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= = = Stoa Basileios = = =
Stoa Basileios (), meaning Royal Stoa, was a stoa constructed in Ancient Athens in the 6th century BC and substantially altered in the 5th century BC. It was located in the northwest corner (known as "the Herms" because of the great number of "Herma" set up there) of the Athenian Agora.
The Royal Stoa was the headquarters of the King Archon and of the Areopagos council (in charge of religious affairs and crime). A statue of "Themis" (representing Justice) stood in front of the building. Copies of some of the city laws were kept in the Stoa.
The front of the building was where Socrates met Euthyphro and had the conversation which Plato recreated in his "Euthyphro". It was where Socrates was formally charged with impiety by Meletus. Historians believe that the voting for ostracism, a political practice in Athens during the 5th century BC, may have taken place in front of the Royal Stoa.
= = = Shutterstock = = =
Shutterstock is an American provider of stock photography, stock footage, stock music, and editing tools; it is headquartered in New York City. Founded in 2003 by programmer and photographer Jon Oringer, Shutterstock maintains a library of around 200 million royalty-free stock photos, vector graphics, and illustrations, with around 10 million video clips and music tracks available for licensing. Originally a subscription site only, Shutterstock expanded beyond subscriptions into a la carte pricing in 2008. It has been publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange since 2012.
Since its founding Shutterstock has acquired a handful of other companies, starting with Bigstock in 2009 and followed by digital asset management software provider Webdam in 2014. After acquiring Rex Features and PremiumBeat in 2015, Shutterstock signed a partnership agreement with the Associated Press and most recently acquired Flashstock in 2017. It also has licensing deals with companies such as Penske Media Corporation. The company had over 100,000 contributors as of March 2016, with an "active customer base of 1.4 million people in 150 countries."
Shutterstock was founded in 2003 by American entrepreneur and computer programmer Jon Oringer. Creating his own online marketplace, Oringer initially uploaded 30,000 of his own stock photos and made them available via subscription, with unlimited downloads and a monthly starting fee of US$49. When demand exceeded his photo supply, he began hiring additional contributors. In 2006, the firm claimed that it was the "largest subscription-based stock photo agency in the world" with 570,000 images in its collection. The firm branched into film in 2006 with the launch of Shutterstock Footage. , By 2007, the company had 1.8 million photos. Insight Venture Partners invested in the company that year. Shutterstock expanded beyond subscriptions into a la carte pricing in August 2008, with its "On Demand" service removing daily download limits.
On September 23, 2009, Shutterstock announced that it had purchased Bigstock, a rival credit-based microstock photography agency. "Fast Company" argued the deal put "Shutterstock on a competitive playing field with Getty, whose iStockPhoto is also credit-based." Shutterstock had 11 million royalty-free stock images by early 2010. In February 2011, it announced a two-year partnership with the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA)
By April 2012 the company had 18 million royalty-free stock images. The firm announced the Shutterstock Instant tool in May 2012, which displayed images in an interlocking mosaic to increase viewing speed. The product was launched by the newly formed Shutterstock Labs, which develops tools and interfaces for Shutterstock, among other projects. In May 2012, Shutterstock filed for an initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange, which it completed on October 17, 2012 under the ticker SSTK.
Shutterstock, Inc. announced Spectrum, a new "image discovery tool," in March 2013. At the time, the firm had 24 million licensable photos, vectors and illustrations in its portfolio. In August 2013, Shutterstock and Facebook announced a partnership to integrate Shutterstock's library within Facebook's Ad Creator, allowing advertisers to select from Shutterstock's images when creating ads. At the time, Shutterstock was available in 20 languages including Thai, Korean, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, German, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese.
In September 2013, Shutterstock launched Offset, marketplace prioritizing high end curated photos from established artists. In October 2013, the firm stated it served 750,000 customers, with 30 percent of those customers in Europe. Shutterstock's shares had reached a $2.5 billion market value by the fall of 2013, while revenue for 2013 was US$235 million.
In March 2014, Shutterstock acquired Webdam, a provider of online digital asset management software. In May 2014, the firm partnered with Salesforce to integrate Shutterstock's image library into Salesforce's Social Studio. Shutterstock debuted its Palette tool in July 2014, a "multi-color image discovery tool." The firm announced it had surpassed 2 million video clips on September 2, 2014. Shortly afterwards it revealed a new app meant to help contributors with uploading and categorizing photos. Shutterstock's revenue was $328 million in 2014, an increase of 39% from 2013. In 2014, Shutterstock paid "over $83 million to its roughly 80,000 contributors."
In January 2015, Shutterstock acquired both Rex Features, Europe's largest independent photo press agency for $33 million, and PremiumBeat, a stock music and sound effects service, for $32 million. Penske Media Corporation formed a partnership with Shutterstock in June 2015 to create and license entertainment and fashion images. According to the terms of the deal, by 2016 Shutterstock would have an exclusive right and license to PMC's archive, which included magazines such as "Variety", "Women's Wear Daily," and "Deadline". "Crain's" wrote that with the partnership, "Shutterstock, a provider of stock imagery and music tracks, is stepping into the world of red carpets and fashion runways—and taking a key provider of fashion and entertainment photos and video away from archrival Getty Images.".
The company also acquired BEImages, another largest independent photo press agency.
By March 2016, the company had "over 100,000 contributors," with around 70 million images and 4 million video clips available for licensing and sale. That month Shutterstock announced it would be distributing material from the Associated Press in the United States, with the deal to last 3 years and cover 30 million photos and around 2 million videos. The photos were expected to go live in April. According to "Entrepreneur", Shutterstock also had an "active customer base of 1.4 million people in 150 countries."
In July 2016, Shutterstock revealed a partnership with Google advertising products including AdSense, AdWords, and AdMob. The integration allows marketers creating Google ads to directly access Shutterstock images and track ad performance via the Shutterstock API. In October 2016, the firm announced a distribution deal with the European Pressphoto Agency.
In February 2018, Shutterstock invested $15 million into China based ZCool, building on the operational relationship the two firms have had since 2014 when ZCool first became the exclusive distributor of Shutterstock creative content in China. Webdam, which Shutterstock itself acquired back in 2014, was sold to Amsterdam-based Bynder for $49.1 million to move Shutterstock's strategy away from digital asset management. Shutterstock later enter into a partnership with Tencent Social Ads, the online advertising subsidiary of Tencent.
In May 2018, IBM's Watson Content Hub, a content management system (CMS) for marketers to create content using the IBM Watson AI search tool, announced its partnership with Shutterstock,beginning July, 2018.
Shutterstock is headquartered in New York. In October 2013 Shutterstock opened its new European headquarters in Berlin, Germany and by March 2014, Shutterstock had additional offices in Amsterdam, Chicago, Denver, London, Montréal, Paris and San Francisco. After maintaining its New York headquarters for years in a Wall Street office, in March 2014 Shutterstock relocated into the Empire State Building. According to "Inc.", the office was selected with the goal of decreasing commute times for New York employees. The new location was built with no private offices, instead with 23 "pop-in rooms" for private meetings and conferences when needed.
After its founding in 2003 with CEO Jon Oringer as the sole employee, by 2007 Shutterstock had grown to 30 people. In 2010 Oringer hired Thilo Semmelbauer as COO, who had previously worked with TheLadders.com and Weight Watchers. With 295 employees as of October 2013, the firm had grown to 700 employees as of 2016. In 2014, "Fast Company" published an article featuring Shutterstock as an example of a successful "intrapreneur"-reliant company, touting the company's "hackathons" for fostering staff creativity.
In response to the company censoring results in China, over 180 Shutterstock employees signed a petition again the decision.
Shutterstock licenses media for online download on behalf of photographers, designers, illustrators, videographers and musicians, maintaining a library of almost 200 million royalty-free stock photos, vector graphics, and illustrations. Shutterstock also has 10 million video clips and music clips in its portfolio. While Shutterstock currently has several payment models, "The Atlantic" wrote in 2012 that Shutterstock "pioneered the subscription approach to stock photo sales, allowing customers to download images in bulk rather than à la carte." "The Atlantic" further wrote that Shutterstock is "a web community in the manner of a Facebook or a Twitter or a Pinterest, with its value relying almost entirely on the enthusiasms of its contributors."
With potential contributors able to apply to the site for free, Shutterstock has a team of reviewers "charged with ensuring editorial consistency and quality." As of 2016, if one of ten of a photographer's pictures are accepted, then they become a Shutterstock contributor. As of 2011, only around 20 percent of applicants were approved, and "less than 60 percent of all the images uploaded by those approved contributors were ultimately put up on the site." Once approved, contributors can begin uploading their work through the website. They supply keywords, categorize the images, and submit them to the "inspection queue", where images are examined for quality, usefulness and copyright and trademark laws. Each time an image is downloaded, the photographer receives a flat rate. Explains VICE, "photographers retain copyright over their images, but Shutterstock is given full permission to market, display, and license the image to the customers on their site without final approval from the photographer." As of March 2015, contributors added around 50,000 new images daily, and Shutterstock had paid around $250 million to contributors since its founding. In 2014, it paid $80 million to contributors.
In September 2019, engineers at Shutterstock began designing a system to censor results displayed to users with IP addresses in China, with the system being implemented in October 2019. The system returns no results in response to queries such as "President Xi", "Chairman Mao", "Taiwan flag", "dictator" or "yellow umbrella".
The company has a history of aggressive marketing practices including misleading pricing, free trial offers with hidden fees, cumbersome switch of automatic subscription renewal as well as the cancellation of the subscription itself. Because of these practices many consider shutterstock to be a scam , .
Shutterstock began selling stock video in February 2006. Shutterstock Footage operates similarly to their image library, offering video clips by subscription or on a per-clip basis. As of 2014, Shutterstock Footage contained around 2 million royalty-free video clips. Shutterstock Music debuted later, with new content submittable by contributors.
Shutterstock for iPad was launched in November 2011, and in May 2012 the app received a Webby Award for People's Voice in the tablet app category for utilities and services. Shutterstock for iPad was followed in 2012 by a universal iOS app, which by 2013 had been downloaded 650,000 times. The iOS app originally lacked the ability to download images, with that functionality added later. The universal iOS app also included new features for Shutterstock, including the ability to filter image searches by color. Shutterstock debuted an Android App in 2013, and in September 2014, Shutterstock launched an app dedicated to its contributors, both available for iOS and Android. The app allows contributors to upload, keyword and categorize new images.
In 2012, Shutterstock launched Shutterstock Labs, a lab for "exploratory tools and products." In May 2012, Shutterstock Images LLC announced the Shutterstock Instant tool, which according to the company was inspired by Shutterstock for iPad. The interface displays images in an interlocking mosaic view, allowing users to view more photos in less time. Shutterstock Instant was made available on the Shutterstock Labs website. The prototype for the search tool Spectrum was launched on March 21, 2013. With development in-house by Shutterstock Labs, the tool "indexes hexagram data to yield search results by color." In July 2014, Shutterstock launched Palette, which allows users to add colors to the terms of the search, in addition to keywords.
Shutterstock has developed a number of tools utilizing a "convolutional neural network" that it created to help with reverse image search technology. The network is "essentially a computer system that is trained to recognize images – there are millions of specific items such as cats, bicycles, the night sky – and pull up the most relevant photos." It "breaks down the key components of a photo numerically, drawing from its pixel data instead of metadata that is pulled from those tags and keywords."
In March 2016, Shutterstock debuted its Reverse Image Search tool. According to "Entrepreneur," with the tool "users can upload an image, either from Shutterstock or another source, and the tool will call up images that look like and have a similar feel to the original photo." The reverse image search allows users to not just search by keywords, but to also find images based on "color schemes, mood, or shapes." Later that month, the firm debuted its Similar Search and Discovery tools, with the "similar search" option provided beneath photos on its website.
= = = WWE Cyber Sunday = = =
Cyber Sunday was an annual professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). From 2004 to 2005, the event was known as Taboo Tuesday and was exclusive to the Raw brand.
During the event's "Taboo Tuesday" years, it was the first regularly-scheduled pay-per-view held by the company on a Tuesday since 1991's This Tuesday in Texas, the first regularly-scheduled non-Sunday pay-per-view since the 1994 Survivor Series, and the first non-Sunday pay-per-view of any kind since in 1996. The inaugural event was held in October, and the 2005 event was pushed back to early November. By 2006 the show was moved to a more traditional Sunday night slot—alleviating problems with the taping schedule of "SmackDown!" (usually held on Tuesdays)—and renamed Cyber Sunday.
The most distinctive feature of Cyber Sunday was the ability for fans to vote on certain aspects of every match. The voting typically began in the middle of an episode of "Raw" a few weeks beforehand and ended during the pay-per-view, often moments before the match was slated to begin. Because of this, Cyber Sunday was billed as an "interactive pay-per-view". For the first four events, voting was made online through WWE.com, with the official tag line for the PPV being ""Log On. Take Over."" In 2008 however, this was replaced by votes through text messaging but this was only available to United States mobile carriers. However, the match between The Undertaker and The Big Show was made universal, as fans were allowed to vote for the match stipulation on WWE.com.
In 2009, the event's Pay-Per-View slot was replaced by Bragging Rights. However, the fan interaction aspects of the pay-per-view have since been incorporated into "Raw" as "WWEActive" (originally "RawActive") for most "Raw" episodes.
= = = Anne-Marie Hurst = = =
Anne-Marie Hurst was the lead vocalist for the groups the Elements, Skeletal Family and Ghost Dance. She was the lead vocalist of the Elements until 1982. In December 1982, she helped form Skeletal Family. After departing from Skeletal Family in 1985, she co-founded Ghost Dance with Gary Marx (formerly of the Sisters of Mercy).
Hurst released her first solo album, "Day of All Days", in 2011 on Jungle Records.
= = = Poughkeepsie Galleria = = =
The Poughkeepsie Galleria (locally known as "The Galleria") is a shopping center on U.S. 9 in the Town of Poughkeepsie, New York, located just north of Wappingers Falls, and is the largest shopping center in Dutchess County. The Galleria has an area of with two floors containing 123 shops and restaurants as well as a 16-screen, stadium-seating Regal Cinemas theater.
The Galleria is owned and managed by The Pyramid Companies, a group who also owns and manages regional sister mall the Palisades Center in West Nyack, NY. The Galleria has adopted the Pyramid corporate "MB-18" teenage curfew policy on Friday and Saturday evenings, a policy that began in September 2005. Anchor stores include Best Buy, Dick's Sporting Goods, JCPenney, Macy's, Sears, and Target.
In the early 1980s, a proposal for a two-story indoor mall in Poughkeepsie, New York was submitted. Despite much conflict and many protests, the proposal was submitted, and the mall opened on August 1, 1987 as the Poughkeepsie Galleria Mall.
Upon opening, the mall had five anchor stores: G. Fox & Co., Jordan Marsh, Lechmere, Filene's, and J. C. Penney. Due to underperformance, the Filene's store closed in 1989 and was replaced with Steinbach, which relocated from South Hills Mall next door. Sears also announced plans to relocate from South Hills Plaza at the same time. Steinbach closed in 1995 and became Dick's Sporting Goods and DSW Shoe Warehouse the same year. Filene's returned to the mall in the early 1990s by taking over the defunct G. Fox chain, while Sears ultimately opened at the mall after Jordan Marsh was vacated. Montgomery Ward also moved into the mall in the early 1990s, becoming the sixth anchor and replacing an existing store in Poughkeepsie.
In 2004, both DSW and Dick's moved to new locations vacated by Montgomery Ward, while the former Filene's and Lechmere building was converted to Target.
During January 2005, the mall announced it would enact and begin enforcing the Pyramid Companies' "MB-18" teenage curfew policy beginning in September 2005, following a large fight involving young teenagers in front of then-Filene's. Due to the size of the incident, local police were called, and several arrests were made. Filene's was converted to Macy's in 2006.
= = = Mirko Marjanović = = =
Mirko Marjanović (, ; 27 July 1937 – 21 February 2006) was a former Prime Minister of Serbia from 1994 to 2000 and a high-ranking official in Slobodan Milošević's Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS).
Marjanović was born into a large working-class family with 7 children in Knin, in the Littoral Banovina of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (present-day Croatia). He had 4 brothers and 2 sisters. His father, Dušan, worked in the local factory, while mother Marija was a homemaker.
After completing primary school and gymnasium in his hometown, Marjanović moved to Zagreb where he attended musical academy which he never finished.
He then moved to Belgrade, where in 1960 he graduated at University of Belgrade's Faculty of Economics, more specifically at the department for microeconomics.
Upon graduation, Marjanović came back to Knin since he found employment there as the supervisor in Tvik factory. From there, he advanced to the position of financial director, and eventually moving on to metallurgical factory in Zenica. In 1973, he transferred to the Moscow outpost of Progres - a state company that handled close to 80% of Yugoslav black metallurgy and other heavy industries.
By 1976 he quickly advanced up the ranks to become one of the directors at Progres. He handled company's steel division in Russia quite successfully while developing an impressive network of influential friends and business partners such as Viktor Chernomyrdin (later to become Prime Minister of Russia), and Yuri Brezhnev, son of Leonid Brezhnev.
In 1979, Marjanović was named as Progres' general director.
From 1989 until 1994, he was the president of FK Partizan's executive board. One of his more notable moves while at the post was bringing Predrag Mijatović to the club in December 1989. Mijatović, at the time a young promising player from Titograd's FK Budućnost, was very close to signing with Hajduk Split when Marjanović stepped in and convinced him to come to Belgrade. Upon leaving the club, Marjanović was named Partizan's honorary president.
Marjanović officially commenced his PM term on 18 March 1994. He was widely regarded as little more than a puppet of then Serbian president Slobodan Milošević.
After early parliamentary elections in late 1997, Milošević's SPS-led coalition (with Yugoslav Left and New Democracy) formed a government with far-right Serbian Radical Party (SRS) led by Vojislav Šešelj. Marjanović was picked for another PM term that started on March 24, 1998.
Naturally, Marjanović continued as a mere extension of Slobodan Milošević who at this time held the post of President of Yugoslavia. Here's how sources from the top levels of Milošević's Socialist Party of Serbia described Marjanović's government modus operandi in "Evropljanin" magazine: "Prime Minister Marjanović suggests something – ministers do not vote – and then Marjanović simply concludes the matter as agreed on. Of course Marjanović neither suggests nor concludes anything without first consulting Milošević". ("Evropljanin" issue #13, 19 October 1998, p. 15)
Even deputy PM Vojislav Šešelj indirectly confirmed this operating procedure when he said the government meetings are always well prepared, never lasting longer than 15–20 minutes. ("Srpska slobodarska misao", Vol. I 2000, issue #1, p. 142)
This two-year period is widely seen as the most brutal whilst Serbia was led by Milošević. Marjanović's government (with Šešelj as its deputy PM), passed two of what critics consider to be the most draconian pieces of legislation in Serbian political history: the University Law that stripped the University of Belgrade of its autonomy, opening the way for the government to install professors, deans and rectors, as well as the Information Law, which aimed to restrict the activities of media financed by political enemies; despite this, the media played a prominent role in the 5 October 2000 coup d'état.
Similarly to his first term in office, Marjanović again took a back seat, leaving the limelight to more aggressive members of his cabinet like deputy PM Šešelj and Minister of Information Aleksandar Vučić.
On 21 October 2000, two weeks after the Bulldozer Revolution, Marjanović resigned to be replaced by a transitional government composed of the Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS), the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS), and the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) until new parliamentary elections could be organized.
Marjanović continued to lead Progres all throughout his six and a half years as Serbian PM, though he claimed his status at the company was frozen. The company, which during the 1990s started importing gas from Russia (deal personally negotiated by Marjanović) was still officially publicly owned.
Although allegations of wrongdoing ran rampant for years, Marjanović was never prosecuted. No legal action was taken against him after the new authorities took office following the overthrow of Slobodan Milošević in October 2000. On 23 January 2002, Marjanović was re-elected as Progres' main board president.
He died on 21 February 2006, in Belgrade, at age of 68, from undisclosed causes.
= = = Jessica Schultz = = =
Jessica Schultz (born January 2, 1985 in Anchorage, Alaska) is an American curler from Richfield, Minnesota. She currently plays second for Erika Brown.
Schultz was a member of the United States women's curling team at the 2006 Winter Olympics. For the 2006 U.S. World Team Trials in March, Schultz was named skip, or captain, of Team USA (the team's regular skip, Cassie Johnson, did not play in the tournament), and the team finished fourth under her direction.
She joined the Erika Brown rink in 2011. Brown and her team won the 2013 United States Women's Curling Championship and went on to represent the United States at the 2013 World Women's Curling Championship, finishing in fourth after losing the bronze medal game to Canada's Rachel Homan. They also qualified to participate at the 2014 United States Olympic Curling Trials. They finished first in the round robin standings and defeated Allison Pottinger in a best-of-three series final to clinch the berth to the Olympics.
She lived in Duluth, Minnesota. While attending Lake Superior College, she studied physical therapy.
= = = Bobby Kingsbury = = =
Bobby Kingsbury (born August 30, 1980) in Cleveland, Ohio, is an American baseball player. He is a two-time Atlantic 10 Player of the Year and went on to play in the Pittsburgh Pirates minor-league organization. Kingsbury was the first baseball player to earn back-to-back Atlantic 10 Player of the Year Awards, in 2001 and 2002. He went to school at Fordham where he set an NCAA record for stolen bases in a game (8), and was drafted by the Pirates in the 8th round of the 2002 Major League Baseball Draft, but his excellent glove, a quick bat, an intelligent hitting approach, and his work ethic could have given him a third or fourth-round pick if he'd gone to a warm-weather college.
During the 2004 Summer Olympics held in Athens, Greece, Kingsbury, who has a Greek grandmother, was given the chance to play for the host nation, Greece. Most of the players on the Greek baseball team were Americans with Greek heritage, including North Florida coach Dusty Rhodes, and White Sox scout John Kazanas, Clay Bellinger of the Orioles, outfielders Nick Markakis the Orioles and Nick Theodorou of the Dodgers, and catchers Mike Tonis of Royals and George Kottaras of the Padres.
Kingsbury, an alumnus and 2008 Hall of Fame inductee of Fordham University and current member of the Pittsburgh Pirates organization, picked up one of the biggest hits of the tournament for Greece, an RBI triple, in their lone win, which came against Italy in the preliminary round.
In the spring of 2006, Kingsbury was invited to the Pirates major-league camp in Bradenton, FL as a non-roster invitee. During the seventh inning of the first game against the Philadelphia Phillies, Kingsbury dove for a ball in right field and upon hitting the ground dislocated his left throwing shoulder. He fully tore his rotator cuff and labrum thus ending his 2006 campaign.
= = = The Curse of the Daleks = = =
The Curse Of The Daleks is a Dalek stage play, written by David Whitaker and Terry Nation, which appeared for one month at the Wyndham's Theatre in London beginning 21 December 1965. It is notable for being Terry Nation's first live action attempt to exercise his ownership of the Dalek concept independently of the BBC. As such, it does not include the character of the Doctor, the TARDIS or any other elements from the "Doctor Who" television series. Produced by John Gale and Ernest Hecht, and directed by Gillian Howell, it was performed mostly as a matinée indicating that children were the intended primary audience.
Following the crash landing of an Earth spacecraft on Skaro, one of the astronauts believes he can turn the Daleks into his servants. As ever, the Daleks have other plans.
Freelance writers for the BBC were allowed to retain intellectual property rights over concepts and characters they introduced into individual serials. As a result, Terry Nation found himself co-owning the Dalek phenomenon of the mid-1960s. Nation was eager to find some way of divorcing them from the "Doctor Who" universe so that he could build a franchise which would not require BBC cooperation, and two such attempts were made in 1965.
One was the Doctor and companionless episode "Mission to the Unknown". Though commonly known as an introduction to the "Doctor Who" serial, "The Daleks' Master Plan", it was also preparatory to a proposed Dalek-only pilot called, "The Destroyers". Had it been completed, "The Destroyers" would have been centred on the same "Space Security Service" seen in "Mission to the Unknown" and "Master Plan".
The play was the second attempt, which introduced the idea of the accidental human discovery of the planet Skaro (similar to the storyline of the TARDIS crew in "The Daleks"), and the humans' subsequent reaction against the Daleks.
While this was the only one of the approaches to be produced on the strength of Terry Nation's ownership alone, it received no further independent development. Elements from this play were later reworked by David Whitaker for the Second Doctor television story "The Power of the Daleks".