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Editor Notes – Kent Trabing
JW Dinner
Retail & Media
Real Estate Data Collection and Resolution Platform — L.D. Salmanson, WG'13
By: Kent Trabing, WG'01
category: Entrepreneur
L.D. Salmanson, WG'13
"Maverick Herder" (CEO) of Cherre
L.D. Salmanson, WG'13, immigrated into the United States from Israel on a Joseph Wharton Fellowship. He entered school with a rare clarity about his goals, as well as how and when he would accomplish them. That put him in the position to create a successful business and give back to future Wharton students.
What is Cherre?
Cherre is a real estate data collection and resolution platform for large enterprises. Our clients are mostly banks, insurance companies, large multiple listing services, hedge funds and mortgage-backed securities companies. They consume data from thousands of data feeds from multiple sources, in real time, and spend millions of dollars and endless man-hours to make sense of the data.
What kinds of data?
Public data such as permits, violations and past transactions; subscription data like foot traffic and internet searches; and internal data, such as CRM or research data. We collect all the data, resolve it for clients in real time and create a single source of truth in an API format.
Can you give an example?
For the New York Metro market, Cherre has over 100 million data points from thousands of sources. One client, Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY), has 1,500 internal feeds coming from residential and commercial brokerage firms. REBNY has feeds that it pays for, like demographics and maps, subway data, and traffic feeds, and it has another 200 or 300 public feeds providing construction permit requests, certificates of occupancy and violations. REBNY used to pay a team of data engineers and analysts millions of dollars to take that data and put it into one usable form, which is very hard to do. We solved that for REBNY. Today, all that data comes to our platform where we resolve it and produce one accurate data stream for REBNY's 17,000 clients.
Another client is one of the largest property-and-casualty insurance companies in the U.S. Let's say a customer of the insurance company asks for a quote in real time. Perhaps the customer just bought a home and wants to purchase homeowner's insurance. Typically, since this customer's data is incomplete, the insurance company lowballs the quote. In which case, it may lose money because it should have charged the customer more, or it overprices the customer, and the customer leaves to a competitor. Cherre's core competency is helping clients connect large amounts of data in real time. We mesh the data together into one stream — that's the magic.
Better data means better decisions. For example, Zillow has a team of 50 data engineers on a project called Zestimate. Zillow launched a competition to pay $1 million if you can improve its algorithm. Zillow claims that 80% of the time it is within 20% of the closed price. If we were to run our verified data through that exact same model, then the variance drops to plus or minus 5%. Better data gives a better return than a better algorithm at some point. Diminishing returns may have been reached on algorithms but not on data.
Incorrect data could be the wrong number of bedrooms, or a transaction that was an inside deal?
Yes. Even public information may be off. The NYC Department of Finance gives one size for a lot, which is the basis for taxes. The NYC Department of Buildings gives another size for the lot, which is used for zoning. And often, they are both different from the actual size. We spend a lot of time researching and taking data from many sources in real time, to answer which data source is accurate for what purpose and when.
What is the importance of real time?
The data going into our pipeline is collected in real time, and our clients need our output to be in real time for them to make real-time decisions.
So, yes, many aspects of real estate are fixed, but other critical data can change quickly. Mortgage-backed securities are priced mark-to-market. Also, internet search traffic on a property, weather, crime, foot traffic and risk — all these can change in a moment.
Let's say a plumbing permit was filed for a building yesterday. What does it mean? We don't know, but the insurance company wants to know before it gives a quote.
You entered Wharton with a clear goal and strategy, which you executed.
I entered with a goal to help large investment firms, like Fidelity, T. Rowe Price or Putnam, collect data from public, private and internal sources, to make better investment and underwriting decisions for private companies.
To accomplish that goal, I wanted an education that would be relevant. I waived the entire first-year core and replaced it with the most advanced finance and technical classes around financial derivative products, repo markets, asset management — things I knew nothing about. By the time I graduated, it wasn't like I knew these subjects perfectly, but I knew which questions to ask.
Second, I sought out the best network of mentors and influencers, like Professors Eric Bradlow and Adam Grant, who could help me to build out that idea and attract talent. By the summer of my first year, I joined a company as co-founder to help large pre-IPO companies like Facebook and Twitter raise capital from large investment firms in alignment with my goal. Our company was acquired 18 months later by Oppenheimer & Co. in 2013. Then I co-headed Oppenheimer's Private Shares Group for another two and a half years.
How did you start Cherre?
I wanted to do the same for real estate what we had done for private equity, and as a director of a strong group at Oppenheimer, I thought it could be done inside the company. However, I really felt a passion to focus solely on this new project. So, I asked my friend Ben — who I had known and started companies with since I was 14 — if he wanted to join me, and we started two years ago.
Today, we are 17 people, each the best at what they do. The author Hunter Thompson once said, "At the top of the mountain, we are all snow leopards. Anybody who can do one thing better than anyone else in the world is a natural friend of mine."
My job is to find people who can do one thing better than everyone else. I have guys who can't put together a full sentence, but they are excellent at the job I need them to do. My job is to find mavericks and to herd them into one place to accomplish our work.
Talk about being a Joseph Wharton Fellow.
I didn't have to do much as a fellow. I was required to keep a high GPA and attend a dinner the first year. Since the fellowship included a scholarship, I have since been very active in giving back to Wharton, as I'd like as many people to have the same opportunities that I did — primarily, to be able to take risk!
What's your immigrant advantage?
I grew up in Israel. I came to America to attend Wharton.
There's a reason that Israelis are successful in technology startups. They can code from an early age in school and continue to receive training, even in the army. Culturally, I think we are natural entrepreneurs because, at our core, we're irreverent. An Israeli will go to a corner with three pizza shops and say, "You know what we're missing? A fourth pizza shop." After Talman Marco sold his company Viber, he came and saw Uber, Lyft and two other ride-sharing services. He decided to start a fifth one, which he soon sold to Gett for $200 million. That irreverence is something like bravado.
This is a true story. I was returning to the U.S. from Canada and coming through immigration. There was a long line on the right, and nobody lined up on the left. I ask myself: "Why is that? I went up to the border control officer on the left and asked, "Why isn't there anyone in this line?" He said, "I don't know!"
On the other hand, Israelis are extremely reverent — "I know I don't know anything. I come from a little swamp in Israel." We may not project humility, but I know I'm this little speck of nothing in this giant land of opportunity, where so many others are accustomed to this battlefield.
The third thing, which is rare, is that we're not afraid to fail. It's a little easier when you have nothing to lose. We're shameless — "I know everyone's failed before me, but I've got this."
Nobody remembers your failures. They only remember your success.
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Jacinda Ardern becomes the first prime minister to walk in a Pride Parade
Jacinda Ardern has become the first prime minister to walk in a Pride Parade celebrating New Zealand's rainbow communities, joining thousands of people at the colourful event on Auckland's Ponsonby Road.
More than 70 floats and about 3500 participants made their way up the road in the sixth annual Pride Parade tonight, watched by thousands of onlookers.
Ms Ardern was part of a Labour Party contingent, including Finance Minister Grant Robertson and MP Louisa Wall.
The Prime Minister said the parade was "fantastic" and "wonderful" and it felt like it was bigger than every before.
"Our float sort of stays the same but everything else seems to get bigger," she told TVNZ reporter Matty McLean as she walked along.
Ms Ardern said the parade showed there is a lot of support for the LGBTQI communities.
"And ultimately this is a parade about diversity and inclusiveness. And I'm really proud of the work the team has done to make that real over the years and in our laws."
Ms Ardern said she thinks New Zealand has been turning the tide on inclusiveness for these communities for some time 'but it's always been incremental".
"But we can't be complacent. As long as there are kids in New Zealand, if they are LGBTQI, if they have high levels of mental health issues or self harm, that tells us that we still have work to do."
The PM broke off from the parade along the way to greet spectators with hugs.
The Green Party and National Party also had representatives in the parade, which is the highlight of the annual Pride Festival calendar.
Police also took part in the parade with a special Rainbow-decorated police car created to mark New Zealand Police's commitment to diversity and to acknowledge the important relationship between police and New Zealand's Rainbow community.
In 1999, then-prime minister Jenny Shipley attended the Hero Parade, a gay and lesbian parade through the streets of Auckland.
New ZealandAuckland
NZ tsunami surge warning cancelled, Nuku'alofa 'like moonscape'
UK woman missing after being swept away in Tonga tsunami
Women accused of breaching Covid restrictions to go on trial
Interactive map shows NZ suburbs median house value rises
Brian Tamaki arrested after alleged breach of bail conditions

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California Swan Song
Are Indian H-1B workers a threat to American techies?
This is not a recent article. But I ran across some boots-on-the-ground information that should shed some light on the subject. First, the article:
A few days ago, I wrote a piece on the fracas that ensued when Disney and power utility Southern California Edison apparently hired Indian firms TCS and Infosys to replace in-house tech workers with Indians on H-1B visas. What seemed to enrage many about these two situations was the added ignominy that these fired workers had to suffer when they were made to train their Indian counterparts lest they lose out on their severance pay.
Still, there is a general feeling in the US that Indian companies have played fast and loose in trying to make a quick buck, which in this case is around $20 billion in revenue -- no small pile. Along the way, American IT workers feel enormously embittered towards people who they feel are not skilled enough and have poor communication skills, while Indian H-1B holders are aghast when they discover that they are being paid a fraction of a client's billed amount. It's an ugly situation all around.
So what is really going on? I think there is a moral case to be made here. I believe there are plenty of Americans who are skilled to fill these jobs. They aren't being hired because it's much cheaper to bring in foreign workers under the H1B visa program. This is an ABUSE of the system.
The question came up in Quora and here is the question and what I thought was the pointed answer:
Do you really believe the "there are too few qualified software engineers available in the USA" speech that software companies are preaching?
Donald William Gillies, Software Engineer at Google
I graduated with a PhD in computer science in 1993. In that year, UT-Arlington (a 3rd rate almost-community-college-level school) had 1 job opening and received 400 job applicants. UT-Austin (a 1st rate top-10 school) had 2 positions and received 1500 applicants. The odds are a little better today; at the PhD level now perhaps there are only 50 applicants for every position open. I worked in an ECE department that was a top-10 school, and we found that half of our graduates never found a job in Electrical Engineering. Is there a shortage of computer scientists or electrical engineers in the USA? No way.
The people who say there is a shortage, are all of them shills for the H1B industry. Many lawyers make an illicit living off that program. America definitely has a shortage of software engineers with no college loans who are willing to work for food. There is an unlimited supply of students from overseas who received free government-paid educations from their home countries, and are willing to work for almost nothing because they have no encumberances and their families are starving, overseas. Meanwhile, many USA engineering schools are charging a tuition premium for software engineers (and other engineers) to become educated.
The H1B program has replaced Civil-War Slavery as a way to indenture software engineers and force them to work for the same company for 7 years. What American companies are complaining about is that they don't have a way to get slave-labor for 100% of their workforce, like a Southern Plantation had in the 1840's. My previous employer had roughly 4,000 employees (40% of their engineering workforce) from the H1B program, and that wasn't enough for them. They had a fulltime army of salaried lawyers to run their "H1B factory" at a big discount to smaller companies. They wanted 100% H1B workers, they had to hire 60% of their engineers domestically, which was 60% too many. The CEO was just given a $95M pay package whilst 1000 layoffs were announced, all the ones I knew about were American-born, that was his way of funding his obscene pay package.
Software Engineering has become a field that rewards foreigners and penalizes domestically grown engineers who work hard and play by the rules and borrow heavily to fund their wildly overpriced American educations.
The Taulbee survey is a very precise survey of PhD, MS, and BS production in computer science, by ~150 CS departments nationwide.. If you read it I think you will notice that graduate student production is at an all-time high, university hiring is at an all-time low, and BS production is re-approaching the bubble levels of 2001-2004. These are all signs of a surfeit, NOT a shortage...
There were several commenters that disagreed. A few that agreed. I think this one was the most valid.
Posted by Johnnygeneric at 11:46 PM No comments:
California gun law will let police confiscate legally-owned weapons
I don't see how this could hold up in court. Why don't they just use asset forfeiture laws???
Under the law, the factors a judge can consider in granting the restraining order include not only threats of violence, but also prior felony arrests (even without a conviction), evidence of alcohol abuse, and even the simple act of recently purchasing a gun or ammunition.
Once granted, police can use the restraining order to confiscate all of a person's guns and ammunition, and the person is also barred from buying or possessing guns and ammo for the duration of the order. A full court hearing must then be heard within three weeks. At that hearing, a judge will be able to extend the restraining order for an entire year.
"The law gives us a vehicle to cause the person to surrender their weapons, to have a time out, if you will," Los Angeles Police Department Assistant Chief Michael Moore told Southern California Public Radio. "It allows further examination of the person's mental state."
This is CA. This law will be sooo....abused.
Posted by Johnnygeneric at 7:56 PM No comments:
Megaship docks in L.A. as change roils shipping industry
I love big machines. These ships are awesome!!
The CMA CGM Benjamin Franklin, which arrived Saturday at the Port of Los Angeles on a maiden voyage from China and South Korea, can carry nearly a third more cargo than the largest ships that currently call at the San Pedro Bay ports.
In an effort to move more cargo on less fuel, ocean freight carriers are in a race to build megaships with much larger capacities than the typical ships calling at U.S. ports. The average container ship being built now is nearly three times the size of the average a decade ago.
Aerial footage shows California methane leak
Oh, and the video is in black and white to make it look REALLY NASTY. It is nasty and the tech guys are trying their damndest to stop the leak.
At the same time, 86,000 barrels of oil seep through natural sources onto the Santa Barbra coast. No one seems to be too upset about that.
So, what are the latest numbers on natural oil seep quantities? We at SOS first started our little non-profit nine years ago because we were astounded by the amount of oil and gas flowing into our local coastal waters. We reviewed studies by pre-eminent researchers at UC Santa Barbara (UCSB). A 1999 publication by Hornafius et al. was entitled The World's Most Spectacular Marine Hydrocarbon Seeps. The study states that literature reviews of marine hydrocarbon seepage usually conclude that the area along the northern Santa Barbara Channel is one of the most prolific hydrocarbon seepage areas in the world. We knew natural seepage existed at other places worldwide. The idea that quantities in the channel were comparable was astounding. Upon reviewing the 1999 study by Quigley et al. that showed oil production could reduce seepage – we were hooked. (More about that later!)
But what are those quantities? The UCSB Hydrocarbon Seeps Project is the online compendium of ongoing research on the natural laboratory that is the Coal Oil Point seep field. Based upon this research and data from analyses of other seeps in the Santa Barbara Channel our co-founder Bruce Allen, a physicist, extracted the estimate that roughly 86,000 barrels/3,000,000 gallons of oil bubble into the Santa Barbara Channel each year.
CA Reps VOW TO KILL FREE SPEECH
Hat tip to Frontpage.com on this one. Loretta Sanchez and Judy Chu, both from CA are sponsors of this bill. Absolutely disgusting.
That's right: "violence, bigotry and hateful rhetoric." The implications of those five words will fly by most people who read them, and the mainstream media, of course, will do nothing to elucidate them. But what H. Res. 569 does is conflate violence -- attacks on innocent civilians, which have no justification under any circumstances – with "bigotry" and "hateful rhetoric," which are identified on the basis of subjective judgments. The inclusion of condemnations of "bigotry" and "hateful rhetoric" in this Resolution, while appearing to be high-minded, take on an ominous character when one recalls the fact that for years, Ellison, Carson, and his allies (including groups such as the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations, CAIR) have been smearing any and all honest examination of how Islamic jihadists use the texts and teachings of Islam to incite hatred and violence as "bigotry" and "hateful rhetoric." This Resolution is using the specter of violence against Muslims to try to quash legitimate research into the motives and goals of those who have vowed to destroy us, which will have the effect of allowing the jihad to advance unimpeded and unopposed.
Posted by Johnnygeneric at 10:04 AM No comments:
New York Loses $400 Million After Imposing The Nation's Highest Cigarette Tax
And NYC thought they were taking the high road. All they did was push the whole cigarette economy underground. Do you blame the smoker?
Smokers responded to higher prices not by shelling out more cash at the store but by turning to the black market, crossing state lines and buying cheaper brands, such as Seneca, from Native American outlets. The last 10 years have a been a boon to organized crime, with 58 percent of New York's cigarettes supplied from out-of-state, according to the Tax Foundation. The number of packs bought paying the full tax has also collapsed by 62 percent.
62 per cent! And NYC hasn't seen the errors of their ways? As usual, it's leftist gone wild.
California welcomes world's first fully sustainable biofuel facility
Now, this actually looks interesting. I'm all in with biodiesel. Maybe these guys are doing it right.
The new San Joaquin Valley-based facility, which is owned and operated by sustainable biofuel and bioenergy company Biodico Westside, will produce up to 20 million gallons of biodiesel per year, and create 45 direct jobs in partnership with West Hills Community College.
"Biodico Westside Facility is a result of years of research and development to produce biofuels that make good environmental, social and business sense," said Biodico President and Founder Russ Teall. "Today, we are forging a new path in biofuel production by utilizing sustainable solutions to convert diverse feedstocks into renewable sources of fuel and energy."
Inside the Billion-Dollar Battle for Puerto Rico's Future
Personally, I think all those people/funds that were STUPID enough to fund Puerto Rico should lose their shirts. Anyway, I can't help but wonder if this is part of the Great Undoing (I, uh, couldn't think of what else to call it).
Stephen J. Spencer, a restructuring expert representing Puerto Rico bondholders including some hedge funds, said letting the government renege on agreements with hedge funds and other investors would set a dangerous precedent, undermining the integrity of the bond market.
"It's really a wealth transfer from the bondholders to the municipalities," Mr. Spencer said.
Others fear a different precedent: A handful of wealthy investors, they argue, are trying to rewrite the social contract of an entire United States territory. Puerto Rican officials say they have already cut public services and slashed central government spending by a fifth to keep ahead of payments to the hedge funds and financiers.
"What they are doing, by getting all the resources for themselves, is undermining the viability of Puerto Rico as a commonwealth," said Joseph E. Stiglitz, the Nobel Prize-winning economist. "They want their money now, and they want to get the rules set so that they can make money for the next 20 years."
It was pretty obvious these "bondholders" should never have allowed themselves to do something like this. I am sure they knew what would happen to the people of Puerto Rico if the territory tried to stick to the agreement.
I think Puerto Rico should EXACT PAYMENT from the rich wealthy bondholders to invest in their country so that basic services could be made whole. Then the Federal Government should step in and oust the leaders and Governor of the island and set up a management team to get PR back on a sound footing.
Posted by Johnnygeneric at 8:16 AM No comments:
In Virginia's Bible Belt, an Arabic Lesson Ignites Anger
This is really unfortunate. And I can't help but wonder if phrases are being picked to foment the problems.
The school closings came one week after the teacher gave Riverheads High School students an assignment that involved practicing calligraphy and writing a statement in Arabic - the Shahada, a profession of faith recited in Muslims' daily prayers.
The statement translated to: "There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah." The teacher's lesson was drawn from instructional material that also includes Judeo-Christian assignments.
School officials said the aim of the lesson was to illustrate the complexity of the written Arabic language, not to promote any religious system, and a different sample text will be used in the future.
Of all the phrases to use, they had to pick this one?? For a Christian to write this is almost sacrilegious. And this isn't the only example of this.
I remember back in the 8th grade I did a poster on the Arabic alphabit. I think I made a B.
I did a quick look online and discovered some Islamic Proverbs that I think are pretty innocent and probably could have been used.
Guard yoursef from 6 things:
♦ When you speak, speak the truth
♦ Fulfill when you promise
♦ Discharge your trust
♦ Be pure in thought and action
♦ Withold your hand from striking
♦ Withold from talking that which is unlawful and bad
"Sharpen the mind, harden the body, soften the heart, and be of service to others." – a motto for the believer, by AbdelMalik Ali.
Why the HECK did the teacher have to pick something she/he should have known would be controversial and in-you-face.
I'm afraid the quality of teachers in general is pretty bad.
Dan Walters: State still owes one huge debt
CA better hope the stock market keeps going up. Otherwise, they are in a heap o' trouble.
Recovery from that recession has been underway for nearly a half-decade, but California still has more than a million unemployed workers and is still paying out about $6 billion a year in benefits to a third of them.
The UIF is still insolvent – nearly $7 billion in the hole – and in 2012 the feds began whittling down California's debt by raising taxes on the state's employers, about $3 billion so far and rising, plus hundreds of millions in interest.
It's expected that the feds will collect nearly $4 billion more over the next two years to reduce the debt further.
The debt will disappear eventually, probably in 2019, 10 years after the UIF went into the red, but that still would leave the fund in precarious position.
LIMBAUGH: just elect Democrats, disband the Republican Party, and let the Democrats run it,
What an utter SHAM! Limbaugh is completely correct. What a dismal failure the GOP has become.
This was out-and-out, in-our-face lying, from the campaigns to individual statements made about the philosophical approach Republicans had to all this spending. There is no Republican Party! You know, we don't even need a Republican Party if they're gonna do this. You know, just elect Democrats, disband the Republican Party, and let the Democrats run it, because that's what's happening anyway. And these same Republican leaders doing this can't, for the life of them, figure out why Donald Trump has all the support that he has? They really can't figure this out?
Repeated stabs in the back like this -- which have been going on for years -- combined with Obama's policy destruction of this country, is what has given rise to Donald Trump. If Donald Trump didn't exist and if the Republican Party actually does want to win someday, they'd have to invent him. It's just mind-boggling when you figure out everything that has been granted Obama. All the money, the tax increases, the Cadillac plans in Obamacare. All kinds of punitive things in Obamacare, delayed yet again so that people will not be made aware of the pain and suffering Obamacare's gonna cause.
Rush....is right.
U.S. Oil And Gas Production Steady Despite Low Prices
I've always thought it a bad idea to bet against the Capitalist. This is a good example.
The take-away quote from this article from Oil and Gas Online:
"Several factors support U.S. oil and gas production, even at lower prices," said Bernadette Johnson, a managing partner at Ponderosa and head of the company's energy analytics team. "Wellhead economics continue to improve as technology gains cut drilling and completion costs. And while we expect U.S. production will trend lower in 2016, our analysis shows there are almost 4,200 drilled but uncompleted wells in inventory, and they will bring additional production as they are brought online."
In my opinion, the destruction to Saudi Arabia's economy will be severe. Even after they "win" the oil price war, it will be a long time before they can recover from what has and will happen to their finances. Through shear will and determination, Capitalists can carry this game on far longer than you might expect.
November 2014: Lots of snow in Buffalo proof of AGW; December 2015: No Buffalo snow proof of AGW
Just amazing how Climate Reality Deniers constantly want it both ways.
2015: ABC Tweet: For the first time in 116 years, Buffalo, NY has had no measurable snow yet this season. http://abcn.ws/1RJfGDi
2014: Counterintuitive, yes, but extreme snowfalls are becoming more common in places like Buffalo due to global warming. http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/11/19/lake_effect_snow_in_buffalo_climate_change_is_making_snowstorms_more_extreme.html …
Top Ten Reasons Why California Is No Longer The Place To Be Or Move To
Very well written article on the problems with CA. Unfortunately, it will only get worse before it gets better.
In fact, it's quite amusing to hear people talk about how they love California, all their reasons will be because the weather is good, or because it's good because of the nice weather, or because the sun is shining and the weather is nice, or because it's warm outside because the weather is nice, or some other derivative of "the weather is nice". This is because the only real benefit of living in California is because of the weather. That and the emotional ideal itself of "living in California". There really isn't any other reason.
California is on one of the steepest declines in quality of living in the nation. Taxes, housing, and immigration are some of the primary factors contributing to this decline. Whereas California has been a coveted and highly desired place to be, from both native Californians and other-staters alike for the past many decades, this is no longer the case.
The ten things are worth reading. High taxes, unemployment, etc. It's all there.
California plastics company to open Pflugerville facility, hire 100
So, the expansion is NOT happening in CA, but TX.
Within the next year, Medway Plastics has committed to hiring a minimum of 20 full-time employees at an average salary of $40,000 per year. PCDC is working with Medway Plastics to use state grants for workforce training and recruitment.
"It is clear that Pflugerville is a forward-looking, business-friendly city. Medway Plastics can now tap into new markets in Texas and the U.S.," said Medway Plastics Corp. President Tom Hutchinson Jr., in the announcement.
Medway, founded in 1974, will also relocate its research and development laboratory to the new Pflugerville facility. Though Medway Plastics will continue operations in California, the company may consider relocating its headquarters to Pflugerville within the next five to eight years, the company said.
SEVEN Networks to relocate HQ from California to Marshall
It doesn't say why the move.
Networks, which develops mobile device management and optimization software, is relocating its corporate headquarters to Marshall from San Carlos, California. The company, founded in 2000, is privately held and has research and development centers in California and Finland.
The company plans to utilize local talent and has plans to hire as many as 25 full-time employees, including seven software engineers.
The company will reside in the Center for Applied Technology, which is also home to the Marshall Economic Development Corporation (MEDCO) – which played a key role in bringing SEVEN to Texas.
Reshoring Gaining Strength Among Large Manufacturers, BCG Survey Finds
"Striking" is the way it was put.
"The fundamental economic forces that are prompting many companies to reassess their global manufacturing footprint have not changed," explained Michael Zinser, a BCG senior partner and coleader of the firm's global manufacturing practice. "Given the big differences in wage growth and productivity—and the greater attention companies are paying to total cost—there is good reason to believe that the cost-competitiveness of the U.S. compared with China and many other major export economies will continue to improve in the near term."
Advanced manufacturing technologies such as robotics, whose costs are shrinking as their capabilities increase, are helping to make the U.S. more attractive for investment. Fifty-six percent of respondents said that lower automation costs have improved the competitiveness of U.S.-made products compared with similar goods sourced from low-cost countries. Moreover, 71% said advanced manufacturing technologies will improve the economics of local production, and 75% said they will invest in additional automation or advanced manufacturing technologies in the next five years.
Yes, this isn't a complete "win". Automation is the real winner, not the regular joe-blow worker. Several years ago I mentioned that all the jobs that were lost in the 90s and early 2000s would not come back even of all the companies that left came back. It was because of automation.
But, better the build the plants with automation here than build the automated plants there.
Facebook censors Michael Savage post of Muslims protesting
I'm glad I disabled my Facebook account. CENSORSHIP!! CENSORSHIP!!
Savage said it's only a matter of time before "any and all criticisms of Islam will be considered hate speech by Zuckerberg and the Obama goons."
"I am banned in Britain and soon banned from Facebook?"
In 2009, Savage was banned from entering the U.K. by Prime Minister Gordon Brown's government, which lumped him together with Muslim jihadists and leaders of racist groups for "seeking to provoke others to serious criminal acts and fostering hatred," as WND reported.
Last week, Attorney General Loretta Lynch told a Muslim activist group that she would prosecute anti-Muslim rhetoric that "edges toward violence," sparking widespread criticism that prompted her to walk back the remarks.
Nobel Laureate Smashes the Global Warming Hoax
Probably one of the most common-sensical reviews of Global Warming Hysteria thast I've ever listened to.
Loretta Lynch, Come and Get Me
This was truly appalling. Did she think she could make such an outrageous statement?
Edges toward violence? Is she kidding? EDGING? WHAT HELL does that even mean?
Well, several people have taken to Youtube daring Loretta to go and get them.
Climate Hustle Paris Premiere
I was in London while all this was going on. The middle of London was shut down due to climate warming protesters and caused massive headaches for tourist (which we were). So, lots of stop and go traffic causing cars and trucks to belch out massive amounts of greenhouse gases they wouldn't have otherwise.
Thanks Left Wingers!! Hah!!
We were trying to catch a ride on the Tube when the protests were wrapping up. All the freaks from the protest started flooding the subway system. We saw some radical vegans with a "V" marked on their faces. They also sported shirts announcing who they are. What a bunch of losers.
I thought I would add this youtube video of the movie that premiered in Paris at the same time all of this was going on. Good for them!!
VDH BOOK: The Decline and Fall of California: From Decadence to Destruction
I'll be reading this and reporting what I read. Has VDH reached his "trigger point?"
Venezuela Awakens From Its 17-Year Socialist Nightmare
I'm sorry to say, this is what it will take for the US to turn around. We will have to "walk through fire" to come out on the other side a wiser country.
What a shame. But good news for Venezuela.
It's total victory in legislative terms and will enable the legislature to throw out politicized Supreme Court justices and appoint honest ones.
The new Congress can also boot corrupt election officials and appoint fair ones. And they will even be able to declare President Nicolas Maduro — the late dictator Hugo Chavez's hand-picked successor — mentally unstable and unfit for office, or remove him for incompetence. They can also stop his executive orders dead.
The Congress also will have the power to free the 71 or so political prisoners now rotting in Chavista dungeons without trial, including top opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez. And Venezuela's central bank will stop destroying the country's money, now nearly worthless.
Let's hope at least half of the good will be done.
In new California climate initiative, bill will target key pollutants
Say goodbye to CA's agricultural industry. Gloibal Warming will put a stop that that. Actually, the bureaucrats who deny that there is no man-made global warming will put an end to it. Why? Because rotting vegetation causes methane gas to be generated. And that's a byproduct of farming - which is just plain stupid.
California would target certain harmful emissions under new legislation being introduced by state Sen. Ricardo Lara in an effort to boost public health while battling global warming.
Known as short-lived climate pollutants, the emissions include diesel exhaust and methane from agriculture. Focusing on these pollutants has been a key topic of conversation at the United Nations summit on climate change because they're considered a way to make quick progress toward reducing greenhouse gases while providing a clear health benefit.
Methane gas is the product of ANYTHING ORGANIC THAT ROTS. This includes the mighty Sequoya trees all the way down to the crab grass that grows. And it also includes:
COMPOST PILES.
So,all of you greenies out there that are really REALLY into composting, get ready for the Feds to put an end to it!!
Google's chairman wants algorithms to censor the internet for hate speech
So, this was never about Free Speech. This was all about corralling speech and then slicing it all up.
In an op-ed for The New York Times (paywall), Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, inserted himself directly into the middle of a heated debate about the line between fighting terrorism's online reach and internet censorship.
"It's our responsibility to demonstrate that stability and free expression go hand in hand," he writes. "We should build tools to help de-escalate tensions on social media—sort of like spell-checkers, but for hate and harassment."
That, my friend, is too much power for one company to have.
So, after ISIS, the next step will be stop those evil gay-hating Christians.
Trading Meat for Tires as Bartering Economy grows in Greece
Greeks, Russians, Venezuelans... are these signals?
This may work out better than most people think. I just wonder how you barter for more internet time to barter for other things.
Graphic artists are exchanging designs for olive oil. Accountants swap advice for office supplies. In the agricultural heartland and on the Greek islands, informal bartering, which has historically helped communities survive, has intensified as more people exchange fruits, vegetables, other crops, equipment, clothing and services.
"In Greece there's a major liquidity problem," said Mr. Roussos, who met the tire vendor and scores of new clients through an Athens based online barter club, Tradenow, which created its own currency called tradepoints. "People are finding it more convenient to trade because money is not readily available."
Russians Turn to Bartering in Economic Recession
I can't help but ask: Will the internet make money obsolete? Russia is bartering online as well!
An economic recession and soaring grocery prices have prompted Russians to go online to trade household items for food, with scores of websites facilitating a barter system cropping up around the country.
Russia's main social network, VKontakte, has an array of online groups, targeting various cities, where local inhabitants place ads to trade clothes, furniture, tableware or even kittens for "yummies."
Chicken for diapers: Bartering abounds in scarcity-stricken Venezuela
The end of a civilization. That's what Communism and Socialism are. And as much as I like to think that the USA is better than Venezuela, we are watching our future unfold before our very eyes.
When a country's currency dies, there is nothing left but barter, because there is no portable form of value that can be transferred from one person to another. The good news is bartering is a lot more high tech than it used to be.
More than 14,000 people are following the Twitter handle @spvzla where medicine is traded and bartered. The Facebook page "Trueque Anti-Bachaqueros Caracas" — another popular swapping site — has more than 10,300 members. And the image sharing site Instagram has become the go-to place to find baby items. The page Mamaenapuros, or "Mom in a Jam," for example, has more than 22,000 followers.
I just can't understand why it takes this sort of desperation and desperate situation for people to realize that they can not rely on governments to take care of them.
As a result, while the nation boasts the world's largest oil reserves, it's having trouble keeping aspirin and car batteries on the shelves.
That has soured the national mood, and the majority of polls predict the opposition will win control of the National Assembly for the fist time in more than 15 years.
My only prayer is that the people of Venzuela finally learn not to trust government to do the right thing. If anything, the bout with bartering will teach the people that, yes, they can do it without the need for the heavy hand of government to control their own affairs.
Yet another reason I bought the Surface Pro 3: Keyboard spills.
In my cursory review I mentioned that the detachable keyboard was nice since it meant the CPU and other important electronics weren't under the keyboard. Several years ago I fried my MBA when I spilled coffee on it once (which is an incredible side story if anyone is interested in reading it - just leave a comment).
I knew it was only a matter of time before I did the same to the SP3. And sure enough that's exactly what happened. I panicked for a brief second, then immediately detached the keyboard. Once this was done, I knew I could methodically start wiping the screen of the SP3 and wipe off the keyboard and bang it against the table to get the coffee out from between and beneath the keys. Now I just wait for it to dry.
Here's photo of the mess before I cleaned up the SP3 but after I cleaned up the keyboard.
Surface Pro 3's annoying right-click issue solved with Windows 10
A while back I did a cursory review of the Surface Pro 3. Before the Surface Pro 3, I had an old MacBook Air that I kept comparing it to. One of the issues was the one button trackpad of the MBA and the two button trackpad of the SP3. The one-button design is by far easier to work with. Right clicking on the MBA is accomplished by just holding down the control button before pressing the button; a two-hand maneuver.
Luckily, Windows 10 brings a solution that I like even better than the MBA solution.
Windows 10 now allows you to disable the right click and enable a two-finger tap that brings up the menu. This is done by swiping from the right side, picking All Settings> Mouse and Touchpad>Turn off "Allow right clicks on the touchpad" > Turn on "Use a two finger tap for right click"
And you're done!
It took a tiny bit of getting used to. I kept trying to right click at first. But now, it's pretty easy.
Land of Stupid: Facebook's Zuckerberg to give 99 percent of shares to charity
Yup! Nothing has changed. Stupid Capitalists giving their money away only to see its use perverted. We live in the Land of Stupid.
I guess we can kiss the Free-Wheeling Internet good bye completely.
Thanks asshole, Z!
Facebook Inc (FB.O) Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg and his wife said on Tuesday they will give away 99 percent of their Facebook shares, currently worth about $45 billion, to a new charity in a letter addressed to their daughter, Max, who was born last week.
The plan mirrors a move by other high-profile billionaires like Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates, who have pledged and set up foundations to give away their fortunes to charity.
So, now we will get a stomach full of yet someone else who knows what's good for us, like maybe Common Core 2.0
What a stupid, stupid man.
Johnnygeneric
I have 39 years as a chemical engineer. I would not classify myself as an expert, but I would call myself very knowledgeable. I've done engineering and design in the food processing business, biotech, pharmaceuticals, consumer products, oil and gas, polymers, biodiesel, biomass to liquids, coal to liquids and gas to liquids. I'm also a worldwide published author having written in the past for Computer Shopper Magazine among other minor magazines for several years. I have one patent in my name.
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Migrants From 20 Countries Waiting for Okay to Proceed to US Border
David J. Harris Jr.
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Illegal aliens from 20 countries are waiting for permission to proceed to the United States border from Mexico, including 500 from the very violent Africa. Thousands of invaders from all over the world are waiting in a detention center in Tapachula, Mexico until the government gives its permission for them to continue on to the border of the United States. The Africans are from the countries of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, and Cameroon. The migrants have registered for permits that will allow them to travel through Mexico, but they have not heard anything yet.
From The Latin American Herald Tribune
Net immigration of Mexicans to the US fell to zero several years ago. Today's northbound migrants come overwhelmingly from the Central American nations of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, though people from more distant lands have also come to see Mexico as an entryway to the United States.
The migrants now gathered in Tapachula include whole families who have decided to leave their countries fleeing poverty and violence, including pregnant women and many others with babies in their arms.
They look tired after traveling through many countries after leaving their homelands and traversing much of Latin America until they arrived at the Siglo XXI immigration station.
Outside the station, there are dozen latrines, but despite that the area appears unhealthy. Children cry and their parents are clamoring for the Mexican government to let them through, since they don't want to remain in Mexico.
Michee Nikumu told EFE that he is from Congo and is traveling with his pregnant wife and son, all of them suffering from hunger and thirst since they don't have any money. In addition, they are all sick with fever and diarrhea.
In the case of the woman, her health is delicate because she suffers from urinary tract infections and her pregnancy is thus classified as "high risk."
Nikumu said that they arrived in Cuba after leaving their homeland and traveling through Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras and Guatemala before entering Mexico.
Do you understand what this means? Nikumu expects the United States to supply him with money, clothes, a place to live, food heat and medical.
My book is here! And I personally handed a copy to our President at the White House!!! I hope you enjoy it @realDonaldTrump!
BOOK – Why I Couldn't Stay Silent
Thank you @RealCandaceO for writing the foreword for it!!! #BLEXIT #Woke #WeTheFree #WalkAway
Follow David on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Patreon and YouTube @DavidJHarrisJr


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StageBuzz.com
Review – Dominizuelan Presents: People in the City (New York International Fringe Festival, Tall Hispanic-Short Hispanic Productions)
Review by Erin Winebark
Two drunk white girls, a couple of old Jewish ladies, and a tranny prostitute walk into a bar . . . though this would make a great set-up for a joke, it's really a small sampling of the characters found in Dominizuelan Presents: People in the City. This two-woman show features twenty different characters in twelve interrelated scenes and monologues written and played by Lorena Diaz ("the tall one") and Wendy Mateo ("the short one"). Both actresses are Hispanic women, but the characters they portray span all ages, genders, and ethnic stereotypes, and their writing pokes fun at every race equally.
In the opening scene, we meet two old Jewish ladies at a restaurant, interrogating their waitress in an attempt to get some Splenda since one left her baggie full of it at home.
"You speak Mexican?" she asks the waitress with "exotic-looking features."
"No, they speak SPAINISH in Mexico," corrects her friend. "Do you speak Spainish?"
Though, I, personally, do not speak Spainish, my favorite line of the whole show was spoken of a certain blonde socialite in a scene where two Latina housekeepers seemed to be discussing American celebrities: "Ella es una puta!" Una puta, indeed.
Both Diaz and Mateo give strong, funny performances. Diaz, in particular, transitions seamlessly through widely diverse characters - from a homeless man, to an aging Hispanic man, to a vibrant Latina single mom. Her physicalizations are dead-on, and she fully transforms into the gender and race she portrays at any given time — no easy feat given the minimal production values and lack of any kind of costume or set change. Mateo easily inhabits the worlds of the scenes, and fully commits to each action. In one of the funniest moments, her drunken stupor is so convincing that it elicited more than a few laughs from the audience.
Renata Sheppard's choreography, along with an upbeat soundtrack and slight changes in lighting, serve as transitions. Though some of these transitions last a bit longer than necessary, they allow the viewer to see the relationships which exist from scene to scene. In one scene, we meet a tranny prostitute talking to a "white girl" on her corner, and as the scene progresses we realize that the white girl is actually one of the drunk girls from an earlier scene. This happens multiple times throughout the show, and is a rather brilliant way to show each side to the story. Though it's clear that the show originated out of improvisation, Charna Halpern's direction focuses the characters and action and gives the scripted show a casual, off-the-cuff feel.
People in the City is a comedy, but by the end, it turns into comedy with a message: everyone has a story, and we're all connected through common experience, even when we think we have nothing in common. Or at least, that's what I got out of it, though admittedly, my Mexican is a little rusty.
Dominizuelan Presents: People in the City
Written by Lorena Diaz & Wendy Mateo
Directed by Charna Halpern
Choreography by Renata Sheppard
Production Manager: Stephanie Acosta
Featuring: Lorena Diaz and Wendy Mateo
Posted by Byrne Harrison at 6:50 AM
Labels: Fringe 2009, Review
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Joe Biden's Irish ancestry is part of
a long tradition among US Presidents
A colourful street scene in Carlingford, Co Louth … Owen Finnegan and Jane Boyle were married in Carlingford in 1839 (Photograph Patrick Comerford)
Joe Biden is due to be inaugurated as the 46th President of the United States later this month, in a public ceremony in front of the Capitol Building in Washington on Wednesday 20 January.
Already, links to the new president have been claimed by Co Louth, Co Mayo, and – more recently – Co Wexford. According to genealogist John Hamrock, all eight of Joe Biden's great-great-grandparents on his mother's side were born in Ireland in the first half of the 19th century and two great-grandparents on his father's side were born in Ireland too.
Joseph Robinette Biden jr was born on 20 November 1942 in Scranton, Pennsylvania. His parents, Joseph Robinette Biden Sr and Catherine Eugenia (Jean) Finnegan, were married in 1941, and he grew up in a family steeped in Irish culture and values.
He once told RTÉ: 'My grandfather and grandmother Finnegan, all my mother's brothers, and my father told us about the courage and commitment it took for our relatives to emigrate from Ireland – in the midst of tragedy to distant shores, where they didn't know what awaited them. It took great courage.'
His closest link to Ireland is his great-grandfather, James Finnegan, who emigrated from Carlingford, Co Louth, as a child in 1850, and his great-grandmother, Catherine Roche, who left Taghmon, Co Wexford, in the 1840s.
Saint Munn's Church, Taghmon, Co Wexford … the hymnwriter Henry Francis Lyte was a curate while the Roche family was living in Taghmon (Photograph Patrick Comerford)
The family history research company Ancestor Network has carried out extensive research into the new President's family tree. According to the genealogist John Hamrock, he has strong Irish roots. In the way Americans calculate or define Irish identity, President Biden is five-eighths Irish, with ten of his 16 great-great-grandparents born in Ireland.
John Hamrock's research shows all eight of Joe Biden's great-great-grandparents on his mother's side were born in Ireland in the first half of the 19th century, and two great-grandparents on his father's side were born in Ireland too.
Jean Finnegan was the daughter of Ambrose Joseph Finnegan and Geraldine Blewitt, who were married in 1909. Ambrose Finnegan was born in 1884, the son of Catherine (Roche) and James Finnegan, who lived in New York and moved to Scranton, Pennsylvania.
Ambrose Finnegan's parents, Owen and Jane Finnegan, were from the Cooley Peninsula, near Carlingford, Co Louth. Owen Finnegan was born ca 1820, and while no record of his baptism survives, his parents may have been James Finnegan and Mary White. Owen Finnegan and Jane Boyle were married in 1839 in Carlingford. He emigrated to New York in 1849, and his wife Jane arrived a year later, with three children, James (7), Stephen (5) and Patrick (infant). Jane died in 1874 and Owen died in 1875.
Another son, Ambrose Joseph Finnegan, later married Catherine Roche, whose parents, Thomas and Roche and Bridget (née Fox), were from Taghmon, Co Wexford. Thomas Roche, who was born in 1813, was a stonemason. His daughter Catherine Roche emigrated from Taghmon in the 1840s; she later married Ambrose Joseph Finnegan, and they are great-grandparents of Joe Biden.
Paul Roche from Camolin, Co Wexford, uncovered Mr Biden's connections with Taghmon and other parts of Co Wexford, going back seven generations to Maurice Roche, whose son Patrick married Mary Roche from Taghmon. Thomas and Bridget (Fox) Roche emigrated to America with their daughter Catherine, who married Ambrose Finnegan.
Sunset on the River Moy … Edward Blewitt was living in Ballina in the 1820s and 1830s (Photograph Patrick Comerford)
The Blewitt family also had strong Irish connections. Geraldine Blewitt's four grandparents – Patrick Blewitt and Catherine (Kate) Scanlon, and James Stanton and Mary Arthurs – were all born in Ireland.
The Blewitt and Scanlon families were from Rappacastle, near Ballina, Co Mayo. Joe Biden's great-great-great-grandfather, Edward Blewitt, emigrated to the US in 1851 on the SS Excelsior. He left Ireland with his wife Mary Mulderrig (sometimes given as Redington) and their seven children, including Patrick Blewitt, then 18, who is Joe Biden's great-great-grandfather.
The Blewitt family from Rappacastle was living in Ballina by the 1820s. Edward Blewitt was a brickmaker, supplying bricks for the building of Ballina Cathedral in 1827, and his son Patrick Blewitt was baptised in Ballina in 1832.
Edward is thought to have worked with the Ordnance Survey in Mayo in the 1830s, and the family left Ballina for neighbouring Ardagh after an outbreak of cholera in Ballina, before moving to America.
Joe Biden also has Irish ancestors on his father's side of the family. His great-great-grandparents, John Hanafy and Mary Ward, were born in Ireland. Mary Ward's parents – Joe Biden's great-great-great-grandparents – John and Mary Ward, were from Co Galway.
Today, Mr Biden's Irish relations through the Finnegan family include the Ireland rugby internationals Rob and Dave Kearney. Their father, David Joseph Donald Kearney, is a fifth cousin of the president-elect, according to research out by Epic, the Irish Emigration Museum.
Kamala Harris and
an Irish slaveholder
The new Vice-President, Kamala Harris, has strong family roots in Jamaica through her father and in India through her mother. But Irish genealogists recently explored whether her great-grandmother from Jamaica, Iris Finegan, had another Irish link to match Joe Biden's links with Louth, Wexford and Mayo and Louth.
However, if there is an Irish link in Kamala Brown's ancestry, it is most likely through Hamilton Brown, who was from Co Antrim.
Her father, Professor Donald J Harris, is the son of Beryl and Oscar Harris, known to the family as 'Miss Beryl' and 'Maas Oscar'. His paternal grandmother, Christiana Brown, was known as 'Miss Chrishy' and his maternal grandmother, Iris Allen or Finigan, was 'Miss Iris.'
He has told how Miss Chrishy was a 'descendant of Hamilton Brown, who is on record as plantation and slave owner and founder of Brown's Town.' The Harris family was based in Orange Hill, Brown's Town.
Kamala Harris's great-grandmother Christiana Brown was born about 1881. According to Donald Harris, she was a descendant of Hamilton Brown, a slave owner and the founder of Brown's Town.
The grave of Hamilton Brown in Jamaica … was the slaveowner from Co Antrim an ancestor Kamala Harris? (Photograph: Find a Grave)
Hamilton Brown was an Ulster Presbyterian and settled in Jamaica when he was about 20. He became a prominent plantation and slave owner, and was a lawyer and a member of the Jamaican Assembly. He was described as 'an ignorant, brutish and fiend-like man, well calculated to be a member of the House of Assembly or any house disposed to uphold slavery.'
Hamilton Brown campaigned vigorously against the abolition of slavery and resented 'the interference of the home government with their slaves.' At the abolition of slavery in 1834, Brown was associated with compensation claims involving more than 1,000 slaves. He returned to Ireland to recruit new labourers in Ballymoney, Kildare and Limerick to replace the slaves on his plantations.
Brown died on 18 September 1848, and he is buried at Saint Mark's Anglican Church in Brown's Town.
Donald J Harris's father, Kamala Harris's grandfather, was born on 5 April 1914 and at birth was named Oscar Wilde Brown, perhaps as a tribute to the Irish writer. But his birth was re-registered as Oscar Joseph Harris in 1950. Meanwhile, the connection between Hamilton Brown and Kamala Harris remains unproven.
Biden's links with
the Wexford Kennedys
The 'Emigrant Flame' on the Quays at New Ross, Co Wexford … the great-grandparents of John F Kennedy and Joe Biden may have left New Ross for America around the same time (Photograph Patrick Comerford)
Paul Roche was amazed when he came across discover Joe Biden's links with Co Wexford. Already Co Wexford had one of the most significant connections with any American president in John Fitzgerald Kennedy, whose great-grandfather, Patrick Kennedy, was from Dunganstown, Co Wexford.
'Where the Roches lived was only 18 miles from Dunganstown,' he told the Wexford People. 'Both great-grandparents possibly left New Ross around the same time for America.'
One genealogist said, 'it's fair to say' that Joe Biden is 'the most Irish of Irish presidents since John F Kennedy.' The Kennedys were from Co Wexford and the Fitzgeralds from Bruff, Co Limerick.
Thomas Fitzgerald from Bruff emigrated to Boston and married Rosanna Cox from Co Cavan. Their son, John Francis ('Honey') Fitzgerald, was Mayor of Boston, and the father of Rose Kennedy, mother of the brothers John F, Bobbie and Ted Kennedy.
The John F Kennedy memorial and sculpture on the quayside in New Ross (Photograph Patrick Comerford)
In all, 22 US Presidents to date have Irish ancestry, from parents to seven times great grandparents and the children of immigrants. Although none was actually born in Ireland – if they were, they would not be eligible for the Presidency – many have come back to Ireland to visit their ancestral homes.
Andrew Jackson, the seventh President (1829-1837), was the first with Irish ancestry. He was born in 1767 to parents who emigrated from Carrickfergus just two years earlier with their two Irish-born sons. His father died at 29, just a few weeks before his birth.
James Buchanan also had Irish parents. His father, also James Buchanan, emigrated from Milford, Co Donegal, in 1783, and he raised James and his ten siblings in Pennsylvania.
Other presidents with immediate Irish ancestry include James Knox Polk, Ulysses S Grant, William McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Ronald Reagan, the Bush father and son, and – of course – Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
As for Donald Trump, his only connection with Ireland seems to be his golf resort in Doonbeg, Co Clare. And that is probably more than enough.
The Trump golf resort in Doonbeg, Co Clare … Donald Trump's only connection with Ireland (Photograph Patrick Comerford)
This feature was first published in January 2021 in the 'Church Review' (Dublin and Glendalough)
Captions:
Labels: Ballina, Carlingford, Church Review, Co Wexford, Doonbeg, Family History, Genealogy, Jamaica, New Ross, Rugby, Taghmon
3 January 2021,
Second Sunday of Christmas
'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it' (John 1: 4) … sunrise over the River Slaney at Ferrycarrig, Co Wexford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)
Wisdom says, 'Over waves of the sea, over all the earth, and over every people and nation I have held sway' (Sirach 24: 6):
as we give thanks for the coming of Christ
at Christmas, into our lives, into the world …
We look forward to the promises of the Kingdom,
and we pray that Divine Wisdom may hold sway over all the earth,
and guide the rulers of the nations and every people.
We pray for all nations torn and divided by war and strife,
and we pray for all peacemakers,
for all who defend democracy and human rights,
for all who are working through this Covid crisis,
that they be filled with wisdom.
Wisdom 'gave to holy people the reward of their labours; she guided them along a marvellous way' (Wisdom 10: 17):
that we may be guided along your marvellous ways.
we pray this week for the Episcopal/Anglican Province of Alexandria
and the Most Revd Dr Mouneer Hanna Anis,
Archbishop of Alexandria and Bishop of Egypt.
In the Church of Ireland,
we pray this month for the Diocese of Armagh
and Archbishop John McDowell.
In the Diocesan Cycle of Prayer, we pray this week
for the poor and the homeless,
that we may be moved to relieve their distress.
We pray for our own parishes and people and for ourselves …
'To all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God' (John 1: 12):
we pray for ourselves, for one another as children of God,
for those we love and those who love us,
and we remember those who have brought love into our lives:
We give thanks for new life …
We pray for those in need and those who seek healing …
for those working for healing …
for those waiting for healing …
for those seeking an end to this Covid crisis …
Sylvia … Daphne … Declan …
Ajay … Ena … Eileen … George … Louise …
Ralph … Cait …
We pray for those we have offered to pray for …
and we pray for those who pray for us …
for Margaret, Nigel, Brian and their families …
especially Allan …
and for those whose anniversaries are at this time …
including Kathy …
May their memories be a blessing to us …
A prayer from the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel) on the Second Sunday of Christmas:
May your grace shine upon us.
Give us a new revelation of your love
And help us be a light to the world.
The Anglican Cycle of Prayer prays this week for the new Church of the Province of Alexandria … Patrick Comerford with Archbishop Mouneer Anis at a recent USPG conference in High Leigh
These intercessions were prepared for use at the Parish Eucharist in the Rathkeale and Kilnaughtin Group of Parishes on the Second Sunday of Christmas, 3 January 2021
Labels: Alexandria, Askeaton, Castletown, Egypt, Kilnaughtin, Prayer, Rathkeale, Tarbert, USPG
'The light shines in the darkness, and
the darkness did not overcome it'
'In the beginning was the Word' (John 1: 1) … an old typewriter seen in a restaurant in Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Sunday 3 January 2021, the Second Sunday of Christmas (Christmas II)
The Parish Eucharist
The Readings: Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 24: 1-12; Wisdom 10: 15-21; Ephesians 1: 3-14; John 1: 1-9, 10-18.
'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it' (John 1: 4) … light in the darkness in the courtyard in Marlay Park, Dublin, on New Year's Eve last Thursday (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)
May I speak to you in the name of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.
The Book of Sirach and the Wisdom of Solomon are unusual choices in the Lectionary for the readings this morning. Too often and too easily they are dismissed as Apocryphal readings, yet they bridge the gap between Jewish Wisdom literature and the ideas that are introduced in Saint John's Gospel.
The author of Sirach, Jesus ben Sira, understood Wisdom as leading to prosperity, and in his opening words, he declares: 'All wisdom is from the Lord, and with him it remains for ever' (Sirach 1: 1).
This morning's reading opens: 'Wisdom praises herself, and tells of her glory in the midst of her people' (Sirach 24: 1). For Jewish writers and thinkers, the created world is God's, so faith and reason go hand in hand; learning about creation is learning about God; reasoning is done in the context of faith in God; and knowledge of God is seen as leading to wisdom.
The Wisdom of Solomon or the Book of Wisdom was written in Greek, probably in Alexandria in the mid-first century BC, and is part of the Wisdom literature in the Septuagint or Greek Jewish Bible, along with the Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs (or Song of Solomon), Job and Sirach.
The central theme of this book is 'Wisdom' itself. Wisdom (Σοφία, Sophia) is the perfection of knowledge of the righteous as a gift from God, showing herself in action, and Wisdom is with God from all eternity.
In this book, Wisdom, the spirit of God, is personified as Lady Wisdom. This book also tells us that being made in the image of God includes sharing with God in immortality.
Earlier in this chapter, the author says Wisdom has been God's agent in saving people in the past, and active in saving the people of Israel, through Moses. They are blameless, for they have been chosen and set apart by God (verses 1-14).
Now we are told that Wisdom has delivered a holy and blameless people from their oppressors. Wisdom entered the soul of the 'servant of the Lord,' and delivered the people, guiding these people by day and by night, on dry land and through deep waters.
In response to this, even the mute and small children could no longer be silent, but sang out God's praises.
The Gospel reading this morning brings us back to Saint John's prologue to the Fourth Gospel.
This is not just a traditional Gospel reading that many of us associate with Christmas morning, but it is a wonderful piece of classical Greek poetry, and it makes so many connections with the Wisdom literature that provides the two other readings this morning.
The Prologue is first and foremost poetry. It is a hymn – a poetic summary – of the whole theology of this Gospel, as well as an introduction to it.
The Fourth Gospel, the Gospel according to Saint John, is one of the great works of literature, and its opening phrase, Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, 'In the beginning was the Word,' is one of the most dramatic opening lines in literature.
This is such beautiful literature that I have often though that the Greek poetry and drama of Saint John's Gospel would be a major possibility if I ever thought about researching and writing another thesis in theology.
The Prologue is an introduction to this Gospel as a whole. It tells us that the Logos is God and acts as the mouthpiece (Word) of God 'made flesh,' sent to the world in order to be able to intercede for humanity and to forgive human sins.
The Prologue is of central significance to the doctrine of the Incarnation. This Prologue can be compared with Genesis 1, where the same phrase, 'In the beginning …,' first occurs along with the emphasis on the difference between the darkness and the light.
'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it' (John 1: 5).
This Prologue is probably one of the most profound passages in the Bible. As simple as its language and phrases are, its description of Christ as the Logos has had a lasting influence on Christian theology.
The prologue prepares the reader for the rest of the Fourth Gospel. Important themes are signalled and Christ's identity is established at the very outset through the use of Christological titles, divine portents or the manner of his birth.
Saint John's is the only Gospel to speak of Christ's pre-existence as the Logos and the only Gospel to include a poetic prologue.
What about Saint John's use of the term λόγος or Logos (1-2) – most frequently rendered 'Word' in modern English translations?
This term is deeply rooted in Old Testament thinking (see Genesis 1, Proverbs 8). The role of the Logos in Saint John's writings also parallels, in ways, that of personified Wisdom in a number of traditions within Judaism, including Sirach and this morning's reading. However, Wisdom and the Logos need not be identified with each other, since Wisdom is a creation of God (Sirach 1: 9), while the Logos is pre-existent and Divine.
The Prologue introduces a number of terms throughout Saint John's Gospel and his letters. They include 'life,' 'light' (verse 5), 'believe' (verse 7), 'world' (verse 9), 'children of God' (verse 12), and 'flesh' and 'truth' (verse 14). These concepts are introduced in relationship to the Logos, who is decidedly at the centre of all that is being said.
The single most influential thinker in the 16th century Jewish mysticism, Rabbi Isaac Luria (1534-1572), thought deeply about why evil and suffering exist in the world. In a poetic-like response, he told a story of Creation in which God who is unlimited brings into being a limited, empty space in which Creation can occur.
The Almighty is everywhere, and only by contracting into himself – like a someone inhaling deeply to allow another person to pass by in a narrow corridor – could God create an empty space in which the Creation could occur.
Luria imagines God retracting a part of the Eternal being into the Godhead itself in order to allow such a space to exist, a sort of exile. And so, Creation begins with a Divine exile.
A stream of light then flows from God into the empty space God creates. According to Isaac Luria, God created vessels into which he poured his holy light. These vessels were not strong enough to contain such a powerful force and they shattered. The sparks of divine light were carried down to earth along with the broken shards.
The light of God pours into Creation too, and every time someone does something good, according to Rabbi Luria, we rescue one of those holy sparks and restore it.
The day will come, Luria imagines, when we all do our part, and the entire remaining Divine Light is restored to God's world. Without access to the Divine Light, evil will be unable to survive and will crumble away to dust.
For Luria, our task, our human endeavour, is the commandment tikkun olam, to repair the world, to reverse the shattering of the vessels, to restore the light of God.
For Luria and his followers, redemption is bound up with creation – to the idea of 'retracing the path' to creation and revelation, in order to return to the 'unity and purity' of the beginning of the world.
Luria's key ideas gave voice to the impossible brokenness of the human condition. The pain of the Divine breakage permeates reality. We inherit it; it inhabits us. But redemption – the tikkun olam that will repair the broken world – remains possible.
In the words of Leonard Cohen, 'there is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in.'
In our frailty and our brokenness, we are open to redemption and to the light of the world.
As Saint John tells us in our Christmas message this morning, 'The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world' (John 1: 9).
And so, may all we think, say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.
Saint John the Evangelist is often represented by an eagle … a carving on the pulpit in Saint Michael's Church, Waterville, Co Kerry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8 He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9 The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.
10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.
14 And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth. 15 (John testified to him and cried out, 'This was he of whom I said, "He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me".' 16 From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.
'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it' (John 1: 4) … the River Lee at night in Cork (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)
Liturgical Colour: White (or Gold).
The Penitential Kyries:
Lord God, mighty God,
you are the creator of the world.
Lord Jesus, Son of God and Son of Mary,
you are the Prince of Peace.
by your power the Word was made flesh
and came to dwell among us.
in the birth of your Son
you have poured on us the new light of your incarnate Word,
and shown us the fullness of your love:
Help us to walk in this light and dwell in his love
that we may know the fullness of his joy;
who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given,
and his name shall be called the Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9: 6)
The Preface:
You have given Jesus Christ your only Son
to be born of the Virgin Mary,
and through him you have given us power
to become the children of God:
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Light eternal,
you have nourished us in the mystery
of the body and blood of your Son:
By your grace keep us ever faithful to your word,
in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.
The Blessing:
Christ, who by his incarnation gathered into one
all things earthly and heavenly,
fill you with his joy and peace:
652, Lead us, heavenly Father, lead us (CD 37)
166, Joy to the world, the Lord is come! (CD 166)
425, Jesu thou joy of loving hearts (CD 25)
'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it' (John 1: 4) … evening lights at Knightstown on Valentia Island, Co Kerry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2020)
Saint John the Evangelist depicted on the Gate at Saint John's College in Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
This sermon was prepared for Sunday 3 January 2021, and was part of a celebration of the Eucharist in Askeaton with limited attendance
Labels: Askeaton, Cambridge, Christmas 2020, Cork, Ferrycarrig, Limerick, River Lee, River Slaney, Saint John's Gospel, Sermons 2021, Valentia Island, Waterville
Praying at Christmas with USPG:
10, Sunday 3 January 2021
'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it' (John 1: 5) … a street scene in Bologna (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Throughout Advent and Christmas this year, I am using the Prayer Diary of the Anglican Mission Agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel) for my morning reflections each day.
I was one of the contributors to the current USPG Diary, Pray with the World Church, introducing the theme of peace and trust this morning:
Before this day starts, I am taking a little time this morning for my own personal prayer, reflection and Scripture reading.
The theme of the USPG Prayer Diary this week (3 to 9 January 2021) is 'David and Goliath', and is introduced by the Right Revd Shourabh Pholia, Bishop of Barishal Diocese in the Church of Bangladesh:
'The 2020 monsoon season caused a lot of disruption in Bangladesh, and we are all experiencing various challenges as a result. Some people lost their lives and prolonged floods robbed many of their livelihoods, houses, crops and businesses. Some are at the verge of losing their faith.
'When I was a child, I used to collect spare change, particularly the coins that were gold in colour. I would store them in a box to use it in time of need. I don't remember now what I did with that money. But I do know how I would use it if I had it now. Friends, I would like to encourage you to start collecting spare coins again. Today they can buy a hungry child a meal, or a sick elderly person some medicine. They could give a desperate person a little seed to start a small business.
We all are familiar with the story of David and Goliath. David may have lived a long time ago, but the world still has Goliath-sized problems today: hunger, pollution, wars, injustice, corruption, human rights abuses, sickness. Just like David, we can do something about them.'
Sunday 3 January 2021 (Second Sunday of Christmas):
Yesterday's morning reflection
Labels: Bangladesh, Bologna, Christmas 2020, Mission, Prayer, Saint John's Gospel, USPG
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In the heart of California's Central Valley, Turlock is the second largest city in Stanislaus County with a population which has grown steadily from 13,992 in 1970 to over 70,000 today. Home of California State University Stanislaus (CSUS), Turlock provides an unusual opportunity to combine a quality learning environment with relaxed rural living.
Cultural art experiences, sports activities, twenty four parks,sixteen schools, a full range of medical facilities and the attractiveness of the nearby Mother Lode, San Francisco Bay area and the Sierra Nevada add to the pleasure of living in Turlock.
The City currently has approved budget allocations for 389 employees. The General Fund budget for fiscal year 2008/09 is $34,002,198. The Non-General Fund budget represents an additional $152,783,698 in budgeted expenses.
Turlock offers premiere golf courses for all skill levels. Its 18-hole championship golf course has challenging fairways, small greens and lush beauty. Turlock Golf & Country Club offers proprietary and social memberships and is open to members with a reciprocal agreement.
Stevenson Ranch Golf Course is located just 10 miles from Turlock and is open to the public. This low lying, fluid course offers wide landing areas, but the wetlands, cattails, lakes, and large gaping bunkers will keep you on your toes all day.
For more information on recreation opportunities offered in Turlock, for both adults and children, contact the City Recreation Services office at (209) 668-5550 or, of course, the Turlock Convention & Visitors Bureau at (209) 632-2221.
Student & faculty performances showcasing top-notch theater productions, as well as gallery viewings, are regularly scheduled at the beautiful CSUS campus here in Turlock. Check the 'Calendar of Events' section for current & upcoming events. The art gallery is open 12-4 pm Monday thru Thursday and is free.
The galllery, located at 226 N. First Street in Turlock offers a wide array of originals and prints. Call (209) 667-7332.
First run motion pictures on 14 separate screens, located at 2323 West Main Street just west of the intersection with Highway 99. Call 664-3620.
Top name entertainers regularly perform in the beautifully refurbished high school auditorium located at 1574 E. Canal Drive. Every seat in the house is like being in the front row. Call 668-1169 for more information.
Located at 108 S Center Street in the Heart of Historical Downtown Turlock, this unique museum is open 11 a.m. - 3 p.m. Tuesdays & Thursdays and 1-4 p.m. Saturdays. Call (209) 668-7386.
Visit Beekman & Beekman five generation old farm/apiary on Geer Road in Hughson, California, just outside of Turlock, to taste the unique flavors of pure varietals honeys and the wine that premium honey can create. The Tasting Room's current hours are 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. Saturday 1 p.m. - 5 p.m. Sunday. They are closed on holidays. For more information call (209) 667-5812 and weekends call (209) 669-6325.
One of the truly exciting aspects of Turlock is that it is home to California State University, Stanislaus. The local community and visitors benefit from the campus, as it serves as a delightful venue for many wonderful open air concerts, first-rate arts and entertainment activities, and of course opportunities to attend athletic events and tournaments of the CSUS Warrior athletic teams. The campus has breathtaking scenery with waterfalls, bridges and sprawling greens. It is the perfect place to picnic or catch a performance by the university's outstanding theater department. The Art Gallery is open 12 - 4 pm Monday thru Thursday and is free.
Just a few miles out of town is the world famous Hilmar Cheese Company, Learn about the benefits of the California dairy industry. Explore interactive, hands-on exhibits! Watch Daisy's moooovie! Learn how cheese is made. Family, Group, school, and scout tours are available. They offer tours, cheese tasting and fantastic lunches for the whole family to enjoy.
Downtown Turlock is the place to shop! Our Historic Downtown just underwent a multi-million dollar renovation, making it a must see in Turlock. With antique shops, cafes and clothiers, downtown Turlock offers the true main street experience.
The Fairgrounds located in Turlock offers a wide array of activities throughout the entire year. For more information on current and upcoming events at the Stanislaus County Fairgrounds go to www.stancofair.com or call (209) 668-1333.
Open to members, guests of members and members of clubs with reciprocal agreements, The Turlock Golf and Country Club is located about five miles south of Turlock.
Turlock has over 24 community parks for your enjoyment.These parks provide a safe, fun recreational location for relaxing, sports and picnics. The city's parks include everything from benches and picnic tables to sports facilities and miniature lakes. Donnelly Park offers a dramatic miniature lake, a large children's play area, basketball ccourts, picnic facilities and more. Pedretti Sports Complex freatures on of the best- maintained Softball Complex in the area.
Donnelly Park, the City's premier community park, maintains hundreds of beautiful trees, which provide a very shady environment for family gatherings and a comfortable haven during the summer heat. Donnelly Park offers two covered picnic sites that can be reserved for private functions, as well as two restroom facilities and two playground areas.
Crane Park is one of the City's oldest and most popular parks. The large shade trees that cover the entire park offer a safe haven from the Valley's high summer temperatures. The park offers a new playground area, an ADA-compliant drinking fountain, two newly re-surfaced tennis courts, 10 newly renovated horseshoe pits, a new restroom facility, a half-court basketball area, perimeter sidewalks, several large and small picnic areas available for reservation and open space.
This facility includes four softball fields, a hardball field, batting cages, three grass volleyball courts, a concession stand covered bleachers, drinking fountains, picnic areas, a large covered picnic area that can be reserved for special events, a fully accessible tot playground area, restroom facilities and hundreds of shady trees.
This 30-acre complex included 14 soccer fields, a restroom facility, two softball diamonds, and outdoor amphitheater, a large picnic area, in the center plaza area, a tot playground, benches, an informational kiosk in the plaza area and lots of shade trees. The complex is bordered on the east and west sides by two neighborhood parks, which include two sand volleyball courts, playground areas, picnic areas with BBQs, a half-court basketball court and drinking fountains.
Turlock offers endless shopping opportunities! From bookstores and galleries to shopping centers and boutiques, there is plenty of shopping opportunities throughout Turlock. Turlock, offering the best of national chains and specialty shops to fulfill anyones shopping list. Five major shopping centers carry everything from everyday necessitates to specialty items. Turlock has something for everyone!
Located at the Fulkerth Avenue exit off of highway 99, Countryside Plaza boasts several major retail stores such as Wal-Mart, Staples and JC Penneys as well as auto service centers, eateries and various clothing and apparel boutiques.
Turlock's historic downtown retail area exudes small town American charm. With Marin Street's recent multi-million dollar renovation, this shopping area offers some of Turlock's finest dinning and specialty stores, making it the perfect place to take a stroll and see the sights.
Myriad retailers are located along this major city artery. Look for department and grocery stores, commercial retailers, and gift shops. The area has a major hardware chain, plus fitness centers, footwear and music, art & computer supply stores. It is also next to California State University, Stanislaus.
One of Turlock's main thoroughfares, visitors will find a variety of shopping from party supplies and automotive care to major drug stores and supermarkets. With several small shopping complexes located just off Golden State Blvd., there is much to see in this town.
Located at the intersection of Golden State Boulevard, Monte Vista Avenue and Highway 99, MVC is Turlock's newest shopping center, Kohls, Target, Home Depot, anchor this well-planned, multi-store complex with continual additions being made to this variety of popular retailers.
Open every Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday from 10 AM to 4 PM.
Reasonably prices antiques and collectables with a huge variety for all ages. Open Monday 11 Am - 5 PM, Tuesday thru Saturday 10 AM - 5PM, and Closed on Sunday.


The National Mobile Service Provider Mobitel for the first time in Sri Lanka launched a new 24 hour 'Cash Out' service under its mobile money arm, mCash to provide Mobitel mCash customers the unique opportunity to withdraw cash from Commercial Bank Cardless ATM in a quick and effortless manner.
Mobitel mCash offers yet another customer friendly facility to enjoy relaxed and a convenient lifestyle by allowing its users to make Cash Out transactions through the mobile device with just a press of a button. The new service is particularly useful in sending money person to person using mCash where the receiver needs to withdraw money on an urgent basis. This special service gives Mobitel customers the benefit of making 'Cash Out' transactions 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Mobitel customers could take advantage of the new facility by logging into their mCash Account and selecting the "ATM Withdrawal" option available under the "mBanking" service offered by mCash. The customer would subsequently receive a SMS with a five digit Pass Code that enables immediate access to the mCash "Cardless Cash Transactions" option on the Commercial Bank Cardless ATM screen. The SMS would also indicate the possible withdrawal amount according to the mCash balance in his mCash Account. On entering the mCash Account Number (Mobile Number), Pass Code and the required Amount, mCash Customer would receive physical cash which will be dispensed from the ATM.
Mobitel mCash is designed to suit all customer needs in one portable and user-friendly mobile phone device. Whether it's purchasing a good or enjoying a particular service, the aim is to make mCash the best available mobile service and to transform lifestyles by satisfying customer needs. This new facility provided in partnership with Commercial Bank will further strengthen mCash as the number one option for mobile money, as banking services are also popular among the clientele and well known for the large number of ATMs available countrywide. This makes it extremely easy for mCash Customers to take advantage of the new Cash Out facility via the Commercial Bank Cardless ATMs.
Customers are eligible to utilize the mCash 'Cash Out' facility if they possess a registered mCash account and a balance available in their account to withdraw money. Customers are not required to be Commercial Bank Account holders to avail this facility.
Mobitel has experienced a rapid growth of over five million active subscribers and has made a strong presence in the country for its customer convenient services. mCash launched in November 2013 is licensed under Central Bank of Sri Lanka and allows Mobitel subscribers to maintain a mobile account and experience a whole new convenient method of carrying out financial transactions. mCash now provides customers the opportunity to deposit and withdraw money, pay utility bills and insurance premiums and even to make purchases for goods and services through mobile phone devices.