ISML 2012: More seedings, more seedings, more seedings

ISML 2012: More seedings, more seedings, more seedings

By JR Salazar (Bongaboi)
February 29, 2012

The Seeding Round for the first phase of the 2012 International Saimoe League has concluded, and the presumptive favorites took the top spots.

In Nova Group 0, where the first 12 qualifiers from the Nova classification were placed, Kanade Tachibana finished first with 2763 votes. Ruri Gokou was second with 1725 votes while Homura Akemi was third with 1561 votes.

Yui Hirasawa is possibly a lock to make it to the regular season via Phase II. She recorded 3286 votes to finish first in Stella 1. Nymph was second with 2516 votes and Konjiki no Yami was third with 2324 votes.

The face of Guilty Crown, Inori Yuzuriha, won 3028 votes to finish first in Nova Group 2. Meiko Honma was second with 2314 votes and Madoka Kaname was a close third with 2293 votes.

In Stella Group 3, Last ORder was first with 2972 votes. Nagisa Furukawa was second with 2397 votes. Ui Hirasawa was third with 2304 votes. In Nova Group 4, Erio Touwa was first with 3025 votes. Shouko Kirishima was second with 2353 votes and Kanon Nakagawa was third with 2052 votes.

Illyasviel von Einzbern came out on top in Stella Group 5, recording 3143 votes. Nagi Sanzen'in was second with 2556 votes and Kotomi Ichinose was third with 2166 votes.

Illya's mother, Irisviel von Einzbern, made a family sweep, winning 2589 votes to finish first in Nova Group 6. Mizuki Himeji was second with 2249 votes and Shiori Shiomiya was third with 2184 votes.

Holo was first in Stella Group 7 with 2716 votes. Konata Izumi was second with 2526 votes and Tsumugi Kotobuki was third with 2201 votes. And in Nova Group 8, Subaru Konoe ws on top with 2446 votes. Elucia de Lute IRma was second with 2398 votes and Yuno Gasai was third with 2315 votes.

Phase II of the 2012 International Saimoe League preliminaries is scheduled for Sunday, March 11. Vote for your favorite candidates at InternationalSaimoe.com and join the ongoing debate.

USA 1, Italy 0

ESPN.com: US Soccer

Wednesday, February 29, 2012U.S. beats Italy for first time

Associated Press
GENOA, Italy -- The United States beat Italy for the first time in 11 games over 78 years, a 1-0 victory in an exhibition Wednesday night on Clint Dempsey's goal in the 55th minute.

Dempsey took a short pass from Jozy Altidore following Michael Bradley's cross and put a right-footed shot from just inside the penalty area just past an outstretched hand of goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon. It was his 25th goal in 83 international appearances.

A native of Nacogdoches, Texas, who turns 29 on March 9, Dempsey has had the most accomplished season by a U.S. attacking player in European soccer. He's scored 16 goals this season for Fulham, becoming the American career scoring leader in England's Premier League with 43 goals.

The loss was particularly deflating for Italy, a four-time World Cup champion preparing for the start of the European Championship in June. The Americans, who are getting ready for their opening qualifier for the 2014 World Cup in June, had been 0-7-3 against Italy and had been outscored 32-4.

Italy dominated for stretches but the American defense held and the Azzurri were called for offsides nine times.

With retired baseball star Mike Piazza watching from the stands alongside former U.S. forward Brian McBride, the Americans won their fourth straight match to improve to 5-4-1 under Jurgen Klinsmann, who took over as U.S. coach from Bob Bradley last summer.

It was a measure of personal revenge for Klinsmann, the former German World Cup great. Germany, then coached by Klinsmann, lost to Italy in the 2006 World Cup semifinals and the Azzurri went on to win the title.

U.S. goalkeeper Tim Howard had a big kick save in the fifth minute. Italy nearly tied the score in injury time when Riccardo Montolivo's shot went past a post.

Italy lost in Genoa for the first time since 1924. The previous time the Azzurri played at Stadio Luigi Ferraris was a match stopped in the seventh minute by crowd trouble. Italy was awarded a 3-0 win over Serbia in a Euro qualifier.

Klinsmann had most of his regulars back following victories over Venezuela and Panama while playing with a backup squad. He had hoped to be able to pair Dempsey with Landon Donovan for the first time since taking over as coach, but Donovan missed the match because of bronchitis.

Italy had its own personnel problem, especially up front where it was missing injured forwards Giuseppe Rossi and Antonio Cassano. Manchester City striker Mario Balotelli was left off the squad because of his temper and unpredictability.

Notes

Dempsey became just the fourth American to score against Italy, joining Buff Donelli (1934), John Harkes (1992) and Donovan (2009). There was also one own goal in 2006.

Davy Jones meets his locker.

Davy Jones of Monkees fame dead of heart attack at 66

By MATT SEDENSKY

Last Modified: Feb 29, 2012 04:58PM

Davy Jones, an actor-turned-singer who helped propel the made-for-TV band The Monkees to the top of the ratings and the pop charts and into rock ‘n’ roll history, died Wednesday in Florida.

Jones, lead singer of the 1960s group that was assembled as an American version of The Beatles, died of a massive heart attack in Indiantown, where he lived, his publicist Helen Kensick said.

Jones, 66, had complained he wasn’t feeling well earlier in the morning. Fire-rescue personnel responded, taking him to Martin Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Jones had attended a performance of his wife Jessica Pacheco’s flamenco dance group last week at which he seemed well, according to a friend who said the former pop star was working on a new musical.

Jones was a former jockey and child actor in his native England. He rose to fame in 1965 when he was picked for the rock band The Monkees, which was formed by Hollywood producers Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider to star in a comedy TV show called “The Monkees” about a band called, naturally, The Monkees. The show would include the band performing a song.

The Monkees quickly stormed radio and TV airwaves with a string of chart-topping songs that went on to sell an estimated 65 million copies worldwide.

Musical ability wasn’t paramount in casting the band and show. While Mike Nesmith and Peter Tork had some musical experience, Micky Dolenz, like Jones, had been a child actor.

The band was meant to evoke The Beatles, already famous for their music and the movies “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Help!” Each role was loosely patterned after one of The Beatles, with Jones as The Monkees’ version of Paul McCartney.

In August 1966, The Beatles, performing in San Francisco, played their last live set for a paying audience. The same month, The Monkees released their first album, introducing the world to the group that would star in the NBC series when it premiered in September 1966.

The show caught on thanks not only to the music but also its fast-paced comedy, inspired as much by the Marx Brothers as The Beatles. As David Bianculli noted in his

Dictionary of Teleliteracy, “The show’s self-contained music videos, clear forerunners of MTV, propelled the group’s first seven singles to enviable positions of the pop charts: three number ones, two number twos, two number threes.”

At 5-feet-3, Jones was, by far, the shortest member of the group — a fact often made light of on the show. But with his youthful good looks and lead vocals on songs including “Daydream Believer,” he was also the group’s heartthrob. And with the pronounced accent that he never lost, Jones was, in some ways, The Monkees’ direct connection to Beatlemania.

But The Monkees came under fire from music critics when it was learned that session musicians — and not the group’s members — played the musical instruments on their early recordings. They were derided as the “Prefab Four,” an insulting comparison to The Beatles’ nickname, the “Fab Four.”

In reality, Jones could play the drums and guitar, and although Dolenz learned to play the drums only after he joined the group, he could also play guitar, as could Nesmith.

Nesmith also wrote several of The Monkees’ songs, as well as songs for others. Tork, who played bass and keyboards on the TV show, developed into a multi-instrumentalist.

The group eventually prevailed over the show’s producers, including music director Don Kirchner, and began to play their own instrumentals.

And they had enviable behind-the-scenes talent to support them, including Carole King and Gerry Goffin, who wrote “Pleasant Valley Sunday,” and Neil Diamond, wo wrote “I’m a Believer.” Musicians who played on their records included Billy Preston, Glen Campbell, Leon Russell, Ry Cooder and Neil Young. Jimi Hendrix famously played with the band on tour.

The group also released the 1968 film “Head,” derided at the time as a psychedelic mishmash notable only for an appearance by Jack Nicholson. It has since come to be considered a cult classic by Monkees fans.

Still, after just two seasons and 58 episodes, the series flared out. It was cancelled in the summer of 1968.

Jones left the band in late 1970, and the band broke up over creative differences in 1971.

That same year, he recorded the solo hit “Rainy Jane” and made a series of appearances on TV shows including “Love, American Style” and “The Brady Bunch.” He played himself in a wildly popular episode of “The Brady Bunch” that aired in late 1971 in which he makes an appearance at Marcia Brady’s school dance after Marcia, as president of her school’s Davy Jones Fan Club, promised her classmates she could get him to show up.

The band reunited from time to time for brief tours, usually without Nesmith, the latest one in 2009.

All four band members came together for a 1996 album, “Justus,” and a subsequent TV movie “Hey, Hey, It’s The Monkees!” that saw them still living in the same house and still traveling in the Monkeemobile — just like old times.

Jones, who is also survived by four daughters from previous marriages, continued to make appearances on TV and stage. But it was the fame of The Monkees that pulled him back to that era time and time again. On his website, he recalled during auditions for the show when all four men finally were put together in a scene.

“That’s it,” he recalled everyone around him saying: “Magic.”

...are?

Facebook faces nationwide class action tracking cookie lawsuit

By Emil Protalinski | February 29, 2012, 9:40am PST

Summary: Facebook is once again being sued for tracking its users even after they logged out of the service. This new nationwide class action lawsuit alleges the company violated federal wiretap laws.

Facebook users are suing the social networking giant over allegations that itviolates federal wiretap laws. In addition to several lawsuits filed in multiple states, including Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Mississippi, the company is now facing a nationwide class action lawsuit. Law firms Murphy PA and Girard Gibbs have made their case in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing Facebook of continuing to ignore concerns over its tracking cookies. They argue the company violates its own privacy policy, which states post-log-out activity is not tracked by the social networking giant.

Facebook has been accused multiple times of using cookies to track users even after they log out of the service. Menlo Park has since twice denied the allegations, and has also twice fixed the issue. Nevertheless, the lawsuits just keep coming.

Like the previous lawsuits, Facebook is once again being accused of violating the Federal Wiretap Act. Additionally, this nationwide class action lawsuit says Facebook violates the California Internet Privacy Requirements Act and the California Unfair Competition Law. It’s worth noting that similar cases against Facebook and others filed under the wiretap law have been thrown out because browser cookies are simply not considered wiretaps and plaintiffs have difficulty proving any harm.

“The days when online service providers can run roughshod over the privacy rights of their customers are over,” William Murphy Jr., founding partner of Murphy PA, said in a statement. “Companies that operate commercial websites, such as Facebook, need to realize the public is increasingly concerned about its privacy rights. Perhaps even more importantly, there is a growing community of security experts and bloggers that is extremely savvy about internet technology and committed to ensuring that people’s privacy rights are respected and protected.”

In September 2011, self-proclaimed hacker Nik Cubrilovic accused Facebook of tracking its users even if they log out of the social network. He explained that even after logging out of the service, whenever he visited a website that had a Facebook plugin, information including his account ID was still being sent to Palo Alto.

The company responded by denying the claims and offering an explanation as to why its cookies behave the way they do. Menlo Park explained that it does not track users across the Web and its cookies are used to personalize content. As for the logged-out cookies, Facebook said they are used for safety and protection.

After a long technical discussion, Cubrilovic confirmed Facebook made changes to the logout process, and that the cookies in question behave as they should. They still exist, but they no longer send back personally-identifiable information after you log out. The company also took the time to explain what each cookie is responsible for.

Later that month, 10 privacy groups and US congressmen sent letters asking the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate Facebook for these and other practices. Note that the FTC settlement from November 2011 was over charges that date back to December 2009, meaning the tracking cookie issue was never discussed.

In October 2011, the issue came back. It was discovered that the datr cookie, which can be used for tracking users, was once again being set on third-party websites with a Facebook social plugin– whether you are logged in or logged out of the service. Facebook confirmed the bug, said only some third-party websites were affected, and fixed it.

Also in September, Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) agreed to conduct a privacy audit of Facebook. Since the social network giant’s international headquarters is in Dublin, the larger majority of the site’s users are affected by any of the DPC’s decisions (see Europe versus Facebook). Thankfully for Facebook, when the DPC completed his three-month privacy audit of Facebook’s activities in December 2011, he said Facebook makes “innovative use of cookies to identify unusual or suspicious activity” on an account.

All that being said, Facebook still needs to worry about this lawsuit and all the previous ones related to cookie tracking. I have contacted Facebook and will update you if I hear back.

Update 10:00 AM PST: “We believe that these cases are without merit and we will fight them vigorously,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.