Hi everybody, my name is Jeffrey and I have a confession to make today. I love using Ruby. There's just something about it. Yeah, you can applaud for that. Okay, starting off with some applause. And you know, the funny thing about Ruby is I wouldn't be surprised if many of you in this room feel the same way. There's just something about using this programming language, right? And I'm really interested in the question of why. What is it about Ruby that makes people fall in love with it? And to some extent, this is kind of a personal question. It might just be a matter of taste. But I do think there are tools that we can use to systematically analyze this question. And the value of doing this analysis, it's not just for intellectual curiosity. I think when we as engineers want to design successful systems, it's really important that we look at other successful systems and try to learn everything we can from why they work, why we like them. And whether it's a programming language or a framework or other products, there's a lot to be learned from doing this sort of analysis. And so today we're going to try to dig into this question of what makes Ruby what it is, what can we learn from the design of this language that we all love. And the lens we're going to do this through is by comparing Ruby to other programming languages. So Matz, the creator of Ruby, is kind of a huge programming language enthusiast. He loves checking out weird other new programming languages. And he says, the reason is by learning other languages, we can broaden our horizons about what's out there and we can more deeply understand Ruby itself. So one tech we can take on this is to compare Ruby to other modern programming languages that we might use today. Like Rust, wow, bird in the auditorium. That bird loves Ruby too. So we can compare Ruby to other languages that we might use today like Rust or Python or Java. And there's some value in this. But I kind of think of this as like trying to understand a person by comparing them to their friends or their peers. That's not how you understand a person. To understand someone, you gotta meet their family. Meet their parents, understand where they came from, how they were raised. And so that's what we're going to do today. We're going to meet Ruby's family. We're going to explore three prominent programming languages that contributed heavily to the design of Ruby, Lisp, Smeltok, and Perl. And as we go through these languages, part of it will just be introducing those who haven't seen these languages before to what they are. But we're also going to dig deeper than that. And what I want to get at is not just these languages in isolation, but how are they all combined to become this one coherent language called Ruby that we use? What can we learn from the design decisions that Matt's made in combining them? And also, there's a lot of cool forgotten ideas that these languages had that didn't quite make it into Ruby or have kind of perhaps been forgotten entirely today. And so maybe there are some of these ideas that you can draw inspiration from in thinking about how we can move forward the way that we do programming. So let's get started. Starting with Lisp. Can I see a show of hands? Who here has ever used a Lisp before? Okay, so a good number of people. Those of you who didn't have your hands up, you might be wrong. So Ruby was actually originally a Lisp according to Matt's. He says maybe it could have been called Matt's Lisp. Now for those of you who've used Lisp, this might seem kind of surprising. But we'll get to what he meant by this. So what is Lisp? In 1958, this guy, John McCarthy, a computer scientist, was thinking about a problem. And the problem he was thinking about was not how to make a new programming language. The problem he was thinking about was how can we describe computation algorithms in a new way? What's a new set of axioms to describe computation? And what he came up with was this idea that eventually became the language called Lisp, list processing language. But that wasn't the core of his intention. Now Lisp was a pretty simple idea. You have these data structures of lists and a few very simple operators for manipulating lists, things like chopping them up, putting them back together. And the amazing thing about Lisp is, out of just those primitives, you can actually describe any arbitrary computation. So one of the most famous examples of this is that you can write an interpreter for the Lisp language itself using a very small number of primitives. Now to kind of appreciate the significance of this achievement in the arc of computing history, we can kind of look at languages on this spectrum that we talk about a lot, from low level to high level. So low level means close to the hardware, high level means close to the way that humans think in an abstract way, right? And until Lisp, we were kind of on this slow, arduous climb from the bottom. We were layering on top of how the machine works, slightly better ways of thinking, but we were still pretty low level. Lisp was not just another layer on top of these layers. Lisp kind of flew in from a totally different direction. McCarthy was not thinking about how can we paper over how computers work. He was thinking about describing computation in an abstract way, completely decoupled from how computers work at all. And I think sometimes people will say things like, Lisp was discovered, not invented. This is what they're talking about. This is what was different about Lisp at the time. And when you think about this in the context of Ruby, I think you see a very strong lineage from this idea to this day. The idea that we want our systems to be designed primarily around the way that people think, rather than the way that machines think. And the system will figure out how to translate what you're thinking. It kind of relates to what David talked about in his keynote yesterday. There's a lot of conceptual compression going on in Lisp and in Ruby. Now, because Lisp was essentially the first real high level language, there are many, many specific things that it introduced to the world that Ruby got. Conditionals, dynamic typing, garbage collection, symbol types, all came from Lisp at first. But there's one area that's particularly interesting to look at, I think, which is how Ruby incorporates the way that Lisp thinks about functions. So in Lisp, functions were treated very differently from prior languages. They're just values that you can create and manipulate at runtime. So here, we're using the lambda keyword in Lisp to define an anonymous function that takes an x and multiplies it by two. And Lisp also introduced the idea of higher order functions like map, which can take those functions as arguments and do stuff with them. Now, if you've ever used map in Ruby, you understand the power of this way of thinking, right? And in Ruby, you can actually kind of directly translate this code. There's a lambda keyword, there are function types. We basically have all of this directly inherited from Lisp. So some of you are kind of squinting at this, because this isn't how we normally do map in Ruby, right? We actually don't use the lambda keyword very much. We use these things called blocks. Now, we all get used to using blocks every day, but have you ever thought about the question of, what are blocks really, and why do they exist at all? Why not just use lambdas? So what are blocks? They're kind of weird. They're not objects. Everything in Ruby is an object, right? Not blocks. If you type that into an IRB, it is not a standalone thing. You have to define a method that takes a block as this invisible argument that you can't see and calls it. So what's the point of this? Well, I think that blocks are basically a very concise syntax for the special cases where you need to pass one anonymous function to another function, one and only one. But it turns out that that special case is tremendously common and actually really useful. So here, we have this kind of pipeline of functional transformation on some data in Lisp and Ruby. And the Ruby is just cleaner, because we often have this case of just passing one function into something else. Domain specific languages. On top, I have what our spec might look like if it was written in Lisp. Lots of parentheses, lots of lambda keywords everywhere. And Ruby, just having this concise syntax for one anonymous function being passed enables all sorts of stuff. And you see this used all over the place in Rails and migrations, rake tasks, and so on. Now, I would argue this is actually inconsistency. In Lisp, you have this one thing, lambdas, that you can use everywhere. In Ruby, you have blocks, procs, lambdas. I know it took me a while to wrap my head around the differences between all those different things. If you ever need to pass two anonymous functions to a function, you can't use blocks anymore, you have to switch to a totally different syntax. So it's arguably more confusing, more complex, and inconsistent. And yet, blocks add so much to the language, right? And so I think what I take away from this is that we often hold up consistency as this key goal of design, but actually sometimes a little bit of inconsistency in a system optimizing for those special cases that are really high leverage can be a great choice. Let's talk about syntax. So this is a little bit of Lisp syntax. Looks pretty different from Ruby, right? This is called S expressions. And there's this fun fact of computing history, which is that this famous Lisp syntax was actually not originally intended to be the syntax of Lisp. It was supposed to be the internal syntax that they would use in the interpreter. But someone on the research group just wrote an interpreter that used this syntax directly. That got popular, and the rest was history. And John McCarthy, the guy you saw earlier, wasn't actually a fan of this. He wanted M expressions to prevail in the end, but he has this great quote that I think anyone who's done software engineering will kind of resonate with, where he says, that project was neither finalized nor explicitly abandoned. It just kind of receded into the indefinite future. So we got this syntax. And actually, there's a lot of nice things about Lisp syntax. It mirrors the abstract representation of the code very well. So you have very little parsing in the language. You can do cool things with macros that manipulate this code as data. Anyone who uses Lisp will say, don't worry about the parentheses, you'll get used to it. But if Ruby started out as a Lisp, why didn't we get this syntax, right? Ruby got its syntax from another language called FORTRAN. And whether or not you think that Lisp syntax is better or worse, and there are tons of debates about that that I'm not gonna get into now, I think that there was really no choice when Matz was developing Ruby. Whether or not he thought that Lisp syntax was better, by 1992, there was a clear winner, right? All of our languages that we use today, for the most part, used the FORTRAN tree of syntax. And so I think there's this idea that sometimes if you wanna be a widely adopted thing, even if you think there might be something better, you just have to go with what everyone's using. And I think Ruby syntax is a great example of that. If Ruby had used Lisp syntax, I truly don't think that we would all be here today using it professionally. And so I think we might see similar things going on today with, for example, the Rails treatment of the modern JavaScript ecosystem. Maybe some people in the Rails community have the reservations about how people do modern JavaScript, but it's a trend. And to stay relevant, sometimes you just have to go along with those trends and not fight those battles. So there is kind of a fun question of, well, there's some cool stuff you can do with Lisp syntax that you can't do with Ruby, but can you do it with Ruby? So there's a gem for Ruby, a Ruby parser written in Ruby, where you can give it any Ruby code as text and it will parse it into an abstract syntax tree for you. This is just data.  Now you might be thinking, this is a terrible idea and you would be right, but there are some interesting use cases for it. So for example, there's a gem that does mutation testing, which is when you take your code and modify it randomly and make sure your tests fail. And that uses this sort of thing under the hood. So it's interesting to think about, can we do some of the things that Lisp people do with macros using these sorts of tools in Ruby as well? Now, of course, we don't need to resort to this thing very often in Ruby because we have other tools for doing metaprogramming and that brings us to our next language, Smalltalk. So can I see a show of hands? Who here has used Smalltalk before? Okay, a few hands, fewer than the Lisp hands. So Smalltalk was the first object oriented language. And as a result, it had an enormous influence on Ruby. The language was primarily created by this guy on the left, Alan Kay, with his collaborators Adele Goldberg and Dent Inglis at the really legendary Xerox PARC Lab in Palo Alto in the 1970s. Alan Kay's goal was a little bit different than John McCarthy's. He was more focused on kind of the human aspects of computing. Kay's vision was a world where anyone can write programs that they want to use, whether it's an architect, designing architecture software for themselves, or kids making games for themselves. And I think this resonates with David Tsikino from yesterday morning around making technology more accessible to more people, right? By conceptually, by creating the right abstractions and compressing a lot of the complexity under the hood, the vision is to create a system that anyone can use to make the programs they want. And this is part of why he named it Smalltalk, this focus on kids using the language. There's a funny other part to why he named it Smalltalk which is that Alan Kay says he was fed up with these systems with huge names like Zeus and Thor that didn't really do anything. And so he wanted to make a system with a cute little name that actually did a lot. Now Smalltalk wasn't just the first object oriented language, it was actually much more than that. So Smalltalk was an editing environment for that language for which they obviously had to invent the modern graphical user interface. They had to invent overlapping windows. Not only that, they needed a programming paradigm to program the user interface. So the model view controller paradigm was also invented in this lab. So it's kind of not a stretch to say that most of what we do today in some way came out of this one lab at Xerox Park. And by the way, down the hall, they were developing Ethernet and the modern personal computer. So it was a really extraordinary place. But for the purposes of this, I think focusing on the object oriented part of Smalltalk is the most interesting piece. So Ruby's an OO language, right? And we often have these conversations about the right way to do OO or OO techniques. Sometimes we even ask what is object oriented programming at all. And I don't know if there's one real answer to this question, but I think we can ask, what was the original goal of object oriented programming? What was the intention? And to that, we look to Smalltalk. So Alan Kay did share one goal with John McCarthy. He was looking for a way of describing computation in a beautiful, consistent way. And so because of that, he was a big fan of Lisp. But he had some problems with Lisp. And amazingly, as small and consistent as Lisp was, Alan Kay thought it wasn't enough. He was concerned that there were some parts of Lisp like that lambda key where we saw, which themselves could not be implemented in Lisp. They were special cases built into the language. And Alan Kay wanted an even tinier core to the language that could be used to compose computation of arbitrary complexity. He famously wanted the syntax to fit on a single index card. So he kind of went back to the drawing board and said, all right, up until this point, we've been taking our computers and we've been splitting their capabilities into different bits that are less powerful than a whole computer, things like functions and data. And Alan Kay said, what if instead, we split the computer up into millions of little units that were all individually as powerful as the whole computer itself? You can kind of imagine it as a bunch of computers connected by this really fast network. He said in computer terms, Smalltalk is a recursion on the notion of a computer itself. So this is the core idea that started object-oriented programming. This is where it all came from. And if you think of it in these terms, it's really interesting how so many of the other ideas that we get in OO flow from this way of thinking about it. So what does this mean in practice? When we do something like three plus four, in Smalltalk that is not just three plus four.  And what that thing does with your message is entirely up to it. You have no control over it. So one way I like to think of it is it's almost like you're sending a remote API request to this web service called three. You're saying, can you please plus four? You have no control over what it does with that, right? And this idea of giving the receiver of a message so much control over what it does leads to really interesting possibilities around highly dynamic behavior. And that's kind of the gist of what OO started as. It's really remarkable as I started researching this talk how many of the constructs in Ruby that we use for OO are literally just direct translation of how you do it in Smalltalk. So in Smalltalk, you can send a message to three saying add four. In Smalltalk, you can ask three, hey, what kind of thing are you? Are you an integer? And it will tell you. In Smalltalk, classes are also objects. So you can ask the integer class, what kind of thing are you? It's just a class. Even the idea of control flow iterating over arrays using message sending and blocks comes right out of Smalltalk. The way that we do metaprogramming in Ruby largely descends from Smalltalk. So in this Smalltalk snippet, what we're doing is opening up the integer class and we're saying when you don't understand the message that gets sent to you, do something. In Ruby, we can do the exact same thing. We can open up integer and define method missing. This idea descends directly from the core principle of a receiver of a message having full control of what it does. It doesn't have to look it up in a preexisting table. It can really do anything. Now there are other things that we didn't get from Smalltalk that kind of didn't make the cut. And I think those are interesting to look at as well. So one example is conditionals. In Smalltalk, there are no conditionals because that would be another special case. We want to keep things consistent and recursive for member. So in Smalltalk, conditionals, you just take a Boolean object and you send it two messages, if true and if false, with blocks of code for each case. And you can do this in Ruby. People have done this. There are gems you can use for this, but we don't do it that way. And it's interesting to ask why did Matz abandon the Smalltalk way of doing conditionals? And I don't know the answer. You know, I don't know why he did it exactly, but I would point again to this idea of introducing inconsistency in thoughtful ways. You know, the way that we do conditionals, it's much more conventional. Every language does it that way, right? It's arguably, I would say, easier to read than the Smalltalk way, maybe. And in the original Smalltalk system, consistency was the one overarching goal. We want this tiny language. And I think again and again, you see in Ruby, we take many of these principles of consistency, but we sprinkle in little bits of inconsistency where it helps to make things easier to use. There's nothing we didn't get from Smalltalk, which is the editing environment itself. So Smalltalk had an editing environment that was probably unique in the history of computing, and I don't think has really been replicated again. So this is a modern Smalltalk UI. You can still download this today. And in Smalltalk, your code is not organized into files the way that we typically do things. Instead, you can kind of see these modules in the left, and then you can pick a class in this menu here. Within a class, you can see categories of methods grouped by related behavior, essentially. And then you can click into one of those, and finally, you can click into one of the methods if you want and edit it. So already a different way of thinking about organizing our code, but it's not only that. It's actually, the remarkable thing is that this code we're seeing is also running underneath the IDE itself.  My editor itself actually blows up. Now, I know that's not the greatest demo of why is this useful, but there are actually interesting things you can get from this. So one of my favorite examples is sometimes you know the input and the output you want, and you know that there's that method somewhere in the standard library, but you forget what it's called, right? Since small talk, because the editor is so integrated with the system itself, you can just say, oh man, this video isn't gonna show, is it? So the video's a bit cropped, but what I did is I gave it two and two and four. So I said, I want two and two and four. What's the method I can apply to two and two that makes it four? And it gives me some of the answers. You can't see this cropped, but another thing that I'm doing here is I'm typing in a full date, and I'm then saying, give me the day of the week of that date. I'm just specifying the input and output I want, and it goes and finds the method for me. So really interesting behavior enabled by the editing environment being so tightly integrated with the language itself, but we didn't get it. And I think again, Matt's picked his battles, and I think he picked them well. This is a pretty radical idea. There's a lot of barriers to adopting this sort of thing, and I think if Ruby had taken all of this stuff from small talk, it's very likely that we wouldn't have the wide adoption we have today. I think using a traditional editing environment was a necessary concession, most likely to gain adoption. It is really interesting to me to think about, could we bring some of this rich editing stuff back? Ruby at its core has a lot of functionality from small talk that you need to do this sort of thing. What would it look like to start building IDEs that are 10 times more powerful than RubyMind or the other common IDEs that we use today? Perhaps something for you all to think about. Time for the last language, Pearl. The Swiss army chainsaw of programming languages. So Pearl, as you can tell from this photo, is gonna be a bit of a different situation than these other languages we've looked at. So Pearl was developed in the late 80s by this guy, Larry Wall, who was a linguist working as a sysadmin at NASA at the time. And Larry Wall was not trying to create a new set of axioms for computation. He was not trying to spread computing to the whole world. Larry Wall was just trying to get some sysadmin stuff done. And his idea for doing that was, what if we could combine some of the convenience of text processing tools like said with the power of real programming languages like C? What if you melded them together? And the result was Pearl. Now there's a few kind of slogans of Pearl that I think illustrate the thought process that went into designing this language. A program is correct if it gets the job done before you get fired. So this is not a guy trying to design a perfect new programming language. There's an extreme focus on pragmatism, on productivity, on just getting things done and getting out of your way. There's more than one way to do it. So you heard Mark mention this in his keynote yesterday evening. This slogan that we often talk about in the Ruby community came from Pearl. And you can contrast this with other languages like Python or a lot of more academic communities that wanna focus on having the one right way. It's actually really interesting the origins of where this slogan came from. You remember Larry Wall was a linguist, right? And he thought of computation as being more similar to human language than to kind of mathematical modeling. So in human language, you can express yourself in a variety of ways that are equally valid, right? And he kind of brought that ethos to Pearl. And I think we still see it very, you know, prominently in Ruby today. And finally, another slogan that he had was easy things should be easy and hard things should be possible. And this ties very directly to that principle we've been talking about of thoughtful inconsistency. Introducing those special cases when it counts to make things easier, even if it results in there being multiple ways of doing things and perhaps a slightly less consistent model. So when you buy a car, it's really important that it has a chassis that works, a transmission that works, it has wheels, right? But the interior also matters too. Having nice seats, having, you know, the detailing on the dashboard, that stuff contributes a lot to your experience of driving a car. I think a lot of the time academic programming languages focus on the chassis too much and don't really think about the interior, the detailing. And that shows when you try to use them. And on the other hand, Ruby has this very tight focus on getting these details right. It feels polished, right? A lot of the time when you're using Ruby, you notice little things that make it just nice and easy to use. And I think a lot of that stuff came right out of Pearl. Both the focus on that being important as well as a lot of the specifics. So one great example is string interpolation. Pearl has, I think, the easiest string interpolation I've ever seen in any language because every variable starts with a special symbol so there's literally no syntax, you just pop variables into your strings. Now, Ruby, we don't have it quite this easy, but we still have a pretty nice string interpolation syntax. And it amazes me to this day when I'm using other languages how often there is no good way to do string interpolation, this thing that we do all the time when we're making applications, right? JavaScript until very recently had no good way of doing this. And I think this is a great example of if you're Larry Wall and you're doing syshabmin stuff, you know string interpolation is important for getting stuff done and you're gonna make a good way of doing it. It's not a core fundamental piece of the language but it's a really important detail. And I think there's a lot of things like this. So these are all things that Ruby got from Pearl. A native syntax for regular expressions. The percent w syntax for easily specifying arrays of words. Here docs for just putting in long bits of text. I've never tried doing that in JavaScript. Inserting underscores in your long numbers to make them more readable. So again, all of these are small things, right? They don't, each of them on their own isn't a make or break feature for a language but they add up. And I think Ruby did a really good job of stealing a lot of the good stuff that Pearl came up with in this category. Now there's other things that might be a little more controversial. So global variables. A lot of languages don't even have global variables these days. Ruby does and the dollar sign at the front makes it look awfully pearly. And you know, we can argue about whether using globals is a good idea or a bad idea in production code and so on. But sometimes when you're just hacking together a script to get something to work, it's nice to use a global variable, right? And I think that's a lot of ethos of Pearl that we see still remaining in Ruby. Even these weird cryptic variables. So Ruby has these globals that have these unreadable names. This one tells you the process idea of the current running process and there's many more. These seem closer to the side of objectively bad ideas. Like you should never use these in a program. And yet, again, if you're just hacking together a little script, they can be sometimes pretty useful. It's very pragmatic. Now sometimes Pearl goes too far on this. In Pearl, if you print the string eight and you add the string one to it, anyone know what you get? You get nine. That's not good. Another example, if you take an array variable and you declare a scalar variable and assign the array directly to that scalar, what do you get? It converts it to the length of the array for you. So Pearl tells very heavily towards these kind of implicit type coercions, which remind me of some of the most frustrating parts of using a system like JavaScript. But we don't get those parts in Ruby, right? Ruby has a more strongly typed type system underneath it. And so I think when you look at what Ruby got from Pearl, it got a lot of these details and the nice bits around the edges without necessarily getting too much of this inconsistent core. So that brings us back to this question. Why do I love Ruby? Why do we all love Ruby? And I think to me summing up all of this stuff that we've seen, the answer is balance. This balance of consistency of computational model with some inconsistencies when it makes the system easier to use. The balance of the academic rigor of systems like small talk and Lisp with the freewheeling pragmatism of Pearl. You know, also Ruby's very opinionated in some ways. It is uncompromising about being object oriented, for example. And at the same time, we saw that Matz picked his battles. A lot of the more radical ideas that would have made Ruby harder to choose were left behind in the interest of adoption. And I think this balance stuff is what makes Ruby hard to pin down. You know, a lot of the times we people try to design their systems to be the most something, right? Marketing wants it to have number one, whatever. You see this all the time. You see cell networks advertising most coverage, fastest coverage, even a company like Apple that has a strong sense of design. You see them advertising, thinnest laptop, right? But I see Ruby as a good reminder that sometimes you don't need to be the most anything. Ruby's not the most functional or the most oh-oh. It's not the fastest or the highest level. It's not the most radical or the most pragmatic. It's just kind of this beautiful blend of all those different things mixed together in a very thoughtful way. And to me, that's kind of what I take away from looking at the history of Ruby. And I hope that when you go off and design the systems that you work on, whether they're programming languages or web frameworks or just a product, that you think about how to take inspiration from other good ideas and blend them together in a perfect balance to make it work beautifully. Thanks.


Naples USO hosted this year's Naples talent show petty officer Andres Hernandez that front row to bring us a story Participants from around NSA Naples gather as the USO gets ready to host its annual talent show This event brings people together. It's gonna be a great night of entertainment Showmanship and it's amazing.  I didn't know he could sing It's just a great it's a great thing for this for this community and obviously people here had a great time tonight So I'm very grateful to the USO for putting this on more information on upcoming USO events Visit their Facebook page at USO Naples With the USO celebrating its 75th anniversary this year the event is just one of many ways the USO brings service members together


I highlight that the Center for Clinical Research brings to clinicians is their extensive knowledge and experience with providing clinical care options to patients that are not candidates for active clinical trials. We do this through compassionate use, emergent use, and humanitarian use. The Center for Clinical Research team is well versed in bringing these opportunities to patients with critical needs.


How's it going everyone Caleb here with late in sports cards next night? We're gonna be working on 10 of the Panini silver packs for Jeffrey. Yes. Good luck Jeffrey Yeah, two four six eight ten Thanks again, Jeffrey. Yes We go man Brady base orange and bead to 199 This one on the in beat. There's a rated rookie of Evan Mobley CD lamb red to 99 Crystal Lave Purple kawaii there he is to 25 That's purple kawaii Josh Allen orange Henry Davis To 199 not bad there. There's a cat orange Trey young to 199 Polisic And a messy nice messy red Heck yeah, Jersey number messy Here we go Very nice. That is 10 of 99 Congrats there very nice it Very very good There you go Polisic Brett s Brett, I do not think I'll get to your order tonight. It'll be within the first hour tomorrow Brett John yours is for sure ripping tomorrow Anthony Edwards and orange Justin Herbert to 199. Yeah, nice Jersey number messy. There's a blue Marcelo Meyer to 50 Saizouki and an orange Matt Corral to 199 Nice orange No problem guys Yeah, we're stuffed with personals right now, so appreciate the patience everyone in a red Damien Lillard to 99 Thanks again. Appreciate it there. We'll have all those well protected up Jeffrey and right out to you Thanks again Jeffrey s for the order


Russian General Tatarenko eliminated during strike on Belbek airbase. As a result of the attack of the Ukrainian armed forces on the positions of Russian troops at the Belbek Aerodrome in occupied Crimea, 10 military men of the Russian army have been eliminated including the commander of the aviation squadron, Lieutenant General Alexander Tatarenko. This is reported by Dialogua media outlet with reference to reports on Russian public pages. It is reported that two missiles hit the command post of the 38th fighter aviation regiment. Another missile attacked the communication post of the aerodrome. As a consequence of the strike, 10 servicemen were killed. Alexander Tatarenko, the commander of the aviation squadron of the fighter regiment, is among the dead. Russian media wrote, it is also noted that the Ukrainian army launched cruise missiles along unexpected routes for the enemy, most of them passed over the water surface of the Black Sea. We remind you, the attack of the Ukrainian defence forces on the positions of the Russian army at the Belbek airfield was carried out on January 31st. The information about the successful defeat of the target was confirmed by the commander of the Ukrainian armed forces, Mikhail Oleshtuk.


I'm Anthony Smith and these are the Top 5 Things You Need To Know About Copyright. Copyright is not necessarily a bad thing. Videos don't get copyright. Sure, you may get a copyright strike or a copyright notice, but let's not treat the words copyright and copyright infringement like they're interchangeable. 1. Copyright exists from the moment content is created in a fixed form. Many people assume that copyright only exists once you register something that you've created with the US Copyright Office or another country's equivalent. While registering with your respective government entity can't hurt, it's not necessary for copyright to exist. What exists the moment your content is in a tangible form of expression. The US Copyright Office defines this as something directly perceptible or in a form that is to be communicated with the aid of a machine or device. Under US Copyright Law, a wide variety of works can be copyrighted. The categories listed here were meant to be interpreted broadly. These categories include literary works, musical works, including words if applicable, dramatic works, and the music in them, noted choreography, pictures, sculptures, and other graphical works, films, sound recordings, and architectural works. Again, these categories were intended to be interpreted as broadly as possible because the government wished to encourage and not impede creativity. Now you cannot copyright phrases, ideas, methods, underlying concepts, or widely accepted theorems, or anything that is common knowledge. However, names, titles, short phrases can still be trademarked. Number 2. Fair use is fair use, except when it's not. There are a lot of misconceptions regarding fair use, especially where YouTube is concerned. Fair use is not one size fits all. What counts as fair use in one person's video may not necessarily apply to you and in your video. Now let me explain. US copyright law and international treaties generally recognize fair use as the legal utilization of copyrighted content for the purposes of commentary review, news reporting, scholarly research, parody, and education. However, fair use does not immediately apply if your content fits under one of those categories. Fair use is ultimately determined after considering these four criteria. One, the purpose and character of the use. Two, the nature of the copyrighted content. Three, the percentage of the whole copyrighted work used. And four, the potential market value of both the original and the derivative works. Under these four categories of for-profit parody advertisement may fall under fair use, while an ad-less reaction video may not. Fair use is only really decided by a judge at the end of the day. It is implemented into a case-by-case basis and provides no blanket protection. Number 3. All plagiarism is copyright infringement, but not all copyright infringement is plagiarism. Miriam Webster defines plagiarism as the act of using another person's words or ideas without giving credit to that person. Plagiarism is theft, pure and simple. There is no excuse for it, no grounds to justifying it, stealing someone's work is in essence a violation of their copyright. In those scenarios, you are willfully distributing their content without their permission. The detent of the US Copyright Act of 1976, particularly the portion that gives the copyright owner the exclusive right to distribute copies or phonorecords of the work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, etc. But what if you give someone credit in the video description? What if you say, no copyright infringement intended? Is that plagiarism? The short answer is no, it's not plagiarism. You gave full credit to the person who made the original, however, you are still potentially infringing on that content creator's copyright. No copyright disclaimer in the video or description will change that. This would be like me kicking you in the shin and then saying, oops, no pain intended. It doesn't change the fact that I did in fact cause you pain. If you do not have a written statement from the original content creator stating that you have permission to post their work, you are still violating their legal right to exclusively distribute their creation. Typically, permission is given either through a license to use their work such as what you'd see with a music library or contract. Depending on the nature of the contract, permission may only be temporary, so be sure to read what you're signing at all times. Number 4. Mailing yourself a copy of your work is not adequate copyright protection in a court of law. Known as the poor man's copyright, this entails mailing yourself a copy of the work so that you have a date stamp record of when you sent it. It's also a waste of postage. Remember, copyright exists the moment the work takes a tangible form. Additionally, this method is no replacement for actual registration. While the UK is a bit more flexible on the subject of the poor man's copyright, this process does not constitute adequate proof that you are the creator. Registering your work with your country's respective copyright office allows you to pursue statutory damages in the event of infringement, but it can also be cost prohibitive. Check your country's copyright office for details. Granted, this one doesn't apply to YouTube as much since everything is digital now, but it's still good information to have. Just because someone told you that you can use their content does not mean that you can distribute it to others. Picture this scenario. Pretend that you contact me about your desire to feature my music in your channel. If I were to say yes, you could then upload my music in a showcase video. Simple, right? The problem is, some folks take it one step further and assume the permission also allows them to distribute my music as royalty-free tracks without further attribution. This is seen all too often in music, film, and even with books and short stories. A person sends someone else a manuscript with the intent of getting an opinion, only to find it on a website or blog later on. Just don't do it. It's not yours to distribute. When in doubt, ask the person whose content you wish to use for specific instructions. There you go, there are your five things to know about copyright. Just for kicks and giggles, here's a bonus fact about copyright. Bonus number six. Short tracks often sometimes have more than one right attached to them. Confused? I wouldn't blame you. This takes a little bit more patience to wrap your head around, but largely explains why using music on YouTube is such a difficult affair. A musical copyright is often a large conglomeration of multiple smaller rights that occasionally aren't even owned by the same person or organization. The nitty gritty explanation may be best saved for a different video. But a long story short, you often need to contend with two rights in particular, especially if you'll be making money off of the content that you use. We've established that copyright is present the moment that a work takes tangible form. Copyright law allows the copyright owner to assign or delegate certain aspects of that right to individuals or groups as he or she chooses. In most cases, this is usually a publisher. Typically, you'll need to secure mechanical rights and synchronization rights in order to use some tracks. Mechanical rights deal with the right to include a composition or sound recording. You'll need to acquire synchronization rights to then include that sound recording in a larger audio-visual production. Just getting permission for one or the other isn't enough. You need both when applicable. Well, that does it for this video. If you found this content helpful in any way, hit that like button and let me know in the comment section down below what copyright information you found most useful. Also, remember to subscribe to Bill Miller link below if you haven't already. Till next time, don't forget to like, subscribe and do all those things that make us love our jobs. Also, be awesome to yourself and amazing to each other. Bye Freedom Family.


It was a sober movement as tears and weeping trailed parents, friends and relatives of the slain abducted 300 level students of Greenfield University at the funeral service in honour of Dorothy Johanna, the burial held at Echoa Goodness Church in chicken local government area of Kaduna State. With Dorothy Johanna was among the first set of three students who were murdered by drug doctors. Speaking at the funeral service, pastor of the church Reverend Dr. David Guillette asked the residents to extol her virtue as he described her as a humble, patient and obedient girl in his service to God and humanity. The father of the late student Johanna Meck called on the government to be proactive in his driver and find an elastin solution to the problems of insecurity, bedeviling the state and Nigeria at large. Government should be proactive, they should not just keep quiet, they should be proactive to help the situation because it's getting out of hand. The vice chancellor of the Greenfield University, Professor John La, simplifies with the families of the kidnapped students and those that have been killed. When this happened, it was a challenge to us, it was painful. We've made spirited efforts to ensure that we settle the matter and preserve what was not meant to be. And today we're here for the excitement and we're trusting God that all will be better after. A 200-level international relations student at the Greenfield University, Jesse Jackery, who managed to escape, described the act as traumatic and unforgettable, as the kidnappers countered away six boys and 16 girls to a non-destination. Dorothy actually was someone that she never looked for trouble from anybody. She was also on her own. She was quiet and kind. That was literally what I knew about her. Also, Josephine, a sister to Darcy, narrated how they got the knees of her abduction. In that same day, we spoke, she was like, even during their anniversary, by God's grace, all of us would be strong. We would snap with our children. Just feel how far they came out by answering you and some other girls in the school. It was not like he seemed like, but he said some girls escaped like a girl. I mean, I had the feeling that it was my sister that escaped. The abductors have killed five of the students, demanded 800 million Naira as ransom from the government before the students will be released. Thank you.


What's up, good people. Welcome back to SPM Buzz. My name is Shiko Gitao. Right with us today is the one and only kuleinje wana kweta the only Kenyan artist who can feel a stadium. Prince Inda. Yes, John Abbey. Apu ibusu juna semanini. Ne jaza stadium. Mosa ni Kenya mejita hebi? Ku jaza stadium. Last year to learn you did something in Kisumu. Ya, we are planning to do it even better in various parts of the country. Na jokuna wasa ni wana uliza seri ni gali? Seri ni kufanya mzikenzori. It doesn't matter ni niluga gani wana imba. Seri ni kufanya mzikenzori. Just do good music and market your music. Talking about marketing, probably we have seen other Kenyan artists try to do marketing via kido gotu kupiga kiki. But we haven't seen that from Prince Inda. Do you think kiki sells? Do you think it's a good strategy for that matter? Maybe for some people it does, but for me it does not. You have ever thought of going that way? No. Why? Because I have my own way. Why would I go that way? I have my own way. Now let's talk about Sunday, March 3, 2024. Finally, after almost nine months, nine good months, project is coming up. Project, very serious one. Very serious project is coming. It has already taken over the areas. It has not been yet released. So let's just wait because things are not going to remain the same again. What's different are you maybe have you done or rather worked on in this new project? The video that we are yet to release, I don't think if there is any Kenyan artist who have done so. This is not a cloud. This reality. There is no Kenyan artist who have done so. And it will take time. We have seen this particular song and video. It roughly took you 2.5 million Kenyan shillings. Do you agree? Minimum. That's at least 2.5 million. 2.5 million at least. And if we add the mislinias, I think... 3.5? It will hit 3 million.  It is. So far, the most expensive. Labda nezatombia ni aspekgani labda inna leta. The fact that it's the most expensive. Probably where did you shoot the song from? Is it here in the country? Amma ilkweinja taifu? No, no, location doesn't matter.  We're looking at maybe this particular song according to you. Unada ni ni aspekgani amani ni nili. Ilikwe like the most expensive thing. Dressing, shooting, audio. Of course, from the closet to the people who act as actors and actors, who are there and of course the director himself. Who's the director? Daudi Anguka, the Oscar select. Yeah. Jamani levels, new levels. Now let's talk about the brick. Prince Inda wa 20 years. 9 months after the album. 9 whole months. What was happening? Where did you take that brick? Okay, the kind of music I do doesn't fade easily. And I don't know if it's a good idea. Okay, the kind of music I do doesn't fade easily. And the fact that I'm releasing another song, it doesn't mean the other songs have faded. No. The kind of content I do, I can release a song today and I'll release another one in two years' time and I'll still be relevant. You'll still be relevant. Wow, timeless. The kind of content we have is timeless. People resonate with them. Time to time. So are we expecting also after Sunday, are we expecting to have another long break? No, not really. But from now onwards, we want to put you guys on toes. Okay. Back to back. I think we've had enough break and it's now time to get to work. Probably one thing that you have learnt during the break or probably a strategy that you have laid going forward during this 9 months break. It's a very good strategy and let me assure you, mtapenda. That's all I can say. Mtapenda. Actually, water waits you. You're not ready. They're not ready. Let's talk about the album that you produced 9 months ago. What is the name of the album? The previous album. The previous album was Poin Mardak. Poin Mardak. The teachings of life. Why specifically this name? The teachings of life? Because the content that is there relates. With life. Exactly. Maybe talking about this particular album, we can say 95% of the songs are low songs. On the other hand, Prince Inda, you have audience from every part of this country. We think probably you're still majoring in low songs. Why? Our music has got no boundary. You see, in Kenya today, right now, everyone wants to do low songs. Why? Because there is something about low music. So many people love low music. And of course, the other genre. But in simple terms, music has got no boundary. Any good music will sell. Maradil language. Any good music will sell. Have you ever probably had a thought of now trying to I'm not saying that you don't incorporate people from other regions, but now fully going into doing I would say music that are not necessarily low. But I would say any other person can listen to understand apart from just vibing. Have you ever maybe thought of that? Of course, I have unreleased songs which have not done fully in low. They are coming. Talking about the album, I saw certain blogs, not one, not two, talking about the album. And in the comment section, you would not hungekosa like a comment. Because a lot of people actually expected us to see a collab in that album, especially from the one Bahati. But we've already done collabos with Bahati. Talking about maybe the album specifically. The album specifically was for Ohangla, was for that genre. And of course, if I must do a collab, I'll do an EP. In an EP you would probably incorporate a collab. So many other artists. Let's talk about this group of people who think probably there was a fallout between you and Bahati. No, I think I've never heard that. I'm getting that for the first time. Okay, it's planning. No, on you side maybe this year doing a collab with Bahati. Why Bahati? I think I would say because for example looking at a song like at Pia Ambo, it has over 20 million, is it 20 million or something, 26 million something on YouTube. Probably your chemistry. I have so many good chemistry with some other artists also. So I'll do collab with any other artist. Be it Bahati or any other artist. You are open. I'm open. I have heard you talk about other genres of music. And of course the debate has been there online about maybe getting it on being the Kenyan type of music like this probably would sell our country out there. He may talk a Kenyan. I don't know what you would say about that. Okay, everyone is entitled to his opinion. I'm not against Gangiton. There are those fans who are my fans and they listen to Gangiton as well. So what I'll say let us do our best on what we are good at to make sure Kenyan music is out there. What about the new taste? Abanton, we have others who think Abanton. I've never heard of that. I can explain it to you. So this type of music they do sample old songs but now with new content. Do you think there's no originality in that because first of all you have sampled someone else's song into this but on the other hand we are seeing them doing so well. Okay, you know when it comes to music there is something we call when you sample an old song it depends on the kind of audience you want. First of all it brings that nostalgic feeling. When you sample an old song when someone listens to that song he's like, I've heard this sound somewhere. It brings that nostalgic feeling. So there's no crime in that and there's nothing we are doing. You see in this industry there's nothing new we are doing. We borrow ideas everywhere, every now and then. So when it comes to art it's about borrowing of ideas. Would you be okay even Abanton if you sampled your song? Why not? I'm good. You're very much okay. Yes. Oh wow. Let's talk about the Kenyan music industry and of course you're among the top artists we have in our country but a couple of weeks ago you've had an issue with does music in our country really pay? It relates to this particular question do you think Kenyan music pays enough to artists compared to probably the work they put in? For example you knew a song coming up this Sunday it cost 2.5 million. Kuna msania te sema will this song really give back this money? Do you think the Kenyan music industry is paying enough to their artists? No, I don't think so. It does not. Yeah because I think our government there is someone somewhere sleeping there is someone somewhere stealing. Talking of someone somewhere stealing. No, Juzi Juzi there is someone somewhere stealing from the artist or there is someone somewhere sleeping in his work. A lot of artists think it's someone somewhere probably stealing from Kenyans because Juzi I think if it was not Kekobo dreams or something they were little at least the amount of money Kenyan artist got from MCSK and what they would have gotten if labda akungekuana izi labda holes you saw that debate I don't know what you would say about it because everyone is pointing a finger at MCSK I don't want to point fingers but what I can say I'll repeat again you see that there is someone somewhere stealing or there is somewhere sleeping either of the two I think we deserve better What advice would you give to Kenyan artist now to Juzi Shida because we will say we need a few putting in so much effort putting in so much money in music that doesn't give up what advice would you give to Kenyan artist concerning this to Kenyan artist I'll not advise Kenyan artist what I can tell Kenyan artist is to continue working so hard I'll advise Kenyan government let us put up a structure whereby every artist is able to monetize every coin that is generating he or she is generating because artists are dying poor while there are some people behind the curtains just eating on their shadows please our government should come up with a very clear structure on how to help our artist yeah kamainda kuna time ushe i feel maybe a particular year specifically that you felt you putting so much effort but the returns were not so appealing there's always that point there's always that point of course there's always that a point where you feel like no I think I'm giving much that I'm that I'm taking because you see as an artist we need to be motivated really motivated and not motivated in that we are being given no let them stop stealing from us talking about this point where you felt like you had put in more effort but the returns are not so much appealing what has that done to you or rather to Prince Inda you have a specific year that you really felt this one was a tough one of course those years when I was beginning yeah and it has been a journey we learn we learn we learn the hard way yeah wow as we wind up maybe Prince Inda you can tell us or rather talk to your fans 2021 another album coming up another EP coming up singles all through 2024 2024 is hotter than any other year you've heard of Prince Inda that's all you can see about 2020 expect fire and nothing less talking about that Inesimekana Kwamba probably you guys are working on something with Saudi Soul not sure whether it's Saudi Soul as a group like we knew I'm a specific artist from the previous Saudi Soul where did you get that where to kazi atuna sema sema kule na zandani probably we are planning and God willing we might surprise East Africa and of course the world with the whole Saudi Soul crew wow we are not revealing anything let's keep on praying for the good health let's keep on being alive right let's keep on being alive remember to stay tuned because of course this Sunday the third of March 2024 after nine months finally Prince Inda kuna yule labda pa li wukwanya YouTube jina yungoma nya jadwong yulems chana wamze ya you have heard it yourself pa li wukwanya our YouTuber this Sunday we have an upcoming project by Prince Inda thank you so much for your time and uh who mwa kajamani wa to hawa kaisana you to me agree no extra break it will be back to back back to back adding in indium jameni metosha we won't give you a break this time round right guys you have heard it yourself from Prince Inda thank you so much for watching this video remember you can find us on all platforms at espmbaz.ke you can find me too at i underscore am shiko gitao on all social media platforms facebook instagram xkilla mahali tiktok i underscore am shiko gitao until next time have yourself a good good time


Hello and welcome to this edition of Abledon on Air, the one and only program that focuses on the needs, concerns, and achievements, so it's a different label. I'm Lauren Seiler. I'm Maureen Seiler. And on this edition of Abledon on Air, we go into the world of food, special needs, and birthright trips to Israel, yes, Israel. So with us to discuss this topic, he went to Israel, Emery, from Orca Media. Thank you for joining us on Abledon on Air. And tell us about the birthright trip to Israel and what you did, how you did it, and how people can do it after they watch this program. Usually you have to apply to get in, but I think you usually get in as long as you can directly link a grandparent to being Jewish. And it's basically for people ages 17 to 32 now to go basically on a free trip to Israel if you're Jewish. And so I went with my older sister, and we were there for 10 days. And there's lots of specialized trips that focus on, there's a trip that specializes on the culinary stuff of Israel, or if they want to do more hiking or more stuff in the wilderness. But we went on the general Israel trip, so we visited a lot of the more famous sites and different places all over the country. Obviously, special needs are not, or challenged are not, you went away far, right? So there were certain, I should say boundaries, or certain things that you had to abide by, right? You couldn't call people because it's seven hours ahead. How did you deal with some of those situations, the money, so on and so forth? The money was tricky because they had an exchange person when they landed there, but my sister and I both missed it because we had some phone issues. And we ended up not really having a working phone for a lot of the trip, which was unfortunate, but we managed to deal with it. There wasn't really a very reliable internet connections anywhere or anything like that. So when we were in the airport, I downloaded a lot of Netflix shows on my phone. But for the most part, by the end of each day, we didn't get back until 9 or 9.30, or even 10, sometimes later each night, and we had done so much that day that I was pretty exhausted anyways. So it wasn't like I needed to connect to anything really, for the most part. So you dealt with losing your luggage, pros and cons to everything. How did you end up losing your luggage and situation? We're not sure, yeah. Most of the, a majority of the people on our ship lost their luggage for at least a few days. I was lucky and got my back after only two days. Which airline did they find? We flew from Boston. We flew from Newark, the New Jersey airport. I forget what the name of the airline was. LL? Yeah, it was LL. I'm surprised. How was the food? Because some of your pictures reflected of that. Well, the food on the airline was better than American airline food. That's for sure. For breakfast, because the flight is about 12 hours, so for breakfast you had an option of either eggs or you could get some crepe type things that came with it, like a nice cheese spread, because everything was kosher, so you couldn't have eggs with the dairy or whatever. No, no. I know that. I flew. Yeah, like for example falafel and other pictures. There was lots of great food in Israel. I think the best example of when we went to the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem. The food court there is divided in two, because you can either have meat with your food or you can have animal products like dairy and that kind of stuff, but you can't have any of those together. No, you can't mix it together. So it's basically segregated, which is really interesting how on one whole half of the food court is all people who are eating meat and then it's divided by one of those, like a fence basically. So I'm like, what happened in the Holocaust? You were divided by fences and ghettos and that type of thing. Because did they want to picture that as far as? I don't think so. I think it was more just they're being extremely careful about being kosher, which every single place we went to in Israel was kosher. It was just because it's so focused around the Jewish faith. Now as far as you've visited certain parts of Israel, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, now explain about the Bedouin situation, the Bedouin people. We spent a night with the Bedouin people, which are like, I believe they're Muslim and they are a nomadic group of people that travel across the Israeli desert and so they have big tents that they set up and they travel around. And so we spent a night with them and it was more like a Bedouin tourist hotel where you got to sleep in a tent and they made you food and there were camels and that was pretty cool. A hotel for Bedouins? A hotel that the Bedouins, it was like a touristy hotel that the Bedouins ran and since it's all based on tents and stuff, they could really set it up anywhere, which is cool. And it seems that the birthright trips really latched onto that and that was a cool experience. It says that the Bedouins, because the Bedouins came from Arabic, they originally were nomadic people. So you dealt with being in a desert, you dealt with being in a tent, probably no running water, right? No, not really. Oh, you had water? They had facilities on bathrooms and showers for their guests. It was a much more modernized dwelling, but everything was still intense and based around that. So what are some advice, is someone special needs or dealing with challenges? Because I know that airports now, when you board a flight anywhere, doesn't necessarily have to be Israel. Don't forget, Israel is a 12-hour flight, okay? Can, in your opinion, with the proper preparation, can a person whose dealing with a special need take that long flight? So these are certain things that have to go into account. How did you deal with the long flight? Have you ever been on a long flight like that before? No, before this, the longest flight I'd been on was probably to California. So I really hadn't ever been on a flight that was longer than like three or four hours before. How did you end up dealing with the flight? You slept a lot, right? I had a lot of trouble sleeping actually. I'm not sure why, but I slept for maybe like two or three hours at the max, just on and off. And I just couldn't stay asleep for longer than an hour or so. You don't like airplane food? How was the food? The food was fine. It was better than American airplane food, like I said. I'm not sure why I couldn't get to bed. Maybe it was just the constant motion or something. But it just relaxed and kept hydrated, watched some of the movies they had. What advice can you give someone who wants to do this type of trip? You know, obviously you had to prepare ahead of time. You had to make phone calls to the age. So do you have to prove that you're Jewish in order to go to a trip like this? Yeah, there's always some people who slip through the cracks and say they're Jewish, but they're actually not. But for the most part, you just have to show documentation that your grandmother or grandfather or somebody related to you is Jewish. When you get to the airport, they interview, LL Airlines is pretty crazy, because they interview every single person one-on-one. So why are you going? They want only 50 pounds in a suitcase. Yeah, 50 pounds max in a suitcase. What were some of the questions they asked you? They asked me if I ever went to synagogue, how often what the name of my rabbi was, who else in my family goes to synagogue, etc. They got kind of freaked out because I told them about the structure at Beth Jacob synagogue.  They don't have one specific rabbi there. They have a few. Yeah, so they weren't going to let you on it first? They let me and my sister through fine. There was a few people, they stopped and looked through their bags and that kind of thing, because they're really paranoid about people smuggling stuff in and rightly so. The culture and stuff that's not allowed in Israel is much different than America. Yeah, and they also have rules that a religious person can't sit next to a woman on an airplane. Going to Israel, they have certain specific rules. So you went to some synagogues, right? Yeah.  Not really, because I had prepared for it and I knew that lots of places I was going to have to wear, wear some sort of head covering. That's why I brought this hat with me. But lots of the synagogues provided free kippas to wear while you were there, which was cool. And it's really just more about being polite and just making sure you understand what the rules are more than anything else.  Sometimes. We visited, what are they called? We went to the city, Sfad. Yes, Sfad is very nice. It's very artistic. Oh, it's beautiful in there. Yeah, it was a very beautiful city. Did it take you to that synagogue there? Yeah, we went to a few synagogues there. The city got beautiful. It has all different kind of art. Different things. And we went to, I forget what they're called, but they're like the water, it's like the bathing thing. Oh, Miqvah. Yeah, we went to the Miqvah. Miqvah, yeah, separate women, separate men, two days. You went into a Miqvah? How did you feel, how did you like the experience of it? Well, it was kind of crazy because the men and the women separated into different groups. So how did you like the experience? Well, we went to the world's oldest Miqvah in Sfad that's like over 500 years old. So how did you like it? The water runs off the mountain. It's like rain water, rain water. So how did you like it? I wasn't going to go in at first, but I was like, hey, I'm probably never going to be here again. No, you might get experience. Yeah, so how did you like the experience? It was cold, but it was really cool. It was very interesting. It was Israel, a lot of the stuff I did there, I was just, stuff I wouldn't normally do. I was just like, did you like the experience? Yeah, she didn't, the woman didn't get to go into any Miqvahs because they didn't have time. It takes a lot longer for a woman to prepare, I guess. Yeah, yeah. Than for men. So they went for the men, so the women stayed outside again. Did you see any celebrations in Israel? Because I know now Israel is celebrating, or a couple of days ago was Israel's 70th birthday, being their independence day. So did you see any celebrations? We went to parades. We didn't see any official celebrations at parades, but we went out on the town a few nights, and we saw some people at a concert where people were playing music, or some people at a dance club and stuff like that. Yeah. Is there any, like, you talk about the food for a minute, any food that you didn't want to try? You were like, you know, because I know Israel food is really strange to some. Did it take you to Burger King and Jerusalem? Burger King and McDonald's, they have kosher McDonald's. The only kosher Burger King in Jerusalem, did they take you there? No, we didn't. We tried to stick to more, like, local stuff. They took you to the best dishes, good falafel there. I don't know. Most of the stuff there was pretty good, but I don't think there was anything that I was too. Well, I guess the gefilte fish. Yeah, that's a little strange for anyone, disability or not. I love gefilte fish. I had some at Passover a few weeks ago, and it was better because my grandmother made it, whereas this gefilte fish was off of a hotel. Most of the food we ate at our breakfasts and dinners were at the hotel catered, so it wasn't like the best Israeli food, but it was pretty solid. Yeah, well, I mean, we don't have a jar here, but gefilte fish is actually, it's a Jewish dish made from poached and ground deboned fish. My aunt used to do that for me. Yeah, but I mean, the jar stuff has the jelly. But to have one now, you could boil with carrots, you leave it in the wrapper, and you put it in a pot. Did you have traditional masalbalsu? Oh, I did, yeah, on Shabbat. Yeah, because the way some people make it, you know. Go to Israel to get real Jewish food. I think the worst or weirdest thing I ate there was they had kosher sushi at, like, the night so tall it wasn't good. Really? It was not good. I mean, I forget, but it was in Jerusalem. I think they accidentally booked us a really nice hotel, and they didn't realize it. It was like, I think it was like five-star, like, one of the best hotels in Jerusalem. They just hadn't realized. They had all these options. I had sushi and it was, my nephew's wedding was delicious. Kosher sushi can be kosher, but it must fish in terms of being kosher. Because obviously, when you go to any place, you're not going to get, that's kosher, you're not going to have shrimp, or you're not going to have lobster, or you're not going to have certain things that don't have fins. So the fish that they must have used, probably flounder or whatever. Did you have a St. Peter's fish? They put it on the grill? No, I don't think we did that. Okay, well, we're getting hungry at the moment. Let's get back to the show. You brought your good walking shoes out here, I presume. Oh, absolutely. We did a lot of picking. Where did you walk to? They took you to the Western Wall. Yeah, we went to the wall. We went there on Shabbat, and then we went there a few days later. So it could be a little less busy. Did you end it up? I'm talking about religion for a minute. To fill it, you saw a lot of people with that. Did you end up doing that? Well, we were given the option to all the men in the group, and at first I didn't. But then as I was leaving the wall, the second time we were there, which was a few days after Shabbat, there was somebody, there was a rabbi there, and he came up to me, and he was like, are you Jewish? And I was like, yeah, he was like, were you ever, were you ever Bar Mitzvah, did you ever have a Bar Mitzvah? And I actually didn't have a Bar Mitzvah when I turned 13. And I said, no, I didn't. And so he just like wrapped, he put that on me, told me to refuse. It's basically the Torah wrapped around. But if you drop the other part, you have to fast that whole, you know, you have to fast I think 24 hours or something. But yeah, the first five books of the Torah is in that. And they painstakingly write it. It's not printed, it's written. So yeah, there's a lot of strange customs that people are not used to being Jewish.  But Israel, you know, if you can take that trip, you know, recommendations go with the group like getting a free trip, because it is very expensive. Yeah, I'm glad I went because it was free. And I don't think I would have went otherwise. But I think that if I were to go back again, which I would like to, I would definitely like to go without a big group just so I could like explore it on my own because it was very regulated. It was very boxed off. And a lot of stuff meaning how? A lot of stuff was like censored or like they didn't, they didn't bring us to certain places or they didn't let us talk to certain people. And it was all very with the parameters. I'm not sure they, it's, I mean, it's funded by like a majority of it is funded by the Israeli government that pays for this. So it might be something, a lot of time, anything, anything that might be. But they brought you to the good parts of Israel. They didn't bring you to the Palestinian people. Not at all. There's a lot of security. Like you had mentioned with the Bedouins that you saw the Israeli army there. Yeah. How was that experience? Did you end up speaking to some of them? Well, we had five soldiers stay with us for about half of the trip from the Israeli army. I think that was the best experience because they had different political views and different outlooks on stuff relating to the army. And there were several times when they argued about like ethics of things and stuff relating to the army. And that was really interesting to see because we didn't really get to see that anywhere else. There was a real people who were working in the army and they had like different thoughts about... Because you know the Israeli army now, I mean for non combative maneuvers, matter of fact, because the IDF... the IDF employs people with disabilities. Yeah. Actually, I think we learned while we were there, the Israeli government, they'll find employment for... they'll look at somebody's like skills, even if they have a disability or not, and they'll place them in the... Some of them are working in books. Yeah. We saw a play that was a one-woman play with a woman who was blind and deaf in the lead role. And that was very cool. Did they take you to see the books? Yes. Which one? Not sure. There's so much... We packed like eight or nine things into every day. It's hard to remember exactly. Yeah, because according to the Jerusalem Post... There's a lot of... According to the Jerusalem Post it says that disabled Israelis must also serve in the IDF. Well, it depends on what they can do. Yeah. If you wouldn't make a good... If you can't walk very well or something like that, they might not put you in a combat role. Well, I wouldn't want to go combat. No. Now, is there anything you didn't like being there? Like, didn't know there's pros and cons to everything. Well, our tour guide was a little... If he... A lot of this stuff... He just... He... He... He talked about lots of things, it seemed to be very one single-minded one viewpoint and a lot of stuff was small or seemed like not very significant. And we could have... I felt we could have been doing a lot more of their time than spending five hours in like less than like a one mile radius. Did they take you to Meir Shireen? Yeah, we did. Oh, yeah, I know that. I've been there. Did you... No. You weren't allowed to... Did you end up taking to any relatives while you were in Israel? Because I know it was hard not having a phone. I don't think we... I managed to contact my mom once or twice. We don't have any relatives that live over there as far as I know. No, but I'm saying being far away from home. Oh, okay. Yeah. We contacted my mom once or twice. But other than that, not really, no. Yeah. So was that really hard being away from like your mom being scared that you're away, that type of thing? I guess so. I think my mom didn't really realize what Israel was. She was imagining like the Middle East, like the stereotypical like in the movies, like all the houses are made out of clay and it's all dusty. No. There's a lot of thieves and no, it's like a very modernized country. And I think she was more scared than she should have been. Did you buy any souvenirs? Oh, absolutely. I got my mom a menorah that was made over there and she asked for some olive oil from Israel. Oh, yeah, olive oil. And they let me bring that back. And I brought her and her fiance some liquor as well. I brought my younger sister. We went to a farm, like a winery. You went to a shuk, which is a market, right? Yeah, a shuk. But we went to a very, like apparently a very famous winery that won a bunch of awards. That was near the Sea of David, I think. But of course, you're going to be showing us some pictures while this runs. So, well, we'd like to thank you for joining us on Ableton on Air. Absolutely. And when you make another trip, let us know. Sure. For more information on, as a matter of fact, I'm going to pull up the number. I know it's, hold on one second. It's going to be going to edit this. You have to stamp the passport, right? Hold on, hold on. Let me see if I can pull up. I just want to, there's a number here for Israel. Oh, there we go. For more information on the birthright trips to Israel, you can log on to, hold on one second. Hold on. I know, wait, hold on. I'm looking for the website. Oh, there we go. For more information on the birthright trips to Israel, you can log on to www.taglit.taglit.com. Again, you can log on to www.taglit.com, where the birthright is real. While that puts an end to this edition of Ableton on Air, I'm Lauren Seiler. I'm Arlene Seiler. See you next time.


Dom Solanke now attacking the penalty area, right-hand side into the beat of Ryan Christie, it won't forgo the fact there! Scream to get on top of the mark, Chris, is that Kellen in? You're all myself. White players are often completely isolated, because the essential women's fielders aren't able to get forward and support. Lerman down to the right where it goes, into the top of the box, and Dom Solanke has got four-round him. Lovely one-two, we're big! Let's see this corner, we'll come back to that, Mark Kondes is on. Here comes the corner towards the near post, and he found Mark Kondes.