title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: The Jordans portrayed their characters in four films. In the early years of the radio show, they were supporting characters in the 1937 Paramount film "This Way Please", starring Charles "Buddy" Rogers and Betty Grable. Once the show hit its stride, they had leading roles in the RKO Radio Pictures films "Look Who's Laughing" (1941), "Here We Go Again" (1942), and "Heavenly Days" (1944).


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: The first two RKO films are generally considered the best, as they co-star fellow radio stars Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy. Harold Peary also appears in both as Gildersleeve, with Arthur Q. Bryan, Bill Thompson, Harlow Wilcox, Gale Gordon, and Isabel Randolph appearing in both their show roles and as other characters. Bill Thompson in "Look Who's Laughing" played two parts: The pushy sales-man, and the man who shouted "It's Hillary Horton". Gale Gordon played Otis Cadwalader, Molly's ex-boyfriend in "Here We Go Again". Arthur Q. Bryan played the Mayor's aide in "Look Who's Laughing". The Jordans' participation in "Look Who's Laughing" was set up in the Fibber McGee & Molly episode "Amusement Park" (June 17, 1941), in which Gale Gordon played an RKO pictures representative who followed the McGees around the amusement park and chose the McGees as a representative American couple to star in a movie with Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy. The day before the film's real-life premiere in San Francisco, the movie had its fictional opening in Wistful Vista during that week's radio episode, and Bergen and McCarthy made a guest appearance ("Premiere of Look Who's Laughing" (November 11, 1941)).


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: "Look Who's Laughing" has been released on VHS and DVD as part of the "Lucille Ball RKO Collection". "Here We Go Again" has been released on VHS and was released on DVD on January 14, 2014, through Warner Archives. "Heavenly Days" was also included in the January 2014 DVD release of "Here We Go Again" as part of a "double feature" DVD. "Look Who's Laughing", "Here We Go Again" and "Heavenly Days" have been featured on Turner Classic Movies.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: In addition to the feature films, the McGees appeared in character in the 1945 film "The All-Star Bond Rally", a promotional film for war bonds. The characters appear as bookends to the film, attending a stage presentation hosted by Bob Hope, who knows and recognizes them. "The All-Star Bond Rally" lapsed into the public domain in 1973 and is widely available.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: Other films featured the McGees' neighbors. The first film was called "Comin' Round the Mountain" (1940) and featured the McGees' neighbors The Old-Timer (played by Bill Thompson) and Gildersleeve, as the mayor of the town. Gildersleeve's character was in many other films before "The Great Gildersleeve" show and movies. Abigail Uppington is in the film "County Fair" along with Harold Peary, and his future radio show co-star Shirley Mitchell (who also played Leila Ransom in "The Great Gildersleeve"); the Uppington character also appeared in "Barnyard Follies".


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: NBC, taking stock of its most valuable broadcast properties and anticipating the lucrative new field of television, regarded " Fibber McGee and Molly" as being essential to its future plans. In 1948 the network offered to buy the franchise outright from its owners: Jim Jordan, Marian Jordan, and Don Quinn. The owners agreed to the buyout, and "Fibber McGee and Molly" officially became the property of NBC.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: The network had high hopes of converting the radio show to television. These hopes were not shared by the Jordans, who preferred to remain in radio. "They were trying to push us into TV, and we were reluctant," Jim Jordan told an interviewer many years later. "Our friends advised us, 'Don't do it until you need to. You have this value in radio--milk it dry.'" The Jordans grudgingly agreed to film a TV pilot when their longtime sponsor S. C. Johnson requested it, but the video adaptation was abandoned. The sponsor, anxious to devote more advertising dollars to television, parted company with "Fibber McGee and Molly" amicably. Pet Milk took over the sponsorship of the radio show in 1950 (for two years), followed by Reynolds Aluminum, which subsidized the show until the end of the primetime run on June 30, 1953.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: NBC wanted to keep its property going, so the show was retooled as a daily 15-minute show, aired Monday through Friday twice a day (afternoons and evenings). The retooling had new economies taking their toll on the original format. The studio audience was dispensed with, leaving the Jordans to record their dialogue in a quiet studio. All five of each week's episodes were recorded in a single session. (This proved a special boon to Marian Jordan, who found the new surroundings more comfortable and convenient.) The musical sections of the half-hour format were removed, leaving a quarter-hour of continuous comedy. Although announcer Harlow Wilcox and character comedian Gale Gordon did not participate in the daily shows, Bill Thompson and Arthur Q. Bryan continued making appearances alongside the Jordans, along with familiar radio performers Virginia Gregg, Herb Vigran, Robert Easton, and Mary Jane Croft, among others. The new format began airing on October 5, 1953, and was successful; NBC Radio kept "Fibber McGee and Molly" in its weekday lineup through March 23, 1956.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: NBC had launched an ambitious new format for its weekend programming in 1955: "Monitor". This was designed especially to demonstrate the immediacy and importance of radio, with a mixture of news, sports, music, comedy, human interest, and special events running continuously throughout the weekend hours. In 1957 NBC, still valuing its "Fibber McGee and Molly" property, invited Jim and Marian Jordan to record new comedy routines for "Monitor". These interludes, aired as "Just Molly and Me", featured the Jordans (alone, with no supporting cast) in five-minute sketches written by "Monitor" staffer (and Bob and Ray writer) Tom Koch. Koch caught the spirit of the series beautifully, bringing back many of the familiar hallmarks of the half-hour series and cleverly fashioning new stories in five-part serial form. A 1959 strip, "Autumn Drive," has Fibber and Molly planning to look at the fall foliage: episode one has the couple enthusing about the trip; episode two has McGee explaining foliage to Teeny; episode three has the McGees loading their car for any contingency; episode four has them on the road; and episode five has them reviewing the photographs they took on the tour. Radio historian Gerald S. Nachman has written that the Jordans anticipated renewing their contract with NBC for another three years when Marian's battle against ovarian cancer ended with her death in 1961.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: After the last of the "Just Molly and Me" radio shorts ceased production, there were two attempts at getting the McGees onto television. Only one came to fruition. The "Fibber McGee and Molly" TV series began production on March 15, 1959, for broadcast beginning in September 1959. Initial press releases stated that Jim Jordan, Jr. would be the director, but he became a consultant, along with the radio show's original creator, Don Quinn. The TV version was produced by William Asher for NBC (and co-sponsored by Singer Corporation and Standard Brands). Neither of the Jordans, nor Phil Leslie (the head writer by the end of the radio series), took part in the series. The decision was made to recast both roles, with younger actors Bob Sweeney and Cathy Lewis as Fibber and Molly respectively; Lewis had previously played Jane Stacy, a very similar straight-woman character, on the radio version of "My Friend Irma". Bill Davenport served as head writer for this series. The only radio alumnus to appear as a regular cast member was Harold Peary, who took the role of Mayor La Trivia.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: The TV version's main asset was character comic Bob Sweeney, who caught the spirit and cadence of Jim Jordan's "Fibber" delivery, alternating between cheerful, boastful, and fretful. Veteran screen actor Addison Richards made a good foil as Doc Gamble. The series had solid comedy situations, and might have succeeded as a typical domestic comedy if the characters had been named anything "but" Fibber and Molly, but it couldn't replicate the flavor and humor of the original "Fibber McGee and Molly". The TV series did not survive its first season, ending its run in January 1960. The pilot episode and at least three episodes of the television series have lapsed into the public domain.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: The second TV venture only got as far as the planning stages. NBC approached Jay Ward, producer of the "Rocky and Bullwinkle" TV cartoons, to film a series of half-hour "Fibber McGee and Molly" cartoons. This was probably an attempt by NBC to reactivate its property to compete with ABC's then-new cartoon sitcom "The Flintstones". Ward declined, and NBC's "Fibber McGee and Molly" franchise finally came to an end.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: In the 1970s, Jim Jordan briefly returned to acting. An episode of NBC's "Chico and the Man" featured a surprise appearance by Jordan as a friendly neighborhood mechanic. Jordan also lent his voice to Disney's animated film, "The Rescuers" (1977) and reprised his role as Fibber McGee (complete with the closet gag) in an advertisement for AARP. He died in 1988—a year before "Fibber McGee and Molly" was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: Jim Jordan married Gretchen Stewart (the widow of Yogi Yorgesson) after Marian's death. Gretchen and the Jordan children donated the manuscripts of "Smackout" and "Fibber McGee and Molly" to Chicago's Museum of Broadcast Communications after his death in 1988. Perhaps fittingly for his longtime radio alter ego, Jordan died on April Fool's Day.


title: Fibber McGee and Molly

text: The show has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame next to the NBC studios where the show was performed. The S.C. Johnson Company has preserved more than 700 shows it sponsored for fifteen years.


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: "Last Train to Clarksville" is a song by American pop rock band the Monkees. It was released as the band's debut single on August 16, 1966, and was later included on the group's self-titled album, which was released on October 10, 1966. The song, written by Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, was recorded at RCA Victor Studio B in Hollywood on July 25, 1966, and was already on the Boss Radio "Hit Bounds" playlist on August 17, 1966. The song topped the "Billboard" Hot 100 on November 5, 1966. Lead vocals were performed by the Monkees' drummer, Micky Dolenz. "Last Train to Clarksville" was featured in seven episodes of the band's television series, the most for any Monkees song.


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: The song was written by the songwriting duo of Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart. Boyce has said that the song's opening guitar part (played by Louis Shelton) was an attempt to emulate the type of memorable and clearly identifiable riff that the Beatles had used in songs such as "I Feel Fine", "Day Tripper" and "Paperback Writer". The latter Beatles' song had reached number one on the U.S. charts three months earlier, around the time that "Last Train to Clarksville" was written and recorded. The lyrics too were inspired by "Paperback Writer": Hart misheard the end of that song on the radio and thought Paul McCartney was singing "take the last train"; Hart then decided to use the line himself, after he found out that McCartney was actually singing "paperback writer."


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: Hart knew that the Monkees' TV series was being pitched as a music/comedy series in the spirit of the Beatles' film "A Hard Day's Night," and he was hoping that by emulating the Beatles the song might become a successful single. He included a rhythmic lyric, and wrote in the "Oh No-No-No, Oh No-No-No" lyrics as a response to the Beatles' famous, "Yeah Yeah Yeah," from "She Loves You".


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: The lyrics tell of a man phoning the woman whom he loves, urging her to meet him at a train station in Clarksville before he must leave, possibly forever. There is no explicit reference to war in the song, but its last line, "And I don't know if I'm ever coming home," was an indirect reference to a soldier leaving for the Vietnam War. Hart has denied any connection by the song to the city of Clarksville, Tennessee, near Fort Campbell, Kentucky, the home of the 101st Airborne Division that was then serving in Vietnam. According to Hart, "We were just looking for a name that sounded good. There's a little town in northern Arizona I used to go through in the summer on the way to Oak Creek Canyon called Clarkdale. We were throwing out names, and when we got to Clarkdale, we thought Clarksville sounded even better. We didn't know it at the time, [but] there is an Army base near the town of Clarksville, Tennessee — which would have fit the bill fine for the storyline. We couldn't be too direct with the Monkees. We couldn't really make a protest song out of it—we kind of snuck it in."


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: Although Clarksville, a common location name in the U.S., is in the song's title, the video accompanying the song on the Monkees' TV show depicts a sign pointing to Clarkesville, a much less common spelling now used only for a single town in Georgia; other communities of that name have been either abandoned or renamed.


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: Boyce and Hart's band, Candy Store Prophets, performed the instrumental session work on the recording.


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: The single's B-side, "Take a Giant Step," later appeared as the closing track on Side 1 of the Monkees' debut album. Micky Dolenz performed lead vocals.


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: The song is presented as a plea to a heartbroken girl to move on from her past romantic disappointments and to "learn to live again at last" by "taking a giant step outside your mind." Critic Eric Lefcowitz describes the song as "proto-psychedelic."


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: Of "Last Train to Clarksville", "Billboard" remarked that "all the excitement generated by the promotion campaign for the new group...is justified


title: Last Train to Clarksville

text: by this debut disk loaded with exciting teen dance beat sounds." "Cash Box" said that it is "a hard-driving, pulsating romantic wailer with catchy repeating riff."


title: Executive information system

text: An executive information system (EIS), also known as an executive support system (ESS), is a type of management support system that facilitates and supports senior executive information and decision-making needs. It provides easy access to internal and external information relevant to organizational goals. It is commonly considered a specialized form of decision support system (DSS).


title: Executive information system

text: EIS emphasizes graphical displays and easy-to-use user interfaces. They offer strong reporting and drill-down capabilities. In general, EIS are enterprise-wide DSS that help top-level executives analyze, compare, and highlight trends in important variables so that they can monitor performance and identify opportunities and problems. EIS and data warehousing technologies are converging in the marketplace.


title: Executive information system

text: The term EIS lost popularity in favor of business intelligence (with the sub areas of reporting, analytics, and digital dashboards).


title: Executive information system

text: Traditionally, executive information systems were mainframe computer-based programs. The purpose was to package a company's data and to provide sales performance or market research statistics for decision makers, such as, marketing directors, chief executive officer, who were not necessarily well acquainted with computers. The objective was to develop computer applications that highlighted information to satisfy senior executives' needs. Typically, an EIS provides only data that supported executive level decisions, not all company data.


title: Executive information system

text: Today, the application of EIS is not only in typical corporate hierarchies, but also at lower corporate levels. As some client service companies adopt the latest enterprise information systems, employees can use their personal computers to get access to the company's data and identify information relevant to their decision making. This arrangement provides relevant information to upper and lower corporate levels.


title: Executive information system

text: When talking about computer hardware for an EIS environment, we should focus on the hardware that meets the executive's need. The executive must be put first and the executive's needs must be defined before the hardware can be selected. The basic hardware needed for a typical EIS includes four components:


title: Executive information system

text: In addition, with the advent of local area networks (LAN), several EIS products for networked workstations became available. These systems require less support and less expensive computer hardware. They also increase EIS information access to more company users.


title: Executive information system

text: Choosing the appropriate software is vital to an effective EIS. Therefore, the software components and how they integrate the data into one system are important. A typical EIS includes four software components:


title: Executive information system

text: An EIS must be efficient to retrieve relevant data for decision makers, so the user interface is very important. Several types of interfaces can be available to the EIS structure, such as scheduled reports, questions/answers, menu driven, command language, natural language, and input/output.


title: Executive information system

text: As decentralizing is becoming a trend in companies, telecommunications plays a pivotal role in networked information systems. Transmitting data from one place to another has become crucial for establishing a reliable network. In addition, telecommunications within an EIS can accelerate the need for access to distributed data. It can be both by scientific and business means.


title: Executive information system

text: EIS helps executives find data according to user-defined criteria and promote information-based insight and understanding. Unlike a traditional management information system presentation, EIS can distinguish between vital and seldom-used data, and track different key critical activities for executives, both which are helpful in evaluating if the company is meeting its corporate objectives. After realizing its advantages, people have applied EIS in many areas, especially, in manufacturing, marketing, and finance areas.


title: Executive information system

text: Manufacturing is the transformation of raw materials into finished goods for sale, or intermediate processes involving the production or finishing of semi-manufactures. It is a large branch of industry and of secondary production. Manufacturing operational control focuses on day-to-day operations, and the central idea of this process is effectiveness.


title: Executive information system

text: In an organization, marketing executives' duty is managing available marketing resources to create a more effective future. For this, they need make judgments about risk and uncertainty of a project and its impact on the company in short term and long term. To assist marketing executives in making effective marketing decisions, an EIS can be applied. EIS provides sales forecasting, which can allow the market executive to compare sales forecast with past sales. EIS also offers an approach to product price, which is found in venture analysis. The market executive can evaluate pricing as related to competition along with the relationship of product quality with price charged. In summary, EIS software package enables marketing executives to manipulate the data by looking for trends, performing audits of the sales data, and calculating totals, averages, changes, variances, or ratios.


title: Executive information system

text: Financial analysis is one of the most important steps to companies today. Executives needs to use financial ratios and cash flow analysis to estimate the trends and make capital investment decisions. An EIS integrates planning or budgeting with control of performance reporting, and it can be extremely helpful to finance executives. EIS focuses on financial performance accountability, and recognizes the importance of cost standards and flexible budgeting in developing the quality of information provided for all executive levels.


title: Executive information system

text: This trend frees executives from learning different computer operating systems, and substantially decreases implementation costs. Because this trend includes using existing software applications, executives don't need to learn a new or special language for the EIS package.


title: Executive information system

text: Interactive visualizations are trending. 3D visualizations in a VR/AR environment looks like a possibility already. Also, predictive analytics open the doors for (machine) learning what is going to be next based on data from the past. While the data processing can be done in many ways, learning is not completely unsupervised. There is still a good deal of classification using expert personnel analysis. In near realtime scenarios, latencies while doing ML can be a barrier. Optimizing data models, size and processing path/time are ongoing work. As more data is captured at different data stages in not only EIS apps but also other enterprise apps, audio and video tagging can catalyse data discovery.


title: Autotrader.com

text: Autotrader.com, Inc. is an online marketplace for car buyers and sellers, founded in 1997. It aggregates new, used, and certified second-hand cars from dealers and private sellers. The site also provides users with automotive reviews, shopping advice, and comparison tools for car financing and insurance information.


title: Autotrader.com

text: Autotrader.com is owned by the Cox Automotive subsidiary of Cox Enterprises. The company is led by Sanford Schwartz.


title: Autotrader.com

text: In 2010, Providence Equity Partners purchased a 25% interest, becoming a minority owner in the company. Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers is also an investor.


title: Autotrader.com

text: In August 2016, Cox Automotive bought out News Corp Australia's 55% stake in CarsGuide.com.au, forming the new automotive venture, Cox Automotive Australia. In the two years following, Cox Automotive worked with buyers and sellers through various avenues and identified a gap in the market. This eventually led to the launch of the Autotrader.com.au website in October 2018, alongside the Australian arm of Kelley Blue Book. In May 2020, eBay Classifieds group acquired Cox Media, which is the subsidiary of Cox Automotive that runs Autotrader.


title: Autotrader.com

text: The Australian branch operates slightly differently due to the specifics of the Australian market. The website styles itself as the 'automotive marketplace where everyone wins.' It suggests that it benefits buyers by providing them with dealer reviews, which allow buyers to review their experiences with sellers, as well as the Price Advisor provided through Kelley Blue Book; while sellers would benefit from having better-informed and more confident buyers. CEO Shaun Cornelius stated that the website is "cutting out legwork for dealers as they receive leads from buyers who are more primed and ready to purchase."


title: Autotrader.com

text: The website aggregates new, demonstrator and second-hand cars. For buyers, the company provides access to support and guidance, to allow them to make a more educated purchasing decision. They also provide transparent information about the dealer of the car, including the location, the name, a photo of the sales manager, their dealership rating and buyer reviews.


title: Autotrader.com

text: Autotrader.com offers services that help consumers buy cars, sell cars, or research car purchases. For those looking to buy a car, the site offers listings of new and used vehicles for sale from dealers and private sellers. It can search for cars through many categories: make and model, price range, style, drive type (automatic or manual), engine type, color (exterior and interior), mileage and number of doors.


title: Autotrader.com

text: Those looking to sell a car to a dealer can ask for offers from their local area. After taking their car to the dealer to verify its condition, the owner may then sell the car to the dealer for the offered price, either as cash or trade-in value. For sellers, you may purchase an ad package to create an ad with a description and upload up to 30 photos.


title: Autotrader.com

text: The firm has an editorial team that reviews new and used cars and provides tips and advice via videos, articles, and social media content. The firm offers its products and services online and on its iPhone, Android, Windows 8, and iPad apps.


title: Autotrader.com

text: The firm owns and operates AutoTraderClassics.com, an online marketplace of classic, antique, and specialty automobiles.


title: Autotrader.com

text: Autotrader earned the 2010 Most Useful Automotive Site, from J.D. Power and Associates, the 2012 Information Week 500 Award, and the 2013 Dealers' Choice Diamond Awards for both New and Used Vehicle Internet Leads.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth University is a private university in West Long Branch, New Jersey. Founded in 1933 as Monmouth Junior College, it became Monmouth College in 1956 and Monmouth University in 1995 after receiving its charter.


title: Monmouth University

text: There are about 4,400 full-time and 260 part-time undergraduate and 1,750 graduate students, as well as 302 full-time faculty members. About 80% of faculty members hold Ph.D.s or other terminal degrees in their field of study. The university's student-to-faculty ratio is about 14:1. Forty-four percent of students live on-campus. Most of Monmouth's student body is drawn from the northeastern United States, although student body is composed of students from 29 states and 28 countries.


title: Monmouth University

text: The school that would become Monmouth University was founded in 1933 as Monmouth Junior College, a two-year junior college under Dean Edward G. Schlaefer. Created in New Jersey during the Great Depression, Monmouth Junior College was intended by Schlaefer to provide an opportunity for higher education to high school graduates in Monmouth County who could not afford to go away to college. The junior college did not have its own campus at the time of its founding and was housed at Long Branch High School in Long Branch. Due to sharing a building with a high school, classes were taught during evening hours after the high school students had departed.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth Junior College opened to students on November 21, 1933. The junior college's first student enrollment was reported at 325, all graduates from Monmouth County high schools, with a faculty of 12 instructors. Federal reemployment funds financed the junior college, with approximately $18,000 approved by New Jersey Director of Emergency Relief John Colt.


title: Monmouth University

text: In 1947, the school received full college accreditation from the New Jersey Board of Education to award associate degrees to students. 100 students became the first recipients of associate degrees from Monmouth Junior College the following year. Support from students and the community is credited with helping the school continue to teach classes and become a privately funded institution.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth Junior College acquired its own campus in 1955 when it relocated from Long Branch to the estate of Shadow Lawn in West Long Branch. The estate was purchased from Eugene H. Lehman for $350,000. In addition to the monetary cost, Lehman signed over the estate under the provision that he serve as the school's president for one year.


title: Monmouth University

text: A year later, the school was renamed Monmouth College when it was accredited by the state to offer four-year programs that would award bachelor degrees to students. Through the agreement that granted Shadow Lawn to the school, Lehman became the first president of Monmouth College from 1956 to 1957. Schlaefer resumed leadership after Lehman's tenure, serving as president from 1957 to 1962. Monmouth's first commencement was held at Shadow Lawn the same year that Schlaefer assumed the presidency and the first bachelor's degrees were awarded the year after, in 1958.


title: Monmouth University

text: The 1960s saw further growth for Monmouth in campus size, athletics, student life, and academics. At the start of the decade, the Murry and Leonie Foundation transferred ownership of the Murry Guggenheim House to Monmouth, which became the school's library. The transfer also included a stable and carriage house that would be converted into the Lauren K. Woods Theatre. Elmwood and Pinewood, Monmouth's first campus residence halls, opened in 1963, while the William T. Boylan Gymnasium was built in 1965 as a new home for the basketball team. Additional property was acquired by the college in 1969 when Monmouth was granted ownership of Maurice Pollak's home, the site of what would become Pollak Theatre. Amid the campus expansion, Monmouth College received authorization from the state to offer graduate programs and award master degrees in 1967.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth's 50th anniversary in 1983 was coincided by its athletics program being granted Division I status from the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Teams representing Monmouth competed in the Northeast Conference for the next three decades. The 50th anniversary also saw the first Founders' Day at Monmouth, which would become an annual tradition. Four years later, the school's Athletics Hall of Fame was established. The school's athletic program was joined by a football team in 1993.


title: Monmouth University

text: A significant development occurred for Monmouth in 1995 when it was granted university status by the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education, resulting in the school being renamed Monmouth University. The university status was obtained under the leadership of Rebecca Stafford, the school's first female president, who described Monmouth as being "on the move". The College Center, constructed in the 1970s, would be renamed the Rebecca Stafford Student Center in her honor.


title: Monmouth University

text: The 21st century saw the completion of a pedestrian underpass on campus in 2001. By the end of the decade, the Multipurpose Activity Center replaced the William T. Boylan Gymnasium as the home of the men's and women's basketball teams in 2009. The new facility, which cost $57 million, was described by then-Senior Associate Athletic Director Jeff Stapleton as "probably the biggest undertaking that the institution has done". The facility was renamed OceanFirst Bank Center in 2016 after Monmouth University and OceanFirst Bank reached a $4 million agreement through 2036 that included the naming rights of the facility.


title: Monmouth University

text: The athletic teams would continue to compete in the Northeast Conference until 2013 when they moved to the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC). As the MAAC did not sponsor collegiate football, Monmouth's football team became part of the Big South Conference as an associate member. In 2022, all teams except for women's bowling joined the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA).


title: Monmouth University

text: The centerpiece of the Monmouth University campus is Shadow Lawn. Originally, it was the site of the Shadow Lawn mansion, constructed in 1903 and housed 52 rooms.


title: Monmouth University

text: After the original Shadow Lawn was destroyed by a fire in 1927, the current building that would become was built as a residence for Mr. and Mrs. Hubert Templeton Parson. Mr. Parson was the former head of F.W. Woolworth Company. The building was designed by Horace Trumbauer and Julian Abele. Abele is regarded as the first professional African American architect.


title: Monmouth University

text: Shadow Lawn became municipal property during the Great Depression and until Monmouth acquired ownership, it was home to Highland Manor Junior College, a private girls' school. Today, it is a National Historic Landmark. Some classrooms and the administrative offices are inside of the building.


title: Monmouth University

text: Shadow Lawn was named to the National Register of Historic Places on March 28, 1978. It was named a National Historic Landmark on February 4, 1985.


title: Monmouth University

text: Shadow Lawn has also been a host of the film version of "Annie", starring Aileen Quinn. Some of the scenes in this movie were filmed inside and outside of the building along with the rest of the Monmouth University campus. Shadow Lawn was used as Daddy Warbucks' mansion.


title: Monmouth University

text: Following Monmouth's acquisition of the estate, Shadow Lawn was renamed Woodrow Wilson Hall after United States President Woodrow Wilson, who stayed in the original mansion during his campaign in summer of 1916. The current mansion was renamed to Great Hall in 2020, with the university citing racist policies of Wilson for the change.


title: Monmouth University

text: In 1903, Murry Guggenheim (1858–1939), son of Meyer Guggenheim, bought property in West Long Branch to build a summer residence for himself and his wife, Leonie. The original structure of the Beaux-Arts mansion, designed by Carrère and Hastings is now the Murry and Leonie Guggenheim wing of the Monmouth University Library.


title: Monmouth University

text: The Guggenheim estate also included a stable and carriage house across the road on Cedar Avenue. This has been converted into the Lauren K. Woods Theatre.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth University's placement on the "U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges Ranking" increased during the 2010s, moving from 76 in 2005 to 37 in 2012 and 30 in 2013 among regional universities in the Northern United States. By 2018, Monmouth ranked at 28 among northern regional universities, its highest spot at the time from "U.S. News & World Report". The ranking also made Monmouth the highest private regional university in New Jersey and the state's second-highest regional university behind The College of New Jersey.


title: Monmouth University

text: Despite moving up in the "U.S. News & World Report" ranking, however, Monmouth University did not appear on Forbes Magazine's List of America's Best Colleges until 2021. Mark Blackmon, the director of News and Public Affairs at Monmouth, attributed the school's omission in 2016 to "Forbes" relying "on some information that can be highly subjective", with schools "[losing] points for awarding grants and scholarships". In response to Forbes allegedly lowering a school's ranking for providing financial support, Blackmon commented that, "We are actually quite proud that we can assist so many students in getting an education", and concluded, "Even though Monmouth failed to make the Forbes list, I think that it doesn't reflect the quality of its teachers and the type of school that Monmouth is. I think it should have definitely made it." The 2021 ranking marked the first appearance of Monmouth University, in which it placed 394.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth University has held multiple academic symposia on the work of Bruce Springsteen and houses the Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth University has a variety of on-campus clubs and organizations, including the campus television station "HawkTV"; the college radio station WMCX-FM, one of the last media outlets to interview Bob Marley and the first media outlet in America to announce his death; and the student-run newspaper "The Outlook", which has been published since 1933.


title: Monmouth University

text: The Department of Art and Design is an active participant in the arts of Monmouth. It maintains multiple galleries for exhibiting creative works of students, faculty, and staff, as well as practicing artists and designers.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth University also has its own independent, student run record label, Blue Hawk Records. The music organization allows students to learn hands-on, gaining relevant experience and encountering situations that would occur in the Music Industry. Blue Hawk Records allows students to work together, alongside experienced industry professionals, to build their skills in talent scouting, artist promotion and development, live music and record releases, artwork, packaging, sales, marketing, further learning the structure of business and how to mold artists into marketable material.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth's athletic teams are known as the Hawks. The Hawks compete as members of the Colonial Athletic Association. The school had competed as a Division I (NCAA) school in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference from 2013 to 2022, with football competing as an FCS independent in the 2013 season before joining the Big South Conference in 2014. Monmouth left the MAAC and join the CAA on July 1, 2022. Monmouth fields the following sports at the Division I level: baseball, basketball (men's and women's), bowling (women's) cross country (men's and women's), field hockey, football, golf (men's and women's), indoor track (men's and women's), lacrosse (women's and men's), soccer (men's and women's), softball, tennis (men's and women's), and track & field (men's and women's). In the fall of 2014, Monmouth announced the reintroduction of swimming programs (women's and men's) at the Division I level in the fall of 2015.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth University (then still Monmouth College), added football to the school's ledger of sports teams in 1993. The team's first game was played on September 25 of that year. The first points in school history were scored on a bizarre defensive play by intercepting and returning a two-point conversion.


title: Monmouth University

text: A new multipurpose activity center opened with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on September 16, 2009. The Center currently serves as the primary indoor athletic structure. A partnership agreement with OceanFirst Bank named the facility as the OceanFirst Bank Center in June, 2016. It houses a 4,100 seat competition arena; a 200-meter; six-lane indoor track; locker rooms; educational and conference space; ground-level bookstore; and fitness center. The new facility adjoins the William T. Boylan Gymnasium a 2,500-seat arena built in 1965.


title: Monmouth University

text: Monmouth has been in the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament in 1996, 2001, 2004, and 2006. Monmouth won their first NCAA men's basketball tournament game in 2006 when they beat Hampton University in that year's play-in game. It was the first time a Northeast Conference school won a game in the NCAA tournament since 1983 when Robert Morris University won in the opening round. Monmouth's men and women's soccer teams as well as baseball, women's lacrosse, men's tennis and men's golf team have also reached the NCAA tournament. The men's lacrosse team made the 2016 NCAA playoff tournament as well. The Monmouth Men's Soccer team is the only sport on campus to ever advance to the second round of the NCAA tournament. The men's soccer team also hosted three first round NCAA Tournament games on The Great Lawn, in 2009, 2010 and 2011. Monmouth's men's soccer team has even been ranked as one of the top teams in the country. In September 2010, Monmouth attained the #4 spot on the NSCAA/HendrickCars.com National Rankings and has been ranked in the national top 25 every single week for the past two seasons. Men's lacrosse won the 2021 MAAC conference championship


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Amílcar Cabral International Airport , also known as Sal International Airport, is the main international airport of Cape Verde. The airport is named after the revolutionary leader Amílcar Cabral. It is located two km west-southwest from Espargos on Sal Island. Sal is the main hub for the national airline, Cabo Verde Airlines; and serves as a base for carrier Cabo Verde Express. This airport was also one of NASA's locations for a facility to handle the Space Shuttle after reentering from orbit.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: The first airport on Sal Island was built in 1939 by Italy, as a fuel and provisions stopping-point on routes from Europe to South America. The first flight, an arrival from Rome and Seville, was on 15 December 1939. As a consequence of World War II, the Italian involvement in the airport project ceased. After World War II, the Portuguese colonial government purchased the airport from Italy and by 1949 the airport was a fully operational. In 1950, DC-4 service on Alitalia began on a Rome — Sal — Buenos Aires — Caracas route. In 1961 jet service (a DC-8) on the route rendered the stop at Sal unnecessary, and international service was suspended.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Between 1960 and 1967 Sal was a stop of the "Voo da amizade" ("Friendship Flight"), a dedicated service between Brazil and Portugal. It was operated from 1960 to 1965 by Panair do Brasil and from 1965 to 1967 by TAP-Transportes Aéreos Portugueses and Varig. Only Brazilian and Portuguese citizens or foreigners with permanent residence in Brazil or Portugal could purchase tickets for those flights, which were extremely popular due to their low fares. At this time, Cape Verde was a Portuguese Overseas Province and therefore part of the territory of Portugal.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: From 1963 to 1975, the Portuguese Air Force's No 1 Transit Airfield (AT1, "Aeródromo de Trânsito n.º 1") was installed in the Sal airport. The AT1 supported the military air connections between European Portugal and the Portuguese African provinces, as well as serving as the operational base for the maritime patrol aircraft occasionally deployed in Cape Verde.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Beginning in 1967, Sal was used as a refueling stop by South African Airways, for flights to and from Europe, since SAA was denied landing rights by most African countries due to the international boycott of apartheid. By 1983, SAA operated 13 round trips per week between Sal and Johannesburg, using the island as a stop for its Boeing 747 services to New York, Houston, London, Brussels and Amsterdam. The island saw as many as 36 SAA flights per week in the mid-1980s, but this number was cut dramatically following the imposition of US sanctions in 1987. By 1996 only one weekly SAA flight stopped at Sal (service between Johannesburg and New York). Sal was later used as a fuel stop on SAA's Atlanta service starting in 2003. SAA's final flight to Atlanta was on July 1, 2006.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Aeroflot used Sal as a stop on its Il-62 services from Moscow and Budapest to Dakar and Conakry in the late 1970s. Cubana also operated Il-62s on the Havana-Sal-Luanda-Maputo route in the early 1980s, and the Havana-Sal-Bissau-Luanda route in the late 1980s.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: In 1985, TACV began service to Boston, Massachusetts using a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 provided by LAM Mozambique Airlines. Boston hosts the largest Cape Verdean community in the United States. TACV flights to Boston have since been shifted to Praia International Airport. Other international destinations include inter alia Amsterdam, Lisbon, Luxembourg, Madrid, Paris, and Porto. Domestic destinations include Santiago and São Vicente.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Since 2017 Sal has been a refuelling stop for the twice-weekly South Atlantic Air Bridge service operated by Air Tanker between the UK and the Falkland Islands. This is a temporary arrangement until the runway at Ascension Island is repaired which is expected to be in 2020.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Amílcar Cabral has one terminal. It is a two-story building containing check-in, waiting, and arrival areas, as well as shopping, banking, and passenger services. The second floor houses airport operations and airline offices. There are four gates, and buses (Cobus 3000s) are used to transport passengers to the aircraft stands.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: Cabo Verde Express has its head office in the Concourse Hall. The two duty-free shops along with refreshment facilities, retail kiosks and outdoor smoking areas are located after security scanning and passport control, adjacent to the six departure gates.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: The airport's main runway is 3,272 m (10,734 ft) long and is the longest in Cape Verde. It is used for long-haul flights. It was also one of the designated emergency landing strips for the U.S. Space Shuttle. The second runway is 1,500 m (4,921 ft) long and was used by small planes. It is now closed for traffic.


title: Amílcar Cabral International Airport

text: The airport is located on the west side of the road (EN1-SL01) linking Espargos and Santa Maria, the island's main tourist destination. There is no scheduled public transport; taxicabs, shared cars known as "aluguer", and rental cars are available.


title: Abzû

text: Abzû is an adventure video game developed by Giant Squid Studios and published by 505 Games for PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and Amazon Luna. Initially released as a digital title in August 2016, a retail version for consoles was released in January 2017. Following the journey of a diver exploring the ocean and restoring life using sonar calls, the gameplay allows the player to freely navigate underwater environments ranging from open water and natural caverns to ancient ruins.


title: Abzû

text: Development lasted three years, involving a team of thirteen people. Several members, including director Matt Nava and composer Austin Wintory, had previously worked on the 2012 video game "Journey"—the ocean setting of "Abzû" was both a reaction to the desert setting of "Journey" and inspired by Nava's love of scuba diving. The setting and story drew from Sumerian mythology and the cosmic ocean myth. Reaching high positions in sales charts, "Abzû" was praised by journalists: the majority of praise went to its art style, with some critics comparing it to "Journey".


title: Abzû

text: In "Abzû", the player takes on the role of a diver in a vast ocean—after waking up floating on the ocean's surface, the diver begins exploring the surrounding underwater environments filled with plant and animal life, in addition to uncovering ancient technology and submerged ruins. In a few areas, the diver is also able to explore land-based environments above the water. As the game progresses, the diver unlocks new areas and pursues the secrets behind the forces harming the local environment. The diver's course through the game follows a linear path through interconnected areas filled with marine life. The player directs the diver through the environments using full analogue control, able to interact with the environment to solve switch or item-based puzzles, and the ability to meditate which grants the character the ability to sit on the shark-shaped pedestals within each area to observe the surrounding sea life. The diver can accelerate, and interact with marine life using sonar chimes. The diver can grab onto the bodies of larger marine animals and ride on them. Each area sports hidden collectables for the diver to find.


title: Abzû

text: The narrative of "Abzû" is told wordlessly through gameplay and using cutscenes, taking place in a vast ocean. The player character, referred to as a female diver, awakens floating in the ocean and begins exploring the surrounding sea: ruins and ancient murals show that an ancient civilization which shared a symbiotic connection with the ocean. As she explores, she is led by a great white shark to wells that—when activated using an energy from within her—restore life to the local seas. That energy is being forcefully harvested by pyramid-like devices, the development of which disrupted the ocean's balance and brought about the civilization's downfall. Upon reaching the original pyramid, the diver sees the great white shark attacking it, and the pyramid's counterattack damages the diver—revealing her to be mechanical and confirming her existence as a being connected to the pyramid and capable of restoring life to the ocean—and mortally wounds the great white shark, which dies as the diver comforts it. After activating the final well, the great white shark manifests and guides the repaired diver back to the original pyramid which the diver destroys, returning life to the ocean. During the credits, the diver and great white shark swim together through the revitalized ocean.


title: Abzû

text: The origins of "Abzû" lay in the development of "Journey", an independent video game developed by Thatgamecompany and released in 2012. "Abzû"s creator, director and art director Matt Nava had previously worked as art director for "Journey" during its three-year development. Having worked in a game featuring a desert setting, Nava wanted to change to a more vibrant and populated setting for his next title. Nava began creating the pitch for "Abzû" before leaving Thatgamecompany and founding the game's developer Giant Squid Studios. One of the main elements Nava incorporated was his love for ancient cultures and their artwork, particularly relating to the myths surrounding the concept of Abzu. Nava's love of the ocean, which he explored through his hobby of scuba diving, also figured heavily in the design of "Abzû". The team at Giant Squid Studios grew to ten developers from across the industry, mainly programmers who specialized in multiple aspects of game design from gameplay to graphics, in addition to a graphical and technical artist who helped create and animate the character models.


title: Abzû

text: The game was first announced at the 2014 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3). It was later previewed at E3 2016. The game's initial digital release was on PlayStation 4 via PlayStation Network and Windows through Steam on August 2, 2016. Later it was also released digitally on Xbox One through Xbox Live on December 6, 2016. The game also received a physical release for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on January 31, 2017. A Nintendo Switch was released through the Nintendo eShop on November 29, 2018. It was released in Japan on February 27, 2020. It was also included in the early access release of the cloud gaming platform Amazon Luna on October 20, 2020. All versions were published by 505 Games.


title: Abzû

text: The game's title stems from Sumerian mythology, particularly the myth of the ocean goddess Tiamat and the fresh water god Abzu uniting to form all life: a reason this was chosen was that myths surrounding land-based life and their supposed origins in a cosmic ocean were a recurring theme in multiple world mythologies. The title is made up of the Sumerian words "ab" (water) and "zu" (to know), translated by the developers as ""Ocean of Wisdom"". The word provided difficulties early on, as the Sumerian spelling "Abzu" differed from the Akkadian spelling "Apsû". As a compromise, the team merged the two spellings into the game's title. The circumflex over the letter "u" caused problems for the team as hardly anyone knew how to type it and the computer programs had trouble handling it as part of the coding. The use of the word played into the game's focus on the ocean due to its mythic connections. The Middle Eastern influences extended to the game's architecture, and incorporated Nava's wish for structures to have meaning beyond being simple scenery or tools for player progression.


title: Abzû

text: The aim from an early stage was not to simulate diving, but instead to capture the dream-like feeling of ocean exploration. As part of his research, Nava experimented with other ocean simulation games and found they were not "fun". By removing any time limit or air gauge, the team sought to promote a relaxing sense of exploration. The meditation mechanic was added during later development from 2015 to 2016 as a means of allowing players a view of the surrounding marine life and environment. When choosing their game engine, Matt Nava was still the only staff member and so they needed an easy-to-use platform with tools and technology to create the game. Unreal Engine 4 was still quite new at this time, but it was chosen after the team had vetted other developer software available at the time. The team were able to use both Unreal Engine 4's advanced developer tools and expand the engine's functionality to incorporate unique elements such as fish shoal behavior, vegetation animation, and underwater lighting. Using Unreal Engine 4 allowed engineer Derek Cornish to construct unique systems for underwater lighting effects.


title: Abzû

text: The artistic style was meant to portray a vibrant underwater world, but the team also needed to prevent activity on-screen from overwhelming the player, so a stylized look was chosen to both maintain the game's artistic style and reduce the amount of "visual noise". Environmental editing was a big issue for the team, with much of their early development dedicated to creating editing tools that could do small-scale edits to environments after they had been locked down. When creating the environments, Nava drew on his experience developing "Flower" for Thatgamecompany, creating sporadically scattered interaction points that triggered with player exploration and triggered new life or new elements within each environment. Since there was no dedicated animator, the team needed to use multiple techniques for animating the diver, fish and flexible vegetation: the diver used a skeletal animation run through a complex state machine, vegetation such as seaweed used rope physics, while fish mainly used mathematical motion in combination with morph target posing to remove the need of individual skeletal structures.


title: Abzû

text: The types of fish seen in "Abzû" were based on real-life creatures from the oceans of Earth, and to fit them into the game each species was distilled down to its most distinctive traits. The team had "tens of thousands" of fish within the game. Their swimming styles were directly modeled on the behavior and physics of real fish movements. The number of fish presented problems with running the game, but the programming staff developed a method of simplifying each fish's animation without compromising the game's visuals, which "multiplied the number of fish possible on screens by 10". Each fish species had its own unique artificial intelligence that had cascading levels of awareness and interaction with other species and objects in the environment. The team started with getting the fish to swim without clipping through walls, then built upon that with further expansion on fish behavior and interaction. Their most challenging task was creating realistic bait balling effects for shoals of small fish, which was only achieved and finalized near the end of development. The developers did take liberties by grouping together types of fish from different parts of the globe which would normally not be able to interact, though this fell in line with the game's overall theme and the myths it referenced. Despite this, the developers emulated the zones that each fish would be found in, whether it be a coral reef or the deep ocean where sunlight does not reach. The amount of work and the team's dedication to creating a realistic and vibrant experience meant they were creating fish until development finished.


title: Abzû

text: The soundtrack for "Abzû" was composed, conducted, and produced by Austin Wintory, who had previously worked on "Journey" and "The Banner Saga". Wintory was first shown concept art for the project by Nava before Giant Squid Studios was founded and development began. When the studio was founded, Wintory was invited on board the project. The music was written from the start to be interactive and dynamic rather than based on specific cues. To achieve this, Wintory had to play the game extensively and repeatedly to get a sense for what players would experience and what would best match the mood. Similar to Wintory's work on "Journey", the first track written was the main theme "To Know, Water" and further tracks were created over the game's three year development based on that theme. The track titles from the second piece onwards were taken either from an English translation of the "Enūma Eliš", or were named after marine creatures featured in levels where the tracks featured. The credits theme was purely choral, with the lyrics sung at normal speed.


title: Abzû

text: The score's instrumental element began with using a harp as its base, with a choir being used later. The choir sections, performed by the London Voices Choir were used to represent the spiritual elements of the story. The lyrics were the first ten lines of the "Enūma Eliš" used for each track with drawn-out syllables to sound alien. More instrumentation was needed, with a full orchestra eventually being incorporated. As with his work on "Journey" and "Assassin's Creed Syndicate", he used a soloist alongside an ensemble orchestra: in this case, the solo instrument was an oboe. The oboe solos were performed by Kristin Naigus, whom Wintory had heard performing a cover of a track from "Journey" on YouTube. The music for early levels went through extensive redrafts with an estimated fifty minutes of music being discarded for five minutes left in-game, though pieces of later sections came together quickly and remained generally unchanged. The Diver's theme formed a recurring leitmotif throughout the score. Wintory worked closely with "Abzû"s sound designer Steve Green and created a music-based story that flowed alongside and worked with the visual narrative of "Abzû".


title: Abzû

text: The official soundtrack was released as a digital album through Bandcamp and iTunes on August 2, 2016. A physical edition was released on October 22 through Varèse Sarabande. The album included a long piece of music in the track "Balaenoptera Musculus" that was not used in-game, but was included by Wintory as he liked the piece. Music reviewers were generally positive about the soundtrack album. The soundtrack later won the 2017 Game Audio Network Guild's "Best Original Soundtrack Album" award. The soundtrack was also nominated at the 2017 BAFTA Games Awards in the "Music" category, but lost to "Virginia". For his work on "Abzû", Wintory won the 2016 International Film Music Critics Association award for "Best Original Score for a Video Game or Interactive Media", making his second win in a row. The score was also nominated at the Hollywood Music in Media Awards in the "Original Score – Video Game" category. Reviewers of the game also gave unanimous praise to the soundtrack, positively comparing it to that of "Journey".


title: Abzû

text: In its debut week on Steam, the game reached #9 in platform sales charts. "Abzû" was at #18 among the best-selling titles on PlayStation Store's PS4 charts for August, being the third best-selling new title that month behind "" (#7) and "No Man's Sky" (#1). The PS4 and PC versions received scores of 78 and 83 on aggregate site Metacritic based on 19 and 72 reviews respectively, each denoting "generally favorable" reception. "Abzû" was nominated at The Game Awards 2016 in the "Best Art Direction" category; at the Golden Joystick Awards in the "Best Original Game", "Best Visual Design" and "PlayStation Game of the Year" categories; and at the 2017 BAFTA Games Awards in the "Artistic Achievement" category.


title: Abzû

text: Martin Gaston of "Eurogamer" called it "a mechanically simple game, but a pleasurable one"—while finding early sections barren and the camera awkward at times, he enjoyed the gameplay's simplicity. Scott Butterworth of "GameSpot" found the gameplay lacking in variety, but otherwise praised the game's immersive qualities. Justin McElroy of "Polygon" felt that the gameplay, while generally enjoyable, was undermined by a lack of player interaction. Zack Furniss of "Destructoid" found swimming easy and enjoyable despite simplistic controls, and found that the experience benefited from its short length. Matthew Kato of "Game Informer" found the lack of interaction was balanced out by the sheer spectacle of environments and swimming with marine life. Jose Otero of "IGN" enjoyed the continued rewards of exploration despite its minimal amount of gameplay mechanics, while James Davenport of "PC Gamer" enjoyed both the exploration and the ability to meditate and observe the environment. Tom Orry of VideoGamer.com enjoyed the gameplay but disliked its lack of seamless environments, and David Roberts of "GamesRadar+" felt that the game's biggest strength was its simplicity when compared to other titles on the market at the time.


title: Abzû

text: The visuals and environments were generally praised for their artistic style and beautiful environments, with many citing the graphics as one of the game's main strengths; Butterworth positively compared the graphics to the cel-shaded style of "", Otero called the game's art direction "fantastic" and praised the consistent framerate, while Orry praised the art style and graphics despite the simplistic models making "Abzû" appear "basic looking". Reactions to the story were generally positive, with many critics calling it an emotive experience, with many noting its narrative as being mostly open to interpretation: Kato compared the game's themes to "". Some reviewers were less positive: Furniss felt that "Abzû"s story was not as grand as its developers touted, while Davenport found it overly familiar to the point of being cliche. Multiple reviewers favorably compared the artistic style and gameplay experience to "Journey" and the previous work of Thatgamecompany. Roberts in particular noted that some players might find it too similar to the likes of "Journey".


title: The Score Group

text: Quad International, Inc., doing business as The Score Group, is a publishing company based in Miami, Florida that engages in the production and distribution of adult entertainment. Founded in 1991, The Score Group (TSG) publishes several monthly magazines including its flagship publication "Score", and several others including "Voluptuous", "18eighteen", "Naughty Neighbors" and "Leg Sex". TSG also publishes quarterly magazines including, "XL", "40something", "50Plus Milfs", "60Plus Milfs" and "New Cummers", as well as a mainstream men's magazine "Looker". In addition it distributes adult content through its websites which include Scoreland.com, SCOREVideos.com, PornMegaLoad.com, Voluptuous.com, 18eighteen.com, XLgirls.com, LegSex.com, 40SomethingMag.com, 50PlusMilfs.com, 60PlusMilfs.com and NewCummers.com. The publishing company also produces and distributes full-length adult films under its Score Videos label.


title: The Score Group

text: "Score" specializes in photographs of women with large breasts, either naturally larger or augmented.


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane, sold under the brand name Ladasten, is an atypical psychostimulant and anxiolytic drug of the adamantane family related to amantadine and memantine which is used in Russia in the treatment of neurasthenia. Although the effects of the bromantane have been determined to be dependent on the dopaminergic and possibly serotonergic neurotransmitter systems, its exact mechanism of action is unknown, and it is distinct in its properties relative to typical psychostimulants such as amphetamine. Because of its unique aspects, bromantane has sometimes been described instead as an adaptogen and actoprotector.


title: Bromantane

text: The therapeutic effects of bromantane in asthenia are said to onset within 1- to 3-days. It has been proposed that the combination of psychostimulant and anxiolytic activity may give bromantane special efficacy in the treatment of asthenia.


title: Bromantane

text: In a large-scale, multi-center clinical trial of 728 patients diagnosed with asthenia, bromantane was given for 28 days at a daily dose of 50 mg or 100 mg. The impressiveness were 76.0% on the CGI-S and 90.8% on the CGI-I, indicating broadly-applicable, high effectiveness. The therapeutic benefit against asthenia was notably observed to still be present one-month after discontinuation of the drug, indicating long-lasting positive effects of bromantane. Quality of life was significantly increased by bromantane, and this increase remained at one-month after withdrawal of bromantane. 3% of patients experienced side effects; none of the adverse effects were serious; and 0.8% of patients discontinued treatment due to side effects. Bromantane was also noted to normalize the sleep-wake cycle. The authors concluded that "[Bromantane] in daily dose from 50 to 100 mg is a highly effective, well-tolerated and [safe] drug with a wide spectrum of clinical effects. Therefore, this drug could be recommended for treatment of asthenic disorders in neurological practice."


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane is described primarily as a mild psychostimulant and anxiolytic. It is also said to possess antiasthenic properties. Bromantane is reported to improve physical and mental performance, and hence could be considered a performance-enhancing drug.


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane has been found to lower the levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines IL-6, IL-17 and IL-4 and to normalize behavior in animal models of depression, and may possess clinical efficacy as an antidepressant. It has also been found to increase sexual receptivity and proceptivity in rats of both sexes, which was attributed to its dopaminergic actions. It has been proposed that bromantane may suppress prolactin levels by virtue of its dopaminergic properties as well. Bromantane has been found to "agonize" amphetamine-induced stereotypies "in vivo", suggesting that it might potentiate certain effects of other psychostimulants.


title: Bromantane

text: Although it is frequently labeled as a psychostimulant, bromantane is distinct in its pharmacology and effects relative to typical psychostimulants, such as the phenethylamines (e.g., amphetamine and its derivatives) and their structural analogues (e.g., methylphenidate, cocaine, mesocarb, etc.). Whereas the latter directly act on the dopamine transporter to inhibit the reuptake and/or induce the release of dopamine, bromantane instead acts via indirect genomic mechanisms to produce a rapid, pronounced, and long-lasting upregulation in a variety of brain regions of the expression of tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) and aromatic -amino acid decarboxylase (AAAD) (also known as DOPA decarboxylase), key enzymes in the dopamine biosynthesis pathway. For instance, a single dose of bromantane produces a 2- to 2.5-fold increase in TH expression in the rat hypothalamus 1.5- to 2-hours post-administration. The biosynthesis and release of dopamine subsequently increase in close correlation with TH and AAAD upregulation. Enhancement of dopaminergic neurotransmission is observed in the hypothalamus, striatum, ventral tegmental area, nucleus accumbens, and other regions. As such, the key mechanism of the pharmacological activity and psychostimulant effects of bromantane is activation of the "de novo" synthesis of dopamine via modulation of gene expression. In contrast, typical psychostimulants do not affect TH or AAAD expression and thus have no effect on dopamine biosynthesis.


title: Bromantane

text: A selection of quoted excerpts from the medical literature detail the differences between bromantane and typical psychostimulants:


title: Bromantane

text: As such, bromantane has few to no side effects (including peripheral sympathomimetic effects and hyperstimulation), does not seem to produce tolerance or dependence, does not show withdrawal symptoms upon discontinuation, and displays an absence of addiction potential, all of which are quite contrary to typical psychostimulants. In accordance with human findings, animals exposed to bromantane for extended periods of time do not appear to develop tolerance or dependence either.


title: Bromantane

text: The precise direct molecular mechanism of action by which bromantane ultimately acts as a dopamine synthesis enhancer is unknown. However, it has been determined that activation of certain cAMP-, Ca-, and phospholipid-dependent protein kinases such as protein kinase A and especially protein kinase C corresponds with the manifestation of the pharmacological effects of bromantane. As such, bromantane seems to be activating intracellular signaling cascades by some mechanism (e.g., agonizing some as-yet-undetermined receptor) to in turn activate protein kinases, which in turn cause increased transcription of TH and AAAD.


title: Bromantane

text: Researchers discovered that amantadine and memantine bind to and act as agonists of the σ receptor (K = 7.44 μM and 2.60 μM, respectively) and that activation of the σ receptor is involved in the central dopaminergic effects of amantadine at therapeutically relevant concentrations; the authors of the study stated that this could also be the mechanism of action of bromantane, as it is in the same family of structurally related compounds and evidence suggests a role of dopamine in its effects. But this could also be seen as evidence of the contrary since bromantane has effects which are distinctly different from amantadine and memantine; if two different compounds were believed to operate with identical mechanisms their effects, would in turn be equally similar (e.g., serotonin transporter inhibition is the mechanism of two different antidepressants)


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane was once thought to act as a reuptake inhibitor of serotonin and dopamine. Indeed, bromantane does inhibit the reuptake of serotonin, dopamine, and to a lesser extent norepinephrine "in vitro" in rat brain tissue. However, the concentrations required to do so are extremely high (50–500 μM) and likely not clinically relevant. (Although one study found an IC for dopamine transport of 3.56 μM, relative to 28.66 nM for mesocarb; neither drug affected serotonin transport at the tested concentrations, in contrast.) In any case, the lack of typical psychostimulant-like effects and adverse effects seen with bromantane supports the notion that it is not acting significantly as a monoamine reuptake inhibitor, but rather via enhancement of dopamine synthesis.


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane has been found to increase the expression of neurotrophins including brain-derived neurotrophic factor and nerve growth factor in certain rat brain areas.


title: Bromantane

text: Although not relevant at clinical dosages, bromantane has been found to produce anticholinergic effects, including both antimuscarinic and antinicotinic actions, at very high doses in animals, and these effects are responsible for its toxicity (that is, LD) in animals.


title: Bromantane

text: The psychostimulant effects of bromantane onset gradually within 1.5- to 2-hours and last for 8- to 12-hours.


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane is an adamantane derivative. It is also known as adamantylbromphenylamine, from which its name was derived.


title: Bromantane

text: In the 1960s, the adamantane derivative amantadine (1-aminoadamantane) was developed as an antiviral drug for the treatment of influenza. Other adamantane antivirals subsequently followed, such as rimantadine (1-(1-aminoethyl)adamantane) and adapromine (1-(1-aminopropyl)adamantane). It was serendipitously discovered in 1969 that amantadine possesses central dopaminergic psychostimulant-like properties, and subsequent investigation revealed that rimantadine and adapromine also possess such properties. Amantadine was then developed and introduced for the treatment of Parkinson's disease due to its ability to increase dopamine levels in the brain. It has also notably since been used to help alleviate fatigue in multiple sclerosis.


title: Bromantane

text: With the knowledge of the dopaminergic psychostimulant effects of the adamantane derivatives, bromantane, which is 2-(4-bromophenylamino)adamantane, was developed in the 1980s at the Zakusov State Institute of Pharmacology, USSR Academy of Medical Sciences (now the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences) in Moscow as "a drug having psychoactivating and adaptogen properties under complicated conditions (hypoxia, high environmental temperature, physical overfatigue, emotional stress, etc.)". It was found to produce more marked and prolonged psychostimulant effects than the other adamantanes, and eventually entered use. The drug was notably given to soldiers in the Soviet and Russian militaries to "shorten recovery times after strong physical exertion". After the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, bromantane continued to be researched and characterized but was mainly limited in use to sports medicine (for instance, to enhance athletic performance). In 1996, it was encountered as a doping agent in the 1996 Summer Olympics when several Russian athletes tested positive for it, and was subsequently placed on the World Anti-Doping Agency banned list in 1997 as a stimulant and masking agent.


title: Bromantane

text: Bromantane was eventually repurposed in 2005 as a treatment for neurasthenia. It demonstrated effectiveness and safety for the treatment of the condition in extensive, including large-scale clinical trials, and was approved for this indication in Russia under the brand name Ladasten sometime around 2009.


title: Bromantane

text: The reductive amination between 2-Adamantanone [700-58-3] and 4-Bromoaniline [106-40-1] in the presence of formic acid gave bromantane (3).


title: Masala film

text: Masala films of Indian cinema mix multiple genres into one work. Masala films emerged in the 1970s and are still created as of the 2020s. Typically these films freely mix action, comedy, romance, and drama or melodrama. They also tend to be musicals that include songs, often filmed in picturesque locations.


title: Masala film

text: The genre is named after the masala, a mixture of spices in Indian cuisine. According to "The Hindu", masala is the most popular genre of Indian cinema. Masala films have origins in the 1970s, and are common in every major film industry in India. Production of these films are still active in early 2020s.


title: Masala film

text: According to a number of critics and scholars, the masala film was pioneered in the early 1970s by filmmaker Nasir Hussain, along with screenwriter duo Salim–Javed, consisting of Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar. "Yaadon Ki Baaraat" (1973), directed by Hussain and written by Salim-Javed, has been identified by many as the first masala film. However, critic S. Shankar has claimed the genre has existed in Tamil cinema as early as the 1950s, citing "Parasakthi" (1952) and "Enga Veettu Pillai" (1965) as examples. After "Yaadon Ki Baaraat", Salim-Javed went on to write more successful masala films in the 1970s and 1980s. A landmark for the masala film genre was "Amar Akbar Anthony" (1977), directed by Manmohan Desai and written by Kader Khan. Manmohan Desai went on to successfully exploit the genre in the 1970s and 1980s.


title: Masala film

text: "Sholay" (1975), directed by Ramesh Sippy and written by Salim-Javed, also falls under the masala genre. It is sometimes called a "Curry Western", a play on the term Spaghetti Western. A more accurate genre label is the "Dacoit Western", as it combined the conventions of Indian dacoit films such as "Mother India" (1957) and "Gunga Jumna" (1961) with that of Spaghetti Westerns. "Sholay" spawned a subgenre of "Dacoit Western" films in the 1970s.


title: Masala film

text: Masala films helped establish many leading actors as superstars in the 1970s and 1980s, such as Dharmendra, Amitabh Bachchan, Sridevi achieved stardom in their early Bollywood career with masala movies. Since the 1990s, actors such as Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan (Salim Khan's son), Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn and Ranveer Singh in Bollywood, M.G. Ramachandran, Rajinikanth, Kamal Haasan, Ajith Kumar, Vijay, Suriya Sivakumar, Vikram, Dhanush, Sivakarthikeyan, in Kollywood ,NTR, Chiranjeevi, Mahesh Babu, Allu Arjun, Jr. NTR, Nagarjuna, Ram Charan Tej, Venkatesh and Pawan Kalyan in Tollywood, Jayan, Mohanlal, Mammootty, Jayaram, Dileep, and Prithviraj Sukumaran in Malayalam cinema, Vishnuvardhan, Ambarish, Darshan, Puneeth Rajkumar, Sudeep and Yash in Kannada cinema, Dev, Jeet and Ankush Hazra in Bengali cinema and others have all tasted success in this format.


title: Masala film

text: This style is used very often in Hindi (Bollywood) and South Indian films, as it helps make them appeal to a broad variety of viewers. Famous masala filmmakers include David Dhawan, Anees Bazmee, Farah Khan and Prabhu Deva in Bollywood ; Shaji Kailas and Joshiy in Malayalam Cinema ; Raja Chanda, Raj Chakraborty, Sujit Mondal, Rajiv Kumar Biswas and Rabi Kinagi in Bengali cinema; K. Raghavendra Rao, S. S. Rajamouli, Puri Jagannadh, Trivikram Srinivas, Boyapati Srinu and Srinu Vaitla in Telugu cinema; S. Shankar, Hari, Siruthai Siva, Pandiraj, AR Murugadoss, K. V. Anand, N. Lingusamy and K. S. Ravikumar in Tamil cinema; and in Kannada cinema it was V. Somashekhar and K. S. R. Das in the 1970s; A. T. Raghu and Joe Simon in the 1980s; K. V. Raju, Om Prakash Rao and Shivamani in the 1990s; and K. Madesh and A. Harsha in the 2000s.


title: Masala film

text: Beyond Indian cinema, Danny Boyle's Academy Award–winning film "Slumdog Millionaire" (2008), based on Vikas Swarup's Boeke Prize winning novel "Q & A" (2005), has been described by several reviewers as a "masala" movie, due to the way the film combines "familiar raw ingredients into a feverish masala" and culminates in "the romantic leads finding each other." This is due to the influence of the Bollywood masala genre on the film. According to Loveleen Tandan, "Slumdog Millionaire" screenwriter Simon Beaufoy "studied Salim-Javed's kind of cinema minutely." The influence of Bollywood masala films can also be seen in Western musical films. Baz Luhrmann stated that his successful musical film "Moulin Rouge!" (2001) was directly inspired by Bollywood musicals.


title: Masala film

text: Aamir Khan (Nasir Hussain's nephew), who debuted as a child actor in the first masala film "Yaadon Ki Baraat", has been credited for redefining and modernising the masala film with his own distinct brand of socially conscious cinema in the early 21st century. His films blur the distinction between commercial masala films and realistic parallel cinema, combining the entertainment and production values of the former with the believable narratives and strong messages of the latter, earning both commercial success and critical acclaim, in India and overseas.


title: Masala film

text: While the "masala" film genre originated from Bollywood films in the 1970s, there have been several earlier influences that have shaped its conventions. Examples of this influence include the techniques of a side story, back-story and story within a story. Indian popular films often have plots that branch off into sub-plots; such narrative dispersals can clearly be seen in the 1993 films "Khalnayak" and "Gardish". The second influence was the impact of ancient Sanskrit drama, with its highly stylised nature and emphasis on spectacle, where music, dance and gesture combined "to create a vibrant artistic unit with dance and mime being central to the dramatic experience." Sanskrit dramas were known as "natya", derived from the root word (dance), characterising them as spectacular dance-dramas which has continued in Indian cinema. The third influence was the traditional folk theatre of India, which became popular from around the 10th century with the decline of Sanskrit theatre. These regional traditions include the Jatra of Bengal, the Ramlila of Uttar Pradesh, and the Terukkuttu of Tamil Nadu. The fourth influence was Parsi theatre, which "blended realism and fantasy, music and dance, narrative and spectacle, earthy dialogue and ingenuity of stage presentation, integrating them into a dramatic discourse of melodrama. The Parsi plays contained crude humour, melodious songs and music, sensationalism and dazzling stagecraft."


title: Masala film

text: A major foreign influence was Hollywood, where musicals were popular from the 1920s to the 1950s, though Indian filmmakers departed from their Hollywood counterparts in several ways. "For example, the Hollywood musicals had as their plot the world of entertainment itself. Indian filmmakers, while enhancing the elements of fantasy so pervasive in Indian popular films, used song and music as a natural mode of articulation in a given situation in their films. There is a strong Indian tradition of narrating mythology, history, fairy stories and so on through song and dance." In addition, "whereas Hollywood filmmakers strove to conceal the constructed nature of their work so that the realistic narrative was wholly dominant, Indian filmmakers made no attempt to conceal the fact that what was shown on the screen was a creation, an illusion, a fiction. However, they demonstrated how this creation intersected with people's day to day lives in complex and interesting ways."


title: Masala film

text: Javed Akhtar, a pioneer of masala films, was also greatly influenced by Urdu novels by Pakistani author Ibn-e-Safi, such as the "Jasoosi Dunya" and "Imran" series of detective novels. They inspired, for example, famous Bollywood characters such as Gabbar Singh in "Sholay" (1975) and Mogambo in "Mr. India" (1987).


title: Masala film

text: During the 1970s, commercial Bollywood masala films drew from several foreign influences, including New Hollywood, Hong Kong martial arts cinema, and Italian exploitation films. Following the success of Bruce Lee films such as "Enter the Dragon" in India, Bollywood films starting with "Deewaar" (1975) up until the 1990s often incorporated fight sequences inspired by 1970s martial arts films from Hong Kong cinema. Rather than following the Hollywood model, Bollywood action scenes tended to follow the Hong Kong model, with an emphasis on acrobatics and stunts, and combined kung fu (as it was perceived by Indians) with Indian martial arts (particularly Indian wrestling).


title: John Savident

text: John Savident (born 21 January 1938) is a retired British actor, known for his numerous television roles, including his portrayal of Fred Elliott in the soap opera "Coronation Street" from 1994-2006. He is also known for his performance as Monsieur Firmin in the West End debut of The Phantom of the Opera and "The Lion King."


title: John Savident

text: Savident was born in Guernsey and still lived there at the time of the German occupation of the island in 1940. He and his family escaped to England in a fishing boat. During his early years, he was a police officer before turning to acting as his profession.


title: John Savident

text: Savident created the role of Monsieur Firmin in the original production of "Phantom of the Opera", which opened on 9 October 1986 at Her Majesty's Theatre in Haymarket, London. He appeared as the renegade scientist Egrorian in a 1981 episode of the cult science fiction TV series "Blake's 7". He also had other television appearances in "The Saint", "Callan" and "Doctor Who" .


title: John Savident

text: Despite his many film and TV roles (including civil servant Sir Frederick Stewart in "Yes, Minister" and a memorable part in "A Clockwork Orange"), it was only during the 1990s when Savident joined the cast of "Coronation Street" as the bellicose but romantic butcher Fred Elliott that he became a household name. He made his first appearance on the show in 1994 and his character quickly became popular with viewers.


title: John Savident

text: In December 2005, Savident announced that he was to leave "Coronation Street" citing (undisclosed) "personal reasons". His character died of a stroke nine months later, in October 2006. He later revealed that he had retired from the show "because he wanted to spend more time with his family in Hertfordshire".


title: John Savident

text: Since leaving, he has been critical of the way the series is produced in a number of articles and television interviews, claiming that the programme is amongst other things "on too frequently" and "badly lit". He has also said he disagrees with the programme hiring well-known actors, as it takes jobs away from struggling, unknown actors.


title: John Savident

text: Savident was one of the readers on the BBC's online Advent Calendar in December 2006. That year, he appeared in the pantomime "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" as the henchman at Manchester Opera House, alongside his former "Coronation Street" co-star Suranne Jones, as well as Justin Moorhouse and an all-star seven dwarves including Warwick Davis.


title: John Savident

text: In 2007, he was touring as the lead in a production of "Hobson's Choice". He appeared on "Loose Women" on 19 March 2009 to discuss his part as Sir Joseph Porter in the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta "HMS Pinafore", which toured the United Kingdom during the spring and summer of 2009.


title: John Savident

text: He guest-starred in the Christmas special episode of "Holby City" in 2012, playing patient Rupert Pool. He voiced the character Pendle in the "Doctor Who" audio-drama "Order of the Daleks".


title: John Savident

text: On 1 December 2000, Savident was stabbed in the neck at his home in Manchester by Michael Smith, who claimed he was acting in self-defence. Savident said at the time, "I suddenly felt somebody come up behind me and whizz me round so I was face down on the bed and then I felt a prick on my throat". Smith demanded valuables from Savident, and the keys to his classic Morgan sports car. Savident had met Smith in Napoleon's, a gay bar, following a personal appearance at an event for World AIDS Day. They then went to Savident's home – apparently to discuss the theatre – which Smith claimed was a euphemism for sex. In September 2002, Smith, by then aged 30, was sentenced to seven years in prison. He had been charged with wounding Savident with intent to cause him grievous bodily harm and robbing him of his wallet, credit cards, a silver money clip and cash, a Georg Jensen watch and ring, keys, and an invitation to "Coronation Street"'s 40th anniversary birthday party. Savident's neck was pierced twice in a struggle with Smith; one of the wounds only missed the main artery in Savident's neck by less than an inch, and sliced straight through a minor blood vessel. The next week on "Coronation Street", the large sticking plaster on his character's neck was explained as a "butchering accident".


title: John Savident

text: Savident has been married to Rona Hopkinson since 1961; the couple have two children and several grandchildren.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: In popular culture, sets of precious substances may form hierarchies which express conventional perceived relative value or merit. Precious metals appear prominently in such hierarchies, but as they grow, gems and semi-precious materials may be introduced as part of the system. The sequences can provide interesting examples of the arbitrariness of semiotic signs.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: Jubilees have a hierarchy of years: silver (25 years), ruby (40 years), golden (50 years), diamond (60 years), and platinum (70 years). Wedding anniversaries extend the jubilee hierarchy with various sequences of substances filling in many of the gaps between the same major milestones. In 2017 the 65th anniversary of the accession of Elizabeth II was widely referred to as her "sapphire jubilee" or more specifically as her "blue" sapphire jubilee (see Sapphire Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II) but more traditionally the sapphire anniversary is considered to be the 45th.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: Ancient Greek mythic-cultural cosmology depicted a decline from a golden age to a silver age followed by an Iron Age. In some variants there is a Bronze Age, an interim between the Iron Age and Silver Age.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: In Japan, the traditional "Sho Chiku Bai" (松竹梅) ranking system has a hierarchy of pine , bamboo , and plum . This is commonly used by restaurants to indicate how elaborate (and expensive) set meals are.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: The measurement of sales of popular music starts high relative to the wedding anniversary scale, concentrating on gold and platinum (see gold album). Likewise, credit card companies usually have a "gold card" and a "platinum card" (many formerly had a "silver card" then followed by a "gold card", but due to similarity in appearance between silver and platinum these were often discontinued with the rise in popularity of platinum as a precious metal).


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: Sports events have a well-established convention (introduced into the Olympic tradition at the 1904 Summer Olympics), of a hierarchy of medals: bronze medal - silver medal - gold medal. This presumably echoes conventional coinage systems, in which cheap bronze or copper denominations could aggregate to intermediate silver coins, then to gold money. The archetypal British designations (penny, shilling and pound) parallel and reflect this hierarchy.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: Events-sponsorship in sport or in the arts may involve (for example) silver, gold and/or platinum sponsors.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: Fantasy role playing games often have a hierarchy of materials, following the relative strengths of pre-modern metals, bronze, iron and steel, for example, at the lower end, and moving up through fantastic or legendary materials such as mithril and adamant.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: The "golden age" metaphor is extended to a number of disciplines, for example the golden age of science fiction.


title: Hierarchy of precious substances

text: Some multiplayer video games feature a hierarchy of players that uses precious metal names to distinguish the various levels of skill, often progressing from Bronze to Silver, to Gold, to Platinum, then to Diamond.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: The Maunder Minimum, also known as the "prolonged sunspot minimum", was a period around 1645 to 1715 during which sunspots became exceedingly rare. During a 28-year period (1672–1699) within the minimum, observations revealed fewer than 50 sunspots. This contrasts with the typical 40,000–50,000 sunspots seen in modern times over a similar timespan.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: The Maunder Minimum was first noted by Gustav Spörer in publications in 1887 and 1889, work that was relayed to the Royal Astronomical Society in London, and then expanded on, by solar astronomers Edward Walter Maunder (1851–1928), and his wife Annie Russell Maunder (1868–1947), who also studied how sunspot latitudes changed with time. Two papers were published in Edward Maunder's name in 1890 and 1894, and he cited the two earlier papers written by Gustav Spörer. Because Annie Maunder had not received a university degree, restrictions at the time caused her contribution not to be publicly recognized. The term "Maunder Minimum" was popularised by John A. Eddy, who published a landmark paper in "Science" in 1976.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: The Maunder Minimum occurred within the Little Ice Age, a long period of lower-than-average European temperatures. The reduced solar activity may have contributed to the climatic cooling, although the cooling began before the solar minimum and its primary cause is believed to be volcanic activity.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: The Maunder Minimum occurred between 1645 and 1715 when very few sunspots were observed. That was not because of a lack of observations, as during the 17th century, Giovanni Domenico Cassini carried out a systematic program of solar observations at the Observatoire de Paris, thanks to the astronomers Jean Picard and Philippe de La Hire. Johannes Hevelius also performed observations on his own. Here is the total of sunspots recorded, by example, in the decennial years (omitting Wolf numbers):


title: Maunder Minimum

text: During the Maunder Minimum enough sunspots were sighted so that 11-year cycles could be determined from the count. The maxima occurred in 1676–1677, 1684, 1695, 1705 and 1718. Sunspot activity was then concentrated in the southern hemisphere of the Sun, except for the last cycle when the sunspots appeared in the northern hemisphere. According to Spörer's law, spots appear at high latitudes at the start of a cycle, subsequently moving to lower latitudes until they average about latitude 15° at solar maximum. The average then continues to drift lower to about 7° and after that, while spots of the old cycle fade, new cycle spots start appearing again at high latitudes. The visibility of these spots is also affected by the velocity of the Sun's surface rotation at various latitudes:


title: Maunder Minimum

text: Visibility is somewhat affected by observations being done from the ecliptic. The ecliptic is inclined 7° from the plane of the Sun's equator (latitude 0°).


title: Maunder Minimum

text: In his highly influential paper, John A. Eddy discussed solar eclipses during the Maunder Minimum. From text of eye-witness reports of events in 1652, 1706 and 1715, he concluded that the solar corona was weak in intensity and unstructured during the Maunder Minimum. However, no graphical evidence of these events was available to him. A few representations of these events were available in political cartoons and on coins and medals but these were, almost certainly, not drawn by observers who had actually witnessed the events. There were two prints made by witnesses of the 1706 event but these were made for commercial reasons and not by trained astronomers. Then in 2012 Markus Heinz of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin discovered two paintings of the 1706 eclipse that were known to have existed but were thought lost. They were by a trained and skilful astronomer and observer, Maria Clara Eimmart, the daughter of the director of an observatory housed on a bastion of the walls of Nürnberg castle. The paintings were in excellent agreement with detailed text description of the event by Johann Philipp Wurzelbau (also in Nürnberg) and by French mathematician and cartographer Jean de Clapiès and astronomer François de Plantade who observed the same event from the Babote Tower in Montpellier. This confirmed Eddy's conclusion about a weak and structureless corona during the Maunder minimum and agreed with simulations of the structureless F-corona, with no detected K-corona that is ordered by the magnetic field, as has been modelled for low coronal magnetic flux. A full discussion of these observations of the Maunder minimum corona and how the K-corona had partially returned by the time of the 1715 event is given by Hayakawa et al. (2020)


title: Maunder Minimum

text: The Maunder Minimum roughly coincided with the middle part of the Little Ice Age, during which Europe and North America experienced colder than average temperatures. Whether there is a causal relationship, however, is still under evaluation. The current best hypothesis for the cause of the Little Ice Age is that it was the result of volcanic action. The onset of the Little Ice Age also occurred well before the beginning of the Maunder Minimum, and northern-hemisphere temperatures during the Maunder Minimum were not significantly different from the previous 80 years, suggesting a decline in solar activity was not the main causal driver of the Little Ice Age.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: The correlation between low sunspot activity and cold winters in England has been analyzed using the longest existing surface temperature record, the Central England Temperature record. A potential explanation of this has been offered by observations by NASA's Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment, which suggest that solar ultraviolet light output is more variable over the course of the solar cycle than scientists had previously thought. A 2011 study found that low solar activity was linked to jet stream behavior, resulting in mild winters in some places (southern Europe and Canada/Greenland) and colder winters in others (northern Europe and the United States). In Europe, examples of very cold winters are 1683–84, 1694–95, and the winter of 1708–09.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: Past solar activity may be recorded by various proxies, including carbon-14 and beryllium-10. These indicate lower solar activity during the Maunder Minimum. The scale of changes resulting in the production of carbon-14 in one cycle is small (about one percent of medium abundance) and can be taken into account when radiocarbon dating is used to determine the age of archaeological artifacts. The interpretation of the beryllium-10 and carbon-14 cosmogenic isotope abundance records stored in terrestrial reservoirs such as ice sheets and tree rings has been greatly aided by reconstructions of solar and heliospheric magnetic fields based on historic data on Geomagnetic storm activity, which bridge the time gap between the end of the usable cosmogenic isotope data and the start of modern spacecraft data.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: Other historical sunspot minima have been detected either directly or by the analysis of the cosmogenic isotopes; these include the Spörer Minimum (1450–1540), and less markedly the Dalton Minimum (1790–1820). In a 2012 study, sunspot minima have been detected by analysis of carbon-14 in lake sediments. In total, there seem to have been 18 periods of sunspot minima in the last 8,000 years, and studies indicate that the Sun currently spends up to a quarter of its time in these minima.


title: Maunder Minimum

text: A paper based on an analysis of a drawing by John Flamsteed suggests that the Sun's surface rotation slowed in the deep Maunder Minimum (1684).