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Four highlights from the fourth Republican presidential debate in Tuscaloosa

The smallest field yet of GOP candidates faced off Wednesday in the fourth Republican presidential debate of 2023 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, with the first salvos of the night aimed at former Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley, while former President Donald Trump, who holds a wide lead in polling, held a closed campaign fundraiser in Florida. From the outset, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy had harsh words for Haley, whose poll numbers have been improving after strong performances in the previous debates. She was also endorsed a few days ago by the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity, and a super PAC supporting her has received big donations from tech and Wall Street financiers. The fourth candidate on stage, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, didn't get a ...

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Sports

Texas Rangers exorcise demons past, capturing first World Series title: ‘This is the vision’

Josh Sborz recorded the final strike of the season, the one that had eluded the Texas Rangers twice in their previous attempt to win a World Series, and slammed his glove to the Chase Field turf as a dogpile ensued. For the Rangers reliever, it was euphoric. For a Texas fan base that had waited more than 50 years to celebrate its franchise's first championship, it was cathartic. For 12 years, the game-tying and game-winning swings from David Freese in Game 6 of the 2011 World Series played on a loop in the memories of Rangers fans, haunting them more and more as each passing season of fruitlessness and futility left them without an opportunity to avenge the most heartbreaking defeat in franchise history. They were not convinced they would get another chance. On Wednesday night in...

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Sports

Big Ten coaches, ADs encourage commissioner Tony Petitti to act on Michigan sign-stealing scandal, per report

Big Ten coaches spent nearly an hour expressing their frustration with the ongoing investigation into Michigan's alleged sign-stealing operation during a 90-minute video call with commissioner Tony Petitti, according to ESPN. The collected coaches encouraged Petitti to take action against Michigan, acknowledging the fact that the NCAA's investigation likely won't affect Michigan's 2023 season either way. "Collectively, the coaches want the Big Ten to act -- right now," a source told ESPN. "What are we waiting on? We know what happened." Big Ten presidents and athletic directors have also met with Petitti to encourage action in the case, Yahoo Sports reports. "He is going to have to act or he will lose the coaches and ADs," another source told ESPN. Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh ...

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Entertainment

Giles Martin on Producing the Beatles’ ‘Now and Then,’ Remixing the Red and Blue Albums, and How Technology Is Enabling a Mass Emotional Experience

Christmas has come early for Beatles fans… who fortunately have been granted a week between gifts, so they don’t have to choose which to unwrap first. There was Thursday’s release, of course, of the newsmaking “Now and Then” single, a track that features the late John Lennon and George Harrison that was recently completed by Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, with Martin on board as McCartney’s co-producer. Following a week later, only slightly in the new song’s shadow, are new iterations of the “1962-66” and “1967-70” collections that came out in the early ’70s, featuring dozens of tracks newly remixed by Martin to be heard in modern stereo or Dolby Atmos. Martin, the son of original Beatles producer George Martin, addressed both projects in a wide-ranging interview with Variety this wee...

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Technology

Apple Reveals What ‘Shot on iPhone 15’ Really Means

The iPhone 15 Pro has Apple's most advanced camera setup ever, and the company was keen to show it off in its most recent product announcement. The "Scary Fast" event saw the reveal of new Macbook Pros with Apple's new M3 ARM chip, but the event itself was also a vehicle to promote the iPhone. Apple shot the entire thing with an iPhone 15 Pro Max, but the company's behind-the-scenes video puts that claim in a new light. In addition to the phone, Apple used thousands of dollars worth of equipment and a team of professional videographers and editors. So, don't expect your videos to look this good. Apple made a big deal of the iPhone 15 Pro's cameras when announcing the phone several months back. The base model iPhone 15 still has just two camera sensors (a wide-angle and ultrawide), and ...

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Technology

Apple’s latest 16-inch MacBook Pro nearly dethrones the Mac Pro in Geekbench 6, crushes Snapdragon’s Elite X

Preliminary performance benchmarks for Apple's M3 and M3 Max have recently surfaced online in Geekbench 6's database, and if the results hold true, the M3 Max packs a serious punch and manages to come astonishingly close to the much more expensive Mac Pro featuring the M2 Ultra. During Apple's recent 'Scary Fast' Mac event, the company announced significant upgrades to the MacBook Pro line-up, now powered by the company's latest M3 series chips. Apple claimed remarkable improvements across the line-up, with the standout performer being the new M3 Max, which, according to Apple's claims, is up to an impressive 80% faster in CPU tasks and 50% faster in GPU tasks than the M1 Max. In a recent Geekbench 6 listing, the M3 Max scored an impressive 21,084 and 2,943 in multi-core and single-...

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Technology

Another report confirms Galaxy S24 is launching sooner than expected

A few rumors have claimed that Samsung will launch the Galaxy S24 earlier than usual, and it looks like it is indeed the case. A new report from South Korea confirms that Samsung will launch its next-generation flagship smartphone series in January 2024 to make up for the sluggish performance of its semiconductor chip division. Galaxy S24 launch date is January 17, 2024A report from SBS Biz claims that Samsung will launch the Galaxy S24 on January 17, 2024, in San Francisco, USA. The company has reportedly finalized its plans for the launch event, and the preparations have started. It also confirms that the Galaxy S23 FE will be launched in South Korea on December 1, 2023, with a price tag of KRW 800,000 (around $600). It has been three years since the launch of a Fan Edition Galax...

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Technology

Apple slides from 2013 skewer Android as “a massive tracking device”

"Here is [sic] the latest slides we have on privacy," Senior Vice President of Services Eddy Cue wrote to CEO Tim Cook and then-SVP of Marketing Phil Schiller in January 2013. "Still a lot more work to do but good start." Those slides, newly made public as an exhibit in the Department of Justice's ongoing antitrust trial against Google, on "The State of Privacy," cast a dim light on Apple's competitors, particularly Google. They quote former CEO Eric Schmidt's notorious remarks on Google's policy to "get right up to the creepy line but not cross it." They unfavorably compare Apple and Google's approaches to account data combination, voice search privacy, maps, and search. And most notably, they give over an entire slide to a summary: "Android is a massive tracking device." The exhib...

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Ecology

Stocks Rally as Fed’s Rate Hikes Seen Near End: Markets Wrap

Stocks rallied as investors reacted to the possible peak of the Federal Reserve’s historic tightening campaign and processed the latest major company earnings. Rates-sensitive real estate stocks led the advance in Europe’s Stoxx 600 index, which is set for its longest winning streak since July. US equity futures pointed to an extension of Wednesday’s gains on Wall Street as Asian stocks headed for their biggest gain in almost four months. ...

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Entertainment

Matthew Perry revealed Friends co-star who ‘reached out the most’ during sobriety struggle

Matthew Perry once recalled that Jennifer Aniston kept in close contact with him throughout the ups and downs of his journey towards sobriety. A year before his tragic death on Saturday (28 October), the Friends star, who was 54, opened up about the support he received from his co-star Aniston, 54, who played Rachel Green on the sitcom. “She was the one that reached out the most. You know, I’m really grateful to her for that,” Perry told ABC News’s Diane Sawyer in an October 2022 interview. He further revealed that Aniston was the first castmate to confront him about his alcoholism while filming the series, which ran from 1994 to 2004. “Jennifer, she says, ‘We know you’re drinking,’” Sawyer said to Perry. “Yeah, imagine how scary a moment that was,” the actor replied. “I...

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