title: Gamilaraay

text: The pathway leading novices from the larger to the smaller circle was adorned with "yammunyamun", figures cut into the exposed sapwood of trees along the route, or drawn on the ground. On the occasion observed by Mathews, on the right hand side, down the track, was a mocked up bowerbird's nest, and further on a scarecrow figure with trousers and jacket stuffed with grass, representing a whiteman. As the youths passed along this track, the significance of the symbols and their relevance to tribal beliefs was explained. Further down the path, a yammunyamun image of a bullock was formed from bark, dirt and the animal's skull. At , a long representation of Baiame and his spouse "Gooberangal" lay, moulded from the earth, respectively on the right and left of the track. Further on, still on the left, was a carved figure of the Emu, apparently crouching, its head pointed towards the large bora. To its right, a further on, was "Goomee", Baiame's fire, a high mound with a lit fire on top. A further on, parallel to the track and on Goomee's side, a codfish was depicted, and after it the "Currea", a serpentine creature, and, on the other side of the path, two death adders, followed then by a turkey's nest, an earth-stuffed porcupine's skin, and a kangaroo rat's nest. At last, there was a carving of a full tribal man on one side of the track, and an aboriginal woman on the other.


title: Gamilaraay

text: The Sandstone Caves (within the Pilliga Nature Reserve) are co-managed by the Gamilaraay people together with NPWS. All interpretive signage is in the Gamilaraay language followed by English. A small example, created by the Coonabarabran Gamilaraay Language Circle (Suellen Tighe, Maureen Sutler, Sid Chatfield & Peter Thompson), is given below. (See adjoining image.)


title: Kiss Sixth Sense

text: Kiss Sixth Sense () is a South Korean web series based on hit Naver webtoon by Gatnyeo. Directed by Nam Ki-Hoon, written by Jeon Yu-ri and starring Yoon Kye-sang, Seo Ji-hye, and Kim Ji-seok. It tells the story of Hong Ye-sool, a woman who has the supernatural ability to see the future when she is kissed, accidentally kisses her boss, Cha Min-hoo, and sees their future together. Her life gets more entangled when Ye-sool's ex-boyfriend Lee Pil-yo comes back into her life. The series released two episodes every Wednesday at 16:00 (KST) from May 25, 2022 to June 29, 2022 exclusively on Disney+ in select regions.


title: Kiss Sixth Sense

text: On August 4, 2021, Yoon Kye-sang and Seo Ji-hye received offers to play the lead roles in "Kiss Sixth Sense". From August to September 2021, the cast line up was announced. The series reunites Yoon Kye-sang and Seo Ji-hye after working together as siblings in the 2004 SBS drama "My 19 Year Old Sister-in-Law". On April 21, 2022, photos from the official script reading were published.


title: Kiss Sixth Sense

text: On January 5, 2022 the series canceled the scheduled filming for the day due to the sudden death of Kim Mi-soo. The filming resumed the following day after they paused filming, but there was no confirmation on whether Kim's character would be recast, or Kim's scenes were completed.


title: Kiss Sixth Sense

text: On October 14, 2021, "Kiss Sixth Sense" was announced to be released by Disney+ at their APAC Contents Showcase. In addition to South Korea, other Disney+ Star markets with "Kiss Sixth Sense" scheduled for May 25, 2022 included Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. The series aired on the same date for Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand via Disney+ Hotstar. It was scheduled for June 29, 2022 in Japan.


title: Kiss Sixth Sense

text: The following is the official track list of "Kiss Sixth Sense (Original Television Soundtrack)" album. The tracks with no indicated lyricists and composers are the drama's musical score; the artists indicated for these tracks are the tracks' composers themselves. Singles included on the album were released from May 25, 2022, to June 29, 2022.


title: Kiss Sixth Sense

text: Following its release, "Kiss Sixth Sense" repeatedly ranked within the top five among the "Top 10 TV Shows on Disney+" in South Korea, having ranked first place on June 7th. It also steadily ranked within the top 10 on this same list in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan while ranking in the top three of this list in Indonesia.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: From the perspective of many of the survivors, the effect of the plague may have been ultimately favorable, as the massive reduction of the workforce meant their labor was suddenly in higher demand. R. H. Hilton has argued that those English peasants who survived found their situation to be much improved. For many Europeans, the 15th century was a golden age of prosperity and new opportunities. The land was plentiful, wages high, and serfdom had all but disappeared. A century later, as population growth resumed, the lower classes once again faced deprivation and famine.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Figures for the death toll vary widely by area and from source to source, and estimates are frequently revised as historical research brings new discoveries to light. Most scholars estimate that the Black Death killed up to 75 million people in the 14th century, at a time when the entire world population was still less than 500 million. Even where the historical record is considered reliable, only rough estimates of the total number of deaths from the plague are possible.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Europe suffered an especially significant death toll from the plague. Modern estimates range between roughly one-third and one-half of the total European population in the five-year period of 1347 to 1351 died, during which the most severely affected areas may have lost up to 80% of the population. Contemporary chronicler Jean Froissart estimated the toll to be one-third, which modern scholars consider less an accurate assessment than an allusion to the Book of Revelation meant to suggest the scope of the plague. Deaths were not evenly distributed across Europe, with some areas affected very little while others were all but entirely depopulated.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The Black Death hit the culture of towns and cities disproportionately hard, although rural areas (where most of the population lived at the time) were also significantly affected. Larger cities were the worst off, as population densities and close living quarters made disease transmission easier. Cities were also strikingly filthy, infested with lice, fleas, and rats, and subject to diseases caused by malnutrition and poor hygiene. The population of the city of Florence was reduced from 110,000 to 120,000 inhabitants in 1338 to 50,000 in 1351. In the cities of Hamburg and Bremen, 60–70% of the inhabitants died. In Provence, Dauphiné, and Normandy, historians observe a decrease of 60% of fiscal hearths. In some regions, two-thirds of the population was annihilated. In the town of Givry in the Bourgogne region of France, the local friar, who used to note 28–29 funerals a year, recorded 649 deaths in 1348, half of them in September. About half the population of Perpignan died over the course of several months (only two of the eight physicians survived the plague). Over 60% of Norway's population died between 1348 and 1350. London may have lost two-thirds of its population during the 1348–49 outbreak; England as a whole may have lost 70% of its population, which declined from 7 million before the plague to 2 million in 1400.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Some places, including the Kingdom of Poland, parts of Hungary, the Brabant region, Hainaut, and Limbourg (in modern Belgium), as well as Santiago de Compostela, were unaffected for unknown reasons. Some historians have assumed that the presence of resistant blood groups in the local population helped them resist infection, although these regions were touched by the second plague outbreak in 1360–1363 (the "little mortality") and later during the numerous resurgences of the plague (in 1366–1369, 1374–75, 1400, 1407, etc.). Other areas which escaped the plague were isolated in mountainous regions (e.g. the Pyrenees).


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: All social classes were affected, although the lower classes, living together in unhealthy places, were most vulnerable. Alfonso XI of Castile and Joan of Navarre (daughter of Louis X "le Hutin" and Margaret of Burgundy) were the only European monarchs to die of the plague, but Peter IV of Aragon lost his wife, his daughter, and a niece in six months. Joan of England, daughter of Edward III, died in Bordeaux on her way to Castile to marry Alfonso's son Pedro. The Byzantine Emperor lost his son, while in the Kingdom of France, Bonne of Luxembourg, the wife of the future John II of France, died of the plague.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Estimates of the demographic effect of the plague in Asia are based on population figures during this time and estimates of the disease's toll on population centers. The most severe outbreak of plague, in the Chinese province of Hubei in 1334, claimed up to 80% of the population. China had several epidemics and famines from 1200 to the 1350s and its population decreased from an estimated 125 million to 65 million in the late 14th century.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The precise demographic effect of the disease in the Middle East is very difficult to calculate. Mortality was particularly high in rural areas, including significant areas of Gaza and Syria. Many rural people fled, leaving their fields and crops, and entire rural provinces are recorded as being totally depopulated. Surviving records in some cities reveal a devastating number of deaths. The 1348 outbreak in Gaza left an estimated 10,000 people dead, while Aleppo recorded a death rate of 500 per day during the same year. In Damascus, at the disease's peak in September and October 1348, a thousand deaths were recorded every day, with overall mortality estimated at between 25 and 38 percent. Syria lost a total of 400,000 people by the time the epidemic subsided in March 1349. In contrast to some higher mortality estimates in Asia and Europe, scholars such as John Fields of Trinity College in Dublin believe the mortality rate in the Middle East was less than one-third of the total population, with higher rates in selected areas.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Because 14th-century healers were at a loss to explain the cause of the Black Death, many Europeans gave supernatural forces, earthquakes and malicious conspiracies, among other things, as possible reasons for the plague's emergence. No one in the 14th century considered rat control a way to ward off the plague, and people began to believe only God's anger could produce such horrific displays of suffering and death. Giovanni Boccaccio, an Italian writer and poet of the era, questioned whether it was sent by God for their correction, or if it came through the influence of the heavenly bodies. Christians accused Jews of poisoning public water supplies, alleging Jews were making an effort to ruin European civilization. The spreading of this rumor led to complete destruction of entire Jewish towns. In February 1349, 2,000 Jews were murdered in Strasbourg. In August of the same year, the Jewish communities of Mainz and Cologne were murdered.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Where government authorities were concerned, most monarchs instituted measures that prohibited exports of foodstuffs, condemned black market speculators, set price controls on grain, and outlawed large-scale fishing. At best, these proved mostly unenforceable; at worst, they contributed to a continent-wide downward spiral. The hardest-hit lands, like England, were unable to buy grain abroad from France because of the prohibition, and from most of the rest of the grain producers, because of crop failures from shortage of labour. Any grain which could be shipped was eventually taken by pirates or looters to be sold on the black market. Meanwhile, many of the largest countries, most notably England and Scotland, had been at war, using up much of their treasury and exacerbating inflation. In 1337, on the eve of the first wave of the Black Death, England and France went to war in what would become known as the Hundred Years' War. Malnutrition, poverty, disease and hunger coupled with war, growing inflation, and other economic concerns made Europe in the mid-14th century ripe for tragedy.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Historian Walter Scheidel contends that waves of plague following the initial outbreak of the Black Death had a leveling effect which changed the ratio of land to labour, reducing the value of the former while boosting that of the latter, which lowered economic inequality by making landowners and employers less well-off while improving the lot of the workers. He states, "the observed improvement in living standards of the laboring population was rooted in the suffering and premature death of tens of millions over the course of several generations." This leveling effect was reversed by a "demographic recovery that resulted in renewed population pressure." On the other hand, in the quarter-century after the Black Death it is clear that in England, many laborers, artisans, and craftsmen, those living from money-wages alone, did suffer a reduction in real incomes owing to rampant inflation. In 1357, a third of property in London was unused due to a severe outbreak in 1348–49. However, for reasons still debated, population levels declined after the Black Death's first outbreak until around 1420, and did not begin to rise again until 1470, so the initial Black Death event on its own does not entirely provide a satisfactory explanation to this extended period of decline in prosperity. See Medieval demography for a more complete treatment of this issue, and current theories on why improvements in living standards took longer to evolve.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The great population loss brought favorable results to the surviving peasants in England and Western Europe. There was increased social mobility, as depopulation further eroded the peasants' already weakened obligations to remain on their traditional holdings. Seigneurialism never recovered. Land was plentiful, wages high, and serfdom had all but disappeared. It was possible to move about and rise higher in life. Younger sons and women especially benefited. As population growth resumed, however, the peasants again faced deprivation and famine.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: In Eastern Europe, by contrast, renewed stringency of laws tied the remaining peasant population more tightly to the land than ever before through serfdom.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Furthermore, the plague's great population reduction brought cheaper land prices, more food for the average peasant, and a relatively large increase in per capita income among the peasantry, if not immediately, in the coming century. Since the plague left vast areas of farmland untended, they were made available for pasture and put more meat on the market; the consumption of meat and dairy products went up, as did the export of beef and butter from the Low Countries, Scandinavia, and northern Germany. However, the upper class often attempted to stop these changes, initially in Western Europe, and more forcefully and successfully in Eastern Europe, by instituting sumptuary laws. These regulated what people (particularly of the peasant class) could wear, so that nobles could ensure that peasants did not begin to dress and act as a higher class member with their increased wealth. Another tactic was to fix prices and wages, so that peasants could not demand more with increasing value. In England, the Statute of Labourers 1351 was enforced, meaning, no peasant could ask for more wages than in 1346. This was met with varying success depending on the amount of rebellion it inspired; such a law was one of the causes of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt in England.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The rapid development of the use was probably one of the consequences of the Black Death, during which many landowning nobility died, leaving their realty to their widows and minor orphans.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: In the wake of the drastic population decline brought on by the plague, wages shot up and labourers could move to new localities in response to wage offers. Local and royal authorities in Western Europe instituted wage controls. These governmental controls sought to freeze wages at the old levels before the Black Death. Within England, for example, the Ordinance of Labourers, enacted in 1349, and the Statute of Labourers, enacted in 1351, restricted both wage increases and the relocation of workers. If workers attempted to leave their current post, employers were given the right to have them imprisoned. The statute was poorly enforced in most areas, and farm wages in England on average doubled between 1350 and 1450, though they were static thereonafter, until the end of the 19th century.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Cohn, comparing numerous countries, argues, that these laws were not primarily designed to freeze wages. Instead, he says, the energetic local and royal measures to control labor and artisans' prices was a response to elite fears of the greed and possible new powers of lesser classes that had gained new freedom. Cohn continues, that the laws reflect the anxiety that followed the Black Death's new horrors of mass mortality and destruction, and from elite anxiety about manifestations, such as the flagellant movement and the persecution of Jews, Catalans (in Sicily), and beggars.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: By 1200, virtually all of the Mediterranean basin and most of northern Germany had been deforested and cultivated. Indigenous flora and fauna were replaced by domestic grasses and animals, and domestic woodlands were lost. With depopulation, this process was reversed. Much of the primeval vegetation returned, and abandoned fields and pastures were reforested.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The Black Death encouraged innovation of labor-saving technologies, leading to higher productivity. There was a shift from grain farming to animal husbandry. Grain farming was very labor-intensive, but animal husbandry needed only a shepherd and a few dogs and pastureland.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Plague brought an eventual end of Serfdom in Western Europe. The manorial system was already in trouble, but the Black Death assured its demise throughout much of western and central Europe by 1500. Severe depopulation and migration of the village to cities caused an acute shortage of agricultural laborers. Many villages were abandoned. In England, more than 1300 villages were deserted between 1350 and 1500. Wages of labourers were high, but the rise in nominal wages following the Black Death was swamped by post-Plague inflation, so that real wages fell.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Labor was in such a short supply that Lords were forced to give better terms of tenure. This resulted in much lower rents in western Europe. By 1500, a new form of tenure called copyhold became prevalent in Europe. In copyhold, both a Lord and peasant made their best business deal, whereby the peasant got use of the land and the Lord got a fixed annual payment, and both possessed a copy of the tenure agreement. Serfdom did not end everywhere: it lingered in parts of Western Europe and was only introduced to Eastern Europe after the Black Death.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: There was also a change in the inheritance law. Before the plague, only sons and especially the elder son inherited the ancestral property. Post-plague, all sons as well as daughters started inheriting property.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Renewed religious fervor and fanaticism came in the wake of the Black Death. Some Europeans targeted "groups such as Jews, friars, foreigners, beggars, pilgrims", lepers and Romani, thinking that they were to blame for the crisis.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Differences in cultural and lifestyle practices also led to persecution. As the plague swept across Europe in the mid-14th century, annihilating more than half the population, Jews were taken as scapegoats, in part because better hygiene among Jewish communities and isolation in the ghettos meant that Jews were less affected. Accusations spread, that Jews had caused the disease by deliberately poisoning wells. Mobs attacked Jewish settlements across Europe; by 1351, 60 major and 150 smaller Jewish communities had been destroyed, and more than 350 separate massacres had occurred.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: According to Joseph P. Byrne, women also faced persecution during the Black Death. Muslim women in Cairo became scapegoats when the plague struck. Byrne writes, that in 1438, the sultan of Cairo was informed by his religious lawyers, that the arrival of the plague was 'Allah's punishment for the sin of fornication,' and that in accordance with this theory, a law was set in place stating that women were not allowed to make public appearances, as 'they may tempt men into sin.' Byrne describes, that this law was only lifted when "the wealthy complained that their female servants could not shop for food."


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The Black Death hit the monasteries very hard because of their proximity with the sick who sought refuge there. This left a severe shortage of clergy after the epidemic cycle. Eventually the losses were replaced by hastily trained and inexperienced clergy members, many of whom knew little of the rigors of their predecessors. New colleges were opened at established universities, and the training process sped up. The shortage of priests opened new opportunities for laywomen to assume more extensive and more important service roles in the local parish.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Flagellants practiced self-flogging (whipping of oneself) to atone for sins. The movement became popular after the Black Death. It may be that the flagellants' later involvement in hedonism was an effort to accelerate or absorb God's wrath, to shorten the time with which others suffered. More likely, the focus of attention and popularity of their cause contributed to a sense that the world itself was ending and that their individual actions were of no consequence.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The Black Death had a profound effect on art and literature. After 1350, European culture in general turned very morbid. The general mood was one of pessimism, and contemporary art turned dark with representations of death. The widespread image of the "dance of death" showed death (a skeleton) choosing victims at random. Many of the most graphic depictions come from writers such as Boccaccio and Petrarch. Peire Lunel de Montech, writing about 1348 in the lyric style long out of fashion, composed the following sorrowful "sirventes" "Meravilhar no·s devo pas las gens" during the height of the plague in Toulouse:


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: Although the Black Death highlighted the shortcomings of medical science in the medieval era, it also led to positive changes in the field of medicine. As described by David Herlihy in "The Black Death and the Transformation of the West," more emphasis was placed on "anatomical investigations" following the Black Death. How individuals studied the human body notably changed, becoming a process that dealt more directly with the human body in varied states of sickness and health. Further, at this time, the importance of surgeons became more evident.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: A theory put forth by Stephen O'Brien says, the Black Death is likely responsible, through natural selection, for the high frequency of the CCR5-Δ32 genetic defect in people of European descent. The gene affects T cell function, and provides protection against HIV, smallpox, and possibly plague, though for the last, no explanation as to how it would do that, exists. This, however, is now challenged, given that the CCR5-Δ32 gene has been found to be just as common in Bronze Age tissue samples.


title: Consequences of the Black Death

text: The Black Death also inspired European architecture to move in two different directions: (1) a revival of Greco-Roman styles, and (2) a further elaboration of the Gothic style. Late medieval churches had impressive structures centered on verticality, where one's eye is drawn up towards the high ceiling. The basic Gothic style was revamped with elaborate decoration in the late medieval period. Sculptors in Italian city-states emulated the work of their Roman forefathers while sculptors in northern Europe, no doubt inspired by the devastation they had witnessed, gave way to a heightened expression of emotion and an emphasis on individual differences. A tough realism came forth in architecture as in literature. Images of intense sorrow, decaying corpses, and individuals with faults as well as virtues emerged. North of the Alps, painting reached a pinnacle of precise realism with Early Dutch painting by artists such as Jan van Eyck ( – 1441). The natural world was reproduced in these works with meticulous detail whose realism was not unlike photography.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella Clara Eugenia (; 12 August 1566 – 1 December 1633), sometimes referred to as Clara Isabella Eugenia, was sovereign of the Spanish Netherlands in the Low Countries and the north of modern France with her husband, Archduke Albert VII of Austria.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Their reign is considered the Golden Age of the Spanish Netherlands. Isabella was one of the most powerful women in 16th- and 17th-century Europe.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella Clara Eugenia of Austria was born in the Palacio del bosque de Valsaín, Segovia on 12 August 1566. She was the first surviving daughter of King Philip II of Spain and his third wife, Elisabeth of Valois.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Her father was reportedly overjoyed at her birth and declared himself to be happier on the occasion than he would have been at the birth of a son. He already had a male heir, Carlos, Prince of Asturias, but father and son had never developed a close rapport and frequently lived in conflict with one another.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella was baptized by Juan Bautista Castaneo, apostolic nuncio, later Pope as Urban VII. Her godfather was her uncle John of Austria. She was named after her mother, the day of her birth, and the devotion to St. Eugenio, whose body her father had transferred the year before from Saint Dionysius of Paris to Toledo with her mother's help through her brother, the King of France.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: A year later, Isabella's younger sister, Catalina, was born. Their parents were very close to their daughters, buying them jams, dolls, toys, and more. However, their mother miscarried a daughter in 1568 and died the same day.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella and Catherine grew up beloved by her father and her stepmother, Anna of Austria, Philip's fourth wife. The sisters developed a close relationship. Their father ultimately fathered five children by Anna, all of whom died in early childhood except his heir, Philip.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella and Catherine were raised under the care of Margarita de Cardona, their stepmother's lady-in-waiting, and some of their mother's own ladies-in-waiting, such as Claude de Vineulx. Both sisters were described as intelligent and well aware of their high social status.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella had a very good education. Her studies presumably included good manners, mathematics, and the languages Dutch, French and Italian besides her native Spanish. Famous artist Sofonisba Anguissola, who served as court painter at the time, influenced the Infanta's artistic works. Isabella was the only person whom King Philip permitted to help him with his work, sorting his papers and translating Italian documents into the Spanish language for him.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: After her maternal uncle, Henry III of France, was assassinated by the fanatical young monk Jacques Clément on 2 August 1589, Philip II claimed the French crown on Isabella's behalf despite France's Salic law, which forbade cognatic succession.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: At any rate, her mother had ceded any claim to the French crown with her marriage to the Spanish King. However, the "Parlement de Paris", in power of the Catholic party, gave verdict that Isabella was "the legitimate sovereign" of France. The Huguenot leader, Henry III of Navarre, the actual heir by traditional French inheritance laws, ultimately made his claim to the throne, converted to Catholicism and was crowned in 1594.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: As Infanta of Spain and Portugal, Isabella was quite eligible on the political marriage market, though she ended up marrying late for her time.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: At the age of two, Isabella was promised to marry her cousin Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor (18 July 1552 – 20 January 1612), son of her aunt Maria. However, Isabella had to wait for more than 20 years before the eccentric Rudolf declared that he had no intention of marrying anybody. Meanwhile, she served as her father's primary caretaker during the last three years of his life, when he was plagued by gout and frequent illness.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Philip decided to cede the Spanish Netherlands to Isabella on condition that she marry her cousin, Albert VII, Archduke of Austria. He was her former fiancé's younger brother the former Viceroy. They were to reign over the Netherlands jointly and be succeeded by their descendants according to the male-preference cognatic primogeniture but should a female succeed, she was required to marry the King of Spain or the person chosen by the King of Spain. It was stipulated that, should they have no children, the Netherlands would revert to the King of Spain upon the death of either spouse.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: As Albert was the Archbishop of Toledo, he had to be released from his religious commitments by Pope Clement VIII before the wedding could take place. Shortly before Philip II died on 13 September 1598, he resigned the thrones of the Netherlands in favor of Isabella and her fiancé. The Pope celebrated the union by procuration on 15 November at Ferrera. On 18 April 1599, 33-year-old Isabella married Albert in Valencia. They had three children who died at a very young age, in 1605, 1607, and 1609.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Beginning in 1601, the Archduke and Archduchess ruled the Habsburg Netherlands together. Their reign is a key period in the history of the Spanish Netherlands. After Albert's death, Isabella was appointed Governor of the Netherlands on the King of Spain's behalf.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The first half of Albert and Isabella's reign was dominated by war. After overtures to the United Provinces and to Queen Elizabeth I of England proved unsuccessful, the Habsburg policy in the Low Countries aimed at regaining the military initiative and isolating the Dutch Republic. The strategy was to force its opponents to the conference table and negotiate from a position of strength.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: In pursuit of that goal and to get their political agenda to all Flemish social classes, Albert and Isabella used the most diverse media. Visual art, in the baroque style popularized in the wake of the Counter-Reformation, was the perfect tool. This, coupled with the political configuration of the period, made the Archduke's Court at Brussels one of the foremost political and artistic centers in Europe of that time.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: It became the testing ground for the Spanish Monarchy's European plans, a boiling pot full of people of all sorts: from artists and diplomats to defectors, spies and penitent traitors, from Spanish confessors, Italian counselors, Burgundian functionaries, English musicians, German bodyguards to the Belgian Nobles. Brussels became a vital link in the chain of Habsburg Courts and the diplomatic conduits between Madrid, Vienna, Paris, London, Lisbon, Graz, Innsbruck, Prague, and The Hague could be said to run through there.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The accession of James VI of Scotland as James I in England had paved the way for a separate peace with England. On 24 July 1604, England, Spain and the Archducal Netherlands signed the Treaty of London. The return to peace was severely hampered by differences over religion. Events such as the Gunpowder Plot caused a lot of diplomatic tension between London and Brussels, but the relations between the two courts tended to be cordial on the whole. Anne of Denmark wore her portrait in a locket as a public token of friendship and kinship.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The threat of diplomatic isolation and General Ambrogio Spínola's campaigns induced the Dutch Republic to accept a ceasefire in April 1609. The subsequent negotiations between the warring parties failed to produce a peace treaty, but led to the Twelve Years' Truce, agreed in Antwerp on 9 April 1609. Under the Truce's terms, the United Provinces were to be regarded as a sovereign power for the duration of the truce. After four decades of war, the treaty brought a period of much-needed peace to the Southern Netherlands.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The period of the Truce brought the Habsburg Netherlands a much-needed peace, mainly because the fields could be again worked in safety. The archducal regime encouraged reclaimation of land that had been inundated in the course of the hostilities and sponsored the impoldering of De Moeren, a marshy area that is presently astride the Belgian–French border.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The recovery of agriculture led in turn to a modest increase of the population (and thus workers) after decades of demographic losses. Industry and in particular the luxury trades likewise underwent a recovery, bringing considerable economic stability and prosperity to the Southern Netherlands.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: However, international trade was hampered by the closure of the river Scheldt. The archducal regime had plans to bypass the blockade with a system of canals linking Ostend via Bruges to the Scheldt in Ghent and joining the Meuse to the Rhine between Venlo and Rheinberg. To combat urban poverty, the government supported the creation of a network of "Monti di Pietà" based on the Italian model.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The archducal regime ensured the triumph of the Catholic Reformation in the Habsburg Netherlands. Most Protestants had by that stage left the Southern Netherlands. After one last execution in 1597, those that remained were no longer actively persecuted.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Under the terms of legislation passed in 1609, their presence was tolerated, provided they did not worship in public or engage in religious activities. The resolutions of the Third Provincial Council of Mechlin of 1607 were likewise given official sanction.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Through such measures and by the appointment of a generation of committed bishops, Albert and Isabella laid the foundation of the Catholic confessionalisation of the population. New and reformed religious orders enjoyed the particular support of the rulers. Although the Archduke had certain reservations about the order, the Jesuits received the largest cash grants, allowing them to complete their ambitious building programs in Brussels and Antwerp. The Capuchins were given considerable sums as well. The foundation of the first convents of Discalced Carmelites in the Southern Netherlands depended wholly on the personal initiative of the archducal couple and bore witness to the Spanish orientation of their spirituality.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The reign of Albert and Isabella Clara Eugenia saw a strengthening of princely power in the Habsburg Netherlands. The States General of the loyal provinces were only summoned once in 1600. Thereafter, the government preferred to deal directly with the provinces.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The years of the Truce allowed the archducal regime to promulgate legislation on a whole range of matters. The so-called Eternal Edict of 1611, for instance, reformed the judicial system and ushered in the transition from customary to written law. Other measures dealt with monetary matters, the nobility, duels, gambling, etc.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: The actions of the two rulers stimulated the growth of a separate South Netherlandish identity. However, Albert and Isabella's children died at a very young age and as the years passed, it became clear that they would have no more offspring and thus independence wouldn't be possible.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: After that, Albert and Isabella's goal became the reincorporation of the Southern Provinces into the Spanish monarchy. They consolidated the authority of the House of Habsburg over the territory of the Southern Netherlands and largely succeeded in reconciling previous anti-Spanish sentiments. As a result, the States of the loyal provinces swore to accept the King as heir of the Archduke and Archduchess in a number of ceremonies between May 1616 and January 1617.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: As the Spanish King's Governor after 1621, the older, widowed Isabella alternated successes, such as that of the Capture of Breda in 1625, with failures and setbacks, such as the losses of 's-Hertogenbosch in 1625 and Maastricht in 1632.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: Isabella and Albert stimulated the growth of the artistic movement of Flemish Baroque painting. Their patronage of such artists and architects as Peter Paul Rubens (their court painter since 1609), Wenceslas Cobergher, Jacob Franquart, Pieter Brueghel the Younger, the De Nole family, Otto van Veen, and many others made the Court of Brussels one of the foremost artistic centers in Europe of that time.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: However, virtually nothing remains of Albert and Isabella's palace on the Coudenberg in Brussels, their summer retreat in Mariemont, or their hunting lodge in Tervuren. Their magnificent collections were scattered after 1633, and considerable parts of them have been lost. Still, the Archdukes enjoy a well-merited reputation as patrons of the arts. By far, the best preserved ensemble of art from the archducal period is to be found at Scherpenheuvel, where Albert and Isabella directed Cobergher, Theodoor van Loon, and the de Noles to create a pilgrimage church in a planned city.


title: Isabella Clara Eugenia

text: After her retirement in 1633, Isabella joined the Secular Franciscan Order. She became a nun at the Convent of Las Descalzas Reales in Madrid, where she lived with her mother-in-law Maria. She died there that same year. She was of great importance to the convent, and donated major artworks to it, including a famous series of Brussels tapestries, designed by Rubens. These depict Isabella as the order's patron saint, "Clare of Assisi with Monstrance".


title: Mega Man 2

text: Mega Man 2 is an action game developed and published by Capcom for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was released in Japan in 1988 and in North America and PAL regions the following years. "Mega Man 2" continues Mega Man's battle against the evil Dr. Wily and his rogue robots. It introduced graphical and gameplay changes, many of which became series staples.


title: Mega Man 2

text: Although sales for the original "Mega Man "were unimpressive, Capcom allowed the team to create a sequel. They worked concurrently on other Capcom projects, using their free time to develop the game, using unused content from the first game. Takashi Tateishi composed the soundtrack, with Yoshihiro Sakaguchi serving as a sound programmer.


title: Mega Man 2

text: "Mega Man 2" is the second best selling "Mega Man" game, with more than 1.51 million copies sold. Critics praised its audio, visuals and gameplay as an improvement over the first game. Many publications rank "Mega Man 2" as the best game in the series and one of the greatest video games of all time. It has been featured in game compilations, including "Mega Man Legacy Collection" for Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo 3DS, and Nintendo Switch, become a part of console emulation services, and appeared on mobile phones. "Mega Man 3" was released in 1990.


title: Mega Man 2

text: After his initial defeat Dr. Wily, the series' main antagonist, creates his own set of Robot Masters in an attempt to counter Mega Man: Metal Man, Air Man, Bubble Man, Quick Man, Crash Man, Flash Man, Heat Man, and Wood Man. He also constructs a new fortress and army of robotic henchmen.


title: Mega Man 2

text: Mega Man is then sent by his creator, Dr. Light, to defeat Dr. Wily and his Robot Masters. Mega Man defeats the eight new Robot Masters and then challenges Wily himself. During the final fight, Dr. Wily flees into the caves beneath his fortress and when Mega Man follows, attempts to trick Mega Man into thinking he is a space alien, but Mega Man defeats the alien revealing it to be a holographic projection device which malfunctions showing Dr. Wily at the controls. After the scientist begs for mercy, Mega Man spares Wily and returns home.


title: Mega Man 2

text: "Mega Man 2" is a platform and action game like its predecessor, "Mega Man". The player controls Mega Man as he traverses eight stages to defeat the bosses, Dr. Wily's Robot Masters: Metal Man, Air Man, Bubble Man, Quick Man, Crash Man, Flash Man, Heat Man, and Wood Man. Each Robot Master features a unique weapon and a stage related to their weapon's power. For example, Air Man shoots small tornadoes and is fought in a sky-themed level, while Wood Man can use a shield of leaves and is found in a forest-themed stage. After defeating a boss, their signature weapon becomes available to the player. The Robot Masters have weaknesses to the weapons of certain other Robot Masters; therefore, choosing the order in which the levels are played is a vital component of the gameplay. After completing certain stages, Mega Man receives a special item. These items create platforms that allow Mega Man to access areas that he otherwise could not.


title: Mega Man 2

text: After defeating the eight Robot Masters, the player proceeds to Dr. Wily's fortress, which consists of six levels that are played linearly. As in the first game, the player is required to fight each Robot Master a second time in Dr. Wily's fortress. However, these battles take place in a single room rather than a series of linearly connected rooms. The room contains teleportation devices that lead to each Robot Master. The devices can be entered in any order, but are not labeled. Once the bosses are defeated again, the player must fight Dr. Wily.


title: Mega Man 2

text: "Mega Man 2" features a few gameplay changes from the original "Mega Man". A new item, the Energy Tank, allows a player to refill Mega Man's health at any time. Also introduced is a password system. After defeating each Robot Master a password is displayed, allowing the player to return to that particular point in the game after restarting the system. The password stores the particular list of completed Robot Masters, as well as the number of accumulated Energy Tanks. Unlike the first game, "Mega Man 2" does not feature a score counter, and the player is unable to return to Robot Master levels once completed.


title: Mega Man 2

text: The first "Mega Man" game—released in 1987—was not successful enough to justify the immediate development of a sequel. According to Roy Ozaki, director Akira Kitamura had wanted to make a sequel to Mega Man, but producer Tokuro Fujiwara was against it. Kitamura then went to Capcom Vice-President to get permission to make the game. Capcom allowed the development team to create a sequel on the condition that they work concurrently on other projects as well. The staff spent their own time on the project to improve upon the original by adding more levels and weapons, as well as improving the graphics. The project supervisor of the first "Mega Man" invited Inafune to the sequel's development crew; Inafune was working on a separate game at the time. On the previous game, Inafune worked as an artist and character designer but became more involved in the production process of the sequel. "Working on ["Mega Man 2"] marked my second year at this, and I even got to mentor a 'new kid', which opened up a whole new world of stress for me," Inafune recounted. The development time for the game was only three to four months.


title: Mega Man 2

text: Due to the limited amount of cartridge space available for the first game, elements such as planned enemy characters were omitted from the final product. The unused content was later transferred to "Mega Man 2". The team was limited by the graphical capabilities of the console, and designed characters as pixel art to maintain consistency between the designs and final product; some design elements, however, were lost in the transition. The gameplay system from the original game was kept for "Mega Man 2", but the team included more traps for the player to navigate. The game's three support items were added to aid the player because of complaints from consumers and Capcom's marketing department regarding the original game's high difficulty. Inafune's supervisor was "especially unsure" about the usefulness of the Energy Tanks.


title: Mega Man 2

text: The first game did not have any influence from fans, but for the second game, Kitamura wanted to get ideas from players and put them in. The developers allowed input from the public by including boss designs created by fans. Capcom received 8,370 boss submissions for the game, although even the designs for the final eight Robot Masters were "tweaked".


title: Mega Man 2

text: Inafune intended his artwork for "Mega Man 2" to be more "anime-ish" than in the first game. A second difficulty setting was added for the North American release. The original version was labeled "difficult", and a "normal" setting was created that made the "arm cannon" and boss weapons more powerful. Veteran video game cover illustrator Marc Ericksen painted the North American box art, which included Mega Man firing a pistol instead of his trademark Mega Buster. Ericksen explained that he was unfamiliar with the game and was directed by the Capcom America creative team to give Mega Man a pistol.


title: Mega Man 2

text: The soundtrack for "Mega Man 2" was composed by Takashi Tateishi (credited as Ogeretsu Kun), with "Mega Man" composer Manami Matsumae (credited as Manami Ietel) included for having her work on the credits theme from the first game repurposed for the title screen, and for co-composing a minor part of the melody for Air Man's stage. Matsumae had been moved to the arcade division, considered more prestigious at the time, which necessitated a new composer. Matsumae and Tateishi worked closely during their time at Capcom, with Tateishi assisting Matsumae with "U.N. Squadron" in a similar manner during the period, albeit uncredited. Tateishi's musical background was unusual compared to his contemporaries at Capcom, in that he had not been classically trained but was instead drawing on his experience performing in a band. He sought to consciously move away from the more classical sounding themes that were common at the time. He was also relatively new to the games industry, having only been hired by Capcom earlier that year for "Mad Gear" (1988). Tateishi would not remain with the franchise after "Mega Man 2", as he and Kitamura both resigned from Capcom soon afterwards to work on "Cocoron".


title: Mega Man 2

text: Tateishi's initial compositions for the game were of varying moods, with some of them being considered "too cute" by Kitamura, requesting them to be changed to fit in with the rest of the soundtrack. A single fragment of this declined concept remains in the game as Crash Man's stage theme. Tateishi has indicated that "no one has" the earlier, softer score. Stylistically the score was influenced by Mezzoforte and Yellow Magic Orchestra.


title: Mega Man 2

text: The widely praised piece used for the first two Wily stages was heavily compromised due to data limitations, with Tateishi being forced to use the first eight measures of the song multiple times throughout it. Intent to compose a song exclusive to the second stage was quickly abandoned for the same reasons.


title: Mega Man 2

text: As with the previous game, the sound programming was handled by Yoshihiro Sakaguchi, credited as Yuukichan's Papa.


title: Mega Man 2

text: Though the first "Mega Man" game had relatively low sales, "Mega Man 2" was a huge success. Since its 1988 release, "Mega Man 2" has sold over 1.5 million copies worldwide. The game is the highest selling in the "Mega Man" series and Capcom's 58th highest-selling game.


title: Mega Man 2

text: "Mega Man 2" was critically praised. "Electronic Gaming Monthly"s four reviewers—Steve Harris, Ed Semrad, Donn Nauert, and Jim Allee—rated the game favorably, each scoring it 8 out of 10. They stated that it was better than the first "Mega Man", citing the improved audio-visuals, new power-ups, and password system. Nauert and Allee, however, expressed disappointment that the game was less difficult than the first game. Nadia Oxford of 1UP.com complimented its aesthetics and gameplay. She further stated that "Mega Man 2" improved the gameplay of its predecessor by removing excessively difficult elements. "Mean Machines" two reviewers, Julian Rignall and Matt Regan, praised several aspects of the game. Rignall lauded the gameplay, citing its addictiveness and the puzzles. Regan praised the difficulty and called the gameplay balanced. Both reviewers complimented the graphics, calling them detailed and stunning, and described it as a great platform game. The color palette (combination of colors) used is proficient as noted by "Retro Room" as it writes: "Every stage in this series has a distinct theme, which requires the color palette to define that theme clearly. My favorite example is the overwhelmingly blue Flashman stage, with the use of the neon-looking flashing stage graphics that make the level really feel alive." "Retro Gamer" editor Richard Burton described it as a "must-have" game for the system, comments echoed by two of "Electronic Gaming Monthly"s reviewers. Zach Miller writing for "Game Informer" attributed the success of the game to the players' option to defeat the stages in the order of their choosing. He praised the simple control scheme and the variety of weapons and items. GamesRadar ranked it the second-best NES game ever made, calling it "the pinnacle" of the 8-bit "Mega Man" games.


title: Mega Man 2

text: The game's soundtrack has been well received by critics. Joey Becht of IGN listed three stage themes from "Mega Man 2" along with the main title song among the best in the series. In 2008, "Game Informer" listed "Mega Man 2"s introduction sequence as the fifth-best video game opening, citing the build up of excitement that the music and appearance of the character instills. The "Doctor Wily Stage Theme" was ranked second in ScrewAttack's "Top 10 Video Game Themes Ever" video. "Nintendo Power" editorial staff praised the music in 2008, stating it is among the best on the platform. In 2009, Gamasutra's Brandon Sheffield describe the music as easily recognizable and lamented that contemporary video game music lacked that trait. The opening riff from the "Crash Man" stage's theme inspired the theme music for the YTV program "Video & Arcade Top 10".


title: Mega Man 2

text: "Mega Man 2" is a favorite among "Mega Man" fans, with many calling it the best in the series. Critics have also referred to the game as the series' best. Oxford considered it one of the most memorable game in the series, and Burton and "Electronic Gaming Monthly" both called the game the best in the series. IGN's Levi Buchanan listed three of the game's bosses among the "Top 10 "Mega Man" Robot Masters". Several publications consider the game a critical success and have listed it high on "top game" lists. At the end of 1989, it was the top ranked game on "Nintendo Power"s Top 30 list. In 1997 "Electronic Gaming Monthly" named it the 73rd best console video game of all time, saying it was the most appealing and challenging game in the series. In August 2008, "Nintendo Power" listed "Mega Man 2" as the third best Nintendo Entertainment System video game. The editorial staff praised the polished improvements over the previous game. GameSpot named "Mega Man 2" as one of "The Greatest Games of All Time". It ranked number 33 in "Nintendo Power"s "Top 200 Nintendo Games Ever" list and number 60 in "Official Nintendo Magazine"s "100 Best Nintendo Games" list. Miller considered it one of the greatest games of all time. In 2007, IGN's three editorial offices—United States, United Kingdom, and Australia—compiled a list of top 100 games. They listed "Mega Man 2" as number 67, citing the action and strategic elements along with the impact it had on the series. "Mega Man 2" was placed 4th on IGN's list of the Top 100 NES Games. "Mega Man 2" was the first game on the cover of "Electronic Gaming Monthly". Game Informer placed the game 32nd on their top 100 video games of all time in 2001.


title: Mega Man 2

text: Kitamura chose to leave Capcom and joined the company Takeru, where he worked on the game "Cocoron" instead of "Mega Man 3".


title: Mega Man 2

text: Keiji Inafune claims the success of "Mega Man 2" is what made the "Mega Man" series a hit that continues to spawn sequels. 1UP.com commented that the game helped establish the series as a prominent and commercially successful video game franchise. IGN cited "Mega Man 2" as helping define the platforming genre. "Retro Gamer" credited it with helping the series obtain the global presence that allowed spin-offs and more sequels to be created. Many of the conventions of the original "Mega Man" series were defined by the first game, but "Mega Man 2" added crucial conventions that were retained for the rest of the series. The traditional number of Robot Masters for the series is eight as used in "Mega Man 2", rather than the six used in the original. It was the first in the series to include an opening cinematic. "Mega Man 2" also introduced the Energy Tank item, special movement items, teleporter room, and password system, which became staples in future games. The Energy Tank became the series' iconic health refill item and later served as inspiration for a promotional "Rockman E-Can" drink. In developing "Mega Man 9", producer Inafune and Hironobu Takeshita looked to the first two games in the series for inspiration, with "Mega Man 2" serving as a standard to surpass in order to meet fans' expectations. "Mega Man Universe" was to feature a remake of "Mega Man 2"s story campaign, as well as feature customizable characters and levels. However, Capcom has officially announced the game's cancellation due to "various circumstances." In "Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U", Wily Castle, as depicted in Mega Man 2, appears as a selectable stage in both versions of the game. The stage returned in "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate".


title: Mega Man 2

text: In 1990, Tiger Electronics produced a handheld electronic version with abridged gameplay. "Mega Man 2" was remade in 1994 for the Sega Genesis game "", featuring updated graphics and sound. In 1999, "Mega Man 2" was rereleased for the PlayStation as the second of six "Rockman Complete Works" discs, though only in Japan and under the original title "Rockman 2". It is largely identical to the original NES release, but had a number of bonuses, such as a "navi mode" for beginners that presents the player with a slightly remade version of the game, detailed encyclopedic content, image galleries, and remixed music. "Mega Man 2" was included with nine other games in the series in "Mega Man Anniversary Collection" for the PlayStation 2, GameCube, and Xbox, released between 2004 and 2005. The game's emulation is identical to the re-release contained in "Rockman Complete Works". Also in 2005, "Mega Man 2" was released alongside other Capcom games as part of a "Plug It In & Play TV Games" peripheral by Jakks Pacific. "Mega Man 2" made its way to mobile phones in 2007. The game was added as a part of the Wii Virtual Console service in PAL regions on December 14, 2007. In celebration of the ninth game's release in September 2008, Capcom Japan released the game on August 26, 2008 in Japan and a North American release on September 15, 2008. In March 2009, Capcom released the game for iPhone OS, while in September of the same year the Complete Works version of "Mega Man 2" was released on the Japanese PlayStation Store, making it available for download on the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable. Inafune expressed a desire to remake "Mega Man 2", similar to "Mega Man Powered Up", but stated that such a project was dependent on the commercial success of the latter. A tech demo for the Nintendo 3DS called "Classic Games" was shown at E3 2010, displaying more than a dozen classic games, including "Mega Man 2", using 3D effects. Reggie Fils-Aime announced that the games were slated for release on the 3DS and would possibly use the 3DS' features, such as 3D effects, analog control, or camera support. The game was released on the 3DS via the Virtual Console in Japan on August 8, 2012 and was released in Europe and North America on February 7, 2013.


title: Mega Man 2

text: "Mega Man 2" was novelized in the "Worlds of Power" series published by Scholastic in 1990. The novel mostly follows the game, even offering game hints at the end of some chapters. Besides the added dialogue, the one major variation in the novel is that Dr. Light fears Mega Man's chances against Dr. Wily's more powerful new robots and while attempting to duplicate him, accidentally turns him into a human being, a difficulty Mega Man must endure throughout the story. The book's cover also lacks the gun depicted on the North American box art of the game, due to a "no weapons" policy that "Worlds of Power" writers had to abide by.


title: Mega Man 2

text: The game was also adapted into the third story arc for the Archie Comics "Mega Man" comic, "The Return of Dr. Wily." In the arc, the Robot Masters are intended to either defeat Mega Man or infect him with a virus bit by bit as he absorbs their Special Weapons. All the Robot Masters are defeated but Mega Man ends up under Dr. Wily's control until the Mega Man Powered Up Robot Masters come to his rescue. Dr. Wily escapes and sets his course for the Lanfront Ruins in South America, foreshadowing an adaptation of "Super Adventure Rockman."


title: Mega Man 2

text: The "Mega Man 2" soundtrack is one of the most widely remixed soundtracks in gaming, and a great many covers were produced in the 2000s by various artists. "Mixdown" magazine described the soundtrack as one that would be "rehashed and reimagined at conventions and festivals until the end of time" and further that covering it had been a rite of passage in the early period of the nerd rock scene. Numerous artists and bands performed all or part of the soundtrack on studio albums in the 2000s, including The NESkimos on "Battle Perfect Selection" (2002), Chromelodeon on "Year 20XX" (2003), The Minibosses on "Brass" (2005), Mega Ran on his self titled album (2007), and The Megas on "Get Equipped" (2008). Many bands of the era additionally drew their stage names from the series, such as Armcannon and The Protomen.


title: Mega Man 2

text: Capcom endorsed some of these groups, officially licensing Mega Ran's 2007 cover album and bringing him to San Diego Comic-con that year. In 2010 The Megas were hired by Capcom to produce music for a "Mega Man Universe" trailer. All of these groups performed at the gaming music event MAGFest through the 2000s and 2010s. Tateishi himself appeared at Super MAGfest 2019.


title: Interac

text: Interac is a Canadian interbank network that links financial institutions and other enterprises for the purpose of exchanging electronic financial transactions. Interac serves as the Canadian debit card system and the predominant funds transfer network via its e-Transfer service. There are over 59,000 automated teller machines that can be accessed through the Interac network in Canada, and over 450,000 merchant locations accepting Interac debit payments.


title: Interac

text: The network was launched in 1984 through the nonprofit Interac Association, a cooperative venture between five financial institutions: RBC, CIBC, Scotiabank, TD, and Desjardins; by 2010, there were over 80 member organizations. The group founded a for-profit counterpart organization, Acxsys, in 1996, which launched additional Interac-branded services including e-transfers. Following several aborted merger attempts which were either blocked by the Competition Bureau or by some of the co-owners between 2008 and 2013, Interac and Acxsys were combined into a single for-profit organization, Interac Corporation, on 1 February 2018. Interac's head office is located at Royal Bank Plaza in Toronto.


title: Interac

text: In 2019, Interac Corporation acquired 2Keys Corporation, Ottawa-based digital identity and cyber security for governments, financial institutions and commercial clients.


title: Interac

text: In 2021, Interac Corporation acquired the exclusive rights to the digital ID services for Canada from the digital ID and authentication provider SecureKey Technologies Inc.


title: Interac

text: On July 8, 2022, all Interac services were disrupted in Canada due to a nationwide Rogers Communications network outage resulting in millions of dollars in lost transactions for businesses. On July 11, 2022, Interac stated they were adding another provider in addition to Rogers to strengthen their network redundancy.


title: Interac

text: Interac is the organization responsible for the development of a national network of two shared electronic financial services:


title: Interac

text: Interac Direct Payment (IDP) is Canada's national debit card service for purchasing of goods and services. Customers enter their personal identification number (PIN) and the amount paid is deducted from either their chequing or savings accounts.


title: Interac

text: As of 2001, the number of transactions completed via IDP has surpassed those completed using physical money.


title: Interac

text: Beginning in 2004, IDP purchases could also be made in the United States at merchants on the NYCE network.


title: Interac

text: IDP is similar in nature to the EFTPOS systems in use in the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand.


title: Interac

text: Interac Direct Payment is a PIN-based system where the information entered on the PIN pad is encrypted and verified at a central server, rather than being stored on the card itself. Because of this, it is significantly more secure than traditional signature or card-based transactions. Despite these security features, there are ongoing fraud concerns, particularly when debit cards are "duped" or "skimmed" — a compromised automated teller machine or point-of-sale terminal will record the account information contained in the magnetic strip of the card, allowing for duplicate cards to be created at a later time. The owner of the card is then secretly video taped or observed entering their PIN, allowing a criminal to use duplicate cards to make fraudulent purchases.


title: Interac

text: In 2007, Interac announced it would be moving to EMV chip card technology. The main benefit to this technology over the existing magnetic stripes is that the chips are almost impossible to copy due to high levels of encryption.


title: Interac

text: Shared Cash Dispensing (SCD): cash withdrawals from any ABM not belonging to a cardholder's financial institution. This Canada-specific service is similar to international systems like Plus or Cirrus. Virtually every ABM in Canada is on the Interac system.


title: Interac

text: The Interac e-Transfer service is offered by CertaPay. It allows online banking customers to send money to anyone with an e-mail address and a bank account in Canada. Prior to February 2018, this was an Interac-branded service operated by Acxsys Corporation. Interac e-Transfer service is designated as a prominent payment system and is subject to oversight by the Bank of Canada.


title: Interac

text: The Interac Online service allows customers to pay for goods and services over the Internet using funds directly from their bank accounts. Because no financial information is shared with the online merchant, the Interac Online service is more secure than online credit card payments. This service, an Interac branded service operated by Acxsys Corporation prior to February 2018, began in 2005 and is expanding as more merchants choose to participate. Since November 2007, the service has been available to customers of four of the five largest Canadian banks: RBC, BMO, Scotiabank, and TD Canada Trust. CIBC, the sole outlier, uses Visa Debit for online payments from bank accounts. As of February 2009, the service is offered by roughly 300 merchants including two large universities (for tuition payments), two major wireless carriers, provincial lottery corporations, and a wide variety of retailers. Interac Online is an Online Banking ePayments service very similar to iDEAL in the Netherlands, Giropay in Germany, and Secure Vault Payments in the United States.


title: Robots (upcoming film)

text: Robots is an upcoming American science fiction romantic comedy film written and directed by Anthony Hines and Casper Christensen and starring Shailene Woodley and Jack Whitehall. It is based on a short story by Robert Sheckley.


title: Academic fencing

text: Academic fencing () or is the traditional kind of fencing practiced by some student corporations () in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Latvia, Estonia, and, to a minor extent, in Belgium, Lithuania, and Poland. It is a traditional, strictly regulated épée fight between two male members of different fraternities with sharp weapons. The German technical term (from Latin meaning 'dimension') in the 16th century referred to the specified distance between each of the fencers.


title: Academic fencing

text: Modern academic fencing, the "Mensur", is neither a duel nor a sport. It is a traditional way of training and educating character and personality; thus, in a mensur bout, there is neither winner nor loser. In contrast to sports fencing, the participants stand their ground at a fixed distance. At the beginning of the tradition, duelers wore only their normal clothing (as duels sometimes would arise spontaneously) or light-cloth armor on the arm, torso, and throat. In recent years, fencers are protected by mail or padding for the body, fencing arm, fencing hand (gauntlet) and the throat, completed by steel goggles with a nose guard. In Austria and Switzerland, a nose guard is uncommon. Opponents fence at arm's length and stand more or less in one place, while attempting to hit the unprotected areas of their opponent's face and head. Flinching or dodging is not allowed, the goal being less to avoid injury than to endure it stoically. Two physicians are present (one for each opponent) to attend to injuries and stop the fight if necessary.


title: Academic fencing

text: The participants, or "Paukanten", use specially developed swords. The so-called "Mensurschläger" (or simply "Schläger"), exists in two versions. The most common weapon is the "Korbschläger" with a basket-type guard. Some universities use the so-called "Glockenschläger", which is equipped with a bell-shaped guard. These universities are Leipzig, Berlin, Greifswald, Dresden, Tharandt (in the Forestry College, which is now part of Technische Universität Dresden), Halle on the Saale, Frankfurt-an-der-Oder, and Freiberg. In Jena, both "Korbschläger" and "Glockenschläger" are used. "Studentenverbindungen" from some western cities use "Glockenschläger" because their tradition had its origin in one of the eastern universities but moved to West Germany after World War II.


title: Academic fencing

text: The scar resulting from a hit is called a "smite" (German "Schmiss"), and was seen as a badge of honour, especially in the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th. Nowadays the presence of scars usually indicates a mistake and therefore are no longer considered especially dignified. Today, it is not easy for an outsider to identify Mensur scars due to better medical treatment. Also, the number of mandatory Mensuren was reduced in the second half of the 20th century. Most Mensur scars are located on the left temple of the forehead. Scars on the cheek and chin are rather uncommon today and sometimes due to accidents.


title: Academic fencing

text: Starting in Spain at the end of the 15th century, the dueling sword (rapier) became a regular part of the attire of noblemen throughout Europe. In the Holy Roman Empire, this became usual among students, as well. Brawling and fighting were regular occupations of students in the German-speaking areas during the early modern period. In line with developments in the aristocracy and the military, regulated duels were introduced to the academic environment, as well. The basis of this was the conviction that being a student meant being something different from the rest of the population. Students wore special clothes, developed special kinds of festivities, sang student songs, and fought duels, sometimes spontaneously (so-called "rencontre", French "meeting" or "combat"), sometimes according to strict regulations called "comment" (French "how"). The weapons used were the same as those employed in civilian dueling, being at first the rapier and later the smallsword (court sword, dress sword, French "l'épée de cour", German "Kostümdegen", "Galanteriedegen"), which was seen as part of the dress and always at hand as a side arm.


title: Academic fencing

text: Student life was quite unsafe in these years, especially in the 16th and 17th centuries during the Reformation wars and the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), when a major part of the German population was killed. Public life was brutal and students killing each other in the street was not uncommon.


title: Academic fencing

text: A major step towards civilization was the introduction of the "regulated" duel, of which the first recordings exist from the 17th century. The fight was not decided on the spot, but the time and location were appointed and negotiations were done by officials. A so-called "Kartellträger" did the arrangements and a "second" represented the interests of the fighter during the duel and could even give physical protection from illegal actions. A kind of referee was present to make decisions, and eventually, the practice of having an attending doctor became normal so as to give medical help in case of an injury.


title: Academic fencing

text: At the end of the 18th century (after the French Revolution), wearing weapons in everyday life fell out of fashion and was more and more forbidden, even for students. This certainly reduced the number of spontaneous duels dramatically. The regulated duel remained in use, though still forbidden.


title: Academic fencing

text: The foil was invented in France as a training weapon in the middle of the 18th century to practice fast and elegant thrust fencing. Fencers blunted the point by wrapping a foil around the blade or fastening a knob on the point ("blossom", French "fleuret"). In addition to practising, some fencers took away the protection and used the sharp foil for duels. German students took up that practice and developed the "Pariser" ("Parisian") thrusting small sword for the "Stoßmensur" ("thrusting mensur"). After the dress sword was abolished, the "Pariser" became the only weapon for academic thrust fencing in Germany.


title: Academic fencing

text: Since fencing on thrust with a sharp point is quite dangerous, many students died from their lungs being pierced ("Lungenfuchser"), which made breathing difficult or impossible. However, the counter-movement had already started in Göttingen in the 1760s. Here the "Göttinger Hieber" was invented, the predecessor of the modern "Korbschläger", a new weapon for cut fencing. In the following years, the "Glockenschläger" was invented in east German universities for cut fencing as well.


title: Academic fencing

text: Thrust fencing (using "Pariser") and cut fencing (using "Korbschläger" or "Glockenschläger") existed in parallel in Germany during the first decades of the 19th century—with local preferences. Thrust fencing was especially popular in Jena, Erlangen, Würzburg, and Ingolstadt/Landshut, two towns where the predecessors of Munich University were located. The last thrust "Mensur" is recorded to have taken place in Würzburg in 1860.


title: Academic fencing

text: Until the first half of the 19th century, all types of academic fencing can be seen as duels, since all fencing with sharp weapons was about honour. No combat with sharp blades took place without a formal insult. Compared to pistol duels, these events were relatively harmless. The fight regularly ended when a contestant received a wound at least one inch long that produced at least one drop of blood. It was not uncommon for students to have fought approximately 10 to 30 duels of that kind during their university years. The German student Fritz Bacmeister is the 19th-century record holder, due to his estimated 100 mensur bouts fought in Göttingen, Jena, and Würzburg between 1860 and 1866.


title: Academic fencing

text: For duels with nonstudents, e.g., military officers, the "academic sabre" became usual, apparently derived from the military sabre. It was a heavy weapon with a curved blade and a hilt similar to the "Korbschläger".


title: Academic fencing

text: During the first half of the 19th century and some of the 18th century, students believed the character of a person could easily be judged by watching him fight with sharp blades under strict regulations. Academic fencing was more and more seen as a kind of personality training by showing countenance and fairness even in dangerous situations. Student corporations demanded their members fight at least one duel with sharp blades during their university time. The problem was that some peaceful students had nobody to offend them. The solution was a kind of formal insult that did not actually infringe honour, but was just seen as a challenge for fencing. The standard wording was "dummer Junge" (German for "stupid boy.")


title: Academic fencing

text: In the long term, this solution was unsatisfying. Around 1850, the "Bestimmungsmensur" (German "bestimmen" means "ascertain", "define" or "determine") was developed and introduced throughout Germany. This meant the opponents of a "Mensur" were determined by the fencing official of their corporations. These officials were regularly vice-chairmen ("Consenior") and responsible for arranging "Mensur" bouts in cooperation with their colleagues from other corporations. Their objective was to find opponents of equal physical and fencing capabilities to make the event challenging for both participants. That is the way it is still done today and is the concept of the "Mensur" in the modern sense of the word.


title: Academic fencing

text: Before the Communist revolution in Russia and before World War II, academic fencing was known in most countries of Eastern Europe, as well.


title: Academic fencing

text: By the end of the 19th century, the dueling form evolved into the modern Mensur. In 1884, the British "Saturday Review" described the dueling as follows:


title: Academic fencing

text: In the German Schläger combat the position is the same as in back-swording, save that the left arm is kept, as in sabre play, behind the body; commonly the waistband of the trousers is grasped by the left hand. The weapon is a long, narrow blade, like a pointless rapier, but much more flexible. It is sharpened for a length of twenty centimetres (say eight inches) on the true edge, and five on the false edge. For practice and instruction blunt and rather stouter blades are used. The mask is like an English single-stick mask, but stronger and heavier. A padded leather vest, coming almost down to the knees, covers the body, and the right arm is encased in a sleeve attached to a gauntlet, which may be compared to an elongated Rugby football. In the actual duel, there is an even more elaborate system of defense; the right wrist is guarded with a ring of mail, and the arm with folds of silk, which, like the turban of the East, are enough to stop an ordinary cut. Practically, though not according to strict rules, the body is altogether covered. The eyes are protected by iron spectacles, with a strong wire net instead of glasses.


title: Academic fencing

text: During the times of the Third Reich, the national socialist leadership chose to forbid academic fencing. They had recognized that Mensur fencing was an integral part of the internal strength of the last still-existing independent Studentenverbindung fraternities during the later 1930s. As Nazi pressure increased and fraternities were forced to officially suspend their activities, so-called comradeships were founded. These provided means for practicing and organizing the Mensur among former fraternities while remaining undetected to the Nazi secret police. One such example was the SC-Comradeship "Hermann Löns" initiated by members of the Corps Hubertia Freiburg and other fraternities in Freiburg, Germany. There, fencing Mensur "duels" continued and even intensified from 1941 on, with over 100 of such duels happening during World War II in Freiburg alone. Following the war, most of the formerly suspended fraternities were reactivated and resumed the traditions of Mensur fencing if they had not continued throughout the time of Nazi occupation.


title: Academic fencing

text: Today, the Mensur is practiced by about 400 traditional "Studentenverbindung" fraternities in Germany, several of the Corps, Burschenschaften, Landsmannschaften, Turnerschaften and Sängerschaften. Menzura, as the Mensur is known in Poland, and is still practised, although its popularity has declined since the end of World War II. It is also still known in a few other European countries, though there, protective equipment use is extensive and dueling scars are almost unheard of.


title: Academic fencing

text: American traveller Mark Twain devoted several chapters of "A Tramp Abroad" (1880) to Heidelberg students' fencing.


title: Academic fencing

text: In "Three Men on the Bummel" (1900), Jerome K. Jerome devoted a chapter to German student life, and describes the "German Mensur" in detail. While much of the book has a tone of admiration for the German people, he expressed extreme disapproval for this tradition.


title: Academic fencing

text: In George MacDonald Fraser's "Royal Flash" (1970), the protagonist Harry Flashman is scarred with a "Schläger" as part of his disguise as a Danish prince.


title: Academic fencing

text: Mensur scars are repeatedly noted and described as a sign of beauty and manliness by German characters in Katherine Anne Porter's novel "Ship of Fools".


title: Academic fencing

text: Mensur scars are mentioned in passing in Robert Heinlein's "Starship Troopers" when two German recruits are asked at the beginning of boot camp where they got their scars. The drill sergeant even uses the term "Korpsbruder" (as spelled in modern German). E. C. Gordon, the hero of Heinlein's "Glory Road", mentions his desire for a degree from Heidelberg and the dueling scars to go with it.


title: Academic fencing

text: The opening scene of "The Mystery of the Spanish Chest," in season three of "Agatha Christie's Poirot", features two men fighting in the mensur style. The episode's dialogue implies that the fencers are English, rather than German, and that one fencer has challenged the other to a duel over a woman.


title: Academic fencing

text: In the James Bond books by Ian Fleming, the supervillain Ernst Stavro Blofeld has a dueling scar below his eye.


title: Academic fencing

text: "A more detailed article (in German) with multiple illustrations can be found on the German Wikipedia:"


title: Jackie Martling

text: John Coger "Jackie" Martling, Jr. (born February 14, 1948) is an American stand-up comedian, writer, radio personality, author, actor, and musician also known as Jackie the Joke Man. He is best known as a former writer and in-studio comedian for "The Howard Stern Show" from 1983 to 2001.


title: Jackie Martling

text: Born and raised on Long Island, New York, Martling began a career in stand-up comedy in 1979, developing a blue comedy act in local venues. He self-produced his first of three comedy albums, "What Did You Expect?" (1979), during this time. After becoming involved with Rick Dees's radio show as a regular joke feature, Martling sent his albums to New York City radio personality Howard Stern, who invited him as a weekly guest and writer in 1983. This led to his hiring as head writer from 1986 to 2001. He released further albums during his tenure, including "Sgt. Pecker" (1996), "Joke Man" (1996), "Hot Dogs + Donuts" (1998).


title: Jackie Martling

text: Since his departure from "The Howard Stern Show", Martling has undertaken various projects, including acting roles in television and film, and continues to perform stand-up. From 2006 to 2014, he was the host of "Jackie's Joke Hunt" on Sirius XM Satellite Radio, on Howard Stern's channel. He released his first music album, "Happy Endings" (2008). Martling has written two books, "Disgustingly Dirty Joke Book" (1998) and "The Joke Man: Bow to Stern" (2017).


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling was born on February 14, 1948 in Mineola, New York, a village on Long Island. The eldest of four children, he is of English, French, and Dutch ancestry. Martling took up music at seventh grade and spent time as a gymnast in his youth. He attended James H. Vernon School in East Norwich, New York followed by Oyster Bay High School and, in 1971, earned a mechanical engineering degree from Michigan State University. After graduating, he stayed in East Lansing, Michigan for a further two years. During his time in college, Martling was the singer and guitarist in a band. He quit the group and spent six months in Denver, Colorado working in construction.


title: Jackie Martling

text: After returning to New York, Martling became the singer and guitarist in The Off-Hour Rockers with guitarist Chris Bates and keyboardist Herbie Werner, with whom incorporated jokes, banjos, and the kazoo in their sets. He also performed solo shows and told jokes during his act. In order to accommodate the band's gear, Martling drove a used hearse. Martling took stand-up comedy more seriously when, in 1976, he attended an open-mic night at Catch a Rising Star comedy club in New York City. "The auditioner bailed out early and the MC wasn't in the room, so I jumped on stage and told a joke, one that I was sure the entire world knew. The MC, David Sayh, came back in the room and saw me up there but let me finish". Sayh encouraged Martling to continue performing as a joke teller, and soon found out that "few people knew any of the zillions of jokes I knew".


title: Jackie Martling

text: By 1979, Bates and Werner disbanded the Off Hour Rockers to start a new group. At that point, Martling started to pursue stand-up comedy full-time, developing his stage act of songs and dirty jokes. During a gig at My Father's Place in Roslyn, New York, Martling met the likes of comedians Eddie Murphy, Rob Bartlett, and Bob Nelson who would perform for several minutes at Martling's gigs. In 1979, he set up a "dial-a-joke" telephone line from his parents' attic, Jackie's "Use Your Finger! (516) 922-WINE", which remains in operation to this day. Also in 1979, Martling released his first comedy album, "What Did You Expect?!" (1979), which he recorded himself using his own recording equipment. This was followed by "Goin' Ape!" (1980).


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling made a breakthrough in 1981 when Dave Lipson, writer and producer of Rick Dees's morning radio show on KIIS in Los Angeles, discovered his joke line and played his daily joke updates on Dees's program. The exposure led Martling to star in a designated joke segment for Dees, who went on to give Martling his nickname, "The Joke Man". Also in 1981, Martling released his third album, "Normal People Are People You Don't Know That Well" (1981).


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling first heard of radio personality Howard Stern in August 1982 when the owner of Garvin's comedy club in Washington, D.C., where Stern performed during his time at WWDC, suggested to Martling that he send his comedy albums to him. By early 1983, Martling had mailed his three comedy albums to Howard Stern, then less than a year into his stint in afternoons at WNBC in New York City. Stern took a liking to his material and invited him on as a guest in February 1983, which soon turned into a weekly guest spot without pay. Stern then began a regular segment titled "Stump The Comedian", a contest where callers were challenged to start a joke that Martling had to provide the punchline to, otherwise they win prizes.


title: Jackie Martling

text: In 1985, following the show's cancellation from WNBC, Stern stayed in New York City and relocated to afternoons on WXRK. Martling was subsequently hired as a writer on "The Howard Stern Show" when it moved to the mornings slot in February 1986, initially for two days a week. After around two months, Martling was hired full-time and became known as the head writer who would take lines written by himself and sound effects and producer Fred Norris and "determine what goes in front of Howard". Along with Norris, Martling contributed material to radio bits and song parodies and is featured and credited on Stern's television shows, home videos, and albums. In 1994, a puppet that resembled Martling, known on the show as the "Jackie puppet", began to feature on "Howard Stern" on the E! channel and voiced by show impressionist Billy West.


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling would release further albums during his time on the show, including "Sgt. Pecker" (1996), "Joke Man" (1996), "Hot Dogs + Donuts" (1998), and "F Jackie" (2000).


title: Jackie Martling

text: From late 1997 to early 1998, Martling was absent on the show for six weeks while his contract with WXRK owner Infinity Broadcasting Corporation was being renegotiated. During this time, he refused to be filmed on the E! television show until he had also secured a contract from the channel. Martling had taken time off to negotiate his contract "three or four times" throughout his time on the show.


title: Jackie Martling

text: In February 2001, Martling made history when he became the first comedian to perform at the B.B. King Blues Club in New York City.


title: Jackie Martling

text: On March 5, 2001, Stern announced Martling's departure from the show after negotiations fell through once more. Martling, who was earning $578,000 at the time, asked for a salary that averaged $1 million per year over the next five years. He declined the station's final offer of $650,000 on the advice of his lawyer. Martling twice attempted to accept the offer once the deadline to accept had passed, and he was declined. He has since added other reasons to his departure, including his inability to sleep and perform effectively for the show, having to announce his failing marriage on the air, and the inability to address his alcohol abuse had he continued. In August 2001, a newspaper reported his wish to return, but Stern declined, partly due to the Win Jackie's Money contest he had already started, which involved comedians auditioning for Martling's place in the studio by sitting in on some shows. In October 2001, comedian and actor Artie Lange replaced Martling for a tenure that lasted until December 2009.


title: Jackie Martling

text: Following his departure, Martling returned as a guest during the show's final week on terrestrial radio prior to its relocation to Sirius Satellite Radio, on December 15, 2005. He returned to the show on Sirius on March 13, 2007, and has since returned in the studio and by phone. A two-day special on Martling's time on the show titled "Stern Spotlight: Jackie Martling" aired in May 2007.


title: Jackie Martling

text: Since 1993, he has released six 78-minute dirty joke CDs, three videos, a DVD ("A Safe Distance from Genius"), five joke books including 1998's best-selling Simon & Schuster title, "Jackie "The Joke Man" Martling's Disgustingly Dirty Joke Book", and the iPhone app "The Jackie Button". He also co-created a line of electronic joke products with "EB-Excalibur", and their "MiniJokeMaster Jr." keychain is sold through various retailers.


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling has appeared in many films during his career, including the comedy documentary "The Aristocrats" (2005), "Mail Order Bride" (2008), "Venus & Vegas" (2010), and "White Irish Drinkers" (2010). He appeared in the short film "Jokebitch" (2005). Martling received a Best Supporting Actor Award at the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival. He appeared on the TNT television show "Leverage" and in August 2007, Martling filmed the pilot episode for the sitcom "The Pikers".


title: Jackie Martling

text: On October 3, 2006, Martling returned to radio as the host of a weekly, one hour comedy show, "Jackie's Joke Hunt", on Stern's channel Howard 101 on Sirius. Martling's co-host was a fellow member of the Friar's Club, Ian "McKean" Karr. The final episode, "The Last Lick Hunt", aired on November 25, 2014 after 402 shows. Martling can also be heard on the Sirius comedy channel Raw Dog Comedy.


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling released his first music album, "Happy Endings", in 2007, co-produced by guitarist Frank Vignola. From October 27 to November 4, 2008, Martling and "American Idol" runner-up Bo Bice entertained American troops in Kuwait and Iraq. In 2010, Martling wrote and performed a one-man show for a run in New York City titled "JokeLand on Broadway". In 2012, he appeared in Fred Carpenter's "Send No Flowers", the short film "My Cross to Bear", and voiced two puppets in the human/puppet film, "The Fuzz" (2013).


title: Jackie Martling

text: Martling's second book (an autobiography), "The Joke Man: Bow to Stern", was released on October 24, 2017. Lange, who replaced Martling on "The Howard Stern Show" from 2001 to 2009, wrote the book's foreword.


title: Jackie Martling

text: From 1988 to 2008, Jackie Martling was married to Nancy Sirianni. Their personal life as well as her appearances and call-ins to The Howard Stern Show contributed greatly to their popularity and put Jackie and Nancy in a spotlight they had not previously enjoyed. Nancy Sirianni's musical endeavors with her band, The Scoldees (and before that her bands All Folked Up and Big Orange Marble), were played on Stern's radio show and discussed by Howard and his staff. In 2008, Martling and Sirianni continued their professional association with an Off-Off-Broadway Broadway Game Show called "Play With Jackie." Martling also had a cameo in a low budget horror movie Nancy starred in called "Ghoul School", which became another punchline for Stern.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: In computing, preemption is the act of temporarily interrupting an executing task, with the intention of resuming it at a later time. This interrupt is done by an external scheduler with no assistance or cooperation from the task. This preemptive scheduler usually runs in the most privileged protection ring, meaning that interruption and resuming are considered highly secure actions. Such a change in the currently executing task of a processor is known as context switching.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: In any given system design, some operations performed by the system may not be preemptable. This usually applies to kernel functions and service interrupts which, if not permitted to run to completion, would tend to produce race conditions resulting in deadlock. Barring the scheduler from preempting tasks while they are processing kernel functions simplifies the kernel design at the expense of system responsiveness. The distinction between user mode and kernel mode, which determines privilege level within the system, may also be used to distinguish whether a task is currently preemptable.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Most modern operating systems have preemptive kernels, which are designed to permit tasks to be preempted even when in kernel mode. Examples of such operating systems are Solaris 2.0/SunOS 5.0, Windows NT, Linux kernel (2.5.4 and newer), AIX and some BSD systems (NetBSD, since version 5).


title: Preemption (computing)

text: The term preemptive multitasking is used to distinguish a multitasking operating system, which permits preemption of tasks, from a cooperative multitasking system wherein processes or tasks must be explicitly programmed to yield when they do not need system resources.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: In simple terms: Preemptive multitasking involves the use of an interrupt mechanism which suspends the currently executing process and invokes a scheduler to determine which process should execute next. Therefore, all processes will get some amount of CPU time at any given time.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: In preemptive multitasking, the operating system kernel can also initiate a context switch to satisfy the scheduling policy's priority constraint, thus preempting the active task. In general, preemption means "prior seizure of". When the high-priority task at that instance seizes the currently running task, it is known as preemptive scheduling.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: The term "preemptive multitasking" is sometimes mistakenly used when the intended meaning is more specific, referring instead to the class of scheduling policies known as "time-shared scheduling", or "time-sharing".


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Preemptive multitasking allows the computer system to more reliably guarantee each process a regular "slice" of operating time. It also allows the system to rapidly deal with important external events like incoming data, which might require the immediate attention of one or another process.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: At any specific time, processes can be grouped into two categories: those that are waiting for input or output (called "I/O bound"), and those that are fully utilizing the CPU ("CPU bound"). In early systems, processes would often "poll" or "busy-wait" while waiting for requested input (such as disk, keyboard or network input). During this time, the process was not performing useful work, but still maintained complete control of the CPU. With the advent of interrupts and preemptive multitasking, these I/O bound processes could be "blocked", or put on hold, pending the arrival of the necessary data, allowing other processes to utilize the CPU. As the arrival of the requested data would generate an interrupt, blocked processes could be guaranteed a timely return to execution.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Although multitasking techniques were originally developed to allow multiple users to share a single machine, it became apparent that multitasking was useful regardless of the number of users. Many operating systems, from mainframes down to single-user personal computers and no-user control systems (like those in robotic spacecraft), have recognized the usefulness of multitasking support for a variety of reasons. Multitasking makes it possible for a single user to run multiple applications at the same time, or to run "background" processes while retaining control of the computer.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: The period of time for which a process is allowed to run in a preemptive multitasking system is generally called the "time slice" or "quantum". The scheduler is run once every time slice to choose the next process to run. The length of each time slice can be critical to balancing system performance vs process responsiveness - if the time slice is too short then the scheduler will consume too much processing time, but if the time slice is too long, processes will take longer to respond to input.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: An interrupt is scheduled to allow the operating system kernel to switch between processes when their time slices expire, effectively allowing the processor's time to be shared among a number of tasks, giving the illusion that it is dealing with these tasks in parallel (simultaneously). The operating system which controls such a design is called a multi-tasking system.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Today, nearly all operating systems support preemptive multitasking, including the current versions of Windows, macOS, Linux (including Android) and iOS.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Some of the earliest operating systems available to home users featuring preemptive multitasking were Sinclair QDOS (1984) and Amiga OS (1985). These both ran on Motorola 68000-family microprocessors without memory management. Amiga OS used dynamic loading of relocatable code blocks ("hunks" in Amiga jargon) to multitask preemptively all processes in the same flat address space.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Early PC operating systems such as MS-DOS and PC DOS, did not support multitasking at all, however alternative operating systems such as MP/M-86 (1981) and Concurrent CP/M-86 did support preemptive multitasking. Other Unix-like systems including MINIX and Coherent provided preemptive multitasking on 1980s-era personal computers.


title: Preemption (computing)

text: Later DOS versions natively supporting preemptive multitasking/multithreading include Concurrent DOS, Multiuser DOS, Novell DOS (later called Caldera OpenDOS and DR-DOS 7.02 and higher). Since Concurrent DOS 386, they could also run multiple DOS programs concurrently in virtual DOS machines.