Holiday shopping may just get a little bit more expensive. UPS announces this week that the company will begin charging “Peak” rates during certain time frames. Between November 19th and December 2nd, UPS will charge $0.27 per package for all ground shipments sent to a residential address.
The extra costs will then go away during early December but, will return once again during December 17th and December 23rd. In fact, UPS announced the company would tack on an additional $0.27 surcharge for ground shipments, $0.81 Next-Day Air, and a $0.97 charge for two-or-three-day deliver.
UPS is one of the largest postal shipping company in the world. (WDnet Creation / Shutterstock.com)
While an extra charge, which is at most still less than a dollar, may seem like not much. It can be expensive for retailers who ship thousands of packages through UPS during the holidays. As a result, businesses will have to decide whether they should increase shipping rates, raise prices on products, or bite the bullet and pay the surcharge as a cost of keeping the business alive. Moreover, this will be extremely tight for online retailers who promise free ground shipping.
It is important to note that big packages will also be faced with “peak” surcharges on top of standard surcharges on those shipments.
UPS says the money the company makes from these charges can be used to offset expenses for additional delivery trucks, seasonal workers and other operating costs during the holidays. It is important to note during the 2016 holidays, UPS’s average daily volume was more than 30 million packages for more than half of the available shipping days. As a result, UPS hired about 95,000 seasonal employees to handle the large volume of shipments.
On Tuesday, Amazon announced Prime Wardrobe, which gives Amazon the potential to disrupt the fashion industry further.
The new style platform, Prime Wardrobe, is similar to other subscription service plans like Stitch Fix and Trunk Club. Under the new business model, Amazon Prime’s Prime Wardrobe will include brands like Adidas, Calvin Klein, Levi’s and Hugo Boss. Also, Prime Amazon will deliver shipments in a resealable box along with a prepaid shipping label. Amazon says their goal is to make it easier for shoppers.
Shoppers will have the ability to save up to 20%, try on the clothes before they buy them, and get to choose from over a million items including fashion items designed for women, men, kids, and babies.
How will a customer save money by using Amazon Prime Wardrobe?
Amazon says should a customer keep five or more items, they will be able to receive up to 20% of those items. While keeping three or four fashion items allows the customer to obtain a 10% discount.
This new deal will continue to put pressure on department stores, especially if Amazon starts selling the same items those companies usually carry. Moreover, the new business model “try before you buy” concept has been relatively successful. Stitch Fix earned $730 million last years by letting customers try on clothes at home.
Meanwhile, other retail companies have suffered as more and more people are looking towards saving money and using e-commerce for their shopping needs. In fact, earlier this month the parent company behind Ann Taylor, Lane Brand and Loft announced they would be closing between 250 to 650 stores.
This news comes after Amazon announced the acquisition of Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion. The deal is expected to shape up the grocery retail industry as Amazon continues to invest and implement new technology to the retail industry.
On Monday, Federal and state officials made moves to block the merger between DraftKings Inc. and FanDuel. Government officials argue the combination between the two companies could hurt competition by controlling 90% of the daily fantasy sports market within the United States.
The Federal Trade Commission says it will file a suit seeking a court injunction to block the deal. The FTC was joined by the attorneys general of California and the District of Columbia.
“This merger would deprive customers of the substantial benefits of direct competition between DraftKings and FanDuel,” said Tad Lipsky, the head of the FTC competition department.
DraftKings is the largest fantasy sports company, according to the FTC with FanDuel, which is based out of Scotland is the second largest.
How does DraftKings and FanDuel operate?
Fantasy leagues are the business that runs DraftKings and FanDuel. Users pay a fee to select a line-up of professional athletes; then the customers compete for prizes based on how well athletes do. DraftKings and FanDuel compete to offer the largest prizes by holding different contests, according to the FTC.
In a statement, DraftKings CEO Jason Robins and FanDuel CEO Nigel Eccles explained the two companies would “work together” to determine how the company will move forward.
“We are disappointed by this decision and continue to believe that a merger is in the best interests of our players, our companies, our employees and the fantasy sports industry,” they said.
The FTC voted to authorize their staff to seek a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction in federal court.
According to Los Angeles Daily News, both companies will reportedly operate separately and it is unlikely a merger will take place before the start of this year’s NFL season, which is the fantasy league industry’s most profitable time of the year.
Time Warner and Snap Inc. have announced a deal that will bring more advertising revenue for shows designed for Snapchat. The deal is valued at $100 million and Time Warner will create up to 10 original shows designed for Snapchat every year.
Also, Time Warner also announces they will buy ads for HBO, Turner, and Warner Bros. on Snapchat.
The new shows include scripted content, daily news, documentaries, and comedies. The Time Warner productions will be similar to those already aired on the platform and released by other networks on Snapchat.
Currently, Snapchat runs programming that runs between 3 to 5 minutes long in a vertical format. At the moment, there is one new show airing per day. This deal will create about three new shows per day, varying between the different types of genres.
Snap will keep 50% of the ad revenue generated by the shows, and the content partners will be able to keep the other half, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Presumably, the goal of these new shows is to keep users on the mobile application longer.
Time Warner is committed to investing in advertisements from Time Warner businesses including HBO, Turner and Warner Bros. on Snapchat, which is a huge vote of confidence in the social networking company.
Snapchat is a popular social media application for sharing messages, images, and videos (Ink Drop / Shutterstock.com)
“This is an exciting and natural move as we bring together some of our leading video properties and brands with Snapchat’s dynamic platform,” Time Warner marketing EVP Gary Ginsberg said in a statement. “We’re confident this partnership will help drive larger audiences to our shows and to the new direct to consumer platforms we continue to rollout.”
“This partnership is another exciting step as we continue to branch out into new genres, including scripted dramas, comedies, daily news Shows, documentaries, and beyond,” said Snap’s VP of content Nick Bell.
Following getting inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, his wife giving birth to twins, and tackling the “exploitative” bail industry, Jay-Z has announced his next solo studio album, 4:44, which will be released on June 30.
The album announced through joint Sprint promotion in partnership with Tidal. Also, the new Jay-Z album will be initially exclusive to that streaming platform.
Jay-Z bought Tidal and relaunched the platform in early 2015. Then this year, Sprint bought a $200 million stake in the company, which is good news for the rapper considering Jay-Z purchased the streaming company for $56 million.
Details surrounding Jay Z’s new album have not been released other than a 30 second-long promotional video for the song “Adnis,” which features Academy Award-winning actor Mahershala Ali playing a boxer. Jay-Z could be heard in the background saying:
“Letter to my dad / that I never wrote / Speeches I prepared that I never spoke / Words on a paper that I never read / Proses never penned they stayed in my head.”
Sprint customers will able to obtain a six-month trial of Tidal’s premium service, which offers a higher quality stream of music in comparison to other companies, as a result of the $200 million deal with Tidal.
“Today is an exciting day to be a Sprint customer,” said Marcelo Claure, Sprint president, and CEO. “JAY-Z is a global icon, and we’re giving customers an incredible opportunity to be among the first to experience his new album 4:44. Our loyal, existing customers, and customers who switch to Sprint, can experience the album exclusively, plus access a complimentary six-month trial of TIDAL HiFi, giving them access to content they can’t get anywhere else.”
Sprint is using the cross promotion to promote the company’s 1Million Project, which will provide high school students with wireless devices and unlimited internet access. The program was launched earlier this year to 4,000 students in five different districts, five schools and through a non-profit program.
To ensure the future of the human species SpaceX CEO, Elon Musk, claims building a self-sustaining colony on Mars is critical.
According to Musk’s blueprint, titled “Making Humans a Multi-Planetary Species,” explains the CEO’s vision for making the human race a multi-planetary, space exploring society.
The master plan, which is a summary of Musk’s presentation at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara last year, claims that a future apocalyptic event will force the world to find other planets to live on to prevent extinction.
Helga Esteb / Shutterstock, Inc.
Out of all the options currently available, Musk argues that Mars is the best option especially considering Venus is made up of acid, Mercury is too close to the sun, and Earth’s moon is too small and doesn’t have an atmosphere.
Musk asserts Mars’ environment provides an opportunity for the future.
“It would be quite fun to be on Mars because you would have gravity that is about 37 percent of that of Earth, so you would be able to lift heavy things and bound around, furthermore, the day is remarkably close to that of Earth,” Musk says. “We just need to change the populations because currently, we have seven billion people on Earth and none on Mars.”
Also, Mars has the atmosphere to possibly grow plants as the environment is primarily CO2, nitrogen, argon and several other elements.
That said, traveling to Mars is not cheap. The estimated cost for sending a single person to Mars could cost up to $10 billion. To create a self-sustaining community the cost will need to be substantially decreased.
Therefore, Musk’s new goal is to reduce the cost of traveling to Mars to approximately $200,000. SpaceX CEO says to make it cheaper to get to Mars it will be necessary for rockets to be reusable and to create fuel on Mars rather than making trips back and forth to Earth for fuel.
Musk says that due to Mars’ atmosphere and elements currently available, it is also possible to produce the methane and oxygen required to provide the fueling for the interplanetary spaceship.
FLORIDA, USA, 13th August 2015, SpaceX building with Launchpad 39 at Cape Canaveral, Kennedy Space Center with blue cloudy sky background. Elements of this image furnished by NASA. (L Galbraith / Shutterstock.com)
“It would be pretty absurd to try to build a city on Mars if your spaceships just stayed on Mars and did not go back to Earth,” Musk writes. “You would have a massive graveyard of ships; you have to do something with them.”
Musk plans on using the Raptor engine, which will be “highest chamber pressure engine of any kind ever built.” That said, it will need to have the capacity to carry 100 passengers and condense oxygen and methane for fuel.
“We are talking about a lift-off thrust of 13,000 tons, so it will be quite tectonic when it takes off,” Musk writes. “This is really intended to carry huge numbers of people, ultimately millions of tons of cargo to Mars.”
NEW YORK – DEC 14, 2016: Tesla CEO Elon Musk is seen in the lobby of Trump Tower on December 14, 2016, in New York. (JStone / Shutterstock.com)
Moreover, many ships will need to leave Earth every launch window to transport 1 million people to Mars in a matter of years instead of centuries.
SpaceX hopes that over time and engineering research, the cost to reach Mars could eventually decrease to $100,000.
So when will this interplanetary trip to Mars happen? Well, Musk is vague when it comes to an official date.
“If things go super-well, it might be in the 10-year timeframe, but I do not want to say that is when it will occur,” Musk says. “There is a huge amount of risk. It is going to cost a lot. There is a good chance we will not succeed, but we are going to do our best and try to make as much progress as possible.”
According to a new report published in the Journal of Pediatrics, gun-related injuries are now the third leading cause of death among U.S. kids ages 1 to 17 years old.
Researchers found almost 1,300 children in the U.S. die from a gunshot wound every year. Moreover, an additional 5,790 children are treated for a gunshot injury every year.
Basically, “About 19 children a day die or are medically treated in an emergency department for a gunshot wound in the U.S.,” said lead study author Katherine A. Fowler, a behavioral scientist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
Researchers examined data from three national databases including the National Vital Statistics System, the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, and the National Violent Death Reporting System. Based on this information, researchers examined trends in gun deaths and gun-related injuries among children between 2002 and 2014.
Researchers found, for example, that each year between 2012 and 2014, the majority of gun related deaths were homicides (53 percent).
However, the number of fatalities associated with law enforcement shootings and “firearm deaths of undetermined intent”, which means the circumstances that lead up to the shooting, were not clear.
Three groups were the most likely to die in shootings, black children, older kids, and boys, according to the study.
Who is getting shot?
The study found children who died between 2012 and 2014, 82 percent were males. The rate of gun-related deaths among children among 13 to 17 years old was 12 times higher than the rate of deaths among children under the age of 13.
Moreover, the mortality rate among black children was 4.1 deaths per 100,00 children, which was ten times higher than the rate among non-Hispanic white children and Asian/Pacific Islander children.
Suicides involving a gun have decreased between 2002 and 2006. However, researchers found the number of suicides increased by 60 percent between 2007 and 2014.
The rates of homicide involving guns among kids were also higher in the South and Midwest, in comparison to other parts of the country.
China will send their first X-RAY telescope into space to study black holes. On Thursday, China released their first X-ray space telescope. The new telescope will study black holes and gamma ray bursts in space. Also, scientists will be able to measure magnetic fields and how black holes operate.
The satellite used a Long March-4B rocket and was launched from China’s Gobi Desert at 11 am. The Hard X-ray Modulation Telescope named Insight will now allow researchers to observe the inside of pulsars, gamma-ray bursts, and black holes.
Research into gamma-ray bursts will allow for scientists to better understand gravitational waves and how to use pulsars for space navigation.
Zhang Shuangnan, the lead researcher,told reporters they are excited to further study black holes, gravity, and laws of physics.
“We are looking forward to discovering new activities of black holes and studying the state of neutron stars under extreme gravity and density conditions, and physical laws under extreme magnetic fields. These studies are expected to bring new breakthroughs in physics.”
The new telescope will be able to see new black hole activity by scanning the Milky Way galaxy for areas that emit X-rays. In comparison to other countries telescopes, Insight will have a broader range and larger detection area. As a result, researchers will be the technology to find gamma-ray bursts, pulsars, and black holes more efficiently.
Roiet, Thailand – Aug 23, 2016 : Kindergarten students walk past The Space exposition by China National Space Administration(CNSA) at Roiet Science Centre, Thailand (Akarat Phasura / Shutterstock.com)
China’s Space Program
China is investing billions of dollars in their space program. Earlier this year, China’s first cargo spacecraft was docked with an orbiting space lab as the country is working on having their own crewed space station by 2022. Earlier this week, Chinese researchers were able to recreate a “spooky” space physical phenomenon, which could change data encryption forever.
The Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS (PACHA) is an organization for providing recommendations and information to the President of the United States, as well as providing a strategy for combating the disease. However, on Friday, six members of PACHA resigned. In fact, several of the members wrote an op-ed, which was published in Newsweek, arguing that they can no longer do their job under a “president who simply does not care.”
The op-ed was written by Scott Schoettes, who was supported by five other members including Lucy Bradley-Springer, Gina Brown, Ulysses Burley III, Michelle Ogle, and Grissel Granados. According to Schoettes, President Donald Trump’s administration has not created a strategy for combating HIV/AIDS in America. Schoettes goes on to say the Trump administration “pushes legislation that will harm people living with HIV and halt or reverse important gains made in the fight against this disease.”
New York, NY USA – July 16, 2016: Donald Trump speaks during introduction Governor Mike Pence as running for vice president at Hilton hotel Midtown Manhattan ( lev radin / Shutterstock, Inc.)
Schoettes points out that the commission met with Secretary Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders during the primaries, but they never met with Trump. Schoettes added that the website for the Office of National Aids Policy was one of the many websites that were taken down after Trump took office. Moreover, Trump has not named the individual assigned to become the head of the White House National AIDS Policy organization, which was created during President Obama’s time in the White House.
The overall main idea in the op-ed is how the administration has created a plan to scale back the Affordable Care Act, claiming the law has resulted in “gains in the percentage of people with HIV who know their status, the percentage engaged in care, [and] the percentage receiving successful treatment.”
Proposals to replace the American Care Act with the American Health Care Act “would be particularly devastating for people living with HIV.”
The several individuals that resigned argue they would “be more effective from the outside,”and are calling for members of Congress to listen to others who are working to reform the healthcare system.
Pacha was created during the Clinton administration in 1995 to provide guidelines and recommendations for the ongoing HIV/AIDS epidemic, which came after President Ronald Reagan’s 1987 Presidential Commission on the HIV Epidemic and the 1988 National Commission on AIDS.
What was PACHA like under President Obama?
The council was able to help craft a new national strategy for HIV/AIDS during the Obama administration. As a result, their guidelines provide ways to reduce infections, increase health care access, reduce inequalities in the healthcare system and design a national strategy to respond to the illness.
When a typical user uses Facebook, it may look like Facebook is not doing much. But, behind the scenes, programmers have developed technology to deliver targeted advertising, relevant content, and information to keep you engaged and returning to the application. With 1.9 billion users worldwide, some of that user-generated content contains violent images, profanity, and even extremist views. So Facebook is revealing how the company is planning to fight terrorism via the social networking application.
Facebook released a new outline that points out the new methods on how to combat this threat by using artificial intelligence and other software.
Monika Bickert, Facebook’s Director of Global Police Management and Brian Fishman, Counterterrorism Policy Manager, said in their latest blog post, “We agree with those who say that social media should not be a place where terrorists have a voice. We want to be very clear how seriously we take this — keeping our community safe on Facebook is critical to our mission.”
[2016-12-26] Facebook Headquarters, 1 Hacker Way, Menlo Park, California, USA. Facebook “like” sign at the entrance sign board and visitors taking photo against it are in this photo (achinthamb / Shutterstock, Inc.)
Facebook will use artificial intelligence to eliminate terrorism on the website. Artificial intelligence is currently being used in image-matching to identify whether an uploaded photo or image is the same as one used by terrorists. They are also creating technology that understands the text, which could recognize propaganda or other language used by terrorists.
Ultimately, Facebook is trying to identify and remove terrorist clusters by eliminating Pages or groups, or determining if an account is connected to other accounts that have already been deleted for terrorism. The company is also actively removing fake accounts and developing artificial intelligence to handle other issues on the platform.
That said, artificial intelligence cannot do everything. Facebook pointed out in an example, “A photo of an armed man waving an ISIS flag might be propaganda or recruiting material, but could be an image in a news story.”
Consequently, Facebook will continue to hire specialists to identify flagged content. The social network enterprise noted they are not alone and the company is sharing their information with Microsoft, Twitter, and YouTube.
