When Beyoncé announced “new music” from her former girl group Destiny’s Child, at first it seemed like this meant a new album. It does not. It means a new song.

Otherwise, “Love Songs” is just that, a compendium of ballads concerning romance by the hitmaking late ’90s-early ’00s soul pop group fronted by Beyoncé and featuring Kelly Rowland — who also has a solo song included — and later Michelle Williams (and, at various times, LeToya Luckett, LaTavia Roberson, and Farrah Franklin).

This type of compilation can be done right — see: Madonna, “Something to Remember” — but in a digital world of playlist-making it’s unnecessary when, as in this case, 13 of the 14 tracks are already available.

Also, listening to the placid “Love Songs” you realize why Destiny’s Child released so few ballads and made their bones with more uptempo numbers like “Survivor” and “Bootylicious.” With the exception of the Bee Gees-penned “Emotion,” many of these songs are short on melody and rhythmically sluggish.

Destiny’s Child completists need only download the new track, “Nuclear,” a modestly appealing trifle that features quasi-scientific nonsense about “when two become one on a quantum level” and benefits from all the slow jam somnambulance preceding it by being slightly more alert.

Casual fans are better off getting the hits compilation “#1’s.” It’s a great dance-workout disc and clearer indicator of what these children were truly destined to do. (Out now) - SARAH RODMAN

Summary: When Beyoncé recently announced “new music” from her former girl group Destiny’s Child, it seemed like this meant a new album. It does not. It means a new song. Destiny’s Child’s “Love Songs” is just that, a compendium of ballads concerning romance by the hitmaking late ’90s-early ’00s soul pop group. This type of compilation can be done right but is increasingly unnecessary, especially when, as in this case, 13 of the 14 tracks are already available.


More than half of Americans describe themselves as vacation-deprived, yet, on average, US workers don’t take all the vacation days offered to them, according to a study released Monday. It’s estimated that 500 million vacation days a year are lost by US employees who let them lapse.

The study, by Expedia, found that US workers are offered an average of 15 vacation days a year but take only 11. That’s a stark contrast to European attitudes toward time off. Most of the European labor force is offered 30 vacation days a year, and workers in Finland, France, Germany, and Spain take every day available. The median number of vacation days in the United Arab Emirates and Brazil is also 30, and workers in those countries also take all 30.

When asked about leaving vacation time on the table, participants in the study cited busy work schedules, money concerns, or a perception that taking every vacation day offered would be viewed negatively by the boss.

Many respondents also reported that they are still checking e-mail and voice mail and responding to text messages when they are not on the clock.

The study, now in its 15th year, found that Americans prioritize pay (71 percent) over time off (29 percent). And even though most US workers don’t use all of their vacation days, they would go through some bizarre sacrifices to get more.

In exchange for one extra day of vacation each year, 49 percent of Americans would give up alcohol for a week, 47 percent would avoid social media for a week, 40 percent would give up coffee, 26 percent would abstain from sex, and 19 percent would give up the Internet entirely.

And 11 percent of those surveyed said they would give up showering for a week.

Summary: US workers are offered an average of 15 vacation days a year, but only take 11. It’s estimated that 500 million vacation days a year are lost in the US by employees who let them lapse.


In the carefully chosen words of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts spokeswoman Tricia Wajda, it’s “an interesting time” for the organization to bring onboard a new president and CEO.

The nonprofit is accustomed to political controversy, but its latest is particularly contentious: congressional investigations into how it handles fetal tissue after abortions.

Anti-abortion groups accuse Planned Parenthood of selling the tissue for profit and say undercover videos prove it. Planned Parenthood denies the charges and calls the videos misleadingly edited, but also says it will no longer accept reimbursement for the costs of providing fetal tissue for medical research.

Amid that charged landscape, Dr. Jennifer Childs-Roshak has been named PPLM’s new leader and proudly says this: “I have no qualms at all about being a vocal supporter of the importance of the work Planned Parenthood does, and I have 150% backing for the quality of that work.”

Roshak, 51, who lives in the Back Bay, is the first doctor to lead the Boston-based organization. She’s been a primary care physician for more than 20 years, including as regional medical director for Atrius Health (she’s based at Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates’ Kenmore Square practice), Milford Regional Medical Center, Tri-County Medical Associates in Milford, and Family Health Center of Worcester.

Roshak, who begins her new job Nov. 23, succeeds Marty Walz, who resigned in January.

Of threats to cut off federal money to Planned Parenthood over the fetal tissue controversy, Roshak has this view: “I can’t imagine Planned Parenthood is going to lose funding. I think there’s a lot more public support out there for Planned Parenthood than perhaps is reflected in some of the Republican polls.”

Her husband, Phil Roshak, is a tax accountant at Ernst & Young in Boston.

Summary: Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts has named a new president and CEO


11/26/2015 AT 07:30 PM EST

The tryptophan has gotten to

She posted a video from her Thanksgiving celebrations, err, rather siesta, proving the Holmes' do Turkey Day right.

"#foodcoma #familytime #love HAPPY THANKSGIVING! #blessed," she captioned the black and white clip that shows the actress, 36, sleeping comfortably on a couch with the rest of her family.

at Detroit Metro Airport on Wednesday with 9½-year-old Suri, her daughter with ex-husband

After preparing her first Thanksgiving turkey in 2014, Holmes may have passed on the cooking duties this year.

"I'm the baby of five and I've been sort of using that for a long time but now I'm taking responsibility and my mother's going to teach me how to make a turkey," she

about her holiday plans at the time.

Summary: "#foodcoma #familytime #love HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!! #blessed," Holmes wrote on Instagram


After years of yearning for Led Zeppelin to reunite, Jason Bonham has finally found solace in honoring his father.

“I started it as therapy, I think,” says Bonham by phone of his tribute band, Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience, which performs at the House of Blues on Saturday. “In my life, there’s always been talk of a Led Zeppelin reunion. . . . I was just so disappointed for years that it never happened. As soon as I would let the possibility go, next thing you know there’s a phone call, and then it was on again.”

The son of late Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham, Jason was exposed to stardom at an early age. Before he founded JBLZE in 2010, Bonham played on and off again with Led Zeppelin’s remaining members — Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, and John Paul Jones — most memorably in their 2007 reunion concert at London’s O2 Arena.

“When you’re involved with those guys, you’re being involved in one of the biggest bands in the world,” Bonham explainssays. “You can kind of get lost in the hype.” As a child, he remembers staring in disbelief when told that 84,000 people crowded into a stadium were waiting for his father’s band to play — the same father who, at home, would put on the jukebox and watch as his son played along on his drum kit.

Over the years, Bonham has worked tirelessly to perfect his drumming, citing his father as his hero. He remembers how Plant and Page especially would see bits of his father in his mannerisms, his tendency toward recklessness, and his ability to maintain the steadily pulsating rhythm integral to Zeppelin’s sound.

Although working with Plant, Page, and Jones was largely successful, Bonham came to realize that re-creating the organic chemistry between the founding four would never be possible. “It was once, eight years ago yesterday, that [Plant] said to me, ‘Without a shadow of a doubt, there is no one who can play it like you, other than your father — [but] you’re not your father, and to me, Led Zeppelin was with your dad,’ ” Bonham says. “And I get it. I’m OK with that.”

Letting go of his father’s musical career and moving on with his own has allowed Bonham to perpetuate Zeppelin’s legacy, through what he calls his “fun gig,” while also pursuing his own interests — drumming in Sammy Hagar’s band the Circle, to name just one. He plays around 30 shows a year with JBLZE — each night a different combination of set list and improvisation, true to Led Zeppelin’s jam-oriented vibe.

“Some of their best songs were 25 minutes long, where they would go off on a whole other tangent,” recalls Bonham. “The musicianship of the band was so big that they could just follow each other. . . . They could take it as the mood went. The one thing I try to capture when I do the shows is this spirit of what Led Zeppelin always had to offer — the element of jam.” Bonham also sets out to create a multi-dimensional experience, combining Zeppelin music with home videos and other footage. With his father playing on screen, the Bonhams are able to drum together: something the two were never able to do while Bonzo was alive.

“There was only ever one drum kit, so we never got to play together at the same time,” explains Bonham. “[My dad] used to say his dream was to have him play side by side with me at Madison Square Garden, and we never got a chance to do that. So I’ve been kind of fulfilling these dreams, for the last five years, doing this.”

And essentially, Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience is exactly that: a way for him to share his father’s life and music with a crowd that wants the experience to survive as much as he does. “I’ve grown up around [Led Zeppelin], I’ve played with them, have a slightly different insight than some of the other [cover bands],” he says. “So this is very heartfelt to me. That’s why it’s my experience, my Led Zeppelin Experience — for me, it’s the different stories I tell the audience.”

In return, he receives heartfelt responses from the audience. Reflecting on one man who told him about waiting in line for two days to see a Led Zeppelin concert in 1980, only to find out that the show was canceled because John Bonham had died that day, Bonham explains his project’s transformation.

“I suddenly thought to myself, this is more than just about how I’m missing him,” he explains. “I’d forgotten that there’s a whole audience here, and they lost their drummer. They lost their favorite band.” Perhaps, with Bonzo living on through his son, they don’t have to mourn just yet.

At House of Blues, Saturday

at 6 p.m. Tickets $35. 800-653-8000, www.livenation.com

Summary: Jason Bonham, son of Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham, brings his tribute band, Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience, to the House of Blues this week.


02/03/2016 AT 11:40 AM EST

saying she was "disappointed" in the

among this year's Oscar nominations,

has continued her push to raise awareness of the issue.

The actress, who won an Oscar for best supporting actress in 2014, said she believes the #OscarsSoWhite controversy is a "symptom of something else."

"I think what we are asking for is really for more stories to be told, for inclusion in the stories that are told," she said while appearing on the

show Wednesday morning. "It's good for all of us when we hear a diverse number of stories and are able to experience more diversity. It's more reflective of the world we live in."

"I think that's what we ultimately want," she continued. "Is for a diversity of stories to be told."

Nyong'o, 32, was on the morning talk show to promote her Broadway debut in the play

, which features an all-female, diverse cast, and was a story Nyong'o was passionate to tell.

"I feel really grateful to be in the position that I find myself where I can use the little weight I have to get stories that I feel are untold – or yet to be told – made," she explained. "For example with

, this is something that I brought to the table because it had moved me in a way that I wanted to perform it and share it with people."

"That's the role I can play," she concluded.

has created a plan to do his part in helping increase the number of women and minority directors in the film industry.

, Murphy is launching a foundation within his production company called Half. His goal is to have 50 percent of directors on his shows be either women or minorities. The director made a point to include both people of color and members of the LGBTQ community in his plan.

"The industry has always been about, you come to us," he explained. "There's not a lot of effort and inclusion, and I'm saying, 'No, we're going to go to you.' "

echoed similar feelings to that of Murphy, stressing the importance of taking action in the issue.

"There's work that needs to be done on everyone's side. It's not the Academy's fault. It's not the Academy's job to right civil-rights wrongs for the country," he told PEOPLE. "People of color, it's our job to make sure we are doing all we can to be a part of the system."

actor continued: "If it's important enough, get some people together and let's put a program together to put a dent in this issue that is not going away until we all deal with it."

Summary: "I think what we are asking for is really for more stories to be told, for inclusion in the stories that are told," Lupita Nyong'o said on the Today show


The White House in its Friday-of-a-holiday-weekend news dump cited an ongoing legal dispute in Nebraska over approval for the Keystone route through the state as the reason for the latest in years of delays.

But there is no reason that dispute should change the federal government's decision on whether building the pipeline is in the national interest.

President Obama's own State Department has now twice concluded that the pipeline would cause no net harm to the environment. And State is involved only because the pipeline crosses the Canadian border, which does not, in fact, extend into Nebraska. Indeed, it seems fairly clear that on the merits, the administration would likely have approved the pipeline months if not years ago.

Read More U.S. extends Keystone XL comment period, delaying final decision

But there are at least 100 million reasons why the president has held up the decision.

Those reasons live in the bank account of hedge fund manager Tom Steyer who has pledged to spend $100 million helping Democrats avoid disaster in a 2014 midterm election where their Senate majority is in serious jeopardy. Steyer's No. 1 issue? Stopping the Keystone pipeline.

The San Francisco money manager on Friday declared the latest delay "rotten eggs" for pipeline builder TransCanada and "good news on Good Friday for those who oppose Keystone as not being in our nation's best interest."

The delay, however, was not at all good news for vulnerable red state Democrats, including Sens. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Mark Pryor of Arkansas and others.

Read MoreWhat Happens if the Keystone XL Pipeline Isn't Built?

Landrieu has the most to lose given that she is a strong proponent of the pipeline, which would deliver crude product from Alberta's oil sands to the Gulf Coast for refining and sale on the global market.

And the Louisiana senator, who already trails Republican Bill Cassidy in early polls, has cited her influence in Washington as a key reason for voters to keep her on the job. She used her first ad of the campaign to do that very thing (immediately drawing rebukes from Republicans for recreating scenes in the Senate).

But now Landrieu, who chairs the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, has demonstrated a total inability to actually influence the administration on a key decision that would impact the economy in her state.

Landrieu on Friday blasted the administration's decision as "irresponsible, unnecessary and unacceptable." And some make the case that Keystone gives her an opportunity to create distance between herself and an unpopular president.

That may be true but is likely swamped by the fact that Landrieu's key selling point—I can deliver for Louisiana!—is now fundamentally undermined.

If Landrieu goes down in November, as she very well may, she can probably thank the Obama White House for her defeat.

Summary: There are at least 100 million reasons why the president has held up the decision on the Keystone pipeline, POLITICO's Ben White says.


The Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit packed in famous names and exclusive interviews on Tuesday.

IBM IBM CEO Ginni Rometty, No. 1 on the 2012 Most Powerful Women list, did her first interview since taking the CEO job in January.

Kraft Foods CEO Irene Rosenfeld talked strategy on the day she split her business into two new companies.

Former Yahoo YHOO CEO Carol Bartz gave advice to new chief Marissa Mayer on reviving the business.

Stay tuned to Postcards and visit this MPW site for highlights, videos and stories from the Summit, which continues today. You can watch the main-stage sessions, starting at 8:45 a.m. PST and listed on the Summit agenda, by registering here. It’s all free.

Meantime, here are five of my favorite quotes from yesterday’s MPW Summit sessions:

“Never love something so much you can’t let go of it.” – IBM CEO Ginni Rometty on the reinvention that is essential for long-term success

“As a woman, I don’t have to tell you that size is not everything.” – Irene Rosenfeld on splitting Kraft and now running Mondalez International MDLZ , a $36 billion-a-year part of the $54 whole.

“Sooner rather than perfect” – Xerox XRX CEO Ursula Burns’ sign on her office wall. Here’s a video clip of Leigh Gallagher’s interview with Burns.

“Changing culture is not a sprint. It’s a marathon.” – Carol Bartz’s advice to Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer. Here’s a video clip of me interviewing Bartz.

“You have to be awesome with your flaws, the things that aren’t exactly perfect.” – Coca-Cola KO SVP Wendy Clark on building a social media mega-brand, with authenticity.

More highlights! Lena Dunham, the star and creator of HBO’s Girls, was charming and funny as she talked about next-gen power and her show’s critics with CNN’s Soledad O’Brien.

And my conversation with former Sara Lee CEO HSH Brenda Barnes and her daughter, Erin, touched and brought some tears to the MPW audience. Barnes had a major stroke in 2010, and Erin quit her job to help her mom recover. “The Rehabilitation of Brenda Barnes” is in the current issue of Fortune. Stay tuned here on Postcards for more on a video clip of our conversation at the Summit.

Summary: The Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit packed in famous names and exclusive interviews on Tuesday. IBM CEO Ginni Rometty, No. 1 on the 2012 Most Powerful Women list, did her first interview since taking the CEO job in January. Kraft Foods CEO Irene Rosenfeld talked strategy on the day she split her business into two…


Erin Robinson (left) and Joslyn Davis

By Joslyn Davis and Erin Robinson

02/13/2015 AT 12:10 PM EST

HOLY OMG Erin and I are really on

. This is really happening. What is my life? Those were my initial thoughts after watching episode one of

season 28. I'll happily admit that I'm openly biased because I think this cast is exceptional in every way possible, but putting all of that aside, as someone who's also watched almost every single season of the race, I think this first episode is easily the most laugh-out-loud funny episode I've ever seen!

Right out of the gate, this season is breaking new ground because it's packed with so many "firsts" that hardcore fans of the show are going to be blown away by. The first time the entire cast started racing from their homes all throughout the country. The first time any portion of the show has been live. And, most importantly, the first time EVER in TV history, a show has featured a fully digital influencer cast – cast that is packed with people who also happen to be diehard fans of

From the moment we got the clue from

at Erin's house, it was a full-blown sprint to Mexico City's Monumento a la Revolución. People were falling, bodies were flying, and I'm pretty sure that within the first five seconds I hit Erin in the face; pretty basic race stuff. It was total and complete mayhem at that first clue box as we chose our first Detour. Selecting the Mariachi option was pretty much a no-brainer because it sounded so cool. And guess what? It was. After running two miles through Mexico City, we arrived in Plaza Giribaldi to what was truly an out-of-body experience you could only have on the

When else is a person engulfed in a circle formation of 300 playing mariachis? Never. Erin and I were so up in these beautiful people's personal space, I swear I think I made out with one of them! #NoRegrets

After quickly finding our mariachi we hopped in a cab to head out to the pyramids where we realized we were at the top of the pack in 3rd place! In that first leg you're really just trying to figure out what the heck is going on, how the race works, and asking yourself (if you're me) why you packed so much and quickly you can throw stuff away. After slumberpartyingitup outside on a patio with the all the racers, we got up at the crack of dawn for the infamous cave challenge! It was so wild to finally see what went down in those caves because I couldn't see Erin's road block. I was just up on flat land having a personal dance party with myself. I'm so proud of her and the fact that she never gave up! And also, I cannot believe we survived the most sketchy cab ride of all time trying to get the pit stop.That cab ride almost cost us the whole race. The driver literally pulled over the freeway. WHO DOES THAT? Regardless, running to that mat, seeing Phil and having him tell us we were still in it was the best moment ever and I can't wait to see the next episode!

Nothing in the world could have prepared us for leg one on season 28 of

Joslyn and I jumped off of bridges in costumes, took tight rope walking classes, and learned how to shoot a bow and arrow better than Katniss in the

, and it still wasn't enough. As soon as we arrived in Mexico, our preparation went out the window and adrenaline took over!

Joslyn and I jumped into the first cab that we could find. "Â¡Rapido!" is the only word I know in Spanish, and I must have nailed it (along with Joslyn speaking fluent Spanish) because we went from zero to 90 MPH in matter of seconds. Our cab driver revealed to us that he too was in a race, competing with all of the other racers' cabs to get us to the Monumento a la Revolución first. By the end, our word of choice was "Â¡Cuidado!" We were third to the clue box, and all I could think about was how this was crazier than all of the 5 a.m. Black Friday sales I've ever been to, combined...and I got punched over a television once.

Joslyn and I chose the Mariachi Madness Detour. Luckily, some helpful Clevver fans gave us directions along the way. Little did we know, we were signing up for a two-and-a-half mile sprint! After sitting on a plane for hours, my legs did not want to cooperate! Thankfully, though, this detour made every HEAVY step worth it. There was something truly magical about 300 mariachi men and women giving you the live performance of a lifetime at 1 a.m., but we should have rethought the 25-lbs. backpacks.

: After a freezing, FORTY FIVE minute "sleep" we're back to the race! I volunteered as tribute to "pick up the pieces" and, before I knew it, I was going underground into dark caves where we had to dig for puzzle pieces. I'm claustrophobic. I'm terrified. I'm sweating. And I may or may not have comforted myself with the idea that maybe I'd find Batman in there. Things took a turn for the worst. I was missing a puzzle piece to my white mask and other racers told me that the blue mask wouldn't get approved.

Don't listen to other racers. After searching for my missing white piece for entirely too long, Sheri [LaBrant] and I gave it one last shot, and I decided to try the blue set. And hallelujah it was freaking approved!

I'm convinced our cab driver to the pit stop was loco. At one point on the freeway he actually pulled over off the side of the road to let cars PASS him. Joslyn and I knew that this could put us behind other teams that we had passed, and it did. Sheri and Cole [LaBrant] actually beat us there! Thank God we didn't take that penalty!

Leg one is the hardest leg to get through. You really need it to emotionally and physically get your bearings in this strange "Amazing Race" bubble you exist in. Luckily for Joslyn and I, we experienced both highs and lows in episode one and I conquered one of my biggest fears, which means we're warmed up and more than ready to take on our next challenge! Batman would be proud!

airs Fridays (8 p.m. ET) on CBS.

Summary: The social media personalities share the wildest moments from the premiere


On Tuesday, the ACLU of Ohio released aÂ timelineÂ tracing the declineÂ of the country's first privately- owned prison. Ohio Governor John Kasich first proposed privatizing prisons in March of 2011Â as a way to climb out of an $8 billion budget deficit. The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction boastedÂ $3 million in savings "for Ohio taxpayers compared to similar state facilities."Â Â However, since being purchased for $72.7 million from the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the largest private prison corporation in the United States,Â the prison has racked up countless violations.

In anÂ auditÂ last October, the CCA was slapped with 47 violations including having smaller-than-state standard housing units: "all housing units prove less than the requirement of 25 feet of unencumbered space per occupant." Â Later that same year, the CCA failed yet another inspection. And now, according toÂ Think Progress, the CCA's Lake Erie prison "is reportedly overcrowded atÂ 130% capacity, with single-person cells holding 3 inmates each, according to internal documents obtained by the ACLU." Â Since the U.S. leads the world in incarcerations withÂ 2.2 million Americans behind bars, it is no surprise that state budgets are being overwhelmed by prison costs. But instead of trying to legislate prison reform, Gov. Kasich decided to delegate responsibility to private systems that have an incentive to find ways to keep profits up.

The CCA is not shy about its goals, stating in the company's 2010 Annual Report: "We believe we have been successful in increasing the number of residents in our care and continue to pursue a number of initiatives intended to further increase our occupancy and revenue."

The ACLU's report on the failings of CCA's Lake Erie Prison highlights the need for an overhaul in the prison system, not privatization of it. And there are ways. Last month, Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky, a Republican, and Patrick Leahy of Vermont, a Democrat, introduced theÂ Justice Safety Valve Act, a bill that would begin to alleviate the problem of overcrowded prisons by altering mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent drug offenses.


What Harvard’s calendar may tell us about Facebook’s IPO.

Conventional wisdom is that Facebook will file for its IPO within the next few months. But, if so, someone should tell Sheryl Sandberg.

Sandberg is the social network’s chief operating officer, and its second-most powerful executive after Mark Zuckerberg. She also was just announced as the keynote speaker at Harvard Business School’s Class Day, which takes place on May 23.

It would be highly unusual for Sandberg to give a public speech after her company has filed to go public, due to a variety of SEC-mandated quiet period restrictions. In theory, she could do so without mentioning anything about Facebook, but then why would HBS students want to hear from her? And we’re not just talking restrictions on material items like revenue growth or earnings. Even certain qualitative assessments could run afoul of the quiet period police.

Earlier this week, there was speculation about an imminent Facebook IPO filing due to some changes to the ways in which its stock is being traded on secondary markets. CNBC reporter Kayla Tausche threw cold water on the rumor, writing:

The company’s COO Sheryl Sandberg is scheduled to speak in Davos on Sunday, which makes it highly unlikely that Facebook will file before then.

Well, now we have Sandberg scheduled to speak on May 23. It’s certainly possible that Facebook will file beforehand, and that Sandberg and HBS will figure out a way to make it all work out. But since all of us are just scavenging for breadcrumbs here, this particular announcement seemed to be worth mentioning…

Sign up for my daily email newsletter on deals and deal-makers: GetTermSheet.com

Summary: What Harvard's calendar may tell us about Facebook's IPO. Conventional wisdom is that Facebook will file for its IPO within the next few months. But, if so, someone should tell Sheryl Sandberg. Sandberg is the social network's chief operating officer, and its second-most powerful executive after Mark Zuckerberg. She also was just announced as the…


WATERTOWN — Director Bridget Kathleen O’Leary hesitantly demonstrates a colorful shadow puppet — a mole digging its way through bits of golden dust — that is part of the storytelling in “Blackberry Winter.”

“I’m not really a puppet person,” she says during a rehearsal break for the play, which is being presented at New Repertory Theatre as part of the National New Play Network’s rolling world premiere. “But when I read ‘Blackberry Winter,’ I found playwright Steve Yockey’s blend of the everyday with magical elements fascinating and was eager to make it work.”

In the play, which takes its title from the Southern and Midwestern term for a cold snap that occurs in late spring, a woman named Vivienne is coming to terms with her mother’s descent into Alzheimer’s disease. As she struggles to get a handle on how to stay in control of a situation for which she is unprepared, Vivienne escapes from the pressure by imagining a fable, acted out onstage with the help of shadow puppets.

“I think what I love about Yockey’s writing is that he challenges us to look at things differently,” says O’Leary. “Alzheimer’s disease is the red herring. The play is really about care-giving and learning to allow the space for things to change.”

On New Rep’s rehearsal stage, actress Adrianne Krstansky, who plays Vivienne, moves around an area punctuated by pedestals, each holding one ordinary household object. As she selects an item — a red marker, an iron, a trowel — and builds a story around it, these ordinary objects provide a kind of comfort and reassurance, Krstansky says.

“Vivienne is very meticulous,” says Krstansky. “She likes the precision of tasks like baking, of knowing the role each ingredient must play to make a successful cake.”

In fact, she says, “Each object feels like an idea. They become the motor that moves the story forward.”

But when the facts and details start to overwhelm her, Vivienne develops her “origin myth” to try to understand what’s happening.

“I think this myth becomes the heart and soul of the story,” says O’Leary. “It allows her to say things that she can’t say in her practical, responsible world.”

In Vivienne’s tale, two narrators recount the story of a White Egret (Paula Langton) who tries to preserve the memories of all the animals in the forest by burying them in a box in the ground, while a Gray Mole (Ken Cheeseman), digging as he always does, releases the memories so they are lost. As the narrators speak, the movement of the animals is represented by colorful overhead-projector shadow puppets.

O’Leary and her production team spent time at the Puppet Showplace Theater in Brookline to learn about different styles of puppetry, finally choosing this style to illustrate Vivienne’s tale. O’Leary says the script doesn’t specify if the action should be portrayed by puppets or animation, but she felt the mechanics needed to be seen.

“The puppeteers and the actors are in the scene together,” she says. “It’s important that they listen to each other, even if they don’t exactly interact. It’s been a great opportunity to stretch myself as a director and learn how to integrate these puppets into Vivienne’s storytelling.”

While Krstansky dominates the stage, she says the other main character is the audience.

“They are my scene partners,” she says. “Part of my job is to engage them in this world I am living and creating it. There’s a wonderful vulnerability Vivienne lets us see when she shares this myth,” says Krstansky.

“I think the transitions from Vivienne and her realistic, everyday objects to the magical forest setting allow her a moment to breathe,” says O’Leary. “It allows her to admit that it’s OK to have this be about herself. It’s OK to breathe.”

At New Repertory Theatre, Watertown, through April 17. Tickets $40-$55. 617-923-8487, www.newrep.org.

Summary: In New Repertory Theatre’s “Blackberry Winter,” a woman grapples with her mother’s descent into Alzheimer’s disease and escapes from the pressure by imagining a fable.


There was a lot on the program at the New York Live Arts gala the other night at the Museum of Jewish Heritage.

Dinner was completely vegetarian—a few pieces of vegetable sushi and some Greek lasagna with artichokes, eggplant and chickpeas—of which someone at our table managed, very impressively, to eat only the artichokes, eggplant and chickpeas, leaving behind every single piece of pasta.

The evening itself, however, was a veritable pu pu platter of speeches and performances.

In the end, it was maybe a lot to take in, but for all intents and purposes the fundraiser, hosted by actor Hugh Dancy (whose wife, Claire Danes, is starring in the play “Dry Powder” at the Public Theater) offered a real window into the goals and programming of this performing-arts center on West 19th Street for guests including actor Delroy Lindo and gala co-chairs Sarah Arison, Slobodan Randjelovic and Jon Stryker.

The organization bestowed a lifetime achievement award on Dora Amelan, the Paris-based mother-in-law of New York Live Arts Artistic Director Bill T. Jones. Mr. Jones has created a dance piece about Ms. Amelan entitled “Analogy/Dora: Tramontane,” of which an extended, intimate and floor-shaking excerpt was performed between the vegetable sushi and the Greek lasagna.

Other performances included work by choreographer Sonya Tayeh and a song by Mx. Justin Vivian Bond, who “was born a Christian white boy in Maryland and I’m still one of those things.”

“My mantra is ‘Keep it pretty, keep it shallow, keep it moving,’” said Mx. Bond, who will be involved in the next Live Ideas festival at Live Arts. “Perhaps that’s why they picked me.”

Also on the docket: a comic speech by playwright and actress Sarah Jones, perhaps best recognized for her one-woman theater piece “Bridge and Tunnel.”

“There’s no relations, as far as we know,” said Ms. Jones of her friend Mr. Jones. This was done in a British accent in homage to Mr. Dancy, who was her tablemate at the party.

“I do speak the Queen’s English,” she said, “since I am from Queens.”

Ms. Jones, who is at work on a new multicharacter, one-woman show called “Sell/Buy/Date,” played an elderly donor, a homeless woman and an overambitious millennial to show her veritable appreciation for Mr. Jones and the work he has done for New York Live Arts, which was founded in 2011.

Writer Lawrence Wechsler was given the “Live Ideas Award,” in recognition of his work curating the first two Live Ideas Festivals at New York Live Arts. Meanwhile, Okwui Okpokwasii, another performer and choreographer who currently holds the institution’s two-year residency for midcareer artists, spoke about how important the organization has been to the gestation of new content.

“They look hard for a bit of soil until what emerges is an improbable and wild thing,” Ms. Okpokwasii said. “They break ground and I plant the seed.”

A particularly hot ticket auction item was a meal with Mr. Dancy and Ms. Danes. “Thank you for buying me dinner,” Mr. Dancy told the crowd after that lot sold.

Also, naturally, “Hamilton” tickets, which are clearly one of the hotter items on the charity circuit at the moment and giving “Saturday Night Live” seats a run for their money. Two pairs of house seats went for $6,000 each.

Write to Marshall Heyman at marshall.heyman@wsj.com

Summary: At the New York Live Arts gala, a busy program.


If you go to a startup conference these days, you can’t even get in the door without a pitch that has the word “disrupt” leading the way like a ship’s prow slicing through an uninviting ocean. You can’t simply have invented a better way of drying your hair or collecting your laundry—you need to disrup t the hair-drying industry and the laundry industry.

I’m sorry, but can I disrupt the buzzword industry for a moment? This word suggests that, in the increasingly frantic daily routine of the modern consumer, what he really...

If you go to a startup conference these days, you can’t even get in the door without a pitch that has the word “disrupt” leading the way like a ship’s prow slicing through an uninviting ocean. You can’t simply have invented a better way of drying your hair or collecting your laundry—you need to disrup t the hair-drying industry and the laundry industry.

I’m sorry, but can I disrupt the buzzword industry for a moment? This word suggests that, in the increasingly frantic daily routine of the modern consumer, what he really yearns for is a new product that will explode in his life like a small hand grenade. “Disrupt” and “disruptive” and “disruption” don’t have a positive connotation—or at least they didn’t before some pitchman disrupted their meaning.

If someone shows up when I’m halfway through my lasagna and starts pounding the table because there is something I need to take care of immediately, I don’t think “Oh, good, my dinner has been disrupted.” And it is no better if it is my phone doing the disrupting with flashing and buzzing notifications for a hundred different apps.

What I really want is something that unifies and simplifies the many threads of my life.

As the number of data sources and services increases, and the volume of data from each service rises as well, my life is transitioning from heavily overloaded to catastrophically overloaded. I need something that will cost me fewer button clicks, fewer wasted thought cycles, fewer trips to different digital services before I’m able to see the entire picture. I need products that will release me from the tedium of management—from the chore of being my own file clerk. I need products that help me pull it together and make sense of it all, not ones that wreck the familiar. Because, at the present rate, it won’t be long before the daily administrative overhead is so high that there won’t be time for anything else.

And this applies as much to product design as to what the product does: I don’t need my life disrupted by the struggle of learning how to use a new app, either. You know you’ve encountered bad design in the physical world when you see a fat instruction manual telling you how to do something. The digital world is similar: I want an interface I can understand right away, with no explanation whatsoever—that fits under my fingers as though it has always been there.

With disruption thundering all around, I don’t need more of it. How about some technological peace and quiet? Simplify, please.

Mr. Gelernter is the CEO of the tech startup Dittach.

Summary: Daniel Gelernter writes that tech ideas now must promise to “disrupt” entire industries. I’ll take a pass, he says, of the buzzword. How about a new idea that “unifies and simplifies the many threads of my life.”


Lester Cohen/Getty Images for Shutterfly

04/26/2016 AT 12:30 PM EDT

following her split from Will Kopelman, but she's found happiness in her own resilience.

"Just strength. Now that I'm a mom, and I know that it harkens back to the girls, aside from that, it really is 'girl power,' 'badass,' " the actress told PEOPLE of what keeps her happy at her Mother's Day Event hosted with Shutterfly and the Children's Hospital Los Angeles at Estrella on Monday. "It is 'strength,' 'clarity,' 'conviction,' 'health,' 'focus.' "

Barrymore and husband Will Kopelman announced their plans to divorce earlier this month. The couple

, Olive, 3, and Frankie, 2, and were married for almost four years.

"It's funny, because there are times in my life that I am so loosey-goosey, so hedonistic, and it is so just 'hippy-dippy,' but right now I feel this great backbone is 'One foot in front of the other,' which is sort of my attitude right now," she explained on Monday. "That is anything but loosey-goosey – that if you don't stay in a straight line, you are going to get into trouble."

Despite Barrymore's recent breakup, a source

, the actress is still "optimistic for the future."

"She's a romantic at heart," said the source, who is close to the actress. "Everyone who knows her knows that is who she is and who she's always been, and that doesn't change."

Summary: Drew Barrymore and husband Will Kopelman announced their plans to divorce earlier this month


Corporate issuance has been running hot, and Alibaba came to market Thursday with a massive $8 billion deal amid reports it was five times oversubscribed.

Corporate investment grade issuance is already more than $90 billion for the month to date, and this week's activity pushed 2014 issuance to a record $1.039 trillion so far, surpassing 2013's total of $1.036 trillion, according to Thomson Reuters IFR. Besides Alibaba's issuance, there was a $2 billion Johnson & Johnson deal; $2 billion from Dominion Resources; and $1 billion from Albemarle, according to IFR.

Alibaba offered a 5-year bond, to yield 0.95 percentage points more than comparable Treasurys.

"One $8 billion deal is not just an $8 billion deal. It has a series of flows behind that that could generate multiples of $8 billion in related hedgings, swaps, etc," said David Ader, chief Treasury strategist at CRT Capital. Investors hedging the Alibaba or other corporate deals, for instance, might sell Treasurys ahead of the deal and then buy them back after it.

"I frankly think the way the market is trading, we're going to improve. We're going to see some lower yields. If we can hold on in the face of this type of stuff. I think the market is making a statement," Ader said. Stronger U.S. data are typically a negative for the bond market, resulting in selling and higher yields.

Watch More: Debate it! Alibaba vs. Apple

Ader pointed to dollar-yen, trading above 118.80 on Thursday. He said weak currency and low yields in Japan may be one factor sending investors to the U.S. market. European PMIs also weighed on markets there but sent buyers into U.S. bonds.

The Philadelphia Fed business index was a shocking 40.8, versus an expected 18 and October's 20.7. The consumer price index was flat, dragged down by energy costs, but better than the 0.1 percent decline that was expected.

Read More Business activity at highest since December 1993: Philly Fed

Existing home sales rose 1.5 percent, the briskest pace this year for an annual rate of 5.26 million. It was the first month in 2014 when sales improved over year-earlier levels, up 2.5 percent.

Yields moved slightly higher after the CPI report, but selling didn't last. The 10-year yield ranged between 2.30 and 2.35 on Thursday.

U.S. yields moved slightly higher but less than might normally be expected. The 10-year yield does not look to be breaking out of a 17-session range. The 10-year closing yield has ranged between 2.30 and 2.38 percent in that time.

The 10-year was sought as a safe haven earlier in the day when European PMIs came in weaker than expected. The German bund, correlated to the Treasury yield, also saw its yield move lower, but the positive U.S. data were not promptly reflected in bunds and the spread between the two widened by 4 basis points.

Summary: Despite strong economic data on housing sales and from the Philadelphia Fed, the bond market remained largely nonchalant. Blame Alibaba.


First of all, let us say that we stand by any and all studies which suggest that chocolate is even marginally good for you and thus, we support indulging your cravings pretty much whenever. But, if you’re trying to get your fix without all those calories and sugar, then you might be in luck.

Calorie-free chocolate “Cravings” are edible strips that you place on your tongue for chocolate flavor. Remember those Listerine breath strips that were all the rage 10 years ago? Yeah, it’s the same idea. No sugar, no calories — just milk chocolate flavor dissolving on your tongue.

Creator Ian Goldfarb launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise money for the project but fell short of his funding goal. His next plan is to seek an equity investor or a bank loan so he can make Cravings a reality. He seems to believe pretty strongly that zero-calorie chocolate could really take off.

“It’s a chocoholic’s dream,” Goldfarb told the New York Daily News.

Is it really, though? Could this really satisfy your chocolate craving like a good old fashioned Hershey’s bar? Probably not, but it could be a good alternative for people who have self-control.

Summary: It would work just like those Listerine breath strips


Iconic pop artist Peter Max has been the target of several assassination plots by his much younger wife, who is in an emotionally unstable, suicidal panic about losing her meal ticket, new court papers charge.

The papers filed in Manhattan Supreme Court came to light Wednesday — the day before the artist’s temporary guardian Diana Krausz is due in Manhattan Family Court Thursday to argue for an order of protection for her 77-year-old client against his wife, Mary, 48.

POP ARTIST PETER MAX ALLOWED TO RETURN HOME WITH HIS WIFE, JUDGE RULES IN GUARDIANSHIP BATTLE

The new court papers allege that for the last few years, Mary Max has been browbeating her husband, who struggles with dementia, to give her as much as $1500 a day in cash which she uses to buy lavish jewels, and that he’s deeply in debt as a result.

The filings say Max has depleted his own savings, checking and business accounts — and tapped a rich elderly cousin — to satisfy her demands, giving her more than $15 million and racking up more than $6 million in debts.

They also say the artist's son, Adam Max, has given the Manhattan District Attorney's office a tape of his stepmother trying to hire a hit man to mutilate his father's hand and to kill a depressed friend in Riverside Park where, he says, Mary Max has left his father sitting alone on a park bench in the dark.

PETER MAX HIT WITH $1M LAWSUIT OVER COMMISSION ON SALE OF ARTWORK

Adam Max told investigators earlier this year that Mary has physically abused his father, giving him a head gash that required stitches and a black eye, and "poisoning" him with laxatives as recently as August.

After investigating, prosecutors challenged parts of Adam's story. Adam Max complained to his lawyer that the lead prosecutor seemed to be "dismissive" of his alarm, even though she promised to keep the investigation open.

The court papers are part of a case that Krausz has been making — mostly in private sessions with judges — arguing that Max needs to be protected from his wife.

"What these people have done is insinuate themselves into Mary and Peter's life without legal authority. They're married. They've been married 18 years. He has the right to give his wife whatever the hell she wants. I don't care if she spends it on tulips! It's none of their damn business," Wolf said.

CHECK OUT OUR NEW APP: GET THE DAILY NEWS ON ANDROID OR IOS

Wolf said Krausz has no authority to go to court claiming to be the artist's court appointed guardian because the appointment was rescinded. And even though the Appellate Division stayed that decision, Wolf says, Krausz still can't act because the court never defined her powers.

Krausz portrays the marriage as a rocky one where both sides were consulting with divorce attorneys several years ago. Wolf maintains they were only amending their post nuptial agreement as wealthy couples often do.

Summary: Peter Max has been the target of several assassination plots by his younger wife, new court papers charge.


Confirming the presence of polio in a city with even one infected person is not impossible, said Dr. Mark D. Sobsey, a professor of environmental microbiology at the University of North Carolina. The stool of an infected person contains so many viral particles that tests at a sewage treatment plant can reveal it. Such tests helped track outbreaks in the Gaza Strip and Haiti in recent years.

Since many Amish use outhouses, however, state officials geared up to go door to door. They unearthed a public health form explaining how to collect stool samples. The form had pictures of a flush toilet and a garbage can with a plastic liner -- things foreign to many Amish communities. Officials changed the form.

Gary Wax, an epidemiologist for the Minnesota Department of Health, contacted the leader of the Amish community where the child lives and asked for his permission to seek stool samples from those in his community. The leader gave his blessing, Mr. Wax said.

"We really tried to do it in a respectful way rather than just barge right in there," Mr. Wax said.

Since the Amish have no phones, he could not call for appointments. He and his colleagues knocked on doors. They had been warned against speaking directly to Amish women without their husbands present, Mr. Wax said, and the men were "running all over the place, helping each other with harvesting and construction." So if the man was not at home, they left.

"We came back many times to some places," Mr. Wax said. After weeks of effort, just 5 of 24 families in the community agreed to cooperate. Three of the five, including the family of the 8-month-old, proved to have infected children.

"I would be surprised if we don't get a paralytic case someplace," Dr. Hull said.

In a neighboring community, a 38-year-old farmer who is also a sawyer agreed to speak with a reporter only if his name would not be used, saying Amish people avoided calling attention to themselves.

The farmer, who has seven children, explained that nothing in Amish law forbade vaccinations, but that many Amish believed that vaccines weakened the immune system. He added that as a result of the infections, he planned to have his children vaccinated against polio, measles, mumps and rubella, and that most of the families in his community were doing the same. "We'll get vaccinated if we feel it's necessary," he said. "But our definition of necessary may be very different from yours."

A further challenge for public health officials is that their surveillance efforts cannot be confined to a few remote farming communities.

"My mental image of the Amish was that they don't travel at all because they don't drive cars," Dr. Hull said. "That's not true."

The Amish commonly take buses and trains, and occasionally even planes. Families from the baby girl's community recently attended a wedding in Ontario, Canada, that health officials said drew more than 1,000 guests. Some have visited Wisconsin in recent weeks.

Polio experts have long feared that an immune-deficient person could cause an outbreak of paralytic polio. That is a particular hazard in poorer countries.

In much of the developing world, children are given an oral vaccine made of a live, nonparalytic polio virus. Two drops confer partial immunity, making mass vaccination campaigns achievable in poor countries. To become fully immunized, a child must be vaccinated several times. The vaccine causes an infection that usually lasts a few weeks. The infection can spread to others and immunize them, too.

But if the virus spreads too far among previously unvaccinated people, its genes will change and the virus will regain its ability to cripple and kill. Such a virus caused an outbreak of paralytic polio in Haiti and the Dominican Republic in 2000 and 2001, crippling 21. (The outbreaks in Africa and Asia began after many Nigerians refused vaccinations in 2003, suspecting they were a Western plot to sterilize Muslim girls.)

The United States and much of the developed world used live-virus vaccinations for decades, but switched in recent years to a dead virus that is injected. The dead virus does not cause an infection or paralysis.

In people with poor immune systems like the 8-month-old Amish child, the live polio vaccine can change to a paralytic form without being passed to anyone else, since such people can nurse a mutating virus for years.

In most of the world, such patients die quickly because of poor medical care. In the West, they can live for years, with a few of them shedding polio viruses all the while. Among experts, these patients are called "chronic excreters." That such a polio wellspring would be born among a largely unvaccinated population like the Amish, Dr. Hull said, was a "random unlucky event."

"It's a model of what might happen if we stop vaccinating too soon," he said.

The Amish girl remains hospitalized in strict isolation. Health officials will not say where. And they are still trying to figure out where she contracted the virus.

Genetic testing showed that the virus was almost identical to that of the oral polio vaccine given in much of the rest of the world but not in the United States. The slight changes to the virus from that of the vaccine suggested that it had been circulating for at least two years. The girl has never traveled abroad.

A fear is that such a person could unwittingly incubate a polio infection for a decade or more and then accidentally reintroduce it -- years after experts have declared it eliminated from the world and vaccinations have stopped.

That prospect has long seemed remote, because such children are so rare, Dr. Aylward of the World Health Organization said. But an outbreak of paralytic disease in Minnesota would prove that it was more likely than many had believed, and it would demonstrate that work now under way to better understand the risks posed by chronic excreters would have to be intensified.

"Or we may need to revisit the strategy and time frame for stopping the use of the oral polio vaccine," Dr. Aylward said. "It's a tiny chance, but it's something we need to keep an eye on."

Summary: Five children in Amish communities in Minnesota are found to have polio, disease that was pronounced dead in Western Hemisphere years ago; how polio came to dairy farming community of 24 families, with 19th-century ways that include deep-rooted suspicion of vaccination, is medical whodunit and cautionary tale; eradicating polio may prove far harder than anyone thought, even in developed world; vaccination rates in United States are at historic highs, but increasing number of parents are resisting inoculations for their children, fearing they may cause disorders; scientists have almost universally discounted that possibility; Amish law does not forbid vaccination, but many Amish believe vaccines weaken immune system; description of how disease was discovered in first Amish child; photos (M)


Well, it’s official. Girl Scouts has gone Hollywood — in the best way possible. During the Oscars Sunday night, host Chris Rock, in a show of support for his two daughters — who are both Girl Scouts — asked the Hollywood elite in attendance to dig deep in their tuxedoed pockets and bejeweled evening clutches, and purchase some Girl Scout cookies. As a perfect coda to the end of what was National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend, a Girl Scout troop from the Los Angeles area then emerged from the stage and filtered out into the audience, where attendees waved cash in the air for the nearest Girl Scout to sell them our iconic cookies.

While this made for a truly entertaining, engaging and heartwarming moment during a very prestigious and high-profile event, we are honored that a celebrity of Chris Rock’s stature — and the Academy Awards’ producers – demonstrated their profound goodwill by supporting our girls and the Cookie Program. This star-studded platform served as a compelling reminder to a captive viewing public of just what our Girl Scout Cookies represent. Each celebrity that purchased Girl Scout Cookies Sunday night was not just scoring a much-needed snack, they were actually investing in a girl’s future, as well as their respective communities. The stakes for the future vibrancy and evolution of our nation are too great to neglect investment in one of our most promising resources: young girls.

See also: Chris Rock Sold $65,000 Worth of Girl Scout Cookies at the Oscars

In fact, 100%of the net revenue raised through Girl Scout Cookie sales stays within local councils, where girls decide how to spend their troop cookie money, often funding projects that impact their communities. In a powerful demonstration of this point, the Girl Scout troop featured during Sundays Oscars ceremony used their funds from the evening’s earnings for a school-supply drive for foster kids in need, as well as the chance to expand their horizons through participation in fun activities like a painting class and educational field trips.

I believe the most significant and impactful effect of the Girl Scouts program is often hidden under the radar: that is, for years, the cookie program has served as the springboard for some of our nation’s most accomplished women in business and beyond. You may not realize it, but when you buy a box of Girl Scout cookies, you are participating in the largest youth entrepreneurial program in the world — a program that teaches girls elemental business acumen and interpersonal skills that will serve them throughout their lives. Specifically, girls learn the intricacies of goal setting, decision making, money management, people skills, and business ethics — all vital tools for leadership in an increasingly competitive global economy.

So, in light of the tremendous spotlight, generous reception and groundswell of awareness, Girl Scouts would like to offer our sincerest thanks to Chris Rock, the Academy and all the celebrities who supported us Sunday last night by purchasing our cookies. Not only was our organization granted a once-in-a-lifetime chance to be a part of history, we were presented with an opportunity to express something far more substantive: reinforcing the narrative of a beloved American tradition empowering the next generation of CEOs, educators, STEM trailblazers, mothers and leaders to revolutionize our world.

Anna Maria Chavez is the CEO of Girl Scouts.

Summary: And the Hollywood elite who donated


Richard Sarkis and David Kinsley were juniors at Williams College, surfing the net for a cheap source for their economics textbook, when they discovered a little known economic fact: the very same college textbooks used in the United States sell for half price -- or less -- in England.

Just like prescription drugs, textbooks cost far less overseas than they do in the United States. The publishing industry defends its pricing policies, saying that foreign sales would be impossible if book prices were not pegged to local market conditions.

But many Americans do not see it that way. The National Association of College Stores has written to all the leading publishers asking them to end a practice they see as an unfair to American students.

''We think it's frightening, and it's wrong, that the same American textbooks our stores buy here for $100 can be shipped in from some other country for $50,'' said Laura Nakoneczny, a spokeswoman for the association. ''It represents price-gouging of the American public generally and college students in particular.''

But thanks to the Internet, more and more individual students and college bookstores are starting to order textbooks from abroad -- and a few entrepreneurs, including Mr. Sarkis and his friends, have begun what are essentially arbitrage businesses to exploit the price differentials.

''We couldn't understand why what costs $120 here should cost $50-something there,'' said Mr. Sarkis, who, with Mr. Kinsley and another classmate, has spent three years building a Web-based company, BookCentral.com, selling textbooks from abroad to students in the United States. ''It seemed so sleazy of the publishers. We were sure that college students would be shocked and outraged if they knew about the foreign prices. But it's been this big secret.''

That is changing, though. To the despair of the textbook publishers who are still trying to block such sales, the reimporting of American texts from overseas has become far easier in recent years, thanks both to Internet sites that offer instant access to foreign book prices, and to a 1998 Supreme Court ruling that federal copyright law does not protect American manufacturers from having the products they arranged to sell overseas at a discount shipped back for sale in the United States.

Before the Supreme Court decision, Americans could not take advantage of the discounts abroad without violating the copyright law.

Now, however, ''gray market'' sales are taking off on campuses.

At one prestigious university, a sophomore imported 30 biology books from England this fall and sold them outside his classroom for less than the campus-bookstore price, netting a $1,200 profit. Next semester, if all goes well, he plans to expand the operation.

''The only difference is that they say 'international edition' in little print on the cover,'' said the student, who added that he was not certain whether his project raised any legal issues, and therefore asked that neither he nor his college be identified.

At other colleges, Asian students have banded together to take advantage of textbook prices in Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia, which are even lower than those in Europe.

Many students, individually, have begun to compare the textbook prices posted on American sites like Amazon.com, with the lower prices for the same books on foreign sites like Amazon.co.uk.

The differences are often significant: ''Lehninger Principles of Biochemistry, Third Edition,'' for example, lists for $146.15 on the American Amazon site, but can be had for $63.48, plus $8.05 shipping, from the British one. And ''Linear System Theory and Design, Third Edition'' is $110 in the United States, but $41.76, or $49.81 with shipping, in Britain.

Many college bookstores, meanwhile, have taken matters into their own hands, arranging their own overseas purchases.

''I buy from Amazon.co.uk and from sources in the Far East, and I knew more and more students were doing the same thing, individually,'' said Tom Frey, owner of the University Bookstore at Purdue University, who sells the new books from overseas at the same price as a used American book. ''Then this fall, for the first time, the Fed Ex man told me that the students at the Indian Association here at Purdue had just gotten a delivery of 14 skids of books, about 50 books each, from India. I think I'm losing about 10 percent of my sales to overseas books.''

Relations between textbook publishers and college booksellers have been seriously roiled by the issue.

''This has become a very hot issue since last year, when it just seemed to explode all of a sudden,'' said Ms. Nakoneczny, of the college store association. The association's letter to the publishers warned that the pricing structure might be an antitrust violation. ''The sale of identical books to foreign buyers at prices significantly lower than to domestic buyers, while publicly stating that domestic prices are due to high costs, could constitute an unfair or deceptive act,'' the letter said. While there is no longer protection in the federal copyright law for the pricing differentials, the major publishers are still trying to stop the reimporting of texts priced for foreign markets, mostly through contract language forbidding foreign wholesalers to sell to American distributors. Some have placed stickers on covers, saying ''International Edition RESTRICTED Not for Sale in North America'' or added the cover line ''International Student Edition.''


Silicon Valley loves vanity metrics, so lets add a new one to evaluate venture capital firms: mobile app downloads.

Mobile analytics company SensorTower recently released a report ranking the top 20 VC firms based on how many times people downloaded the apps created by their portfolio companies. And the winner is: Kleiner Perkins.

In all, Kleiner invested in 13 of the top 1,000 best performing apps in Apple’s App Store last year, racking a combined 81.3 million iOS downloads, according to SensorTower’s estimates. Its top three apps are Uber, Snapchat, and Spotify, though the firm has also invested in Airbnb, Houzz, Flipboard, Shopkick, and Jawbone (Up) among others.

In second place came Institutional Venture Partners, with an estimated 60.8 million total downloads from apps like Snapchat, Clash of Clans (Supercell), and Dropbox. Accel Partners, also an investor in Spotify, Clash of Clans, Dropbox, rounded out the top three with an estimated 52.8 million total downloads. Check out SensorTower’s blog for the full list.

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Of course, SensorTower’s report is only an estimate of app download numbers, and more importantly, they don’t reflect the app maker’s (or its investor’s) financial success. In fact, many of the most popular apps are free while executives try to figure out how to turn their money losing operations into profitable businesses.

Whatever the case, tech companies also spend a lot of time focusing on other metrics like monthly or daily active users instead of downloads. Last year, Snapchat co-founder and CEO Evan Spiegel revealed that the ephemeral messaging app had close to 100 million daily active users, a number that has now reportedly climbed to 150 million (more than Twitter). Uber and Spotify, on the other hand, look at slightly different metrics—active riders, and overall and paying users. Downloads, you can see, don’t really count for much.

Of course, this report only takes into consideration consumer-focused companies that have mobile apps and the venture capitalists that invested in them. Enterprise-focused companies, though not as sexy and often invisible to the average consumer, do frequently generate very sizable, if not bigger investment returns.

It’s also important to remember that evaluating investors is an imperfect science. Earlier this week, Fortune‘s Dan Primack wrote about a new project, Sunesis, he’s advising that aims to assess venture capitalists based on their returns to their own investors, known as limited partners.

“Venture capital is one of very few investment management industries without an accurate accounting of the best professionals,” he wrote, adding that many existing lists and rankings use too much qualitative data and not enough weight it put on actual financial returns.

So the lesson here? We might never truly find out which venture capital firm is truly the best.

Summary: Of course, this isn't the whole story.


White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest still won’t say the administration told no lies to sell the Iran nuclear deal — but the White House is doing its best to obscure that damning fact.

The story starts a month ago, when top Obama aide Ben Rhodes admitted he’d fed a false tale about the Iran negotiations to his media “echo chamber,” which then “validated” the fable.

That prompted FoxNews’ Kevin Corke to ask Earnest at the May 9 press briefing: Could he say no Obama official had lied to the public about the Iran negotiations?

“No, Kevin,” Earnest replied, before adding a storm of words to fuzz the issue — including the bizarre claim that “there is no evidence” anyone lied.

Weirder still: Earnest’s original two-word response — “No, Kevin” — was omitted from the official White House transcript.

Asked about that this week, Earnest said it was because his response was inaudible.

But it isn’t: You can clearly hear the words on the official White House video. Earnest might as well have said, Who you gonna believe, me or your lying ears?

To make it all more surreal, Earnest is now refusing to give a direct answer to the same question. He hems, haws and switches subjects; the closest he’ll come is to insist the administration made a “fact-based, accurate, truthful case” about how everyone benefits from the deal.

Read between his lies — er, lines, and it’s plain he’s pretty sure his colleagues did lie.

Which may make him the closest thing to an honest guy to be found on Team Obama.

Summary: White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest still won’t say the administration told no lies to sell the Iran nuclear deal — but the White House is doing its best to obscure that damning fact. The stor…


TMZ was flooded with emails and phone calls this morning tipping us off that

... but now we know they were all fooled by a PHENOMENAL impersonator.

A guy who looks just like Jack Sparrow tied the knot yesterday at the Ventura County Courthouse. It was a real marriage ... not a hoax.

The guy was a DEAD RINGER for Depp (

) ... even dressed just like him. Everyone thought he was really Johnny ... and lots of Depp fans took pics with him.

Let's hope the wedding video comes out better than the "

Summary: TMZ was flooded with emails and phone calls this morning tipping us off that Johnny Depp just married Amber Heard ... but now we know they were all…


Jon Feinstein, a co-curator at the Humble Arts Foundation, presents a series of landscape images he curated for TIME LightBox, examining the legacy of the New Topographics movement of the 1970s and how landscape photography can blossom into new and uncharted territories.

For nearly a decade, the Humble Arts Foundation has been dedicated to championing new ideas in photography, and creating opportunities for early career photographers to get their work in front of influential professionals. Throughout all this, a thread that’s run steadily through all our projects is an interest in how the proliferation of photography online since 2000 has allowed photographic genres to break down, mutate and evolve faster than ever before, both in the studio and the trenches of the world at large.

Selecting work for “Other Landscapes,” we apply this filter to contemporary landscape photography to examine how it, as a genre, can lean on unexpected traditions and practices. Many landscape photographers who have emerged over the past 20 years have been making work that is heavily influenced by New Topographics photographers of the 1970s like Stephen Shore, Lewis Baltz, Robert Adams and Bernd and Hilla Becher. The term, coined by curator William Jenkins who organized the pivotal 1975 exhibition of this work at The George Eastman House in Rochester, New York, reflected a rejection of the grand classical landscapes that proceeded them in exchange for a more realistic attention to the banal, sometimes industrial details that were replacing them.

Often large format, today’s disciples of the New Topographics tackle ideas ranging from how the eye travels through space to their ongoing challenges with an increasingly developing world and the general intersection of the natural and the synthetic. Like the Bechers, their work can be coldly typological, and at times it includes the industrial structures of strip mall culture, occasionally nodding in appreciation to the overlooked details the everyday. While there is no shortage of inspirational work in those who follow this tradition, and we continue to find it as moving as its predecessors, we’re curious about landscape photography’s next step. If Ansel Adams’ generation elevated the land, and Stephen Shore’s applied a banally realistic approach, what’s next? How the genre can blossom into new, uncharted territory, and how has it done so in the past 15 years? How can it build on these traditions but incorporate other influences as well? How can it look outside of photography and get more fluid? How has technology updated the conversation?

The work we selected here breaks from conventions in contemporary landscape photography by sharing equal influence in Shore, the Bechers, Robert Adams and Lewis Baltz with even some of the ideas raised with Robert Smithson’s 1970 landscape intervention, The Spiral Jetty. While many of the photographers included in this selection in some way reference the formal traditions of the New Topographics, each also inserts his or her hand into the process with varying interpretations of intervention. These 14 contemporary photography-based artists take both Smithson and the New Topographics’ approaches to new heights using performance, material intervention and digital manipulation to rethink how they view and experience the natural world. Whether it’s Daniel Gordon flying over classically majestic fields (without the aid of Photoshop), Richard Mosse using Infra Red film to give us new perspective on the war torn Congo, or Alejandra Laviada painting bright colors onto industrial structures she finds in the forest, these 15 photographers make us excited to look at landscapes again with ever expanding eyes.

The Humble Arts Foundation, co-created by Feinstein and Amani Olu, has worked with more than 2,000 artists, published two volumes of The Collectors Guide To New Art Photography, and produced over 40 online and brick and mortar exhibitions with galleries and organizations such as Phillips de Pury, the Magenta Foundation and Newspace Center for Photography.

Summary: These 14 photography-based artists take the New Topographics' approach to the next level


As the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter inches toward Air Force combat readiness later this year, the Pentagon will take the troubled combat jet on a 14-stop tour around the world in an effort to boost the F-35’s flagging brand image.

Speaking to the House Armed Services Tactical Air and Land Forces Subcommittee this week, Air Force Lt. Gen. Christopher Bogdan told legislators that the aircraft suffers from a “perception problem” and an “information gap.”

“The public perception and the reality are so different,” said Bogdan, the Pentagon’s F-35 program manager. “Getting out there and telling the story is part of what we need to continue to do.”

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is arguably the world’s most sophisticated fighter jet, laden with advanced sensors, the latest in airborne stealth capabilities, and eight million lines of computing code. With a program cost of $400 billion—and a projected lifetime cost of $1 trillion—it is easily the most expensive weapons system in history.

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It’s also years behind schedule, billions of dollars over budget, and the object of relentless scorn from the media, critics in Congress, and armchair generals alike. A slew of technical setbacks–ranging from engine fires to cracked fuselages to an emergency ejection system that might be just as deadly as a fiery plane crash–have created a long string of rapid-fire PR headaches for the Pentagon and Lockheed Martin lmt , the aircraft’s manufacturer.

Perhaps the toughest hurdle the Pentagon faces in rebranding the F-35 is that many of its biggest problems aren’t perception problems—they’re quite real. Originally slated to enter service in 2012, only the Marine Corps version has currently been declared combat-ready and even that initial operating capability has been called into question by critics. (The Air Force Plans to declare initial operating capability for its F-35 variant later this year.)

The delays and cost overruns stem from no single problem. The escape systems suffer problems that have barred pilots weighing less than 136 pounds from flying the jet. The aircraft’s $400,000 futuristic helmet has required intensive troubleshooting. An engine fire grounded the entire fleet in 2014, while cracks in the fuselage bulkheads, engine mounts, and turbine blades grounded F-35s the year before. Last year, a report surfaced indicating that the F-35 couldn’t compete with an F-16—one of the many U.S. military jets it is supposed to replace—in simulated aerial dogfights.

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More recently, Pentagon evaluators have cited major problems with the F-35’s software, both on the ground and aboard the aircraft. On the ground, maintenance software designed to diagnose problems can’t tell the difference between healthy parts and defective ones. In the air, a communication glitch between the F-35’s radar computer and its central computer cause the radar to switch off roughly every four hours of flight time, requiring pilots to reboot it.

Though the Pentagon claims these problems are all fixable, the litany of issues plaguing the F-35 over the years—and the high costs associated with them—hasn’t buoyed the F-35’s public image. But since 2010, the program has largely stabilized with production increasing (something like 170 jets have now been delivered to the U.S. and allies) and costs falling.

That’s the story the Pentagon wants to tell with its summer roadshow. As production ramps up and economies of scale begin to kick in, the price of procuring F-35 aircraft over the life of the program is down $7.5 billion in 2012 dollars, Bogdan revealed this week.

“We had real decreases in real costs this year,” Bogdan noted at a press briefing following his remarks to Congress. “For a program that has a tragic past, that is not a bad year.”

To highlight that not-bad year, F-35s will make appearances at more than a dozen public events starting at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona next week. Chicago and New York will both get to see F-35s on the wing. In July, the jet will make a much-anticipated debut at the Farnborough International Air Show and Royal International Air Tattoo, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious aerospace events.

The F-35’s Farnborough debut was originally slated for 2014, but its appearance was canceled when the entire fleet was grounded following that aforementioned engine fire. With rebranding top of mind, the Pentagon is hoping the F-35’s 2016 world tour will run a bit more smoothly.

Summary: How to fix a $400 billion image problem.


A historic new exhibit, Art from the Holocaust, opened in the rear wing of the German Historical Museum in Berlin last week. For the first time ever, art from the collection of Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Museum is being shown outside in Germany. The exhibit features 100 works, mostly drawings and paintings, by Jewish inmates of labour camps, ghettoes and concentration camps. Many of the works portray the dark realities of day-to-day life in Nazi imprisonment. The fact that the works survived to the present day is, in most cases, a miracle: many were hidden or smuggled out at great risk by friends of the artists.

The show, which is timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Germany and Israel, comes at a moment of growing concern about the rise in anti-Semitism across Europe. As Angela Merkel opened the exhibit on Monday, she told reporters that she hoped the exhibit would send a message to new arrivals to Germany from countries “where hatred of Israel and Jews is widespread”.

But the works are also, regardless of their current political context, deeply moving testaments to human resilience and the power of art, and, as Walter Smerling, the show’s co-curator with Eliad Moreh-Rosenberg points out, aesthetically powerful works on their own terms. The curators winnowed down the selection from a shortlist of several hundred. “We selected works according to artistic considerations, and chose works that provoked us and made us wonder what story was behind the image,” says Smerling, who is also the head of the Foundation of Art and Culture. We asked him to explain the stories behind some of their selections.

Summary: A new exhibition in Berlin explores the grim realities of life for Jews in Nazi camps and ghettoes. Thomas Rogers meets one of its curators.


06/23/2016 AT 01:15 PM EDT

More than a year after her

is thanking the women in her life who comforted her through her darkest days – and once again calling for other women to lean in and support one another.

The 46-year-old widowed mother of two sat down with

in an interview that aired Thursday, crediting Facebook's Lori Goler and Huffington Post co-founder

for being strong influences in her life.

Huffington "has been for a very long time a source of great career advice for me, but also a personal shoulder to cry on, which I needed,"

Sandberg added that she had to "dig deep" to emotionally

of husband Dave Goldberg – a successful Silicon Valley entrepreneur and CEO of SurveyMonkey who died at the age of 47 of

on May 1, 2015, in Punta Mita, Mexico.

"I had to find the belief in myself that I could keep going," she said. "That I could function as a single mother ... That I would be able to do my job and take care of my children.

"You know, I have resources others don't have, and I'm aware of that. And I'm grateful for that," she added. "And I think we need to do a much better job supporting single mothers. Because there are so many out there who need our help and often the people who need us the most as a society, we abandon. And we need to change that."

While she's doing better now, Sandberg said her time without her spouse is "still a struggle."

"I miss Dave still," she explained. "But I know I don't have any choice other than to keep going. And I keep going because I look deep and I find the resilience inside myself."

It's the support she received from the women involved in her nonprofit foundation, LeanIn.org, that inspired Sandberg to launch the organization's newest campaign: "Together Women Can."

The initiative encourages women to be mentors and powerful allies for other women in the workplace.

joined the movement, telling their stories in a video PSA. Others are encouraged to do the same thing, using the hashtag "#LeanInTogether."

"We see all the time women supporting other women," Sandberg explains. "And I think there's a myth out there that women don't, and it's not true."

She encourages women to do "small, everyday things" to encourage one another, like acknowledging the work of female colleagues or standing up for other women who may be interrupted by men while speaking.

Sandberg also asked parents to allow their daughters to have strong voices.

"We call our little girls 'bossy.' We don't call little boys 'bossy,' because we expect them to lead. We should look at our daughters and say, 'You're not bossy, you have executive leadership skills and I'm going to support and encourage that,' " she said.

LeanIn.Org was founded in 2013 and strives to "empower all women to achieve their ambitions," according to its website.

"My greatest hope is that we will celebrate the women who are helping us. We will get rid of the myth that women are other women's worst enemies, because they're not. And we will start celebrating leadership in women and little girls everywhere," she concluded.

Summary: "I think we need to do a much better job supporting single mothers," Sheryl Sandberg also said while promoting her new initiative


10/12/2009 AT 04:35 PM EDT

Always liked Elvis Presley's hair?

Leslie Hindman Auctioneers in Chicago is putting up a clump of the King's locks for auction Sunday along with memorabilia, clothes and sweat-stained scarves, the Associated Press reports.

The hair is said to have come from Presley's crewcut in 1958 after enlisting in the service. Another collector, who owns some of Presley's hair, has matched the latest sample to one he owns. In 2002, a clump of the late singer's hair went for $115,000 at auction.

Summary: A Chicago auction house is putting up a clump of the King's locks – along with memorabilia – this weekend


Contract disputes usually aren't much fun to eavesdrop on, but an exception must be made for Linkin Park, the deceptively mild-mannered rap-rock band that's feuding with its record company, the Warner Music Group.

Last week the Firm, Linkin Park's management company, issued an entertaining press release. Among other things, the statement said that Warner Music Group's stock offering might weaken the company's ability to "market and promote Linkin Park." This was a neat reversal, since the usual complaint about major labels is the exact opposite: they spend too much money marketing and promoting bands like Linkin Park.

Even more startling was the group's casual claim that they were Warner Music Group's "biggest act," a claim that echoes one made by the Warner Music chairman Edgar Bronfman Jr., who has described the group as "the biggest rock band in the world." Really? Linkin Park? Those rather anonymous-looking guys who recently did time as Jay-Z's backup band? How did that happen?

The answer is that Linkin Park triumphed mainly by not messing up. Less flamboyant and less mediagenic than their rap-rock contemporaries, the members surpassed the competition by working hard and keeping relatively low profiles. The band's second and most recent full-length album, "Meteora," has sold more than 10 million copies, even though Chester Bennington (the lead singer) and Mike Shinoda (the lead rapper) are hardly household names.

By contrast, look what happened to Limp Bizkit, once one of rap-rock's best-selling acts. After a string of hits, the lead barker Fred Durst became better known as a celebrity punch line than as a rap-rock frontman. More people probably remember his rumored fling with Britney Spears or that disastrous Chicago concert (the band was reportedly run off the stage; some fans later sued over the shortened set) than remember the group's 2003 album, "Results May Vary."

Indeed, things have gotten so dire for Limp Bizkit that the band has now embraced precisely the situation that Linkin Park says it is worried about. The new Limp Bizkit mini-album, "The Unquestionable Truth (Part 1)," released by Geffen, snuck into stores last week with virtually no marketing or promotion. This wasn't just a quiet release but a secret one: the band has made no mention of the CD in recent interviews, and many fans (yes, some remain) were doubtless surprised to stroll into record stores on May 3 and find a new Limp Bizkit release on the racks.

While Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit have been busy with (respectively) high-profile press releases and low-profile CDs, an unlikely contender has emerged as the country's favorite heavy rock band of the moment. The hyper-quirky Armenian-American protest-metal act, System of a Down, is in the middle of a whirlwind promotional tour that has included an appearance on "Saturday Night Live" and a so-called "guerrilla tour" (because the band is playing small venues) that came to Irving Plaza on Monday night. All of this is intended to ensure that the band's new CD, "Mezmerize" (American/Columbia), will enjoy one of the year's biggest debuts when it's released on Tuesday.

It's hard to imagine better evidence of the topsy-turvy state of loud rock. While Limp Bizkit bashes out chest-pounding rap-rock on an underground EP, System of a Down is on "Saturday Night Live" playing an antiwar song called, "BYOB," which has singer Serj Tankian exclaiming, "My God is of Bible blood with pointed ears."

The strange thing about Limp Bizkit is that Mr. Durst has always been at pains to portray himself as an underdog, even when his band seemed like a corporate-rock juggernaut. If he were a better lyricist (or a more likable celebrity), his self-pity might have been easier to swallow. As it was, you often had to ignore him in order to enjoy his band's surprisingly propulsive riffs.

The new Limp Bizkit mini-album marks the band's reunion with its adventurous guitarist, Wes Borland, and the songs are as loud and raucous as any Bizkit fan could hope for, full of gluey bass lines and exploding backbeats. Unfortunately, Mr. Durst's rants are as unpalatable as ever: his take on evil priests ("The Priest") falls particularly flat.

Still, System of a Down fans shouldn't be too quick to hop aboard the anti-Durst bandwagon: Mr. Tankian is hardly immune to awkward polemics. In fact, the two singers sometimes write surprisingly similar lyrics. One of these bands has a song that includes the words, "Crying freedom/ Handed to obsoletion/ Still you feed us lies from the tablecloth." One has a song that includes the words, "Rebellious at heart all along/ Is your leader a voice?/ Somehow you've replaced all your gain with a debt." Can you guess which is which?

If nothing else, the diverging tales of System of a Down and Limp Bizkit show just how quickly hard-rock paradigms can shift: at a time when the Latino post-punk noisemakers in Mars Volta seem poised to outsell the rap-rock dinosaurs in Korn, Mr. Tankian's self-conscious weirdness seems a lot fresher than Mr. Durst's red-hatted rage. So if the members of "the biggest rock band in the world" seem surprisingly nervous about their maintaining their stature, maybe they have good reason. All rock bands love pretending to be underdogs, but as Mr. Durst can attest, it's not always fun to become one.

Summary: Kelefa Sanneh Critic's Notebook column on topsy-turvy state of affairs of hard rock bands Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit and System of a Down and impact on their latest albums, tours and promotional campaigns; photos (M)


GLENDALE, Ariz. -- Two of the Arizona Cardinals' most significant offseason acquisitions are injured; one of them -- starting nose tackle Corey Peters -- is lost for the season.

Peters tore his left Achilles tendon in practice Wednesday. Starting left guard Mike Iupati will undergo surgery for a torn left meniscus. Iupati was hurt in Tuesday's practice.

Coach Bruce Arians said Iupati is out three to eight weeks, meaning he could miss the first five games of the season.

Peters tore an Achilles for the second time in three seasons. He tore his right Achilles tendon late in the 2013 campaign.

"The second time around it's really devastating," Arians said before Thursday's practice, "because he was having such a great camp."

Peters was hurt without any contact.

"He was just running toward the ball," Arians said. "Nobody touched him."

Arians said rookie Rodney Gunter, a fourth-round pick from Delaware State, will move into the starting nose tackle role.

Ted Larsen will be the new left guard. Larsen started at the position for Arizona all of last season. But Arians said Earl Watford "will fight for that left guard spot because he's had such a good camp. He's also in the fight for right guard, right tackle."

Iupati, a three-time Pro Bowl selection with San Francisco and a member of The Associated Press all-pro team in 2012 , was Arizona's biggest free agent acquisition. He signed a five-year, $40 million contract with $22.5 million guaranteed.

Iupati is considered one of the best run blockers in the league; the Cardinals ranked last in the NFL at 3.3 yards per carry last season.

"It's obviously a little bit of a drop-off," Arians said of the injury's impact, "but we will be better than we were (last year)."

Peters signed a three-year, $10.5 million deal with $3.75 million guaranteed.

He played all five of his pro seasons with Atlanta, starting all 15 games before he was hurt in 2013. He appeared in 14 games with the Falcons last season.

Gunter, a massive 6-foot-5 and 305 pounds, has been impressive throughout camp.

"He's got all over the quarterback a bunch of times," Arians said. "The centers have had a really, really rough time with his length and strength."

Gunter said Arians told him Wednesday night that he would be the starter.

"It's time for the rookie to step up," Gunter said, "time to go to work, time to grow up fast."

He said he wasn't surprised Arians turned to him as Peters' replacement.

"I've been working hard," Gunter said. "I've been improving since OTAs, rookie minicamp. A lot of vets believe in me. I'm ready to do my job."

Gunter burst through to tackle Kansas City backup quarterback Aaron Murray for a safety in the preseason opener Saturday night.

"He's one of those country boys that you wouldn't want to fight in a bar fight," cornerback Jerraud Powers said. "He's had a hell of a camp."

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Defensive end Calais Campbell said Gunter "is very physically blessed and he's got good instinct."

"He's made plays in camp against our ones that are like `Wow. This guy could be special,'" Campbell said. "We've just got to figure out how to get it out of him consistently."

Gunter agreed with Campbell's assessment that he was "born to play football." He said he will lean on veterans Campbell and defensive tackle Frostee Rucker for help.

"I'm surrounded by greatness," Gunter said, "so I have no other choice but to be great."

Arians said he would like to get new signee Chris Johnson five or six carries against San Diego on Saturday night. Arians said he expects rookie running back David Johnson to play most of the second quarter and the entire third. ... With a suspension of as many as three games looming for Bobby Massie, Bradley Sowell has been practicing with the first string, ahead of first-round draft pick D.J. Humphries. "Bradley's a pro, he shows up every day. D.J.'s a rookie, he shows up once every week." ... Arians was told 'Bird Gang' fans want to know about the status of inside linebacker Daryl Washington, who sat out all of last season due to violating the league's substance-abuse policy and has not been reinstated. "The league hasn't notified me of anything, so I would ask the Bird Gang to please call Daryl," Arians said.

Summary: Cardinals starting nose tackle Corey Peters is lost for the season with a torn left Achilles tendon, and starting left guard Mike Iupati will undergo surgery for a torn left meniscus.