Artistic freedom

For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Apple ’s subscription music streaming service , Apple Music, now has a new sibling, dedicated to classical music. Apple Music Classical has just gone live and is available to most Apple Music subscribers at no extra cost. If you have an individual, family or student subscription, then Classical is included. The only exception is Apple Music Voice Plan, which is the lower-priced version for users of the HomePod, for instance, which is entirely controlled by the user’s voice. Oliver Schusser, Apple’s VP of Apple Music and Beats, talked to The Independent earlier this month about the new venture. He told me, “At Apple, we love music. When we launched Apple Music, in the first few years, we were trying to really wrap our heads around how streaming works and what we should do with the product. But as it went along, we … [Read more...] about Apple Music Classical: iPhone maker launches new streaming service focused on orchestral music

For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails TikTok’s chief executive failed to give assurances that China doesn’t interfere in the app or that its software can be used to spy on users as he faced tough questions at a hearing in the United States Congress. Shou Zi Chew was portrayed as evasive by a hostile committee following fears the Chinese-owned video platform should be barred because of security concerns and because it carries content that can harm children’s mental health. He told Republican representative Cathy McMorris-Rodgers he could not “100 per cent guarantee” that Beijing was not influencing parts of the app. She also asked if Mr Chew could say with certainty that the app could not be used to spy on journalists or other US citizens. He declined to give that same commitment. It led her to accuse TikTok of being a “weapon” that could be … [Read more...] about TikTok boss can’t guarantee China doesn’t interfere with app or spy on users

Before he met and married Meghan Markle , Prince Harry embarked on a number of high-profile relationships with women within the orbit of the royal family and British high society. Of his relationships, the most prominent was with Zimbabwe-born Chelsy Davy, whose family ran a big game farm in South Africa. Within months of their relationship becoming public, Davy was a figure of intense public interest—something Harry has since spoken of his, and her, discomfort over. In court filings, made as part of his ongoing lawsuit against the publishers of the British tabloid Daily Mail over historic phone-hacking and privacy invasion allegations, the prince said that Davy was the victim of unlawful information-gathering techniques such as wiretapping and bugging. The media intrusion, the prince said, made Davy feel as if she was being "hunted." In the end, he said, she questioned whether she wanted a "lifetime of being stalked?" Here, Newsweek looks at who Chelsy Davy is and … [Read more...] about Who is Chelsy Davy—Prince Harry’s ex he feared would be “harassed to death”

Prince Harry is "well within his rights" to weigh in on U.S. politics because he lives in the country and his "wife and children are citizens", according to a discussion on a new episode of Newsweek 's The Royal Report podcast. Chief royal correspondent Jack Royston and royal commentator Kristen Meinzer discussed Harry's address at the United Nations last week marking Nelson Mandela International Day where he likened the "rolling back of constitutional rights here in the United States," with the war in Ukraine and COVID-19 pandemic. Discussing the content of the speech where the prince also revealed the touching association he holds between his mother, wife and Africa , Royston said: "it's always nice to see him speaking about Diana and about Meghan." To this, Meinzer added that it was the political heart of the address which "stood out to me even more." "We all know that royals are not supposed to wade into politics, even though just last week on this show we were … [Read more...] about Prince Harry Is ‘Well Within His Rights’ to Comment On U.S. Politics

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — New Hampshire’s highest court on Wednesday turned away the latest attempt to get a sentence reduction for Pamela Smart, who is serving life in prison for plotting with her teenage lover to have her husband killed in 1990. Smart, 55, was 22 and working as a high school media coordinator when she began an affair with a 15-year-old student who later shot and killed her husband, Gregory Smart. Though she denied knowledge of the plot, she was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder and other crimes and sentenced to life without parole. Having exhausted her judicial appeal options, Smart asked a state council for a sentence reduction hearing last year. The five-member Executive Council, which approves state contracts and appointees to the courts and state agencies, rejected her request in less than three minutes, prompting the appeal to state Supreme Court. But the court dismissed the petition for lack of jurisdiction on Wednesday, saying that ordering the … [Read more...] about New Hampshire court dismisses latest Pamela Smart petition

HONG KONG — China on Wednesday threatened retaliation if House Speaker Kevin McCarthy meets with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen as she passes through the United States next week, saying it would be a “provocation.” Speaking hours later as she left Taiwan, a self-governing island democracy that Beijing claims as its territory, Tsai said external pressure would not deter her government from engaging with the world. Tsai’s trip comes as Beijing is buoyed by newly established diplomatic ties with Honduras and a historic visit to China by Tsai’s predecessor. The dueling visits underscore Taiwan’s increasingly fragile status, as well as the growing tensions between the U.S. and China, which experts told NBC News could make Beijing respond to Tsai’s U.S. travel more aggressively than in the past. In remarks at an airport outside Taipei before her departure, Tsai said, “We are calm and confident, will neither yield nor provoke.” “Taiwan will firmly walk on the road of … [Read more...] about China threatens retaliation if Kevin McCarthy meets with Taiwan’s president

Nine years ago, near the end of my residency training, I sat across from a patient, wondering whether he’d accepted that he was dying. He was in his 60s, an artist with sinewy arms and serene eyes, someone I’d come to know well over the past three years. Cancer had broken into his liver and bone marrow, robbing him of hunger and energy. Each time I saw him, the hollows of his cheeks deepened. I wanted to tell him that he was dying, that I wanted to understand how he envisioned spending his remaining life. But he mostly spoke about his plans: a camping vacation in six months, a friend’s wedding after that. I awaited some sort of arbitrary signal that it was safe to talk about dying. Maybe he’d tell me that he didn’t want more chemotherapy or that his affairs were in order. Like many physicians, I feared that by talking about death before he appeared ready, I might take away his hope, make him give up or send him into an unstoppable tailspin of anxiety and depression. Whether he … [Read more...] about As a Doctor, I Know Being Ready to Die Is an Illusion

On the morning of Oct. 5, President Bush and his education secretary, Margaret Spellings, paid a visit, along with camera crews from CNN and Fox News, to Friendship-Woodridge Elementary and Middle Campus, a charter public school in Washington. The president dropped in on two classrooms, where he asked the students, almost all of whom were African-American and poor, if they were planning to go to college. Every hand went up. “See, that’s a good sign,” the president told the students when they assembled later in the gym. “Going to college is an important goal for the future of the United States of America.” He singled out one student, a black eighth grader named Asia Goode, who came to Woodridge four years earlier reading “well below grade level.” But things had changed for Asia, according to the president. “Her teachers stayed after school to tutor her, and she caught up,” he said. “Asia is now an honors student. She loves reading, and she sings in the school choir.” Bush’s Woodridge … [Read more...] about What It Takes to Make a Student

I. A Broken Economy As Barack Obama prepares to accept the Democratic nomination this week, it is clear that the economic policies of the next president are going to be hugely important. Ever since Wall Street bankers were called back from their vacations last summer to deal with the convulsions in the mortgage market, the economy has been lurching from one crisis to the next. The International Monetary Fund has described the situation as “the largest financial shock since the Great Depression.” The details are too technical for most of us to understand. (They’re too technical for many bankers to understand, which is part of the problem.) But the root cause is simple enough. In some fundamental ways, the American economy has stopped working. The fact that the economy grows — that it produces more goods and services one year than it did in the previous one — no longer ensures that most families will benefit from its growth. For the first time on record, an economic expansion seems … [Read more...] about Obamanomics

In 1980 an ecologist and an economist chose a refreshingly unacademic way to resolve their differences. They bet $1,000. Specifically, the bet was over the future price of five metals, but at stake was much more -- a view of the planet's ultimate limits, a vision of humanity's destiny. It was a bet between the Cassandra and the Dr. Pangloss of our era. They lead two intellectual schools -- sometimes called the Malthusians and the Cornucopians, sometimes simply the doomsters and the boomsters -- that use the latest in computer-generated graphs and foundation-generated funds to debate whether the world is getting better or going to the dogs. The argument has generally been as fruitless as it is old, since the two sides never seem to be looking at the same part of the world at the same time. Dr. Pangloss sees farm silos brimming with record harvests; Cassandra sees topsoil eroding and pesticide seeping into ground water. Dr. Pangloss sees people living longer; Cassandra sees rain … [Read more...] about Betting on the Planet