This Oct. 23, 2019 file photo shows Bruce Springsteen at the world premiere of HBO Documentary Films’ “Very Ralph” in New York. Springsteen will return to Broadway this summer for a limited run of his one-man show “Springsteen on Broadway.” Performances at the St. James Theatre begin June 26 with an end date set — at least for now — for Sept. 4. | AP
Performances at the St. James Theatre begin June 26 with an end date set — at least for now — for Sept. 4.
NEW YORK — The Boss just can’t quit Broadway.
Bruce Springsteen will return to Broadway this summer for a limited run of his one-man show “Springsteen on Broadway.” Performances at the St. James Theatre begin June 26 with an end date set — at least for now — for Sept. 4.
“I loved doing ‘Springsteen on Broadway’ and I’m thrilled to have been asked to reprise the show as part of the reopening of Broadway,” the rocker said in a statement.
“Springsteen on Broadway” debuted in 2017 and was extended three times, finally closing in late 2018. Columbia Records put out a two-disc soundtrack of “Springsteen on Broadway” and a filmed version of the show is on Netflix.
In the show, Springsteen performs 15 songs — including “My Hometown,” “Thunder Road,” and “Born in the USA” — and tells stories about growing up in New Jersey. Some of the stories will be familiar to readers of his autobiography, and he even reads from it. His wife, Patti Scialfa, accompanies him for “Brilliant Disguise.”
Audience members will be required to provide proof of full COVID-19 vaccination in order to enter the theater.
This 2019 photo provided by NOAA shows the Mauna Loa Atmospheric Baseline Observatory, high atop Hawaii’s largest mountain in order to sample well-mixed background air free of local pollution. Heat-trapping carbon dioxide levels in the air peaked in May 2021, in amounts nearly 50% higher than when the industrial age began and they are growing at a record fast rate, scientists reported Monday, June 7, 2021. | AP
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the average carbon dioxide level for May was 419.13 parts per million. That’s 1.82 parts per million higher than May 2020 and 50% higher than the stable pre-industrial levels of 280 parts per million, said NOAA climate scientist Pieter Tans.
The annual peak of global heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the air has reached another dangerous milestone: 50% higher than when the industrial age began.
And the average rate of increase is faster than ever, scientists reported Monday.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the average carbon dioxide level for May was 419.13 parts per million. That’s 1.82 parts per million higher than May 2020 and 50% higher than the stable pre-industrial levels of 280 parts per million, said NOAA climate scientist Pieter Tans.
Carbon dioxide levels peak every May just before plant life in the Northern Hemisphere blossoms, sucking some of that carbon out of the atmosphere and into flowers, leaves, seeds and stems. The reprieve is temporary, though, because emissions of carbon dioxide from burning coal, oil and natural gas for transportation and electricity far exceed what plants can take in, pushing greenhouse gas levels to new records every year.
“Reaching 50% higher carbon dioxide than preindustrial is really setting a new benchmark and not in a good way,” said Cornell University climate scientist Natalie Mahowald, who wasn’t part of the research. “If we want to avoid the worst consequences of climate change, we need to work much harder to cut carbon dioxide emissions and right away.”
Climate change does more than increase temperatures. It makes extreme weather — storms, wildfires, floods and droughts — worse and more frequent and causes oceans to rise and get more acidic, studies show. There are also health effects, including heat deaths and increased pollen. In 2015, countries signed the Paris agreement to try to keep climate change to below what’s considered dangerous levels.
The one-year jump in carbon dioxide was not a record, mainly because of a La Nina weather pattern, when parts of the Pacific temporarily cool, said Scripps Institution of Oceanography geochemist Ralph Keeling. Keeling’s father started the monitoring of carbon dioxide on top of the Hawaiian mountain Mauna Loa in 1958, and he has continued the work of charting the now famous Keeling Curve.
Scripps, which calculates the numbers slightly differently based on time and averaging, said the peak in May was 418.9.
Also, pandemic lockdowns slowed transportation, travel and other activity by about 7%, earlier studies show. But that was too small to make a significant difference. Carbon dioxide can stay in the air for 1,000 years or more, so year-to-year changes in emissions don’t register much.
The 10-year average rate of increase also set a record, now up to 2.4 parts per million per year.
“Carbon dioxide going up in a few decades like that is extremely unusual,” Tans said. “For example, when the Earth climbed out of the last ice age, carbon dioxide increased by about 80 parts per million and it took the Earth system, the natural system, 6,000 years. We have a much larger increase in the last few decades.”
By comparison, it has taken only 42 years, from 1979 to 2021, to increase carbon dioxide by that same amount.
“The world is approaching the point where exceeding the Paris targets and entering a climate danger zone becomes almost inevitable,” said Princeton University climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer, who wasn’t part of the research.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
The Chicago Cubs have been among the surprises of the National League this season as the regular season is currently in the month of June and the Cubs are tied with the Milwaukee Brewers at the top of the National League Central division. The Chicago Cubs might have some flexibility with their payroll now. Entering […]
PARIS — Google is being fined $268 million by France’s antitrust watchdog for abusing its ‘dominant’ position in online advertising.
The search engine giant is also promising to overhaul the way its platform is used for buying and selling digital ads, at least in France, which could have repercussions on its ongoing legal fights with regulators elsewhere in Europe, the U.S. and around the world.
Google’s advertising practices have harmed its competitors along with publishers of mobile websites and applications, the French Competition Authority said Monday. The authority said it is the responsibility of a company with a dominant market position to avoid unfairly undermining its competition.
Google, based in Mountain View, California, did not dispute the facts and opted to settle after proposing some changes, according to a prepared statement from the Competition Authority.
The settlement might serve as a roadmap for other governments that are scrutinizing Google’s market power, said Douglas Melamed, a Stanford University law professor.
“I imagine that Google’s decision to settle reflected a judgment that it could live with those terms even if it were forced upon it by other jurisdictions,” he said.
The head of the authority, Isabelle de Silva, said the decision was unprecedented in the way that it delved into the complex algorithmic auctions that power Google’s business selling online display ads.
The fine, along with Google’s commitment to changing its practices, “will make it possible to re-establish a level playing field for all players, and the ability for publishers to make the most of their advertising space,” de Silva said.
Google France’s legal director, Maria Gomri, said in a blog post Monday that Google has been collaborating for the past two years with the French watchdog on issues related to ad technology, notably the platform known as Google Ad Manager. She wrote that commitments made during negotiations would “make it easier for publishers to make use of data and use our tools with other ad technologies.”
After tests in the months ahead, changes will be deployed more broadly, some of them globally, Gomri said. She didn’t specify which changes would apply outside of France.
The French authority’s investigation was prompted by complaints from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., French newspaper group Le Figaro and Belgium-based Rossel La Voix. Le Figaro later withdrew its complaint.
U.S. tech giants have been facing intensifying scrutiny in Europe and elsewhere over their business practices. Germany became the latest country to launch an investigation of Google, using stepped up powers to scrutinize digital giants.
The German competition watchdog said Friday that it was examining whether contracts for news publishers using Google’s News Showcase, a licensing platform launched last fall, include “unreasonable conditions.”
Google has been facing pressure from authorities to pay for news and signed a deal earlier this year with a group of French publishers that paves the way for it to make digital copyright payments.
European Union regulators have also charged Apple with stifling competition in music streaming and accused Amazon of using data from independent merchants to unfairly compete against them with its own products. They are investigating Google’s data practices for advertising purposes and recently opened a formal antitrust investigation into Facebook’s advertising practices.
In the U.S., the Justice Department and dozens of states brought antitrust lawsuits against Google last year. They are seeking to prove that Google has been methodically abusing its power as the internet’s main gateway in a way that hurts consumers and advertisers.
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Alabama coach Nick Saban, who has won a record seven national championships, has agreed to a three-year contract extension running through the 2029 season.
Alabama announced the extension on Monday, including $8.425 million in base salary and talent fee for the current contract year with annual raises of unspecified amounts.
The 69-year-old Saban, who has led the Crimson Tide to six national championships since taking over in 2007, will receive an $800,000 “contract completion benefit” after each contract year from 2022-25.
Saban said in statement that he and his wife Terry “are pleased and happy to sign another contract extension that will keep us in Tuscaloosa through the end of our career. Our family calls Tuscaloosa and the state of Alabama home, it’s a place where our roots now run deep.”
He signed a new eight-year deal in 2018 worth at least $74.4 million, including $400,000 annual raises and three payments of $800,000 for completing contract years.
Alabama won another national championship in Saban’s 14th season this January with his second perfect record with the Tide. It was a record seventh national title for Saban, who also won the 2003 BCS crown at LSU, breaking the tie with former Alabama coach Bear Bryant among FBS coaches.
He has led Alabama to seven Southeastern Conference championships and a 170-23 on-the-field record (five wins were vacated in 2007 due to NCAA infractions).
“Coach Saban is the best college football coach in the nation, and one of the greatest coaches of all time in any sport, and we are extremely fortunate that he has agreed to another contract extension at Alabama,” Tide athletic director Greg Byrne said.
Alabama has been ranked No. 1 in the Associated Press Poll for at least one week for 13 straight years, breaking the previous record of seven set by Miami from 1986-92.
Alabama’s 127 wins over the past decade is the best 10-year run by any FBS school during the AP poll era going back to 1936.
The financial terms of the contract remain subject to approval by the University of Alabama System Board of Trustees, who have been notified of the proposed terms and conditions.
My daughter has an idea: Let’s go to Pilsen Yards. She wants to check out the place her friends are talking about. It’s fun, the 140-seat patio twinkly with string lights, and the standout dish is the taco árabe ($4) with chicken, fattoush, queso fresco, and hummus. Tacos árabes sounded familiar, and I recalled they’re on the menu at Evette’s in Lincoln Park, where the cooking of one co-owner’s Lebanese grandmother is seen through the prism of another co-owner’s Mexican heritage. Their chicken árabes (two for $9, three for $12) combine cinnamon-scented, fresh-off-the-spit shawarma with cucumber yogurt, jalapeño tabbouleh, and radishes in a way that triggers both the taco and gyro pleasure responses.
But I don’t think I’ve cracked the taco árabe code yet. They’re a specialty of Puebla, where Christian Arabs fleeing the Middle East settled and brought with them not only the shawarma spit, the progenitor of al pastor, but the tradition of wrapping spiced lamb in a pita. Over time, the lamb gave way to pork and the pita to a thick flour tortilla. So I went to Maywood’s Antojos Poblanos el Carmen, a one-table spot where the taco árabe ($4.50) comes in an extra-thick tortilla. Inside is seared pork lavished with oregano, thyme, and onions melted into submission. Accompanied by the traditional chipotle sauce and radishes, it tastes not so much of fusion as of a longing for home, a Levantine soul with a Mexican heart. I’ll be back with my family — with any luck, we’ll score the table.
In this Monday, Nov. 5, 2018 file photo, a woman walks past the logo for Google at the China International Import Expo in Shanghai. France’s anti-competition watchdog has decided to fine Google $268 million for abusing its “dominant position” in the complex business of online advertising. It said Monday, June 7, 2021 that the move is unprecedented. | AP
Google, based in Mountain View, California, did not dispute the facts and opted to settle after proposing some changes, according to a prepared statement from the Competition Authority.
PARIS — Google is being fined $268 million by France’s antitrust watchdog for abusing its ‘dominant’ position in online advertising.
Practices used by the search engine giant to sell ads “penalize Google’s competitors” along with publishers of mobile sites and applications, the Competition Authority said Monday. It is the responsibility of a company with a dominant market position to avoid undermining its competition.
Google, based in Mountain View, California, did not dispute the facts and opted to settle after proposing some changes, according to a prepared statement from the Competition Authority.
The head of the authority, Isabelle de Silva, said the decision was unprecedented in the way that it delved into the complex algorithmic auctions that power Google’s online display advertising business.
The fine, along with Google’s commitment to changing its practices, “will make it possible to re-establish a level playing field for all players, and the ability for publishers to make the most of their advertising space,” de Silva said.
Google France’s legal director, Maria Gomri, said in a blog post Monday that Google has been collaborating for the past two years with the French watchdog on issues related to ad technology, notably the platform known as Google Ad Manager. She wrote that commitments made during negotiations would “make it easier for publishers to make use of data and use our tools with other ad technologies.”
After tests in the months ahead, changes will be deployed more broadly, some of them globally, Gomri said.
The French authority’s investigation was prompted by complaints from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., French newspaper group Le Figaro and Belgium-based Rossel La Voix. Le Figaro later withdrew its complaint.
U.S. tech giants have been facing intensifying scrutiny in Europe and elsewhere over their business practices. Germany became the latest country to launch an investigation of Google, using stepped up powers to scrutinize digital giants.
The German competition watchdog said Friday that it was examining whether contracts for news publishers using Google’s News Showcase, a licensing platform launched last fall, include “unreasonable conditions.”
European Union regulators have also charged Apple with stifling competition in music streaming, accused Amazon of using data from independent merchants to unfairly compete against them with its own products. They are informally investigating Google’s data practices for advertising purposes.
Tony Award nominee Joaquina Kalukango is among the Chicago cast of “Paradise Square” for its pre-Broadway engagement. | Provided
Tony Award nominee Joaquina Kalukango will lead the cast for the show which will be presented in a five-week, pe-Broadway engagement at the James M. Nederlander Theatre Nov. 2-Dec. 5.
The cast for the Broadway-bound musical “Paradise Lost,” which will receive its pre-Broadway run in Chicago this fall, was announced Monday.
Tony Award nominee Joaquina Kalukango and Chilina Kennedy will lead the cast for the show which will receive a five-week engagement at the James M. Nederlander Theatre (24 W. Randolph) Nov. 2-Dec. 5.
The cast will also feature John Dossett, A.J. Shively, Nathaniel Stampley, Sidney DuPont, Gabrielle McClinton, Kevin Dennis and Jacob Fishel.
Produced by Garth Drabinsky, “Paradise Lost” is directed by Tony Award nominee Moisés Kaufman (“I Am My Own Wife”), with choreography by two-time Tony Award winner Bill T. Jones (“Spring Awakening,” “Fela!’), and a book by Christina Anderson Marcus Gardley, Craig Lucas and Larry Kirwan. The production features the “re-imagined” songs of Stephen Foster and original compositions, with a score by Jason Howland (“Beautiful: The Carole King Musical”), Nathan Tyson (“Tuck Everlasting”), Masi Asare (“Monsoon Wedding”) and Kirwan.
Alessandra MelloThe Berkeley Rep cast of “Paradise Square” featured Hailee Kaleem Wright (front, left to right), Karen Burthwright and Sidney Dupont; Chloé Davis (back, left to right) Sir Brock Warren, Jamal Christopher Douglas and Jacobi Hall.
The production, which received its world premiere in 2019 at Berkeley Rep, tells the story, set in New York in 1863, about the tenement housing community of Five Points in Lower Manhattan where Irish immigrants and free-born Black Americans who had escaped slavery via the Underground Railroad co-existed and shared their cultures as the tight-knit community until the Civil War’s New York Draft Riots of 1863 violently changed everything.
“It is here in the Five Points where tap dancing was born, as Irish step dancing joyously competed with Black American Juba,” the show’s official press announcement stated.
Drabinsky, who Chicagoans may remember for his critically acclaimed projects here including “Ragtime,” “Showboat” and record-setting “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” starring Donny Osmond in the 1990s, is the controversial theater mogul who was sentenced to five years in prison after being convicted in Canada of defrauding shareholders of Livent, the theater production company he co-founded with Myron Gottlieb, also convicted in the high-profile case. Drabinsky was released on parole in 2013 after serving 17 months, and additional charges in the U.S. were later dismissed.
In this Sept. 19, 2019, file photo, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos speaks during his news conference at the National Press Club in Washington. Bezos will be among the people on Blue Origin’s first human space flight next month. The company said in a post Monday, June 7, 2021, that Bezos will be joined on the New Shepard flight by his brother Mark and the winner of an online auction. | AP
The Amazon founder announced Monday he will launch July 20 from Texas along with his firefighter brother Mark. Also making the 10-minute up-and-down hop will be the highest bidder in a charity auction.
Jeff Bezos will ride his own rocket into space next month, joining the first crew to fly in a Blue Origin capsule.
The Amazon founder announced Monday he will launch July 20 from Texas along with his firefighter brother Mark. Also making the 10-minute up-and-down hop will be the highest bidder in a charity auction.
Bezos is stepping down as Amazon’s CEO on July 5 — just 15 days before liftoff — to spend more time on his space company as well as his newspaper, The Washington Post. His stake in Amazon is currently worth $164 billion.
“To see the Earth from space, it changes you. It changes your relationship with this planet, with humanity. It’s one Earth,” Bezos, 57, said in an Instagram post. “I want to go on this flight because it’s a thing I’ve wanted to do all my life. It’s an adventure. It’s a big deal for me.”
Bezos said he invited his younger brother — his best friend — to share the journey and make it even more “meaningful.”
The flight will officially kick off Blue Origin’s space tourism business. The company has yet to start selling tickets to the public or even to announce a ticket price for the short trips, which provide about three minutes of weightlessness. The capsule can hold six people, each with their own large window. The company hasn’t said who might occupy the remaining three seats on the debut passenger flight.
Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson also plans to launch aboard his own rocket later this year, after one more test flight over New Mexico. SpaceX’s Elon Musk — who’s transported 10 astronauts to the International Space Station and already sold private flights — has yet to commit to a spaceflight.
Blue Origin successfully completed the 15th test flight of its reusable New Shepard rocket in April, with the capsule reaching an altitude of 66 miles. Before liftoff, a mock crew strapped into the capsule for practice, then hopped out, paving the way for the upcoming flight with passengers on board.
The company’s launch and landing site is in remote west Texas, 120 miles southeast of El Paso and close to the Mexican border. After the capsule separates, the rocket lands upright, to be used again. The capsule, also reusable, descends under parachutes.
For its first crew launch, the company chose the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin. It also used a space anniversary in May to announce an online auction for a seat on the flight — the 60th anniversary of the first U.S. spaceflight by Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard, for whom the rocket is named.
The current high bid is $2.8 million. The auction will conclude Saturday, with the winning amount donated to Club for the Future, Blue Origin’s education foundation. Nearly 6,000 people from 143 countries have taken part in the auction.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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