Coconut oil is as unhealthy as butter, according to American Heart Association.
While Coconut oil is commonly considered as a healthier alternative, US health experts say coconut oil can raise “bad” cholesterol. In fact, the American Heart Associations says no research supports coconut oil as a healthier food alternative.
On Friday, the American Heart Association updated their guidelines on fats, which are found in foods such as butter, beef, and coconut oil. While the organization acknowledges that the majority of saturated fats in the American diet come from animal products, it also says that plant products such as coconut oil can also contain saturated fats as well.
Concerning calorie and fat content, coconut has as many calories as olive oil. But unlike a tablespoon of olive oil, which as one gram of saturated fat, the same amount of coconut oil has 12 grams.
The American Health Association says the high amount of saturated fat content in animal products such as butter and coconut oil can raise levels of “bad” cholesterol. Scientists, nutritionists, and health experts say people should avoid saturated fats because they are linked to high cholesterol and type 2 diabetes.
As a result, olive oil is currently the healthier alternative.
Amazon rocked businesses around the world on Friday when the company announced plans to buy Whole Foods Markets and enter the grocery retail business. The $13.7 billion deal will take the battle between Walmart and Amazon to a new level.
The deal between Amazon and Whole Foods Markets will shake up the grocery industry as Amazon has been investing and testing new technology to transform the retail industry, such as Amazon Go, now the company has physical locations to test and implement those new technological innovations.
MONTREAL, CANADA – MARCH 10, 2016 – Amazon shipping box with branded tape on it. Amazon is one of the most popular and biggest online store. (dennizn / Shutterstock.com)
News of the deal sent shares of competing retailers such as Walmart, Target, Costco, and Kroger down as much as 13% as Wall Street investors tried to understand how Amazon’s new purchase will change the grocery industry.
In a statement, Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder, and CEO said why Whole Foods Markets is a great business model.
“Millions of people love Whole Foods Market because they offer the best natural and organic foods, and they make it fun to eat healthy.” Bezos added, “Whole Foods Market has been satisfying, delighting and nourishing customers for nearly four decades – they’re doing an amazing job and we want that to continue.”
John Mackey, Whole Foods co-founder, and CEO reveals how this partnership will change the grocery retail chain. “This partnership presents an opportunity to maximize value for Whole Foods Market’s shareholders, while at the same time extending our mission and bringing the highest quality, experience, convenience and innovation to our customers.”
Following the news of the deal, Whole Food Market will continue to operate under the name and brand of Whole Food Market and source their goods from trusted vendors and partners. John Mackey will remain as the company’s CEO, and the headquarters will continue to stay in Texas.
Before the deal is finalized, it has to be approved by Whole Foods Market’s shareholders, regulatory officials and other closing conditions. The deal is expected to close by the second half of 2017.
Whole Foods presents a new opportunity for Amazon. Amazon Go introduced a grocery retail world where individuals can go grocery shopping without a checkout counter. Now, with hundreds of Whole Foods Markets across the country, Amazon can implement this new technology and disrupt the entire grocery retail industry. In fact, a report released by the Council of Economic Advisers found that technology will replace nearly all jobs that earn $20/hour and if Amazon decides to implement Amazon Go into Whole Foods, this could potentially change consumer shopping forever.
Are you a huge fan of the hit HBO series Game of Thrones? If so, then I have some amazing news.
According to reports, Elevator Casting is looking for major Game of Thrones fans ages 18 to 30 years to work on a paid on-camera focus group. The casting company is looking for fans of the TV show to talk about their favorite characters and moments on the show. Those selected to work on the focus group will have an interview via SKYPE which will take place on Friday, June 16th.
LOS ANGELES, CA – SEPTEMBER 20, 2015: “Game of Thrones” star Peter Dinklage at the 67th Primetime Emmy Awards at the Microsoft Theatre LA Live.
Game of Thrones is one of the most watched shows on television with one of the biggest fan bases around the world. The seventh season of the hit HBO TV series is set to premiere on July 16th and conclude on August 27th. Unlike previous seasons that had ten episodes, the seventh season will only have seven episodes. Moreover, the show will largely feature content currently not found in George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series but will be adapted to the material from the upcoming sixth and seventh novels.
The show was adapted for TV by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss. The series features a large cast including Emmy award winning actors. Most notably, Peter Dinklage, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Lena Headed, Emilia Clarke and Kit Harrington star in the series. The new season will also introduce new characters.
Share prices of Snapchat’s parent company Snap continue to fall as the company’s IPO price for the first time since the company made its market debut.
Shares of Snap Inc dropped nearly 5 percent on Thursday to their IPO price, illustrating how Wall Street has lost confidence in the company as it faces fierce competition from Facebook.
Snap, a company that considers its self a camera enterprise instead of a social media company, ohs Snapchat a mobile application that allows users to capture video and pictures that delete after a few seconds. The stock price of Snapchat hit $17, the price set last March.
It is important to note that Snap hit a $29.44 high days after it Wall Street but the value of the company has declined with Thursday’s price being the lowest since the company’s IPO.
NEW YORK CITY, NY- March 2, 2017: Snapchat’s Snap Inc. makes IPO debut on the New York Stock Exchange NYSE. Investors flocked to initial public offering, pushing valuation of nearly $24 billion. (NYCStock / Shutterstock.com)
Recent studies have show Snapchat is extremely popular and one of the most popular social media applications for teenagers and young millennials. But many investors on Wall Street are apprehensive about how the company can return a profit due to its slow user growth after Instagram launched features similar to Snapchat. In fact, a February Techcrunch report found Snapchat’s growth stalled by 82% following the release of Instagram Stories. Moreover, following the release of Instagram Stories, Snapchat had the lowest growth quarter since the company released their data in 2014.
Even the company highlighted the fact is now facing fierce competition. Snapchat explained in their IPO filing: “We face significant competition in almost every aspect of our business both domestically and internationally,” Snap Inc told. Not to mention, the company pointed out that their competition “mimic our products and therefore harm our user engagement and growth.”
That said, it is important to note that after Facebook made its stock market debut the company’s stock price dropped below its IPO price in its second day of trading. However, since then the company is now up more than 300 percent since its IPO.
HBO is ramping up production for their new movie surrounding Penn State, Joe Paterno, and the Jerry Sandusky scandal.
According to Project Casting, casting directors are now seeking men and women ages 18 to 25 to play college students in the upcoming HBO feature film as it shoots in New York starting this July. Filming is expected to wrap this September.
Variety reports that the movie will center around Joe Paterno, the winningest coach in college football history, as he becomes mixed into the Penn State Jerry Sandusky sexual abuse scandal. The HBO movie will focus on Paterno’s legacy, and the college football coach is forced to face harsh questions.
(Image Credit: Paul Kane / Tinseltown / via Shutterstock.com)
About the Penn State Child Sex Abuse Scandal
In case you missed it, the Penn State child sex abuse scandal centers around Jerry Sandusky, a former assistant football coach for the Penn State Nittany Lions. Sandusky was charged and convicted of multiple counts of sexual abuse of children as the coach located and groomed victims through his charity organization, The Second Mile.
The scandal started in early 2011 when Sandusky was indicted on over 50 counts of child molestation. While Sandusky’s abuse may have begun over 40 years ago, he was charged with abuse that occurred between 1994 and 2009. Moreover, three school officials including the school president Graham Spanier and athletic director Tim Curley were charged with perjury, obstruction of justice, failure to report suspected child abuse and other related charges. After the child sex abuse scandal had broken, Spanier designed, and the Penn State Board of Trustees terminated the contracts of head football coach, Joe Paterno.
UNIVERSITY PARK, PA – OCT 9: Penn State’s coach Joe Paterno watches his players warm up before a game against Illinois at Beaver Stadium October 9, 2010 in University Park, PA (Editorial credit: Richard Paul Kane / Shutterstock.com)
According to an independent investigation by former FBI director Louis Freeh and his law firm, the Freeh report found that Spanier and Paterno had known about allegations of child abuse conducted by Sandusky as early as 1998, and did not disclose them. As a result, Freeh argued that the most senior leaders at Penn State showed “total disregard for the safety and welfare of Sandusky’s child victims,” which called for Sandusky to become “empowered” to continue his abuse.
By March 2017, an investigation by the Penn State officials ended with Curley, Schultz, and Spanier guilty of misdemeanor charges of child endangerment, and in June 2017, all three were sentenced to prison.
To attract new users to the social network, Twitter is redesigning their applications. The renovations to their mobile, desktop and web platforms is not a major change from its prior user experience but, the updates will include a series of small changes to things like where settings are located, changes to the typography, and more.
Instead of tapping over to your profile to find the settings section on iOS, everything related to settings has been moved to a new left-side navigation menu. That means you will no longer see a “profile” button at the top of the app. Twitter says the new change will reduce clutter. Now, users can sweep right on the home screen to see the new menu, where you will find your profile, setting sand other options.
Twitter, inc.
For Android users, these changes were implemented last summer, and because of their positive response, Twitter is making those changes to iOS.
Other changes to the Twitter app include profile icons are now round instead of square. Plus, typography is more consistent, while headlines such as “Trending Now” are bolder to increase user engagement.
In addition, Twitter has changed their Reply icon. The icon was fairly standard and a recognizable symbol. But in an effort to appear to new users, the arrow has been changed into a conversation bubble, similar to Facebook’s comment icon.
While the changes are not major, the change illustrates how Twitter is evolving. Twitter was original a messaging system that allowed for microblogging. It has later become a place for people to engage in group chats. Now, you can post nearly anything from text, to photos, to videos, and most recently moments. Now, the new “comment” feature will make it similar to Facebook, which may help the company attract new users.
The Retweet, Like, and DM icons also were revamped and changed.
It is important to note that changes such as the ability to edit previous tweets have not been implemented. Currently, the company has 328 million monthly active users, which could be attributed to Donald Trump’s tweets.
JUNE 13, 2017: Close up of mobile phone screen with the Twitter account of Donald Trump. The American President has over 32 million followers on Twitter. (Editorial credit: Tero Vesalainen / Shutterstock.com)
The biggest change iOS users may see is that web links will now open in Safari’s View controller within the Twitter app, which will make it easier to access accounts other websites.
Twitter says the changes will be launched today to Twitter for iOS and Twitter for Android through an update.
According to a new study, fever during pregnancy may increase the risk for autism in a child later on.
Researchers from Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health studied information on nearly 96,000 children born in Norway from 1999 to 2009. Scientists found there were 538 cases of autism spectrum disorder among those in the group. Researchers also discovered that moms of 15,701 reported one or more fevers during their pregnancy, that is similar to rates seen in the United States. Out of those pregnant women who had a fever, 583 gave birth to an autistic child.
Despite the correlation, researchers were unable to define a cause and effect relationship between a fever during a pregnancy and autistic newborns. It was only able to detect a connection between the two.
Columbia’s Dr. Mady Hornig, director of translational research at the Center for Infection and Immunity said, “We had maternal reports of fever at 4-week intervals throughout the entire pregnancy, and we were able to link these data to the autism data we had collected through various methods and also through a patient registry.”
Hornig told CBS News, “We were interested in trying to understand the role of fever because of prior reports with respect to fever, but there were not many. And there had also been many suggestions over the years that various types of infections in mothers during pregnancy had been associated with autism outcomes.”
Hornig argued that every woman who develops a fever during her pregnancy will give birth to an autistic child. Rather, fevers are just a response to an infection and “ it is common during pregnancy. The absolute risk is low. The vast majority of women who get an infection with fever, even flu, are not going to end up having a child with autism,” Hornig told the New Independent.
That said, Hornig says it may just be a deficiency in the mother’s immune system that causes the child to be born autistic.
“There is something in the mother’s immune response that may increase the risk for the infant,” Hornig said. “But it’s not in every mother. We don’t think this is a pathway for autism. We don’t think it’s the only way autism is triggered in children.”
Nike announced that the company plans to cut approximately 1,400 jobs as part of a plan to revamp their e-commerce and retail sector.
On Thursday, the company announced a new initiative to expand their direct selling to consumers and developing their e-commerce platform. As a result, two percent of their global workforce will be cut to implement a “Consumer Direct offense.” The new reorganization project will target customers in 12 different cities. These cities include New York, London, Shanghai, Beijing, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Paris, Berlin, Mexico City, Barcelona, Seoul, and Milan as these cities are expected to account for more than 80% of the company’s growth through 2020.
BEIJING, CHINA- APRIL 7, 2017: A kid rides bicycle next to a Nike Air shoes billboard at Sanlitun SOHO. Nike, Inc. is an American multinational corporation, founded in 1964, serves worldwide (Editorial credit: testing / Shutterstock.com)
“In the new alignment, the company will drive growth by deeply serving consumers in 12 key cities,” the company said in a statement. “Nike is moving closer to the consumer — creating a local business, on a global scale.”
The company is restructuring their global business so the firm can focus on building a digital and merchandising platform that is more responsive to the previously mentioned markets.
Nike is also changing the product cycle times of they apparel in half and investing in new categories that are expected to have the greatest growth potential such as, running, baseball and young athletes.
This news comes after retail stores are closing hundreds of stores due to pressure from Amazon and other e-commerce giants.
“Today we serve our athletes in a changing world: one that’s faster and more personal,” said Trevor Edwards, president of the Nike Brand.
“This new structure aligns all of our teams toward our ultimate goal — to deliver innovation, at speed, through more direct connections.”
Shia LaBeouf is traveling to Savannah, Georgia alongside Fifty Shades of Grey actress, Dakota Johnson, for the new movie The Peanut Butter Falcon.
According to Project Casting, casting directors are now hiring kid actors, background extras, photo doubles, and featured roles to work on the new movie.
The Peanut Butter Falcon centers around a crab fisherman as he starts on a journey to get a young man with Down syndrome into a professional wrestling school in rural North Carolina and away from the retirement home where he’s lived most of his life. The movie is written and directed by Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz. The film will also star Zachary Gottsegen from the film Becoming Bulletproof.
LOS ANGELES, CA. February 2, 2017: Actress Dakota Johnson at the premiere of “Fifty Shades Darker” at The Theatre at The Ace Hotel, Los Angeles. (Editorial Credit: Jaguar PS / Shutterstock.com)
Shia LaBeouf recently premiered his latest production American Honey, where he played Jake in the Andrea Arnold production. The movie centered around a teenage girl with nothing to lose who joins a traveling magazine sales crew and gets caught up in a binge-filled life with non-stop partying across the Midwest. The movie was selected to compete for the Palme d’Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival where it won the Jury Prize. Also, for the 70th BAFTA Awards American Honey received a nomination for Best British film.
This news comes after T.I.’s new movie The Traplaunched an open casting call for background actors, photo doubles, and stand-ins in Atlanta and the recent announcement that made Georgia the filmmaking capital of the world.
Study finds people who eat fried potatoes are more likely to die earlier than individuals who do not.
According to a recent study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, people who eat fried potatoes two or more times a week double their risk of an early death in comparison to individuals who avoid fried potatoes.
Dr. Nicola Veronese, the lead author of the study and a scientist at the National Research Council in Padova, Italy, says more and more people are eating fried potatoes around the world. In fact, according to the National Potato Council, Americans consumed 112.1 pounds of potatoes per person in 2014.
According to the US Department of Agriculture, the vast majority of potatoes consumption is processed french fries.
Veronese and his team monitored over 4,000 people aged 45 to 79 over eight years to study how people eat of potatoes and how it affected their health. Even though many individuals understand eating fried potatoes are unhealthy, there is not much data on the topic, Veronese explained to CNN in a statement. So, researchers decided to break up the 4,440 participants into groups and understand how frequently they ate potatoes and how it impacted their health.
Over the course of eight years, a total of 236 participants died. Analyzing the data, researchers found that those who ate fried potatoes two to three times each week doubled their risk of dying in comparison to those who did not eat fried potatoes. Moreover, researchers found that age or sex of the participants did not influence the results of the study. However, men were more likely than women, and younger participants were more likely than older participants to enjoy fried food.
