Background.

After the Third Partition of Poland in 1795, the Polish nation had ceased to exist as an independent state. From 1795 through the beginning of World War I, several unsuccessful uprisings to regain independence took place. The Great Poland Uprising of 1806 was followed by the creation of the Duchy of Warsaw, which lasted for eight years before it was partitioned again between Prussia and Russia. Under German rule, Poles faced systematic discrimination and oppression. The Poles living in the region of Greater Poland were subjected to Germanisation and land confiscations to make way for German colonization.  At the end of World War I, US President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points and the idea of national self-determination were met with opposition from European powers standing to lose influence or territory, such as Germany, which dominated Greater Poland. German politicians had signed an armistice leading to a ceasefire on 11 November 1918. Also, Germany had signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with the Bolshevik Russia to settle the territorial boundaries of the eastern frontiers. That treaty took into consideration of a future Polish state and so from then until the Treaty of Versailles was fully ratified in January 1920, many territorial and sovereignty issues remained unresolved.  Wilson's proposal for an independent Poland initially did not set borders that could be universally accepted. Most of Poland that was partitioned and annexed to Prussia in the late 18th-century was still part of Greater Germany at the close of World War I, the rest of the Kingdom of Poland being in Austria-Hungary. The portion in Germany included the region of Greater Poland, of which Poznań (Posen) was a major industrial city and its capital. The majority of the population was Polish (more than 60%) and hoped to be within the borders of the new Polish state.

Uprising.

In late 1918, Poles hoping for a sovereign Poland started serious preparations for an uprising after Wilhelm II's abdication on 9 November 1918, which marked the end of the German Empire. The monarchy was replaced by the Weimar Republic.  The uprising broke out on 27 December 1918 in Poznań, after a patriotic speech by Ignacy Paderewski, the famous pianist, who would become the Polish prime minister in 1919.  The insurrectionist forces consisted of members of the Polish Military Organization, who formed the (Citizen's Guard), later renamed as (People's Guard), which included many volunteers, who were mainly veterans of World War I. The first contingent to reach the Bazar Hotel, from where the uprising was initiated, was a 100-strong force from (Wilda's People's Guard) led by Antoni Wysocki. The ruling body was the (Supreme People's Council). Initially, the members of the Council, including Captain Stanisław Taczak and General Józef Dowbor-Muśnicki were against the uprising, but they changed their minds in support of the insurrection on 9 January 1919.  The timing was advantageous for the insurrectionists since between late 1918 and early 1919, internal conflict had weakened Germany, and many of its soldiers and sailors engaged in mutinous actions against the state. Demoralized by the signing of the armistice on 11 November 1918, the new German government was further embroiled in subduing the German Revolution.  By 15 January 1919, Poles had taken control of most of the province, and they engaged in heavy fighting with the regular German army and irregular units such as the Grenzschutz. Fighting continued until the renewal of the truce between the Entente and Germany on 16 February. The truce also affected the front line in Greater Poland, but despite the ceasefire, skirmishes continued until the final signing of the Treaty of Versailles on 28 June 1919.  The uprising is one of the two most successful Polish uprisings, the other being the Great Poland Uprising of 1806, which ended with the entry of Napoleon's army on the side of the Poles fighting against Prussia.  Many of the Greater Poland insurrectionists later took part in the Silesian Uprisings against German rule, which started in late 1919 and ended in 1921.

Reaction.

The uprising had a significant effect on the decisions in Versailles that granted Poland not only the area won by the insurrectionists but also the lands of the Polish Corridor, which were also part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth before the First Partition of Poland in 1772 and connected Poland to the Baltic Sea. Some of the major cities included Bydgoszcz (Bromberg), Leszno (Lissa) and Rawicz (Rawitsch). The riots initiated by the minority Germans later influenced the decision to have popular votes in Silesia, where the public was allowed to vote whether it wanted to be part of Poland or Germany.  Germany's territorial losses following the Treaty of Versailles incited German revanchism, and created unresolved problems such as the status of the independent Free City of Danzig and of the Polish Corridor between East Prussia and the rest of Germany. Attending to these issues was part of Adolf Hitler's political platform. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, Poland refused several German proposals for popular referendums, population transfers, highway projects and customs union reforms for fear of an eventual land grab from Germany.

The Greater Poland uprising of 1918–1919, or Wielkopolska uprising of 1918–1919 (; ) or Posnanian War was a military insurrection of Poles in the Greater Poland region (German: Grand Duchy of Posen or Provinz Posen) against German rule. The uprising had a significant effect on the Treaty of Versailles, which granted a reconstituted Second Polish Republic the area won by the Polish insurrectionists. The region had been part of the Kingdom of Poland and then Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth before the 1793 Second Partition of Poland when it was annexed by the German Kingdom of Prussia. It had also, following the 1806 Greater Poland Uprising, been part of the Duchy of Warsaw (1807–1815), a French puppet state during the Napoleonic Wars.


Biography.

Frances was the daughter of Walter Stewart, or Stuart, a physician in Queen Henrietta Maria's court, and a distant relative of the royal family. She was born on 8 July 1647 in exile in Paris, but was sent to England in 1663 after the restoration by Charles I's widow Henrietta Maria as maid of honour (a court appointment) and subsequently as lady-in-waiting to Charles II's new bride, Catherine of Braganza.  The great diarist Samuel Pepys recorded that she was the greatest beauty he ever saw. She had numerous suitors, including the Duke of Buckingham and Francis Digby, son of the Earl of Bristol, whose unrequited love for her was celebrated by Dryden. Her beauty appeared to her contemporaries to be equalled only by her childish silliness; but her letters to her husband, preserved in the British Museum, are not devoid of good sense and feeling.  The Count de Gramont said of her that "it would be difficult to imagine less brain combined with more beauty."  While a member of the royal court, she caught the eye of Charles II, who fell in love with her. The king's infatuation was so great that when the queen's life was despaired of in 1663, it was reported that he intended to marry Stewart, and four years later he was considering the possibility of obtaining a divorce to enable him to make her his wife because she had refused to become his mistress.  Eventually, in March 1667, she married (as his third wife) Charles Stewart, 3rd Duke of Richmond, 6th Duke of Lennox (1639-1672), a 4th cousin of King Charles II, but produced no issue. It is possible she had to elope, after being discovered with him by Lady Castlemaine, a rival for the king's affections.  The now Duchess of Richmond, however, soon returned to court, where she remained for many years; and although she was disfigured by smallpox in 1669, she retained her hold on the king's affections. It is certain, at least, that Charles went on to post the Duke to Scotland and then to Denmark as ambassador, where he died in 1672.  The duchess was present in 1688 at the birth of James Francis Edward Stuart ("The Old Pretender"), son of James II, and was one of those who signed the certificate before the council. She died in 1702 aged 55, leaving a valuable property to her nephew Alexander Stuart, 5th Lord Blantyre, whose seat of Lethington was renamed Lennoxlove after her.

Britannia.

Following the war with the Dutch, Charles had a commemorative medal cast, in which her face was used as a model for Britannia; this subsequently became customary for medals, coins and statues. She continued to appear on some of the copper coinage of the United Kingdom until the decimalization of the currency in 1971. She also appeared on the fifty pence piece in 2006.

Frances Teresa Stewart, Duchess of Richmond and Lennox (8 July 1647 – 15 October 1702) was a prominent member of the Court of the Restoration and famous for refusing to become a mistress of Charles II of England. For her great beauty she was known as "La Belle Stuart" and served as the model for an idealised, female Britannia.


Life.

Aimée was born 4 December 1768, the daughter of wealthy French plantation owner Henri du Buc de Rivery (1748 - 1808) and Marie Anne Arbousset-Beaufond (1739 - 1811) in Pointe Royale, south-west of Robert on the Caribbean island of Martinique. Through marriage, she was an eighth cousin-in-law, once removed, of Empress Josephine. via Josephine's first marriage with Alexandre de Beauharnais, who had been executed during the Reign of Terror.  Having been sent to a convent school in France, she was returning home, in July or August 1788, when the ship on which she traveled vanished at sea. It is theorized that the ship was attacked and taken by Barbary pirates. It has been further suggested that she was enslaved, and eventually sent to Constantinople as a gift to the Ottoman Sultan by the Bey of Algiers.

Legend about her being Valide Sultan Nakşidil.

According to the legend, Aimée became the wife of the sultan, taking the name of Nakşidil, who introduced French ideas to the sultan, and so to the Ottoman people. It has been theorized that her French-style reforms may have led to his death at the hands of the Janissaries and the Ulema, since both groups opposed liberalization of the empire. During the rule of Abdul Hamid I, she taught him French and, for the first time, a permanent ambassador was sent from Constantinople to Paris. Selim III, a son of Abdul Hamid I who later succeeded him as Sultan, started a French newspaper. He also allowed Nakşidil to decorate the palace in rococo style, which was popular in France at that time.  The legend of Aimée as Nakşidil continues, claiming that she had accepted Islam as part of the harem etiquette, as well as the religion of her husband, yet always remained a Roman Catholic in her heart. Her last wish was for a priest to perform the last rites. Her son, the sultan, did not deny her this: as Aimée lay dying, a priest passed for the first time through the Seraglio, to perform the Holy Sacrament before her death. Her tomb lies not far from the Hagia Sophia.

Controversy over the legend.

Some researchers have looked into the alleged history of Aimée du Buc de Rivéry in the royal harem and found it implausible. According to Turkish historian Necdet Sakaoğlu, Nakşîdil Sultan was ethnically Georgian in origin.  While several stories claimed that Aimée was abducted in 1781 - early enough that the seventeen year old could have been the mother of Mahmud II, born in 1785 - other stories took into account that Aimée was well in France with her family until the year 1788 at least. In the latter recounts of the tale, Aimée is only the foster mother to Mahmud II, while his birth mother died in his childhood.  None of those accounts however are considering a contemporary source from the year 1817: Nakşidil was reportedly abducted when she was still two years old. That version of her story, if true, would make it impossible for her to be identical with the missing Aimée.  Robert Vine wrote: "The myth of two cousins from a island becoming respectively the wife of the French Emperor and the mother of the Ottoman Sultan has an obvious romantic attraction - but by the same token, is highly improbable, unless provided with solid factual proof".  There are however indications that seeds of the legend have been carefully planted. Several older myths, dating back even to the early 16th century, already purported connections between the French and the Ottoman monarchy. These have been traced to be politically motivated fabrications, so that alliances between the respective monarchs were seen as justifiable. The Aimée-Nakşidil tale distinctly parallels to these older tales. In times of monarchy, the stories about abducted French princesses weren't repudiated to maintain good relations - in fact, both Napoleon III and Abdülaziz were pleased to announce their kinship to each other, years later. In later times this and similar harem tales have been used to perpetuate the prejudice of Turkey, the Middle East and the Islam in general as mysterious and despotic in nature, despite more accurate accounts available. The legend furthermore reinforced prejudices of the Ottoman Empire as a backwater country, where even a western slave consort was able to initiate an overdue modernization while the primitive natives couldn't conceive necessary reforms.

Aimée du Buc de Rivéry (4 December 1768 –?) was a French heiress who went missing at sea as a young woman. There is a legend that she was captured by Barbary pirates, sold as a harem concubine, and was the same person as Nakşîdil Sultan, a Valide Sultan (Queen Mother) of the Ottoman Empire; this has not been proven.


Routes.

The Lyon Metro consists of four lines, A, B, C and D, each identified on maps by different colours:

Lines A and B.

Line A ("Perrache - Laurent Bonnevay (Astroballe)") and Line B ("Charpennes - Part-Dieu") were constructed by cut-and-cover and went into service on May 2, 1978, as the inaugural lines of the Lyon Metro. Trains on both lines run on rubber tyres rather than steel wheels.  Line B was extended to "Jean Macé" on September 9, 1981, to "Gerland" on September 4, 2000 and to "Gare d'Oullins" on 11 December 2013.  An extension to "Vaulx-en-Velin La Soie" on Line A opened in October 2007.  By 2020, Line B will be automated, with the same system as Line D. New MPL 16 rolling stock has been ordered to Alstom in 2016 for Line B. The MPL 75 trains currently used on Line B will join the other MPL 75s on Line A to increase the capacity.

Line C.

The "Croix-Rousse-Croix-Paquet" rack railway, which was refurbished in 1974, was integrated into the Metro in 1978 as Line C, with an extension to Hôtel-de-Ville (thus running from "Hôtel-de-Ville" to "Croix-Rousse"). It was extended to "Cuire" on December 8, 1984.  The line was constructed using various methods; the incline rising through a deep tunnel, the portion on the flat at "Croix-Rousse" using cut-and-cover while the section beyond "Hénon" runs on the surface. The "Croix Paquet" station claims to be the steepest metro station in Europe, with an incline of 17%.  Line C uses an overhead wire while Lines A, B and D use a third rail.

Line D.

Line D, the first fully automatic metro line in France, started with operators on board trains on September 4, 1991, between "Gorge de Loup" and "Grange Blanche". The line was extended to "Gare de Vénissieux" on December 11, 1992, when it switched to driverless operation. On April 28, 1997, it was extended again to "Gare de Vaise".  Using rubber tyres like lines A and B, trains on line D are controlled by a system known as MAGGALY ("Métro Automatique à Grand Gabarit de l’Agglomération Lyonnaise"). Unusually for a driverless metro, no platform screen doors are installed on station platforms. The trains use infrared sensors to detect obstructions on the track. Other systems using this technology include the Nuremberg U-Bahn and Budapest Metro's Line 4.  The deepest line in Lyon, Line D was constructed partly using boring machines and passes under both rivers, the "Rhône" and the "Saône". At long with 15 stations, it is also the longest line in Lyon.  In 2016, new MPL 16 rolling stock was ordered from Alstom for Lines B and D and is expected to come into service on the line starting in 2020. These trains will increase the capacity of Line D and they will be coupled to form four-car units at rush hours and should replace the MPL 75 of line B which would be only on line A.

Operation.

The Metro, like the rest of the local public transport system, is operated by Keolis Lyon (ex-SLTC - the'(Lyon public transport company)), under the TCL brand -'(Lyon public transport). It is operated on behalf of SYTRAL - the "" (Rhône department and Lyon metropolitan transport syndicate), a Syndicat Mixte.

Future expansion.

Work is under way to extend Line B to a new terminus at Lyon's southern hospital complex in Saint-Genis-Laval. The extension is due to enter service in 2023. New rolling stock, capable of operating as a single two-car trainset or two coupled trainsets for four-car operation, will be introduced and the line will be automated. Existing rolling stock used on Line B will be used to enhance capacity on Line A. Line D will also receive 10 new trainsets and its automatic control system will be upgraded.  A new line, dubbed Line E, is under consideration to link Lyon's western suburbs to the city centre. Twelve variants were initially proposed; two options, running from either "Bellecour" or "Hôtel de Ville" to "Alaï", have been selected for further study and could potentially be opened by around 2030.

The Lyon Metro () is a rapid transit system serving Lyon Metropolis, France. First opened in 1974, it currently consists of four lines, serving 40 stations and comprising of route. Part of the Transports en Commun Lyonnais (TCL) system of public transport, it is supported by two funiculars and a tramway network.


History.

Foundation.

Surplex.com AG was established by the brothers Bruno and Florian Schick at the end of 1999 as a typical start-up company of the Dotcom-era. The core idea was to develop an online marketplace to simplify the trading of used machinery and to make the highly segmented second hand machinery market more transparent.  This business model attracted many institutional and private investors. International venture capital consortia such as the Carlyle Group and the French Vivendi-group invested a total of around EUR 50 million. Also prominent private investors including Lars Schlecker, Lars Windhorst, Marc Schrempp or the chairman of Fiat Paolo Fresco have invested in Surplex.

Crisis.

With the bursting of the Dot-com bubble, Surplex.com AG found itself in a struggle to survive. Offices were closed, the head office was transferred back from Berlin to Düsseldorf and most of the approximately 140 jobs were lost. In March 2003 Michael Werker, who had initially come to Surplex from the traditional engineering company Deutz, became CEO.

Turnaround.

It was only through a rebalancing of the company, to include a focus on more traditional services, that Surplex was able to consolidate its finances. Today Surplex is no longer limited to „virtual“ business processes, but also offers „real“ services around the application of used machinery, e.g. personal consultation, appraisals and storage. Used machines and production lines are marketed worldwide. Furthermore, Surplex carries out big internet auctions (live and online), e.g. for companies like Linde, ABB, ThyssenKrupp and Bayer.

Products.

The business-to-business-platform from Surplex is a European player in selling used machines and equipment and was awarded the best platform in 2001 by Forrester Research. At its peak, the platform had more than 8,000 customers and 12,000 machines.  Surplex is the publisher of the world's largest magazine for used machinery and equipment (communicator). With a circulation of 45,000 and more than 100,000 readers, it reaches people in more than 100 different countries.

Surplex GmbH is a Düsseldorf based company that is primarily focused on buying and selling used machinery. The company buys and sells used machinery and industrial plants, carries out internet auctions and offers appraisals and valuations.


Mass licensing of software.

Mass distributed software is used by individuals on personal computers under license from the developer of that software. Such license is typically included in a more extensive end-user license agreement (EULA) entered into upon the installation of that software on a computer. Typically, a license is associated with a unique code, that when approved grants the end user access to the software in question.  Under a typical end-user license agreement, the user may install the software on a limited number of computers.  The enforceability of end-user license agreements is sometimes questioned.  As of 2020, there are various ways to license software with different kinds of licensing models, which allow software vendors to profit from their product offerings in flexible ways.

Patent licensing.

A licensor may grant permission to a licensee to conduct activities which would otherwise be within the, offer for sale, or import a patented product, or to perform a patented process. The term of a patent license may be a "fixed" (i.e., specified) term, such as 5 years, or may be for the life of the patent (i.e., until the patent expires). A patent is by its nature limited in territorial scope; it only covers activity within the borders of the country issuing the patent. Accordingly, a patent license does not require a territory provision.  The consideration provided by the licensee in return for the patent license grant is called a patent royalty payment. In a "paid-up" license, the "lump sum" royalty payment is a specified monetary amount, typically due shortly after the effective date of the patent (e.g., within 15 business days of the effective date), and no further payments are required. Otherwise, the royalty payment is a "running royalty," typically payable on an annual basis. The annual royalty may be a specified amount (e.g., one million dollars each year), or an amount proportional to the volume of licensed activity conducted by the licensee (e.g., one dollar per unit of licensed product sold by the licensee that year, or one percent of the net sales amount of the licensed products sold by the licensee that year).  A licensing agreement is an arrangement whereby a licensor grants the right to intangible property to another entity for a specified period, and in return, the licensor receives a royalty fee from the licensee. Intangible property includes patents, inventions, formulas, processes, designs, copyrights, and trademarks.  Advantages of a licensing agreement:  Disadvantages of a licensing agreement

Trademark and brand licensing.

A licensor may grant permission to a licensee to distribute products under a trademark. With such a license, the licensee may use the trademark without fear of a claim of trademark infringement by the licensor. The assignment of a license often depends on specific contractual terms. The most common terms are, that a license is only applicable for a particular geographic region, just for a certain period of time or merely for a stage in the value chain. Moreover, there are different types of fees within the trademark and brand licensing. The first form demands a fee independent of sales and profits, the second type of license fee is dependent on the productivity of the licensee.  When a licensor grants permission to a licensee to not only distribute, but manufacture a patented product, it is known as licensed production.

Artwork and character licensing.

A licensor may grant a permission to a licensee to copy and distribute copyrighted works such as "art" (e.g., Thomas Kinkade's painting "Dawn in Los Gato") and characters (e.g., Mickey Mouse). With such license, a licensee need not fear a claim of copyright infringement brought by the copyright owner.  Artistic license is, however, not related to the aforementioned license. It is a euphemism that denotes freedom of expression, the ability to make the subject appear more engaging or attractive, by fictionalising part of the subject.

Academia.

A licentiate is an academic degree that traditionally conferred the license to teach at a university or to practice a particular profession. The term survived despite the fact that nowadays a doctorate is typically needed in order to teach at a university. The term is also used for a person who holds a licentiate. In English, the degree has never been called a license. In France, the "licence" is the first degree awarded in Universities.  In Sweden, Finland, and in some other European university systems, a 'licentiate' is a postgraduate degree between the master's degree and the doctorate. The licentiate is a popular choice in those countries where a full doctoral degree would take five or more years to achieve.

Vehicle licensing.

A license to driving certain vehicles has been applied to many countries around the world. Being allowed to drive a certain vehicle requires a specific driving license, the type of license depending on the type of vehicle.

Criminal law.

In the United Kingdom prisoners serving a determinate sentence (a fixed time in prison) will be released prior to the completion of their full sentence "on licence". The licence is the prisoner's agreement to maintain certain conditions, such as periodic reporting in to a probation officer and only living at an approved address, in exchange for their early release. If they break the conditions of the licence, they can be "recalled" (returned to prison).  Offenders serving determinate sentences are released automatically at a set point in their sentence, whereas prisoners serving indeterminate sentences (e.g. life imprisonment) can only be released by the parole board.

Economic theory.

Patent licensing has been studied in formal economic models in the field of industrial organization. In particular, Katz and Shapiro (1986) have explored the optimal licensing strategy of a research lab selling to firms who are competitors on the product market. It turns out that (compared to the welfare-maximizing solution) the licensor’s incentives to develop innovations may be excessive, while the licensor’s incentives to disseminate the innovation are typically too low. Subsequently, the seminal work of Katz and Shapiro (1986) has been extended in several directions. For example, Bhattacharya, Glazer, and Sappington (1992) have taken into account that the firms acquiring licenses must make further investments in order to develop marketable products. Schmitz (2002, 2007) has shown that asymmetric information due to adverse selection or moral hazard may lead the research lab to sell more licenses than it would do under complete information. Antelo and Sampayo (2017) have studied the optimal number of licenses in a signalling model.

Criticism.

The provision of licenses and the agencies that mandate them are often criticised by libertarians, like Milton Friedman, for creating an anticompetitive environment for occupations, which creates a barrier to entry for more qualified and skilled individuals who may not have the resources to obtain the necessary licences. According to Friedman, licenses and permits have become so burdensome due to legislation that favors the current establishment of wealthy occupants that they decrease the supply of such occupations, which raises prices for the average consumer. Libertarians and the anti-authoritarian left (anarcho-communists) view competing guilds and other voluntary communes as being more beneficial for disseminating the skills and education required to perform a specified career.

See also.

Intellectual property-related:  Other:

A license (American English) or licence (British English) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit).


Life.

Mario Capecchi was born in Verona, Italy, as the only child of Luciano Capecchi, an Italian airman who would be later reported as missing in action while manning an anti-aircraft gun in the Western Desert Campaign, and Lucy Ramberg, an American-born daughter of Impressionist painter Lucy Dodd Ramberg and German archaeologist Walter Ramberg. During World War II, his mother was sent to the Dachau concentration camp as punishment for pamphleteering and belonging to an anti-Fascist group. Prior to her arrest she had made contingency plans by selling her belongings and giving the proceeds to a peasant family near Bolzano to provide housing for her child. However, after one year, the money was exhausted and the family was unable to care for him. At four-and-a-half years old he was left to fend for himself, living as a street child on the streets of northern Italy for the next four years, living in various orphanages and roving through towns with groups of other homeless children.  He almost died of malnutrition. His mother, meanwhile, had been freed from Dachau and began a year-long search for him. She finally found him in a hospital bed in Reggio Emilia, ill with a fever and subsisting on a daily bowl of chicory coffee and bread crust. She took him to Rome, where he had his first bath in six years.  In 1946 his uncle, Edward Ramberg, an American physicist at RCA, sent his sister money to return to the United States. He and his mother moved to Pennsylvania to live at an "intentionally cooperative community" called Bryn Gweled, which had been co-founded by his uncle. (Capecchi's other maternal uncle, Walter Ramberg, was also an American physicist who served as the tenth president of the Society for Experimental Stress Analysis.) He graduated from George School, a Quaker boarding school in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in 1956.  Mario Capecchi received his Bachelor of Science in chemistry and physics in 1961 from Antioch College in Ohio. Capecchi came to MIT as a graduate student intending to study physics and mathematics, but during the course of his studies, he became interested in molecular biology. He subsequently transferred to Harvard to join the lab of James D. Watson, co-discoverer of the structure of DNA. Capecchi received his Ph.D. in biophysics in 1967 from Harvard University, with his doctoral thesis completed under the tutelage of Watson.  Capecchi was a Junior Fellow of the Society of Fellows at Harvard University from 1967 to 1969. In 1969 he became an assistant professor in the Department of Biochemistry at Harvard Medical School. He was promoted to associate professor in 1971. In 1973 he joined the faculty at the University of Utah. Since 1988 Capecchi has also been an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He has given a talk for Duke University's Program in Genetics and Genomics as part of their Distinguished Lecturer Series. He was the speaker for the 2010 Racker Lectures in Biology & Medicine and Cornell Distinguished Lecture in Cell and Molecular Biology at Cornell University. He is a member of the Italy-USA Foundation.  After the Nobel committee publicly announced that Capecchi had won the Nobel prize, an Austrian woman named Marlene Bonelli claimed that Capecchi was her long-lost half-brother. In May 2008, Capecchi met with Bonelli, 69, in northern Italy, and confirmed that she was his sister.

Knockout mice.

Capecchi won the Nobel prize for creating a knockout mouse. This is a mouse, created by genetic engineering and in vitro fertilization, in which a particular gene has been turned off. For this work, Capecchi won the 2007 Nobel prize for medicine or physiology, along with Martin Evans and Oliver Smithies, who also contributed.  Capecchi has also pursued a systematic analysis of the mouse Hox gene family. This gene family plays a key role in the control of embryonic development in all multicellular animals. They determine the placement of cellular development in the proper order along the axis of the body from head to toe.

Mario Ramberg Capecchi (6 October 1937) is an Italian-born molecular geneticist and a co-winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discovering a method to create mice in which a specific gene is turned off, known as knockout mice. He shared the prize with Martin Evans and Oliver Smithies. He is currently Distinguished Professor of Human Genetics and Biology at the University of Utah School of Medicine.


Early life and education.

A native of Rockford, Illinois and graduate of Rockford Central High School, Tullock attended the University of Chicago and, after a break for military service during World War II, received a J.D. in 1947. Following a brief period in private practice, he joined the Foreign Service that fall. After completing training, he was posted to Tianjin, China, later receiving Chinese language instruction at Yale and Cornell and follow-on postings to Hong Kong and Korea. He resigned from the Foreign Service in 1956. While he originally intended to pursue a career as a foreign trader in the Far East, his work on "The Politics of Bureaucracy" eventually led him to begin collaboration with James M. Buchanan at the University of Virginia while Tullock worked at the University of South Carolina teaching international studies.

Academic career.

Tullock's collaboration with Buchanan produced "The Calculus of Consent: Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy" (1962), which quickly became a seminal work in the new field of public choice. He later joined Buchanan as a faculty colleague at Virginia. For four years Buchanan and Tullock continued their research program, even founding a new journal for their field (1966), first called "Papers in Non-Market Economics" and eventually titled "Public Choice", where they invited articles applying economic theory to all sorts of non-market phenomena, especially in the realm of government and politics. Despite the success of the book and the journal, disagreements with the UVA administration eventually led Tullock to leave.  In 1967, Tullock identified many of the concepts of what came to be known as rent-seeking in a seminal paper.  Tullock moved to Virginia Polytechnical Institute (VPI, now called Virginia Tech) in 1968 and was joined by Buchanan a year later. There they continued the Public Choice Society and the journal, of which Tullock remained editor until 1990. At VPI, Tullock wrote a number of influential articles and books, including "Private Wants, Public Means" (1970), "The Logic of the Law" (1971), "The Social Dilemma" (1974), and "The Vote Motive" (1976).  In 1983, Tullock and the Center for Study of Public Choice moved to George Mason University, at the time a relatively unknown school in Fairfax, Virginia. Tullock taught at GMU from 1983–1987 and at the University of Arizona from 1987–1999. He continued to publish widely (more than 150 papers and 23 books in all), including "The Economics of Wealth and Poverty" (1986), "Autocracy" (1987), "Rent Seeking" (1993), "The Economics of Non-Human Societies" (1994) and "On Voting: A Public Choice Approach" (1998). In 1999 he returned to George Mason as a professor of law and economics, where he retired in 2008.

Rent seeking.

Tullock developed a theory referred to as rent-seeking. Rent seeking, according to public choice theory, is securing profits through the political process rather than the market process of exchange. An example of rent seeking is when a firm, union, or special-interest group lobbies political actors (e.g. politicians or bureaucrats) to influence legislation in a beneficial manner. This can lead to moral hazard when politicians make policy decisions based on the lobby instead of the efficiency of the policy.  Tullock also formulated and considered the Tullock paradox, namely, the paradox of why rent-seeking is so cheap.

Tullock's spike.

The name "Tullock's spike" refers to a thought experiment in which Tullock suggested that if governments were serious about reducing road casualties, they should mandate that a sharp spike be installed in the center of each car's steering wheel, to increase the probability that an accident would be fatal to the driver. Tullock's idea was that the normal process of risk compensation would then lead to safer driving by the affected drivers, thereby actually reducing driving fatalities.

Awards and recognition.

In 1994 Tullock was awarded an honorary Ph.D. from the University of Chicago and in 1998 became a distinguished fellow of the American Economic Association. He served as President of the Southern Economic Association, the International Atlantic Economic Society (1998–1999), the Western Economic Association and the Public Choice Society. In 1996 he was elected to the "American Political Science Review" Hall of Fame. He was sometimes considered a longshot candidate for the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.

Criticism.

His book, "The Politics of Bureaucracy", has been criticized for overlooking a substantial body of literature. A number of authors have criticized Tullock and the public choice tradition as being too simplistic in its explanation of political behavior.

Death.

On November 3, 2014, Tullock died at the age of 92 in Des Moines.

Gordon Tullock (; February 13, 1922 – November 3, 2014) was an economist and professor of law and Economics at the George Mason University School of Law. He is best known for his work on public choice theory, the application of economic thinking to political issues. He was one of the founding figures in his field.


Life.

The wars involving Mecklenburg forced her father to send Anna Maria and her two older brothers, Christian Louis and Karl, first to Sweden and shortly afterwards to Denmark, to the court of Dowager Queen Sophia (born Duchess of Mecklenburg-Güstrow). In 1629 Anna Maria was sent to Saxony with Dowager Electress Hedwig, to the latter's dower state, Castle Lichtenberg near Prettin, where she was educated. After Hedwig's death in 1642, Anna Maria returned to Schwerin, where she was reunited with her father, her mother having died in 1634. She also probably then met for the first time her stepmother, Marie Katharina of Brunswick-Dannenberg, and her three surviving half-siblings. Anna Maria was her father's favorite child as demonstrated by the cordial, even affectionate tone of the letters that they wrote to each other.  On 23 November 1647, in Schwerin, Anna Maria married Augustus, second surviving son of Johann Georg I, Elector of Saxony, and moved with her husband to Halle, the main city of his domains as Administrator of the Archbishopric of Magdeburg. During her marriage, she bore twelve children, including three daughters who died in infancy in 1663.  On 22 April 1657 her husband, by the terms of his father's will, received the towns of Weissenfels and Querfurt as his own Duchy, and hence Anna Maria became Duchess consort of Saxe-Weissenfels.  Anna Maria died on 11 December 1669 in Halle and was buried in a magnificent coffin in the Schloss Neu-Augustusburg in Weissenfels. Her three infant daughters who had been buried in the Halle Cathedral were reinterred with her.

Issue.

In Schwerin on 23 November 1647 Anna Maria married Augustus, Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels. They had twelve children:

Anna Maria of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (1 July 1627, in Schwerin – 11 December 1669, in Halle) was a German noblewoman, a member of the House of Mecklenburg and by marriage Duchess of Saxe-Weissenfels.


Plot summary.

A woman arrives in Guernsey, with her son Gilliat, and buys a house said to be haunted. The boy grows up, the woman dies. Gilliat becomes a good fisherman and sailor. People believe him to be a wizard.  In Guernsey also lives Mess Lethierry – a former sailor and owner of the first steamship of the island, the "Durande" – with his niece Deruchette. One day, near Christmas, when going to church, she sees Gilliat on the road behind her and writes his name in the snow. He sees this and becomes obsessed with her gesture. In time he falls in love with her and goes to play the bagpipes near her house.  Sieur Clubin, the trusted captain of "Durande", sets up a plan to sink the ship on the Hanois reef and flee with a ship of Spanish smugglers, "Tamaulipas". He gets in touch with Rantaine, a swindler who had stolen a large sum of money from Mess Lethierry many years ago. Clubin takes the money from Rantaine at gunpoint.  In thick fog, Clubin sails for the Hanois reef from where he can easily swim to the shore, meet the smugglers, and disappear, giving the appearance of having drowned. Because of the fog he has mistakenly arrived at the Douvres reef, which is still halfway between Guernsey and France. Left alone on the ship, he is terrified, but he sees a cutter and leaps into the water to catch it. At that moment he is grabbed by the leg and is pulled down to the bottom.  Everybody in Guernsey finds out about the shipwreck. Mess Lethierry is desperate to get the "Durande"s engine back. His niece declares she will marry the rescuer of the engine, and Mess Lethierry swears she will marry no other. Gilliat immediately takes up the mission, enduring hunger, thirst, and cold trying to free the engine from the wreck. In a battle with an octopus, he finds the skeleton of Clubin and the stolen money on the bottom of the sea.  Eventually he succeeds in returning the engine to Lethierry, who is very pleased and ready to honour his promise. Gilliat appears in front of the people as the rescuer but he declines to marry Deruchette because he had seen her accepting a marriage proposal made by Ebenezer Caudry, the young priest recently arrived on the island. He arranges their hurried wedding and helps them run away on the sailing ship "Cashmere". In the end, with all his dreams shattered, Gilliat decides to wait for the tide sitting on the Gild Holm'Ur chair (a rock in the sea) and drowns as he watches the "Cashmere" disappear on the horizon.

Influence.

The novel is credited with introducing the Guernésiais word for octopus ("pieuvre") into the French language (standard French for octopus is "poulpe").

Dedication.

The following dedication appears at the front of the book:

Publishing history.

The novel was first published in Brussels in 1866 (Hugo was in exile from France). An English translation quickly appeared in New York later that year, under the title "The Toilers of the Sea". A UK edition followed in 1887, with Ward Lock publishing Sir G Campbell's translation under the title "Workers of the Sea" followed by an 1896 Routledge edition under the title "Toilers of the Sea".  Hugo had originally intended his essay "L'Archipel de la Manche" ("The Archipelago of the [English] Channel") as an introduction to this novel, although it was not published until 1883, and the two have only been published together in the 20th century.  In 2002, Modern Library published an edition with a new translation by James Hogarth, which bills itself as "the first unabridged English edition of the novel".

Film adaptations.

There have been at least five film adaptations of the novel, including:

Toilers of the Sea () is a novel by Victor Hugo published in 1866. The book is dedicated to the island of Guernsey, where Hugo spent 15 years in exile. Hugo uses the setting of a small island community to transmute seemingly mundane events into drama of the highest calibre. "Les Travailleurs de la Mer" is set just after the Napoleonic Wars and deals with the impact of the Industrial Revolution upon the island.


Early life.

Klaus Nomi was born Klaus Sperber in Immenstadt, Bavaria, Germany on January 24, 1944. In the 1960s, he worked as an usher at the Deutsche Oper in West Berlin where he sang for the other ushers and maintenance crew on stage in front of the fire curtain after performances. He also sang opera arias at the Berlin gay discothèque Kleist Casino.  Nomi moved to New York City in 1972. He began his involvement with the art scene based in the East Village. According to "The Nomi Song", a documentary by Andrew Horn, Nomi took singing lessons and supported himself as a pastry chef.

Career.

In 1972, Nomi appeared in a satirical camp production of Richard Wagner's "Das Rheingold" at Charles Ludlam's Ridiculous Theater Company as the Rheinmaidens and the Wood Bird. He came to the attention of New York City's art scene in 1978 with his performance in "New Wave Vaudeville", a four-night event MC'd by artist David McDermott. Dressed in a skin-tight spacesuit with a clear plastic cape, Nomi sang the aria "Mon cœur s'ouvre à ta voix" ("My heart opens to your voice") from Camille Saint-Saëns' opera "Samson et Dalila" The performance ended with a chaotic crash of strobe lights, smoke bombs, and loud electronic sound effects as Nomi backed away into the smoke. Joey Arias recalled: "I still get goose pimples when I think about it... It was like he was from a different planet and his parents were calling him home. When the smoke cleared, he was gone." After that performance Nomi was invited to perform at clubs all over New York City.  At the New Wave Vaudeville show Nomi met Kristian Hoffman, songwriter for the Mumps. Hoffman was a performer and MC in the second incarnation of New Wave Vaudeville and a close friend of Susan Hannaford and Tom Scully, who produced the show, and Ann Magnuson, who directed it. Anya Phillips, then manager of James Chance and the Contortions, suggested Nomi and Hoffman form a band. Hoffman became Nomi's de facto musical director, assembling a band that included Page Wood from another New Wave vaudeville act, Come On, and Joe Katz, who was concurrently in The Student Teachers, the Accidents, and The Mumps.  Hoffman helped Nomi choose his pop covers, including the Lou Christie song "Lightnin' Strikes". Hoffman wrote several pop songs with which Nomi is closely identified: "The Nomi Song", "Total Eclipse", "After The Fall", and "Simple Man", the title song of Nomi's second RCA French LP. This configuration of the Klaus Nomi band performed at Manhattan clubs, including several performances at Max's Kansas City, Danceteria and Hurrah.  Disagreements with the management Nomi engaged led to a dissolution of this band, and Nomi continued without them. In the late 1970s, while performing at Club 57, The Mudd Club, The Pyramid Club, and other venues, Nomi assembled various up-and-coming models, singers, artists, and musicians to perform live with him, including Joey Arias, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, John Sex and Kenny Scharf. He also appeared on Manhattan Cable's TV Party. David Bowie heard about Nomi's performances in New York and soon met him and Arias at the Mudd Club. Bowie hired them as performers and backup singers for his appearance on "Saturday Night Live" on December 15, 1979. The band performed "TVC 15", "The Man Who Sold the World", and "Boys Keep Swinging". During the performance of "TVC 15", Nomi and Arias dragged around a large prop pink poodle with a television screen in its mouth. Nomi was so impressed with the plastic quasi-tuxedo suit that Bowie wore during "The Man Who Sold the World" that he commissioned one for himself. He wore the suit on the cover of his self-titled album, as well as during a number of his music videos. Nomi wore his variant of the outfit, in monochromatic black-and-white with spandex and makeup to match, until the last few months of his life. He released his second album, "Simple Man", in November 1982.  Nomi also collaborated with producer Man Parrish, appearing on Parrish's album "Hip Hop Bee Bop" as a backup vocalist on the track "Six Simple Synthesizers".  He played a supporting role as a Nazi official in Anders Grafstrom's 1980 underground film "The Long Island Four".  The 1981 rock documentary film "Urgh! A Music War" features Nomi's live performance of "Total Eclipse." His performance of "Mon cœur s'ouvre à ta voix" was used for the closing credits.  666 Fifth Avenue was listed as the contact address in the liner notes of Nomi's 1981 self-titled record.  In the last several months of his life, Nomi changed his focus to operatic pieces and adopted a Baroque era operatic outfit complete with full collar as his typical onstage attire. The collar helped cover the outbreaks of Kaposi's sarcoma on his neck, one of the numerous AIDS-related diseases Nomi developed toward the end of his life. Nomi was reported to be gay, and at one point was involved in the "rampant promiscuity" that earned John Sex his surname; before his illness, there was speculation that he was asexual.

Illness and death.

Nomi died on August 6, 1983 at the Sloan Kettering Hospital Center in New York City, one of the first celebrities to die of complications from AIDS.

In popular culture.

Filmmakers such as Andrew Horn and writers such as Jim Fouratt consider Nomi an important part of the 1980s East Village scene, which was a hotbed of development for punk rock, music, the visual arts and the avant-garde. Although Nomi's work had not yet met with national commercial success at the time of his death, he garnered a cult following, mainly in New York and in France. Andrew Horn's 2004 feature documentary about Nomi's life, "The Nomi Song", which was released by Palm Pictures, helped spur renewed interest in the singer, including an art exhibit in San Francisco at the New Langton Arts gallery and one in Milan at the Res Pira Lab, which subsequently moved to Berlin's Strychnin Gallery, called "Do You Nomi?". New music pieces inspired by Nomi were commissioned by the gallery for a variety of European musicians, including Ernesto Tomasini, a singer often considered to be Nomi's heir.  In 2001 German pop duo Rosenstolz and English singer Marc Almond recorded a cover version of "Total Eclipse". Garbage used his "Valentine’s Day" song as the basis for their 2012 "Beloved Freak".  Nomi makes an appearance in Derf Backderf's graphic novel "Punk Rock and Trailer Parks," released in 2008.  | valign=top |

Klaus Sperber (January 24, 1944 – August 6, 1983), known professionally as Klaus Nomi, was a German countertenor noted for his wide vocal range and an unusual, otherworldly stage persona.


Biography.

Rachel was born in Saratov in Imperial Russia on September 20, 1890, the eleventh daughter of Isser-Leib and Sophia Bluwstein, and granddaughter of the rabbi of the Jewish community in Kiev. During her childhood, her family moved to Poltava, Ukraine, where she attended a Russian-speaking Jewish school and, later, a secular high school. She began writing poetry at the age of 15. When she was 17, she moved to Kiev and began studying painting.  At the age of 19, Rachel visited Palestine with her sister en route to Italy, where they were planning to study art and philosophy. They decided to stay on as Zionist pioneers, learning Hebrew by listening to children’s chatter in kindergartens. They settled in Rehovot and worked in the orchards. Later, Rachel moved to Kvutzat Kinneret on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, where she studied and worked in a women's agricultural school. At Kinneret, she met Zionist leader A. D. Gordon who was to be a great influence on her life, and to whom she dedicated her first Hebrew poem.  In 1913, on the advice of Gordon, she journeyed to Toulouse, France to study agronomy and drawing. When World War I broke out, unable to return to Palestine, she returned instead to Russia where she taught Jewish refugee children. In Russia she suffered from poverty and strenuous labour, as well as the reappearance of her childhood lung disease. It may have been at this point in her life that she contracted tuberculosis. Lonely, ill and famished, she had only one hope left: to return to Palestine. In 1919, after the war, she boarded the first ship to leave Russia to Palestine. She returned to Palestine on board the ship "Ruslan" and for a while joined the small agricultural kibbutz Degania, a settlement neighboring her previous home at Kinneret. However, shortly after her arrival she was diagnosed with tuberculosis, then an incurable disease. Now unable to work with children for fear of contagion, she was expelled from Degania and left to fend for herself. In 1925 she lived briefly in a small white house in the courtyard of the William Holman Hunt House at No. 64 Street of the Prophets in Jerusalem. She spent the rest of her life traveling and living in Tel Aviv, eking out a living by providing private lessons in Hebrew and French, and finally settled in a sanatorium for tuberculosis patients in Gedera.  Rachel died on April 16, 1931 in Tel Aviv, at the age of 40. She is buried in the Kinneret cemetery in a grave overlooking the Sea of Galilee, following her wishes as expressed in her poem "If Fate Decrees". Alongside her are buried many of the socialist ideologues and pioneers of the second and third waves of immigration. Naomi Shemer was buried near Rachel, according to Shemer's wish.

Literary career.

As a member of the editorial staff of Davar newspaper, Zalman Rubashov later Zalman Shazar, who became the third President of Israel, encouraged her to write and publish her poetry. Her early work was in Russian but she switched to Hebrew. Most of her poems were written in the final six years of her life, usually on small notes to her friends. In 1920 her first poem, "Mood", was published in the Hebrew newspaper "Davar". Eventually the majority of her poems were published there on a weekly basis, and quickly became popular with the Jewish community in Palestine and later, the State of Israel.  Rachel is known for her lyrical style, the brevity of her poems, and the revolutionary simplicity of her conversational tone. The majority of her poetry is set in the pastoral countryside of the Land of Israel. Many of her poems echo her feelings of longing and loss, a result of her inability to realize her aspirations in life. In several poems she mourns the fact that she will never have a child of her own. Lyrical, exceedingly musical and characterized by its simple language and deep feeling, her poetry deals with fate, her own difficult life, and death. Her love poems emphasize the feelings of loneliness, distance, and longing for the beloved. It also touches upon the hardships and laments of a pioneer reminiscing of times spent in labouring on the land. Her lighter poetry is ironic, often comic. Her writing was influenced by French imagism, Biblical stories, and the literature of the Second Aliyah pioneers. Another major creative influence on Rachel’s poetry was the Acmeists and their leader, the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. Rachel’s style reflects the movement’s strive for “clarity, accuracy, conciseness, and economy of language” in poetry.  In some poems Rachel expresses identification with biblical figures such as Rachel, her namesake matriarch, and Michal, wife of David.  Rachel also wrote a one-act comic play "Mental Satisfaction", which was performed but not published in her lifetime. This ironic vignette of pioneer life was recently rediscovered and published in a literary journal.

Awards and recognition.

Rachel was the first Jewish woman poet in Palestine to receive recognition in a genre that was practiced solely by men. Anthologies of her poetry remain bestsellers to this day. Many of her poems were set to music, both during her lifetime and afterwards, and are widely sung by Israeli singers. Her poems are included in the mandatory curriculum in Israeli schools. A selection of her poetry was translated to English and published under the title "Flowers of Perhaps: Selected Poems of Ra'hel", by the London publisher Menard. Poems by Rachel have been translated to English, German, Czech, Polish, Esperanto, Italian, Serbo-Croatian, Hungarian, Basque (by Benito Lertxundi) and Slovak.  In his foreword to the 1994 edition of "Flowers of Perhaps", the acclaimed Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai stated: "What may be most remarkable about the poetry of Ra'hel, a superb lyric poet, is that it has remained fresh in its simplicity and inspiration for more than seventy years."  In 2011, Rachel was chosen as one of four great poets whose portraits would be on Israeli currency (the other three being Leah Goldberg, Shaul Tchernichovsky, and Nathan Alterman).  In 2016, Google Doodle commemorated her 126th birthday.

Published works.

Poetry books published in Hebrew  Later compilations and editions in Hebrew  Books in translation  Individual poems have been published in Afrikaans, Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, English, Esperanto, French, Frisian, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Romanian, Serbo-Croatian, Slovak, Spanish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese, Welsh, and Yiddish.

Rachel Bluwstein Sela (September 20 (Julian calendar), 1890 – April 16, 1931) was a Hebrew-language poet who immigrated to Palestine, then part of the Ottoman Empire, in 1909. She is known by her first name, Rachel (, ), or as Rachel the Poetess (, ).


Host selection.

After a lengthy decision-making process in which FIFA's executive committee met eight times, Italy was chosen as the host nation at a meeting in Stockholm on 9 October 1932. The decision was taken by the executive committee without a ballot of members. The Italian bid was chosen in preference to one from Sweden; the Italian government assigned a budget of 3.5 million lire to the tournament.

Qualification and participants.

36 countries applied to enter the tournament, so qualifying matches were required to thin the field to 16. Even so, there were several notable absentees. Reigning World Cup holders Uruguay declined to participate, in protest at the refusal of several European countries to travel to South America for the previous World Cup, which Uruguay had hosted in 1930. As a result, the 1934 World Cup is the only one in which the reigning champions did not participate. The British Home Nations, in a period of self-imposed exile from FIFA, also refused to participate, even though FIFA had offered England and Scotland direct entry to the tournament without qualification. Football Association committee member Charles Sutcliffe called the tournament "a joke" and claimed that "the national associations of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland have quite enough to do in their own International Championship which seems to me a far better World Championship than the one to be staged in Rome".  Despite their role as hosts, Italy were still required to qualify, the first and only time the host nation needed to do so. The qualifying matches were arranged on a geographical basis. Withdrawals by Chile and Peru meant Argentina and Brazil qualified without playing a single match.  Twelve of the 16 places were allocated to Europe, three to the Americas, and one to Africa or Asia (including Turkey). Only 10 of the 32 entrants, and four of the 16 qualified teams (Brazil, Argentina, United States and Egypt, the first African team to qualify for a World Cup finals tournament), were from outside Europe. The last place in the finals was contested between the United States and Mexico only three days before the start of the tournament in a one-off match in Rome, which the United States won.

List of qualified teams.

The following 16 teams qualified for the final tournament. 10 of these teams made their first World Cup appearance. This included 9 of the 12 European teams (Italy, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Sweden, Austria, and Switzerland) as well as Egypt. Egypt was the first team from Africa in the finals and would not qualify again until the next time the competition was held in Italy, in 1990.

Venues.

The number of supporters travelling from other countries was higher than at any previous football tournament, including 7,000 from the Netherlands and 10,000 each from Austria and Switzerland.

Format.

The group stage used in the first World Cup was discarded in favour of a straight knockout tournament. If a match was tied after ninety minutes, then thirty minutes of extra time were played. If the score was still tied after extra time, the match was replayed the next day.  The eight seeded teams – Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Hungary – were kept apart in the first round.

Summary.

All eight first-round matches kicked off at the same time. Hosts and favourites Italy won handsomely, defeating the USA 7–1; "The New York Times" correspondent wrote that "only the fine goal-tending of Julius Hjulian of Chicago kept the score as low as it was". Internal disputes meant Argentina's squad for the tournament did not contain a single member of the team which had reached the final in 1930. Against Sweden in Bologna, Argentina twice took the lead, but two goals by Sven Jonasson and a winner by Knut Kroon gave Sweden a 3–2 victory. Fellow South Americans Brazil also suffered an early exit. Spain beat them comfortably; 3–1 the final score.  For the only time in World Cup history, the last eight consisted entirely of European teams – Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. All four non-European teams who made the journey to Italy were eliminated after one match.  In the quarter-finals, the first replayed match in World Cup history took place, when Italy and Spain drew 1–1 after extra time. The match was played in a highly aggressive manner with several players of both sides injured: rough play injured the Spanish goalkeeper Ricardo Zamora in the first match, leaving him unable to participate in the replay, while on the other side rough play by Spaniards broke the leg of the Italian Mario Pizziolo who would not play in the national team again. Italy won the replay 1–0; their play so physical that at least three Spaniards had to depart the field with injuries. Italy then went on to beat Austria in the semi-finals by the same score. Meanwhile, Czechoslovakia secured their place in the final by beating Germany 3–1.  The Stadium of the National Fascist Party was the venue for the final. With 80 minutes played, the Czechoslovaks led 1–0. The Italians managed to score before the final whistle and then added another goal in extra time to be crowned World Cup winners.  Throughout the years, several sources have reported that the tournament was marred by bribery and corruption, and could have been influenced by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, who used the tournament as a propaganda tool for fascism. According to these accusations, Mussolini personally selected referees for the matches where the Italian national team were playing, while the Italian government meddled in FIFA's organisation of events, re-organizing the logistics of the matches to further promote fascism. Nonetheless, Italy also won the following edition of the World Cup (held in France) as well as the Olympic football tournament in 1936.

Squads.

For a list of all squads that appeared in the final tournament, see "1934 FIFA World Cup squads".

Goalscorers.

With five goals, Oldřich Nejedlý was the top scorer in the tournament. In total, 70 goals were scored by 45 players, with none of them credited as an own goal.

FIFA retrospective ranking.

In 1986, FIFA published a report that ranked all teams in each World Cup up to and including 1986, based on progress in the competition, overall results and quality of the opposition (not counting replay results). The rankings for the 1934 tournament were as follows:

The 1934 FIFA World Cup was the second edition of the FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national association football teams. It took place in Italy from 27 May to 10 June 1934.


Planning.

The 2nd Belorussian Front—under Konstantin Rokossovsky—had initially been tasked with advancing westward north of the Vistula River toward Pomerania and the major port city of Danzig, with the primary aim of protecting the right flank of Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front, which was pushing towards Berlin. During the East Prussian Offensive, however, Rokossovsky was ordered to wheel directly north toward Elbing. This left substantial German forces intact in Pomerania, where they threatened the right flank of Zhukov's formations.  As a result, once the initial phase of the East Prussian Offensive was over, the 2nd Belorussian Front was redeployed with the intention of attacking westwards into Pomerania, eliminating the possibility of a German counter-offensive (similarly, the parallel Silesian Offensives of Konev's 1st Ukrainian Front in the south were in part designed to protect the 1st Belorussian Front's left flank). The need to secure the flanks delayed the Soviets' final push towards Berlin, which was originally planned for February, until April.  Joseph Stalin's decision to delay the push toward Berlin from February to April has been a subject of some controversy among both the Soviet generals and military historians, with one side arguing that the Soviets had a chance of securing Berlin much quicker and with much lower losses in February, and the other arguing that the danger of leaving large German formations on the flanks could have resulted in a successful German counter-attack and prolonged the war further: the Germans did in fact mount a surprise counter-attack in Pomerania in mid-February, Operation Solstice. The delay did, however, allow the Soviets to occupy significant parts of Austria in the Vienna Offensive.

German intelligence.

As early as 13 February, German intelligence services had deduced that the Soviets would seek to clear Pomerania before advancing on Berlin. The 2nd Army—defending a large and exposed sector running through Pomerania eastward toward the edge of East Prussia at Elbing — sought permission to withdraw, but this was denied by Adolf Hitler. Graudenz, on the Vistula, was surrounded on 18 February (the garrison, from the 83rd Infantry Division—finally surrendered the following month).

Deployments.

Wehrmacht.

The corps of the Second Army were seriously understrength by this time, being composed largely of fragmentary or "ad hoc" units. The 3rd Panzer Army had been rebuilt using the "korps" of the recently formed 11th SS Panzer Army, the original formation having been largely destroyed in Lithuania and East Prussia, where its remnants were now defending Königsberg.

The offensive.

Breakthrough.

Rokossovsky opened the offensive on 24 February using the fresh troops of Kozlov's 19th Army, but after an initial advance of some they were halted by intense German resistance. On 26 February, he inserted the 3rd Guards Tank Corps east of Neustettin, where they achieved a penetration of, and relieved Kozlov of command. The 3rd Guards Tank Corps broke through at Baldenburg, while Neustettin on the Front's left flank fell to the 3rd Guards Cavalry Corps on 27 February.  Weiß had hurriedly assembled the VII Panzer Corps, including the remnants of the 7th Panzer Division, at Rummelsburg to threaten 19th Army's flank. However, after a Soviet breakthrough at Köslin on 2 March, the 2nd Army found itself completely cut off from the rest of its Army Group.

1st Belorussian Front joins the attack.

Zhukov's right wing—a grouping of the 3rd Shock Army and 1st and 2nd Guards Tank Armies—went over to the offensive on 1 March, striking northward with the main force concentrated at Reetz. The entire left wing of 3rd Panzer Army was cut off by their breakthrough, after Guderian refused Raus' request for withdrawal; the right flank withdrew towards Stettin.  On 4 March, forward Soviet tank units reached the Baltic, and the German forces in Pomerania were trapped in a series of encirclements. The 2nd Army began to fall back on the Danzig fortified area, while the X SS Corps of the 3rd Panzer Army had been surrounded at Dramburg.

The second phase.

Rokossovsky opened the second phase of his offensive on March 6. The 2nd Shock Army threatened to cut off the defending forces in the fortress of Marienburg, which was evacuated two days later, while in the east Elbing finally fell on 10 March. The defence of Marienburg was conducted by a "Kampfgruppe" under the nominal control of the staff of the 7th Infantry Division, including marine, SS and other units. Weiß, having warned that the Elbing pocket could not be held, was relieved of command on 9 March and replaced by Dietrich von Saucken. The troops of the German 2nd Army withdrew in disarray into Danzig and Gdingen, where the 2nd Belorussian Front besieged them. Zhukov's forces meanwhile, cleared the remainder of 3rd Panzer Army from the east bank of the lower Oder, driving the Germans from their last positions in a bridgehead at Altdamm.

Siege of Kolberg.

Many civilian refugees from Pomerania had fled into the coastal town of Kolberg, which was surrounded by 4 March. Nevertheless, the town was successfully defended until 18 March, by which time evacuation was almost complete.

Siege of Danzig.

The Danzig-Gotenhafen (Gdingen) Fortified Area—also the main port for refugees from East Prussia escaping to the west—was ordered to be defended for as long as possible by von Saucken in order to keep the evacuation routes open.  Rokossovsky opened his final offensive on 15 March 1945; the main thrust, toward the coast at Zoppot between Gdingen and Danzig, being undertaken by the 70th and 49th Army advancing in parallel. The fighting was savage, but by 19 March 1945 the Soviet spearheads had reached the heights over Zoppot, while the 4th Panzer Division had been pushed back to the outskirts of Danzig itself. By 22 March 1945, the 70th Army reached the sea, splitting the German defence. Gdingen was taken on 26 March 1945, its defenders and many civilians retreating to the headland at Oxhöft, from where they were evacuated to the Hel Peninsula.  Danzig finally fell on 30 March 1945, after which the remnants of the 2nd Army withdrew to the Vistula delta southeast of the city. Evacuation of civilians and military personnel from there and from the Hel Peninsula continued until 10 May 1945. The Soviets declared the East Pomeranian Offensive complete a week after the fall of Danzig.  According to Soviet claims, in the Battle of Danzig the Germans lost 39,000 soldiers dead and 10,000 captured.

The East Pomeranian Strategic Offensive operation () was an offensive by the Soviet Red Army against the German "Wehrmacht" on the Eastern Front. It took place in Pomerania and West Prussia from 10 February – 4 April 1945.


Early life and education.

Romer was born to former Colorado governor Roy Romer and Beatrice "Bea" Miller. He has four brothers and two sisters. One of his brothers, Chris Romer, is a former Colorado state senator.  He graduated in 1977 from Phillips Exeter Academy. He earned his Bachelor of Science in mathematics and a PhD in economics in 1983, both from the University of Chicago, after graduate studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1977 to 1979 and at Queen's University (Kingston, Canada) from 1979 to 1980.

Career.

Romer's most important work is in the field of economic growth, and he has made important contributions in the development of endogenous growth theory. He was named one of America's 25 most influential people by "Time" magazine in 1997, and he was awarded the Horst Claus Recktenwald Prize in Economics in 2002. In 2015, he was recipient of the John R. Commons Award, given by the economics honor society Omicron Delta Epsilon.

Academia.

Romer's research on economic growth followed extensive studies of long-run growth during the 1950s and 1960s. The Solow–Swan model, for example, established the primacy of technological progress in accounting for sustained increases in output per worker. His 1983 dissertation, supervised by José Scheinkman and Robert Lucas Jr., amounted to constructing mathematical representations of economies in which technological change is the result of the intentional actions of people, such as research and development. It led to two "Journal of Political Economy" articles published in 1986 and 1990, respectively, which started endogenous growth theory.  He taught at the University of Rochester, the University of Chicago, the University of California, Berkeley, Stanford University and New York University.

Business.

Romer temporarily left academia in 2001 to found Aplia, a company which produces online problem sets for college students; Aplia was purchased in 2007 by Cengage Learning.  He is credited with the quote "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste," which he said during a November 2004 venture-capitalist meeting in California. Although he was referring to the rapidly rising education levels in other countries compared to the United States, the quote became a rallying concept for economists and consultants looking for constructive opportunities amid the Great Recession.

Charter cities.

Romer has attempted to replicate the success of charter cities and make them an engine of economic growth in developing countries. He promoted this idea in a TED talk in 2009, and he has argued that with better rules and institutions less developed nations can be set on a different and better trajectory for growth. In his model, a host country would turn responsibility for a charter city over to a more developed trustee nation, which would allow for new rules of governance to emerge. People could "vote with their feet" for or against these rules.  The government of Honduras considered creating charter cities, though without the oversight of a third-party government, which some argue is neo-colonialism. Romer served as chair of a "transparency committee" but resigned in September 2012 when the Honduran government agency responsible for the project signed agreements with international developers without involvement of the committee.

World Bank.

He became World Bank Chief Economist in October 2016. He resigned on 24 January 2018, following a controversy in which he stated in an interview with "The Wall Street Journal" on January 12, that during the tenure of Chile's socialist President Michelle Bachelet from 2014 onwards, Chile's ranking for ease of doing business had been downgraded by the World Bank as a result of changes of methodology which he claimed may have been politically motivated, a claim denied by the former World Bank economist responsible for compiling Chile's ranking, Chilean economist Augusto Lopez-Claros.

Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics.

Romer shared the 2018 Prize with William Nordhaus. In choosing Romer as one of the 2018 economics laureates, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences stated that he had shown "how knowledge can function as a driver of long-term economic growth.... [Prior macroeconomic studies] had not modelled how economic decisions and market conditions determine the creation of new technologies. Paul Romer solved this problem by demonstrating how economic forces govern the willingness of firms to produce new ideas and innovations."  After receiving the prize, Romer described how he started thinking about the relationship between growth and innovation: "The question that I first asked was, why was progress... speeding up over time? It arises because of this special characteristic of an idea, which is if [a million people try] to discover something, if any one person finds it, everybody can use the idea."  The same day he received the award, Romer married Caroline Weber, a professor of French Literature at Barnard College.

Paul Michael Romer (born November 6, 1955) is an American economist and co-recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (shared with William Nordhaus) in 2018 for his contributions to endogenous growth theory. He was awarded the prize "for integrating technological innovations into long-run macroeconomic analysis".


Life.

Ai Qing was born in Fantianjiang village (), Jinhua county, in eastern China's Zhejiang province. After entering Hangzhou Xihu Art School in 1928, under the advice of principal Lin Fengmian, he went abroad and studied in Paris the following spring. From 1929 to 1932 while studying in France, besides learning art of Renoir and Van Gogh, the philosophy of Kant and Hegel, he also studied modern poets such as Mayakovsky and was especially influenced by Belgian poet Verhaeren.  After returning to Shanghai, China in May 1932, he joined China Left Wing Artist Association, and was arrested in July for opposing the Kuomintang. During his imprisonment, Ai Qing translated Verhaeren's poems and wrote his first book "Dayanhe—My Nanny" (), "Reed Flute" (), and "Paris" (). He was finally released in October 1935.  After the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, Ai Qing wrote "Snow falls on China's Land" () after arriving at Wuhan to support the war effort. In 1938, he moved to Guilin to become the editor of "Guixi Daily" newspaper. In 1940, he became the dean of the Chinese department at Chongqing YuCai University.  In 1941, he moved to Yan'an, and joined the Chinese Communist Party in the subsequent year. Beginning in 1949, he was on cultural committees. He was editor of "Poetry Magazine", and associate editor of "People's Literature".  However, in 1957, during the Anti-Rightist Movement, he defended Ding Ling and was accused of "rightism". He was exiled to farms in northeast China in 1958 and was transferred to Xinjiang in 1959 by the Communist authorities. During the period of the Cultural Revolution he was forced to work daily cleaning the communal toilets for his village of about 200 people, a physically demanding job he was required to carry out for five years, then aged in his 60s. According to an account by his son Ai Weiwei, he lost vision in one of his eyes due to lack of nutrition. He was not allowed to publish his works "Return Song"() and "Ode to Light"() until he was reinstated in 1979. In 1979, he was vice-chairman of the Chinese Writers Association.  He made a second journey to France in 1980, and in 1985 French president François Mitterrand awarded him the title of Commander of the Order of Arts and Letters.

Family.

He is the father of famed Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei, who also participated in designing the Beijing National Stadium, and artist Ai Xuan. He had two daughters with his second wife.

Pen name.

In 1933, while being tortured and imprisoned by the Kuomintang and writing his book "Da'an River — My Nanny", he went to write his surname ("Jiang", ), but stopped at the first component "艹" due to his bitterness towards KMT leader Chiang Kai-shek. He resented sharing the same surname (Jiang/Chiang) and simply crossed out the rest of the character with an "X". This happens to be the Chinese character "ài" (), and since the rest of his name, "Hǎi Chéng" meant the limpidity of the sea, it implied the color of limpid water "qīng" (青, turquoise, blue, or green), so he adopted the pen name "Ai Qing".

Aì Qīng (, March 27, 1910 – May 5, 1996), born Jiǎng Zhènghán () and styled Jiǎng Hǎichéng (), is regarded by some as one of the finest modern Chinese poets. He was known under his pen names Línbì (), Kè'ā () and Éjiā ().


History.

In 1980 artists were invited to submit designs and a jury was assembled consisting of experts in the fields of art and design. The jury chose a design by Karin Daan, based on the pink triangle. With the triangle on the water as its central point, Daan expanded the design to make her work as monumental as possible without disrupting the surroundings.  The idea of a permanent memorial to gay and lesbian victims of persecution dated from 1970, when gay activists were arrested for attempting to place a lavender wreath at the National War Memorial (Netherlands) on Dam Square in the centre of Amsterdam. The wreath was removed by police and denounced as a disgrace.  In 1979 the Dutch gay and lesbian rights movement started an initiative to raise funds for a monument, with the support of groups in other countries. It took eight years to raise the necessary €180,000 to build the Homomonument. Most of this came from donations from individuals and organisations. The Dutch Parliament donated €50,000, and the city of Amsterdam and the province of North Holland also made contributions.  A monument in memory of LGBT victims of repression and persecution was dedicated in Barcelona, Spain in 2011. It was modeled after the Homomonument.

Design.

As well as the triangle on the canal, which has a set of steps leading to the water where floral wreaths are frequently laid, there is a triangle on land 60 cm high and a memorial triangle at street level. The three triangles—each measuring 10 meters (30 ft) on each side—together form a larger triangle connected on each side by a thin row of pink granite bricks. This larger triangle measures 36 meters on each side.  The alignments of the three points of the larger triangle are symbolic. One points towards the National War Memorial on Dam Square. One points towards the house of Anne Frank, a Jewish girl who was deported to her death by the Nazis. The third points towards the headquarters of COC Nederland, the Dutch gay rights group founded in 1946, making it the oldest continuously operating gay and lesbian organisation in the world.  On the triangle pointing towards the Anne Frank House is engraved a line of poetry by the Dutch Jewish gay poet Jacob Israël de Haan (1881–1924): "Naar Vriendschap Zulk een Mateloos Verlangen" ("Such an endless desire for friendship"). The text is from his poem "To a Young Fisherman".  A miniature version of the Homomonument can be seen at The Hague's Madurodam park. The scale model was unveiled on 24 October 24 2006, by Amsterdam mayor Job Cohen and COC chair Frank van Dalen.

The Homomonument is a memorial in the centre of Amsterdam, the capital of the Netherlands. It commemorates all gay men and lesbians who have been subjected to persecution because of their homosexuality. Opened on September 5, 1987, it takes the form of three large pink triangles made of granite, set into the ground so as to form a larger triangle, on the bank of the Keizersgracht canal, near the historic Westerkerk church. The Homomonument was designed to "inspire and support lesbians and gays in their struggle against denial, oppression and discrimination." It was the first monument in the world to commemorate gays and lesbians who were killed by the Nazis.


Early life.

Katherine was born in the Royal Palace in Athens, a few weeks after her paternal grandfather, King George I of Greece, was assassinated in that country's second-largest city (in the English-speaking world until the late 20th century known as Salonika, namely Thessaloniki). She was baptised on 14 June 1913. Her godparents were Dowager Queen of Greece (her paternal grandmother), Dowager Queen of the United Kingdom (her paternal grandfather's sister and her maternal grandmother's sister-in-law), George V of the United Kingdom (her paternal grandfather's nephew and her maternal grandmother's nephew), Wilhelm II, German Emperor (her maternal uncle), The Greek Navy (represented by the Minister of Marine) and The Greek Army (represented by the Minister of War)  She had five siblings – three brothers (George, Alexander and Paul, each of whom would become King of the Hellenes) and two sisters (Princess Helen, who married Crown Prince Carol of Romania, and Princess Irene who married Prince Aimone of Savoy, Duke of Spoleto). When she was christened, the members of the whole Greek Army and Greek Navy became her godparents. At three years of age, she and her mother were trapped in Tatoi Palace, outside Athens, when a fire broke out. The Queen, carrying Katherine, managed to escape in time.

Life in exile.

Her father abdicated in 1917, replaced as king by her brother Alexander. She and her parents were exiled to Switzerland. They were re-instated following Alexander's death in 1920, but Constantine abdicated again in 1922. Exiled again, this time to Sicily, her father died in Palermo in 1923. The family moved to in Florence, where Katherine took up painting. Her second brother George became King George II in 1922, but was deposed in 1924.  Katherine was educated in England, at a boarding school at Broadstairs and then North Foreland Lodge. Her mother died in January 1932, after which she continued to live at the Villa Sparta with her sister, Helen. She and the future Elizabeth II were bridesmaids at the wedding of her first cousin, Princess Marina, to Prince George in 1934.

Return to Greece and marriage.

Her brother George was reinstated as king in 1935, and Katherine returned to Greece with her sister, Irene. She joined the Greek Red Cross when the Second World War broke out in 1939. In 1941, after Greece had been overrun by Axis forces, she fled to South Africa with her third brother, Paul, in a Sunderland flying boat, where she worked as a nurse at a hospital in Cape Town. She heard no news of her sister Helen for four years. She returned to England in 1946, sailing the last leg from Egypt to England on the Cunard liner RMS "Ascania". On board, she met Major Richard Campbell Brandram MC (5 August 1911 – 5 April 1994), an officer in the British Royal Artillery. They were engaged three weeks after they arrived in England, but their engagement was announced only in February 1947. On 1 April at the Royal Palace, three weeks prior to the wedding, her brother King George had a stroke and died shortly after in Katherine's presence. George was succeeded on the Greek throne by Katherine's third brother Paul, who acted as best man at the wedding, which took place according to schedule on 21 April 1947.  She then accompanied her husband to his new army posting in Baghdad, and they later settled in England. On 25 August 1947, King George VI granted her the rank and title of a duke's daughter and she became known as Lady Katherine Brandram. She and her husband lived in Eaton Square in Belgravia, and later moved to Marlow, Buckinghamshire.  According to her obituary in "The Daily Telegraph", "Lady Katherine lived quietly but remained in close touch with her own and the British royal families. She attended the Queen's wedding to Prince Philip (her first cousin), and was a guest at the service to mark Prince Philip's 80th birthday at St George's Chapel, Windsor, in 2001."  After the death of Infanta Beatriz of Spain in 2002, Katherine was the last surviving great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria, as well the last surviving grandchild of Frederick III, German Emperor and Victoria, Princess Royal. She lived for almost 87 years after the death of her brother, King Alexander, and her death left Count Carl Johan Bernadotte of Sweden (31 October 1916 – 5 May 2012) as Queen Victoria's last living great-grandchild.  From the time of the death of her eldest sister Queen Helen, Queen Mother of Romania in 1982, to the time of her own death, she was Queen Victoria's most senior female line descendant. Her death marked the end of all female-line direct descendants of Frederick III, German Emperor and Victoria, Princess Royal.

Issue.

Princess Katherine of Greece and Denmark and Major Richard Campbell Andrew Brandram had one child, a son:

Princess Katherine of Greece and Denmark (; 4 May 1913 – 2 October 2007), styled in the UK as Lady Katherine Brandram from 1947 till her death, was the third daughter and youngest child of King Constantine I of Greece and Sophia of Prussia.


Life.

Rosling was born in Uppsala, Sweden, on 27 July 1948. From 1967 to 1974 Rosling studied statistics and medicine at Uppsala University, and in 1972 he studied public health at St. John's Medical College, Bangalore, India. He became a licensed physician in 1976 and from 1979 to 1981 he served as District Medical Officer in Nacala in northern Mozambique. On 21 August 1981 Rosling began investigating an outbreak of konzo, a paralytic disease first described in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. His investigations earned him a Ph.D. at Uppsala University in 1986. Hans struggled with dyslexia.  Rosling presented the television documentary "The Joy of Stats", which was broadcast in the United Kingdom by BBC Four in December 2010 and has been made available to 'catch up' on BBC iPlayer since. He presented a documentary "Don't Panic — The Truth about Population" for the "This World" series using a Musion 3D projection display, which appeared on BBC Two in the UK in November 2013. In 2015 he presented the documentary "Don't Panic: How to End Poverty in 15 Years", which was produced by Wingspan and aired on the BBC just ahead of the announcement of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.  Rosling was a sword swallower, as demonstrated in the final moments of his second talk at the TED conference. In 2009 he was listed as one of 100 leading global thinkers by "Foreign Policy", and in 2011 as one of 100 most creative people in business by "Fast Company". In 2011 he was elected member of the Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences and in 2012 as member of the Swedish Academy of Sciences. He was included in the "Time" 100 list of the world's 100 most influential people in 2012.

Personal health and death.

When he was 20, in 1968, doctors told Rosling that there was something wrong with his liver and as a consequence, he stopped drinking alcohol. In 1989, Rosling was diagnosed with hepatitis C. Over the years this progressed and Rosling developed liver cirrhosis. At the beginning of 2013, he was in the early stages of liver failure. However, at the same time, new hepatitis C drugs were released and Rosling went to Japan to buy the drugs needed to treat the infection. He expressed concerns in the media over the restricted use of the new drugs due to high costs, stating that it is a crime not to give every person with hepatitis C access to the drugs.  A year after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, Rosling died in Sweden on 7 February 2017 at the age of 68. Amardeo Sarma remembers Rosling as being "able to bring data to life" and how "he shows us how we are wrong in many of our beliefs and that we just don't know much about the world." Sarma calls Rosling a "global citizen" for his activities around the world.

Work in healthcare.

Rosling spent two decades studying outbreaks of konzo, a paralytic disease, in remote rural areas across Africa and supervised more than ten PhD students. His work with Julie Cliff, Johannes Mårtensson, Per Lundqvist, and Bo Sörbo found that outbreaks occur among hunger-stricken rural populations in Africa where a diet dominated by insufficiently processed cassava results in simultaneous malnutrition and high dietary cyanide intake.  Rosling's research also concerned other links between economic development, agriculture, poverty and health. He was a health adviser to WHO, UNICEF and several aid agencies. In 1993 he was one of the initiators of Médecins Sans Frontières in Sweden. At Karolinska Institutet he was head of the Division of International Health (IHCAR) from 2001 to 2007. As chairman of the Karolinska International Research and Training Committee (1998–2004), he started health research collaborations with universities in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America. He started new courses on global health and co-authored a textbook on global health that promotes a fact-based worldview.

Trendalyzer and Gapminder.

Rosling's son, Ola Rosling, built the Trendalyzer software to animate data compiled by the UN and the World Bank that helped him explain the world with graphics. Rosling co-founded the Gapminder Foundation together with his son Ola and daughter-in-law Anna Rosling Rönnlund to develop Trendalyzer to convert international statistics into moving, interactive graphics. The provocative presentations that have resulted have made him famous, and his lectures using Gapminder graphics to visualize world development have won awards. The interactive animations are freely available from the Foundation's website. In March 2007, Google acquired the Trendalyzer software with the intention to scale it up and make it freely available for public statistics. In 2008, Google made available a Motion Chart Google Gadget and in 2009 the Public Data Explorer.

Reception of Rosling's views on the world's future.

Rosling is commonly described as optimist, though he personally rejects the label. In his posthumous book he wrote "The five global risks that concern me most are the risks of global pandemic, financial collapse, world war, climate change, and extreme poverty.” In summary, he wrote, "People often call me an optimist, because I show them the enormous progress they didn't know about. That makes me angry. I'm not an optimist. That makes me sound naive. I'm a very serious “possibilist”. That's something I made up. It means someone who neither hopes without reason, nor fears without reason, someone who constantly resists the overdramatic worldview. As a possibilist, I see all this progress, and it fills me with conviction and hope that further progress is possible. This is not optimistic. It is having a clear and reasonable idea about how things are. It is having a worldview that is constructive and useful.”  In his later years he was advocating on behalf of refugees from Syria and partnered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in this effort. In his last book he wrote repeatedly about the tragedy of the war in Syria saying: "The Syrian conflict will most likely prove to be the deadliest in the world since the Ethiopian-Eritrean war of 1998 to 2000.”  However, some experts still consider Rosling's world-view excessively rose-tinted, or anti-environmental. For instance, in "The One-Sided Worldview of Hans Rosling" Christian Berggren, a Swedish professor of industrial management, argues that "Factfulness", “presents a highly biased sample of statistics as the true perspective on global development, avoids analysis of negative trends, and refrains from discussing difficult issues”. Seeing Rosling as more optimist than “possibilist”, Berggren remarks that, “"Factfulness" includes many graphs of 'bad things in decline' and 'good things on the rise' but not a single graph of 'bad things on the rise'.” In 2013 in "The Ecologist" Robin Maynard reported Rosling as raging against the UN's population projections, and against some ecological objections to development: "I don't give a damn about polar bears! I can live without polar bears."  Hence, Rosling has been criticized as being Pollyannaist about the global political situation in the face of tragedies such as the long-running conflict in Syria, among others. His work on population growth has also been criticized by Paul R. Ehrlich, the U.S. biologist and Professor of Population Studies at Stanford University, and Anne H. Ehrlich, associate director of the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford University, in an article, published online by the MAHB, titled "A Confused Statistician." The Ehrlichs also warn that, while some trends that Rosling cites may indeed be positive, there is the possibility of total collapse of those trends if social and political instabilities occur.

Hans Rosling (; 27 July 1948 – 7 February 2017) was a Swedish physician, academic, and public speaker. He was the Professor of International Health at Karolinska Institute and was the co-founder and chairman of the Gapminder Foundation, which developed the Trendalyzer software system. He held presentations around the world, including several TED Talks in which he promoted the use of data to explore development issues. His posthumously published book "", coauthored with Anna Rosling Rönnlund and Ola Rosling, became an international bestseller.