon appears to have only 30% of the state upgraded.
• In 2014, Verizon MA claims that “At year’s end, FiOS services were available to more than 1 million Massachusetts homes and businesses.”
• Using Census data, Verizon MA covers 2.8 million housing units and 600,000 businesses; 3.4 million total locations – i.e.; only 30% has been upgraded.

• New York — In 1993, the NYNEX Annual Report claimed it would have 1.5-2 million fiber optic lines installed by 1996, (about 1.1-1.6 million in NY State). Never happened.
• In 2006, Verizon NY went back to the state commission and received multiple rate increases, 84%, on basic phone service for ‘massive deployment of fiber optics’– i.e.; construction money supposedly for FiOS.
• Verizon has a separate franchise agreement to have 100% of New York City’s housing units wired by July 2014. Estimates are that Verizon has 80% of NYC completed and has stopped; and there is no requirement to do commercial buildings.
• Verizon will also be leaving 80% of all municipalities in NY State with some or no upgrades, yet 100% of phone customers paid for upgrades with the increases, which comes to over500 a line

.

• New Jersey — By 2010, 100% of the State should have been completed with a fiber optic network capable of at least 45 Mbps in both directions. Verizon collected an estimated15 billion by 2013 for these build outs.
• In 2012, the law was still on the books and two small towns, Greenwich and Stow Creek, complained and were upgraded, in part based on the original law.
• In 2014, the NJ BPU cut a deal with Verizon to erase the laws and it is currently in court, as the state advocate’s office appealed the state’s decision.
• About 50% of the Verizon NJ is still not upgraded, even though 100% of the state phone customers have been and continue to pay the built-in rate increases.
• In 2001, Verizon submitted its Annual Infrastructure Report and claimed it had 55% completed with fiber optic upgrades, capable of 45 Mbps in both directions to residential customers–They lied. FiOS wasn’t deployed until 2006-2007.

• Pennsylvania — By 2015, 100% of the Keystone State is supposed to have been upgraded to fiber optics, just like New Jersey — same, exact plan and the laws were changed in 1994.
• By 2002, nothing had been built and the state Public Utility Commission questioned Verizon, as every filing and every document claimed it would be offering 45 Mbps in both directions. However, the fine print of the original law stated Verizon was only required to have 1.5 M bps speeds.
• The law was changed in 2004 to institutionalize the 1.5 Mbps speed, but the commitment was still for completion by 2015.
• NEWS: In PA, Verizon was able to get the state to erase the commitment to do a wired solution and is now allowed to use their expensive wireless service as a substitute.
• Verizon claims to have 96% completed; truth is Verizon has less than 50% wired and completed.

• Maryland — According to the “Modernization of the Maryland Telecommunications Infrastructure: A Summary of Plans to Upgrade the Local Networks”, the plan, like all of the other states, was for fiber-to-the-home to be completed by 2010, and all copper wiring between the network points (known as ‘interoffice’, would have all of the copper replaced with fiber by 1994.

Note: I write articles for my Huffington Post blog and other media outlets, which included Harvard Nieman Watchdog until its closing in 2012. I am not on staff or work for Huffington Post but appreciate having the ability to write unfettered by corporate-oversight. And when the work has been questioned — by Verizon, in fact, as long as I can prove the accuracy of what I said, they didn’t interfere.

In fact, I’ve challenged Verizon now twice to a debate— but since I use their own data, statements and financials, and other primary sources, etc. they have always declined.

Part 2: Upgrade the Networks? Care about Local Phone Customers? Nah. Verizon’s 331 Investments in 150 Countries.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

If NASA is going to put humans on Mars and other distant worlds, it’s going to need a place for explorers to stay — and it wants your help building those extraterrestrial homes. The agency has launched the 3D Printed Habitat Challenge, a competition…

You are browsing normally and out of no where a window pops up and you go “what the…? …Why would I need to take a test to prove I am smart, I already know I am Awesome!! Click the close button”. And that’s how a Pop up just wasted 7 seconds of your beautiful Life.

No one is a fan of a Pop up ad, even browsers recommend to block pop ups from websites.  They are annoying and waste time, although sometimes you do get an attractive offer, but in most cases they are just plain annoying.

If you are tired of them, then it is time to block them in your particular browser. All browsers come with the ability to block pop ups, you just need to make sure it is enabled.  In this tutorial, we are going to address all Major browsers, you can just see instructions for your particular browser.

Note: Blocking Pop-ups in your browser doesn’t 100% guarantee that no pop-ups will ever be able to show again. There is a chance some of the sneaky ones may still pass and pop-up.

Quick access links

• Chrome
• Firefox
• Internet Explorer
• Safari
• Opera
  

Block Pop Ups in Google Chrome

Click on the Menu located at the top right corner of the screen, and from the menu click on “Settings”.

In “Settings”, click on “Show advanced settings…” by scrolling down.

Now click on “Content settings” located under the heading “Privacy”.

In there, scroll down until you see the option “Pop ups”, just select options below it to allow or block pop ups.

You can also click on “Manage exceptions…” to add individual websites and manage pop up behavior for these sites.

Block Pop Ups in Firefox

Click on Menu located at the top right corner of the screen, and from there click on “Options”.

In “Options”, click on “Content” panel and in there you can check or uncheck checkbox next to “Block pop-up windows” to allow or block it.

If you would like to manage individual website’s pop up behavior, then click on “Exceptions…” and enter your desired website.

Block Pop Ups in Internet Explorer

Click on “Tools” located at the top right corner of the screen, and from there click on “Internet options”.

A window will pop up, click on “Privacy” tab. Under “Privacy” tab you will see the option of “Turn on pop-up Blocker”, check or uncheck it to block or allow pop ups.

Once it is checked, click on “Settings” located next to it.

In “Settings”, you can specify individual websites of which pop ups will not be blocked. You will also have the option to set “Blocking level”. Just click on the drop down menu below the option “Blocking Level” and choose from Low, Medium and High blocking level options.

Block Pop Ups in Safari

Click on the “Gear” icon located at the top right corner of the screen and from the menu click on “Preferences…”.

A new Window will open, in there, just click on “Security” panel and under it, check or uncheck “Block pop-up windows” to allow or block pop ups.

You can also click on “Gear” icon and “tick” “Block pop-up windows”  option right in the drop down menu to block pop ups. Or you can just press Ctrl+Shift+K to allow and block pop ups (there will be no confirmation when these buttons are pressed, so you will have to click on “Gear” icon to confirm pop ups are blocked or allowed).

Block Pop Ups in Opera

Click on “Opera” button located at the top left corner of the screen, and from the menu that opens up, click on “Settings”.

In “Settings”, click on “Websites” from the left menu and you will see new options on the right side. There, you will see an option of “Pop-ups”, just select the options below it to allow or block Pop-ups.

You can also click on “Manage exceptions…” to add individual websites and provide custom pop up settings for them.

Block Pop Ups with an Extension

If you still get pop ups after configuring your particular browser, then you also have the option to add added security with the help of an extension. There are many extensions that can help you block Pop up ads, some of them are free and some are paid with some added features.

Although, you can always look for Pop up blocker extensions for your specific browser, but our recommendation will be “AdBlock Plus”. It is an Open source extension to block ads and it is completely Free to use.

The extension works on all above mentioned browsers and you can just click on “Install” button on the website to download and install the extension in your specific browser. The extension is configured to block pop ups and other annoying ads by default, so you won’t have to make any changes unless you would like to block any other types of ads.

If you have any questions or would like to share your experience with pop up ads, let us know in the comments below.

How To Block Pop Ups , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.

Just as there have been few, if any, NBA players as electrifying as Allen Iverson, there have also been few, if any, as controversial.

He may be the player who crossed over Michael Jordan in his rookie year, but off-court drama has swirled around the former MVP since he was a high school superstar in Virginia. He was arrested as a teen for a bowling alley fight, stirred up controversy by injecting hip-hop style into the NBA and made headlines for talking about practice.

But a new documentary on the NBA legend’s life, simply titled “Iverson,” attempts to put those moments and more within the context necessary to truly understand why he made the decisions he made. More often than you’d expect, it ends up we weren’t told the whole story.

The film, which first aired Saturday on Showtime, is also the directorial debut of Zatella Beatty. In a phone conversation with The Huffington Post, Beatty admitted that when she first began working on the film ten years ago, she wasn’t sure what the final product would look like. What it became, however, is a powerful film that turns the typical narrative ascribed to Iverson on its head.

Throughout the film, stories emerge of a person who is quite different than the man depicted by the media over the last two decades, all of which help to show one of the NBA’s most enigmatic players in a whole new light.

Here are just some of the stories that might change the way you see the NBA legend.

1. As a child, Iverson protected his best friend, a white boy in a predominantly black project, who was picked on because of his race

Iverson said in the doc that his best friend, Jamie Rogers, was often teased because he was white, so Iverson looked out for him. “That was my little partner,” Iverson said.

Rogers’ mother confirmed as much in the doc, saying Iverson often watched out for and took care of the younger kids. Iverson also loved to teach Rogers sports tricks.

“The first time I ever met Bubba Chuck [Iverson’s nickname] he asked me did I ever play football? And I told him I didn’t know anything about football. And he said, ‘Put the ball like this and just throw it!’ And I just threw a perfect spiral,” Rogers said in the documentary.

“He could teach anybody,” Rogers said. “He just wanted you to be good.”

Rogers and Iverson as kids. (Source: Showtime)

2. Iverson’s football coach helped him turn his life around

After Iverson failed the eighth grade, he moved into the home of his football coach, Gary “Mo” Moore.

“I went from the projects, to a real house. It was a big difference,” Iverson said of the home in Hampton, Virginia.

Later, after discovering Iverson had missed 69 days of school, Moore grabbed the child and threw him on top of a car. “I wasn’t going to allow him to fail,” Moore said.

Allen called it a wake-up call. Moore would become Iverson’s personal manager.

“I never had a biological son, but I felt that sort of connection with him,” Moore said.

3. Iverson was actually a class clown in high school

Home videos show footage of Iverson doing impressions, dancing and joking around — a far cry from the fierce competitor people often saw on the court.

“He was a kid that would sing on the bus,” Janet Bailey, Iverson’s math teacher said. “But not in the class. He’s was quiet in class.”

A young Iverson goofing off for the camera. (Source: Showtime)

4. Home video footage shows Iverson wasn’t actually the main aggressor in the bowling alley fight that almost cost him his career

After a 1993 fight started in a bowling alley between a group of white people and Iverson’s friends, the basketball player was identified as the main assailant. But home footage actually showed the teenager leaving the scene.

Just 17 at the time, Iverson was nevertheless tried as an adult. Charged and found guilty with three counts of maiming, the national basketball prospect faced up to 60 years, but was sentenced to 15. Ten were suspended.

“People wanted to make an example of him,” Mike Bailey said.

“That was true injustice,” his wife added.

5. Iverson says he owes Tom Brokaw — yes, Tom Brokaw — a lot

Brokaw covered the story of Iverson’s incarceration and interviewed him from jail. Brokaw said he thinks it helped to get people to look at what was going on and see Iverson’s case differently.

“I got a lot of love for NBC, Tom Brokaw,” Iverson said. “He did a lot for me, and I appreciate him and I owe a lot him for that.”

Iverson was granted conditional clemency by then-Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder shortly thereafter.

A young Iverson talks to Brokaw. (Source: Showtime)

6. Georgetown didn’t actually recruit Iverson. His mother convinced coach John Thompson to let him join the team

After Iverson’s legal troubles, recruiters stopped calling.

“I never recruited Allen at all, they recruited me. I was a little reluctant in the beginning,” then-Georgetown basketball coach John Thompson said.

Thompson said it was Iverson’s mother “more than anybody” else that convinced him to take a chance on her son.

“Coach Thompson saved my life,” Iverson said.

7. Iverson now admits “99 percent” of his fights with Philadelphia 76ers head coach Larry Brown were his fault

“Ninety-nine percent of them were my fault,” Iverson said of the “riffs” he and Brown got into. “We clashed at times but I knew that the love was always there.”

Croce added that Brown never wanted to be “the bad guy,” and he was the one who had to suspend Iverson for missing practice.

“Highly talented, highly sensitive, highly headstrong individuals that come from two different worlds” was how former 76ers president, Pat Croce, described the pair.

8. Iverson’s famous “practice” speech is much less ridiculous if you know the entire context for it

Say “Iverson,” and one of the first thing people will probably say back is “We’re talking about practice?” Ironically enough, most people don’t know that Iverson wasn’t only talking about practice when he was talking about practice.

“We in here talking about practice?” Iverson infamously said at a 2002 press conference following a loss during the first round of the NBA playoffs. “We’re talking about practice, man, I mean, how silly is that?”

But what many have said in the film is that Iverson’s words were clipped into a salacious sound bite. Iverson explains in the film that he wasn’t discounting the value of practice, as it seemed. Instead he felt that he felt it was “silly” to talk about practice rather than the bigger picture, which for him, included the recent death of a friend and a playoff loss.

“I’m upset for one reason, man. Cause I’m in here. I lost. I lost my best friend,” Iverson also said during the press conference. “I lost him. And I lost this year … and then I’m dealing with this, right here.”

BONUS: Iverson has a never-released rap album

He was seen as the player who bridged the culture and style of hip hop and the NBA. So perhaps fittingly, he even recorded a rap record. Iverson’s potential album received swift backlash from Croce and others, including Spike Lee, after <a href="http://articles.philly.com/2001-07-08/entertainment/25315873_1_iverson-s-cd-sixers-president-pat-croce-sixers-organization
” target=”_hplink”>a single titled “40 Bars” was released in 2000. The album, titled “Misunderstood,” was continually postponed and ultimately was never commercially released.

“<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrbB82suhUM
” target=”_hplink”>Looking back on it, it’s embarrassing when I think about all the kids that could’ve ended up hearing all the things that I was saying and portraying someone that, obviously, I’m not because it was gangster rap and I’m not a gangster,” Iverson said of the album in an interview with Complex published this week.

“Iverson” premiered Saturday, May 16 at 9 p.m. on Showtime and will be airing throughout the month. It is also available on Showtime On Demand and on mobile via Showtime Anytime.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.