Linky Friday #72
Linky Friday: categories this week are sports and culture, art and nature, economics and politics, and war and peace.
Ten Second News (Beta)
-Amazon More Than Doubles Quarterly Profits
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/ #Amazon #business #regulationWe are going to need some new terminology for dominance in a business sector. Amazon, already the undisputed king of E-commerce, now commands 43 cents of every dollar spent online.
The online retailer on Thursday surprised investors by more than doubling its quarterly profit to $1.6 billion—just under its record of $1.9 billion from the holiday quarter—as revenue surged about 43%.
The revenue growth was Amazon’s best mark since the third quarter of 2011, pushing the total to about $51 billion. The company credited the better-than-expected results to its highflying cloud-services division and strong growth in the company’s burgeoning advertising business.
Amazon’s swelling profitability doesn’t appear to be an anomaly—it expects operating income to more than double to as high as $1.9 billion in the second quarter—though Chief Financial Officer Brian Olsavsky cautioned he may not always have such good news.
“We certainly will always have periods of higher investment, and through the year we expect investments to increase, particularly video content spend…and we’ll continue to hire,” Mr. Olsavsky said.
With other tech giants under increasing regulatory scrutiny, most notably Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s recent two-day testifying saga before Congress, many speculate what attention law makers might turn towards the retail behemoth.
Those moves highlight Amazon’s rapid ascent from its roots as an online bookseller to a modern-day conglomerate that offers a competitive line of tablets and voice-activated devices, runs a dominant cloud-services business and sells groceries from the neighborhood store. As it expands into new business areas globally and furthers its reach into consumers’ lives—from its Hollywood studios to its recent experimentation into health care and financial services—it is drawing questions about its growing clout.
Most visibly, President Donald Trump in recent weeks lashed out at Amazon’s business practices and economic impact, raising questions whether his comments will spur lawmakers to take a harsher look at Amazon’s dominance. Other tech giants, including Alphabet and Facebook, are facing regulatory scrutiny over their companies’ vast reach and access to personal data.
Still, policy experts say that targeting Amazon on anticompetition grounds would be difficult, requiring overturning principles that have guided regulation for decades.
In the meantime, Amazon shows no signs of slowing down.
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Comment → --Ford Is About to Abandon American Sedans
The Model T, the ’32 deuce coupe, the Thunderbird, the Mustang: For much of its 115-year history, Ford Motor Co. has been synonymous with cars.
But now Ford, one of the great engines of 20th Century American industry, is about to do the unthinkable: abandon the American car business almost entirely.
Just two years from now, a mere 10 percent of the vehicles rolling off Ford assembly lines and into North American showrooms will be sedans and sports cars like the Taurus or Mustang. The rest will be pickups, SUVs and commercial vehicles — more lucrative models that the company hopes will secure its future as change tears through the global auto industry.
Photo by sv1ambo 
-Bill Cosby Found Guilty
/ ##metoo #bill cosby #guiltyBill Cosby has been found guilty on three counts of sexual assault. While not overly surprising, to millions who grew up with the family friendly comedian’s public persona, it is still an astonishing fall from grace.
NBC:
Bill Cosby, who once embodied the idealized American father on a wildly popular sitcom, was convicted of sexual assault on Thursday in a high-stakes retrial after a half-dozen women testified that the famed comedian drugged and assaulted them.
The jury found Cosby guilty on all three counts of Thursday afternoon, drawing an emotional reaction from his accusers. Cosby remains free on bail until sentencing.
Upon reading of the first guilty verdict several of Cosby’s alleged prior victims sobbed and shook with joy. Cosby’s head was bent slightly, eyes shut.Bill Cosby, who once embodied the idealized American father on a wildly popular sitcom, was convicted of sexual assault on Thursday in a high-stakes retrial after a half-dozen women testified that the famed comedian drugged and assaulted them.The jury found Cosby guilty on all three counts of Thursday afternoon, drawing an emotional reaction from his accusers. Cosby remains free on bail until sentencing.
Upon reading of the first guilty verdict several of Cosby’s alleged prior victims sobbed and shook with joy. Cosby’s head was bent slightly, eyes shut.Cosby lashed out at the prosecution when discussing whether to revoke his bail.
Prosecutor Kevin Steele said Cosby had a plane and noted his wealth in giving concerns over his bail.“He doesn’t have a plane you asshole! I’m sick of it you asshole!” he exclaimed.
Meanwhile, the prosecutor argued with the judge.Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas Judge Steven O’Neill said because of Cosby’s “age and his medical condition, I am not going to simply lock him up.” Cosby has to surrender his passport and must remain in his nearby home, the judge said.
There will be much more to come, and some legal analysts are already talking about appeals due to aspects of the case; but for now the first major conviction since the #MeToo movement has fallen on the man once considered America’s father figure, and now convicted sexual abuser.
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-Ronnie Jackson Withdraws From Consideration to Lead Veteran Affairs
Rear Adm.(Dr) Ronnie Jackson has withdrawn his name for consideration to become the next Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, President Trump’s embattled nominee to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs, has withdrawn from consideration for the post amid allegations he had fostered a hostile work environment and behaved improperly while serving as the top doctor leading the White House medical unit.
In a statement Thursday morning, Jackson said, “Going into this process, I expected tough questions about how to best care for our veterans, but I did not expect to have to dignify baseless and anonymous attacks on my character and integrity.”
Jackson, who has been serving in his role as Director of White House Medical Unit since 2006, was appointed physician to the President by then-President Barack Obama and retained by President Trump. But his appointment to head the second largest department of the federal government raised eyebrows from the start:
More from NPR:
Jackson’s initial nomination came as a surprise to many when the president announced his pick last month to lead the VA after the departure of Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin, who had been confirmed with unanimous bipartisan support in the Senate.
While previous presidents had praised Jackson’s medical care, almost immediately questions arose as to whether or not he had the managerial experience to oversee a massive health care operation of 370,000 employees that serves more than nine million veterans and has a budget of nearly $200 billion.
“Admiral Jackson is highly trained and qualified and as a service member himself, he has seen firsthand the tremendous sacrifice our veterans make and has a deep appreciation for the debt our great country owes them,” Trump said in announcing his nomination.
But after the allegations against Jackson began to be reported by national media outlets this week, Trump said he wouldn’t be surprised if Jackson wanted to withdraw given the rising storm, but that it was “his decision.”
President Trump, while praising and defending his nominee, quickly turned his attention to political concerns.
AP:
In a phone interview with “Fox & Friends” Thursday, Trump says Jackson “would have done a great job,” but that he saw where his nomination was going.
Trump says he told Jackson, a Navy vice admiral: “Welcome to Washington. Welcome to the swamp. Welcome to the world of politics,”
Trump places the blame on Montana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, whose office issued a report Wednesday listing allegations it had gathered about Jackson’s work as White House doctor. Trump says: “I think Jon Tester has to have a big price to pay in Montana.”
Whatever comes next, certainly there will be more chaos and controversy for the beleaguered Department of Veterans Affairs.
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-Double Dare Returns, But Kids TV Is Not What It Used To Be
/ #DoubleDare #televisionAnswer the question, or take the physical challenge? Kids who grew up in the 80’s and 90’s might be listening to their own children hear those words, if Nickelodeon’s announced return of Double Dare succeeds.
Nickelodeon announced Wednesday that it’s reviving the iconic ’80s and ’90s kids’ game show Double Dare. The network has ordered 40 episodes of the series, to premiere in the summer.
Originally running (under various titles like Family Double Dare and Super Slimy Double Dare) from 1986 to 1993, the Marc Summers-hosted show had families compete at trivia and physical challenges before making it to the grand finale: running through a messy obstacle course that culminated in pulling a slimy snot-covered flag out of a giant disembodied nose. It ruled, which is why the revival will keep the format.
But more than nostalgia is behind such a move. Nickelodeon, long the king of Kids TV networks, is losing ratings, along with Disney Channel and Cartoon Network.
Bloomberg’s Lucas Shaw reports kids-centered broadcast television, long a ratings stalwart, is hurting:
Kids TV networks are suffering their worst year of ratings declines in recent history/ever. Disney/Nick/Cartoon all down 20%+ https://t.co/YvH6E3pcr9 pic.twitter.com/nB4I48AllF
— Lucas Shaw (@Lucas_Shaw) April 25, 2018
And the reason for that decline:Streaming
The cable networks for children, in decline for years, are now in a free fall. This season’s ratings for the 2-to-11 set are shaping up to be the worst yet. And few in the industry predict a turnaround.
The implications are enormous for giants like Viacom Inc. and Walt Disney Co. Viewership of the three most-popular networks for the very young — Nickelodeon, the Disney Channel and the Cartoon Network — is down more than 20 percent this season from year earlier, according to data from Nielsen. It’s a low point in a long-running trend as Netflix Inc., YouTube and other streaming services have taken off.
Media companies still make money from children’s TV, with the most-watched cartoons spawning toy brands and licensing deals that can generate millions of dollars. So “the traditional brands are stuck in a tough position,” said Birk Rawlings, who left Nickelodeon to run DreamWorksTV, a kids media company that includes a YouTube channel. “They can see what is changing, but to embrace what’s new they must run away from a healthy business.”
It will be good for some to see an old friend, but the new ways of viewing kids programming are both posing tough questions and a physical challenge to broadcasters.
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Linky Friday No. 61
It’s Linky Friday and now you have a way to malinger productivity while reading random links embedded in wry comments that are only funny after you read the articles!
Linky Friday #57
Burt Likko fills in for Will Truman for this week’s aggregation of dozens of links to themed web randomness!
The Myth of a Man
In Linky Friday #29, Will highlights a recent column in The Atlantic by Hugo Scwhyzer that asked, “What If Men Stopped Chasing Much-Younger Women?” His argument, that the Old Man/Young Woman relationship dynamic intrinsically harms society, was not received well by commenters, either here or at The Atlantic. His concerns about this type of relationship, valid…
