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Modern Book Burnings

In 220 BC China, Qin Shi Huang became the first emperor, after uniting all the other the Warring States. In order to deceive those after him that he was the alpha of Chinese history, he, in 213 BC, burned hundreds of scholarly works, ranging from literature to history to philosophy. He created the illusion that only records produced by him and his administration were factual. In addition to this, he persecuted many intellectuals and writers, allegedly killing many of them. In 1258, the House of Wisdom, a prominent library in Baghdad, was destroyed by the Mongols in the Siege of Baghdad. The books from the House were thrown into the River Tigris; so many books were destroyed this way that the river ran black with the ink from the books. The effect of this was the end of the Islamic Golden Age, a period which had seen great advancement in scholarship by Muslim intellectuals. In the 1930s, Hitler and the Nazis burned all literature and art deemed degenerate. This included books that w

The NCAA and "Student-Athletes"

The National College Athletic Association's (NCAA) March Madness tournament is big business. That is obvious. According to SBNation, the NCAA's TV deal for the tournament with Turner Broadcasting System, an American media company, is worth US$19.6 billion in total. The first deal was originally signed in 2010 and was originally written so that Turner would pay US$10.8 billion over the course of 14 years for broadcasting rights for the tournament. The deal was extended in 2016, for an additional 8 years. This cost Turner another US$8.8 billion, and it means that the company will have broadcasting rights until 2032. The tournament is by far the largest source of income for the NCAA. The NCAA's official financial statement for the 2017-18 year shows that the Association generated US$ 844, 267, 484 in revenue, from television and marketing rights fees. Over 777 million dollars from this was the result of their evidently lucrative deal with Turner. Considering all of this,

Game pulled from Nintendo Switch online store by CERO because of poorlycensored nudity

Get it together, Nintendo. A Chinese game from game developers Mighty Craft has led to many complaints regarding the child-friendly image which Nintendo has maintained throughout the many years that they have been producing games. The game in question, a puzzle tile game called Mahjong, was first released on the Sega Saturn and PC. When the game made its debut in Japan after being relaunched, customers were shocked at the poorly censored nudity. At the end of each level, as a reward for playing, the game would display hentai images. However, to comply with Nintendo's Terms and Conditions, the women were censored with shafts of light. Despite this, the women were still clearly visible. Because of these inappropriate images, the game has been pulled from the Nintendo Switch E-Shop. Despite the lackluster attempts at censorship, the shockingly bad age categorisation and the backlash aimed at both Nintendo and Mighty Craft, the game developers have appealed to have thei

The Political Spectrum

Centre-Left. Far Right. Centre Right. Centrist. Far Left. The majority of people use one of the five aforementioned labels to describe the political beliefs of themselves and the beliefs of others. The broader categories of Left and Right stem from the French Revolution, where supporters of the monarchy would be positioned to the right of the king in the Estates-General, and whereas the revolutionary republicans would sit to his left. The staunch royalist loyalists were then known as conservatives; they wished to "conserve" the monarchy and all other traditions. In stark contrast, the republicans became known as liberals; they wished to "liberate" the French people from the hierarchical social order. Thus arose the beliefs that conservatives aimed to preserve the institutions of the past and that liberals aimed to change them. However, I believe that the one-dimensional political spectrum we have become accustomed to is not a useful one. It plots people on a sc

George’s Predictions: Matchweek 32

George Crossfield is back with his set of weekly predictions for the Premier League! We are now almost halfway through the international break, with nearly only a week to go until the Premier League kicks off again with a set of intriguing fixtures, including Liverpool vs Tottenham Hotspur in a vital match in the title race, and Brighton and Hove Albion vs Southampton at the other end of the table. But who does George think will blow through their opponents, and who will “slump like a sack of potatoes”? Fulham vs Manchester City (Saturday 30th, 12:30) Fulham have much better than I thought that they would in their last two matches against big six opposition, limiting both Chelsea and Liverpool to narrow 2-1 victories. I can see them possibly drawing this one. I can also definitely see vulnerabilities in City. The last time they won a game by two clear goals without conceding in the Premier League was all the way back in early Feb, with that 6-0 battering of Chelsea. Since then, apart f

The War Over Graphic Cards

Written by a tech enthusiast The GPU of a computer had always been one of the most important, and most expensive, components of a computer. The two giants in the desktop games have been Nvidia, a gaming-focused corporation, and AMD, a work-bent company.  In the high-end ball park, Nvidia sells the RTX 2080ti, with 11GB of GDDR6 memory, and a base clock speed of 1635 MHz (Founder’s Edition). AMD, to counter, has rebooted the fan-favourite Radeon line with Radeon vii. The Radeon vii runs on a 7nm process VEGA20, and with 16GB of memory. Radeon vii starts at 700 USD, and the RXT 2080ti starts at 1000 USD, so, although the 2080ti is on a different level in terms of performance, it is also far more expensive than the Radeon. For anyone who builds budget gaming rigs, there are many new releases, especially from Nvidia. Nvidia has recently released the GTX 1660 and 1660ti. These have been put in direct competition with AMD’s RX580. According to Linus Media Group’s benchmarks, the 1660 is sl

George's Predictions: Matchweek 30

Invenire Football analyst George Crossfield returns with his predictions for this week’s set of Premier League fixtures, ahead of the huge Arsenal-Manchester United game. Chelsea are also fighting for a Champions League space. But who is George backing this week? Crystal Palace vs Brighton and Hove Albion (Saturday 12:30) Crystal Palace are in the middle of a great run of form right now, and I expect it to show here. Even though Brighton got that much-needed win against Huddersfield last week, I don’t think that they can get anything from this match, given that they are not currently in the relegation battle, and they have a game in hand. George predicts: 2-0 to Crystal Palace Southampton vs Tottenham Hotspur (Saturday 15:00) Tottenham will be happy with their result in the North London Derby, given that Arsenal missed a last-minute penalty, and that their own penalty was arguably not a penalty. I am expecting them to go and win here, but Southampton will push them all the way. We saw