title: Golf content: end of the muscle, other muscles must come into play to stabilize the bone to which the other end of the muscle is attached.) Golf is a unilateral exercise that can break body balances, requiring exercises to keep the balance in muscles. Putting is considered to be the most important component of the game of golf. As the game of golf has evolved, there have been many different putting techniques and grips that have been devised to give golfers the best chance to make putts. When the game originated, golfers would putt with their dominate hand on the bottom of


title: Golf content: the grip and their weak hand on top of the grip. This grip and putting style is known as "conventional". There are many variations of conventional including overlap, where the golfer overlaps the off hand index finger onto off the dominant pinky; interlock, where the offhand index finger interlocks with the dominant pinky and ring finger; double or triple overlap and so on. Recently, "cross handed" putting has become a popular trend amongst professional golfers and amateurs. Cross handed putting is the idea that the dominant hand is on top of the grip where the weak hand is on the


title: Golf content: bottom. This grip restricts the motion in your dominant hand and eliminates the possibility of wrist breakdowns through the putting stroke. Other notable putting styles include "the claw", a style that has the grip directly in between the thumb and index finger of the dominant hand while the palm faces the target. The weak hand placed normally on the putter. Anchored putting, a style that requires a longer putter shaft that can be anchored into the players stomach or below the chin; the idea is to stabilize one end of the putter thus creating a more consistent pendulum stroke. This


title: Golf content: style will be banned in 2016 on the profession circuits. A hole is classified by its par, meaning the number of strokes a skilled golfer should require to complete play of the hole. The minimum par of any hole is 3 because par always includes a stroke for the tee shot and two putts. Pars of 4 and 5 strokes are ubiquitous on golf courses; more rarely, a few courses feature par-6 and even par-7 holes. Strokes other than the tee shot and putts are expected to be made from the fairway; for example, a skilled golfer expects to reach


title: Golf content: the green on a par-4 hole in two strokes—one from the tee (the "drive") and another, second, stroke to the green (the "approach")—and then roll the ball into the hole in two putts for par. Putting the ball on the green with two strokes remaining for putts is called making "green in regulation" or GIR. Missing a GIR does not necessarily mean a golfer will not make par, but it does make doing so more difficult as it reduces the number of putts available; conversely, making a GIR does not guarantee a par, as the player might require three or


title: Golf content: more putts to "hole out". Professional golfers typically make between 60% and 70% of greens in regulation. The primary factor for classifying the par of a relatively straight, hazard-free hole is the distance from the tee to the green. A typical par-3 hole is less than 250 yards (225 m) in length, with a par-4 hole ranging between 251 and 475 yards (225–434 m), and a par-5 hole being longer than 475 yards (435 m). The rare par-6s can stretch well over . These distances are based on the typical scratch golfer's drive distance of between ; a green further


title: Golf content: than the average player's drive will require additional shots from the fairway. However, other considerations must be taken into account; the key question is "how many strokes would a scratch golfer take to make the green by playing along the fairway?". The grade of the land from the tee to the hole might increase or decrease the carry and rolling distance of shots as measured linearly along the ground. Sharp turns or hazards may require golfers to "lay up" on the fairway in order to change direction or hit over the hazard with their next shot. These design considerations will


title: Golf content: affect how even a scratch golfer would play the hole, irrespective of total distance from tee to green, and must be included in a determination of par. However, a par score never includes "expected" penalty strokes, as a scratch player is never "expected" to hit a ball into a water hazard or other unplayable situation. So, the placement of hazards only affect par when considering how a scratch golfer would avoid them. Eighteen-hole courses typically total to an overall par score of 72 for a complete round; this is based on an average par of 4 for every hole, and


title: Golf content: so is often arrived at by designing a course with an equal number of par-5 and par-3 holes, the rest being par-4. Many combinations exist that total to par-72, and other course pars exist from 68 up to 76, and are not less worthy than courses of par-72. Additionally, in some countries including the United States, courses are classified according to their play difficulty, which may be used to calculate a golfer's playing handicap for a given course. The two primary difficulty ratings in the U.S. are the Course Rating, which is effectively the expected score for a zero-handicap "scratch


title: Golf content: golfer" playing the course (and may differ from the course par), and the Slope Rating, which is a measure of how much worse a "bogey golfer" (with an 18 handicap) would be expected to play than a "scratch golfer". These two numbers are available for any USGA-sanctioned course, and are used in a weighted system to calculate handicaps (see below). The overall par score in a tournament is the summation of all the par scores in each round. A typical four-round professional tournament played on a par-72 course has a tournament par of 288. The goal is to play as


title: Golf content: few strokes per round as possible. A golfer's number of strokes in a hole, course, or tournament is compared to its respective par score, and is then reported either as the number that the golfer was "under-" or "over-par", or if it was "equal to par". A hole in one (or an "ace") occurs when a golfer sinks their ball into the cup with their first stroke from the tee. Common scores for a hole also have specific terms. In a typical professional tournament or among "scratch" amateur players, "birdie-bogey" play is common; a player will "lose" a stroke by


title: Golf content: bogeying a hole, then "gain" one by scoring a birdie. Eagles are uncommon but not rare; however, only 18 players have scored an albatross in a men's major championship. There are two basic forms of golf play, match play and stroke play. Stroke play is more popular. Two players (or two teams) play each hole as a separate contest against each other in what is called match play. The party with the lower score wins that hole, or if the scores of both players or teams are equal the hole is "halved" (or tied). The game is won by the


title: Golf content: party that wins more holes than the other. In the case that one team or player has taken a lead that cannot be overcome in the number of holes remaining to be played, the match is deemed to be won by the party in the lead, and the remainder of the holes are not played. For example, if one party already has a lead of six holes, and only five holes remain to be played on the course, the match is over and the winning party is deemed to have won "6 & 5". At any given point, if the


title: Golf content: lead is equal to the number of holes remaining, the party leading the match is said to be "dormie", and the match is continued until the party increases the lead by one hole or ties any of the remaining holes, thereby winning the match, or until the match ends in a tie with the lead player's opponent winning all remaining holes. When the game is tied after the predetermined number of holes have been played, it may be continued until one side takes a one-hole lead. The score achieved for each and every hole of the round or tournament is


title: Golf content: added to produce the total score, and the player with the lowest score wins in stroke play. Stroke play is the game most commonly played by professional golfers. If there is a tie after the regulation number of holes in a professional tournament, a playoff takes place between all tied players. Playoffs either are sudden death or employ a pre-determined number of holes, anywhere from three to a full 18. In sudden death, a player who scores lower on a hole than all of his opponents wins the match. If at least two players remain tied after such a playoff


title: Golf content: using a pre-determined number of holes, then play continues in sudden death format, where the first player to win a hole wins the tournament. The other forms of play in the game of golf are bogey competition, skins, 9-points, stableford, team play, and unofficial team variations. A bogey competition is a scoring format sometimes seen in at informal tournaments. Its scoring is similar to match play, except each player compares their hole score to the hole's par rating instead of the score of another player. The player "wins" the hole if they score a birdie or better, they "lose" the


title: Golf content: hole if they score a bogey or worse, and they "halve" the hole by scoring par. By recording only this simple win-loss-halve score on the sheet, a player can shrug off a very poorly-played hole with a simple "-" mark and move on. As used in competitions, the player or pair with the best win-loss "differential" wins the competition. What's known as the skins game is a variation on the match play where each hole has an amount of money (called "skin") attached to it. The lump sum may be prize money at the professional level (the most famous event


title: Golf content: to use these rules was the "LG Skins Game", played at Indian Wells Golf Resort in California until 2008), or an amount wagered for each hole among amateur players. The player with the lowest score on the hole wins the skin for that hole; if two or more players tie for the lowest score, the skin carries over to the next hole. The game continues until a player wins a hole outright, which may (and evidently often does) result in a player receiving money for a previous hole that they had not tied for. If players tie the 18th hole,


title: Golf content: either all players or only the tying players repeat the 18th hole until an outright winner is decided for that hole—and all undecided skins. A nine-point game is another variant of match play typically played among threesomes, where each hole is worth a total of nine points. The player with the lowest score on a hole receives five points, the next-lowest score 3 and the next-lowest score 1. Ties are generally resolved by summing the points contested and dividing them among the tying players; a two-way tie for first is worth four points to both players, a two-way tie for


title: Golf content: second is worth two points to both players, and a three-way tie is worth three points to each player. The player with the highest score after 18 holes (in which there are 162 points to be awarded) wins the game. This format can be used to wager on the game systematically; players each contribute the same amount of money to the pot, and a dollar value is assigned to each point scored (or each point after 18) based on the amount of money in the pot, with any overage going to the overall winner. The Stableford system is a simplification


title: Golf content: of stroke play that awards players points based on their score relative to the hole's par; the score for a hole is calculated by taking the par score, adding 2, then subtracting the player's hole score, making the result zero if negative. Alternately stated, a double bogey or worse is zero points, a bogey is worth one point, par is two, a birdie three, an eagle four, and so on. The advantages of this system over stroke play are a more natural "higher is better" scoring, the ability to compare Stableford scores between plays on courses with different total par


title: Golf content: scores (scoring an "even" in stroke play will always give a Stableford score of 36), discouraging the tendency to abandon the entire game after playing a particularly bad hole (a novice playing by strict rules may score as high as an 8 or 10 on a single difficult hole; their Stableford score for the hole would be zero, which puts them only two points behind par no matter how badly they played), and the ability to simply pick up one's ball once it is impossible to score any points for the hole, which speeds play. The USGA and R&A sanction


title: Golf content: a "Modified Stableford" system for scratch players, which makes par worth zero, a birdie worth 2, eagle 5 and double-eagle 8, while a bogey is a penalty of −1 and a double-bogey or worse −3. As with the original system, the highest score wins the game, and terrible scores on one or two holes won't wreck an entire game, but this system rewards "bogey-birdie" play more than the original, encouraging golfers to try to make the riskier birdie putt or eagle chipshot instead of simply parring each hole. Shotgun starts are mainly used for amateur tournament play. In this variant,


title: Golf content: each of the groups playing starts their game on a different hole, allowing for all players to start and end their round at roughly the same time. All 18 holes are still played, but a player or foursome may, for instance, start on hole 5, play through to the 18th hole, then continue with hole 1 and end on hole 4. This speeds the completion of the entire event as players are not kept waiting for progressive tee times at the first hole. This form of play, as a minor variation to stroke or match play, is neither defined nor


title: Golf content: disallowed by strict rules and so is used according to local rules for an event. A handicap is a numerical measure of an amateur golfer's ability to play golf over the course of 18 holes. A player's handicap generally represents the number of strokes above par that the player will make over the course of an above-average round of golf. The better the player the lower their handicap is. Someone with a handicap of 0 or less is often called a "scratch golfer", and would typically score or beat the course par on a round of play (depending on course


title: Golf content: difficulty). Calculating a handicap is often complicated, the general reason being that golf courses are not uniformly challenging from course to course or between skill levels. A player scoring even par on Course A might average four over par on course B, while a player averaging 20 over par on course A might average only 16 over on course B. So, to the "scratch golfer", Course B is more difficult, but to the "bogey golfer", Course A is more difficult. The reasons for this are inherent in the types of challenges presented by the same course to both golfers. Distance


title: Golf content: is often a problem for amateur "bogey" golfers with slower swing speeds, who get less distance with each club, and so typically require more shots to get to the green, raising their score compared to a scratch golfer with a stronger swing. However, courses are often designed with hazard placement to mitigate this advantage, forcing the scratch player to "lay up" to avoid bunkers or water, while the bogey golfer is more or less unaffected as the hazard lies out of their range. Finally, terrain features and fairway maintenance can affect golfers of all skill levels; narrowing the fairway by


title: Golf content: adding obstacles or widening the rough on each side will typically increase the percentage of shots made from disadvantageous lies, increasing the challenge for all players. By USGA rules, handicap calculation first requires calculating a "Handicap Differential" for each round of play the player has completed by strict rules. That in itself is a function of the player's "gross adjusted score" (adjustments can be made to mitigate various deviations either from strict rules or from a player's normal capabilities, for handicap purposes only) and two course-specific difficulty ratings: the Course Rating, a calculated expected score for a hypothetical "scratch golfer":


title: Golf content: and the Slope Rating, a number based on how much worse a hypothetical 20-handicap "bogey golfer" would score compared to the "scratch golfer". The average Slope Rating of all USGA-rated courses as of 2012 is 113, which also factors into the Differential computation. The most recent Differentials are logged, up to 20 of them, and then the best of these (the number used depends on the number available) are selected, averaged, multiplied by .96 (an "excellence factor" that reduces the handicap of higher-scoring players, encouraging them to play better and thus lower their handicap), and truncated to the tenths place


title: Golf content: to produce the "Handicap Index". Additional calculations can be used to place higher significance on a player's recent tournament scores. A player's Handicap Index is then multiplied by the Slope Rating of the course to be played, divided by the average Slope Rating of 113, then rounded to the nearest integer to produce the player's Course Handicap. Once calculated, the Course Handicap is applied in stroke play by simply reducing the player's gross score by the handicap, to produce a net score. So, a gross score of 96 with a handicap of 22 would produce a net score of 74.


title: Golf content: In match play, the lower handicap is subtracted from the higher handicap, and the resulting handicap strokes are awarded to the higher handicapper by distributing them among the holes according to each hole's difficulty; holes are ranked on the scorecard from 1 to 18 (or however many holes are available), and one stroke is applied to each hole from the most difficult to the least difficult. So, if one player has a 9 handicap and another has a 25 handicap, the 25-handicap player receives one handicap stroke on each of the most difficult 16 holes (25-9). If the 25-handicapper were


title: Golf content: playing against a "scratch golfer" (zero handicap), all 25 strokes would be distributed, first by applying one stroke to each hole, then applying the remaining strokes, one each, to the most difficult 7 holes; so, the handicap player would subtract 2 strokes from each of the most difficult 7 holes, and 1 each from the remaining 11. Handicap systems have potential for abuse by players who may intentionally play badly to increase their handicap ("throwing their 'cap") before playing to their potential at an important event with a valuable prize. For this reason, professional golf associations do not use them,


title: Golf content: but they can be calculated and used along with other criteria to determine the relative strengths of various professional players. Touring professionals, being the best of the best, often have negative handicaps; they can be expected, on average, to score lower than the Course Rating on any course. In 2005 "Golf Digest" calculated that the countries with most golf courses per capita, in order, were: Scotland, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland, Canada, Wales, United States, Sweden, and England (countries with fewer than 500,000 people were excluded). The number of courses in other territories has increased, an example of this being the


title: Golf content: expansion of golf in China. The first golf course in China opened in 1984, but by the end of 2009 there were roughly 600 in the country. For much of the 21st century, development of new golf courses in China has been officially banned (with the exception of the island province of Hainan), but the number of courses had nonetheless tripled from 2004 to 2009; the "ban" has been evaded with the government's tacit approval simply by not mentioning golf in any development plans. In the United States, the number of people who play golf twenty-five times or more per


title: Golf content: year decreased from 6.9 million in 2000 to 4.6 million in 2005, according to the National Golf Foundation. The NGF reported that the number who played golf at all decreased from 30 to 26 million over the same period. In February 1971, astronaut Alan Shepard became the first person to golf anywhere other than Earth. He smuggled a golf club and two golf balls on board Apollo 14 with the intent to golf on the Moon. He attempted two drives. He shanked the first attempt, but it is estimated his second went more than 200 yards. Number of golf courses


title: Golf content: by country in 2015. Below are the top 18 countries that have the most golf courses. The majority of professional golfers work as club or teaching professionals ("pros"), and only compete in local competitions. A small elite of professional golfers are "tournament pros" who compete full-time on international "tours". Many club and teaching professionals working in the golf industry start as caddies or with a general interest in the game, finding employment at golf courses and eventually moving on to certifications in their chosen profession. These programs include independent institutions and universities, and those that eventually lead to a Class


title: Golf content: A golf professional certification. Touring professionals typically start as amateur players, who attain their "pro" status after success in major tournaments that win them either prize money and/or notice from corporate sponsors. Jack Nicklaus, for example, gained widespread notice by finishing second in the 1960 U.S. Open to champion Arnold Palmer, with a 72-hole score of 282 (the best score to date in that tournament by an amateur). He played one more amateur year in 1961, winning that year's U.S. Amateur Championship, before turning pro in 1962. Golf instruction involves the teaching and learning of the game of golf. Proficiency


title: Golf content: in teaching golf instruction requires not only technical and physical ability but also knowledge of the rules and etiquette of the game. In some countries, golf instruction is best performed by teachers certified by the Professional Golfers Association. Some top instructors who work with professional golfers have become quite well known in their own right. Professional golf instructors can use physical conditioning, mental visualization, classroom sessions, club fitting, driving range instruction, on-course play under real conditions, and review of videotaped swings in slow motion to teach golf to prepare the golfer for the course. There are at least twenty professional


title: Golf content: golf tours, each run by a PGA or an independent tour organization, which is responsible for arranging events, finding sponsors, and regulating the tour. Typically a tour has "members" who are entitled to compete in most of its events, and also invites non-members to compete in some of them. Gaining membership of an elite tour is highly competitive, and most professional golfers never achieve it. Perhaps the most widely known tour is the PGA Tour, which tends to attract the strongest fields, outside the four Majors and the four World Golf Championships events. This is due mostly to the fact


title: Golf content: that most PGA Tour events have a first prize of at least 800,000 USD. The European Tour, which attracts a substantial number of top golfers from outside North America, ranks second to the PGA Tour in worldwide prestige. Some top professionals from outside North America play enough tournaments to maintain membership on both the PGA Tour and European Tour. Since 2010, both tours' money titles have been claimed by the same individual three times, with Luke Donald doing so in 2011 and Rory McIlroy in 2012 and 2014. In 2013, Henrik Stenson won the FedEx Cup points race on the


title: Golf content: PGA Tour and the European Tour money title, but did not top the PGA Tour money list (that honour going to Tiger Woods). The other leading men's tours include the Japan Golf Tour, the Asian Tour (Asia outside Japan), the PGA Tour of Australasia, and the Sunshine Tour (for southern Africa, primarily South Africa). The Japan, Australasian, Sunshine, PGA, and European Tours are the charter members of the trade body of the world's main tours, the International Federation of PGA Tours, founded in 1996. The Asian Tour became a full member in 1999. The Canadian Tour became an associate member


title: Golf content: of the Federation in 2000, and the Tour de las Américas (Latin America) became an associate member of the Federation in 2007. The Federation underwent a major expansion in 2009 that saw eleven new tours become full members – the Canadian Tour, Tour de las Américas, China Golf Association, the Korea Professional Golfers' Association, Professional Golf Tour of India, and the operators of all six major women's tours worldwide. The OneAsia Tour, founded in 2009, is not a member of the Federation, but was founded as a joint venture of the Australasia, China, Japan, and Korean tours. In 2011, the


title: Golf content: Tour de las Américas was effectively taken over by the PGA Tour, and in 2012 was folded into the new PGA Tour Latinoamérica. Also in 2012, the Canadian Tour was renamed PGA Tour Canada after it agreed to be taken over by the PGA Tour. All men's tours that are Federation members, except the India tour, offer points in the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) to players who place sufficiently high in their events. The OneAsia Tour also offers ranking points. Golf is unique in having lucrative competition for older players. There are several senior tours for men aged fifty


title: Golf content: and over, arguably the best known of which is the U.S.-based PGA Tour Champions. There are six principal tours for women, each based in a different country or continent. The most prestigious of these is the United States-based LPGA Tour. All of the principal tours offer points in the Women's World Golf Rankings for high finishers in their events. All of the leading professional tours for under-50 players have an official developmental tour, in which the leading players at the end of the season will earn a tour card on the main tour for the following season. Examples include the


title: Golf content: Web.com Tour, which feeds to the PGA Tour, and the Challenge Tour, which is the developmental tour of the European Tour. The Web.com and Challenge Tours also offer OWGR points. The major championships are the four most prestigious men's tournaments of the year. In chronological order they are: The Masters, the U.S. Open, The Open Championship (referred to in North America as the British Open) and the PGA Championship. The fields for these events include the top several dozen golfers from all over the world. The Masters has been played at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia, since its


title: Golf content: inception in 1934. It is the only major championship that is played at the same course each year. The U.S. Open and PGA Championship are played at courses around the United States, while the Open Championship is played at courses around the United Kingdom. Prior to the advent of the PGA Championship and The Masters, the four Majors were the U.S. Open, the U.S. Amateur, the Open Championship, and the British Amateur. Women's golf does not have a globally agreed set of majors. The list of majors recognised by the dominant women's tour, the LPGA Tour in the U.S., has


title: Golf content: changed several times over the years, with the most recent changes occurring in 2001 and 2013. Like the PGA Tour, the (U.S.) LPGA tour long had four majors, but now has five: the ANA Inspiration (previously known by several other names, most recently the Kraft Nabisco Championship), the Women's PGA Championship (previously known as the LPGA Championship), the U.S. Women's Open, the Women's British Open (which replaced the du Maurier Classic as a major in 2001) and The Evian Championship (added as the fifth major in 2013). Only the last two are also recognised as majors by the Ladies European


title: Golf content: Tour. However, the significance of this is limited, as the LPGA is far more dominant in women's golf than the PGA Tour is in mainstream men's golf. For example, the BBC has been known to use the U.S. definition of "women's majors" without qualifying it. Also, the Ladies' Golf Union, the governing body for women's golf in Great Britain and Ireland, stated on its official website that the Women's British Open was "the only Women's Major to be played outside the U.S." (this was before the elevation of The Evian Championship to major status). For many years, the Ladies European


title: Golf content: Tour tacitly acknowledged the dominance of the LPGA Tour by not scheduling any of its own events to conflict with the three LPGA majors played in the U.S., but that changed beginning in 2008, when the LET scheduled an event opposite the LPGA Championship. The second-richest women's tour, the LPGA of Japan Tour, does not recognise any of the U.S. LPGA or European majors as it has its own set of majors (historically three, since 2008 four). However, these events attract little notice outside Japan. Senior (aged fifty and over) men's golf does not have a globally agreed set of


title: Golf content: majors. The list of senior majors on the U.S.-based PGA Tour Champions has changed over the years, but always by expansion. PGA Tour Champions now recognises five majors: the Senior PGA Championship, The Tradition, the Senior Players Championship, the United States Senior Open, and The Senior (British) Open Championship. Of the five events, the Senior PGA is by far the oldest, having been founded in 1937. The other events all date from the 1980s, when senior golf became a commercial success as the first golf stars of the television era, such as Arnold Palmer and Gary Player, reached the relevant


title: Golf content: age. The Senior Open Championship was not recognised as a major by PGA Tour Champions until 2003. The European Senior Tour recognises only the Senior PGA and the two Senior Opens as majors. However, PGA Tour Champions is arguably more dominant in global senior golf than the U.S. LPGA is in global women's golf. After a 112-year absence from the Olympic Games, golf returned for the 2016 Rio Games. 41 different countries were represented by 120 athletes. It wasn't until 1552 that the first woman golfer played the game. Mary Queen of Scots commissioned St. Andrew's Links. However, it wasn't


title: Golf content: until the 20th century that women were taken seriously and eventually broke the "Gentlemen Only, Ladies Forbidden" rule. Many men saw women as unfit to play the sport due to their lack of strength and ability. In the United States, 1891 was a pivotal year for ladies golf because the Shinnecock Hills nine-hole course was built in Southampton, New York, for women and was the first club to offer membership to women golfers. Four years later, in 1895, The U.S. Golf Association held the first Women's Amateur Championship tournament. Just like professional golfer Bobby Jones, Joyce Wethered was considered to


title: Golf content: be a star in the 1920s. Jones praised Wethered in 1930 after they had played an exhibition against each other. He doubted that there had ever been a better golfer, man or woman. However, Bobby Jones' comment wasn't enough for others to change their views on women golfers. The Royal Liverpool's club refused entry of Sir Henry Cotton's wife into the clubhouse in the late 1940s. The secretary of the club released a statement saying, "No woman ever has entered the clubhouse and, praise God, no woman ever will." However, American golfer and all-around athlete, Babe Zaharias didn't have to


title: Golf content: enter the clubhouse. She was able to prove herself on the course, going on to become the first American to win the British Women's Amateur title in 1947. The following year she became the first woman to attempt to qualify for the U.S. Open, but her application was rejected by the USGA. They stated that the event was intended to be open to men only. The Ladies Professional Golf Association was formed in 1950 as a way to popularize the sport and provide competitive opportunities for golfers. The competitions were not the same for the men and women. It wasn't


title: Golf content: until 1972 that U.S. Congress passed the Title IX of the Education Amendments. "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subject to discrimination under any education program or activities receiving Federal financial assistance." American Renee Powell moved to the UK in the 1970s to further her career, and became the first woman to play in a British men's tournament in 1977. Today, women golfers are still fighting and working hard to have the same opportunities as men golfers. There is still a big


title: Golf content: pay gap in the USGA. The USGA has a long history of writing bigger checks to winners of the men's U.S. Open than the U.S. Women's Open. Golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not utilize a standardized playing area, and coping with the varied terrains encountered on different courses is a key part of the game. The game at the usual level is played on a course with an


title: "Freeways (EP)" content: Freeways (EP) Freeways is the second EP released by Canadian synthpop group Men Without Hats. It was released in Canada only, and only for a limited time. Released in 1985, it contains songs originally released on the group's 1980 EP "Folk of the 80's", plus several versions of the song "Freeways". The first release of any version of the song was as music video filmed for the French version of the song in 1981, premiering that year on the Musi-Video show in Montreal. "Freeways (Euromix)" first appeared as a B-side track on a European 12" edition of the "I Got


title: "1938–39 FA Cup" content: two went to second replays. The four Sixth Round ties were scheduled to be played on Saturday, 4 March 1939. There was one replay, in the Huddersfield Town–Blackburn Rovers match. The semi-final matches were played on Saturday, 25 March 1939. Wolverhampton Wanderers and Portsmouth won their matches to meet in the final at Wembley. The 1939 FA Cup Final was contested by Portsmouth and Wolverhampton Wanderers at Wembley. Portsmouth won 4–1, with goals from Bert Barlow, John Anderson and two by Cliff Parker. Dicky Dorsett scored Wolves' effort. As a result of the suspension of the FA Cup for the


title: TT7 content: TT7 The Theban Tomb TT7 is located in Deir el-Medina, part of the Theban Necropolis, on the west bank of the Nile, opposite to Luxor. It is the burial place of the Ancient Egyptian artisan (his exact title was Scribe in the Place of Truth) named Ramose, who lived during the 19th Dynasty, during the reign of Ramesses II. Ramose was the son of Amenemhab and Kakaia. His wife is named Mutemwia. The tomb consists of a court and a chapel. The chapel is decorated with scenes showing Amenhotep I, Ahmose Nefertari, Horemheb and Tuthmosis IV. Another scene shows King


title: "Kim Seung-hyun (footballer)" content: season, Kim moved to Busan for the year and then returned to the Dragons for a further two seasons. For 2011, Kim has transferred to Daegu FC. Kim has made a single appearance for the U-23s, during the qualification stages for the 2000 Olympic games in Australia. Kim Seung-hyun (footballer) Kim Seung-Hyun (; born 18 August 1979) is a South Korea retired football player, having previously played for Gwangju Sangmu, Busan I'Park, and the Chunnam Dragons. He was arrested on the charge connected with the match fixing allegations on 7 July 2011. But He was found not guilty in the


title: "The Composer's Cut Series Vol. II: Nyman/Greenaway Revisited" content: Michael Nyman Band" or "After Extra Time", which was recorded in Tokyo. This performance was recorded in London and is slightly less aggressively performed. The Michael Nyman Band Memorial The Composer's Cut Series Vol. II: Nyman/Greenaway Revisited The Composer's Cut Series Vol. II: Nyman/Greenaway Revisited is the second in a series of albums, all released on the same day, by Michael Nyman to feature concert versions of film scores, in this case, films of Peter Greenaway, and his 52nd release overall. The album is similar to "The Essential Michael Nyman Band", although a number of tracks are on only one


title: "Aníbal Cavaco Silva" content: Silva on the defence of our democracy." The Green politician Rui Tavares commented "The president has created a constitutional crisis. He is saying that he will never allow the formation of a government containing Leftists and Communists. People are amazed by what has happened." The opposition parties quickly announced their intention of bringing down the new government in a motion of rejection. Eventually, Passos Coelho's government fell on a motion of no confidence, and the President appointed Antonio Costa, the leader of the Socialists, as Prime Minister in his place. Cavaco Silva married at the Church of the Monastery of


title: "Adolf Eichmann" content: Aires. He was hoping to bring Mengele back to Israel on the same flight. However, Mengele had already left his last known residence in the city, and Harel was unable to get any leads on where he had gone, so the plans for his capture had to be abandoned. Eitan told "Haaretz" in 2008 that they intentionally made the decision not to pursue Mengele, reasoning that to do so might jeopardise the Eichmann operation. Near midnight on 20 May, Eichmann was sedated by an Israeli doctor on the Mossad team and dressed as a flight attendant. He was smuggled out


title: "Wisconsin Central Railroad (1871–1899)" content: Judge Reed went back to Wisconsin to lay more groundwork. He had a civil engineer plan and estimate the first portion of the proposed railroad. That stretch from Menasha to Stevens Point was already somewhat settled, and Reed traveled up and down it raising support from the young towns that stood to profit from a rail connection. The arrangement with Colby was that locally raised money would buy the right of way, clear and grade it, put in culverts and bridges, and provide ties. Then Colby and his associates would provide the rails, stations, and all the equipment to run


title: "Depfa Bank" content: largest German underwriter of public covered bonds. The bank was privatized in 1990, and obtained a FSE listing in 1991. At the end of the 1990s, the bank went through a legal restructuring, which led the bank to move its headquarters to the IFSC in Dublin, Ireland in 2002 with the Irish government specifically legislating for it. Depfa Bank was purchased by German mortgage giant Hypo Real Estate in October 2007. The bank ran into liquidity problems in 2008 as a result of the economic and financial turmoil in the United States. At the same time banking supervision in Ireland


title: "USS Zafiro (1884)" content: of documents covering her activities in 1898 and the first half of 1899 precludes any detailed narrative for that period. Presumably, she plied the waters of the Philippine Islands carrying troops, supplies, and dispatches between points in the archipelago. Based at Cavite on Luzon, she is known to have performed such missions during the period from July 1899 – June 1904. Those movements—in support of the United States Army's suppression of the Philippine insurrection and campaigns against the Moslem Moro tribesmen—took her to a host of exotic places, and the length and breadth of the islands. On 10 June 1904,


title: "Les Vingt et un Jours d'un neurasthénique" content: to recollection, traveling from sanitarium to insane asylum and finally to the desolate mountain retreat of a misanthropic friend, who propounds his philosophy of nihilism and decries the futility of art. In his peripatetic narrative, Mirbeau casts a glaring light on the defective human animal, who tries to compensate for his susceptibility to the most humiliating bodily afflictions by asserting scientific mastery of the dangerous world he tries to navigate. Mirbeau combines attacks on colonialism, psychiatry, the politics of intolerance with a rehabitation of man, deemed precious for his very unknowability. While doctors, bureaucrats, and billionaires try to overcome their


title: "Dark energy" content: be able to reach us at any time in the infinite future because the light never reaches a point where its "peculiar velocity" toward us exceeds the expansion velocity away from us (these two notions of velocity are also discussed in Uses of the proper distance). Assuming the dark energy is constant (a cosmological constant), the current distance to this cosmological event horizon is about 16 billion light years, meaning that a signal from an event happening "at present" would eventually be able to reach us in the future if the event were less than 16 billion light years away,


title: "Tullaroan GAA" content: for Tullaroan. Generally, this means players that have enjoyed much success with the club or have played for the Kilkenny senior hurling team. Tullaroan GAA Tullaroan is a Gaelic Athletic Association club located in the village of Tullaroan in County Kilkenny, Ireland. The club was founded in 1884 and is primarily concerned with the game of hurling. Tullaroan is the most successful club in the history of the Kilkenny Senior Hurling Championship. Tullaroan is the oldest GAA club in County Kilkenny. The club was founded in 1884, the same year as the foundation of the Gaelic Athletic Association. Tullaroan currently


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: Asterocampa celtis Asterocampa celtis, the hackberry emperor, is a North American butterfly that belongs to the brushfooted butterfly family, Nymphalidae. It gets its name from the hackberry tree ("Celtis occidentalis" and others in the genus "Celtis") upon which it lays its eggs. The hackberry tree is the only host plant for "A. celtis" and is the food source for larvae. The hackberry emperor is known for being a quick, mercurial butterfly. It often is found along water sources and lowlands, although it lives in a broad range of habitats. Another notable characteristic is that it rarely is spotted visiting a


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: flower, which is considered unusual for a butterfly. Species in the genus "Asterocampa" are regarded as being "cheater" organisms, since these butterflies do not pollinate flowers when they feed from them. This species can more accurately be described as parasitizing their hosts and plant food sources since they extract nutrients without providing any benefits to the host. As a member of the family Nymphalidae, the hackberry emperor oviposits its eggs in clutches, or clusters, upon hackberry leaves. There are a few plausible evolutionary reasons for this behavior, but the exact cause for this species' behavior is contentious. Possible explanations include


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: higher fecundity that may be aided by aposematic coloration. The hackberry emperor is found across a wide range within North America. It has been observed as far south as central Mexico and north into parts of Eastern Canada. Its range extends to the southwest into regions like Arizona, New Mexico, and other parts of the Rockies, as shown by the map. It can commonly be found across the Midwest and especially along the east coast from Florida up to New England. "Asterocampa celtis" lives wherever the hackberry tree lives. There are a variety of species of the hackberry line, and


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: "A. celtis" is not found preferentially on any one kind of hackberry. More specifically, the butterfly lives in cities, forests, and wooded areas, and especially prefers areas near rivers or other bodies of water. The species is not very deterred by human development. Furthermore, the hackberry emperor may be seen near woodland edges, near creeks, around buildings, and around damp, muddy areas. The larvae of "A. celtis" feed upon the leaves and leaf buds of hackberry trees. They must first climb back up their host tree to eat after they are done hibernating over winter. The caterpillars have been known


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: to eat so much at a time that they can completely defoliate a tree. Adults feed on a variety of food sources. They seldom make visitations to flowers so nectar is not a primary food source. Instead, they commonly eat hackberry sap, feces, dead animals including decaying pigs, snakes, and dogs, and old fruit. They drink from water in puddles. Also, they are known to land on humans to lick off their sweat to gain sodium. "A. celtis" usually lays eggs in clusters on the underside of hackberry leaves, although it has been observed to occasionally lay eggs on the


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: top of a leaf. Laying eggs in clusters results in higher fecundity for the female. Some factors influencing oviposition could be that laying eggs in a large cluster decreases the time and energy necessary for searching for new leaf sites, which decrease the risk of maternal death between oviposition events. For "A. celtis," laying eggs in clusters is its best strategy to produce the most offspring. The pale eggs are laid in clusters of 5-20 eggs on the host plant. Eggs look white with a faint green-yellow hue. The body is approximately 1.4" long. The head has brown-black colored dorsal


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: horns. The body is a primarily green with whitish-yellow chalazae, or bumps. At the rear, two sharp tails protrude outwards level with the abdomen. Half-grown larvae hibernate over the winter in fallen hackberry leaves along the forest floor. In the spring, they emerge again and climb back up the hackberry tree to eat the foliage. Pupae have a dark green color with white spots all around the body. There are also white lines going diagonally across the abdomen. Pupae are found on the underside of hackberry leaves and metamorphose into adults in the early summer. "A. celtis" adults exhibit sexual


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: dimorphism. Males have smaller, darker bodies and more slender wings than females. Both males and females are light brown with a row of black or white dots near the far edge of their wings. White spots near the front of the wing help distinguish it from a similar butterfly, the Tawny Emperor. Adult hackberry emperors lay two broods in a year. This production of multiple generations within one year makes it such that all life stages may be present at one time within a single site or host tree. "A. celtis" visits flowers in an unusual way. On the rare


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: occasion that the butterfly visits flowers for feeding, it does not allow its feet or its antennae to touch the flower. Only the proboscis is used to touch parts of the flower, which suggests that the butterfly would be an ineffective pollinator. This is considered to be “cheater” behavior; the butterfly acts selfishly and does not do its part to provide benefits to host plants. Typically, the specialized relationship of flowering plants and butterflies results in mutual benefit, in that the butterfly gains nutrients from flower visits while the host plant gains reproductive fitness from assistance in pollination. However, the


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: hackberry emperor likely does not aid in pollination in any significant way. Generalist species like birds and mammals, such as bears and raccoons, will eat larvae that lie along the forest floor. The stink bug is also a very common predator of hackberry emperor eggs. Scelionid egg parasites antagonize many species of "Asterocampa," including the hackberry emperor. A tachinid fly parasitoid, "Chetogena edwardsii," is another common threat to the hackberry emperor"." Male searching behavior in butterflies generally falls into two different strategies. One strategy is to actively patrol an area for females. Patrollers are attracted to still objects that resemble


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: a mate. The other strategy is to perch. Perchers typically spend only part of the day actively looking for a mate. They sit perched upon a branch waiting for a female to fly by. When a male sees movement nearby it will quickly fly out to attempt to mate, but stay within a limited habitat. "A. celtis" exhibit perching behavior. The male rests on rocks, trees, or fallen branches often along streams from the afternoon until around sundown. The hackberry emperor is not under serious threat. It can commonly be found throughout most of its distribution, although it may be


title: "Asterocampa celtis" content: harder to find at the peripheral edges of its range. Asterocampa celtis Asterocampa celtis, the hackberry emperor, is a North American butterfly that belongs to the brushfooted butterfly family, Nymphalidae. It gets its name from the hackberry tree ("Celtis occidentalis" and others in the genus "Celtis") upon which it lays its eggs. The hackberry tree is the only host plant for "A. celtis" and is the food source for larvae. The hackberry emperor is known for being a quick, mercurial butterfly. It often is found along water sources and lowlands, although it lives in a broad range of habitats. Another


title: "University of Oregon media" content: and cartoons of Jesus, including "Jesus with erection", in response to the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy. In response, Bill O'Reilly called for the firing of university president David B. Frohnmayer and invited members of the "Insurgent" and the "Commentator" onto the O'Reilly Factor, but only "Commentator" staff accepted. Feminist magazine produced by the Women's Center "Flux" is an annual magazine written and edited by students of the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication. It contains in-depth features about a wide variety of topics, many of which are based in the Pacific Northwest but have national appeal and interest.


title: "2008 Bangkok gubernatorial election" content: to reflect the local population's experiences, which ended tragically when her campaign manager drowned. Nearer to the election day, Mr Chuwit caused headline news by punching and kicking a television journalist after an interview. Mr Chuwit also filed complaints against Mr Apirak, claiming that the appearance of Mr Apirak's name on the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration's election publicity posters violated electoral law. The case was accepted by the Bangkok Election Committee, but a final ruling by the Election Commission would not be heard until after the election. Polling was organised by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration under the supervision of the Bangkok


title: "Another Left" content: Another Left Another Left ("Une Autre Gauche") was an electoral initiative in Wallonia, Belgium. It was founded in 2006 by people disappointed by the austerity policies of the socialist and green parties and supported by most parties of the radical left. This attempt to build a new left-wing force in the French-speaking part of Belgium goes back to an appeal published on 22 February 2006 entitled "Another policy is possible, another policy is necessary". Trade union delegates of the company CSC Transcom had taken the initiative for the call. They were triggered by the so-called "generation pact", a law to


title: "Leptoglossus zonatus" content: Leptoglossus zonatus Leptoglossus zonatus is a species of leaf-footed bug, a type of true bugs. It is found throughout much of South America, Central America, Mexico, and the southwestern United States. The bug is two centimeters in length, gray in color, with a zigzagging whitish band across its back and two distinctive yellowish spots on its anterior pronotum, the identifying characteristic for the species. This leaf-footed bug is one of the two major pests of physic nut plants in Nicaragua. In Honduras, where the bug is known commonly as "chinche patona" (large-legged bug), it is a minor garden pest. It


title: "Leptoglossus zonatus" content: is a pest of many crops in Brazil and it may transmit the plant pathogen "Herpetomonas macgheei", a trypanosomatid protozoan. It breeds in pomegranate and desert willow trees, and the gregarious bright orange nymphs aggregate there. It is a serious pest of satsuma oranges in Louisiana, causing damage by feeding and by transmitting the pathogenic yeast "Nematospora coryli". Biological pest control agents found to be effective against this insect include the entomopathogenic fungus "Beauveria bassiana". Leptoglossus zonatus Leptoglossus zonatus is a species of leaf-footed bug, a type of true bugs. It is found throughout much of South America, Central America,


title: "Tropical Storm Julio (2002)" content: 26, the storm was downgraded into a tropical depression. Even though the storm was initially expected to enter the extreme southern Gulf of California and regain tropical storm strength, Julio dissipated near Manzanillo later that day instead. Upon becoming a tropical cyclone, tropical cyclone warnings and watches were issued for portions of the Pacific coast of Mexico; a tropical storm warning was issued from Zihuatanejo to Punta San Telma while a tropical storm watch was in effect from Punta San Telma to Manzanillo. On September 26, once the storm had weakened into a depression over land, all the watches and


title: "Procter & Gamble" content: advocates for a larger international affairs budget, which funds American diplomatic and development efforts abroad. In September 2018, NEWSTAGE reported that Procter & Gamble announces the appointment of Adil Farhat as the new Managing Director for its Nigeria units after the retirement of the previous MD, George Nassar. "Fortune" magazine awarded P&G a top spot on its list of "Global Top Companies for Leaders", and ranked the company at 15th place of the "World's Most Admired Companies" list. "Chief Executive" magazine named P&G the best overall company for leadership development in its list of the "40 Best Companies for Leaders".


title: Housefly content: Housefly The housefly ("Musca domestica") is a fly of the suborder Cyclorrhapha. It is believed to have evolved in the Cenozoic era, possibly in the Middle East, and has spread all over the world as a commensal of humans. It is the most common fly species found in houses. Adults are grey to black, with four dark, longitudinal lines on the thorax, slightly hairy bodies, and a single pair of membranous wings. They have red eyes, set farther apart in the slightly larger female. The female housefly usually mates only once and stores the sperm for later use. She lays


title: Housefly content: batches of about 100 eggs on decaying organic matter such as food waste, carrion, or faeces. These soon hatch into legless white larvae, known as maggots. After 2 to 5 days of development, these metamorphose into reddish-brown pupae, about long. Adult flies normally live for 2 to 4 weeks, but can hibernate during the winter. The adults feed on a variety of liquid or semiliquid substances, as well as solid materials which have been softened by their saliva. They can carry pathogens on their bodies and in their faeces, contaminate food, and contribute to the transfer of food-borne illnesses, while,


title: Housefly content: in numbers, they can be physically annoying. For these reasons, they are considered pests. Houseflies have been used in the laboratory in research into ageing and sex determination. Flies appear in literature from Ancient Greek myth and Aesop's "The Impertinent Insect" onwards. Authors sometimes choose the fly to speak of the brevity of life, as in William Blake's 1794 poem "The Fly", which deals with mortality subject to uncontrollable circumstances. Adult houseflies are usually long with a wingspan of . The females tend to be larger winged than males, while males have relatively longer legs. Females tend to vary more


title: Housefly content: in size and there is geographic variation with larger individuals in higher latitudes. The head is strongly convex in front and flat and slightly conical behind. The pair of large compound eyes almost touch in the male, but are more widely separated in the female. They have three simple eyes (ocelli) and a pair of short antennae. Flies process visual information around seven times more quickly than humans, enabling them to identify and avoid attempts to catch or swat them, since they effectively see the human's movements in slow motion with their higher flicker fusion rate. The mouthparts are specially


title: Housefly content: adapted for a liquid diet; the mandibles and maxillae are reduced and not functional, and the other mouthparts form a retractable, flexible proboscis with an enlarged, fleshy tip, the labellum. This is a sponge-like structure that is characterised by many grooves, called pseudotracheae, which suck up fluids by capillary action. It is also used to distribute saliva to soften solid foods or collect loose particles. Houseflies have chemoreceptors, organs of taste, on the tarsi of their legs, so they can identify foods such as sugars by walking over them. Flies are often seen cleaning their legs by rubbing them together,


title: Housefly content: enabling the chemoreceptors to taste afresh whatever they walk on next. At the end of each leg is a pair of claws, and below them are two adhesive pads, pulvilli, enabling the fly to walk up smooth walls and ceilings using Van der Waals forces. The claws help the fly to unstick the foot for the next step. Flies walk with a common gait on horizontal and vertical surfaces with three legs in contact with the surface and three in movement. On inverted surfaces, they alter the gait to keep four feet stuck to the surface. Flies land on a


title: Housefly content: ceiling by flying straight towards it; just before landing, they make a half roll and point all six legs at the surface, absorbing the shock with the front legs and sticking a moment later with the other four. The thorax is a shade of gray, sometimes even black, with four dark, longitudinal bands of even width on the dorsal surface. The whole body is covered with short hairs. Like other Diptera, houseflies have only one pair of wings; what would be the hind pair is reduced to small halteres that aid in flight stability. The wings are translucent with a


title: Housefly content: yellowish tinge at their base. Characteristically, the medial vein (M1+2 or fourth long vein) shows a sharp upward bend. Each wing has a lobe at the back, the calypter, covering the haltere. The abdomen is gray or yellowish with a dark stripe and irregular dark markings at the side. It has 10 segments which bear spiracles for respiration. In males, the ninth segment bears a pair of claspers for copulation, and the 10th bears anal cerci in both sexes. A variety of species around the world appear similar to the housefly, such as the lesser house fly, "Fannia canicularis"; the


title: Housefly content: stable fly, "Stomoxys calcitrans"; and other members of the genus "Musca" such as "M. vetustissima", the Australian bush fly and several closely related taxa that include "M. primitiva", "M. shanghaiensis", "M. violacea", and "M. varensis". The systematic identification of species may require the use of region-specific taxonomic keys and can require dissections of the male reproductive parts for confirmation. The housefly is probably the insect with the widest distribution in the world; it is largely associated with humans and has accompanied them around the globe. It is present in the Arctic Circle, as well as in the tropics, where it


title: Housefly content: is abundant. It is present in all populated parts of Europe, Asia, Australasia, and the Americas. Though the order of flies (Diptera) is much older, true houseflies are believed to have evolved in the beginning of the Cenozoic era. The housefly's superfamily, Muscoidea, is most closely related to the Oestroidea (blow flies, flesh flies and allies), and more distantly to the Hippoboscoidea (louse flies, bat flies and allies). They are thought to have originated in the southern Palearctic region, particularly the Middle East. Because of their close, commensal relationship with humans, they probably owe their worldwide dispersal to co-migration with


title: Housefly content: humans. The housefly was first described as "Musca domestica" in 1758 based on the common European specimens by the Swedish botanist and zoologist Carl Linnaeus in his "Systema naturae" and continues to be classified under that name. A more detailed description was given in 1776 by the Danish entomologist Johan Christian Fabricius in his "Genera Insectorum". Each female housefly can lay up to 500 eggs in her lifetime, in several batches of about 75 to 150. The eggs are white and are about in length, and they are deposited by the fly in a suitable place, usually dead and decaying


title: Housefly content: organic matter, such as food waste, carrion, or faeces. Within a day, larvae (maggots) hatch from the eggs; they live and feed where they were laid. They are pale-whitish, long, thinner at the mouth end, and legless. Larval development takes from two weeks, under optimal conditions, to 30 days or more in cooler conditions. The larvae avoid light; the interiors of heaps of animal manure provide nutrient-rich sites and ideal growing conditions, warm, moist, and dark. At the end of their fourth instar, the larvae crawl to a dry, cool place and transform into pupae. The pupal case is cylindrical


title: Housefly content: with rounded ends, about long, and formed from the last shed larval skin. It is yellowish at first, darkening through red and brown to nearly black as it ages. Pupae complete their development in from two to six days at , but may take 20 days or more at . When metamorphosis is complete, the adult fly emerges from the pupa. To do this, it uses the ptilinum, an eversible pouch on its head, to tear open the end of the pupal case. The adult housefly lives from two weeks to a month in the wild, or longer in benign


title: Housefly content: laboratory conditions. Having emerged from the pupa, it ceases to grow; a small fly is not necessarily a young fly, but is instead the result of getting insufficient food during the larval stage. Male houseflies are sexually mature after 16 hours and females after 24. Females produce a pheromone, (Z)-9-tricosene (muscalure). This cuticular hydrocarbon is not released into the air and males sense it only on contact with females; it has found use as in pest control, for luring males to fly traps. The male initiates the mating by bumping into the female, in the air or on the ground,


title: Housefly content: known as a "strike". He climbs on to her thorax, and if she is receptive, a courtship period follows, in which the female vibrates her wings and the male strokes her head. The male then reverses onto her abdomen and the female pushes her ovipositor into his genital opening; copulation, with sperm transfer, lasts for several minutes. Females normally mate only once and then reject further advances from males, while males mate multiple times. A volatile semiochemical that is deposited by females on their eggs attracts other gravid females and leads to clustered egg deposition. The larvae depend on warmth


title: Housefly content: and sufficient moisture to develop; generally, the warmer the temperature, the faster they grow. In general, fresh swine and chicken manures present the best conditions for the developing larvae, reducing the larval period and increasing the size of the pupae. Cattle, goat, and horse manures produce fewer, smaller pupae, while fully composted swine manure, with a water content under 40%, produces none at all. Pupae can range from about under different conditions. The lifecycle can be completed in seven to 10 days under optimal conditions, but may take up to two months in adverse circumstances. In temperate regions, 12 generations


title: Housefly content: may occur per year, and in the tropics and subtropics, more than 20. Houseflies play an important ecological role in breaking down and recycling organic matter. Adults are mainly carnivorous; their primary food is animal matter, carrion, and faeces, but they also consume milk, sugary substances, and rotting fruit and vegetables. Solid foods are softened with saliva before being sucked up. They can be opportunistic blood feeders. Houseflies have a mutualistic relationship with the bacterium "Klebsiella oxytoca", which can live on the surface of housefly eggs and deter fungi which compete with the fly larvae for nutrients. Adult houseflies are


title: Housefly content: diurnal and rest at night. If inside a building after dark, they tend to congregate on ceilings, beams, and overhead wires, while out of doors, they crawl into foliage or long grass, or rest in shrubs and trees or on wires. In cooler climates, some houseflies hibernate in winter, choosing to do so in cracks and crevices, gaps in woodwork, and the folds of curtains. They arouse in the spring when the weather warms up, and search out a place to lay their eggs. Houseflies have many predators, including birds, reptiles, amphibians, various insects, and spiders. The eggs, larvae, and


title: Housefly content: pupae have many species of stage-specific parasites and parasitoids. Some of the more important are the parasitic wasps "Muscidifurax uniraptor" and "Spalangia cameroni"; these lay their eggs in the fly larvae tissue and their offspring complete their development before the adult flies can emerge from the pupae. Hister beetles feed on housefly larvae in manure heaps and the predatory mite "Macrocheles muscae domesticae" consumes housefly eggs, each mite eating 20 eggs per day. Houseflies sometimes carry phoretic (nonparasitic) passengers, including mites such as "Macrocheles muscaedomesticae" and the pseudoscorpion "Lamprochernes chyzeri". The pathogenic fungus "Entomophthora muscae" causes a fatal disease in


title: Housefly content: houseflies. After infection, the fungal hyphae grow throughout the body, killing the fly in about five days. Infected flies have been known to seek high temperatures that could suppress the growth of the fungus. Affected females tend to be more attractive to males, but the fungus-host interactions have not been fully understood. The housefly also acts as the alternative host to the parasitic nematode "Habronema muscae" that attacks horses. Flies are a nuisance, disturbing people at leisure and at work, but they are disliked principally because of their habits of contaminating foodstuffs. They alternate between breeding and feeding in dirty


title: Housefly content: places with feeding on human foods, during which process they soften the food with saliva and deposit their faeces, creating a health hazard. However, fly larvae are as nutritious as fish meal, and could be used to convert waste to feed for fish and livestock. Flies have been used in art and artefacts in many cultures. In 16th- and 17th-century European vanitas paintings, flies sometimes occur as "memento mori". They may also be used for other effects as in the Flemish painting, the "Master of Frankfurt" (1496). Fly amulets were popular in ancient Egypt. Houseflies can fly for several miles


title: Housefly content: from their breeding places, carrying a wide variety of organisms on their hairs, mouthparts, vomitus, and faeces. Parasites carried include cysts of protozoa, e.g. "Entamoeba histolytica" and "Giardia lamblia" and eggs of helminths, e.g., "Ascaris lumbricoides", "Trichuris trichiura", "Hymenolepis nana", and "Enterobius vermicularis". Houseflies do not serve as a secondary host or act as a reservoir of any bacteria of medical or veterinary importance, but they do serve as mechanical vectors to over 100 pathogens, such as those causing typhoid, cholera, salmonellosis, bacillary dysentery, tuberculosis, anthrax, ophthalmia, and pyogenic cocci, making them especially problematic in hospitals and during outbreaks of


title: Housefly content: certain diseases. Disease-causing organisms on the outer surface of the fly may survive for a few hours, but those in the crop or gut can be viable for several days. Usually, too few bacteria are on the external surface of the flies (except perhaps for "Shigella") to cause infection, so the main routes to human infection are through the fly's regurgitation and defecation. In the early 20th century, Canadian public health workers believed that the control of flies was important in controlling the spread of tuberculosis. A "swat that fly" contest was held for children in Montreal in 1912. Flies


title: Housefly content: were targeted in 1916, when a polio epidemic broke out in the eastern United States. The belief that fly control was key to disease control continued, with extensive use of insecticidal spraying, well until the mid-1950s, declining only after the introduction of Salk's vaccine. In China, Mao Zedong's Four Pests Campaign between 1958 and 1962 exhorted the people to catch and kill flies, along with rats, mosquitoes and sparrows. During the Second World War, the Japanese worked on entomological warfare techniques under Shirō Ishii. Japanese Yagi bombs developed at Pingfan consisted of two compartments, one with houseflies and another with


title: Housefly content: a bacterial slurry that coated the flies prior to release. "Vibrio cholerae", which causes cholera, was the bacterium of choice, and was used in China in Baoshan in 1942, and in northern Shandong in 1943. Baoshan had been used by the Allies and bombing produced epidemics that killed 60,000 people in the initial stages reaching a radius of 200 km, which finally took a toll of 200,000 victims. The Shandong attack killed 210,000; the occupying Japanese troops had been vaccinated in advance. The ability of housefly larvae to feed and develop in a wide range of decaying organic matter is


title: Housefly content: important for recycling of nutrients in nature. This could be exploited to combat ever-increasing amounts of waste. Housefly larvae can be mass-reared in a controlled manner in animal manure, reducing the bulk of waste and minimizing environmental risks of its disposal. Harvested maggots may be used as feed for animal nutrition. Flies can be controlled, at least to some extent, by physical, chemical, or biological means. Physical controls include screening with small mesh or the use of vertical strips of plastic or strings of beads in doorways to prevent entry of flies into buildings. Fans to create air movement or


title: Housefly content: air barriers in doorways can deter flies from entering, and food premises often use ultraviolet light traps that electrocute insects. Sticky fly papers hanging from the ceiling can also be effective. Another approach is the elimination as far as possible of potential breeding sites. Keeping garbage in lidded containers and collecting it regularly and frequently, prevents any eggs laid from developing into adults. Unhygienic rubbish tips are a prime fly-breeding site, but if garbage is covered by a layer of soil, preferably daily, this can be avoided. Insecticides can be used. Larvicides kill the developing larvae, but large quantities may


title: Housefly content: need to be used to reach areas below the surface. Aerosols can be used in buildings to "zap" flies, but outside applications are only temporarily effective. Residual sprays on walls or resting sites have a longer-lasting effect. Many strains of housefly have become immune to the most commonly used insecticides. Several means of biological pest control have been investigated. These include the introduction of another species, the black soldier fly ("Hermetia illucens"), whose larvae compete with those of the housefly for resources. The introduction of dung beetles to churn up the surface of a manure heap and render it unsuitable


title: Housefly content: for breeding is another approach. Augmentative biological control by releasing parasitoids can be used, but flies breed so fast that the natural enemies are unable to keep up. The ease of culturing houseflies, and the relative ease of handling them when compared to the fruit fly "Drosophila", have made them useful as model organism for use in laboratories. The American entomologist Vincent Dethier, in his humorous "To Know A Fly" (1962), pointed out that as a laboratory animal, houseflies did not trouble anyone sensitive to animal cruelty. Houseflies have a small number of chromosomes, haploid six or diploid 12. Because


title: Housefly content: the somatic tissue of the housefly consists of long-lived postmitotic cells, it can be used as an informative model system for understanding cumulative age-related cellular alterations. Oxidative DNA damage 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine in houseflies was found in one study to increase with age and reduce life expectancy supporting the hypothesis that oxidative molecular damage is a causal factor in senescence (aging). The housefly is an object of biological research, partly for its variable sex-determination mechanism. Although a wide variety of sex-determination mechanisms exists in nature (e.g. male and female heterogamy, haplodiploidy, environmental factors), the way sex is determined is usually fixed within


title: Housefly content: a species. The housefly is, however, thought to exhibit multiple mechanisms for sex determination, such as male heterogamy (like most insects and mammals), female heterogamy (like birds), and maternal control over offspring sex. The exact mechanism of sex determination involved is unresolved, but sexual differentiation is controlled as in other insects by an ancient developmental switch, doublesex, which is regulated by the transformer protein in many different insects. The antimicrobial peptides produced by housefly maggots are of pharmacological interest. In the 1970s, the aircraft modeller Frank Ehling constructed miniature balsa-wood aircraft powered by live houseflies. Studies of tethered flies have


title: Housefly content: helped in the understanding of insect vision, sensory perception, and flight control. "The Impertinent Insect" is a group of five fables, sometimes ascribed to Aesop, concerning an insect, in one version a fly, which puffs itself up to seem important. In the Biblical fourth plague of Egypt, flies represent death and decay, while the Philistine god Beelzebub's name may mean "lord of the flies". In Greek mythology, Myiagros was a god who chased away flies during the sacrifices to Zeus and Athena; Zeus sent a fly to bite Pegasus, causing Bellerophon to fall back to Earth when he attempted to


title: Housefly content: ride the winged steed to Mount Olympus. In the traditional Navajo religion, Big Fly is an important spirit being. William Blake's 1794 poem "The Fly", part of his collection "Songs of Experience", deals with the insect's mortality, subject to uncontrollable circumstances, just like humans. Emily Dickinson's 1855 poem "I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died" speaks of flies in the context of death. In William Golding's 1954 novel "Lord of the Flies", the fly is however a symbol of the children involved. Ogden Nash's humorous two-line 1942 poem "God in His wisdom made the fly/And then forgot to tell


title: Housefly content: us why." indicates the debate about the value of biodiversity, given that even those considered by humans as pests have their place in the world's ecosystems. Housefly The housefly ("Musca domestica") is a fly of the suborder Cyclorrhapha. It is believed to have evolved in the Cenozoic era, possibly in the Middle East, and has spread all over the world as a commensal of humans. It is the most common fly species found in houses. Adults are grey to black, with four dark, longitudinal lines on the thorax, slightly hairy bodies, and a single pair of membranous wings. They have


title: "Fighting Discrimination" content: hailed by NGOs, the media, and representatives of governments and intergovernmental organizations. All publications are available for free on the Fighting Discrimination website. Starting in 2007, the program began producing the Annual Hate Crime Survey, supplemented with an online-based Hate Crime Report Card. Hate Crime Survey <br>The 2008 Hate Crime Survey by Human Rights First provides the most comprehensive and up-to-date overview of hate crime in the 56 countries comprising the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The Survey includes sections examining six facets of violent hate crime: Violence Based on Racism and Xenophobia, Antisemitic Violence, Violence Against


title: "Water resources management in Uruguay" content: supported by a 27 million US dollars loan approved in June 2000. OSE was able to successfully implement and disseminate an in-house reference system that compares performance of the water utility in 21 cities, on the basis of eight service quality indicators. In addition, the first phase helped improve sewer coverage in another 12 cities of the interior by expanding—according to demand—the sewerage systems. Finally, three new sewage treatment plants were built in the cities of Minas, Treinta y Tres and Durazno, with a total capacity to serve 60,000 users. The Inter-American Development Bank has recently approved a consultancy service


title: "Celtic sacred trees" content: Suibne Geilt in Buile Shuibhne (The Frenzy of Suibne) rests on yew trees during his flight. When Eógan and Lugaid mac Con are disputing they hear the magical music of the yew tree over a waterfall; the musician is revealed to be Fer Í (man of yew), the son of Eogabal. Wielders of the spear Gáe Assail are sure to kill their victims if they utter the word "ibar" (yew) as they cast. The agnomen of Cáer, the swan maiden, is Ibormeith [yew berry]. In oral variants of the Deirdre story, King Conchobar mac Nessa drives yew stakes through the


title: "New Silver Beach" content: of Wild Harbor, however U-Boat hysteria during the war led to dwindling popularity. On August 30, 1953, the Wild Harbor Yacht Club was formed on Wickertree Road to primarily serve New Silver and its constituent communities. The Club was incorporated by the United States Sailing Association the following year. A Widgeon fleet was organized in 1979 which brought the sport of sailing back into regional popularity. The club clinched the Southern Massachusetts Beetle Cat championship in 1981, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987, and 1989. In 1990 the club focused its junior sailing on the new 420 class racing vessels which


title: "Mobile phone" content: Mobile phone A mobile phone, cell phone or hand phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while the user is moving within a telephone service area. The radio frequency link establishes a connection to the switching systems of a mobile phone operator, which provides access to the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Modern mobile telephone services use a cellular network architecture, and, therefore, mobile telephones are called "cellular telephones" or "cell phones", in North America. In addition to telephony, 2000s-era mobile phones


title: "Mobile phone" content: support a variety of other services, such as text messaging, MMS, email, Internet access, short-range wireless communications (infrared, Bluetooth), business applications, video games, and digital photography. Mobile phones offering only those capabilities are known as feature phones; mobile phones which offer greatly advanced computing capabilities are referred to as smartphones. The first handheld mobile phone was demonstrated by John F. Mitchell and Martin Cooper of Motorola in 1973, using a handset weighing c. 2 kilograms (4.4 lbs). In 1979, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) launched the world's first cellular network in Japan. In 1983, the DynaTAC 8000x was the first


title: "Mobile phone" content: commercially available handheld mobile phone. From 1983 to 2014, worldwide mobile phone subscriptions grew to over seven billion—enough to provide one for every person on Earth. In first quarter of 2016, the top smartphone developers worldwide were Samsung, Apple, and Huawei, with smartphone sales represented 78 percent of total mobile phone sales. For feature phones (or "dumbphones") , the largest were Samsung, Nokia, and Alcatel. A handheld mobile radio telephone service was envisioned in the early stages of radio engineering. In 1917, Finnish inventor Eric Tigerstedt filed a patent for a "pocket-size folding telephone with a very thin carbon microphone".


title: "Mobile phone" content: Early predecessors of cellular phones included analog radio communications from ships and trains. The race to create truly portable telephone devices began after World War II, with developments taking place in many countries. The advances in mobile telephony have been traced in successive "generations", starting with the early zeroth-generation (0G) services, such as Bell System's Mobile Telephone Service and its successor, the Improved Mobile Telephone Service. These 0G systems were not cellular, supported few simultaneous calls, and were very expensive. The first handheld cellular mobile phone was demonstrated by John F. Mitchell and Martin Cooper of Motorola in 1973, using


title: "Mobile phone" content: a handset weighing . The first commercial automated cellular network (1G) analog was launched in Japan by Nippon Telegraph and Telephone in 1979. This was followed in 1981 by the simultaneous launch of the Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT) system in Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. Several other countries then followed in the early to mid-1980s. These first-generation (1G) systems could support far more simultaneous calls but still used analog cellular technology. In 1983, the DynaTAC 8000x was the first commercially available handheld mobile phone. In 1991, the second-generation (2G) digital cellular technology was launched in Finland by Radiolinja on the


title: "Mobile phone" content: GSM standard. This sparked competition in the sector as the new operators challenged the incumbent 1G network operators. Ten years later, in 2001, the third generation (3G) was launched in Japan by NTT DoCoMo on the WCDMA standard. This was followed by 3.5G, 3G+ or turbo 3G enhancements based on the high-speed packet access (HSPA) family, allowing UMTS networks to have higher data transfer speeds and capacity. By 2009, it had become clear that, at some point, 3G networks would be overwhelmed by the growth of bandwidth-intensive applications, such as streaming media. Consequently, the industry began looking to data-optimized fourth-generation


title: "Mobile phone" content: technologies, with the promise of speed improvements up to ten-fold over existing 3G technologies. The first two commercially available technologies billed as 4G were the WiMAX standard, offered in North America by Sprint, and the LTE standard, first offered in Scandinavia by TeliaSonera. 5G is a technology and term used in research papers and projects to denote the next major phase in mobile telecommunication standards beyond the 4G/IMT-Advanced standards. The term 5G is not officially used in any specification or official document yet made public by telecommunication companies or standardization bodies such as 3GPP, WiMAX Forum or ITU-R. New standards


title: "Mobile phone" content: beyond 4G are currently being developed by standardization bodies, but they are at this time seen as under the 4G umbrella, not for a new mobile generation. Smartphones have a number of distinguishing features. The International Telecommunication Union measures those with Internet connection, which it calls "Active Mobile-Broadband subscriptions" (which includes tablets, etc.). In the developed world, smartphones have now overtaken the usage of earlier mobile systems. However, in the developing world, they account for around 50% of mobile telephony. Feature phone is a term typically used as a retronym to describe mobile phones which are limited in capabilities in


title: "Mobile phone" content: contrast to a modern smartphone. Feature phones typically provide voice calling and text messaging functionality, in addition to basic multimedia and Internet capabilities, and other services offered by the user's wireless service provider. A feature phone has additional functions over and above a basic mobile phone which is only capable of voice calling and text messaging. Feature phones and basic mobile phones tend to use a proprietary, custom-designed software and user interface. By contrast, smartphones generally use a mobile operating system that often shares common traits across devices. There are Orthodox Jewish religious restrictions which, by some interpretations, standard mobile


title: "Mobile phone" content: telephones overstep. To deal with this problem, some rabbinical organizations have recommended that phones with text-messaging capability not be used by children. Phones with restricted features are known as kosher phones and have rabbinical approval for use in Israel and elsewhere by observant Orthodox Jews. Although these phones are intended to prevent immodesty, some vendors report good sales to adults who prefer the simplicity of the devices. Some phones are approved for use by essential workers (such as health, security, and public service workers) on the sabbath, even though the use of any electrical device is generally prohibited during this


title: "Mobile phone" content: time. Mobile phones communicate with cell towers that are placed to give coverage across a telephone service area which is divided up into 'cells'. Each cell uses a different set of frequencies from neighbouring cells, and will typically be covered by 3 towers placed at different locations. The cell towers are usually interconnected to each other and the phone network and the internet by wired connections. Due to bandwidth limitations each cell will have a maximum number of cell phones it can handle at once. The cells are therefore sized depending on the expected usage density, and may be much


title: "Mobile phone" content: smaller in cities. In that case much lower transmitter powers are used to avoid broadcasting beyond the cell. As a phone moves around, a phone will "hand off"- automatically disconnect and reconnect to the tower that gives the best reception. Additionally, short-range Wi-Fi infrastructure is often used by smartphones as much as possible as it offloads traffic from cell networks on to local area networks. The common components found on all phones are: Low-end mobile phones are often referred to as feature phones and offer basic telephony. Handsets with more advanced computing ability through the use of native software applications


title: "Mobile phone" content: are known as smartphones. Mobile phones have central processing units (CPUs), similar to those in computers, but optimised to operate in low power environments. Mobile CPU performance depends not only on the clock rate (generally given in multiples of hertz) but also the memory hierarchy also greatly affects overall performance. Because of these problems, the performance of mobile phone CPUs is often more appropriately given by scores derived from various standardized tests to measure the real effective performance in commonly used applications. One of the main characteristics of phones is the screen. Depending on the device's type and design, the


title: "Mobile phone" content: screen fills most or nearly all of the space on a device's front surface. Many smartphone displays have an aspect ratio of , but taller aspect ratios became more common in 2017. Screen sizes are measured in diagonal inches; feature phones generally have screen sizes below 3.5 inches. Phones with screens larger than 5.2 inches are often called "phablets." Smartphones with screens over 4.5 inches in size are commonly difficult to use with only a single hand, since most thumbs cannot reach the entire screen surface; they may need to be shifted around in the hand, held in one hand


title: "Mobile phone" content: and manipulated by the other, or used in place with both hands. Due to design advances, some modern smartphones with large screen sizes and "edge-to-edge" designs have compact builds that improve their ergonomics, while the shift to taller aspect ratios have resulted in phones that have larger screen sizes whilst maintaining the ergonomics associated with smaller 16:9 displays. Liquid-crystal displays are the most common; others are IPS, LED, OLED, and AMOLED displays. Some displays are integrated with pressure-sensitive digitizers, such as those developed by Wacom and Samsung, and Apple's "3D Touch" system. In sound, smartphones and feature phones vary little.


title: "Mobile phone" content: Some audio-quality enhancing features, such as Voice over LTE and HD Voice, have appeared and are often available on newer smartphones. Sound quality can remain a problem due to the design of the phone, the quality of the cellular network and compression algorithms used in long distance calls. Audio quality can be improved using a VoIP application over WiFi. Cellphones have small speakers so that the user can use a speakerphone feature and talk to a person on the phone without holding it to their ear. The small speakers can also be used to listen to digital audio files of


title: "Mobile phone" content: music or speech or watch videos with an audio component, without holding the phone close to the ear. The average phone battery lasts 2–3 years at best. Many of the wireless devices use a Lithium-Ion (Li-Ion) battery, which charges 500-2500 times, depending on how users take care of the battery and the charging techniques used. It is only natural for these rechargeable batteries to chemically age, which is why the performance of the battery when used for a year or two will begin to deteriorate. Battery life can be extended by draining it regularly, not overcharging it, and keeping it


title: "Mobile phone" content: away from heat. Mobile phones require a small microchip called a Subscriber Identity Module or SIM card, in order to function. The SIM card is approximately the size of a small postage stamp and is usually placed underneath the battery in the rear of the unit. The SIM securely stores the service-subscriber key (IMSI) and the K used to identify and authenticate the user of the mobile phone. The SIM card allows users to change phones by simply removing the SIM card from one mobile phone and inserting it into another mobile phone or broadband telephony device, provided that this


title: "Mobile phone" content: is not prevented by a SIM lock. The first SIM card was made in 1991 by Munich smart card maker Giesecke & Devrient for the Finnish wireless network operator Radiolinja. A hybrid mobile phone can hold up to four SIM cards, with a phone having an IMEI per SIM Card. SIM and R-UIM cards may be mixed together to allow both GSM and CDMA networks to be accessed. From 2010 onwards, such phones became popular in emerging markets, and this was attributed to the desire to obtain the lowest on-net calling rate. Feature phones have basic software platforms. Smartphones have


title: "Mobile phone" content: advanced software platforms. A mobile app is a computer program designed to run on a mobile device, such as a smartphone. The term "app" is a shortening of the term "software application". A common data application on mobile phones is Short Message Service (SMS) text messaging. The first SMS message was sent from a computer to a mobile phone in 1992 in the UK while the first person-to-person SMS from phone to phone was sent in Finland in 1993. The first mobile news service, delivered via SMS, was launched in Finland in 2000, and subsequently many organizations provided "on-demand" and


title: "Mobile phone" content: "instant" news services by SMS. Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) was introduced in 2001. The introduction of Apple's App Store for the iPhone and iPod Touch in July 2008 popularized manufacturer-hosted online distribution for third-party applications (software and computer programs) focused on a single platform. There are a huge variety of apps, including video games, music products and business tools. Up until that point, smartphone application distribution depended on third-party sources providing applications for multiple platforms, such as GetJar, Handango, Handmark, and PocketGear. Following the success of the App Store, other smartphone manufacturers launched application stores, such as Google's Android Market


title: "Mobile phone" content: (later renamed to the Google Play Store) and RIM's BlackBerry App World and Android-related app stores like F-Droid. In February 2014, 93% of mobile developers were targeting smartphones first for mobile app development. From 1983 to 1998, Motorola was market leader in mobile phones. Nokia was the market leader in mobile phones from 1998 to 2012. In Q1 2012, Samsung surpassed Nokia, selling 93.5 million units as against Nokia's 82.7 million units. Samsung has retained its top position since then. In 2017, the top five manufacturers worldwide were Samsung (20.9%), Apple (14.0%), Huawei (9.8%), Oppo (5.7%), and Vivo (6.5%). During


title: "Mobile phone" content: Q2 2018, Huawei overtook Apple as the world's second-largest phone manufacturer. The world's largest individual mobile operator by number of subscribers is China Mobile, which has over 902 million mobile phone subscribers . Over 50 mobile operators have over ten million subscribers each, and over 150 mobile operators had at least one million subscribers by the end of 2009. In 2014, there were more than seven billion mobile phone subscribers worldwide, a number that is expected to keep growing. Mobile phones are used for a variety of purposes, such as keeping in touch with family members, for conducting business, and


title: "Mobile phone" content: in order to have access to a telephone in the event of an emergency. Some people carry more than one mobile phone for different purposes, such as for business and personal use. Multiple SIM cards may be used to take advantage of the benefits of different calling plans. For example, a particular plan might provide for cheaper local calls, long-distance calls, international calls, or roaming. The mobile phone has been used in a variety of diverse contexts in society. For example: In 1998, one of the first examples of distributing and selling media content through the mobile phone was the


title: "Mobile phone" content: sale of ringtones by Radiolinja in Finland. Soon afterwards, other media content appeared, such as news, video games, jokes, horoscopes, TV content and advertising. Most early content for mobile phones tended to be copies of legacy media, such as banner advertisements or TV news highlight video clips. Recently, unique content for mobile phones has been emerging, from ringtones and ringback tones to mobisodes, video content that has been produced exclusively for mobile phones. In many countries, mobile phones are used to provide mobile banking services, which may include the ability to transfer cash payments by secure SMS text message. Kenya's


title: "Mobile phone" content: M-PESA mobile banking service, for example, allows customers of the mobile phone operator Safaricom to hold cash balances which are recorded on their SIM cards. Cash can be deposited or withdrawn from M-PESA accounts at Safaricom retail outlets located throughout the country and can be transferred electronically from person to person and used to pay bills to companies. Branchless banking has also been successful in South Africa and the Philippines. A pilot project in Bali was launched in 2011 by the International Finance Corporation and an Indonesian bank, Bank Mandiri. Another application of mobile banking technology is Zidisha, a US-based


title: "Mobile phone" content: nonprofit micro-lending platform that allows residents of developing countries to raise small business loans from Web users worldwide. Zidisha uses mobile banking for loan disbursements and repayments, transferring funds from lenders in the United States to borrowers in rural Africa who have mobile phones and can use the Internet. Mobile payments were first trialled in Finland in 1998 when two Coca-Cola vending machines in Espoo were enabled to work with SMS payments. Eventually, the idea spread and in 1999, the Philippines launched the country's first commercial mobile payments systems with mobile operators Globe and Smart. Some mobile phones can make


title: "Mobile phone" content: mobile payments via direct mobile billing schemes, or through contactless payments if the phone and the point of sale support near field communication (NFC). Enabling contactless payments through NFC-equipped mobile phones requires the co-operation of manufacturers, network operators, and retail merchants. Mobile phones are commonly used to collect location data. While the phone is turned on, the geographical location of a mobile phone can be determined easily (whether it is being used or not) using a technique known as multilateration to calculate the differences in time for a signal to travel from the mobile phone to each of several cell


title: "Mobile phone" content: towers near the owner of the phone. The movements of a mobile phone user can be tracked by their service provider and if desired, by law enforcement agencies and their governments. Both the SIM card and the handset can be tracked. China has proposed using this technology to track the commuting patterns of Beijing city residents. In the UK and US, law enforcement and intelligence services use mobile phones to perform surveillance operations. They possess technology that enables them to activate the microphones in mobile phones remotely in order to listen to conversations which take place near the phone. Hackers


title: "Mobile phone" content: are able to track a phone's location, read messages, and record calls, just by knowing the phone number. Mobile phone use while driving, including talking on the phone, texting, or operating other phone features, is common but controversial. It is widely considered dangerous due to distracted driving. Being distracted while operating a motor vehicle has been shown to increase the risk of accidents. In September 2010, the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported that 995 people were killed by drivers distracted by cell phones. In March 2011, a U.S. insurance company, State Farm Insurance, announced the results of