Here is a news article: A new female species of praying mantis has been named after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in honor of her work for gender equality.

 Cleveland Museum of Natural History scientists announced Wednesday the Madagascar species would be called the llomantis ginsburgae. It is the first type of praying mantis to be classified female based on its genitalia.

 "As a feminist biologist, I often questioned why female specimens weren't used to diagnose most species," Case Western Reserve University Ph.D. candidate Sydney Brannoch, the study's lead researcher, said in a statement . "This research establishes the validity of using female specimens in the classification of praying mantises."

 The authors said the species reminded them of the 83-year-old justice's infamous lace collar, noting "her appreciation of the jabot, a decorative neck accessory, which resembles the neck plate of the insect."

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 Thank you for signing up for Washington Examiner News Alerts. You should receive your first alert soon! ||||| Scientists Pioneer New Method to Identify Mantises

 Scientists from The Cleveland Museum of Natural History have pioneered a new method to identify praying mantises. They described a new species of leaf-dwelling mantis by establishing a female genitalia character system. Male genitalia characters have historically been a standard in classifying insect species. The research is the first formal study to use female genital structures to delimit a new species of praying mantis. The new species from Madagascar was named in honor of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, for her relentless fight for gender equality. The research was published in the journal Insect Systematics & Evolution.

 Lead author Sydney Brannoch and co-author Dr. Gavin Svenson, both of Cleveland Museum of Natural History and Case Western Reserve University, named the new species Ilomantis ginsburgae (ill-oh-mantis ginnz-BURG-ee). The holotype specimen was collected in Madagascar in 1967 and is housed among the collection of the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle of Paris, France.

 Ilomantis ginsburgae is a new species of leaf-dwelling praying mantis from Madagascar. Scientists from The Cleveland Museum of Natural History named the new species to honor Ruth Bader Ginsburg, associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, for her relentless fight for gender equality. Credit: Rick Wherley, Cleveland Museum of Natural History Expand Caption The female genital structure of Ilomantis ginsburgae was analyzed to describe the leaf-dwelling praying mantis as a new species. Scientists from The Cleveland Museum of Natural History published the first formal study to use female genital structures to delimit a new species of praying mantis in the journal Insect Systematics & Evolution. Credit: Rick Wherley, Cleveland Museum of Natural History Expand Caption The female genital structure of Ilomantis ginsburgae was analyzed to describe the leaf-dwelling praying mantis as a new species. Male genitalia characters have historically been the standard in classifying insect species. Scientists from The Cleveland Museum of Natural History pioneered and established the validity of using female specimens in the classification of praying mantises in research published in the journal Insect Systematics & Evolution. Credit: Rick Wherley, Cleveland Museum of Natural History Expand Caption Sydney Brannoch, a Ph.D. candidate at The Cleveland Museum of Natural History, led research that pioneered a new method to classify praying mantises by establishing a female genitalia character system. Credit: Laura Dempsey, Cleveland Museum of Natural History Expand Caption

 Original source

 “This species description of Ilomantis ginsburgae is novel since it relied heavily on the features of the female genitalia,” said lead author Sydney Brannoch, a Case Western Reserve University Ph.D. candidate working under the direction of Svenson at the Museum. “As a feminist biologist, I often questioned why female specimens weren’t used to diagnose most species. This research establishes the validity of using female specimens in the classification of praying mantises. It is my hope that our work not only sets a precedent in taxonomy but also underscores the need for scientists to investigate and equally consider both sexes in other scientific investigations.”The newly described Ilomantis ginsburgae looks similar to other leaf-dwelling praying mantises. They are green in color, have a flattened body, conical eyes and broad wings with venation that resembles the vein patterns on leaves. The authors also named the species for Ginsburg for her appreciation of the jabot, a decorative neck accessory, which resembles the neck plate of the insect.For the study, the researchers examined 30 praying mantis specimens from three museums. They analyzed the geographic distribution, external features, and both male and female genital characters of the mantises. The scientists found that the female genital characters alone could define the species—and traditionally used character systems corroborated their findings. Similarly, the researchers resurrected Ilomantis as a valid genus from the related genus Nilomantis due to character differences observed on the female genitalia, which again was supported by the other character systems.“Defining or identifying insect species can be extremely difficult if we are limited to using one or a few poorly known characteristics,” said co-author Dr. Gavin Svenson, curator of invertebrate zoology at The Cleveland Museum of Natural History and adjunct assistant professor at Case Western Reserve University. “Developing new characteristics, especially from female specimens, helps us not only test the validity of species, but makes identification much easier. Many praying mantis species have males and females that look very different. If a person finds one sex, they may only be able to identify the specimen if their specimen’s sex matches what is known from previous research. Our work reduces this impediment by characterizing both sexes for praying mantis species.”This study was done as part of Svenson’s broader research project, which is focused on the evolutionary patterns of relationship, distribution and complex features of praying mantises. His current research project aims to align new sources of relationship evidence (DNA sequence data) with morphology and other features to create a new and accurate classification system for praying mantises that reflects true evolutionary relationships.Brannoch SK, Svenson GJ (2016) Leveraging female genitalic characters for generic and species delimitation in Nilomantis Werner, 1907 and Ilomantis Giglio-Tos, 1915 (Mantodea, Nilomantinae). Insect Systematics & Evolution May 2016. DOI: 10.1163/1876312X-47032141 |||||
A summary of this is?

– Ruth Bader Ginsburg: booze-swilling Supreme Court justice, part-time actress, and … new namesake of a praying mantis. Scientists from the Cleveland Museum of Natural History were examining 30 praying mantis specimens when they discovered that species—typically classified using a male specimen—could be differentiated simply by looking at female genitalia, according to a release, per the Washington Examiner. They then noticed that one specimen, collected from Madagascar in 1967, was actually a unique species bearing a resemblance to 83-year-old Ginsburg. As scientists explain, the so-named llomantis ginsburgae has a neck plate that brings to mind the jabot, or frilly collar, often found around the justice's neck. Since the researchers were the first "to use female genital structures to delimit a new species of praying mantis," and Ginsburg has devoted much of her life to gender equality, it only made sense to name the insect in her honor. "As a feminist biologist, I often questioned why female specimens weren't used to diagnose most species," the lead researcher says. "It is my hope that our work not only sets a precedent in taxonomy but also underscores the need for scientists to investigate and equally consider both sexes in other scientific investigations." The llomantis ginsburgae species—kept in a Paris museum—is described in the journal Insect Systematics & Evolution. (Does this frog species look oddly familiar?)


Write a summary based on this article:

Football fans, get ready to rock. While there’s no telling which two teams will face off when Super Bowl LIII hits Atlanta on February 3, a source tells Us that Maroon 5 have been tapped to grace the halftime stage.

 “The offer has been extended and they’ve pretty much accepted,” says the insider in the latest issue of Us Weekly. It’s a dream come true for Adam Levine and his six bandmates. As the Voice coach told Howard Stern in 2015, “We very actively want to play the Super Bowl.”

 Though at the time the 39-year-old frontman denied rumors that the group was in talks to play the big game that year, he also told Stern they had been on a “short list” of groups for a while.

 Currently on tour promoting their 2017 album, Red Pill Blues, the band has a break from shows in between a Las Vegas New Year’s Eve gig and the February 19 start of the Australian leg of their tour — leaving their schedules wide open for the February 3 game.

 Before embarking on the tour in May, Levine opened up to Ellen DeGeneres about bringing his wife, Behati Prinsloo, and daughters Dusty Rose, 23 months, and Gio Grace, 7 months, on the road with him for the first time. “We’ll probably have to have a family bus,” he told the talk show host. “Touring with the kids will be fun because it will be an amazing experience for them. They get to see the world.”

 At last year’s Super Bowl in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Justin Timberlake took the stage to deliver a medley of his hits and a tribute to the late singer Prince.

 For more on Maroon 5 and Super Bowl LIII, pick up the new issue of Us Weekly, on stands now.

 Reporting by Jennifer Peros

 Sign up now for the Us Weekly newsletter to get breaking celebrity news, hot pics and more delivered straight to your inbox!

 Want stories like these delivered straight to your phone? Download the Us Weekly iPhone app now! ||||| Looks like it's not a "Secret" anymore!

 A source close to the situation says Maroon 5 is scheduled to perform Super Bowl LIII halftime on Feb 3rd in Atlanta, Georgia.

 A second source close to the NFL tells ET that Maroon 5 is the halftime performer for Super Bowl LIII.

 The band -- made up of frontman Adam Levine with Jesse Carmichael, James Valentine, PJ Morton, Matt Flynn, Sam Farrar and Mickey Madden -- is currently on their Red Pill BluesTour, but conveniently have a break between a New Year's Eve show in Las Vegas and the Australian leg of their tour, which kicks off on Feb. 19.

 Levine has previously expressed interest in performing the halftime show, telling Howard Stern in 2015 that he and his bandmates "very actively want to play the Super Bowl."

 A spokesperson for the NFL released a statement to ET regarding who is being considered to perform on Super Bowl Sunday. "It’s a Super Bowl tradition to speculate about the performers for the Pepsi Halftime Show," the statement begins. "We are continuing to work with Pepsi on our plans, but do not have any announcements to make on what will be another epic show."

 ET has reached out to the band's reps, as well as Pepsi, who sponsors the halftime show.

 Last year at the U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Justin Timberlake did the honors of performing at halftime during the Super Bowl LII game, which the Philadelphia Eagles won 41-33 over the New England Patriots.

 See highlights from his show, which included a tribute to Prince, below:

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 Related Gallery ||||| Maroon 5 will be the halftime performers at the 2019 Super Bowl, multiple sources confirm to Variety.

 While the group is stylistically more similar to recent performers like Justin Timberlake and Bruno Mars than more controversial ones such as Beyonce and Lady Gaga, Maroon 5’s most recent hit was a tag-team with Cardi B — “Girls Like You” — and it recently collaborated with Kendrick Lamar on the song “Don’t Wanna Know,” so some left-field guest appearances on Super Bowl Sunday are certainly a possibility.

 One of the great challenges in choosing a halftime performer isn’t just its mainstream appeal, but in finding an artist who hasn’t already performed. Over the years, Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, U2, The Who, Katy Perry and even the Black Eyed Peas have all performed, and of course the 2004 set from Janet Jackson (featuring Timberlake) was marred by controversy due to her “wardrobe malfunction.” Prince’s 2007 performance — which saw him playing a galvanizing version of “Purple Rain” in a rainstorm — is widely regarded as the all-time best halftime set.

 The NFL has faced an additional challenge this year due to its stance regarding former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s decision to take a knee during the National Anthem as a sign of protest, which has spurred outrage in some quarters, from the president on down. Kaepernick has not played since the 2016 season and his contract has not been picked up by another team, largely due to the controversy. Reports emerged last year that Jay-Z had turned down an offer to perform during halftime, which he seemingly confirmed in the lyrics to his recent song with Beyonce, “Apesh–“: “I said no to the Super Bowl: you need me, I don’t need you.”

 Reached for comment, a NFL rep tells Variety, “It’s a Super Bowl tradition to speculate about the performers for the Pepsi Halftime Show. We are continuing to work with [longtime sponsor] Pepsi on our plans but do not have any announcements to make on what will be another epic show.”

 A rep for Maroon 5 could not immediately be reached for comment. |||||

– Two sources tell Variety the Super Bowl LIII halftime act has been chosen, and it's Maroon 5. Another source tells Us, "The offer has been extended and they’ve pretty much accepted," while ETOnline says the band is the "frontrunner" to perform. The band itself, fronted by The Voice coach Adam Levine, has not commented, but Levine has in the past made it clear he'd love to perform there. As for the NFL, it says in a statement, "It’s a Super Bowl tradition to speculate about the performers for the Pepsi Halftime Show. We are continuing to work with [longtime sponsor] Pepsi on our plans but do not have any announcements to make on what will be another epic show." The big game will be played at Atlanta, Georgia's Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Feb. 3, 2019.


Trouble at the Top

 More deaths on Everest underscore its problems with overcrowding and unstable weather and geography, writes Nick Heil.

 By now, everyone has seen the startling photos and video of the conga line of climbers ascending Everest earlier this month. If you’ve ever wondered what a human traffic jam looks like at the roof of the world, there it is, in all its goose-down glory. The images, from just a few days ago, show as many as 300 mountaineers moving between Camp 3, on the Lhotse Face, to Camp 4, on the South Col. This isn’t summit day, when those climbers converged again even higher up, but it’s nearly as bad. Many of them successfully reached the top, but at least four didn’t make it back to the bottom.

 A couple of weeks earlier, an equally surprising, if less sensational, story emerged from the mountain, this time from Base Camp. I’m referring to the unprecedented May 7 decision by Russell Brice, owner and expedition leader of Himalayan Experience (Himex), one of the largest and most successful operators on Everest, to cancel his climb, pull up stakes, and go home. Himex has run commercial trips on Everest since 1994, and this year had more than 60 team members on the hill, not to mention a village worth of tents, food, fuel, ropes, radios, and other gear and supplies. Clients had coughed up a nonrefundable $60,000 for the climb, and they’d barely ventured above base camp. After the fateful meeting that morning, Greg Paul, one of the Himex team members who was blogging about his Everest climb, wrote, “Jaws dropped and shock spread throughout the room. Long held dreams, years of training, big time and financial commitments all down the drain in one pronouncement.”

 A few days later, Himex elaborated on the specific reasons the team decided to abort. These included dramatic warmer-than-usual temperatures; dire warnings from experienced sherpas passing through the Khumbu Icefall about its instability; a massive serac (a hanging ice-cliff) directly threatening climbers from above the trail; abundant rockfall on the Lhotse Face (a steep section of the route); and at least two near misses from avalanches earlier in the season. If overcrowding was also part of their calculus, there was no mention of it on the site.

 The growing number of climbers on Everest—most of them amateurs—and the increasing instability of the high-alpine environment, sum up the mountain’s enduring dilemma: How to manage its burgeoning popularity as the terrain becomes ever more dangerous.

 With Himex gone, a mere 700 or so climbers remain on the south side this season (additional teams are also climbing on the north side of the mountain, in Tibet). By May 23, the total body count was up to 11 on the season (the 11th person was reported dead, but has since been found and rescued), barely shy of Everest’s deadlist year, 1996, when 15 people perished, including eight in one day. Currently, a second wave of 200 or so climbers are poised to make a summit bid on May 24-25. Not surprisingly, many observers and media outlets are already fluttering with morbid prognostications of additional carnage. The public isn’t infatuated with this place because it expects everything to turn out OK.

 For those who are unfamiliar with how the Everest dance works, here’s a primer: Climbing teams spend weeks on the mountain acclimatizing before making their summit push, typically between early May and the first week of June, a brief weather window that provides favorable chances of reaching the summit—and returning alive. Everyone ascends via the same route, clipping into ropes stitched up the mountainside—six miles of it—all the way to the top. On summit day, you race the clock, trying to get up and down before your oxygen runs out and your body gives in to the hypoxic environment. There is no cap on the total number of climbing permits issued each year (Nepal is happy to collect the permit fees). Nor are there any regulations determining who goes, or when. If the forecast looks good, it’s up to the loose confederacy of international expeditions to determine whether they jump or stay put.

 Commercial climbing on Everest is in trouble. Despite the best efforts of the established players to improve communication and cooperation; despite a full-time independent medical clinic now operating at base camp; despite, even, the arrival of powerful, high-altitude rescue helicopters servicing some of Everest’s high terrain, the mountain’s two biggest problems—the sheer number of climbers and the deteriorating conditions—have expanded beyond anyone’s control.

 The latter, a growing body of research suggests, may well be linked to climate change. The conditions on Everest this year could be a seasonal aberration, but some hard evidence indicates the unstable trend is here to stay. Nepal’s glaciers have shrunk more than 20 percent in the last 30 years, and the rate has accelerated during the last decade, according to research from the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development. Temperatures throughout the Himalayas are, on average, rising, and the mountains are falling apart in the warming atmosphere. As the Himex climber Greg Paul noted in his post, “Russell [Brice] expects an accident of catastrophic proportions to possible [sic] hit the icefall.”

 Corbis (4) Mountaineers descend from the summit of Everest May 19, 2009

 For every outfit like Himex that makes a prudent, conservative decision to leave, however, a dozen other expeditions stand ready to fill in the vacated boot track. That’s because, since so much is already in motion, it’s nearly impossible to reverse course, a pressure that only intensifies the closer teams get to the top. It’s one of the reasons Himex’s decision is so astonishing. For all the ballyhoo directed at successful Everesters, bailing out midclimb requires an act of will beyond the capacity of most commercial mountaineers. It’s far easier to ignore the risks than to heed them.

 Something else may be happening, too. The proliferation of communication technology now commonplace on remote expeditions has taken Everest voyeurism to new heights. Photos, video, podcasts, lengthy written dispatches, 3D graphics, and GPS tracking tools flood websites each spring, beaming reports from the mountain, practically in real time. Far from serving as cautionary tales, warning wannabes from the dangerous slopes, these extreme reality shows only bolster the peak’s mystique, prestige, and appeal. Climbing Everest has long been a spectacle; now it’s a spectator sport, with no shortage of willing participants. ||||| In "Disposable Man" (August 2013), Grayson Schaffer's story about the risks Sherpas face helping paying clients up Everest, we wanted to know the fatality rate of ethnic Sherpas working on Everest. And we also wanted to answer another question: How did this rate compare to traditionally dangerous industries such as commercial fishing, wilderness aviation (a.k.a. bush pilots), and even military combat.

 Annual Fatality Rates by Profession

 Number of Sherpas Killed on Everest by Year

 To do that, we used the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics' formula for fatality rates per 100,000 full-time equivalents. Determining fatalities was easy: the Himalayan Database keeps excellent records. But figuring out how many hours Sherpas work each season took some legwork—Sherpas don't punch in and out like miners do, and employers aren't paying them by the hour. But we consulted with guides, outfitters, and climbers to arrive at numbers we felt gave a fair picture of just how dangerous the job was (the results: far more dangerous than being a soldier in Iraq from 2003 to 2007). There was only one hitch: to be consistent with the Bureau of Labor Statistic's numbers, we only calculated the number for fatalities from 2000 to 2010. And fatalities have been rising since then. If we calculate the fatality rate for the past decade, the numbers become much more distressing.

 Annual Fatality Rates by Profession

 (Deaths per 100,000 full-time equivalents)

 Miners (2000-2010): 25

 Commercial Fisherman (2000-2010): 124

 Alaskan Bush Pilots (1990-2009): 287

 U.S. military in Iraq (2003-2007): 335

 Everest Sherpas (2000-2010): 1,332

 Everest Sherpas (2004-2014): 4,053

 The reason for the discrepancy is simple. From 2000 to 2010, only seven ethnic Sherpas died on the mountain. Since then, 21 Sherpas have perished, including the 16 who died in the avalanche yesterday.

 Number of Sherpas Killed on Everest By Year

 2014: 17

 2013: 4

 2012: 3

 2011: 0

 2010: 0

 2009: 1

 2008: 0

 2007: 1

 2006: 4

 2005: 0

 2004: 0

 2003: 0

 2002: 0

 2001: 1

 2000: 0

 This year is not just the mountain's worst tragedy. It caps the worst three-year period in Everest history. ||||| For many years, the most lucrative commercial guiding operation on Mt. Everest has been a company called Himalayan Experience, or Himex, which is owned by a New Zealand mountaineer named Russell Brice. In the spring of 2012, more than a month into the climbing season, he became increasingly worried about a bulge of glacial ice three hundred yards wide that was frozen tenuously to Everest’s West Shoulder, hanging like a massive sword of Damocles directly over the main route up the Nepal side of the mountain. Brice’s clients (“members,” in the parlance of Himalayan mountaineering), Western guides, and Sherpas repeatedly had to climb beneath the threatening ice bulge as they moved up and down the mountain to acclimatize and establish a series of higher camps necessary for their summit assault. One day, Brice timed how long it took his head guide, Adrian Ballinger (“who is incredibly fast,” he wrote in the blog post excerpted below), to climb through the most hazardous terrain:

 Adding to Brice’s concern, some of his most experienced Sherpas, ordinarily exceedingly stoical men, approached him to say that the conditions on the mountain made them fear for their lives. One of them actually broke down in tears as he confessed this. So on May 7, 2012, Brice made an announcement that shocked most of the thousand people camped at the base of Everest: he was pulling all his guides, members, and Sherpas off the mountain, packing up their tents and equipment, and heading home. He was widely criticized for this decision in 2012, and not just by clients who were forced to abandon their dreams of climbing the world’s highest mountain without receiving a refund for the forty-three thousand euros they had paid him in advance. Many of the other expedition leaders also thought Brice was wildly overreacting. The reputation of Himex took a major hit.

 After what happened last Friday, though, it’s hard to argue with Brice’s call. On April 18th, shortly before 7 A.M. local time, an overhanging wedge of ice the size of a Beverly Hills mansion broke loose from the same ice bulge that had frightened Brice into leaving Everest in 2012. As it crashed onto the slope below, the ice shattered into truck-size chunks and hurtled toward some fifty climbers laboring slowly upward through the Khumbu Icefall, a jumbled maze of unstable ice towers that looms above the 17,600-foot base camp. The climbers in the line of fire were at approximately nineteen thousand feet when the avalanche struck. Of the twenty-five men hit by the falling ice, sixteen were killed, all of them Nepalis working for guided climbing teams. Three of the bodies were buried beneath the frozen debris and may never be found.

 Although many news reports indicated that all the victims were Sherpas, the legendary mountain people who comprise just half of one per cent of the Nepali population, three of the sixteen were members of other, much larger ethnic groups: one was Gurung, one was Tamang, and one was a member of the Hindu Chhetri caste. All, however, were employed as high-altitude climbing Sherpas—an élite profession that deservedly commands respect and admiration from mountaineers around the world.

 It was the worst climbing accident in the history of Everest, twice as deadly as the infamous storm in May, 1996, that killed eight people, the subject of my book “Into Thin Air” (four of my teammates accounted for half of that grim tally). But dying on Everest has been an occupational hazard for Sherpas ever since a team led by George Leigh Mallory to attempt the Tibetan side of the peak, in 1922, became the first mountaineers to ascend higher than the lower flanks of the mountain. In the final days of that expedition, seven Sherpas from Darjeeling, India, were swept to their deaths in an avalanche. Sad to say, the job hasn’t gotten any safer for Sherpas with the passage of time. According to a piece by Jonah Ogles posted on outsideonline.com, the death rate for climbing Sherpas on Everest from 2004 until now was twelve times higher than the death rate for U.S. military personnel deployed in Iraq from 2003-07.

 There is no denying that climbing Everest is a preposterously dangerous undertaking for the members who provide the Sherpas’ income. But running counter to the disturbing trend among Sherpas, climbing Everest has actually grown significantly safer for Western guides and members in recent years, according to the available data. This can be attributed to a number of factors. Western climbers now use bottled oxygen much more liberally than they did in the past; many Western climbers now prophylactically dose themselves with dexamethasone, a powerful steroid, when they ascend above twenty-two thousand feet, which has proven to be an effective strategy for minimizing the risk of contracting high-altitude cerebral edema ( HACE ) and high-altitude pulmonary edema ( HAPE ), potentially fatal ailments that are common on Everest; and weather forecasts are much more accurate than they were eighteen or twenty years ago.

 During the seventy-six years from the first attempt on Everest, in 1921, through 1996, when I was guided up Everest, a hundred and forty-four people died and the summit was reached six hundred and thirty times, a ratio of one death for every four successful ascents. Notably, over the eighteen years that have passed since 1996, a hundred and four people have died and the summit has been reached six thousand two hundred and forty-one times—one death for every sixty ascents. Furthermore, non-Sherpas accounted for only seventy-one of these deaths, which equates to just one death for every eighty-eight ascents.

 The reason the risk remains so much greater for Sherpas can be traced to several things. Sherpas aren’t provided with nearly as much bottled oxygen, because it is so expensive to buy and to stock on the upper mountain, and they tend to be much better acclimatized than Westerners. Sherpas are almost never given dexamethasone prophylactically, because they don’t have personal physicians in their villages who will prescribe the drug on request. And perhaps most significant, Sherpas do all the heavy lifting on Everest, literally and figuratively. The mostly foreign-owned guiding companies assign the most dangerous and physically demanding jobs to their Sherpa staff, thereby mitigating the risk to their Western guides and members, whose backpacks seldom hold much more than a water bottle, a camera, an extra jacket, and lunch. The work Sherpas are paid to do—carrying loads, installing the aluminum ladders, stringing and anchoring thousands of feet of rope—requires them to spend vastly more time on the most dangerous parts of the mountain, particularly in the Khumbu Icefall—the shattered, creaking, ever-shifting expanse of glacier that extends from just above base camp, at seventeen thousand six hundred feet, to the nineteen-thousand-five-hundred-foot elevation. The fact that members and Western guides now suck down a lot more bottled oxygen is wonderful for them, but it means the Sherpas have to carry those additional oxygen bottles through the Icefall for the Westerners to use.

 Historically, more Everest climbers have perished from severe weather, HACE , HAPE , exhaustion, falling from steep terrain, or some combination of these hazards than from being crushed or buried in the Khumbu Icefall. This seems to be changing, however. Accurate weather forecasting has reduced the risk of being surprised by a killer storm like the one that struck in 1996. But the pronounced warming of the Himalayan climate in recent years has made the Icefall more unstable than ever, and there is still no way to predict when a serac is going to topple over. And Sherpas spend much, much more time in the Icefall than their Western employers.

 In 1996, for example, I made four round trips through the Khumbu Icefall: three circuits as I progressively acclimatized to twenty-four thousand feet during the month of April, and a final round trip on my journey to the 29,035-foot summit and back. I was terrified each of the eight times I moved through the frozen chaos, which usually took more than three hours to ascend, even with my nearly empty backpack, and slightly less than an hour to descend. In contrast, each of the Sherpas supporting my team’s ascent was required to make something like thirty trips through the Icefall, often while carrying eighty-pound loads of food, propane, and bottled oxygen.

 These days, moreover, members are apt to spend even less time in the Icefall than I did when I was on Everest, eighteen years ago. It’s becoming increasingly common for Western guides and members to acclimatize in hypobaric chambers before they arrive in Nepal, or on other, less hazardous Himalayan peaks in advance of their summit assaults, greatly reducing the number of times they must expose themselves to the perils of the Icefall. Some members now make only a single round trip through it, while each of the Sherpas supporting them must still pass through that hazardous terrain between two and three dozen times. Most Western climbers feel more than a little guilty about this, but I know of none who have ever offered to take an extra lap through the Icefall with a heavy load in order to reduce a Sherpa’s exposure.

 The statistics suggesting that Everest has become safe for members may, in fact, be giving Westerners a false sense of security, however. The astounding number of climbers who now attempt to reach the summit on the limited number of days when the weather is favorable presents a new kind of hazard. A notorious photo shot by Ralf Dujmovits in May, 2012, showed more than a hundred and fifty people attached to a series of fixed ropes as they ascended the Lhotse Face toward the South Col of Everest, jammed together so tightly that they had to move in lockstep. The static weight of all these people and their gear was well over thirty thousand pounds. If some mishap had occurred that caused more than a handful of the climbers to put their full weight on one of the ropes simultaneously, the shock to the anchors securing the ropes to the ice could easily have caused them to fail, resulting in the climbers falling two thousand or more feet to the base of the Lhotse Face. If such an accident should come to pass in the future (which isn’t far-fetched), the death count for both members and Sherpas would be horrific.

 In any event, no Western members or guides were killed or injured in last week’s avalanche. At the moment, in the immediate aftermath, almost everyone climbing on the Nepal side of Everest has retreated to base camp to try to come to grips with the catastrophe. Most of them, Sherpas and foreign climbers alike, are reeling from the unprecedented loss of life. At least one expedition has already announced that it will abandon the mountain. For the foreign climbers, to go home now will mean forfeiting most or all of the fifty to ninety thousand dollars they have spent to be guided up Everest. For the Sherpas who make the guided ascents possible, however, to quit now, after only a few weeks’ wages, will be an even greater economic sacrifice, relatively speaking.

 Depending on their talent, experience, foreign-language skills, how many loads they carry up and down the mountain, and how generously they’re tipped by their clients, climbing Sherpas generally take home between two and eight thousand dollars at the conclusion of an Everest expedition, which commences for them in late March and typically ends around the first of June. If a climbing Sherpa dies on the job, his family receives a million rupees (approximately ten thousand five hundred dollars) from the insurance his employer is required to provide. By any reasonable measure, neither these wages nor insurance payouts are fair compensation for the risk involved. But in Nepal, where the median annual income is less than six hundred dollars, most of the Sherpas’ countrymen would eagerly take similar risks for the opportunity to receive that kind of pay.

 Nevertheless, on April 20th, after holding several emotional, contentious meetings at Everest base camp, the climbing Sherpas announced that they would go on strike unless the Nepali government agreed to meet thirteen demands within a week. The threat of a work stoppage was provoked by the Sherpas’ outrage over the Nepali government’s offer to provide just forty thousand rupees—slightly more than four hundred dollars—to the families of the Sherpas killed in the avalanche, to defray their funeral expenses. Among the Sherpas’ demands are that the government increase this compensation to approximately a thousand dollars per family; provide ten thousand dollars to climbing Sherpas who have been seriously disabled; establish a permanent relief fund for injured Sherpas with a portion of the ten-thousand-dollar permit fee every Western Everest climber is charged by the Nepali government; double the current insurance benefit provided by the guiding companies to twenty-one thousand dollars; require the guiding companies to pay Sherpas their salaries, even if they call off the remainder of the 2014 Everest climbing season; and establish a monument in Kathmandu to memorialize the deceased Sherpas.

 The collective anger and resentment expressed by the Sherpas over the past few days is unprecedented. On April 20th, Tim and Becky Rippel, the owners of a guiding company called Peak Freaks, which lost a Sherpa named Mingma Tenzing to a fatal case of HAPE earlier in the month, stated, in a blog post:

 As we suggested in a previous post the Sherpa guides are heating up, emotions are running wild and demands are being made to share the wealth with the Sherpa people on the table. Now that there are more Sherpa operators today on Everest, they’ve come to learn how much the government of Nepal makes in revenues from Everest expeditions and they are asking for a share. This is their time and under very unfortunate circumstances. In any case things are getting very complicated and there is a lot of tension here and it’s growing. Peak Freaks is in support of the Sherpa people any which way it goes. They are our family, our brothers and sisters and the muscle on Everest. We follow their lead, we are guests here.

 Should the government and the Sherpas manage to reach an agreement concerning the terms of the new demands, it will come as no great surprise if most of the Sherpas now grieving intensely for their absent companions resume their dangerous work within the next week or two. Many people believe that this is the most likely outcome.

 Jon Krakauer’s most recent books are “Three Cups of Deceit,” “Where Men Win Glory,” and “Under the Banner of Heaven.”

 Photograph by Niranjan Shrestha/AP. |||||
What is a one-paragraph summary of the above article?

– Jon Krakauer takes to the pages of the New Yorker to weigh in on the latest tragedy on Everest (the author was, of course, part of the 1996 disaster that saw eight climbers killed). His piece makes plain the imbalance between the dangers faced by Sherpas and the climbers they shepherd to the mountain's peak, but before arriving at that point, he shares a fascinating backstory: That of Himex, a New Zealand-based company that Krakauer calls the most "lucrative commercial guiding operation" on Everest—one that on May 7, 2012, packed up shop after 18 years on the mountain and headed home, taking its guides, members (aka paying climbers, who didn't see their $60,000 refunded), and Sherpas with them. The much-assailed decision was one made by owner Russell Brice, who had grown fearful of a 900-foot-wide overhang of glacial ice set directly above the main route on the mountain's Nepal side, an overhang that his members were directly under for as long as an hour while traversing the route. As Krakauer writes, the "wedge of ice the size of a Beverly Hills mansion" that broke free and caused last week's avalanche came from "that same ice bulge" and killed 16 Sherpas. As for the outsize dangers Sherpas face, some standout points: Between 1921 and 1996, the mountain's death ratio was a treacherous one death for every four completed ascents. Between 1997 and present, the death ratio was one for every 60. Among the reasons it's gotten safer: Climbers tend to pack and use more bottled oxygen, and some take the robust steroid dexamethasone once they hit 22,000 feet, which pares down the risk of developing the often fatal high-altitude cerebral edema and high-altitude pulmonary edema. Sherpas typically have less of the former and none of the latter (and are, of course, the ones lugging those extra oxygen bottles up the mountain). Krakauer points to an Outside piece that shares the professions with a lower calculated fatality rate than that of Sherpas: US soldiers stationed in Iraq between 2003 and 2007, miners, and commercial fishermen.


POLK COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) – The case surrounding rapper Kevin Gates unfolded before a jury in a Polk County courtroom Wednesday. A jury of six women convicted the rapper after a day of testimony, finding him guilty of battery after he was seen kicking a female fan during a concert in Lakeland in a video that went viral. The trial lasted one day.

 The judge sentenced Gates to 180 days in the Polk County Jail, with credit for any time served, and fines and court costs.

 In a previous hearing Gates attempted to have the charges dropped using the Stand Your Ground defense. He admitted he kicked a female fan after she reached out and grabbed his pants several times at Rumor’s Nite Club in Lakeland.Lakeland Police charged Gates with simple battery in September 2015.

 In a previous court hearing Gates testified, “I kicked them, I wanted them off me,” he said, adding that after the girl grabbed him so many times, he kicked her in self-defense.

 During the trial Joe Hailey, head of security at Rumors Nightclub, testified. He said there were around 20 security guards working the night of the concert. He said the rapper’s security team inspected the club before the concert and did not make any special requests for additional security, or a barricade between the stage and the crowd. He also said there was room on the stage for Gates to back up if he did not want to be touched.

 The girl’s mom, Kristy Irelan, spoke to News Channel 8 shortly after the incident. She said her 18-year-old daughter, Miranda Dixon, admitted herself to the hospital and had to undergo a CT scan after she was kicked.

 “She told me that she was excited to see him and next thing she knows she was kicked in the chest and she was passed out,” Irelan told News Channel 8.

 Dixon admitted to tugging on his pants during the concert saying, “I was trying to get his attention for my friend.”

 During the trial Dixon’s friend Termeral Redding testified. She was with Dixon at the concert that night.

 Redding admitted she told Dixon to grab Gates to get his attention “because he is a famous rapper.” Redding said the entire front row was grabbing at Gates. She also testified that when Dixon grabbed the rapper the first time, he kept performing. She said the second time Dixon grabbed him, he “ran and kicked her with force, and her friend fell back into her.” At that point she said she went to get help for her friend.

 Well-known defense attorney Jose Baez cross-examined Redding about how serious Dixon was hurt. He broguht up that after Dixon left the club, Redding stayed for the remainder of the show. “You continued to videotape the concert after your friend left,” Baez said.

 Thousands of people signed a petition aimed at banning Gates from Florida venues.

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 updates on the day’s top stories Privacy Policy | Manage Newsletters ||||| Kevin Gates has been sentenced to 180 days in jail after a jury found him guilty of misdemeanor battery on Wednesday.

 The charges stemmed from an August 2015 incident, in which the 30-year-old rapper was filmed kicking a woman in the chest during his concert in Lakeland, Florida. Prior to this week’s verdict, Gates insisted he was innocent and was simply defending himself under Florida's infamous "Stand Your Ground" law. He claimed the victim, Miranda Dixon, was trying to pull him off stage by repeatedly grabbing his shorts from the crowd. Gates said that Dixon wouldn’t heed his verbal warning, so he used “necessary force” to ensure he wouldn’t be harmed.

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 Jose Baez, who also represented Casey Anthony, defended Gates during the trial. According to Fox 13 News, the attorney echoed Gates’ claims, stating his client’s alleged kick was in response to Dixon’s battery. Baez also argued that Gates' foot didn’t actually touch Dixon, and that she was simply attempting to gain damages in an upcoming civil trial.

 “Her credibility is to be questioned and you will not be able to beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt in this case believe her and that is why you should enter a verdict of not guilty in this case," Baez said.

 The jury, made up of six white women, ultimately found Gates guilty. The state reportedly requested 60 days in jail, with one year of probation, and mandatory anger management classes; however, the judge tripled that sentence with credit for any time served, as well as fines and court costs.

 Stay tuned as more information comes in. ||||| - Rapper Kevin Gates was sentenced to 180 days in a Polk County jail after being found guilty of kicking a fan at a concert last year in Lakeland.

 The judge also ordered a one year probation after Gates' jail time. The sentence was three times what prosecutors requested.

 Cell phone video captured the moment Gates kicked the woman - which happened August 29, 2015 at Rumors nightclub. He was charged with an found guilty of battery for kicking the victim, 19-year-old Miranda Dixon. She testified in court Wednesday.

 "He lifted his foot up and kicked me," said Dixon.

 Jurors also heard Gates's testimony in his own defense Wednesday. Gates was represented by Jose Baez, who famously defended Casey Anthony after her young daughter's death.

 Baez argued Gates was battered by Dixon before he kicked her.

 Dixon testified she reached out and touched Gates' shorts on two occasions. After the second time, Dixon says Gates kicked her so hard that she fell back and later blacked out. She also complained of pain in her upper stomach for a month after the incident.

 Baez argued Gates' foot didn't make contact with Dixon at all, and that Dixon was lying in order to gain damages in a separate civil suit against Gates.

 "Her credibility is to be questioned and you will not be able to beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt in this case believe her and that is why you should enter a verdict of not guilty in this case," said Baez.

 The jury was made up of six white women, who decided to convict Gates after two hours of deliberation, which included re-watching the video of Gates kicking Dixon, but being denied by the judge testimony records regarding whether Gates testified that he did kick Dixon. The judge told the jurors they would have to rely on their memories. |||||
What is a one-paragraph summary of the above article?

– A Louisiana rapper was sentenced to six months in jail Wednesday for kicking a female fan during a concert last year in Florida, WFLA reports. A video of the incident went viral. Kevin Gates admitted he kicked the woman—19-year-old Miranda Dixon—but claimed she left him no choice. Gates, attempting to use the Stand Your Ground defense, said Dixon kept grabbing his legs while he was on stage and ignored him when he told her to stop. According to Complex, Gates said he needed to use "necessary force" to protect himself. Dixon admitted to pulling on Gates' pants because she was "trying to get his attention for my friend." Her friend told the court she wanted Gates to notice her "because he is a famous rapper." Dixon said she only grabbed Gates twice before he kicked her, Fox 13 reports. She testified that she blacked out after being kicked and that her stomach hurt for a month. But Gates' attorney said Gates' foot didn't even make contact with Dixon, who he said is lying in order to get money in a separate civil suit. A jury—all white women, Complex notes—found Gates guilty of battery. Prosecutors were only asking for two months in jail, but the judge tripled Gates' punishment.


– People have been calling for it for years, and Mark Zuckerberg said at a company town hall meeting today that a "dislike" button is finally coming to Facebook. "People have asked about the 'dislike' button for many years, and probably hundreds of people have asked about this, and today is a special day because today is the day that I actually get to say we are working on it, and are very close to shipping a test of it," Zuck said, per CNBC. The concept is tricky, he explained, because "we don't want to turn Facebook into a forum where people are voting up or down on people's posts," as they do on, for example, Reddit. "That doesn't seem like the kind of community that we want to create: You don't want to go through the process of sharing some moment that was important to you in your day and have someone 'downvote' it." What people "really want is the ability to express empathy," he said, per Mashable. "Not every moment is a good moment. ... If you are sharing something that is sad, then it may not feel comfortable to 'like' that post." Zuckerberg says Facebook expects to start testing soon, then launching a wider roll-out. As Mashable notes, the move could have big implications: "When a Dislike button becomes a reality, companies and users would have to radically shift the strategy of what they post." And as The Verge notes, "Facebook doesn't want people using 'Dislike' as a way to harass or disrespect other people, and—more cynically—you can argue that it certainly doesn't want people Disliking the sponsored posts that companies pay to put in your News Feed." Indeed, Zuck said back in December that any such button would have to be "a force for good, not a force for bad."

Expand this summary.

People have asked whether Facebook would make a "Dislike" button for years, and for years Facebook has said that it wouldn't. It's kind of obvious why this cycle happens: there's a natural impulse to want to see a "Dislike" button next to Facebook's ubiquitous Like button, but there are also some real problems with that. Facebook doesn't want people using "Dislike" as a way to harass or disrespect other people, and — more cynically — you can argue that it certainly doesn't want people Disliking the sponsored posts that companies pay to put in your News Feed. (On a similar note, please don't forget to Like this article.)

 "[We] are very close to shipping a test of it."

 That all said, Facebook has apparently had a change of heart. It's making a Dislike button — or something like it — and it's apparently going to head into testing soon. "People have asked about the 'Dislike' button for many years ... and today is a special day, because today is the day that I actually get to say we are working on it and are very close to shipping a test of it," Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said today during a public Q&A session, according to CNBC.

 There aren't a lot of details beyond that, but Zuckerberg says that Facebook's goal is to implement the button in a way that makes it a tool to "express empathy" — as in, to Dislike a sad moment that a friend shared — than a way to hurt someone. So while Zuckerberg may have called it a "Dislike" button, what Facebook is building may approximate better to a button for sharing compassion when a thumbs up is socially inappropriate.

 "We don't want to turn Facebook into a forum where people are voting up or down on people's posts," Zuckerberg said. "That doesn't seem like the kind of community that we want to create: you don't want to go through the process of sharing some moment that was important to you in your day and have someone downvote it." Basically, he doesn't want to turn Facebook into Reddit, which, given Reddit's recent troubles, seems like a solid course of action.

 Update September 15th, 4:55PM ET: This story has been updated to elaborate on how Facebook could implement "Dislike" in ways other than as an explicit button.

 Verge Video: Changes are coming to Facebook ||||| After years of speculation and member requests, Facebook is finally working on a Dislike button, CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said. But it's probably not exactly what you think.

 Zuckerberg said the feature will be coming soon during a town hall meeting on Tuesday at the company's California headquarters. However, he also said it wouldn't be a way for users to "downvote" posts and instead would let users express other emotions besides the inferred positivity of the Like button.

 See also: 14 honest Facebook buttons that need to exist

 "People have asked about the 'dislike' button for many years, and probably hundreds of people have asked about this, and today is a special day because today is the day that I actually get to say we are working on it, and are very close to shipping a test of it," Zuckerberg said, according to a CNBC report.

 Zuckerberg added that the company has held off on a Dislike button to avoid becoming a Reddit-style system that encouraged upvoting and downvoting, according to reports.

 "What they really want is the ability to express empathy. Not every moment is a good moment," he said.

 Regardless of its intent, a Dislike button used across the board on Facebook would have a dramatic effect on the service, so in all likelihood, "disliking" something will be one of many Like alternatives, and users will probably have a say over which ones will happen. It would be a large departure from positive persona Facebook has adopted with features like Moments, which serves up old, happy memories in a user's timeline.

 Considering Facebook is by far the largest driver of traffic to news publications, this feature has the potential to be a big deal. When a Dislike button becomes a reality, companies and users would have to radically shift the strategy of what they post.

 Speaking at a similar town hall Q&A in December, Zuckerberg said that a Dislike button is a tricky proposition.

 See also: The Facebook Like Button Could Have Been Green

 "We need to figure out the right way to do it so it ends up being a force for good, not a force for bad," he said at the time. "Everyone feels like they can just push the Like button, and that's an important way to sympathize or empathize with someone," Zuckerberg said "But there are times when you may want the simplicity of a one-click response but a "like" doesn't feel appropriate."

 Especially in light of the recent brouhaha at Reddit, a Dislike button would be a challenge for Facebook to roll out.

 Update — 4:45 p.m. ET: This story was updated to reflect the ambiguity of Zuckerberg's comments. |||||


News article:

Just One More Thing...

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 Close ||||| Story highlights Campus Pride says it received philanthropic foundation's tax forms

 WinShape Foundation quit funding some controversial groups in 2011, official says

 Chick-fil-A president sparked debate last year with comments on same-sex marriage

 Campus Pride's leader says he's developed relationship with Chick-fil-A chief

 Chick-fil-A restaurants' philanthropic WinShape Foundation no longer funds the most controversial and politically charged anti-same-sex-marriage groups and has not since 2011, according to Campus Pride, a leading national LGBT campus organization.

 Campus Pride issued a statement Monday claiming that Chick-fil-A gave the organization's executive director, Shane Windmeyer, access to WinShape's 2011 "990" tax documents.

 He said they show that the nearly $6 million in outside grant funding "focuses on youth, education, marriage enrichment and local communities" and that in the list of the foundation's beneficiaries, "the most divisive, anti-LGBT groups are no longer listed." Among those groups were the Family Research Council, Eagle Forum and Exodus International.

 Windmeyer acknowledged that WinShape continues to fund groups that don't condone same-sex marriage based on biblical beliefs but says these groups, such as the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, don't operate with the same hard-nosed political agenda the other groups are known for.

 Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy sparked controversy last July when he weighed in on same-sex marriage , telling The Baptist Press, "We are very much supportive of the family -- the biblical definition of the family unit."

 JUST WATCHED Chick-fil-A pres.: Focused on the family Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Chick-fil-A pres.: Focused on the family 01:00

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 Gay rights groups were most incensed about the chain's financial support for what they called anti-gay groups.

 The ensuing debate included politicians from Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel to former GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum.

 Some proponents of same-sex marriage called for a boycott of the chain, which had annual sales of more than $4.1 billion last year. It has more than 1,615 locations in 39 states and Washington, and they are closed on Sundays.

 Many who agreed with Cathy took the opportunity to share their beliefs on August 1, dubbed "Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day" by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. Their purchase of chicken sandwiches and nuggets to show their support for the restaurant chain and its president brought the restaurant chain record sales.

 The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation then promoted a National Same-Sex Kiss Day at Chick-fil-A restaurants across the country on August 3.

 "Students on college campuses have been concerned with the giving practices of Chick-fil-A for years," Windmeyer said. "Those comments just added fuel to the fire."

 Students protested on both sides of the issue, and some schools weighed the possibility of removing Chick fil-A from cafeterias and dining halls. However, Windmeyer says many people -- perhaps even himself -- did not take the opportunity to embrace the opportunity for civil discussion on the issue.

 "There was a lot of divisiveness and hate on both sides," said Windmeyer. "It was like the Chick-fil-A brand was a chicken sandwich with purpose."

 Windmeyer says Cathy called him August 10. He expected an argument, yelling, anger, maybe even a lawyer to jump on the line, but instead there was an hour-long private conversation.

 After months of conversations, e-mails and text messages, Windmeyer says, he has developed a personal relationship with Cathy, met his family and even attended the Chick-fil-A Bowl, a college football game on New Year's Eve.

 "It is about opposing viewpoints, not opposing people," Windmeyer said. "Dan cares about young people and was upset to hear how his company was being used to hurt LGBT students."

 Campus Pride says that after Windmeyer and Cathy began to discuss their beliefs and points of view, it suspended a national college campaign against the restaurant in an "effort to find common ground" around the values of respect and dignity Chick fil-A published on its website.

 "The Chick-fil-A controversy continues to impact the lives of LGBT students and provides an opportunity for every college campus to assess their LGBT institutional commitment," Windmeyer said. "Administrators have a responsibility to ensure a safe learning environment and should recognize the toll of the controversy by committing resources and services to ensure LGBT students feel safe and welcome on campus."

 Neither Chick-fil-A nor the WinShape Foundation returned calls seeking comment.

 According to its website, Chick-fil-A -- a privately held chicken restaurant chain -- has more than 1,615 locations in 39 states and Washington, D.C., with annual sales of over $4.1 billion in 2011.

 WinShape Foundation filed the tax forms on November 15, according to Campus Pride, and they are public information that will be released by the IRS when it deems fit.

 Tax-exempt organizations and nonprofits such as the WinShape Foundation must file 990 documents each year and release a list of organizations that received support. |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– If you've been pining for Chick-Fil-A but don't want to support its president's anti-gay stance, rejoice: The company no longer donates to the most controversial groups opposing gay marriage, and hasn't since 2011. Rather, the company "focuses on youth, education, marriage enrichment, and local communities," says Campus Pride. The national LGBT campus organization looked at tax documents for Chick-Fil-A's philanthropic WinShape Foundation to make the determination, CNN reports. However, Chick-Fil-A does still donate to some groups that are against gay marriage—just not the most divisive ones. Despite all the uproar that ensued after company president Dan Cathy said last year that he supported traditional marriage, Chick-Fil-A continues to grow: Sales were up 14% in 2012 over a year prior, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports, and the chain opened 96 new stores.


News article:

Snoop Dogg, world-renowned entertainment icon and unofficial representative of all things weed, has been investing in tech products and platforms for the past year or so, with a particular focus on the cannabis industry. But today, Snoop is entering the tech sphere in a whole new way, with the launch of his very own platform called Merry Jane.

 At its core, Merry Jane is a lifestyle media site with cannabis at the center. Loaded with both video content and editorial content, the site will serve as an information hub for everyone interested in pot, whether it be the n00b or the seasoned smoker.

 [gallery ids="1213163,1213160,1213161,1213164,1213174,1213169"]

 While announcing Merry Jane on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt, Snoop said that the site will provide users with “all they need to know” about pot, and be the encyclopedia of the cannabis world.

 The site will have its own show series, each of which focusing on different aspects of pot as it relates to lifestyle.

 This ranges from a cooking show, where folks can learn how to make amazing edibles (or food that pairs well with cannabis consumption), to ‘Deflowered’ (which is a show that focuses on peoples’ “first time” doing something), all the way to exclusive celebrity interviews. Snoop noted that the site will be enlisting celebrities that are “down with the team” including Seth Rogen and Miley Cyrus.

 But beyond that, Merry Jane will also take a hard editorial look at the business and politics of the cannabis industry, breaking news about legalization, policy, and industry growth.

 And that’s just the start of it.

 Merry Jane also connects to its own database around various strains of cannabis, created by a Merry Jane editorial team, letting users learn more about the strain that might be right for them, and then connecting that reader/user with a local dispensary where they can procure said herbal supplement.

 But unlike other platforms that help inform the reader about different types of greenery, Merry Jane makes it super easy to search for what you’re looking for, whether it’s a wax, edible, or flower. Users can search by type of cannabis, flavors, symptoms, and more, with high-res rotating imagery for every product listed.

 Pre-launch, Snoop and Chung curated dispensaries to put on the platform, but eventually dispensaries will be able to log in to the back end and upload their own menus, update them, and maintain control over their own digital storefront via Merry Jane.

 When asked about the business plan for the site, MJ cofounder Ted Chung said that “advertising is definitely part of the plan,” but noted that the most important thing is providing the marijuana business with a definitive destination for brands and retail locations to create a strong presence. In terms of user acquisition, Chung said that the demand is already there, and expects the site to surpass its competitors within 6 months.

 Snoop also said that Merry Jane will be the door to bring people out of the closet. “There are so many people in the closet, and we are giving them an opportunity to come out of the closet and just admit they like to smoke. I’m a smoker, my name is Snoop Dogg, and I’m a stoner.”

 Merry Jane is launching at today’s Disrupt SF 2015 conference, with a limited amount of beta testers receiving invites today. Over the next few weeks, the platform will open up to the general public. ||||| What do Snoop Dogg and Jared Leto have in common? If you answered "they both make music" then technically you're right, but that wasn't what we were getting at.

 The other thing they share is that they both have invested millions in Reddit, and have contributed to the site's recent $50 million intake from an A-list of investors, according to The Independent.

 But Jared Leto and Snoop Dogg aren't the only stars who are looking for new channels to make money. Many other stars have their hands in founding start-ups and new business. Stars such as…

 NEWS: Jared Leto's Ripped Up Shirt Might Cost More Than Your TV

 Jessica Alba

 In 2012, the Sin City star decided that she wanted to start a company that sold toxin-free household goods. So, she got together with her business partner and they created The Honest Company.

 Justin Bieber

 The only thing Justin Bieber loves more than Justin Bieber is photos of Justin Bieber. So it makes sense that he would be a principle investor – to the tune of $1.1 million – in the up and coming social media photo –sharing site Shots.

 Venus Williams

 The tennis star, who once ranked No. 1 in the world, has had one of the most successful careers in the sport she loves. But that doesn’t mean she wants to stifle her love of interior design. So the sports icon started V Starr Interiors, of which she is currently the CEO. Her company, based out of Florida, has designed the homes of many major athletes and even television talk show sets.

 VIDEO: 9 Celebs Who Launched Their Own Brand of Booze

 Ashton Kutcher

 The new dad and Two And A Half Men star has basically invested in everything, all the time, ever, in one way or another. Currently, he's been focusing on his viral-news site A+ (which is basically Buzzfeed except… well, no. It's Buzzfeed.)

 Akon

 This Konvicted rapper revealed that he owns a diamond mine in Africa. A diamond mine. Like, a hole in the ground out of which diamonds are pulled by people who wish they didn’t have to pull diamonds out of a hole in the ground. At first, Akon responded to criticism of his diamond mine ownership and its role in conflict diamond trading by arguing, "I don't believe in conflict diamonds. That's just a movie." He's since changed his mind.

 PHOTOS: Movie Star Restaurateurs

 Kevin Smith

 Aside from directing some of the most beloved cult comedies in the last 20 years, Smith also runs one of the biggest podcasting networks on the internet.

 Kevin Kostner

 The Waterworld star seems to have taken the environmental message behind his 1995 post-apocalyptic action adventure film very seriously. Kostner bought a company called Ocean Therapy Solutions, which built machines that could separate oil from water, for $24 million. When the BP oil spill occurred, the government and BP leased dozens of the machines from Kostner.

 A surprising number of stars own their own booze companies as well! Check out the video below for more on the wide world of celebrity hooch!

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What is a shorter version of the above article?

– Marijuana enthusiast Snoop Dogg launched a website yesterday, and of course it's all about weed. Merry Jane, which the rapper announced at TechCrunch Disrupt, is what TechCrunch describes as an "information hub" for all things pot; Snoop says it will be a sort of cannabis encyclopedia giving users "all they need to know." There will be shows and videos centered around the marijuana lifestyle, including a food show (cooking with cannabis or pairing meals with pot), celebrity interview videos, and a show called "Deflowered," which will feature people doing something for the first time. There will also be editorial content looking at marijuana news from legalization to pot policy to the business side and the politics of pot. And, of course, there will be a database featuring all sorts of cannabis strains so that users can decide which one is right for them and where they can find it. It sounds pretty high-tech, featuring "high-res rotating imagery for every product listed" and allowing users to search via type, flavor, or even symptom. Right now the site is in beta ("I'm givn away 420 sneak peeks a day," Snoop tweeted. "Sign up now at http://MERRYJANE.com & put 1 n the air !!") but it will be open to the public within the next few weeks. (Click to read about eight other celebrities with surprising side businesses.)


Write a summary based on this article:

A Jewish nurse who treated Robert Bowers moments after the Squirrel Hill synagogue shooting said he saw “confusion” but not “evil” when he looked into his eyes.

 Ari Mahler, one of two Jewish medical professionals to treat Bowers at Allegheny General Hospital on Oct. 27, said in a lengthy Facebook post over the weekend that Bowers “thanked me for saving him, for showing him kindness, and for treating him the same way I treat every other patient.”

 Mahler, a registered nurse at Allegheny General since May, said he did not reveal his Jewish identity to Bowers.

 “I’m sure he had no idea I was Jewish. Why thank a Jewish nurse,” Mahler wrote, “when 15 minutes beforehand, you’d shoot me in the head with no remorse? … This was the same Robert Bowers that just (allegedly) committed mass homicide. The Robert Bowers who instilled panic in my heart worrying (that) my parents were two of his 11 victims less than an hour before his arrival.”

 Even as Bowers was saying, “I want to kill all the Jews,” he was being treated by two Jews — a trauma nurse and an attending emergency room doctor. Hospital President Dr. Jeff Cohen, who also is Jewish, declined to identify them in an earlier interview with the Tribune-Review , but Mahler said he went public on Facebook to tell his own story.

 “I just know I feel alone right now,” he said, “and the irony of the world talking about me doesn’t seem fair without the chance to speak for myself.”

 Mahler did not go into detail about his interactions with Bowers, citing medical privacy laws, but described his own experiences with anti-Semitism and his lack of surprise at the attack on Tree of Life Congregation, where 11 people were killed and six injured on Oct. 27.

 “The fact that this shooting took place doesn’t shock me. To be honest, it’s only a matter of time before the next one happens,” he said. “History refutes hope that things will change. My heart yearns for change, but today’s climate doesn’t foster nurturing, tolerance, or civility.”

 Mahler grew up the son of Rabbi Mark Joel Mahler, who retired as rabbi of Temple Emanuel of South Hills, a Reform synagogue, in June. He said he experienced anti-Semitism from other school children but more from ignorance than from hate.

 “I found drawings on my desks of my family being marched into gas chambers, swastikas drawn on my locker, and notes shoved inside of it saying, ‘Die Jew. Love, Hitler.’ It was a different time back then, where bullying was not monitored like it is now,” he said.

 Mahler worked as a loan officer and a financial consultant before taking a job as a nurse at Magee-Womens Hospital in 2014, according to his LinkedIn.com profile.

 “As an adult, deflecting my religion by saying ‘I’m not that religious,’ makes it easier for people to accept I’m Jewish — especially when I tell them my father is a rabbi. ‘I’m not that religious,’ is like saying, ‘Don’t worry, I’m not that Jewish, therefore, I’m not so different than you,’ and like clockwork, people don’t look at me as awkwardly as they did a few seconds beforehand,” he said.

 Mahler said he did his best to treat Bowers with “compassion and empathy. … I felt that the best way to honor his victims was for a Jew to prove him wrong. Besides, if he finds out I’m Jewish, does it really matter? The better question is, what does it mean to you?”

 As for Bowers, Mahler said, “To be honest, I didn’t see evil when I looked into Robert Bowers’ eyes. All I saw was a clear lack of depth, intelligence, and palpable amounts of confusion. Robert Bowers probably had no friends, was easily influenced by propaganda, and wanted attention on a sociopathic level. He’s the kind of person that is easily manipulated by people with a microphone, a platform, and use of fear for motivation.”

 Mahler ended his Facebook post on the importance of “love in the face of evil. … I could (not) care less what Robert Bowers thinks, but you, the person reading this, love is the only message I wish to instill in you. If my actions mean anything, love means everything.”

 Stephen Huba is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Stephen at 724-850-1280, shuba@tribweb.com or via Twitter @shuba_trib. ||||| Sign up for one of our email newsletters.

 Dr. Jeff Cohen walked into the trauma unit at Allegheny General Hospital, and his eyes locked with synagogue shooting suspect Robert Bowers.

 Cohen, president of the Pittsburgh hospital and a longtime member of the Tree of Life Congregation, wanted to ask Bowers how he was feeling.

 “He’s a very lost guy,” Cohen told the Tribune-Review. “It’s just my impression. It’s not based on fact. I mean, he’s coming off the ambulance yelling ‘kill all the Jews’ and those are the people treating him. That is the height of stupidity.”

 Two of the lead people who immediately treated Bowers at Allegheny General were Jewish, Cohen said. They include the attending emergency room doctor and a registered nurse whose own father is a rabbi, he said.

 Cohen declined to name them but praised them for honoring their profession by putting their emotions aside.

 “It’s hard. You have this internal debate with yourself. Am I going to do what is right? And you do. You do what you think is right,” Cohen said. “The mission here is taking care of people. They didn’t ask anything about him. He was a patient.”

 Not long after treating Bowers, the young nurse broke down in tears. Cohen met with him for about 20 minutes and thanked him for doing his job.

 “He was pretty broken,” Cohen said. “I told him how proud I was. He went home and hugged his parents.”

 Cohen, 63, lives about 50 yards from the Tree of Life Congregation where the mass shooting occurred. He was home on Saturday morning when he heard a loud noise outside. Within minutes, his daughter yelled to him to come downstairs and they watched as police and SWAT teams descended on their street.

 He described the congregation as a safe place where people gather daily to pray and socialize. His own mother-in-law attends services nearly every day and knew nine of the 11 people who were killed. Cohen knew them, too, pausing to mention Cecil and David Rosenthal, two brothers killed in the massacre.

 “The Rosenthal brothers were both handicapped. They were very comfortable there. This is the Jewish version of ‘Cheers.’ Everybody knew their names. This was their home,” Cohen said.

 Cohen, who has been president of Allegheny General Hospital for two years, said that on Sunday night he became more and more curious about meeting Bowers. The suspect was being treated for gunshot wounds and had been placed in isolation to allow police to guard him while he received treatment.

 “I just wanted to see him with my own eyes,” he said. “He had a mother once, or maybe still does. He was loved by a family. How do you get from here to there? I wanted to have my own impression.”

 His conclusion: “He’s not the face of the devil. He’s just a guy who committed a very heinous act.”

 Luis Fábregas is editor of the Tribune-Review’s Valley News Dispatch and Pittsburgh digital editions. You can contact Luis at lfabregas@tribweb.com or via Twitter @LuisTrib. ||||| After last week’s deadly shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, the suspected shooter, Robert Bowers, was rushed to Allegheny General Hospital. Bowers had been wounded during a shoot-out with police. Two of the men who treated him at Allegheny General were themselves Jewish.

 The president of the hospital, Dr. Jeff Cohen, was a member of the Tree of Life synagogue. Cohen told the media last week that two of the people who treated Bowers were Jewish: the ER doctor, and a registered nurse. Cohen described Bowers as “lost” and said that the registered nurse, a young man, broke down in tears after treating him.

 Now the nurse has come forward with an emotional Facebook post about his experience treating Bowers. His name is Ari Mahler. Here’s what you need to know:

 1. Mahler Says Bowers Yelled ‘Death to All Jews’ as He Was Wheeled Into the Emergency Room

 Mahler wrote that Robert Bowers didn’t seem evil — instead, Mahler said, the alleged shooter seemed confused and lost. Mahler speculated that Bowers was a lonely, easily-led man who had been influenced by others. The nurse wrote,

 “I didn’t see evil when I looked into Robert Bowers’ eyes. All I saw was a clear lack of depth, intelligence, and palpable amounts of confusion. Robert Bowers probably had no friends, was easily influenced by propaganda, and wanted attention on a sociopathic level. He’s the kind of person that is easily manipulated by people with a microphone, a platform, and use fear for motivation.”

 Mahler said that he never told Bowers that he was Jewish. He said he didn’t want to go into detail about his interactions with Bowers, but he did say that the suspect thanked him for his kindness and for saving his life. Mahler wrote that he treated Bowers just the same way as he treats all of his patients. But he also wrote that, as Bowers was being wheeled into the emergency room, he yelled, “Death to all Jews!”

 Jeff Cohen, the president of Allegheny General Hospital, said that after Bowers’ treatment Mahler came to him in tears, overwhelmed by what had just taken place.

 2. Mahler’s Father Is a Retired Rabbi

 Mahler’s father is Rabbi Mark Joel Mahler, who served as the rabbi of Temple Emanuel, a reform synagogue in South Hills, from 1980 until 2018. Rabbi Mahler retired in June of 2018.

 The rabbi was known for his use of music; he played guitar and sang during Sabbath services, and he led the synagogue’s band. Several of his children (not Ari) also participated in the band. Rabbi Mahler was also a member of the South Hills Interfaith Ministries and the National Conference of Christian and Jews.

 Rabbi Mahler and his wife Alice have four children: Ari, Shoshana, Moshe, and Shira.

 3. Mahler Says He Often Experienced Anti-Semitism Growing Up

 Ari Mahler wrote that he was not shocked by the Pittsburgh shooting; the Pittsburgh native says that anti-Semitism is nothing new for him. As a boy, he says, he often experienced bullying because he was Jewish. He described finding swastikas scrawled on his locker at school, or finding pictures of his family being sent to the gas chamber. And, Mahler writes, he never managed to confront the bullying head-on:

 “I experienced anti-Semitism a lot as a kid. It’s hard for me to say if it was always a product of genuine hatred, or if kids with their own problems found a reason to single me out from others. Sure, there were a few Jewish kids at my school, but no one else had a father who was a Rabbi. I found drawings on desks of my family being marched into gas chambers, swastikas drawn on my locker, and notes shoved inside of it saying, “Die Jew. Love, Hitler.” It was a different time back then, where bullying was not monitored like it is now. I was weak, too. Rather than tell anyone, I hid behind fear. Telling on the people who did this would only lead to consequences far worse.”

 Mahler also says that he developed defense mechanisms to shield himself from anti-Semites. He got into the habit of telling people that he isn’t very religious. Mahler wrote that even people who view Judaism positively often seem to feel uncomfortable when they meet Jewish people. And so, he says, he’s learned over the years how to ease awkward moments by deflecting attention from his Jewishness.

 4. Mahler Worked as a Financial Consultant Before Going to Work as a Nurse

 Ari Mahler was an honors student at the University of Maryland, graduating in 1999 with a BA in English. Mahler went on to work as a loan officer for American Equity, and then as a financial consultant for PNC.

 Then, in 2013, Mahler enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Nursing, again earning honors and graduating the next year as a registered nurse. Mahler found work as a registered nurse at Magee Women’s Hospital; he switched to working at Allegheny General in March of 2018.

 5. Mahler Concluded His Facebook Post With a Plea for Love in the Face of Evil

 Mahler wrote movingly about his decision to treat Bowers with “compassion” and “empathy.” He wrote that he never told Bowers that he was Jewish, and just treated him with the same care that he would use on any patient. He wrote, “I wanted him to feel compassion. I chose to show him empathy. I felt that the best way to honor his victims was for a Jew to prove him wrong.”

 Mahler wrapped up his Facebook post with a plea. He wrote,

 “Love as an action is more powerful than words, and love in the face of evil gives others hope. It demonstrates humanity. It reaffirms why we’re all here. The meaning of life is to give meaning to life, and love is the ultimate force that connects all living beings. I could care less what Robert Bowers thinks, but you, the person reading this, love is the only message I wish to instill in you. If my actions mean anything, love means everything.” |||||

– An Allegheny General Hospital nurse who treated Robert Bowers, the man suspected of killing 11 at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, after the shooting has stepped forward via a public Facebook post, and he clarifies his identity: "I am The Jewish Nurse." His name is Ari Mahler, and per TribLIVE, he and an ER doctor were two Jewish medical professionals who tended to Bowers, even after he was reportedly wheeled into the hospital yelling, "Death to all Jews." In his post, Mahler doesn't get into too many specifics about his interaction with Bowers, citing privacy laws, but he reveals how as a kid—he was one of four children of a rabbi, per Heavy.com—he dealt with anti-Semitism, and that even as an adult he plays his religion down as a deflection. He notes he didn't tell Bowers he was Jewish, instead choosing to "show him empathy." And also "love." "I could care less what Robert Bowers thinks, but you, the person reading this, love is the only message I wish [to] instill in you," he writes. Mahler, who initially worried his own parents could've been among the synagogue victims, says what happened didn't shock him and that "it’s only a matter of time before the next one happens," adding although "my heart yearns for change … today's climate doesn't foster nurturing, tolerance, or civility." He also notes he didn't see "evil" when he looked into Bowers' eyes, but "something else." Hospital President Jeff Cohen, who said Mahler came to him in tears after treating Bowers, concurs. "He's a very lost guy," Cohen says of Bowers, per TribLIVE, but "he's not the face of the devil. He's just a guy who committed a very heinous act." Read Mahler's post here. (Also working off of love: Muslims raising money for victims of the shooting.)


Write an article based on this summary:

– Gazing at whales from a boat may seem like an animal-friendly pursuit, but new research is questioning that idea. Why? It's not just about the odd collision; whale-watching seems to stress out the whales, Nature reports following a symposium in Scotland. When they spot a boat—whose operators know where the preferred feeding grounds are—the whales may opt to skip a meal or hurry away. In Iceland's minke whales, the rush to escape looks a lot like an effort to flee a predator, with heavy breathing and a boost in speed, researchers say. Meanwhile, dolphins in New Zealand—whose numbers have been dropping, researchers find—appear to be focusing on dodging tourists rather than eating. As for a solution, some areas suggest a distance boats must keep from the creatures, but the standards aren't usually officially required. “Whale-watching is traditionally seen as green tourism,” says a US wildlife biologist. “The negative is the potential for disturbance. That disturbance is a worry because we don’t want to do ‘death by 1,000 cuts.'" Other researchers, however, have seen benefits to whale-watching as a means of encouraging conservation work, Takepart notes. "Presentations in the symposium pointed out much good that whale-watching can do if—and that’s a big if—managed appropriately," says one. (It's not just whales who are on display: Shark watching is also a hit.)

Michael Nolan/Robert Harding World Imagery/Corbis

 Boat trips to watch whales and dolphins may increasingly be putting the survival of marine mammals at risk, conservationists have warned.

 Research published this year shows that the jaunts can affect cetacean behaviour and stress levels in addition to causing deaths from collisions. But some animals are affected more than others and the long-term effects remain unclear, scientists at the International Marine Conservation Congress (IMCC) in Glasgow, UK, heard last week.

 “Whale-watching is traditionally seen as green tourism,” says wildlife biologist Leslie New of the US Geological Survey in Laurel, Maryland. “The negative is the potential for disturbance. That disturbance is a worry because we don’t want to do �?death by 1,000 cuts’.”

 The number of people joining trips has expanded hugely since the 1990s, from 4 million in 31 countries in 1991 to 13 million in 119 countries in 2008, the most recent year for which full data are available. In 2008, the International Fund for Animal Welfare, an animal-protection charity in London, estimated the value of the industry at US$2.1 billion.

 Although collisions with boats can hurt the animals, researchers are more concerned about effects such as animals failing to feed or using up energy swimming away from the vessels. These seemingly small events can add up, studies suggest.

 Earlier this year, for example, marine biologist David Lusseau of the University of Aberdeen, UK, and his team showed that minke whales (Balaenoptera acutorostrata) in Faxaflói Bay in Iceland responded to whale-watching boats as they do to natural predators, upping their speed and respiring more heavily1. But whether this was a direct result of the boats is difficult to pin down: Lusseau, who was not at the meeting, says that soon-to-be-published research by his team shows that behavioural changes are probably not affecting actual numbers of the minke in Faxaflói Bay.

 “The disturbance is a worry because we don’t want to do �?death by 1,000 cuts’.”

 But Lusseau’s group has also shown that the bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops sp.) in Doubtful Sound, New Zealand, could be driven to extinction in decades2. The large number of dolphin-watching trips in the sound is driving the animals away from their preferred areas and forcing them to avoid boats instead of feeding. Dolphin numbers declined from 67 in 1997 to 56 in 2005, the team found.

 Several delegates at the IMCC also described the effects on the roughly 70 endangered Irrawaddy dolphins (Orcaella brevirostris) living in the Mekong River between Cambodia and Laos, which are hounded by scores of tourist boats.

 Determining which populations are most at risk could help to fix the problem, says Lusseau. He suggests plugging short-term observational data into longer-term population models to tease out whether behavioural changes are temporary or serious long-term threats. There are enough data on species types and locations to assess, at least roughly, where whale-watching should and should not be allowed, he says. But funding and political support are hampering the creation of detailed, localized plans. “There is a lot of lip service being paid to understanding the challenges tourism poses on wildlife, but in practice there is very little financial interest in finding this out,” he says.

 Short-term fix

 Guidelines such as specifying minimum distances between animals and boats, speed limits or no-go areas, can help. But codes vary widely: a 2004 study3 found that just 38% were binding; the rest were voluntary. They are also often inadequate. Even with guidelines in place, boats in the dolphin-watching haven of the Bocas del Toro region of Panama hit and killed at least 10 animals in a population of about 250 in 2012 and 2013, according to research presented to the International Whaling Commission in Cambridge, UK, this year.

 Greg Kaufman, executive director of the Pacific Whale Foundation — an organization in Hawaii that runs whale-watching and research trips — holds up the Irrawaddy dolphin as a population desperately in need of protection. “They’re basically killing these animals one at a time,” he says.

 But Brian Smith, a zoologist at the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York who has long studied the Irrawaddy group, says that although cetacean tourism is probably stressful for these animals, the main problem is entanglement in fishing nets. And the alternative to fishing for many people in the region is dolphin-watching.

 Most of the speakers at the IMCC meeting agreed that more should be done to protect dolphins and whales from tourists. “Although whale-watching is not as bad as whaling,” says New, “it might be that last piece that pushes a species over.” ||||| Watching whales and dolphins in their natural habitats may seem like a good alternative to seeing them in aquariums, but some scientists say that the activity may be putting the marine mammals at risk.

 Researchers presented their findings at the International Marine Conservation Congress, a symposium held in Glasgow, Scotland, last week.

 “Whale-watching is traditionally seen as green tourism,” Leslie New, a Maryland-based wildlife biologist who works for the United States Geological Survey, told Nature. “The negative is the potential for disturbance.”

 More than 13 million people take whale-watching trips each year, generating an estimated $2.1 billion annually.

 Boat collisions might be the least of the marine mammals’ problems, according to studies presented at IMCC. The effects of whale-watching excursions are unclear, but scientists worry it may cause behavioral changes in whales and dolphins, such as not feeding or swimming away from boats, which takes energy.

 Vanessa Williams-Grey, head of the Responsible Whale Watch Program at the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, told the BBC in 2011 that the industry could be harmful to marine mammals.

 “Badly run trips can translate into all sorts of negative reactions from the whales,” said Williams-Grey. “They can stop resting or increase their respiratory rate. If they are using more energy, this will have an impact on their health.”

 Other scientists champion whale watching, saying it inspires conservation efforts.

 “Presentations in the symposium pointed out much good that whale watching can do if—and that’s a big if—managed appropriately and impacts are minimized or removed completely,” said Chris Parsons, a whale and dolphin researcher at Pacific Whale Foundation, a Hawaii-based nonprofit that also offers whale-watching trips.

 Emmanuelle Martinez, a senior scientist with the Pacific Whale Foundation, said tourists bear responsibility for behaving properly in the presence of marine mammals.

 “It is not uncommon to see people on their boats and kayaks approaching too close to the mammals, and Jet Skis doing doughnuts around a pod of dolphins,” she said. “I even witnessed a lady literally launching herself on top of a Hector’s dolphin—an endangered species—that was bowriding the boat she was on.”

 “Educating the public to choose the best and most compliant tour operator and to follow guidelines is therefore very important if we don’t want to cause death by 1,000 cuts,” Martinez added. |||||


A 400-pound tiger that mauled a man who jumped from a moving monorail train and plummeted over a protective fence at the Bronx Zoo will not be euthanized and "did nothing wrong," the zoo director said.

 The ticket booths are empty and the gates are chained shut at an entrance to the Bronx Zoo in New York, Friday, Sept. 21, 2012. Zoo officials say a visitor who leaped into an exhibit and was mauled by... (Associated Press)

 Bronx Zoo Director Jim Breheny speaks to the media during a news conference, Friday, Sept. 21, 2012, in New York. A visitor to the zoo was mauled by a tiger after he leaped from an elevated monorail train... (Associated Press)

 CORRECTS THAT MAN DID NOT LOSE LEG, ADDS NEW INFO ON HIS CONDITION- FILE- In this Sept. 20, 2010 photo provided by the Wildlife Conservation Society, three Amur tiger cubs rest by a fallen tree limb at... (Associated Press)

 The mauling happened Friday afternoon in the Wild Asia exhibit, where a train with open sides takes visitors over the Bronx River and through a forest, where they glide along the top edge of a fence past elephants, deer and a tiger enclosure.

 Passengers aren't strapped in on the ride, and the man apparently jumped out of his train car with a leap powerful enough to clear the 16-foot-high perimeter fence.

 The 25-year-old man was alone with a male Siberian tiger named Bashuta for about 10 minutes before he was rescued by zoo officials, who used a fire extinguisher to chase the animal away, said zoo director Jim Breheny. He suffered bites and punctures on his arms, legs, shoulders and back and broke an arm and a leg.

 "When someone is determined to do something harmful to themselves," Breheny said, "it's very hard to stop that."

 Bashuta was returned to a holding area where it usually sleeps at night and will not be euthanized, zoo officials said.

 "The tiger did nothing wrong in this episode," Breheny said.

 A hospital spokeswoman said the man was in stable condition Friday night, but his family has requested that no further information be released.

 "If not for the quick response by our staff and their ability to perform well in emergency situations, the outcome would have been very different," Breheny said.

 After zoo staff chased the tiger off, the man was instructed to roll under an electrified wire to get to safety, Breheny said. Zookeepers then called the tiger into a holding area, he said.

 Bashuta is 11 years old and has been at the zoo for three years.

 The Bronx Zoo, one of the nation's largest zoos, sprawls over 265 acres and contains hundreds of animals, many in habitats meant to resemble natural settings. Its exhibits include Tiger Mountain, Congo Gorilla Forest and World of Reptiles.

 There are 10 tigers at the Wild Asia exhibit, but Bashuta was the only one on display at the time. There are no surveillance cameras in that area of the exhibit.

 Zoo officials said they would review safety procedures but stressed that the situation was unusual.

 "We review everything, but we honestly think we provide a safe experience," Breheny said. "And this is just an extraordinary occurrence ... somebody was deliberately trying to endanger themselves."

 ___

 Associated Press writers Tom Hays and David B. Caruso contributed to this report. ||||| An image of foxes with the message, "We have more to fear from other people than from other animals" was also posted Thursday. In other posts he promotes a vegetarian diet.

 Another image posted Thursday bears the message, "We need to stop being victims and living out of fear. We need to stop preparing for disaster, instead to anticipate a glorious future."

 Bachuta's cubs, were first featured in the Daily News in 2010. He mated with a female tiger, Sasha, the first day they were introduced, after Sasha had rejected previous males zoo handlers paired her with. Their offspring were the zoo's first Amur cubs in more than a decade.

 Breheny praised zoo workers for getting the tiger away from the victim before he did more harm.

 "We were able to prevent a bad situation from turning into a real tragedy," Breheny said at the press conference. "We did not have to use deadly force but we were prepared to do so."

 Bachuta will be back on exhibit tomorrow, zoo officials said.

 "We've never had a single incident like this," Breheny said. "You have to be determined to jump out."bpaddock@nydailynews.com |||||
What is a one-paragraph summary of the above article?

– Bronx Zoo officials say they won't euthanize a tiger that mauled an apparently suicidal visitor yesterday. The 25-year-old victim survived, though the Daily News says he might lose one of his legs. He horrified fellow riders on the zoo's monorail when he jumped off the ride and into the tigers' den. There, a 400-pound male Siberian tiger mauled him until zookeepers moved the animal away with a fire extinguisher, reports AP. The man then rolled under an electrified wire to safety. "The tiger did nothing wrong," said the zoo's director. "When someone is determined to do something harmful to themselves it's very hard to stop that." The New York Post and others have identified the victim as David Villalobos and note that his Facebook page shows that he's an animal lover. In fact, he posted a photo of a mother tiger licking its baby this week. Villalobos was in stable condition this morning.