#caps for emphasis on the surprise of the outcome

[avaa7944]

5 Surprising Benefits of Medicare Advantage Plans You May Not Know About

Medicare Advantage (MA) plans, also known as Medicare Part C, offer a comprehensive alternative to Original Medicare by combining hospital (Part A) and medical (Part B) coverage with additional benefits. While many people are aware of the basic advantages, there are some surprising benefits of Medicare Advantage plans that may not be widely known. Here are five unexpected advantages:

Out-of-Pocket Maximum Limits: Unlike Original Medicare, Medicare Advantage plans in 2024 come with annual out-of-pocket maximum limits. This feature places a cap on the total amount you can spend on covered healthcare services in a given year. Once you reach this limit, the plan covers all additional costs for covered services, providing financial protection and predictability.

This out-of-pocket maximum includes expenses like deductibles, copayments, and coinsurance. Knowing that there is a limit to your potential spending can provide peace of mind and financial security, making it one of the surprising benefits of choosing a Medicare Advantage plan.

Comprehensive Dental, Vision, and Hearing Coverage: Original Medicare typically does not cover routine dental, vision, or hearing services, which can lead to additional out-of-pocket expenses for beneficiaries. One surprising benefit of many Medicare Advantage plans is the inclusion of comprehensive dental, vision, and hearing coverage.

These additional benefits can encompass routine dental check-ups, eyeglasses or contact lenses, hearing aids, and preventive vision and hearing care. For seniors who prioritize their overall well-being, the inclusion of these services in a Medicare Advantage plan can be a valuable and unexpected advantage.

Telehealth Services: The landscape of healthcare delivery has evolved, and many Medicare Advantage plans now offer telehealth services. This benefit allows beneficiaries to access healthcare professionals remotely, often through video calls or virtual consultations. Telehealth can be particularly beneficial for routine check-ups, follow-up appointments, and addressing non-emergency medical concerns without the need for in-person visits.

The convenience of telehealth services enhances access to care, especially for individuals with mobility issues or those living in rural areas. This unexpected benefit has become increasingly relevant in the context of evolving healthcare practices and the emphasis on remote care.

Health and Wellness Programs: Medicare Advantage plans frequently include health and wellness programs designed to promote preventive care and healthy lifestyles. These programs may offer fitness benefits, gym memberships, nutrition counseling, and even wellness rewards for participating in health-related activities.

The emphasis on preventive care aligns to improve overall health and reduce the need for extensive medical interventions. The inclusion of health and wellness programs is an unexpected but valuable component of many Medicare Advantage plans, encouraging beneficiaries to take proactive steps toward better health.

Care Coordination and Chronic Condition Management: Medicare Advantage plans often provide enhanced care coordination services, particularly for individuals with chronic conditions. These plans may offer specialized care management programs that involve a team of healthcare professionals working together to coordinate and optimize the management of chronic health conditions.

The focus on proactive management and coordination of care can result in better health outcomes, reduced hospitalizations, and improved quality of life for individuals with chronic conditions. This emphasis on personalized and coordinated care is a surprising advantage that sets Medicare Advantage plans apart from Original Medicare.

In conclusion, Medicare Advantage plans offer not only the expected coverage for hospital and medical services but also a range of surprising benefits that contribute to improved health, financial security, and overall well-being. From out-of-pocket maximum limits to comprehensive coverage for dental, vision, and hearing services, these unexpected advantages make Medicare Advantage plans a compelling option for many beneficiaries.

#Surprising #Benefits #Medicare Advantage Plans #Health Insurance

[halfgclden]

THE PITS(TOP)

It was at a rest stop on the way out of Billings, Montana, that they got the news. It was before that, actually, but Jade was good about not checking her notifications on the road. 

“Fuck!” Jade yelled and slammed the car door to have something to direct her anger towards, and she resisted the urge to kick the tire afterwards. “Do they even know how long that took us to put together? We can just repost it. What are they gonna do?” 

It had taken less than twelve hours for their major story on a minor celebrity to get posted, cause a big stir, and get taken down. Of course Jade knew this was going to be a likely outcome, but it didn’t mean that she was any less upset about it.

Just as riled up as Jade but stiff as hell from the drive, Joel slowly got out of the car and cracked his back. Then his neck. Then his knuckles. "I can't fucking believe it. This is censorship! Fuck. We have it on a flash drive. They can't do anything. What are they gonna do? Take it down again? They can't do anything." Thunder rumbled as Joel kicked a bottle cap on the ground, a scowl on his typically cheerful face. 

It was bullshit. 

They (mostly Jade) had spent hours researching their facts and putting the most recent episode together. It had been so good. One of their best, for sure. And yet— poof. In an instant, gone. 

Joel watched his twin pace angrily around the parking lot for a moment, then looked up at the gray sky. "What! The! Fuck!" He yelled, taking big breaths in between each word. A family getting into their car a few feet away turned to look at him, disapproval on their face as the mother covered her child's ears. Joel shrugged and turned back to look at Jade, "We knew it could happen but...that was handled in an ungodly amount of time, right? Fuckin' ridiculous."

Jade handled the gas pump with much more force than necessary, then moved so that she could slump against the car. She knew they had backups for this exact reason, but the censorship was expected and unwelcome. Why must people exist with wool over their eyes? Yes, maybe they had insider knowledge on this topic, but that didn't mean that their presentation was any less real and important for the public. 

As if to match their mood, the sky opened up above the twins and rain began to pour. 

"Ungodly my ass," Jade grumbled, and, on cue, there was a crack as the puddle forming on the ground near them shimmered and projected an image of a brightly-dressed bespeckled woman with a stern look on her face. 

"You two..." The woman sighed and shook her head as she pushed back a tangle of curls and piled it all into a messy bun atop her head. "I swear, whenever anything happens, I need only look to you or your siblings." She looked as disheveled as a goddess could, which meant that she still had more grace than an etiquette instructor. "Care to explain what that little stunt was?"

Nothing surprised Joel anymore. Not the speed at which their episode had been taken down. Not the rain that was spattering onto the pavement around them. And amazingly, not the woman who appeared out of thin air before them. "Should have known," he mumbled, loud enough for only Jade to hear. 

Fixing a smile on his face, Joel waved innocently to the colorful apparition. "Hi Auntie." He did his best to look like he hadn't done a thing , cutting a look to Jade while the goddess sighed. "What stunt? We were just doing a little research. No harm in that, right?"

The burning look that the goddess shot Joel suddenly made her feel a lot more menacing than her boho tie dye style. "A little research," she pronounced each word with special emphasis, as if she was holding back. "You exposed a place of safety and sanctity. You two have gone too far with these antics." 

Jade snorted. "Exposed," she repeated with a roll of her eyes. "Every monster and myth on earth already knows where that camp is. So why are you pressed about mortals finding out about y'all? Is it some way to keep them quelled?" She was tempted to start recording on her phone, and it looked as though the rainbow goddess was reciting a mantra under her breath. 

"You two... if this is a cry for attention, you will soon learn that you may be asking for too much. Attention is almost never a good thing to have on you, not with the forces you're playing with." 

Jade gave another exaggerated eye roll at the prophetic tone Iris was taking, then stuck her tongue out at Joel.

Somehow, Joel managed to keep the easy smile on his face, despite the heat from Iris' glare. He leaned back, resting against the trunk of the car. It wasn't every day that you got chewed out by a goddess but...it also wasn't the first time. Joel wondered how long the gods would find them amusing. He swallowed hard, not letting his thoughts go any further down that path. 

As if reading his twin's mind, Joel carefully slid his phone out of his pocket, intending to record the situation they'd found themselves in. The goddess launched into what felt like a pre-prepared speech, talking about the grandiose forces at hand and Joel tried to hide his smile. He caught the look Jade was giving and made a face in return. 

Looking back to Iris, he shrugged. "It's not a cry for attention. We're hardly the first to make a big deal about the strange stuff going on out there. I mean, come on, Auntie— did you even listen to it before you took it down? Long Island was home to some buckwild government experiments back in the day. How do you explain that?" He cut his hand through the air. "There are plenty of people like us that live in the public eye. Shouldn't y'alls sanctuary hold up against anything these 'forces' might throw at it?"

Jade gave a small quirk of her eyebrow towards her brother, but otherwise kept her expression neutral. "We're just saying that maybe it's a time where people start to open their eyes. People who don't want to see past the mist, they won't bother, but why not make it easier for those who could have a foot in both worlds? Mortals have always been a part of myth." Not to mention the fact that the gods may or may not have their fingers in some more suspicious business. Why were they located at the Empire State Building? What kind of power did they have over the political structure of the United States? Did Zeus make money off the Iraq war? 

Iris seemed to be less impressed with each sentence that came from the twins, and her patience was running thin. She looked between both of them before she flicked her hand at Joel's phone, instantly draining the battery. Before he could give her any grief about it, she held up the same hand. "You're lucky I didn't crumble that to dust, dear boy. You two are playing with fire. That is not a warning, that is a guarantee. I suggest you tuck your tails between your legs and not pull any stunts like that again. Apologize and thank those above you for vouching for you."

Chiming in, Joel added, "Yeah! The mythical and mortal worlds have been entwined for centuries! Seems only fair that people who want to know should be able to see what's really around them. And...without mortals, the gods wouldn't have so many heroes to do their bidding." It was a risky point to make, but it was true. Every myth he'd ever read proved it. Still, Joel got the feeling that the gods would not appreciate being called out like that. 

He meant to say more but in that moment, the jig was up. Iris had spotted his not-so-stealthy recording and Joel grimaced. He stood up a little straighter as she delivered her warning, pocketing his now-dead phone. Hopefully the little snippet he'd recorded would still he there when it powered up again but that seemed unlikely. Being told to apologize and give thanks didn't sit right with Joel, so he stood quietly, looking away from Iris to meet Jade's eyes. A raise of his eyebrows silently communicated 'what do you think?' and, at the same time, 'can you believe this is our life right now?'

The rain was picking up, as was the wind, and though Iris seemed entirely unbothered by it, Jade was wondering if she was going to have to change her clothes before driving to a motel for the evening. 

"Do you know what the gods bidding is?" Iris asked Joel, though it was clear that she didn't care for it to be answered. "Of course you don't. Or if you do, you clearly show that you do not understand. The gods are there to keep order. To keep it so that fate is handled in a way that does the least amount of harm. Do you know what happens if you ignore a prophecy, or try to deny it? You've read enough myth to know, haven't you? You can not deny prophecy, it will always come true." 

Jade's cheeks burned despite the cold rain on them, but she held her tongue, and shot Joel a response. 'Ugh, yeah, what else would it be' followed by 'we should probably leave it for now, though.’ She raked her teeth over her lower lip, realizing that Iris was expecting a reply, and maybe the apology she'd already mentioned. "Of course," her tone betrayed her, coming out as a grumble, and she cleared her throat. "I thought this was like Area 51. People even showed up there and nothing happened. Doubt anything is going to come out of this." She kept an eye on Iris, watching for any sort of recognition of the Area 51 incident, since Jade was positive the gods had something under wraps there. Then, she reluctantly added, in a much smoother tone, "We're sorry that it got so big. I mean, subscribers are probably gonna be great, if you let us keep them so we can afford dinner..." 

Iris rolled her eyes, but her stony expression seemed to be cracking, as though she'd delivered the message she was supposed to already. Even the rain seemed to be dying down. 

"—And thank you, of course, for vouching for us," Jade added, figuring that it was what the goddess had hinted at earlier and was now waiting for.

Rain dribbled down his glasses and Joel wished he'd thought of making tiny windshield wipers for them. There was always next time. He slowly took them off his face, using the hem of his shirt to dry them off before looking back at Iris. It would be so easy to continue to argue, to direct his frustration into something instead of holding it inside. But a goddess was a bad target to pick. So Joel kept his mouth shut and nodded along to her rhetoric, a thin smile on his face.

Letting Jade do the talking was much easier than bringing up all the counterarguments his brain had already conjured up. She was the more convincing of them anyway. Joel couldn't fathom how Iris could claim the gods were keeping order when you learned that the children of the gods had basically been the root of most major conflicts in history in Being a Demigod 101. And...Zeus was pretty much responsible for single-handedly being the worst husband in the world. He doubted Hera (or all the mortals he'd knocked up) would agree that he was keeping order. It was probably bad form to bring that up though. Faking a cough to hide his laugh at Jade's mention of Area 51 , Joel looked away. It was definitely bad form to laugh before a clearly pissed-off goddess. But there was something going on at Area 51. Everyone knew that. Idly, he wondered if @_kllledbycain was a Kakashi impersonator full-time. Maybe that was the link to the Area 51 raid they needed! He'd have to remember to tell Jade...as soon as they were out of danger of being smited? Smote? Incinerated. 

It was probably his turn to chime in. To really sell it. He arranged his expression into a sheepish sort of smile. "Seriously, the subscribers would...save us. But, uh, yeah. We didn't think it would take off like that, didn't think anything of it really. It was just supposed to be this silly thing we were working on. We're sorry if we put anyone at risk. And— yeah, what Jade said. Thank you, genuinely."

Jade glanced at Joel, wearing an expression that said 'what, are you going to get down and actually kiss her ass next time?' before glancing away, not wanting to snicker at her brother. 

Iris, however, seemed to be at least somewhat appeased by the twins responses, and while the downpour had turned to slightly more than a drizzle, she wore an expression like unto a tired caretaker. Was she ready for the next problem? Probably not, and so she would send Hermes to deal with that one instead. "I never said I was the one to vouch for you." 

Jade wanted to point out that she didn't deny it either, but she didn't want to make the little smile on Iris's face disappear. "Well, thanks for coming to deliver the message personally, then. It's always good to see you, auntie." Though it'd be better if it didn't come with an unneeded shower. Jade dipped her head to sniff herself. Okay, after hours of driving, maybe the shower wasn't entirely unnecessary. 

Iris hummed in response as the rain died down almost entirely, and her form flickered before the two demigods. "Now, if you even think about putting that back up, I won't be the god associated with weather that will be coming to speak to you." She sighed and put a hand up to her ear. "Okay, now I need to deal with a translation error in Prague. Don't make any trouble, good luck on your trip, and kids, please, get into a change of clothes, before you get sick." 

Jade opened her mouth to make a point, but the goddess was already gone, and so she just looked to Joel like a wet cat, jaw set as her hair dripped. "Such bullshit. I need to remember to wear a wetsuit next time we put up an episode.

Instinctively feeling the judgy look Jade was giving him, Joel turned his head in time to get her subliminal message and give her a generous eye roll in return. Maybe he'd laid it on a bit thick, so what? At least the rain was stopping now. That and Iris looked significantly less bothered and more like herself— which meant that instead of being 100% done with the twins, she was only about 70% done with them. 

"Tell Hermes we say thanks for the coffee," Joel grinned, giving Iris a little wave as he moved to dig a something out of the trunk of the car. He tried not to laugh when she gave them another warning, knowing full well that he and Jade were thinking the same thing. It was time for another episode. "See you later, Auntie," he gave the goddess a small wave as she shimmered out of view then, looked over at Jade. She really did look like a wet cat. He probably didn’t look much better. In fact, the two of them probably looked a little ridiculous. They seemed to be standing in the only area of the whole rest stop that had been rained on. Go figure. 

"Here," he held a towel out to Jade. "I'll add 'wetsuits' to our Patreon wishlist. Should I put 'umbrella' on there too?"

“Shut up,” Jade grumbled, clearly not in the mood for Joel’s ability to remain his goofy self in any situation. She took the towel and stepped around the car so that she could open the back seat and dig through clothes that she could change into for the rest of the ride. "There's an umbrella somewhere in here. Probably ten, honestly, and they're probably all piled under Toothless's cage." She shot their bearded dragon a look, as though he had been hoarding all the umbrellas on purpose, and he gave her a lazy wink in return. "He just winked, Joel! No shit! He basically told us that he ate them all." 

Once fully changed, she wrapped her wet clothes up in the towel and tossed it in the back (something to deal with later), then walked around the car fully so that she could climb into the passenger's side. She drew her legs up so that she could rest them on the dashboard, and was only on her phone for a short time before she groaned and slumped down in the seat, contorting in a very uncomfortable-looking position. 

"Ugh! Ughhhh. They got it taken off Patreon too." She huffed, looking at Joel with a forlorn expression. "Whatever, I don't even give a shit. Like this won't make it blow up even more." She wasn't sure she really believed her words, and her tone betrayed this. "Whatever," she repeated, rolling her eyes as she sniffled and turned her head to look out at the rain dramatically. It would have helped if it was actually still raining. "I'm naming the next episode number 33, I don't even care."

"Alright, alright," he nodded, understanding how his twin was feeling. While Jade busied herself looking for dry clothes, Joel set to work cleaning out the front seat before the next leg of their drive. It was no surprise that he quickly filled a plastic bag with trash— most of which was empty chip and candy bags. "He did what?" Joel glanced over the backseat, making eye contact with Toothless and raised an eyebrow. The reptile stared back at him, unblinking. "Oh, for sure. Tooth's a machine. He could eat a whole umbrella factory. Is that a thing?" 

Finally, the cab of the car was clean, save for the two coffee cups in the center console. Joel picked up Jade's cup, shook it to make sure it was empty, and added it to the bag of trash. Grabbing his own iced mocha, he took a sip, the straw making an empty slurping sound in the drained cup. This too he added to the bag. Returning to the car after disposing of their trash, a gleam in the console caught his eye. In the same moment, Jade clambered into the passenger seat. 

"They— seriously? Ugh." Joel quickly swapped out his shirt for a dry hoodie and got into the passenger seat. "God how do you drive like this?" He muttered before adjusting the chair and mirrors for his height. Wishing he could say something to lift Jade's spirits, a small frown worked its way onto his face. He knew his twin well enough to know that she'd recover in the morning when they saw how many new subscribers and views this debacle was sure to bring, but in the meantime— "Can I offer you a drachma in this trying time?" Joel had fished the handful of gleaming gold coins from the cupholder while Jade vented. Now, he held one out to Jade, the grin on his face almost as bright as the coin resting in his palm. "Looks like someone didn't want our episode to be taken down. Found it under the coffee."

Jade peeked away from the window back at her brother, looking up at him from where she was burrowing herself in her sweatshirt. She took the coin and pressed it to her chest, shifting in the seat to push herself up a bit, as the world seemed a bit less like it was going to end. She exhaled a breath and gave a small smile to Joel. "Should've left fries instead. Can't eat this." 

Nevertheless, her spirits were no doubt lifted, and she raised her eyebrows at her twin. "Ready to start work on episode 33 tomorrow?"

"Episode 33 tomorrow," Joel agreed, as he put the car in reverse. "Fries now."

#c: jade #c: jadejoel

[ophirgottlieb]

Surprise: Apple is Crushing It After All

Apple, iPhone, super, quarter, data,earnings

Surprise: Apple is Crushing It After All

Date Published: 2018-02-27 Written by Ophir Gottlieb This is a snippet from a CML Pro dossier published on 2-26-2018. LEDE Apple just reported the single largest quarterly after tax profits ever, and generally beat estimates for earnings, but the guidance for the current quarter was less than stellar and its booming Services business boomed, but did not KABOOM, and that was reason for some worry. New data surrounding the iPhone's dominance has been releases, and while the "super cycle" didn't come in volume, my goodness, it has come in terms of dollars. STORY We added Apple to Top Picks on 2-Jan-16 for $104.15. As of this writing it is trading at $175.50, or 68% higher. We did a thorough write up of the earnings release as it came out, and you can refer to that dossier here: Must Know: Apple Earnings Review. But it is the latest number crunching from two analytics firms that pushed Apple higher last week, and may see it test that all-time high yet again. Let's get to the data. SURPRISE: IT IS A SUPER CYCLE Apple did something very odd with its iPhone X super phone -- it held it back. The company first released the iPhone 8, and delayed its release of the $1,000 phone. That was hotly contested and it was a huge risk. Analysts still disagree about the outcome, even though the outcome is now an observable fact (we saw sales and earnings). The idea that consumers would pay up more than $1,000 for a phone was risky, and it was yet riskier to let people "opt out" by just going with iPhone 8. But, the real movement for Apple last quarter was the astonishing rise in its average selling price (ASP) per iPhone. Here is a chart:

I don't know why BI decided to use a line chart rather than a bar chart, but let's let the non math people do as they will -- the data is what we want and the broken trend is still easy to see. This cycle (quarter) saw a huge pop out of a pretty tight range. The big jump is because of the $999 super-premium iPhone X, which costs nearly $240 more than the iPhone 7 Plus, which was previously Apple's most expensive phone. CEO Tim Cook said:

Honestly speaking, there's no comparison in the revenue, it's hugely different. In a positive way, obviously.

SO WHAT? Counterpoint Research Director Neil Shah shared some new data and it reads pretty crazy.

The $1,000 smartphone—along with iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus—helped propel Apple (AAPL) to a commanding 76% of smartphone revenue in North America and 57% in Europe.

Then Strategy Analytics came out with more data. According to the firm, Apple has taken more than half of the global smartphone revenues for Q4 of 2017. "Apple iPhone captured a record 51 percent share of all smartphone wholesale revenues." And then we got the real data (our emphasis added): * Apple’s smartphone revenue was seven times higher than its second competitor, Samsung, and seven times more than Huawei. * The iPhone's $800 ASP is three times the industry average. * Samsung’s ASP grew 21%, sitting at $254. And while reports have come out that Apple might ditch the iPhone X, the famed Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities actually went the other way claiming that Apple was going to launch an iPhone X Plus. Yes, a larger, yet more expensive phone. For the record, KGI also carefully noted that Apple has not made a final decision and certainly has not made an official announcement. CONCLUSION Wall Street wanted an iPhone super cycle, and that meant volume. Well, volume beat expectations, but then was lowered for this quarter's guidance, but revenue, that is in a super cycle. And that super cycle has given Apple all kinds of absurd statistics relative to its competitors, from size to market share. For now, the arguments can stop -- Apple had a super cycle -- it was in revenue, and that led to the largest single quarter of earnings ever by a public company. Apple beat another mega cap's record... Apple. And it also dethroned the number three spot, which was... Apple. As for the weaker than expected guidance, we could also just listen to Tim Cook, you know, the CEO, when he said on the earnings call: "iPhone revenue will grow double-digits as compared to last year during the March quarter. And that iPhone sell-through growth on a year-over-year basis will be actually accelerating during the March quarter as compared to the December." We also note that the all-time high in ASP was also a poke in the eye of analysts that said people would not spring for the super expensive iPhone X — wrong. iPhone X was the bestselling iPhone every week it was out. SEEING THE FUTURE It's understanding technology that gets us an edge on finding the gems that can turn into the 'next Apple,' or 'next Microsoft,' where we must get ahead of the curve. This is what CML Pro does. The precious few thematic top picks for 2018, research dossiers, and alerts are available for a limited time at an 80% discount for $19/mo. Join Us: Discover the undiscovered companies that will power technology's future. As always, control risk, size appropriately and use your own judgement, aside from anyone else’s subjective views, including my own. Thanks for reading, friends. The author is long shares of Apple Inc at the time of this writing. Legal The information contained on this site is provided for general informational purposes, as a convenience to the readers. The materials are not a substitute for obtaining professional advice from a qualified person, firm or corporation. Consult the appropriate professional advisor for more complete and current information. Capital Market Laboratories (“The Company”) does not engage in rendering any legal or professional services by placing these general informational materials on this website. The Company specifically disclaims any liability, whether based in contract, tort, strict liability or otherwise, for any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or special damages arising out of or in any way connected with access to or use of the site, even if we have been advised of the possibility of such damages, including liability in connection with mistakes or omissions in, or delays in transmission of, information to or from the user, interruptions in telecommunications connections to the site or viruses. The Company make no representations or warranties about the accuracy or completeness of the information contained on this website. Any links provided to other server sites are offered as a matter of convenience and in no way are meant to imply that The Company endorses, sponsors, promotes or is affiliated with the owners of or participants in those sites, or endorse any information contained on those sites, unless expressly stated.

#$aapl

[its-veso]

NFP Preview: 3 scenarios for EUR/USD

US Non-Farm Payrolls for June are critical for the upcoming Fed rate cut.

Markets will want to see if May’s dismal data was only a one-off.

The US dollar’s next significant move heavily depends on the headline more than the wage numbers.

EUR/USD is set to slide in two out of three scenarios.

Will the Federal Reserve slash interest rates by 50 basis points and embark on a cycle of loose monetary policy? Or will it settle for a minor reduction in rates? That is the question markets are grappling with and June’s jobs report – coming after a disappointing one in May – may provide answers to.

The NFP is due on Friday, July 5th, at 12:30 GMT. Follow it live here[1].

May may have been a one-off

May’s Non-Farm Payrolls report has badly disappointed. The economy has gained only 75K jobs, and this increase came on top of downward revisions for April and March, which totaled 75K as well.

Moreover, the meager job growth in May was accompanied by an underwhelming increase in wages – only 0.2% month on month and 3.1% year on year – both 0.1% below expectations.

While it is impossible to sugarcoat May’s report, it is essential to note that the broader picture remains positive with the unemployment rate standing at 3.6%. Also, one-off weak jobs reports are frequent. The central bank eyes the average increase in positions.

The six-month average is 198K and the 12-month average is 196K.

But was it just a blip?

Expectations stand at an increase of 160K – a tad below the long-term averages but generally a return to normal. Analysts are cautiously optimistic.

Regarding wages,– which have only marginally dipped from the high levels – estimates stand at an increase of 0.3% MoM and 3.2% YoY. This is a repeat of last month’s projections. The unemployment rate is forecast to remain unchanged at low levels of 3.6%.

However, May’s downbeat jobs report was not the first disappointing figure so far this year. In February, the world’s largest economy also failed to grow its labor market by more than 100K jobs.

While employment growth jumped in March and April, the second non-consecutive miss is already worrying. Note the second sub-100K figure on the chart:

Moving from February to recent data for June, leading indicators are also leaning to the downside. Jordi Martínez explains why negatives outweigh the positives[2], emphasis mine:

The first glance at the table seems quite balanced, with four negative inputs, three neutral and three positive signals, but things get more negative looking at the details. It’s not only that we are coming from one of the worse NFP figures from the last decade, but also three of the most meaningful leading indicators have provided pretty strong negative surprises.

Here is the full list of leading indicators toward the release:

Overall, expectations are for a return of significant job growth, but below the averages. And leading indicators lean lower.

Surprise index points to a short-term correction

FXStreet Surprise Index quantifies, in terms of standard deviations of data surprises (actual releases vs. survey median), the extent to which economic indicators exceed or fall short of consensus estimates.

When we examine the long-term trend, surprises have been to the downside. When looking at top-tier and second-tier figures since 2011, we note that the Surprise Index is capped by downtrend resistance. Moreover, the indicator has broken below downtrend support. The lines are drawn on the chart below.

However, when we take a closer look, using figures dating back only to January 2018, the picture is more hopeful.

On this chart, the FXStreet Surprise Index has risen off the downtrend support line (in red) and has even set a higher low, beginning a potential uptrend (green line).

Therefore, the Surprise Index points to a higher chance of an upside surprise within the general trend of disappointing economic indicators.

How to trade the Non-Farm Payrolls with EUR/USD

After we have assessed the expectations and the chances for a surprise, let us examine EUR/USD – the world’s most popular currency pair.

The current trend in EUR/USD is to the downside due to recent political developments.

The Federal Reserve’s upcoming rate cut is already fully priced in. The Fed has sent a clear message in its previous rate decision in mid-June. Markets reacted by pricing in a possibility of a deep rate cut in July – 50 basis points. However, Fed officials have since cooled down expectations by saying it is probably going to be only an “insurance rate cut” – not a series of moves.

Moreover, President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping have reached an agreement to resume trade talks and refrain from slapping new tariffs. The Fed’s dovish twist was partially triggered by global commerce, and as tension diminish, the case for embarking on a long cycle of loose monetary policy has waned.

All in all, the greenback has reasons to gain ground.

On the other side of the pond, the European Central Bank is ready to cut rates and perhaps introduce a new round of Quantitative Easing. President Mario Draghi has opened the door to further accommodation in his Sintra speech, and while the move is unlikely in its mid-July meeting, the ground is set for a substantial loosening in September.

And the next ECB President will be a dove as well. European leaders have nominated Christine Lagarde – the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund – to lead the Frankfurt-based institution. Lagarde has recently praised the ECB’s accommodation and will have the chance to practice what she preached as early as November.  All in all, the bias is in favor of the dollar and against the euro.

EUR/USD Technical Analysis

EUR/USD has been suffering from downside momentum and trades below the 50 and 100 Simple Moving Averages at the time of writing – bearish signs.

Resistance levels from the current price include 1.1410 (June’s high), 1.1390 (late June resistance), 1.1340 (support in late June and resistance earlier), and 1.1320 (early July high point.).

Support levels from the current price include 1.1270 (early July low), 1.1250 (mid-June temporary cap), 1.1200 (round number and support in early and mid-June), 1.1180 (mid-June low), and 1.1140 (late May resistance).

Should the data surprise the market substantially, expect the EURUSD to move an average of 60 pips in the first 15 minutes after the release. Because the previous two releases were weak in terms of deviation between Actual and Consensus, our systems will be more sensitive to trigger a trade. The deviation formula employs a ratio function to replicate behavioral anchors of market participants.

Last month’s Employment Report release triggered a Buy signal in the EURUSD at 1.1294 which closed after 12 minutes for 20 pips. This trade was triggered by a deviation of just -1 in the NFP change figure, according to our Market Impact scale.

Let us move onto the scenarios.

1) Return to normal – EUR/USD may lean lower

After the leading indicators have pointed to the downside, we can assume that real market expectations are lower than 160K. Therefore, the range for an “as expected” outcome would be 120-180K – asymmetrically lower.

In this scenario, EUR/USD may lean lower due to the current bearish bias. However, with no significant surprise from the headline change in jobs, Average Hourly Earnings may have the final word. An upside surprise may exacerbate the falls of EUR/USD while an adverse outcome may stabilize the currency pair or even push it higher.

2) Above 180K – EUR/USD may tumble down

As the FXStreet Surprise Index points to a chance of an upside correction, we assign this scenario a medium probability. Moreover, given the leading indicators’ lean to a worse-than-expected figure, the bar is low for an upside surprise.

In this case, EUR/USD may tumble down quickly due to the bearish bias.

Average hourly earnings may have no impact as the overwhelming message will be that May’s downbeat jobs report was only a one-off. It will take a considerable decline in wage growth to turn EUR/USD higher if jobs beat expectations.

3) Below 120K – EUR/USD has room to rise

After May’s meager employment increase, another downside surprise cannot be ruled out, yet it needs to be substantially worse than estimates. We assign this scenario low probability.

Such an outcome would exceed the low expectations set by the leading indicators and would go hand in hand with the broader picture of the FXStreet Surprise Index rather than the short-term one.

A figure of below 120K would open the door to EUR/USD gaining ground on rising expectations that the Fed would slash interest rates by 50 basis points later this month as the employment is already suffering.

Conclusion

The US Non-Farm Payrolls report for June is critical for the Fed’s potential rate cut in July. After a disappointing outcome in May, a bounce is due in June. However, economists expect a significant bounce yet below averages. Moreover, leading indicators point to an even lower result. The FXStreet Surprise Index points to a long-term downtrend in economic surprises, but a short-term correction.

EUR/USD leans lower ahead of the release and may fall if the headline meets expectations. In this baseline scenario, wage growth may steal the show. In case the data exceeds 180K, euro/dollar may tumble down. In the low likelihood of a meager increase of 120K or fewer jobs, the world’s most popular currency pair has room to rise.

Get the 5 most predictable currency pairs[3]

References

^ Follow it live here (www.fxstreet.com)

^ negatives outweigh the positives (www.fxstreet.com)

^ Get the 5 most predictable currency pairs (www.forexcrunch.com)

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#Forex News #Forex Crunch

[speckledspout]

Liquor Gonna Carry Me Down

ship: wincest (could be read as a general pairing though) rating: teen ao3 link tags: drinking, angst summary: “Dean hated it. He hated being sent on a mission by those pompous sons of bitches that thought they were better than anyone else with their perfectly manicured hands and fancy tools.” word count: 2,052 a/n: so this is kinda seen as a coda to the last episode but it takes place after the episode actually and this kinda came out of some of my own questions that i have when it comes to what’s currently happening in the plot. you’ll see what i’m talking about. plus it’s the first thing i’ve written since my dwbb so yay about that.

Dean was an alcoholic. He would try to deny it whenever Sam would bring it up (which wouldn’t be often because he knew where that conversation always ended) but there was no denying the facts. There was almost never a time that Sam didn’t see his brother without some kind of drink in his hand. However he was getting better. His morning coffee wasn’t spiked with whiskey anymore.

But there were times when everything around him would start to be a little bit too much and he needed something to numb the pain. Sometimes it would be failing on a hunt, getting more innocent people killed. Other times he just felt swallowed by everything that was around him, by the lies and the secrets and the weight of the entire goddamn world. Sometimes it would be all those things combined and well, Dean Winchester was only a man and he could only carry so much.

Sam would try to reassure Dean that he was good, that he did all that he could. He shouldn’t blame himself for those people that had died before he managed to get to them but that was just part of his personality. It was something built into him that made him him. He carried everything on his shoulders, never complained and thought that everything was his fault.

It was bad. The case was bad. How they got the case was bad. The outcome was bad. All of it was just… bad. The British Men of Letters had directed them to a case down in Texas, a werewolf they claimed had gone rouge and was turning the local folk in the small town, slowly building up their own pack.

Dean hated it. He hated being sent on a mission by those pompous sons of bitches that thought they were better than anyone else with their perfectly manicured hands and fancy tools.

And he couldn’t help but feel like he was working under Crowley again, hunting down the Alphas, just under a different name. But evil all smelled the same and this felt like it was only going to come back and bite them in the ass.

Freshly turned pups are usually wild but their uncoordinated and they expected that. The Brits said that there had been at least four people turned and in all honesty, Sam and Dean had dealt with bigger packs than that before and so Dean wasn’t sure why there was an uneasy feeling in his stomach as he pulled up in front of the warehouse that they were supposedly made nest in. However, when the six freshly turned pups attacked them, white teeth bared and hungry for human hearts, they were unprepared for it.

Four, they could handle four but six not including the bitch that turned them in the first place… it all felt like a trap. Like the Brits were purposely trying to get them killed.

It was sheer will power alone that they stayed alive. Sheer will power and adrenaline and the overpowering want to show the Brits that sending them down in the middle of nowhere wouldn’t kill a Winchester so easily.

Didn’t keep from Sam getting hurt though and when they got back to the Bunker, Dean broke out his secret stash of whiskey, not even bothering going to his room to drink it.

Accusations screamed through Dean’s head. Sam got hurt and it was all his fault. If only he trusted his gut or didn’t just go off the information that the Brits had given them. If only he took the little bit of extra time to check it out, to make sure that all the information was right and there wouldn’t be any extra surprises. If only… Sam wouldn’t have gotten hurt. The fucking kid that they had taken wouldn’t have gotten killed.

He felt sick, the alcohol was uneasy in his stomach and he closed his eyes only to be greeted with the image of Sam on his back with that… that thing on top of him. It was so close, he was so close to losing the one thing that he cared.

In all honesty, in the hunter’s world, it was nothing more than a scratch. The claws of the werewolf had broken the skin on Sam’s face leaving a gash that only looked worse than it actually was. Then the werewolf got a little too happy with a knife and sunk it into the soft flesh of Sam’s shoulder. Now that, that hurt like a bitch and it required six stitches which Dean administered with a clenched jaw and a furrowed brow. Sam had tried to reassure Dean that he was going to be alright, he was going to survive; granted he would be a little sore but he was okay. The werewolves were dead and they were alive and everything would be alright.

After Dean had patched Sam up, that’s when he went off to look for his bottle.

Sam looked at the form of his brother, sinking into the chair, staring into the endless glass of whiskey that was in his hand and Sam sighed. There would be no talking to him when he was acting like this, when he felt like this, when he believed every lie that he told himself and with a tired shake of his head, Sam turned and went off to the shower room.

This was always the most relaxing part of hunting. The unwinding. The getting clean. The washing away the dirt and grime and blood that coated his skin and got matted in his hair. He washed away the weight of the hunt, watching it as it went down the drain until the water ran clear.

Dean was still sitting in that chair, still holding onto the bottle staring off into nothing as Sam came back up into the library.

He stood in the doorway for a second before deciding to grab the bottle from his loose fingers and screwed on the cap. “May I take this from you?” Sam wasn’t asking.

“That didn’t sound like a question.” Dean replied looking at the bottle that Sam was holding before meeting Sam’s gaze. He was not going to get the bottle back, no matter how much he begged.

Sam put the bottle down on the table before he moved to sit on the edge right next to Dean.

Dean swallowed thickly. “How are you feeling?” I mean… how does your shoulder feel?” He asked, vaguely gesturing to Sam’s shoulder where he had just stitched him up.

“It’s fine. I’m fine.” Sam said, putting as much emphasis in his words as he could. “What about you? Hmm? How are you feeling?”

“Oh, just great?” The sarcasm was heavy in Dean’s voice but other than that there was no other emotion evident. He stood up. “Now, can I have my drink back or…?”

“No.” Sam said, pushing Dean back down in his seat and moved to where he was now standing directly in front of his brother. Dean stared up at Sam, eyes void of anything and Sam leaned forward, grabbing Dean’s face in between his hands, forcing him to look at him. “Dean… I just want a straight answer from you, man. Alright? No lies.”

Dean scoffed but he answered anyway. “I just don’t like seeing you get hurt.”

“Yeah, well, it’s an occupational hazard of the job. We get hurt. I get hurt. Then we lick our wounds clean and we wake up the next day to do the same thing over again. Hunt down monsters and I’ll be fine…” But Dean was shaking his head.

“Hunt down monsters, huh? Or do you mean just go where those Brits tell us to go?” Dean snapped, eyes on fire now.

“Is that what this is about?” Sam asked, being sure to keep his voice soft. “That we took a job from them?”

“Yeah, Sam! It’s about that. I know that I agreed to trust you about them but Sam, they led us into a trap. They nearly got you killed… again. I can’t… Sam, this goes against everything that I believe in and you… I don’t understand man, how you can be so willing to just work with them after what they did to you.”

“I’m not just willing to work with them, Dean. I don’t trust them but they didn’t send us into a trap. They had faulty intel and…”

“Then why didn’t they insist on coming with us? They were all the more willing to just send us on our merry way but they didn’t seem to be jumping the gun to join us.”

“Because I told them not to come with us, Dean. I’m not stupid. Having you and them in the same room together for hours on end, that would only cause trouble and I know that.” Sam still hadn’t moved his hands from Dean’s face. “I don’t like them anymore than you do but Dean, this could be the end of monsters. The end of innocent people dying. They killed the Alpha vamp…”

“No, you saved their incompetent asses and killed the Alpha vamp.” Dean corrected. That night when they got back from the Brits compound, Dean made Sam tell the whole story and of course his little brother sold himself short, completely disregarding the fact that it was him that saved the day, not them.

Sam sighed, lips pressed into a hard line before continuing. “Okay but still, I wouldn’t have been able to do that if it weren’t for them, if they hadn’t drawn him out of hiding in the first place. With their technology and our skills, Dean, we could kill all the monsters. We could get rid of them all.” There was this smile on Sam’s face that almost seemed shy, like he couldn’t believe what he was saying despite the fact that it was a truth that was drawing nearer every day with every monster that they killed.

“Yeah and then what? What happens when we kill all the monsters and there’s nothing left to hunt? Are you just going to go back to school, become a lawyer, live that life that you’ve always wanted with no more monsters to drag you back in?”

“The life that I’ve always wanted, Dean, was to live my life with you. I don’t care what we do as long as I’m with you.”

Dean scoffed. Leave it up to his girl of a brother to turn this all sappy. “You don’t mean that.” Dean replied with that smile that he had when he was trying to cover up what he was actually feeling. Give Sam the chance to leave and he would.

A world without monsters was the best chance that he was going to get.

“You really believe that, don’t you?” Sam whispered like the words suddenly held so much weight that he couldn’t actually say them. “You really don’t think that you’re all that I want… that I…” He swallowed around the lump in his throat. “That I love you, Dean.”

That time Dean barked out a laugh. He didn’t believe in love. There was no such thing. Just a stupid emotion that Hallmark thrusts upon everyone to sell movies and have people believe that… that… there was no such thing, alright.

“I’m serious, Dean. I mean, I am the one that puts up with your cocky attitude and the random outburst of anger that you have. I am the one that has to deal with your suicidal tendencies that you call saving others. I am the one that has to listen to you scream the same four songs over and over again. I am the one that has to listen to you complain about the crappy motels we sleep in. I am the one that worries about you night and day. I am the one that stays awake at nights worried that you won’t make it home. Okay? I do that and if that isn’t love, then I don’t know what is.”

There was pain in Dean’s eyes. “I’m scared.” He finally admitted.

And Sam felt the air knocked out of his lungs from Dean’s confession.

“Of what?”

A swallow. A pause. The downcast look and then Dean met his brothers waiting gaze. “Of what I’ll be in a world without monsters.”

tagging: @wetsammywinchester, @clearlylostmymind, @kittenofdoomage, @kansaskissedlips, @ilostmyshoe-79, @fawnjensen, @brosinlove, @oh-jesus-sammy, @not-moose-one-shots, @ramblingmandean, @pictures-over-words, @justanothersaltandburn, @purgatoan, @masterlynovak

Post-Episode: s12e14 The Raid

#wincest #supernatural #post-episode: s12e14 the raid #mywincest #so yeah why dean says there at the ending is my question because you know #what is one without the other? #so yeah #thoughts comments and opinions are always welcomed #plus this is the first thing that i've actually written since my dwbb #yay

[bassfanimation]

The Final Problem: Eurus’s crash therapy session

I've written one post talking about how my husband viewed the “I Love You” scene in The Final Problem.  I wanted to write some more, as we’ve discussed TFP in depth together.  We talk a lot about the media we consume because A) we're nerds, and B) our views are usually quite different.  

It's also nice to have a male perspective on things, as it sometimes can shed some light where my female brain just bumbles around in the dark and stubs it's toe on the Feels Dresser.  My husband views things very textually, but he is also fantastic at thinking about stuff on a meta level.  It’s nice because he has no ulterior motives either, no shipper goggles or anything.  I'm going to write a bit about his theories about TFP and what it all meant in his eyes.  I'll add my own views as well, for comparison.  This is going to be a long af post, so strap in!

(Disclaimer: this post may contain more shippy talk than you want, because I am a major Sherlolly/Molly Hooper lover, but you can also disregard my feelings and read for the hell of it.)

My hub said he views The Final Problem as the final case for Sherlock, which is essentially, solving himself.  I remember when Mary's video appeared, and she said she was giving him the toughest case of his life.  I seriously thought it was going to be for Sherlock to solve himself, which is the hardest thing for any person to do...to know yourself.  Instead we got something equally wonderful, but a bit easier to solve: how to mend Sherlock's friendship with John and save him from eternal despair.   Thankfully, Sherlock was a rousing success. He solved it.

"The next one won't be so easy." -Eurus Holmes, The Final Problem

The Final Problem, as my dude talked about it, is about the Holmes family, but mostly Eurus.  It was about Eurus trying to go 'home', only she couldn't.  She had to unlock the one person who could "save her soul", as the song puzzle went.  In order to do that...she had to literally break down Sherlock's walls.  Each major emotional wall he'd built was because of Eurus, so only she could break them down.  Only she was smart enough, and ruthless enough, to accomplish this.  

“You know the problem with disguises? No matter how hard you try, it’s always a self portrait.” -Irene Adler, A Scandal in Belgravia

It's very fitting that Eurus chose to reveal herself while she was disguised as a therapist, because TFP was in essence, a crash therapy session for Sherlock.  Each room in Sherrinford was a self discovery trap.  Now, someone was corresponding with me over the "I Love You" meaning and said it wasn't real because it was manipulation.  That is correct in that it was manipulation...but that is what all therapy really is.  It is someone very skilled manipulating you into understanding your own true feelings.  As a person going through intensive therapy currently, let me tell you, this is exactly what TFP was.  A very elaborate therapy session.  

Room One: Sherlock, John, Mycroft and the Governor.

My hub sees this test as about Sherlock facing the fact that sometimes his actions will hurt his friends and family. Eurus gave Sherlock the choice of giving the gun to Mycroft or John so they could kill the Governor.  He was choosing whether to hurt John or hurt Mycroft. Either of them would be hurt by being forced to kill an innocent man.  Mycroft absolutely could not do it. John thought he could, but he couldn't either.  In the end, their inaction killed two people, but Sherlock was directly responsible for that.  He hurt John AND Mycroft without meaning to.  The consequence was real...the Governor and his wife were killed.  Sometimes your actions will hurt others, sometimes your innaction is just as dangerous. It will happen, and it will hurt you too.  I actually 100% agree with this reading.  My eyes popped out in amazement.

Room Two: Sherlock, John, and Mycroft.

My hub feels this test was to confront Sherlock with his arrogance.  Three brothers, all hanging by ropes, one of them having killed their fourth brother, but which one?  Sherlock solved the crime, but Eurus dropped the two innocent brothers, leaving the guilty one still hanging. The guilty man was eventually dropped as well, but it held a mirror up to Sherlock.  How many times did he blithely solve a crime with no thought as to who might be hurt by that? It never mattered to him. Like Eurus said, "Innocent?  Guilty? Punishing either feels the same."  This is Eurus throwing Sherlock's arrogant disregard for real justice back in his face.  He solves crimes to be "right", no matter what the consequence, no matter who he hurts.  He's confronting his arrogance and his selfishness.

Room Three: Sherlock, John, and Mycroft.  (This one may take some paragraphs, so bear with me.)

The coffin with the words "I Love You" on the lid.  Me and my hub actually diverge a bit here, but I found his reading of it very interesting.  Also, a man's perspective on love is great to have, considering Sherlock IS a man, and this whole episode is about a man’s love.  

My hub was very passionate about discussing this one, which surprised me.  Something he talks about quite often with me is how he feels female fandoms think they understand the minds of guys.  "100 travel brochures do not equal a single trip."  To understand a man’s feelings about love, you really need a man’s perspective.  I can respect that, as I’d want the same kind of respect as a woman with my own feelings.

First and foremost, he thinks Sherlock's words were genuine.  He said Sherlock's reaction was not that of a man who did not mean what he said...in fact it's the opposite, he meant it and it scares the shit out of him, hence the reaction we got.  He said when you like someone, and they like you back but, for whatever reason, you refuse to pursue a relationship with that person.  Often it's feelings of inadequacy.  Sometimes you just don't really know how you feel about that person.  Often, strong friendships can feel like love and if you are friends with a member of the sex you are attracted to, it can be easy to wonder if those feelings are love or not.  The last thing you want to do is pursue those feelings and jeopardize that friendship.

If anything, the "I Love You" test showed JUST (he typed that in all caps in his chat to me) how amazingly important Molly is to Sherlock. He "humiliated" himself just as much as she did. By finally openly admitting that he might have feelings for her, he knows that he has essentially forever altered the nature of their friendship.  Maybe it could grow into something more, but he could have easily destroyed it too. We see in the epilogue that they obviously got past it, but had we not gotten that scene it could easily have been the last time Molly ever answered his calls.  That's why he has been so afraid to even broach the subject before now. The hub added to this that once you understand that Sherlock isn't a "high functioning sociopath" like he claims, then his actions all click and you realize he is a man who is seething with emotions and desperately trying to channel them in order to keep them contained.  

"Sherlock is not all about thinking and rationality. He gets emotional, he lashes out, he shoots the wall. And when he can’t figure something out, he stabs it." -Mrs. Hudson, The Lying Detective

My hub continues on by saying that for someone as obviously traumatized by the loss of a close friend then it makes that scene with Molly so much more meaningful than just a guy telling a woman that he loves her.  Imagine how traumatic it is to force someone like that to risk losing another close friend through their own actions.  Sherlock actually doesn't consider John a friend at this point, he considers him family. They are brothers in arms. There's a special kind of relationship that guys share when they've fought alongside each other. That's what Tolkien was trying to show in LOTR. It's different from a romantic relationship. In some ways it's more intimate and closer. I think Mary saw that.  It's why a lot of cops and soldiers end up divorced. Their wives see that bond that the guy has with his comrades and it puts a heavy strain.  The fact that Mary was able to get past that and even encourage it is a testimony to just what an amazing woman she was. John was INCREDIBLY (his typed caps, again for emphasis) lucky to have her. (yay Mary Watson love)

To dovetail back to how this relates to Molly, my hub believes Molly would also be the kind of woman to be just like Mary.  She would want him to be himself, to be with John, solving cases, being Sherlock and Dr. Watson.  But again, he thinks Sherlock was just so afraid of losing Molly that he never even entertained the idea of being able to have a relationship with her, for fear of losing what they have.  He is really surprised female fans don't understand this. He's heard so many women say that they couldn't imagine pursuing a relationship with a close friend because they didn't want to jeopardize that friendship. Even when you bring up that they are essentially already in a relationship with that person in everything but name.  I actually agreed here, 1000%, because I've been in this situation myself...it is so, so, so painful...and you are always filled with regret over words that weren't said.

The last thing my husband said about the coffin test was that, to him, the coffin symbolized the death of Sherlock and Molly's current relationship, as it’s been throughout the show. It couldn't go back to the way it was, not after what was said.  There is no more unspoken feelings hanging in the air.  Everything is out in the open.  There's only two outcomes now: either Sherlock did pursue a romantic relationship with Molly, or he simply couldn't bring himself to actually commit to her, but the words being said freed Molly of her unspoken, unrequited love, thus allowing her to actually move on.   He thinks they did pursue a relationship, btw.  He wasn't sure until our last viewing, but more on that later.

Lastly, I want to add that I view the coffin as an entirely different symbol. The coffin had the words "I Love You" on it.  Where do we equate love coming from? The heart.  When young Sherlock's best friend was killed, it effectively killed his heart.  It was broken, shattered, dark, put away into a box....dead.  The coffin represents the death of Sherlock's heart. It is the box containing all the love he used to feel inside it.  The coffin test was by far the hardest test...it's the one that had the most harrowing effect on him.  Opening your heart is the hardest thing for us, as human beings, to do.  But Sherlock Holmes did it, even if it confused and frightened him to do it.  Eurus forced it open, in front of John and Mycroft no less!   Sherlock gently touching the lid of the coffin, he is feeling his heart, the heart he has missed for so, so long.  He wants to break it out of that coffin...so he smashes it to bits, screaming while he does it.  He is breaking his love free of death, out of that coffin.

"So many complicated emotions. I lost count!"- Eurus Holmes

Love is also confusing as hell for Sherlock.  It's going to take a while for him to solve that particular one, for Molly.  He can't solve it completely while in that room, so of course...he does what Mrs. Hudson said he does...he stabbed it...or rather, he dismantled it soundly. That's how strong his feelings were.

Room 4: Sherlock, John, Mycroft.

My hub felt this test was simple.  It was to demonstrate to Sherlock that there will always come a time where he will have to choose between friends and family.  He didn't have much else to say, but I have some feelings on it myself.  I think Sherlock actually managed to turn the tables on Eurus during this one.  Remember, his heart is wide open now. He busted it out of that coffin. It is confused and scared, but it is raw and beating like thunder.  He cannot, will not choose between friends and family, because his friends ARE family. They are HIS.  Their love is HIS.  He cannot choose because there is no choice to make.  He would rather truly destroy himself than dare hurt the people he loves any more. We saw this with the Culverton Smith case as well, so this one is no surprise.  It was no surprise to Eurus either, which is why she was prepared.

Room 5: Sherlock.

Finally, the last bit of really amazing symbolism I want to talk about is when Sherlock was in the fake room, just outside Musgrave.  The walls inside there were littered with photographs of the Holmes family.  Sherlock, Mycroft, Eurus, Mummy, and Daddy.  Sherlock's family.  He is forced to look at those pictures...forced to look at who he used to be.  Who Mycroft used to be.  Who Eurus used to be.  The love that existed there, the love he felt, the happiness he so briefly knew.  He had made a prison inside himself...but suddenly he realizes it...all he has to do is push, one last time.  The walls of the fake room literally fall down around him.  His prison is no more.  He's solved himself...now he must solve Eurus in order to save his family.  He could only save John, and the little girl high above, if he solved The Final Problem: himself.

At last, we hear Sherlock say to Eurus when he's holding her in her burnt childhood bedroom that she got lost last time, but this time she can do it right.  He's here now, here for her.  He begs her to save his best friend this time...not let him die like last time.  Sherlock effectively brings his little sister down to the ground again, and he did it with love.  The entirety of The Final Problem represented unlocking Love.  Love for his best friend, his inseparable partner: John.  Love for his family, his big brother: Mycroft, who isn't as strong as he thinks, and Eurus, a little girl who was lost inside her own lonely, cold brilliance.  Love for the quietly strong woman who's love for him was unbreakable: Molly Hooper. Love unlocked Eurus' prison, just as it unlocked Sherlock's.  They brought each other 'home'.

And that is the long ass tale of me and my husband's discussing of this incredible, frustrating, tragic, beautiful, brilliant, messy episode of my favorite show of all time.  I'll admit to you here, I cried in front of my hub when he compared the coffin to the state of Sherlock and Molly's relationship.  He felt so bad, poor guy.  I had also spent the day so upset over Moffat and Gatiss's flippant responses about the "I Love You" scene.  Upon our final viewing at the theater though, walking out, my hub says, "I have a new theory.  I'm almost positive Sherlock and Molly did pursue a relationship.  When she walks into 221B, she's smiling really brightly, and she's heading in the direction where Sherlock was standing in the room." He is right.  Molly could have walked in and simply stood gaping at the miracle of 221B's resurrection, or she could have stood alongside Mrs. Hudson.  But nope.  She went in the direction of the man she's loved for so, so long.  She was going to Sherlock, who is now the good man everyone knew he could be.

Louise Brealey tweeted just before the final series aired that "Molly was back where she belonged." Molly belongs with Sherlock, just as much as John Watson, Rosie Watson, and Mrs. Hudson. She's a permanent part of this Sherlock Holmes's Baker Street. Forever.  <3

#Sherlock #The Final Problem #Sherlolly #Molly Hooper #Eurus Holmes #long post #very long post #Sherlock meta

[ncmagroup]

by Dan Tyre

  Want to know how to become a sales manager? If you’ve done everything you can at your current role and need the challenge only promotion to sales manager will bring, you’re in luck. It’s a task easier said than done.

How do you stand out from your colleagues and distinguish yourself as the only logical choice for the next promotion?

Here are 5 steps to become a sales manager — crucial (and doable) steps that will take you closer to that promotion and the benefits it brings.

Step #1: Address Your Attitude

I’ve seen it too many times.

A top-performing salesperson starts to believe the hype about their position. They start to think that they really are the most important member of a team, a team they believe to be the most important part of the business.

And it ruffles feathers — not in the good kind of way. That kind of attitude will get you noticed for all the wrong reasons. If you want a promotion to the sales manager role, you have to adjust your attitude.

To make the right impression, focus on two aspects of your attitude…

Staying positive

Deals are won and deals are lost. How you deal with success and failure is a key indicator of your ability to successfully manage others. If you become despondent after a failed deal and your productivity drops, no one is going to want you heading a team of your peers.

If, however, you lose a deal and get right back on the horse, you’re going to look like leadership material.

A failure is only a failure if you learn nothing from it. You need to view each failure as a learning experience to improve your overall success rate.

The same goes for successfully closed deals as well. Don’t get cocky thinking you’ve done enough. Use that win as motivation to close the next deal.

Being a team player

Sales is an important element of any business, but you’re not any more important than any other department. Don’t ever get too big for your boots.

Be careful to remain a team player throughout, and keep everyone — both from your own department and those outside — involved and in the loop.

For example, one of the biggest issues within sales is the gap between sales and marketing. Rather than letting this gap persist, do something about it. Spend some time, maybe one day per month, with marketing. Perhaps organize a presentation for marketing once a month to update them on successes and issues.

Even a small gesture to keep everyone in the loop will help establish yourself as a problem solver, and that’s an important skill for any aspiring sales manager.

Step #2: Master Feedback (Both Giving and Receiving)

Feedback is a necessary component of both your own and your team’s growth. 69% of employees say they would work harder if they felt their efforts were being recognized.

Becoming a sales manager depends on your ability to receive feedback from your sales team with humility, and give it to other sales reps without causing offense. It’s a difficult line to walk and not one that everyone is comfortable with.

The best way to prepare for this is to start practicing these communication skills now. It will help prepare you, and it will also make you look like prime promotion material.

Let’s look at a few key principles of taking and giving feedback.

How to Receive Feedback

One of the key issues people have when receiving feedback is that they take it personally. People view what is intended as constructive advice as a personal attack.

Every time you receive feedback run yourself through the below process to stop any immediate emotional responses that are preventing you from extracting the real value of the feedback.

Stop yourself before you respond.

Break down what’s been said and apply it to the situation it refers to.

Analyze how that advice could have changed the outcome.

Ask questions based on how the feedback would have changed the initial situation.

This step-by-step approach will not only help you avoid unnecessary confrontations but will allow you to focus on the real value of the feedback and develop great follow up questions.

How to Give Feedback

Giving feedback can be a minefield. There’s the unknown variable of the other person. Their response is something out of your control so you have to avoid making this seem like a personal attack.

Here’s how to give direct advice that’s focused on the problem.

1) Act quickly

It’s a mistake to wait days, weeks, or even months to follow up on an error or improvement opportunity. Wait too long and everyone will forget what caused the issue, it will feel like your feedback is coming out of nowhere. You need to give feedback as close to the incident as possible.

2) Focus on the problem and the outcome

Try not to use personal pronouns because it makes it easy for this to feel like a personal attack. If you want the recipient to respond positively to the feedback, focus on the problem itself and speak about the benefits overcoming it could bring.

3) Focus on a specific problem

Be specific. You’re there to discuss a particular problem, so keep your advice hyper-relevant to that issue. If you’re too ambiguous the recipient could take the advice the wrong way. Make sure you’re not only outlining the issue but providing a single, actionable piece of advice as well.

Step #3: Find a Mentor

Finding a good mentor is like finding a map to buried treasure. It’s the shortcut you’re looking for.

There’s so much emphasis nowadays on the “self-made business person” that many of us believe we have to do it alone. That couldn’t be further from the truth. You might be surprised to hear this, but even some of the biggest names in business have come up under the tutelage of a mentor.

As Richard Branson says:

“If you ask any successful businessperson, they will always (say they) have had a great mentor at some point along the road.”

Keep these 3 steps in mind when looking for a mentor:

1) Make a case for yourself

Don’t just say “I want a mentor.” Be specific about what you want to achieve, and be ready to show why someone should invest their time into helping you.

2) Start your search within your own company

Your current company should already have successful sales managers. Look for someone who’s had a similar career path to you and ask them for help.

3) Make it easy for them

You’re the one who’s going to have to bend to their needs here. Make sure you’re meeting at times that are convenient for them and that fits into their existing schedule without causing problems.

Step #4: Become the Person You Want Others to Believe You Are

The New York Yankees have a unique method for choosing their team captain.

They wait until someone within the team shows themselves to be an outstanding player and leader before appointing them. They wait until someone is already doing the job of a captain before making it official. It’s why they’ve been without a captain since Derek Jeter retired in 2014.

Sales (and any promotion) are very similar.

If you want to become a sales manager, then you’re going to have to start proving you can take on the relevant responsibilities. You have to start being the unofficial leader of the department today.

Show your employer that you are the only person capable of bringing the team together and getting the best results out of them.

Here are 3 tips to stand out as the unofficial leader.

1) Challenge yourself

Track your personal activity and success rates through your sales software. Set sales goals for yourself. Try to actively increase email open rates, meetings booked, and deals closed on a weekly basis. A good team leader doesn’t just inspire others with words, they lead by example.

2) Become a minor mentor

If someone new joins the team — or if there’s a team member who’s struggling to hit their targets — help them out. It’s great practice acting as a leader, and it will establish you as a valuable member of the team.

3) Take responsibility

You need to own up and take responsibility for your mistakes. The best leaders never pass the buck. They share their successes with their team, and they take personal responsibility for every mistake.

It’s also important that you take on more responsibility when it’s available. Show yourself to be a trustworthy team player who’s not afraid to take on challenging tasks.

It’s going to mean longer days and a more stressful work life without any extra money, but in the long run, it will be a huge feather in your cap when the promotion decision is being made.

Step #5: Plan for It

Don’t misunderstand this.

You can’t plan for a promotion in the way most people plan their day. You can’t say, “I’m going to be in this position by this date”. It never works like that because there’s too much that’s out of your control.

However, you can plan the actions that will make you the perfect candidate. You need to be ready for promotion whenever it makes itself available. Start with the ideas above, set up realistic objectives for yourself, and you’ll already be one step closer towards your goal of grabbing that sales manager role.

How to Become a Sales Manager

Becoming a sales manager isn’t rocket science, but if that’s your plan, you need to be purposeful about it. Let your manager know you’re interested in the role. Get the support you need to level up your skills. And above all, start acting like a sales manager now — and you’ll easily stand out as the obvious choice when the time comes.

  Go to our website:   www.ncmalliance.com

How to Become a Sales Manager in 2020 (Your Foolproof Formula) by Dan Tyre Want to know how to become a sales manager? If you’ve done everything you can at your current role and need the challenge only promotion to sales manager will bring, you’re in luck.

[debrahnesbit]

What Comes Next for Canadian Digital Policy Under a Liberal Minority Government?

In the closing months of the last Liberal majority government mandate, I spoke to a government official about the lessons learned from the prior four years. Their response?  If we knew then what we know now, we would have moved much faster on policy. The four years moves very quickly and if you don’t manage to lay the groundwork and introduce proposed legislation within the first 12 – 24 months, it becomes very difficult to enact given competing policy priorities, demands on committee time, Senate review, and a myriad of other challenges.

As I think about what comes next for Canadian digital policy under the new Liberal minority government, those words strike me as more relevant than ever. Even if the government runs more like a majority than a minority (which certainly seems likely on digital policy as no one is forcing an election over privacy or wireless pricing), the same ministers return to their portfolios (which may or may not happen) and the same committee structures return largely unchanged (which will not happen since that INDU chair Dan Ruimy was not re-elected), picking up where the government left off in June will not be easy. Further, the Liberal platform provides the roadmap for future reforms, but moving rapidly on these issues – particularly given expectations that a minority government’s mandate may run shorter than a majority – suggests that quick wins will be preferred to extensive legislative reform.

So what are likely next steps on digital policy?

During the election campaign, I wrote an op-ed comparing the Liberal and Conservative proposals and discussed the various platforms on my podcast in a conversation with OpenMedia’s Laura Tribe. There are at least six areas of potential focus with considerable overlap between them: telecom and broadband, privacy, culture, tech company regulation and taxation, copyright, and international policy.

Telecom and Broadband Access

The telecom file garnered considerable attention during the campaign as most parties (Conservatives excluded) took turns promising to lower wireless and Internet costs. I also wrote an op-ed on wireless policies, summarizing the Liberal plan as:

Meanwhile, the Liberals launched their own proposal over the weekend with a promise to cut prices by 25 per cent over the next four years. Rather than relying on price caps, the party says it plans to work with the carriers “to offer plans comparable to global prices, plus an unlimited family plan”, create new competition by mandating wholesale access for new mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) that pay for access to existing networks but offer their own pricing and plans, and set-aside future spectrum to make it easier for new entrants to enter the marketplace.

The op-ed identifies several ways to make the plan more effective, including greater certainty on the telecom policy direction, fully opening the market to competition, rejecting new fees on wireless and Internet services, and use affordability as a foundation for telecom policy.

The likely outcome is that the government will wait for the CRTC’s MVNO process to take shape and monitor pricing data over the next 24 months. When combined with reform recommendations from the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review Panel (report due in January 2020), the government is unlikely to introduce major changes until for at least one year, likely two. It will be too late for a major overhaul by that time, but assuming change is desired, quick wins would include expanded MVNO competition, the 3500 MHz spectrum auction that is viewed as essential for 5G implementation, and naming a new CRTC chair in 2022 when the term of current chair Ian Scott comes to an end.

As for broadband access, the Liberal approach is well established with programs designed to provide funding for rural broadband initiatives and a commitment to universal, affordable broadband access by 2030. Given the timeline, major changes from the current path would be a surprise.

Privacy

The Liberal platform identifies its Digital Charter, introduced earlier this year, as the basis for future reforms. The Charter envisioned privacy reform post-election, including changes to consent standards, stronger enforcement, and data portability. The platform also promises a new Data Commissioner, though it remains unclear how that role would intersect with the federal privacy commissioner.

While the document provides a reasonable starting point for discussion, further consultation seems likely before any new bill is tabled at the House of Commons. Indeed, the best case for privacy reform would be for formal consultations based on the Digital Charter to wrap up by the fall of 2020 with legislation introduced before the end of the year. Privacy reform can be contentious, however, and slipping into 2021 is a distinct possibility. If that happens, there is a real risk that the legislative clock will run out on the bill before it can be enacted as heavy lobbying on virtually any significant reform is a near-certainty. Should that happen, pressure from the European Union on the adequacy of Canadian privacy law is likely to intensify.

Culture

The Liberal platform devoted a specific section to culture, promising to strengthen the CBC’s regional mandate, open up the CBC digital platform for journalism startups and community newspapers, and increase Telefilm funding. Yet the most important – and likely contentious issue – involves Internet companies:

move forward, in our first year, with legislation that will take appropriate measures to ensure that all content providers – including internet giants – offer meaningful levels of Canadian content in their catalogues, contribute to the creation of Canadian content in both official languages, and promote this content and make it easily accessible on their platforms.

This commitment is notable for the inclusion of a timeline (first year of the mandate), who it covers, and the flexibility in the requirement. While something is coming in the first year – the government will presumably wait for the final report from the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review Panel in January 2020 before acting – the specific language is somewhat ambiguous, stating it will ensure meaningful levels of Canadian content, contribution to the creation of Canadian content, and promotion of that content. Further, it applies solely to content providers, thereby excluding Internet and wireless providers from its ambit.

Companies such as Netflix could argue they already meet these standards given that they offer considerable Canadian content, spend hundreds of millions on productions each year in Canada, and promote that content on their platforms. It goes without saying that cultural groups would like the government to ignore data that indicates record investment in production in Canada and to mandate commitments that go far beyond current expenditures in the form of contributions to funding programs. There is a risk in doing so, however, since the USMCA might allow the U.S. to retaliate with measures of “equivalent commercial effect.”  The net effect could be hundreds of millions of retaliatory tariffs or measures against Canadian goods and services.

Tech company regulation and taxation

As I noted during the campaign, the Liberal platform marked a dramatic shift in approach to technology companies, shifting from an emphasis on innovation to regulation. The platform features several technology regulation proposals, including a promise to introduce new legal requirements “that all platforms remove illegal content, including hate speech, within 24 hours or face significant financial penalties.” The policy, which borrows from similar rules in Germany, is intended to put pressure Internet platforms to more aggressively remove online content. The platform also promises greater labour protections for people who work through digital platforms, though most of those workers will fall under provincial jurisdiction.

The Liberals have also promised to address taxation, though their proposals also provide some flexibility. The platform commitment states:

make sure that multinational tech giants pay corporate tax on the revenue they generate in Canada. We will also work to achieve the standard set by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to ensure that international digital corporations whose products are consumed in Canada collect and remit the same level of sales taxation as Canadian digital corporations.

According to the Parliamentary Budget Officer costing exercise, the corporate tax proposal would take effect on April 1, 2020 with a three per cent tax on targeted advertising services and digital intermediation services with global revenues of over $1 billion and Canadian revenues of more than $40 million. This would cover search and social media services, but the scope of “digital intermediation services” is uncertain. For example, it seems unlikely to cover a content provider such as Netflix.

As for digital sales taxes, those are likely coming but only after international standards are developed. In fact, the Liberal platform commits only to working with the OECD to establish a standard, not actually implementing digital sales taxes.

Copyright

Copyright did not figure prominently in any major party platform and only made an appearance in the campaign toward the very end with the CBC’s ill-advised lawsuit against the Conservative Party. The lawsuit is unlikely to dissuade parties from using copyright works in their campaign materials, but may succeed in demonstrating the importance of a robust fair dealing provision in the law. Indeed, expanding the fair dealing provision was one of the recommendations of the copyright review.

Having just completed the review, the government is unlikely to prioritize major reforms early in its mandate. The review recommended many reforms (as well as further study of some issues) but a copyright overhaul would be difficult in a minority government environment. In fact, the most notable copyright issue may arise from the potential ratification of the USMCA. Should that trade deal proceed, Canada has two years to implement copyright term extension with the prospect of adopting innovative approaches that meet the treaty requirements and safeguard large portions of the public domain by instituting a registration requirement. That approach would be consistent with the copyright review recommendation and will receive attention as the deadline for implementation gets closer.

International Policy

The Liberal platform references several international policies that intersect with digital issues. As noted above, there is a commitment to work with the OECD to develop global standards on digital sales taxation. Similarly, the technology company regulation rules around content moderation and takedowns are derived from international discussions with countries such as Germany, France, and New Zealand.

In a commitment that would bring a smile to my late colleague Ian Kerr, the Liberals also promise to support a ban on lethal autonomous weapons:

take a leadership role in ensuring the ethical use of new technology, by developing and supporting international protocols to ban the development and use of fully autonomous weapons systems;

The commitment is consistent with its earlier emphasis on ethics and artificial intelligence. While there is much work to do to bring other countries on board, it suggests that Canada hopes to play an important role in developing emerging global technology policies.

The post What Comes Next for Canadian Digital Policy Under a Liberal Minority Government? appeared first on Michael Geist.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8247009 http://www.michaelgeist.ca/2019/10/what-comes-next-for-canadian-digital-policy-under-a-liberal-minority-government/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[toomanysinks]

The damage of defaults

Apple popped out a new pair of AirPods this week. The design looks exactly like the old pair of AirPods. Which means I’m never going to use them because Apple’s bulbous earbuds don’t fit my ears. Think square peg, round hole.

The only way I could rock AirPods would be to walk around with hands clamped to the sides of my head to stop them from falling out. Which might make a nice cut in a glossy Apple ad for the gizmo — suggesting a feeling of closeness to the music, such that you can’t help but cup; a suggestive visual metaphor for the aural intimacy Apple surely wants its technology to communicate.

But the reality of trying to use earbuds that don’t fit is not that at all. It’s just shit. They fall out at the slightest movement so you either sit and never turn your head or, yes, hold them in with your hands. Oh hai, hands-not-so-free-pods!

The obvious point here is that one size does not fit all — howsoever much Apple’s Jony Ive and his softly spoken design team believe they have devised a universal earbud that pops snugly in every ear and just works. Sorry, nope!

Hi @tim_cook, I fixed that sketch for you. Introducing #InPods — because one size doesn’t fit all pic.twitter.com/jubagMnwjt

— Natasha (@riptari) March 20, 2019

A proportion of iOS users — perhaps other petite women like me, or indeed men with less capacious ear holes — are simply being removed from Apple’s sales equation where earbuds are concerned. Apple is pretending we don’t exist.

Sure we can just buy another brand of more appropriately sized earbuds. The in-ear, noise-canceling kind are my preference. Apple does not make ‘InPods’. But that’s not a huge deal. Well, not yet.

It’s true, the consumer tech giant did also delete the headphone jack from iPhones. Thereby depreciating my existing pair of wired in-ear headphones (if I ever upgrade to a 3.5mm-jack-less iPhone). But I could just shell out for Bluetooth wireless in-ear buds that fit my shell-like ears and carry on as normal.

Universal in-ear headphones have existed for years, of course. A delightful design concept. You get a selection of different sized rubber caps shipped with the product and choose the size that best fits.

Unfortunately Apple isn’t in the ‘InPods’ business though. Possibly for aesthetic reasons. Most likely because — and there’s more than a little irony here — an in-ear design wouldn’t be naturally roomy enough to fit all the stuff Siri needs to, y’know, fake intelligence.

Which means people like me with small ears are being passed over in favor of Apple’s voice assistant. So that’s AI: 1, non-‘standard’-sized human: 0. Which also, unsurprisingly, feels like shit.

I say ‘yet’ because if voice computing does become the next major computing interaction paradigm, as some believe — given how Internet connectivity is set to get baked into everything (and sticking screens everywhere would be a visual and usability nightmare; albeit microphones everywhere is a privacy nightmare… ) — then the minority of humans with petite earholes will be at a disadvantage vs those who can just pop in their smart, sensor-packed earbud and get on with telling their Internet-enabled surroundings to do their bidding.

Will parents of future generations of designer babies select for adequately capacious earholes so their child can pop an AI in? Let’s hope not.

We’re also not at the voice computing singularity yet. Outside the usual tech bubbles it remains a bit of a novel gimmick. Amazon has drummed up some interest with in-home smart speakers housing its own voice AI Alexa (a brand choice that has, incidentally, caused a verbal headache for actual humans called Alexa). Though its Echo smart speakers appear to mostly get used as expensive weather checkers and egg timers. Or else for playing music — a function that a standard speaker or smartphone will happily perform.

Certainly a voice AI is not something you need with you 24/7 yet. Prodding at a touchscreen remains the standard way of tapping into the power and convenience of mobile computing for the majority of consumers in developed markets.

The thing is, though, it still grates to be ignored. To be told — even indirectly — by one of the world’s wealthiest consumer technology companies that it doesn’t believe your ears exist.

Or, well, that it’s weighed up the sales calculations and decided it’s okay to drop a petite-holed minority on the cutting room floor. So that’s ‘ear meet AirPod’. Not ‘AirPod meet ear’ then.

But the underlying issue is much bigger than Apple’s (in my case) oversized earbuds. Its latest shiny set of AirPods are just an ill-fitting reminder of how many technology defaults simply don’t ‘fit’ the world as claimed.

Because if cash-rich Apple’s okay with promoting a universal default (that isn’t), think of all the less well resourced technology firms chasing scale for other single-sized, ill-fitting solutions. And all the problems flowing from attempts to mash ill-mapped technology onto society at large.

When it comes to wrong-sized physical kit I’ve had similar issues with standard office computing equipment and furniture. Products that seems — surprise, surprise! — to have been default designed with a 6ft strapping guy in mind. Keyboards so long they end up gifting the smaller user RSI. Office chairs that deliver chronic back-pain as a service. Chunky mice that quickly wrack the hand with pain. (Apple is a historical offender there too I’m afraid.)

The fixes for such ergonomic design failures is simply not to use the kit. To find a better-sized (often DIY) alternative that does ‘fit’.

But a DIY fix may not be an option when discrepancy is embedded at the software level — and where a system is being applied to you, rather than you the human wanting to augment yourself with a bit of tech, such as a pair of smart earbuds.

With software, embedded flaws and system design failures may also be harder to spot because it’s not necessarily immediately obvious there’s a problem. Oftentimes algorithmic bias isn’t visible until damage has been done.

And there’s no shortage of stories already about how software defaults configured for a biased median have ended up causing real-world harm. (See for example: ProPublica’s analysis of the COMPAS recidividism tool — software it found incorrectly judging black defendants more likely to offend than white. So software amplifying existing racial prejudice.)

Of course AI makes this problem so much worse.

Which is why the emphasis must be on catching bias in the datasets — before there is a chance for prejudice or bias to be ‘systematized’ and get baked into algorithms that can do damage at scale.

The algorithms must also be explainable. And outcomes auditable. Transparency as disinfectant; not secret blackboxes stuffed with unknowable code.

Doing all this requires huge up-front thought and effort on system design, and an even bigger change of attitude. It also needs massive, massive attention to diversity. An industry-wide championing of humanity’s multifaceted and multi-sized reality — and to making sure that’s reflected in both data and design choices (and therefore the teams doing the design and dev work).

You could say what’s needed is a recognition there’s never, ever a one-sized-fits all plug.

Indeed, that all algorithmic ‘solutions’ are abstractions that make compromises on accuracy and utility. And that those trade-offs can become viciously cutting knives that exclude, deny, disadvantage, delete and damage people at scale.

Expensive earbuds that won’t stay put is just a handy visual metaphor.

And while discussion about the risks and challenges of algorithmic bias has stepped up in recent years, as AI technologies have proliferated — with mainstream tech conferences actively debating how to “democratize AI” and bake diversity and ethics into system design via a development focus on principles like transparency, explainability, accountability and fairness — the industry has not even begun to fix its diversity problem.

It’s barely moved the needle on diversity. And its products continue to reflect that fundamental flaw.

Stanford just launched their Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (@StanfordHAI) with great fanfare. The mission: "The creators and designers of AI must be broadly representative of humanity."

121 faculty members listed.

Not a single faculty member is Black. pic.twitter.com/znCU6zAxui

— Chad Loder ❁ (@chadloder) March 21, 2019

Many — if not most — of the tech industry’s problems can be traced back to the fact that inadequately diverse teams are chasing scale while lacking the perspective to realize their system design is repurposing human harm as a de facto performance measure. (Although ‘lack of perspective’ is the charitable interpretation in certain cases; moral vacuum may be closer to the mark.)

As WWW creator, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, has pointed out, system design is now society design. That means engineers, coders, AI technologists are all working at the frontline of ethics. The design choices they make have the potential to impact, influence and shape the lives of millions and even billions of people.

And when you’re designing society a median mindset and limited perspective cannot ever be an acceptable foundation. It’s also a recipe for product failure down the line.

The current backlash against big tech shows that the stakes and the damage are very real when poorly designed technologies get dumped thoughtlessly on people.

Life is messy and complex. People won’t fit a platform that oversimplifies and overlooks. And if your excuse for scaling harm is ‘we just didn’t think of that’ you’ve failed at your job and should really be headed out the door.

Because the consequences for being excluded by flawed system design are also scaling and stepping up as platforms proliferate and more life-impacting decisions get automated. Harm is being squared. Even as the underlying industry drum hasn’t skipped a beat in its prediction that everything will be digitized.

Which means that horribly biased parole systems are just the tip of the ethical iceberg. Think of healthcare, social welfare, law enforcement, education, recruitment, transportation, construction, urban environments, farming, the military, the list of what will be digitized — and of manual or human overseen processes that will get systematized and automated — goes on.

Software — runs the industry mantra — is eating the world. That means badly designed technology products will harm more and more people.

But responsibility for sociotechnical misfit can’t just be scaled away as so much ‘collateral damage’.

So while an ‘elite’ design team led by a famous white guy might be able to craft a pleasingly curved earbud, such an approach cannot and does not automagically translate into AirPods with perfect, universal fit.

It’s someone’s standard. It’s certainly not mine.

We can posit that a more diverse Apple design team might have been able to rethink the AirPod design so as not to exclude those with smaller ears. Or make a case to convince the powers that be in Cupertino to add another size choice. We can but speculate.

What’s clear is the future of technology design can’t be so stubborn.

It must be radically inclusive and incredibly sensitive. Human-centric. Not locked to damaging defaults in its haste to impose a limited set of ideas.

Above all, it needs a listening ear on the world.

Indifference to difference and a blindspot for diversity will find no future here.

source https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/23/the-damage-of-defaults/

[fmservers]

The damage of defaults

Apple popped out a new pair of AirPods this week. The design looks exactly like the old pair of AirPods. Which means I’m never going to use them because Apple’s bulbous earbuds don’t fit my ears. Think square peg, round hole.

The only way I could rock AirPods would be to walk around with hands clamped to the sides of my head to stop them from falling out. Which might make a nice cut in a glossy Apple ad for the gizmo — suggesting a feeling of closeness to the music, such that you can’t help but cup; a suggestive visual metaphor for the aural intimacy Apple surely wants its technology to communicate.

But the reality of trying to use earbuds that don’t fit is not that at all. It’s just shit. They fall out at the slightest movement so you either sit and never turn your head or, yes, hold them in with your hands. Oh hai, hands-not-so-free-pods!

The obvious point here is that one size does not fit all — howsoever much Apple’s Jony Ive and his softly spoken design team believe they have devised a universal earbud that pops snugly in every ear and just works. Sorry, nope!

Hi @tim_cook, I fixed that sketch for you. Introducing #InPods — because one size doesn’t fit all pic.twitter.com/jubagMnwjt

— Natasha (@riptari) March 20, 2019

A proportion of iOS users — perhaps other petite women like me, or indeed men with less capacious ear holes — are simply being removed from Apple’s sales equation where earbuds are concerned. Apple is pretending we don’t exist.

Sure we can just buy another brand of more appropriately sized earbuds. The in-ear, noise-canceling kind are my preference. Apple does not make ‘InPods’. But that’s not a huge deal. Well, not yet.

It’s true, the consumer tech giant did also delete the headphone jack from iPhones. Thereby depreciating my existing pair of wired in-ear headphones (if I ever upgrade to a 3.5mm-jack-less iPhone). But I could just shell out for Bluetooth wireless in-ear buds that fit my shell-like ears and carry on as normal.

Universal in-ear headphones have existed for years, of course. A delightful design concept. You get a selection of different sized rubber caps shipped with the product and choose the size that best fits.

Unfortunately Apple isn’t in the ‘InPods’ business though. Possibly for aesthetic reasons. Most likely because — and there’s more than a little irony here — an in-ear design wouldn’t be naturally roomy enough to fit all the stuff Siri needs to, y’know, fake intelligence.

Which means people like me with small ears are being passed over in favor of Apple’s voice assistant. So that’s AI: 1, non-‘standard’-sized human: 0. Which also, unsurprisingly, feels like shit.

I say ‘yet’ because if voice computing does become the next major computing interaction paradigm, as some believe — given how Internet connectivity is set to get baked into everything (and sticking screens everywhere would be a visual and usability nightmare; albeit microphones everywhere is a privacy nightmare… ) — then the minority of humans with petite earholes will be at a disadvantage vs those who can just pop in their smart, sensor-packed earbud and get on with telling their Internet-enabled surroundings to do their bidding.

Will parents of future generations of designer babies select for adequately capacious earholes so their child can pop an AI in? Let’s hope not.

We’re also not at the voice computing singularity yet. Outside the usual tech bubbles it remains a bit of a novel gimmick. Amazon has drummed up some interest with in-home smart speakers housing its own voice AI Alexa (a brand choice that has, incidentally, caused a verbal headache for actual humans called Alexa). Though its Echo smart speakers appear to mostly get used as expensive weather checkers and egg timers. Or else for playing music — a function that a standard speaker or smartphone will happily perform.

Certainly a voice AI is not something you need with you 24/7 yet. Prodding at a touchscreen remains the standard way of tapping into the power and convenience of mobile computing for the majority of consumers in developed markets.

The thing is, though, it still grates to be ignored. To be told — even indirectly — by one of the world’s wealthiest consumer technology companies that it doesn’t believe your ears exist.

Or, well, that it’s weighed up the sales calculations and decided it’s okay to drop a petite-holed minority on the cutting room floor. So that’s ‘ear meet AirPod’. Not ‘AirPod meet ear’ then.

But the underlying issue is much bigger than Apple’s (in my case) oversized earbuds. Its latest shiny set of AirPods are just an ill-fitting reminder of how many technology defaults simply don’t ‘fit’ the world as claimed.

Because if cash-rich Apple’s okay with promoting a universal default (that isn’t), think of all the less well resourced technology firms chasing scale for other single-sized, ill-fitting solutions. And all the problems flowing from attempts to mash ill-mapped technology onto society at large.

When it comes to wrong-sized physical kit I’ve had similar issues with standard office computing equipment and furniture. Products that seems — surprise, surprise! — to have been default designed with a 6ft strapping guy in mind. Keyboards so long they end up gifting the smaller user RSI. Office chairs that deliver chronic back-pain as a service. Chunky mice that quickly wrack the hand with pain. (Apple is a historical offender there too I’m afraid.)

The fixes for such ergonomic design failures is simply not to use the kit. To find a better-sized (often DIY) alternative that does ‘fit’.

But a DIY fix may not be an option when discrepancy is embedded at the software level — and where a system is being applied to you, rather than you the human wanting to augment yourself with a bit of tech, such as a pair of smart earbuds.

With software, embedded flaws and system design failures may also be harder to spot because it’s not necessarily immediately obvious there’s a problem. Oftentimes algorithmic bias isn’t visible until damage has been done.

And there’s no shortage of stories already about how software defaults configured for a biased median have ended up causing real-world harm. (See for example: ProPublica’s analysis of the COMPAS recidividism tool — software it found incorrectly judging black defendants more likely to offend than white. So software amplifying existing racial prejudice.)

Of course AI makes this problem so much worse.

Which is why the emphasis must be on catching bias in the datasets — before there is a chance for prejudice or bias to be ‘systematized’ and get baked into algorithms that can do damage at scale.

The algorithms must also be explainable. And outcomes auditable. Transparency as disinfectant; not secret blackboxes stuffed with unknowable code.

Doing all this requires huge up-front thought and effort on system design, and an even bigger change of attitude. It also needs massive, massive attention to diversity. An industry-wide championing of humanity’s multifaceted and multi-sized reality — and to making sure that’s reflected in both data and design choices (and therefore the teams doing the design and dev work).

You could say what’s needed is a recognition there’s never, ever a one-sized-fits all plug.

Indeed, that all algorithmic ‘solutions’ are abstractions that make compromises on accuracy and utility. And that those trade-offs can become viciously cutting knives that exclude, deny, disadvantage, delete and damage people at scale.

Expensive earbuds that won’t stay put is just a handy visual metaphor.

And while discussion about the risks and challenges of algorithmic bias has stepped up in recent years, as AI technologies have proliferated — with mainstream tech conferences actively debating how to “democratize AI” and bake diversity and ethics into system design via a development focus on principles like transparency, explainability, accountability and fairness — the industry has not even begun to fix its diversity problem.

It’s barely moved the needle on diversity. And its products continue to reflect that fundamental flaw.

Stanford just launched their Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (@StanfordHAI) with great fanfare. The mission: "The creators and designers of AI must be broadly representative of humanity."

121 faculty members listed.

Not a single faculty member is Black. pic.twitter.com/znCU6zAxui

— Chad Loder ❁ (@chadloder) March 21, 2019

Many — if not most — of the tech industry’s problems can be traced back to the fact that inadequately diverse teams are chasing scale while lacking the perspective to realize their system design is repurposing human harm as a de facto performance measure. (Although ‘lack of perspective’ is the charitable interpretation in certain cases; moral vacuum may be closer to the mark.)

As WWW creator, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, has pointed out, system design is now society design. That means engineers, coders, AI technologists are all working at the frontline of ethics. The design choices they make have the potential to impact, influence and shape the lives of millions and even billions of people.

And when you’re designing society a median mindset and limited perspective cannot ever be an acceptable foundation. It’s also a recipe for product failure down the line.

The current backlash against big tech shows that the stakes and the damage are very real when poorly designed technologies get dumped thoughtlessly on people.

Life is messy and complex. People won’t fit a platform that oversimplifies and overlooks. And if your excuse for scaling harm is ‘we just didn’t think of that’ you’ve failed at your job and should really be headed out the door.

Because the consequences for being excluded by flawed system design are also scaling and stepping up as platforms proliferate and more life-impacting decisions get automated. Harm is being squared. Even as the underlying industry drum hasn’t skipped a beat in its prediction that everything will be digitized.

Which means that horribly biased parole systems are just the tip of the ethical iceberg. Think of healthcare, social welfare, law enforcement, education, recruitment, transportation, construction, urban environments, farming, the military, the list of what will be digitized — and of manual or human overseen processes that will get systematized and automated — goes on.

Software — runs the industry mantra — is eating the world. That means badly designed technology products will harm more and more people.

But responsibility for sociotechnical misfit can’t just be scaled away as so much ‘collateral damage’.

So while an ‘elite’ design team led by a famous white guy might be able to craft a pleasingly curved earbud, such an approach cannot and does not automagically translate into AirPods with perfect, universal fit.

It’s someone’s standard. It’s certainly not mine.

We can posit that a more diverse Apple design team might have been able to rethink the AirPod design so as not to exclude those with smaller ears. Or make a case to convince the powers that be in Cupertino to add another size choice. We can but speculate.

What’s clear is the future of technology design can’t be so stubborn.

It must be radically inclusive and incredibly sensitive. Human-centric. Not locked to damaging defaults in its haste to impose a limited set of ideas.

Above all, it needs a listening ear on the world.

Indifference to difference and a blindspot for diversity will find no future here.

Via Natasha Lomas https://techcrunch.com

#TechCrunch

[theconservativebrief]

I spend a lot of time thinking about Captain America. I think about how, after six Marvel Studios films featuring Chris Evans in the role, we’ve gotten to the point where it’s impossible to trace where Evans ends and where Cap begins. I think about how he’s evolved from a character whose duty was to serve his country into a character whose country let him down. I think about how he bicep-curled a helicopter.

And after seeing Avengers: Infinity War, and after seeing Evans tweeting about his character’s presumed cinematic end, I’ve thought a lot about what happens when Captain America dies.

“We don’t trade lives,” Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Cap, tells Vision around Infinity War’s midpoint, explaining that the Avengers leave no men, women, or any other forms of life behind. But as we see half the world’s population (including some of our favorite Avengers) decimated at the movie’s end, it’s not hard to foresee an outcome in next year’s Avengers 4 where Cap is put in the position of trading his life for others.

It’s been eight years since Evans donned the stars and stripes for Captain America: The First Avenger. In that time, he’s evolved from a selfless patriot to a man out of time to a prodigal son. Now, with the future of the universe at stake, the table is set for what could be the biggest moment in the character’s cinematic life.

Given Cap’s character arc, which has always been underscored by his selflessness, and how much Infinity War emphasized his stance on “trading lives,” it certainly seems like a noble sacrifice to save the universe lies in his future. And even if it somehow doesn’t come to that, he’s already cemented his legacy as Earth’s most enduring Avenger.

Cap in Infinity War. Marvel Studios

One of the biggest revelations in Infinity War is Thanos’s motivations for culling the universe: He believes that in order to sustain life, we have to reduce it by half. Resources are finite, and life is a burden on those resources. Eliminate life to an ideal degree (roughly half, according to Thanos’s math), and both life and resources reach an optimal level.

In other words, Thanos believes in trading lives.

The ultimate example of his willingness to trade is his choice to throw his adopted daughter Gamora off a cliff in order to obtain the Soul Stone. His sights are set on completing the Infinity Gauntlet and using it to create his vision of a utopia. Killing his daughter, whom he seems to genuinely love, is the price he’s willing to pay.

Steve Rogers and everything he stands for — and, by extension, the standard for what superheroes in Marvel’s Cinematic Universe strive to be — are the antithesis to Thanos. When faced with the choice between ripping the Mind Stone from Vision’s forehead and killing him, or protecting Vision and risking the fate of half the universe, Rogers refuses to trade a single life in the name of preserving his and countless others’. He’d rather die fighting than sacrifice an innocent to avoid the fight.

This stance is remarkable for a couple of reasons. First, Vision is an AI — Tony Stark’s computer program upgraded with the power of an Infinity Stone — which raises the question of whether Vision is even “alive” to begin with. Also, in contrast to Gamora and Thanos, Vision isn’t someone with a particularly distinct relationship to Steve Rogers. But despite this, Cap doesn’t hesitate in choosing to save Vision at all costs, risking the lives of Avengers and Wakandans alike to protect him.

When Avengers 4 unfolds next year it will most likely involve the resurrection of its vaporized heroes (especially those with confirmed sequels on the schedule). Because of this, I’d expect there to be a continued emphasis on Steve’s “we don’t trade lives” mantra — it’s one of the few lines he’s given in Infinity War, and it’s repeated — in contrast to Thanos’s worldview. There’s just too much symmetry and thematic opportunity there for Marvel to ignore it.

It wouldn’t surprise me if in Avengers 4, in order to undo Thanos’s massive cull, Steve Rogers would have to sacrifice himself to undo the damage of not trading Vision’s life — that he would be faced with having to “trade lives” to get back all the lives that were lost. And the only life Cap would be fine with trading would be his own. (It also wouldn’t surprise me if some sort of Soul Stone mythology leads to a confrontation between Cap and Red Skull, the supervillain from Captain America: The First Avenger who’s revealed to be the keeper of the Soul Stone in Infinity War.)

Cap sacrificing himself for the greater good would feel like the ultimate inverse of Thanos’s decimation: giving his life to save the people he loves, instead of killing someone he loves in the name of a greater good. It’s a sacrifice that only Cap could make.

Find you someone who looks at you the way Cap looks at everyone. Marvel Studios

Back in 2008, Marvel found itself a hero in Iron Man’s Tony Stark, who was sardonic, quippy, and smarter and cockier than his peers. Compared to other relatively earnest cinematic superheroes of the time, like the X-Men and Spider-Man, Tony Stark was the “cool” superhero we needed.

“It takes about two minutes of watching Robert Downey Jr. in action in Iron Man 3 — in any of his appearances as the armored Tony Stark, in fact — to realize what the other Avengers are lacking: Charisma,” Graeme McMillan wrote in Time in 2013, bemoaning the Cap’s stiffness and earnestness in comparison to the Avengers’ other leader.

But a lot changes in five years.

With the way the Marvel Cinematic Universe has since shaken out, with Tony Stark at fault for creating Ultron and ripping apart the Avengers in Civil War, Downey’s portrayal of an artisanal tech jerk hasn’t aged particularly well. (And while I don’t blame Marvel or Downey for this, I can’t see Elon Musk without thinking of the smarminess of Tony Stark, and vice versa.) Tony Stark’s cocksure genius has gone from being an asset to a liability, for the character and the franchise alike. And in those same five years, Cap has become the more endearing hero.

Ever since his first appearance in 2011’s The First Avenger, Steve Rogers has been defined by his spirit — it’s the reason he, in spite of his physical deficiencies, was chosen for the super soldier experiment. In 2012’s The Avengers, he’s a thawed-out man out of time; he has all the powers of a super soldier, but beneath his superhero surface is that scrawny guy who’s a grandpa among his peers. He’s a relic of America’s golden age, and his earnestness and selflessness feel like relics as well: too good and sweet to be of our contemporary time and place, and directly at odds with the modern sensibilities of Tony Stark.

But Cap’s evolution into the heart of the modern MCU begins with the surreal revelation in 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier that the country and the government he believed in and fought for has spoiled since he left it, forcing him to redefine his heroism in relationship to the government that first made him a hero. Then in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, he’s completely at odds with the government, defying orders to save and protect his friends and the greater good, while Tony Stark aligns the remaining Avengers with the government in the name of atoning for the damage he caused by creating Ultron.

Clashing with Tony’s contemporary sarcasm, Steve’s earnestness becomes timeless. His heroism isn’t undertaken out of duty like Tony’s, but rather woven into the fabric of his being. Tony Stark’s goodness saves him from himself, while Steve’s goodness is quantified in saving others.

Infinity War ends with a cliffhanger and a twist. Thanos eliminates half of the universe — and half of the Avengers — as the movie fades to black. But in a post-credits scene, Nick Fury is seen sending a distress call to someone he believes can save the day: Captain Marvel.

We know very little about the upcoming 2019 Captain Marvel film other than that it’s set in the 1990s and that its titular superhero, Carol Danvers, a.k.a. Captain Marvel, is an Air Force pilot caught in the middle of a war between two alien races, probably the Kree and the Skrulls. Setting the movie in the 1990s, and then possibly sending the character into space to deal with cosmic threats, could help explain why Captain Marvel hasn’t already appeared on Earth at some point in the MCU’s 10-year history.

But with the Avengers and the universe in tatters, the table is set for Captain Marvel to make her debut and rally the troops. It also feels like the time when the original core Avengers will pass the torch to the next generation of Marvel heroes.

Evans hasn’t detailed the specifics of his Captan America contract, but he told Good Morning America during the Infinity War press tour: “I don’t know what’s next — but by 2019, that’s it.” And this week he tweeted about how grateful he was for the memories and the experiences of playing (in past tense) the character.

Officially wrapped on Avengers 4. It was an emotional day to say the least. Playing this role over the last 8 years has been an honor. To everyone in front of the camera, behind the camera, and in the audience, thank you for the memories! Eternally grateful.

— Chris Evans (@ChrisEvans) October 4, 2018

Assuming Evans isn’t bluffing, there will be a storytelling opportunity for Captain America to pass his leadership of the team to another captain who happens to share many of his defining qualities (time displacement, an outsider to the core group, a US service member). It would make sense that Cap would sacrifice himself, but also that he would see to it that the Avengers are left in capable, caring, and responsible hands.

There’s thematic precedence for this in the comics that Avengers 4 could easily draw on for this scenario. In Captain Marvel No. 1, written by Kelly Sue DeConnick and drawn by Dexter Soy, Carol and Cap have a strikingly pertinent discussion about her taking the name “Captain Marvel” and leading the team. It’s primarily a conversation about legacy: Carol doesn’t want the title because she doesn’t want to be seen as stealing or besmirching the original Captain Marvel’s good name.

Cap and Carol in Captain Marvel No. 1. Marvel/Dexter Soy

Reading over that scene made me think about the title of Captain America as it stands in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Marvel has, over the past seven years, created a humanity in Captain America. In taking up that mantle, Steve Rogers has become one of the most beloved characters in pop culture, and the defining spirit of the first generation of Avengers. Should Avengers 4 be his last hurrah, it will also necessarily be a celebration of his legacy.

Original Source -> Avengers: Infinity War is the beginning of a goodbye to Captain America

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief