Good afternoon, everyone. I'm in the unenviable position of speaking to you after your lunch break So I will try and make this as entertaining as possible. My name is Jeff Hallington I'm one of the leaders of the face consortium, and I'm Glad to be giving you a face overview for the next 25 minutes This overview you've heard a lot of conversation already this afternoon With respect to several of the technical aspects of the face technical standard I'm here to talk a little bit lighter with respect to the technical details And I'm going to focus a lot more on the business aspects the why of face The motivations behind it and a little bit about the structure of the organization That is working to develop that face technical standard So with that I'm going to go ahead and go forward for the why of the face technical standard and It kind of comes back to the trends within avionics software development And I want to emphasize the software piece to that Trends are that as capabilities are increasing as the need for increased airspace capability Work pilot workload reduction The ability to increase safety of flight Software has taken the front seat with respect to avionics capabilities The figure I show here on the screen 70 to 90 percent Of aircraft capability avionics capability is now implemented as software on board that And You can measure it with that shift from the hardware focus towards software You're starting to see complexity increase as those capabilities increase cost time to field are elements that They're starting to see a lot of growth in those that's not really a good thing And that that's a an issue for both commercial As well as military avionics developments so As we we took a look around a number of us in the industry took a look around as far as What we could do about that we noticed several trends within the commercial airspace industry and primarily with respect to Open standards open architecture and so forth And so we started Jim germinating the idea of what could we do in leveraging that now another motivation That we have with respect to the phase consortium and the phase technical standard has to do with What our adversaries are doing And our adversaries are utilizing asymmetrical techniques Utilizing commercial off-the-shelf items Taking a very A fast approach with respect to developing Their weapon systems and the the quote I show on the bottom here six to one that ratio When I heard that That ratio as it applied to Development of anti aircraft systems by an adversary as compared to A single development cycle for the aircraft the fighter aircraft that was designed to go against that threat I was floored I heard that at the april speeds conference Keynote presentation there and I started thinking about the commercial world When you're looking at competition that's outrunning you to that degree That's a recipe for going out of business right and You know when you think about it from a defense standpoint That's a recipe for defeat in an unacceptable defeat as far as we're concerned So a number of individuals who were visionary with respect to that software development the ability for us to Break those issues that we were seeing with cost and and time to field Started getting together under the leadership of us navy navier pma 209 And we began to discuss What are the issues that we're facing getting to a greater level of detail? and discovered that You know certain things stood out right The development of avionics the development of aircraft systems in general Uh essentially resulted in a siloed development cycle where the end result was capabilities that really they they Kind of stuck with the aircraft itself that specific aircraft type model series And we had a difficult time Very expensive very lengthy process of trying to Uh port that kind of capability to other aircraft So you essentially ended up with a repeating cycle as you went from aircraft to aircraft Drove cost and and schedule Long integration cycles We take a look at What standards that avionics development Utilized not everyone was on the same sheet of music And for us we we saw the end result Uh multiple integration efforts multiple development efforts again a lack of the ability to to Really concentrate on what you really needed to concentrate on which was driving innovation Into your capabilities driving advanced capabilities into your aircraft You're spending a lot of time trying to to just move things around Um And so as again as we looked at the commercial world looked at integrated marzler architecture avionics Um started looking at how we could leverage perhaps the same ideas Maybe not the same ideas, but certainly similar ideas We started seeing a model by which Utilizing standard architecture utilizing open interfaces We could drive leverage ability of components from platform to platform if we developed them correctly And uh that allows us to optimize investments for capability innovation Focusing on what really mattered the most and then being able to Enable that faster integration to cut the time to the field so again, um Taking that cue from the open architecture The group of us who started the phase consortium idea We began to think about The openness of the interfaces the architecture and the standards that we wanted to utilize Think about the the phone that's in your pocket right It's very straightforward for you as a user of your of your phone To be able to go to an app store and to download an app of your liking For the purposes that you need it for and operate that on your phone You don't need to know very much about the phone itself But you do have assurance that the manufacturer of that phone the operating system that that is on it There's enough openness to that where third party developers can develop an ecosystem of applications And you benefit by that wide variety and for that matter The cost effectiveness Of those applications So we wanted to move from the legacy world of a closed system controlled by a single vendor Vendor locked if you will and go more toward that open open standard for For the operating system for the middleware pieces And then of course for the applications themselves then implement the business logic for the capability And do so in a way that If there's an application developer that's out there And they really don't know very much about the system itself and how their application is going to be hosted Yet they are really smart at developing the business logic behind the capability that's innovative for you They still can participate in that market team up with others And develop the application do the testing and do the integration in cooperation with others And now you've got the ingredients for true cost and schedule reduction So those of you who are familiar with software development You are Probably familiar with some of the standards that I show listed up here POSIX A-Ring 6x1 A-Ring 6x53 OpenGL Some of those have existed for a long long time POSIX an outgrowth of The unix wars back in the 1980s of which the open group Hand-to-hand at helping to resolve one of the reasons why we picked them to help manage the face consortium These are standards that are well known They're usable they're open and we felt that that was a great foundation for us To place into the face technical standard But the real value add that the face consortium felt would be um extremely important for Utilization in that technical standard is this is the structure the architecture if you will whereby modular components are capable of being placed into that structure In a way that allows for the portability of reuse and And and others are able to understand what you placed into that system Standard data models to understand the data flows from your module to somewhere else and now the integration process becomes easier these In the end permit life cycle competition By many players in the marketplace and again when you do that now in your differentiation in that marketplace is How innovative is your capability going on board that that that software piece? We also looked at well, how are we going to pick which open standard? Interfaces to use for the software. How are we going to develop that standard architectural structure? And we felt it was hugely important for us to implement a voluntary consensus standards body Formulated underneath with a good legal foundation and on be circular a1 19 Was really important for us allowed for government participation to take place And as well the national cooperative research and production act Which allowed industry together together With protection from things like antitrust issues And if we were following the rules with respect to Uh the the consensus body the fair and equal representation do do process the appeals process Driving toward consensus Then we had that foundation for an Adoptable standard by as many people in the industry as we could reach The overall goal for the face consortium, which was started in 2010 again with the leadership of The navy nav air organization the open group and uh, I would say about 15 or so Organizations that served as charter members Was to create the ability for independent third party vendors to to provide portable and reusable software components that would be hosted on top of essentially a face environment And this this is kind of the most Popular chart that we use to identify the face architecture Each of the booths that you will see in our exhibit hall Are required to have a representation of this face architecture and The components that they are demonstrating or they're showing as part of their booth They need to represent that In the different layers that exist in the face architecture The business In the most important piece for us are two of the segments in this architecture The portable component segment as well as the platform specific services segment Which allow for that portable reusable component to reside And the interfaces that we have chosen For those components to interface to the rest of the system We have carefully identified What calls are allowed that would allow for Those components to not have to know what's underneath the hood so to speak their hardware agnostic their sensor agnostic And then if you've done doing it right operating system agnostic And uh, you do not have to understand the device drivers that you're working with Or other things that would necessarily tie your component To the underlying system therefore we're making that reusability and portability much more easier The rest of the segments the transport services segment The ios services segment and of course the operating system segment Those are probably what we would consider the pieces of the environment that those portable reusable components are going to operate on top of And those are huge with respect to being able to transform the calls from those portable reusable Components to interface with the hardware and sensors As as needed Also important is independent verification that you have followed the face technical standard In all of the requirements necessary for portable and reusable components. We have a multi step process Again independent VA's Verification authorities they run the tests. They do the inspections Necessary for them to say yes, you have followed the standard You now have the ability of obtaining a face certificate which the certification authority will grant and The certification authority also maintains the integrity of the process by allowing for Autotability of the testing that the VA's do there are multiple VA's that we have And there's one single certification authority that kind of oversees their work At the last step of the process we have a library administrator once you have Successfully obtained a face Obtaining face certificate You are now able to list your software On a face library page that the face consortium maintains hugely important for the marketing of your face components And allows for independent verification by a customer Potential customer that Allows them to say yes, I see that you are listed. I know that you have a face certificate And gives them assurance that we have a marketplace with integrity And the ability for for them to say yes, I want to I'm going to select a face Certified product and I think a measure of success with respect to Having application of the face technical standard is right here The number of face certified components that have entered into the face library since 2017 When we started that program We're now 19 components from 12 different suppliers More are in the pipeline They're covering all of the face segments that are in our architecture And there's quite a number of Capabilities that are represented by those components Again, we have in the hall a number of the vendors these vendors here are represented They are given a special signage If they are part of the face library Please go visit them check them out and talk to them about their face conformant products So I've given you kind of a really brief overview Kind of lacking in details. There are many documents of various Um levels of detail that are available for you to Get started with the face technical standard with understanding the face concepts They range in uh with respect to guides for business Contracting and that's both uh industry as well as government contracting officers And uh for programmers themselves Uh kind of the getting started Aspects of what face is all about And allows you to ease into the concept Again, if you have software expertise with some of the standards that I talked about earlier You have a great foundation to begin with the face technical standard If you're uh, if you're the the nerd type That wants to get into the major details There is the face technical standard itself and a companion document called the face reference implementation guide These are very lengthy documents. They will get you into the details As necessary for successfully Implementing face conformant products They are available on the open group website. We have the web page information on the lower left It's probably hard to see At your distance there But w w w dot open group Dot org Backslash face And from there, uh, you'll find information about the consortium about the open group And the documents that we have available. There is a link called Documents and tools Check that page out Those are available for free consortium members we're at I think we normally say 80 Plus members we didn't typically have a little bit of churn from year to year But overall we're maintaining around the 80 mark and The who's who of the defense industry is represented here government Industry as well as academia All have been involved They all are Essentially paying for their own time their own way To provide their experts For each of the face meetings If you're interested in joining Please see the open group booth in the exhibit hall and they will provide you with the information you need Again, I identified myself as one of the face leaders in the consortium We have a whole host of them working on both business as well as technical as well as datum architecture These are hardworking individuals who are spending again a lot of time with this and We we joke as we meet from time to time that you know, we're doing our night job We have our day jobs with respect to our employers And so this is a lot of work And I want to thank those who are in the audience who are Listed on this list for Helping out I can't identify a finer group of individuals to be working with on this initiative and finally you know we we end A lot of presentations with this quote this quote graces the front page of many of our documents And it kind of harkens back to that problem statement that I talked about in the beginning the time and cost that we've seen with the increasing capabilities that are going on board our warfighter aircraft and The complexity of that's driving And the fact that our adversaries are doing all that they can to outrun us with respect to innovation It's time to recapture that Back for the u.s. Warfighter and our allies It's a necessary thing. It's important for us Otherwise this will happen And we don't want that to happen So thank you for your time and your attention. I'm happy to answer any questions that you have


I want to thank Amherst Media for this opportunity. I am Lauren Mills and I am running for a seat on the Amherst Regional School Committee. I have lived in Amherst for two years and moved here because of family. I have two children in the Amherst Elementary School System and my youngest who is four has yet to attend school. But when she does, I want her elementary school to have the factors that are important to all families, caring attentive teachers and administrators. High academic achievement, community engagement, Amherst is diverse because so many families come here on the reputation of the quality of Amherst public schools. When I toured a neighborhood school for my daughter, she immediately wanted to go to the same school as her brothers. Neighborhood schools are important in fostering close relationships with students and families. Community engagement and inclusivity is a primary way that education remains strong. A student's academic success requires that support comes from school and reaches home where parents can become involved in their child's education and maintain a connection with teachers. In 2019, soon to be 2020, all of us knows how it feels to be the other, whether facing our own challenges or being aware of our friends and neighbors' experiences. I see being a member of the school committee as a way to serve my community that has become Amherst, a way to be involved, encourage my children to also be examples of leadership, a voice in planning initiatives that will continue to make the most important part of education, educating our youth to be successful in work and life. I was born and grew up in Boston, Mass, went to school in Brookline through the MECCO program. Early education has always been an interest of mine, not just as a parent. I also worked as an assistant in the classroom at the Page Academy School. I attended a program at Urban College in Boston on early childhood development. I think the long list of community members and institutions that have instilled in me the deep sense of community responsibility, how Hawthorne Youth and Community Center, Wing Center Young at Arts program, and Roxbury Community College, my mother and my husband, who gives me the flexibility to volunteer, and I also thank my children. I want to thank my friends that I have come to know in Amherst that continue the spirit of community and encourage me to get involved.  I hope you decide that I, Lauren Mills, will be one of your choices for school committee. Don't forget to vote on November 5th.


If you want to have a biological age 10-20 years younger, then this video is for you. Here are five must-follow biohacking trends for 2024 to make you look younger and youthful. The last one is a game changer, so you don't want to miss out. These are based on an article published on longevity technology. Number one, biohacking. Biohacking is a trend where people try to improve how their body works, think better, stay healthy, and reach personal goals. In 2024, some popular biohacking trends include things like breath work, using saunas regularly, intermittent fasting, trying red light therapy, and having a moderate amount of coffee.


The Resilience Hub is a non-profit organization focused on permaculture education, growing healthy food, and building community. Carol has been a great pillar in her community and neighborhood. She's a very well-educated woman, and she's really given back to the community as a professor, a mentor, and she just has a very lovely soul. And when you meet Carol, you feel warm and welcome and happy. I heard about the Resilience Hub and through someone who was visiting a friend. And so I had her come and interview me for designing a much larger garden around the house. Once I started talking to her about what permaculture was all about, I decided I wanted to do that kind of gardening. And it was paying attention to a lot more than just your garden. And the sort of symbol they use is that permaculture is about earth care, people care, and sharing with others. And so I think that sharing is thought about in a lot of different ways by different people, but for me it was sharing. I had time, I had the money to set this up, you know, and I could share the food I grew. Her involvement in the Resilience Hub has really been amazing. From the time that she's lived in Portland to moving out to Freeport, she's continued to support several efforts that the Resilience Hub has been involved in. I've been volunteering with the Resilience Hub since 2012 and I have taken several classes including in a permaculture design class, an advanced permaculture design class. And I was really thrilled when I found the Resilience Hub in Portland. And I lived in the city and I was a renter so I didn't have any land. So I wasn't able to practice what I was learning, but through the permabletses I went to all these different properties and saw how on very small scales to really large scales I could put it all into action. I share my garden with my neighbors and, you know, anytime there's a surplus, you know, I'm looking for people to share it with. And so, and it's lovely because people enjoy bringing their kids over and checking out the strawberries and going pick the raspberries. I mean, these are important things for kids and so I get to know the kids in the neighborhood as well. But we got really lucky because I found this place on the Moffko website and people had this property and they really wanted to make it into a really great community space but they just had too many small children and it just didn't work with their lifestyle and they really wanted to sell it to somebody who was going to take it and do like things like the permablets. Our goal is to sustain our family and then the resilience hub does wants to do another project where they do weekly work parties where people come out and learn a project but then they also get a common share so the food we grow will kind of be split almost like a public, like a community garden but it'll be like to form those relationships over time.  A lot of people knew how to do things, I mean, run machines. I didn't know how to run, you know, cutting wood, things like that and food is part of my sense of myself. I love doing it, raising it, making it work, you know, in the sense of being a successful gardener. When the permablets was done here it was really exciting and we were very fortunate because we had had an advanced permaculture design class come out and do a design for our property so we got to take five different designs and kind of pull them together and then figure out what would be the most helpful for us at this time to have done and I think over 40 people came out and they just didn't stop working for eight hours and they did more than we would have expected. We had a lot of younger folks helping lead projects and they were so excited to learn about solar and composting. The best reason to get involved in permablets is the people that you meet are incredible and they're so giving and they have this other sort of, they all come from different backgrounds within this sort of capitalistic structure. They all have different skill sets but when they get here, they're all kind of like at the same level. After I did the permaculture thing I also became a master gardener. I mean I took the University of Maine's gardening, volunteer gardening course and through that I learned more about Hover's for Hunger. I had been looking for something like that ever since I retired. It was a question of giving back and what are you going to do? I thought about joining Habitat for Humanity but after two years of night classes I decided I wasn't that good at it so the garden was coming along and it just made sense. I mean I watched other people do it and thought well you can do this too and that first year I mean I think there was about 300 pounds of food that I brought over. The people that we've done this for have been really grateful and thrilled and very overwhelmed. I've seen a lot of people cry at the end of a blitz. They all wanted to like have everyone stay a little bit longer and like share food or drinks or in a fire. I've seen them throughout the years after even whether at blitzes or just in town and there's like a comradery between us even though we've only maybe only known each other for six hours of the day. And then there's also every year there's all new people coming in to the blitzes and it's always very similar energy. People are very open to learning and grateful and want to help. It's just the spirit. The spirit's the word I use all the time. It's a spirit of we can do this. You know a spirit of helpfulness and I've just never seen it before.


Our next speakers are Gus and Geco or Geo from the Tor Project. They both became onto the project, have been working with the project for a long time now, and a couple of years ago they both became on as employees Gus as the team leader, as the community lead of the project, and Geo as the network team lead, where he has been working on improving the health of the network and making sure that bad relays are removed. Give them all a great round of applause from home and welcome to the stage guys. Take it away. Hello everyone. Hello. This is Geo from the Tor Project and I have Gus with me today to talk about the state of the onion yearly thing and we are really happy to be here at the CCC and think about providing an update what we did, what we're excited about next year and what is basically in the pipeline. Before we start, assuming we have some folks watching this talk wondering what this tool thing is, we thought about picking them up, getting them up to speed and talking a bit about what we are actually talking about here. So Tor is concerned with the online anonymity and censorship circumvention. We produce free software and we actually have an open network of relay operators and relays operated by volunteers, but that's not the only meaning of Tor. You find VR as well in community of researchers, developers, users, and they mentioned relay operators. As a project, we are a US 501C3 non-profit organization. So that's the different notions of Tor you might encounter. So what is actually the Tor design? How does it help with the anonymity goal or censorship circumvention goal? So assume you have two parties who want to communicate over the internet and in particular Alice wants to hide their location or their IP address so they can connect directly to Bob because that would be obvious where they are coming from. So they try to get their traffic through multiple relays so no signal relay can actually betray Alice here and find out what else is up to or where she is coming from. So what Alice is doing or actually Alice Tor client on her machine is picking a path through the network with three relays mentioned here with a one, a two, and a three before she is finally reaching Bob. So this looks like something like this year and at the end Alice is asking the access relay or relay three on this slide to connect to Bob and then they can talk to each other. That's the basic underlying concept of Tor. Then there's the problem that we sometimes see censorship in the wild which means that an adversary is trying to prevent Alice from actually reaching the Tor network and so she can benefit from the privacy properties the network is providing and in this case the direct connection to the cloud above there with the public relays is prevented and what Alice needs to do is to connect to so-called bridges which are non-public relays in this case which work as a first hop and then she is picking the usual remaining two hops before connecting to Bob. So this is a rough idea of how Tor is trying to prevent censorship or to bypass censorship to be more correctly and which will play a role in the coming slides because we talk a bunch about censorship work we do and have done and want to do. So that's basically Tor in a nutshell. There are many more things to Tor but that's hopefully enough to understand what the following updates are about. So if you recall the previous slides that was basically trying to provide privacy at the network layer for users hiding their AP addresses but as we know the web and in particular browsers are large beasts and that's by far not enough anymore to guarantee any meaningful privacy on the internet because of all the tracking mechanisms and ways of fingerprint users. So a couple of years ago we essentially started to provide a tool called Tor Browser which is essentially a fork of Firefox and has dozens of patches on top of that so we can actually provide the privacy guarantees we think are important. And this tool got some meaningful updates over the year and one of this is that we overhauled the Tor Connection experience. Some of you who are already familiar with Tor Browser know about this weird modal dialogue popping up once they installed Tor Browser which was up until the Tor Browser 10.5 the default way of connecting to the Tor Network with the Tor Browser and this is gone because that's a really weird experience. If you have any other browser what is happening once you've started you get a browser window and then start searching or typing whatever you never get any modal dialogue which is a UX experience which is not really the best so we fixed that there's no modal dialogue during startup anymore and there are easy ways to as an easy way to connect automatically now so you don't even see this particular starting screen anymore. Overall skipping a much smoother experience for your Tor Browser usage which is pretty exciting. Then we finally deployed Snowflake which is a means for helping censored users on the internet which is kind of a next next next level step in the arms race against sensors and this has been in the works for a couple of years and has been testing for a month in our Alpha release series and finally made it earlier this year and stable and you can see in this on this graph how the the usage grew over over time starting with the initial launch in the stable series at the beginning of July this year you see there's a continually growing numbers of Snowflake users you see at the at the right side the the spike up and down and Gus will talk about this a bit later but it's it's a growth and we can see this and we can hear the feedback for users so what you can help is running Snowflakes how this is going to to work is a thing Gus will explain it on but there's already a thing you can try to remember and getting out of this talk so you can help censored users yeah that's two of the highlights for this year for for the next year and upcoming years we plan to make it even easier to help censored users around the world for instance by faster updating the default bridges we ship it through browser usually what's happening right now is that once we want to bundle new bridges to a tool browser we have to have a new release which is pretty cumbersome and slow we want to make this faster so that you can keep your tool browser but get updated bridges if there are any available which we can ship and then we continue working on the general idea of just helping users bypassing their censorship they should have a button like I am censored and then tool browser should figure out everything it needs to provide the working bridges for the for the user in the particular region where they are that's the the kind of the golden standard where we want to to get to so this will be pretty exciting work then for another project actually a multi-year project which we recently started I want to give an update the tool browser thing is pretty cool in the sense that you have an app and then you have per app settings kind of and per app means of providing privacy properties but particularly on mobile where you have kind of dozens or hundred of apps it's pretty cumbersome if it's usable or possible at all to configure every app to every app to use tool as a proxy so what we want or we actually want or what users want on mobile at least is a way to to route all safe traffic and specific safe applications through tool you don't want to configure this per app though that's that's not the the way to go um that's a pretty vpn like functionality and do I put vpn in quotes here because that's kind of very working you know concept we we probably want to come come up with the the better term at the the final product because vpn is kind of tainted and and there people have particular understandings what it what it means the vpn is and and we have kind of a new tool here where we are tools trying to to fill the niche and and provide better guarantees and than regular vpns do so we want probably come up with a different term but that's pretty close from the from functionality point of view what what tool wants to do and the the the bonus points here as well are that we can easily expand our censorship circumvention means to the whole device and don't have to deal with that on a per app basis either the work is done with the with our friends from the guardian project and the leap encryption access project which is exciting and we plan to have this available on android first likely starting in 2023 maybe already at the end of next year we'll see as I said it's a multi-year project it's spanning different teams at tour it's it's using the it's using arty the new rust based torque line we are currently writing so that's a pretty exciting project and we hope we make serious progress over next year so let me leave the the application part right now and talk a bit about what we could call network health the one of the points which frequently comes up which is important is our work in the bed relay area the the overall the dealing with malicious relays remains hard with our limited resources we remove for instance several large groups of actual relays in early 2021 and use this actually as kind of a wake-up call through seriously invest in in this area which means writing new scanners for detecting malicious behavior and do a better monitoring for for malicious behavior at the network and I think over the year I'm confident to say that we actually got a stable tour network and compared with the previous years I think it's fair to say as well that we right now have a safer tour network as well compared to the what we had in the previous years so that is exciting progress worth mentioning here but that's not enough right so what we actually want to do to provide an even safer experience and tackling the the problem of malicious relays more at the core is leveraging trust in our really community helping with with those problems and the key points to take away here is that is a mixed approach in a sense that we have technical tools helping with bed relay work but as well this is a social approach which is important here because we can solve the the problem of malicious relays with technical means alone and this is a thing we take into account right now already we started successfully I think with experiments for instance we we removed like three weeks ago two large groups of of relays which we deemed to be malicious which were perfectly configured from a configuration perspective then all the my family setting set and they had a contact info information set which was supposed to be non-spoofable so they did all the technical parts right but still once we started to contact them and and tried to talk to them it was pretty clear they they were very likely malicious and we removed them quickly from the network which showed us once more that there's a social component here too which is important and this will be a priority for the network health team not only for the team I mean there's a community team involved as well and and other teams too but it would be important for for the talk project in 2022 and what this means at the end you know taking trust into account is not set yet there could be the idea that we say okay we have here a large group of trusted relays and they get more traffic to see or more traffic to see from users compared to the non-trusted group this is performance implications and many other implications which we need to explore in detail starting this year and and but more next year and probably for the coming years which actually brings me to my final point on for my part which is talking a bit about the two performance and the work we did this year what's coming up next so if you look at these and this graph or those two graphs you see a growing gap between the bandwidth which is a vertus on the network and the actually used bandwidth over the years starting from you know kind of 2011 and continuing up until today this is kind of counterintuitive because one of the things we usually get as kind of most of the most important complaint is that slow so what's the issue here if you have so much kind of surplus bandwidth but it's not getting used but on the other hand users are complaining towards slow so we have a project which is trying to solve those problems now we think that a big part of this equation is coming up with a good congestion control for the torn network which was lacking so far so that we have an overall better bandwidth usage and this got implemented this year which is exciting and will be deployed next year and we hopefully see not this growing gap anymore but this shrinking gap additionally one thing we we we sorely missed was feedback for relay operators whether they're released or doing well whether they are overloaded and whether they can improve settings and the problem modifications so we implemented a series of kind of warnings or triggers which really operators can monitor and we from the tour project side can monitor as well and then we can can ping really operators and helping them figure out their stuff and getting those issues fixed resolving the overload they see on their relays and planning for plan for 2022 as well is that we start do better load balancing by figuring out which relay relays are seriously overloaded and moving traffic from them back to less overloaded relays giving an overall better performance and and user experience for our users so I think that's all I had to say for my side thanks for listening and now Gus will pick this up thank you dear so hello just as Gus from the tour project and today I will talk a little bit about the community team and our work on the tour community so we will cover user support the new user support forum our new gamification project uh they run a bridge campaign that we started last month and and we are also going to talk about the censorship the tour censorship in Russia so oops here is so for the tour forum uh we at the beginning of this year we start to think about having a place where people can ask questions that is not a main list so in 2021 what looks like a support forum you know how where users can do questions and receive help so email and user documentation are nice are cool are important because people in censored regions they can access this resource they can send an email from Iran from China from Russia now and they can access our documentation but we were thinking about other other ways to reach out to this community to find places to find a way to to them to communicate and ask questions so part of this plan is to the first part of this plan is to have the tour forum so people can access this information and ask questions on a new user support forum that's friendly and you can install an app on your phone and and contact and talk with others and later I will talk about the second part of this plan so we launched the tour forum this year in October and it's been it's been very nice and I invite everyone to join our our tour forum the other project that we are doing at the community team is the our gamification project for relay operators so the idea is to understand what what are the motivations how we can incentivize the tour network how we can grow the tour network basically or why people are stopping children relays so we are doing this as part of our internship and Niko is all in turn and she's doing this work and we have a survey online so people can ask some questions and give feedback about their experience in running relays and we and last month in November we launched a campaign to get more breads and and so far well breads are very important for users living in sensory countries this is how they are going to connect to the tour network so our plan was to have 200 new ops for breads ops for is a plugable transport that can obfuscate your tour connection and uh uh and we uh so the plan was 200 new breads and the campaign stats at now are 900 new running breads 800 new ops for breads and the network size bump from 1,200 to 2,000 new breads uh overall so we uh so the campaign was a is a real success and we and we you can see on the graph here on the on the screen how the campaign changed the the the course of the network size here and and so this campaign started in November and in December a situation just happened so in the beginning of December we we received a lot of users asking for support in Russia and it was not well we usually have some users asking help but that time budget time was different we received like a lot of user support requests basically emails asking for tar breads and that was very strange because we didn't know anything happening so we start to investigate with uni which is a uh open server tar off network interference to understand what was happening so we start to see some anomalies on the tornet uh on on russia uh basically blocking uh not just our uh website but also the tor network uh and not only the tor network but also some tar breads and that was like some we start to looking to that to understand what was happening so uh we start to collect information and we put together in our ticket in the few days later we received an email from from russian authorities uh saying that they were going to block the tar parts domain in and basically we thought to give you answer reason and and we didn't understand what was happening so we i'm going to skip the lawyer part and and and the the supposed the the reasons that they are blocking uh the tor project website and they will focus on what they are actually doing and how that's impacting the tor network and the tor community so russia is the second country legacy country of tor users uh is united states russia germany netherlands and other countries that are the top 10 top 20 countries that are using tor and uh and and we start to look on metrics and see that the the numbers of tor users were were decreasing in in december and we also saw that the bridge users was increasing so you can see clearly the impact of the censorship on joseph graph here and joseph graph is available on matrix portal tool so the summary here is one on december first russian authorities they block it tor director authorities so if you have tor installed on your computer you cannot bootstrap tor uh they block it tor browser breeds so if you have tor browser installed you cannot use these breeds they also block a domain fronting mickey asia so if you try to bypass censorship that was not going to work they also block it snowflake and i'm going to talk a little bit later and they also block it a bunch of tor bids uh in different internet providers so uh depends on where you are on russia you can use tor but in other places that was going to be more complicated and the only way to bypass the censorship at that time on december first was to use a breed from bridge dot tor purge dot org or from our email and and so we start to fight the censorship we launched a telegram bot that you can get a bridge and that and that bridge is not blocked in russia and we test these breeds on our vintage points on russia to see if they are blocked if they are blocked be asked for relay operator to rotate that type of address so these breeds are working and we are checking if they are uh and we are checking inventorying if they are working the tor community also fight fought back and we and the tor community spin up like uh more than 400 new tor breeds in just a few days when we have amazing volunteers translate the tor user support guides in russia and uh and during after the first block on december first the anti-censorship team also provided a fix for snowflake and and it was and just fix was available on tor browser the last released so you can see on just a graph that snowflake was around like less than 2000 users but after december you can see it take a while but then start to increase the number of snowflake users in basically because of russia and you can see just just graph here there is a decrease here is because um the the server crashed after too many users so we fix the server and uh and we start to get more users so if you want to help people in certain country you can run at our bridge or you can run a snowflake proxy and that that will be very helpful for tor users in russia and uh a new update uh during christmas we also had a new round of censorship in russia more breeds were blocked between december 23 and 24 uh we are going to reach out to relay operators and and and say and we are going to contact contact them and say okay you need to rotate your IP address if you want to get back in the game and and fight censorship and we are going to do that and just week uh is snowflake is working fine and we have been working uh with uh doing user support with russian users and we already answered more than 1300 help requests since december 1st just for comparison we we sold at 140 sorry 1,400 support tickets between january and november so in one month we already have more user support requests from russia than uh in a whole one in 12 months basically so so i will do a call here for the internet freedom community to spin up at our bridge or run isoflake proxy if you can if you cannot run a bridge you can donate to relay associations if you cannot donate you can help and teach tor users about uh about breeds or you can help localize tor in russia or you can do we can apply pressure uh like if you are part of a digital rights organization or a human rights organization uh help us to make pressure on russia government uh and stand up in solidarity like edwards noden did and published is uh calling the the russian government to stop blocking tor uh how to get involved uh we are available on tor irc and matrix channels you can join us uh our mailing list they are public and you can see what we are talking and you can help you can also join the tor forum and you can contribute to our get lab and for next year we are going to improve we are going to continue to improve our user support tools for user living in certain uh countries or regions uh so one of our ideas is to provide a telegram uh chat channel so users can communicate and have and get user support on telegram we are going to continue to develop the tor relay gamification project and uh continue to organize tor trainings in the global south in matine america in east africa and organize relay operators meetups uh today we are going to have a relay relay operator meetup 10 p.m german time and the link you can find on tor relay mailing list and also if you search on twitter also some media you can also find that um and the uh today we just covered some topics from the state of the onion we some uh one month ago we did a a huge presentation like two hours and and half about anti-sensorship, fundraising, ux, sysodemine and many other updates about rt about v2 onion deprecation and many other topics and you can watch that on youtube so i think that's it from my side and and we are open for more questions thank you so much guys like obviously so it's a really important project and that's honestly great to see how dedicated you are to to basically helping everyone i was actually uh now we're going to go on to the question and i was actually wondering something myself before we uh we head over to to taking the ones coming in from the internet um basically i as far as i understand like when you working with bridges and making sure to like avoid this censorship and everything like as far as i understand an important tool in this process are the meat bridges where you use huge cloud providers to basically mask traffic to tor that's like regular hdcps website traffic does that not work in the case of russia or like what does the attack threat situation look like at the moment in that scale landscape i can answer in two parts the first part is that some cloud providers they don't like domain fronting and so amazon and and others they they they change their policy and they start to block uh well not just block but to remove uh projects that were using domain fronting so the only cloud provider that allows tor or allow tor to do that was uh azure and we and we had to limit the bandwidth on that so if you use mickey azure on tor browser it's going to be very slow and um and one thing that we so this is the first part like the the providers they don't like that and they were enforcing us to stop or remove remove uh just support the other thing is that the the bill like the cost of running a mickey azure breed or or a mickey amazon breed that was too high and too costly so snowflake is uh is the next step here because it use mic it use domain fronting to to connect you to a tor proxy uh snowflake proxy and the cost will be like a very cheap so you can you can get the the benefit of domain fronting and you can use uh a lot of proxies to connect tor users and that will not cost a lot of money for for the tor project and for for tor users so that's uh is there a way to go here is not look back but look forward it sounds so cool like obviously it seems that this was very important and actually hearing like some of the problems that you guys are facing in your fight i think that's very interesting for for all of us so uh questions from the audience uh the first one is that the apps that you're making like it the question is whether they would make you identifiable so basically if exactly those five apps are always calling home over the same tor nodes that the question is if that if someone could link that back to you do you want to talk about this dust should i go ahead yeah i think this should not be the case i mean depending on what kind of apps you have how they are configured um and um some potential you know timing signatures and stuff so that's one of the things we are concerned for instance with tor browser and um trying to really make sure to break this up in the sense that folks can't learn anything about those patterns you have it's hard in particular if adversaries can monitor you know exit nodes or end points over a long period of time but generally you should be protected from this kind of thread right that makes sense so the next question is that if they understand correctly the tor organization is registered in the united states could the project be in danger of any government pressure to be discontinued and have you guys ever planned to move to more net neutral countries like switzerland or similar hi um so from my point of view i i don't think we suffer any pressure right now from us government so i think what would be interesting well one thing that is important is one thing is the tor project and the other thing is the tor network the tor network is we have director authorities in different countries and that just to avoid this kind of government pressure against the tor network so i think i think the question would be more like finding different ways to fund to to make tor sustainable not just like diversifying our firms so we don't be too connected with a government or one source provider of resource i think this is happening right now isabella the executive director has changing a lot of our money income and if you look back in the history who has government was adding a lot of money through to the tor project in different by different ways you know like uh uh human rights projects and uh internet freedom projects and just was basically how tor is and was funded by us we asked the government but not just us government other governments like swedish government too so i think uh i would be more concerned about the tor director authorities being in just one country and that's not true we are in different countries and i so far i don't i never heard any kind of pressure from the us government against the non-profit college the project so i think that is basically my answer here that's good to him and now to um onto maybe a little bit lighter question do uh top browser users have any chance or hope to see less captures in the future yeah i think we do have some hope there is i mean not just only hope but um we have work ongoing solving this from different angles the first one is um outreach to major providers trying to understand why they are blocking to war or why they provide captures and working with them um to come up with solutions which is or which are not only deployable by them but by the wider industry so there is a knowledge gap here and then trying to based on that trying to figure out how we can solve this problem and that's not only from a you know policy angle but we plan to look into technical means as well for instance there's the idea of providing tokens to to users so they which they can spend anonymously at websites for instance and the websites can can look for that and try to regulate the traffic keeping the noisy bots out while providing good service to our toy users providing such a token that's another thing that won't be solved next year it's a multi-year project to we are a small organization so there has to be you know some kind of prioritization but that's definitely on our radar and a serious problem for us so we should fix this sounds like great initiatives and also like they're going some of the way in order to to some extent legitimize the use of the tool browser maybe not as much in common society but also when actually visiting different websites yeah exactly nice next up is whether you guys are planning to figure out some kind of solutions for firewalls for instance the corporate ones that are slowing traffic down hmm i know guys do you do you have some you know queries or complaints from users for this particular issue i i'm not sure about that yeah i just just would be a very specific question i it's also very fair to just say that it's not a problem that you've heard a lot of complaints about right yeah just true we i didn't heard about that like the capture one is a popular one but i never heard yeah i think there a bunch of larger things to fry here yeah it's not really you know not even our top 10 so there right i guess it can also be very hard for you guys to like work with figuring out how to prioritize all the different initiatives and the wishes that that people have yeah definitely cool um so um unfortunately we don't have time for any more questions right now but there is a break out out room that people can come to and you will answer any further questions for now we are going to have a break on this channel before the next talk that's going on at the 20 hundred which is cookie banner that's online verben ecosystem and google preisträger big brother was 2021 for now thank you very much guys take care and maybe we see you in the


Hey guys, welcome back to my channel. My name is Sonali if you guys don't already know me and today I'm gonna be doing a February favorites. So we're gonna start with Beauty First. This month I splurged on one skincare item. It is the Lotus Youth Preserve face cream with super seven complex from Fresh.  It was I think 45 dollars but it does come with a lot of product. I try to use it only in the morning to have my skin really refreshed and moisturized before I put on makeup otherwise my skin looks really dry if I don't moisturize well. So I try to save it for the morning only because it does cost a little bit more and I'm trying to like make it last as long as possible. Next is the NYX micro brow pencil. I personally think this is a lot like the ABH pencil and I don't really see any difference other than the price because the ABH one is 20 dollars I think and this one is maybe 11 or under 10. At least for me these brow pencils go so fast and I don't want to keep spending 20 dollars every two months or something. So I decided to try out the NYX one and it's pretty much the same exact thing. It is very easy to use this with a heavy hand so I would just be careful and watch a hundred brow tutorials if you can because light strokes are the key to brow pencils and to dip brow as well but I feel like people don't really realize that the first time they put on brow pencil my first time putting on a brow pencil was scary. Next up is the Laura Mercier candle glow sheer perfecting powder. This is pretty much like a very sheer highlighter for all over your skin as you can see it's kind of shimmery and I use it as a setting powder and as like a nose highlight because usually I feel that my t-zone is way too oily to put a highlight on my nose but this one gives it a very sheer glow and not just like a super highlighted nose tip if that makes sense. So I heard about this product from Alexandra Garza here on YouTube and her skin is always glowing but I definitely recommend it to anyone who's looking for that sheer glow. Then I have another setting powder this one is from Durma Blend I actually recently got this over the holidays and the MAC girls swore by this. Apparently this and the setting spray from Durma Blend is they're tried and true and Lifehack may see sells these for 34 dollars I think in a bundle and one of these costs like around 25 or even a little bit more expensive so it just makes sense to get the bundle. So I just set my foundation and concealer with this and then spray on this after I've done everything of my makeup. It's currently 10 30 and I did my makeup at one I think so I think my makeup stayed on pretty well and I did use both of these products today. I just have one fashion favorite of the month and it is my Birkenstocks. I wanted a pair of sandals that I could just slip on super easily and that are very comfortable and I used to have like the little clog Birkenstocks and I just thought it was so funny that they were coming back in style I mean not of course the clog ones these ones kind of look like Jesus sandals almost. Next is my hydro flask this is the best water bottle ever. First of all it is insulated so my ice water stays ice water for a very long time. Second of all this has a sports cap so you don't have to unscrew this like a swell bottle because I used to have a knockoff swell bottle and I hated it because you have to unscrew it and you couldn't just like drink from it like that and there's like technology in the sports cap that keeps it cold as well and at first I wanted like a plain color like a white or like a gray or a black but I'm happy I got this one because it's super colorful and this is like my favorite color back in high school slash middle school I mean it's still super pretty but I wouldn't call it my favorite color anymore I think I'm more on the neutral side. My next favorite is the Kayla It Signs workout program I've been doing it for eight weeks now so I did four weeks of the pre-training and four weeks of real training so far and I'm doing it with my friend and it's so helpful to do it with a friend you guys like you don't understand it's super hard to make excuses when you have a friend doing it with you I used to hate working out because I never knew what to do I always thought walking and running on the treadmill was so boring but this program gives you specific workouts and she tells you how many times to do them so for me that's like a little bit more motivating than just thinking that you have to walk like 30 minutes on the treadmill every day you know what I mean because it's like something different every single day so it's Monday through Friday and you do the workouts Monday Wednesday Friday and then Tuesday and Thursday you do low intensity workouts such as like treadmill or elliptical so I wanted to keep this section continued and I wanted to tell you guys my favorite vlogger of the month this month it is Pia and Kane basically they're Australian vloggers and he titles the videos Diaries of an Instagram husband because she is literally like an Instagram model who gets paid to like go to let's say Bali and stay in their hotels to like take pictures and to just like advertise their hotels and she obviously does like products too but I think it's so cool because they share a lot of their secrets for vlogging and they share what cameras they use and their setups and they're very transparent like if you follow Pia on Twitter she like tweets about like PR emails that she gets and I think it's really interesting to me because obviously I do YouTube too so I kind of like to find out about that stuff and not to mention their videos are amazing they're super high quality and the editing is amazing the last thing of my favorites video is my favorite songs of the month I have a little mix of house music and country hope you guys really enjoyed this video I'm planning on writing up a blog post to have everything linked that I talked about in this video so I will link that blog post down below so you can get direct links to all the random things and beauty things and even the songs I hope you guys are enjoying my weekend in my life vlogs and if you have not seen them yet then check them out I will also put the playlist on my blogs in the description box below I will see you guys in my next video bye bye


Is it how important isn't that people understand? Yeah, this idea in particular or that they understand the ideas behind the market order in general perhaps in a consequentialist way Compared to Institutions friends the women that a yeah, I mean I think it's all about ideas because I think at the end of the day Institutions are reflection of the ideas that we have and not the not the other one now There's a symbiotic relationship if you have bad institutions It's harder to get the ideas into a culture and part of getting the ideas into cultures to build the right institutions that reinforce But it starts with ideas And it ends with ideas that


Let's shift to the golf course a big day for the Beaver's Men's Hockey Program. Past coaches, players, and other alumni all came together to shoot a round of golf and also help benefit the program. Bemidji State hosted the 20th annual Galen-Nagel golf tournament today at the Bemidji Town and Country Club named after the former BSU goalie. The tournament has raised over $400,000 in its first 19 years and 107 of that going towards the Galen-Nagel Endowment Scholarship Fund. Overall though, a fun day for everyone helping support the Beaver Hockey Program. We want to make sure a good chunk of it goes into the Galen-Nagel Scholarship Fund. We want to make sure again that we continually give to that fund and hopefully down the road there's going to be one scholarship that's going to be endowed under Galen-Nagel's name and the rest of it is just you know things that we need for the program and there's just so many things that you need for the program every year. The Bemidji Men's Program has done well for itself and it drives the community in and you know I haven't been to a game in the new arena in a couple years but you know I'd love to come up and watch just to see the atmosphere and see you know the support that everyone gives the team as well. With the amount of alumni and how close the you know Bemidji alumni is it's uh there's a good group that shows up and it's I think I think I heard there's over 40 40 alumni hockey players here and I think there's 160 golfers so it's it's a good turnout. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland news please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.


You need a financial advisor with the freedom to focus on your specific needs. Whatever your goals, Reeve Potter can create a game plan tailored to you. Call Reid at 432-0777 at Pikeville, Kentucky to learn more. Hillbilly Days 2023 has concluded and many agree that it was a smashing success. The weekend-long festival brought plenty of food, music, and tourism into the city of Pikeville for everyone to enjoy. Aside from that, Hillbilly Days also helped stimulate the economy, which draws in more businesses and events for residents to look forward to. We're always excited in the city of Pikeville to host Hillbilly Days. Our entire staff does a great job of contributing not only the city staff, but UMG and all of our city entities really do a great job of coming together and making sure those three days are as successful as possible. I think everything went smoothly this year. It's always a group effort when we talk about Hillbilly Days from loaded on Wednesday night until load out or move out on Saturday evening. We always enjoy seeing all the different visitors come into the city of Pikeville from all over the country that come for the three-day celebration. Planning for Hillbilly Days requires all year. This means city officials are always thinking of new ways to improve the festival and draw in larger crowds. I think we always look forward to the next year as soon as Hillbilly Days has finished the planning starts for the next year. Just seeing things that we can improve upon is always something that we look at and certainly we look forward to having all of our guests and visitors come back next year for Hillbilly Days. We had a lot of different events that went on this year. We had the micro wrestling, we had Trace Atkins in town for a wonderful concert on Saturday evening, and then all of the different attractions that we have over the course of the three days is really something that we look to improve upon every year. But all in all, it was a really good festival this year and we're just thankful that everybody stayed safe and we certainly hope they enjoyed themselves. Reporting from Out in Top News, I'm Nick Colum.


May Holland and Annie have been loyal friends since they were roommates at university. With Annie's help, May switches jobs from a utility company with a hostile supervisor to the Circle, the most inferential company in the world. The Circle's business is like Yahoo's or Google's. The company is created by three wise men. The company offers services such as social media, up-to-date information search engines and other business activities. Making the government or society more accountable is also their mission. May starts at the customer experience department and rises in the ranks quite fast. In fact, she needs the generous fringe benefits offered to her and her parents. In the book, she has had a romance with two men. Francis and Colton. The more she is involved in the company's strategies to make everything transparent, the more risks she is creating for herself. While she is becoming world famous, she also suffers great losses. Dave Eggers was born on March 12, 1970, in Massachusetts, America. He and his family spent some years in Chicago. He intended to pursue a degree in journalism, but his studies came to a halt because his parents died of cancer prematurely. Aged only 21, Dave had to take full responsibility to take care of his younger brother, Christopher. He moved to California and started to write when he took over a local free newspaper called Cups. His first book was called A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, which told his struggle to raise his younger brother, and the book was the finalist for the Blizzard Prize, which is an award for achievements in newspaper and literature. He has written various other works, such as his 2006 novel, What is the What?, the autobiography of Valentino Achaque Deng. This was the finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction. This book has been selected in mandatory read by several American universities. In 2013, he published The Circle, a story about May, a young lady who's also a fresh university graduate working for a San Francisco-based IT company. The Guardian, the British newspaper, comments that The Circle is a prescient, important, and enjoyable book, telling us so much about the impacts of the computer age on human beings.


Rwanda vs Kenya, which country is best for expats? The Republic of Rwanda is a land-locked nation in Central Africa's Great Rift Valley, where the Southeast African continent and the African Great Lakes region meet. Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo all border Rwanda, which is a few degrees south of the equator. Rwanda's natural beauty, with its lush green hittles and breathtaking scenery, is appreciated by expats and digital nomads who call the country home. They also like the warm and inviting locals, affordable housing, and first-rate infrastructure. A significant lure for expats and digital nomads is the nation's dedication to safety and security. The absence of nightlife and entertainment choices is a con that some expats and digital nomads plan to be something of a detriment. On the other hand, Kenya has it everything, from the modern capital Nairobi to the breathtaking white sand beaches along the Mambasa coast. You may anticipate enjoying all of this and much more if you were an expat living in Kenya. Kenya consistently rates as one of the greatest countries in Africa for expats, one of the top safari destinations in the world, and one of the most affordable nations in Africa in terms of cost of living. Hello there. In today's video, we are doing a comparison between Kenya and Rwanda to find out which of them is better for expats to live in. Stay up with us as we discover the best place for you. Demography of Rwanda Rwanda has one of the highest population's densities in Africa, with 445 people per square kilometer. According to historians like Gerard Prunier, the population density may have contributed to the 1994 genocide in some way. With a few significant towns and a largely rural population, the country is evenly distributed with homes. The savannah terrain in the former province of Yenutara and Ekajira National Park in the east are the only sparsely populated areas of the nation. The main city, Kigali, with a population of about a million people. Its infrastructure development is being hampered by its quickly growing population. In accordance with the 2012 census, Kiseni, which is close to Lake Kivu and the Congolese capital of Goma, is the second largest city with a population of 126,000. The National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda pegged Rwanda's population at 11,262,564 as of 2015. With a projection of 13,246,394 by 2023. 10,515,973 people were counted in the population in 2012. The population is youthful. According to the 2012 census, 53.4% of people were between the ages of 16 and 64 and 43.3% of people were under the age of 15. Demography of Kenya. In January 2017, there were roughly 48 million people living in Kenya. Due to the country's enormous population expansion during the past century from 2.9 million to 40 million people, 73% of the population is under 30. Khabira, one of the biggest slums in the world, is located in Nairobi. There are fought to be between 170,000 and 1 million residents of the Shandy town. Around 500,000 people live at the UNHCR compound in the northern city of Dadaab. Many of Africa's major ethoracial and linguistic groupings are represented in Kenya's diversified population. The number of ethnic categories and subcategories recorded in the country's census has increased dramatically over time, rising from 42 in 1969 to more than 120 in 2019. Despite the lack of an official list of ethnic groups in Kenya, this number has increased significantly over time. 60% or 30% of the population are Bantas or Nalots. Arabs, Indians, and Europeans all make up a small ethnic minority as do Crescitic communities. Economy of Rwanda. The 1994 genocide severely harmed Rwanda's economy because of the high-death toll, crumbling infrastructure, looting, and disregard for vital cash crops. This significantly reduced the GDP and weakened the nation's capacity to draw in both domestic and foreign investment. Since then, the economy has grown stronger. The nominal GDP per capita is projected to reach $909.09 in 2022, up from $127 in 1994. China, Germany, and the United States are three important export destinations. The Rwandan Frank, which is used as the country's official currency and is administered by the National Bank of Rwanda, was about 910 francs to one U.S. dollar in December 2019. In 2007, Rwanda became a member of the East African community. Since then, it has ratified a plan for the seven member countries to create a common East African chilling through monetary union. Since there aren't many natural resources in Rwanda, the majority of the population relies on subsistence farming with basic equipment. Agriculture made up an estimated 32.5% of GDP in 2014 and employed an estimated 90% of the working population. Simple farming methods are used, along with narrow pieces of land and sloping terrain. Due in part to the resettlement of displaced persons, farm sizes, and food production have been declining since the middle of the 1980s. Despite Rwanda's abundant ecosystem, imports of food are frequently necessary since food production cannot keep up with population expansion. The situation has improved recently, though, because of the expansion of agriculture. Economy of Kenya Over the past few decades, Kenya's macroeconomic outlook has consistently seen strong development, largely as a result of significant expenditures in information and communication technology, as well as infrastructure projects for the transportation sectors of road, rail, air, and water. However, a large portion of this growth has been funded by cash flows that have been diverted from the microeconomic pockets of ordinary Kenyans through targeted monetary and fiscal measures combined with poor management, corruption, massive theft of public funds, over legislation, and an ineffective judiciary, leading to decreased incomes in common households and small businesses, unemployment, underemployment, and general unhappiness across multiple sectors. Kenya is ranked 25th out of 178 nations in the 2019 Fragile States Index, which places it in the alert category. The country's macroeconomic metrics were updated in 2014, which resulted in a rise in GDP and elevated it to low-middle income status. The Kenyan government is financially broke and finding it difficult to satisfy its financial responsibilities, despite pledges to the contrary from the government. The most severely impacted are junior government employees at both the national and local levels, who have gone up to six months or more without receiving their monthly pay, benefits, or deductions. Data on the state of the economy from various government organizations is contradictory, with official statistics failing to take into account record inflation and extremely high costs for food and other essential items. Culture of Rwanda Rwandan rites, festivals, social gatherings, and storytelling all include music and dance. The most well-known traditional dance consists of three parts, the intor or dance of the heroes performed by men, the umashijiriro or cow dance performed by women, and the drumming, which is usually done by males on Ingoma drums. The National Ballet is the most well-known dancing company. President Javier Armada founded it in 1974 and it now performs both domestically and abroad. Music has historically been passed down orally, with different social groupings having their own distinct styles. Drums are very important and the royal drummers held a prestigious position in the king's court or muami. Drummers perform in ensembles of varied sizes, often seven to nine players. The nation's expanding popular music scene is influenced by American congolese and music from the African Great Lakes. Hip hop, which combines dance hall, rap, ragae, R and B, and dance pop is the most widely listened to genre. While traditional arts and crafts are produced all across the nation, the majority of them started out as useful goods rather than just decorative ones. Particularly popular are woven bowls and baskets, especially those made in the Agaseek basket style. Produced in the southeast of Rwanda, Imigongo is a distinctive cow dung art with a history that dates back to the time when the area was a part of the independent Disaka kingdom. The feces is combined with variously colored natural soils and painted into ridge patterns to create geometric shapes. Wood carving and pottery are some further crafts. Locally obtainable materials are used in traditional building designs. The most prevalent are circular or rectangular mud homes with grass-thatched roofs known as nagatsi. The government has started an initiative to swap these out for more contemporary materials such as corrugated iron. Culture of Kenya. Kenya is not an ethnically homogenous nation. Kenyans are predominantly made up of 13 ethnic groups with a total of 27 other smaller groupings. The vast majority of Kenyans are members of Bantu tribes such as the Kikuyu, Luya, and Kamba. Nalotic tribes like the Luu, Kalinjin, Masai, and Turkana are also present. The Turkana, Rendil, and Samburu are hemitic people. About 13 percent of the population is non-African, including European, Arab, and Indian. Freedom of religion is guaranteed by the Kenyan constitution. 10 percent of the population is Muslim, 10 percent of the population is Christian, and there are a minority of Hindus and Sikhs. The majority of the population holds to traditional African beliefs which are frequently animist. Muslims tend to be concentrated in the eastern coastal regions, whereas Christians tend to be concentrated in the west and central parts of the country. The majority of Kenyans combine conventional religion with their native beliefs. Kenyans, like the majority of Africans, place a strong premium on showing respect and reverence to their departed ancestors. This isn't exactly ancestor worship, rather it's the conviction that after someone passes away, their spirit continues to exist and has to be respected. The idea is that a person doesn't truly pass away until their loved ones stop remembering them. Since they are in a state of limbo and are closer to God than the living, it is believed that one's ancestors can affect the course of one's life. So that his spirit can reside in the kid, they may give offerings to them or name a child after one. Respecting ancestors is said to keep harmony among members of the immediate family, the extended family, and the clan or tribe. Tourism in Rwanda The breathtaking landscape and welcoming locals of Rwanda, often known as the Land of a Thousand Hills, provide one-of-a-kind experiences in one of the most amazing nations in the world. Its volcanoes, highland forests, and expansive plains are home to amazing fauna, giving it a remarkable biodiversity. There is so much more to see and do than just view the gorgeous gorillas, which draw tourists from all over the world. In addition to being hospitable and friendly, Rwandans are respectful, considerate, and dedicated to the idea of progress from the bottom up. From the ancient kingdom to the present, inventiveness is something to be honored, whether it manifests itself in folk dancing, distinctive architecture, or artistic creations. The Albertine Rift is a portion of the Great Rift Valley that extends west of Rwanda. It is abundant with life and home to numerous rare indigenous species, numerous vibrantly colored birds, orchids, and butterflies coexist with chimpanzees, golden monkeys, and other primates. And even that is just the beginning. Rwanda is dedicated to preserving the existence of these famous species within the four national parks as their guardians. With a clean and green perspective, we are always trying to make sure we can live in sustainable harmony with our environment. We prohibited plastic bags in 2008, and as a result of efforts made by every community, our lands may be the cleanest in all of Africa. 10% of the money made from gorilla, safari, and other visitor permits, together with park fees, is used in collaboration with local communities to improve lives. Tourism in Kenya Following agriculture, tourism is Kenya's second largest source of foreign exchange rates. Information about tourism in Kenya is kept up to date by the Kenya Tourism Board. Photosopharis in the 60 national parks and game reserves are the main tourist attractions. The Masai Mara's Wildebeest migration, which is regarded as the seventh wonder of the world, as well as the historical mosques and colonial-era forts in Mambasa, Malindi and Lamu, as well as the Great Rift Valley and Mount Kenya's snow-capped peak, as well as the tea and coffee plantations in Kirito and Thika, as well as the beaches along the Swahili Coast in the Indian Ocean are additional draws. Cuisine in Rwanda The basic foods of the region, such as bananas, plantains, known as ibitok, lentils, sweet potatoes, beans and cassava, maniak, are the foundation of Rwandan cuisine. The average Rwandan eats meat only a few times per month. Telepea is well-liked by people who live close to lakes and have access to fish. The potato is particularly well-liked and is supposed to have been brought to Rwanda by German and Belgian colonialists. Eaten throughout the African Great Lakes, yugoli, also known locally as avugari or umatsima, is a paste made from cassava or maize and water to make a porridge-like consistency. Isombi is a dish made from mashed cassava leaves that goes well with potatoes, yugoli, dried fish and rice. Typically, lunch is a buffet called as male inch that includes the foods mentioned above and occasionally meat. When dining out in the evening, brachettes, which are typically made from goat, though occasionally also from tripe, beef or fish, are the most popular dish. Cuisine in Kenya The diverse cuisine of Kenya is not summed up by a single dish. Every community has its own native cuisine. According to the region, staples include maize and other grains like millet and sorghum that are consumed with a variety of meats and vegetables. Yugoli, tsukumawiki, and nayamachoma are the three foods that are consumed by everyone in Kenya. Kenya's seaside food is distinctive and well-liked across the nation. Tsukumawiki, which translates to to push the weak in swahili, is a straightforward dish that is typically made with greens like cattle or collards, but can also be prepared with cassava leaves, sweet potato leaves, or pumpkin leaves. Because it is frequently consumed to get through the weak or stretch the weak, its swahili name derives from this fact. Grilled meat or nayamachoma or kyukuchoma, as it is often known, is considered an unofficial national cuisine and is typically made with goat or sheep. Typically it is prepared over an open flame. It is typically consumed with machicha, shredded spinach, maharag, bean stew, and yugoli and kachambari. On Christmas Day, it is served as a customary supper. In goko, chicken with yugoli is a favorite dish among the Luya people, who live in the country's western area. Nightlife in Rwanda. Young folks and older people alike enjoy going out to nightclubs in Rwanda. Rwanda boasts a variety of pubs for any taste, from posh urban establishments to cozy rural establishments. The majority of nightclubs in Rwanda feature live music, DJs, themed evenings, and special events. Most nightclubs have a vibrant, upbeat environment because patrons come to party and dance the night away. The majority of nightclubs in Rwanda serve a selection of local and foreign beers, wines, and spirits. Some clubs also offer small meals and snacks. The capital city of Rwanda, Kigali, is home to some of the country's top nightclubs. Popular locations include Phoenix Club and Primus Club, which are renowned for amazing music, cool atmosphere, and enough drinks. Nightlife in Kenya. The claims are accurate. Of all the African countries on the continent, Kenya offers the best clubs and nightlife. You've probably heard the saying Kenya is a partying nation before. Whatever you're looking for, Kenya's varied nightlife is sure to meet your requirements. The scene encompasses everything from upscale dining establishments to legendary bars, as well as everything in between, and offers live music at many venues. Until you visit our clubs, you cannot say that you have really experienced what Kenya is all about. Come dance the night away with the locals at numerous discos. You'll forget all your problems, and let loose thanks to the kind character of Kenyan party goers. Enjoy what will be the best party of your life while sipping the famed Tuskva beer. Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, is a sophisticated party city after sunset. As you dance the night away and take in the starry night sky in Mambasa, the country's lifeline on the coast, you will have an amazing evening. Comparison is done based on an individual's perspective of what they prefer in a particular country. It is your choice to make after going through the various sectors, mentioned to determine which is preferable to the other. Do well to leave a comment and let us know which country you believe is best for you to move to as an expat. If you learned anything after watching this video, do not hesitate to like, share, and subscribe to Africa Reloaded for more interesting updates.