Friday, September 17, 2021

Economists to Congress: Make enhanced child tax credit permanent

Republicans and some moderate Democrats opposed efforts to extend the program


By Thomas Barrabi FOXBusiness

Nearly 450 economists signed an open letter Thursday urging Congress to pursue a permanent extension of President Biden’s child tax credit program, an economic measure that has prompted intense debate on Capitol Hill.

The economists, drawn from universities and institutions across the country, argue that initial research showed a permanent child tax credit would "dramatically reduce childhood poverty" by improving educational, health-related and career outcomes for low-income youth. The letter cited a study that concluded a permanent program would cost 16 cents for every $1 in new economic benefits.

"A permanently expanded CTC would yield tremendous immediate and long-term benefits for children and their families and would be unlikely to meaningfully reduce employment," the letter said. "For these reasons, we believe that the benefits of an expanded CTC far outweigh the costs."

Under the current enhanced child tax credit program enacted in Biden’s $1.9 trillion "American Rescue Plan," eligible parents can receive up to $3,000 per child aged 6 to 17 years old and $3,600 per child aged under 6 each year. Half of the money is dispersed monthly in direct cash payments, with the other half applied as a credit on 2022 tax returns.

Republicans and some moderate Democrats opposed efforts to extend the program, arguing it would be too costly to taxpayers and would disincentivize job seekers as the U.S. economy recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic.

In their open letter, the economists argued that gradual reductions in payments for higher-earning parents, beginning at $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 for married couples, ensured an incentive to pursue work.

"A design feature that limits such effects is that the expanded CTC amount would not phase out until high levels of earnings; thus, most families would not see their CTC amount decline if their income rises," the economists said.

KEEP THEM POOR SO THEY ARE FORCED TO WORK

Economic experts are divided on the potential impact of the enhanced benefits. The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, has referred to Biden’s program as a "bait and switch" that would inhibit participation in the job market.

"Contrary to the administration’s rhetoric, the primary focus and sole permanent feature of the child allowance policy would not be tax relief, but the elimination of all work requirements and work incentives from the current child credit program," the group said in July. "In pursuing this change, the administration explicitly seeks to overturn the foundations of welfare reform established during the Clinton presidency."

The Democrats’ $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill would extend the program through 2025, and Biden and other top Democratic lawmakers have called for it to be made permanent.

The debate could present a roadblock to the bill’s passage in the Senate. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., a key swing voter, has called for the implementation of a work requirement for parents receiving the benefit.
Japan's Noda, former gender equality minister, joins PM race

TOKYO (Reuters) - Seiko Noda, a Japanese former minister for gender equality, announced on Thursday she is running to replace Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and become the nation's first female leader.

© Reuters/ISSEI KATO FILE PHOTO: 
Japan's Internal Affairs and Communications Minister Seiko Noda, who is also minister in charge of women's empowerment, speaks in Tokyo

Noda, considered a long shot, has been a consistent voice urging Japan to address its declining birthrate and fast-ageing population, while advocating women's empowerment.

"I would like to create a politics for the next Japan so women, children, the elderly and disabled people who have not been leading actors, can feel life is worth living in this society," Noda, 61, told reporters.

A critic of conservative former prime minister Shinzo Abe, Noda wanted to challenge him for the leadership of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in 2015 but fell short of the 20 backers needed to run. This time, she cleared the line the day before official registration.

The LDP president becomes Japan's prime minister because of the party's majority in the lower house of parliament.

Vaccine minister Taro Kono, the apparent frontrunner, said on Thursday any new economic stimulus https://www.reuters.com/article/japan-politics/update-2-japan-pm-contender-kono-wants-stimulus-to-focus-on-energy-5g-idUKL1N2QI04A measures should prioritise spending on renewable energy and expansion of 5G networks.

Noda joined a flurry of campaigning among senior figures in the party. Former foreign minister Fumio Kishida and former internal affairs minister Sanae Takaichi are also running in the Sept. 29 election for LDP president.

In her 30s, Noda became Japan's youngest post-war cabinet minister, later holding various cabinet posts, including internal affairs minister.

(Reporting by Yoshifumi Takemoto and Ju-min Park; Editing by William Mallard)
Sir Clive Sinclair, Home Computer Pioneer and Inventor of the Sinclair C5, Dies Aged 81

SEPTEMBER 16, 2021 

Sir Clive Sinclair is widely considered the pioneer of home computing and other consumer electronics, as well as the bizarre Sinclair C5. Belinda Sinclair, his daughter, told the press today that her father died at his London home early this morning, aged 81. 

Most have heard about the Sinclair ZX81 / ZX Spectrum, but his company also produced the TV80, a cathode ray tube-based portable mini television. Unfortunately, the Sinclair FTV1 (TV80) was a commercial flop, with only 15,000 units produced. 

Read more for two videos, including one on his quirky C5 battery-powered vehicle.

For those who have never heard or seen the Sinclair C5, it’s essentially a battery-powered recumbent tricycle for one person. In other words, it’s an electric tricycle with a polypropylene body and a chassis designed by Lotus Cars. Its 12-volt lead–acid electric battery powered a motor with a continuous rating of 250 watts and a maximum speed of 4,100 revolutions per minute, good for a range of 20-miles. The C5 was actually intended to be the first in a line of electric vehicles, but development of its successors, the C10 and C15 models, never progressed further due to poor sales of the C5.

He was inventive and imaginative and for him it was exciting and an adventure, it was his passion. He’d come up with an idea and say, ‘There’s no point in asking if someone wants it, because they can’t imagine it.’ He was a rather amazing person. Of course, he was so clever and he was always interested in everything,” said his daughter.



UK inventor, computing pioneer Clive Sinclair dies at 81

Sir Clive Sinclair, the man who helped bring affordable computers into people's homes in the 1980s, has passed away at the age of 81, UK media reported.



In 1988, Sinclair launched a laptop dubbed Cambridge Z88

British inventor Clive Sinclair, whose passion for technology made him a fortune and earned him a knighthood in the 1980s, has died following a long illness, his daughter Belinda told The Guardian daily and later the BBC on Thursday.

Sinclair was born in 1940 and started building gadgets as a child. He left school at 17 and worked as a technical journalist before starting his own company in 1961. In 1972, he launched a series of groundbreaking pocket calculators. The gadgets were a financial success and gathered praise for what was, at the time, a sleek, cutting-edge design.

But the inventor's personal golden age arrived in the early 1980s. Sinclair's home computer the ZX80 was designed to be cheap and accessible. Launched in 1980, it was also sold in kit form for customers who wanted to put the device together themselves. It was followed up by ZX81 and then ZX Spectrum 48K in 1982. The series rivaled the better known Commodore 64 in the early video game market.

Similar to other computer pioneers such as Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, Sinclair played a key role in bringing personal computers to people's homes. The computer boom also made him a millionaire.


COMPUTER DESIGN: FROM THE LEGENDARY Z3 TO THE APPLE WATCH
Design fit for a museum
The wunderkind from the early days of computer technology, the Commodore PET 2001 was released in 1977. Built to last, most are still fully functional. In 2016, the German Museum of Digital Culture (Deutsches Museum der digitalen Kultur) in Dortmund will put the old treasure in an honorable position. Its retro look is once again fashionable.
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In 1983, he was awarded a knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II.

'A true father' of the computer age

In the mid-1980s, however, Sinclair faced his first flop with an early electric vehicle dubbed the Sinclair C5. In 1986, the inventor sold his computer business to the now-defunct Amstrad.

Several of his later inventions, including a pocket TV and an electric motor that could be fitted to a pedal bicycle, also failed to sell.



Sinclair admitted the 1985 launch of his electric vehicle, which could be powered by batteries or pedals, was botched — range, power, aesthetics and safety concerns were commonly cited as cause for public skepticism at the time

Sinclair continued to develop new gadgets into 2010s, as the world slowly embraced the dream of electric mobility.


"You cannot exaggerate Sir Clive Sinclair's influence on the world," gaming journalist and presenter Dominik Diamond said on Twitter. "And if we'd all stopped laughing long enough to buy a C5 he'd probably have saved the environment."

Hollywood screenwriter and video game developer Garry Whitta also praised Sinclair as "a true father of the modern computing age."



"I'm not sure I'd be where I am today were it not for his ZX Spectrum igniting my love of computers and games," said Whitta, whose credits include the popular video game franchise Gears of War.

In a 2013 interview, Sinclair told the BBC that he did not himself use computers.

"I don't like distraction," he explained. "If I had a computer, I'd start thinking I could change this, I could change that, and I don't want to. My wife very kindly looks after that for me."

Sir Clive Sinclair: Tireless inventor ahead of his time

Thu., September 16, 2021,

Sir Clive Sinclair, who has died aged 81, was one of Britain's most prolific innovators.

Largely self-taught, he began inventing gadgets while he was still at school.

His ZX Spectrum computers brought affordable personal computing to the masses and sold in their millions across the world.

But his attempt to launch an electric vehicle was not successful, and caused him severe financial problems.

Clive Marles Sinclair was born on 30 July 1940 in Richmond, Surrey.

The young Clive was something of an introvert as a child, preferring the company of adults to that of his own age group.

He also developed a passion for creating gadgets, inspired by a character called The Inventor, on the BBC Children's series, Toytown.

A miniature TV was just one of the products he developed

Sinclair made a communications system for his hideout in the woods and built miniature radios and amplifiers.

While doing his A-levels, he designed a circuit for a simple radio which he then commissioned a manufacturer to make up into DIY kits.

The kit was sold through magazines such as Practical Wireless, a publication for which he had already written a number of articles.
Keen to return to inventing

Over the following four years, he wrote books on how to construct various electronic devices including radio receivers and transistor circuits.

But while his books sold well, Sinclair was anxious to get back to inventing, and formed his own company, Sinclair Radionics, in 1961.

He produced a number of printed circuit boards and a miniature transistor radio but was unable to raise enough capital to make the business a success.

Sinclair backed his products with heavy advertising

His first money-making venture came when he heard the Plessey company was discarding new transistors that were not up-to-scratch.

Having discovered the rejects still worked, Sinclair bought them in bulk, re-selling them at a profit and building them into his own products.

Sinclair followed up his kits with fully built hi-fi components and a design for a miniature TV.

He shared the view of Apple's Steve Jobs that design was everything and his products were seen as modern and cutting-edge.
Affordable pocket calculator

In 1972, he designed and released a calculator, the Sinclair Executive.

It was the first true pocket calculator and, while technically not particularly advanced, it looked good and, more importantly, was very affordable.

It won Design Council awards and was put on show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

The ZX Spectrum was a major success

But Sinclair's products were proving unreliable and the company faced financial problems.

An innovative quartz watch, a sleek black affair, never worked properly and customers returned them in their thousands.

Eventually the company was taken over by Labour's National Enterprise Board and split up.

"I'm not a businessman by nature," Sinclair once said, "but we all have to be businesslike in our lives."
Exciting innovations

Sinclair teamed up with Chris Curry who ran a small electronics company called Science of Cambridge. This quickly became Sinclair Research.

In 1980, the ZX80 was launched, a small computer that retailed at less than £100. Enthusiasts could buy it in kit form for £20 less.

It contained many exciting innovations and demonstrated Sinclair's ability to make a product work with the fewest possible number of components.

Sinclair sold his computer business to Alan Sugar's Amstrad

The follow-up, the ZX81, was still primitive by modern standards. But it would run simple applications and very basic games.

But the relationship between Sinclair and Curry soured following the BBC's decision to run a series on computer literacy, and to badge a machine for the programmes.

The corporation eventually chose Curry's Acorn machine which, while technically more advanced than the ZX81, was much more expensive.

Sinclair hit back with the ZX Spectrum. The big attraction was the colour display and, in its various incarnations, Sinclair sold more than five million machines.

He was knighted in 1983 at the recommendation of Margaret Thatcher, but his next big invention was to prove a disaster.
Electric vision

Misguidedly, Sir Clive was beginning to run into financial problems, due to the decision to put his energies, and his cash, into developing an electric vehicle.

Money was poured into research and development and the Sinclair C5 was launched in 1985.

Buyers were disappointed with its limited range, slow speed and inability to climb hills, while reviewers claimed it was unsafe, something Sinclair strongly denied.

The Sinclair C5 failed to find favour with the public

Sinclair himself later acknowledged the launch had been botched.

"The ground was covered in snow and we hadn't realised that the batteries virtually packed up in freezing conditions. It was a crazy time to launch it."

The pressures had an effect on his personal life. His 20-year marriage to his wife, Anne, ended in divorce.

Sir Clive gained something of a reputation as a playboy, often seen in public with beautiful, younger women on his arm.

He also developed a passion for poker, a game that appealed to his love of risk-taking and his willingness to bet his money against the odds.
Funded from personal wealth

Sinclair also faced problems with the launch of a new computer, the QL which, despite its innovative design, failed to sell in any great numbers.

After failed attempts to raise more cash, Sinclair sold the rights to his computers to Alan Sugar's Amstrad.

Sinclair Research continued to operate as a small research and development company marketing Sinclair's inventions and funded from his own personal wealth.

The folding bike was deemed by some to be almost impossible to ride

He was still fixated by the idea of an electric vehicle and, in 1992, launched the Zike, a lightweight electric bike. Like the C5, it failed to sell.

A folding bike, which could fit in a suitcase, it also failed when users declared it to be almost impossible to ride.

In 2011, he announced he was working on a new electric vehicle dubbed the X1.

Sir Clive Sinclair was a driving force behind the success of the now ubiquitous personal computer.

He built up a company that earned millions, won a string of awards and was given a knighthood by Margaret Thatcher. But his efforts were dogged by financial problems caused by the failure of his attempts to build an electric vehicle for the masses.

But he remained one of Britain's great innovators who could turn his dreams into reality. "The idea that an inventor can come up with some brilliant idea and somebody else will make it all happen is nonsense," he once said.

"Either you do it yourself or it ain't going to happen."


Clive Sinclair and the offbeat brilliance of the ZX Spectrum

Keith Stuart
Fri, 17 September 2021, 

Photograph: Peter Jordan/Alamy

One day, in the bitterly cold autumn of 1981, my dad brought something home with him which he said was a sort of present for the whole family. It was a ZX81 home computer. I’d seen them advertised on TV and in comics but I never imagined we’d own one; we didn’t even have a video recorder. I remember seeing the instruction manual for the first time, with its beautiful illustration of a gigantic starship, and I understood straightaway that the thing my dad was at that moment plugging into the TV was the future. My whole family sat around the screen and took it in turns to type in one of the BASIC program listings from that weighty booklet. The result was a game in which you had to input coordinates to throw a ball into a waste-paper basket. I can’t even begin to describe how exciting that was. There was something on the TV that we’d made, and that we could interact with. It was a revelation.

For families all over Britain, Clive Sinclair – who has died aged 81 – brought computers home. The hobbyist computer market, which introduced the likes of Bill Gates and Steve Wozniak to programming, was not as well-developed in this country and required some engineering expertise – you built computers such as the Altair 8800 yourself. The ZX81, you could buy in Boots or WH Smiths or from the Argos catalogue, and it was all there for you. For £70. A lot of money for my family at the time, but not too much.


A revelation … the Spectrum’s predecessor, the Sinclair ZX81.
Photograph: PhotoDreams/Alamy

When the ZX Spectrum arrived a year later, with its colour visuals and tinny audio, it was truly the beginning of the British games industry. Again, it was more affordable than the competition – the BBC Micro, Commodore VIC-20 or Apple II – so teenagers could be given them for Christmas, and could begin making their own games on the rubbery keyboard.


There was something slightly strange about this computer. To use the memory efficiently, each sprite (or moving character on screen) was stored separately from the pixel bitmap, and overlaid on top. The process meant that colours would often leak between objects on screen – a phenomenon known as attribute clash. But just like in other areas of culture, what looks like a technical failing actually became a signature aesthetic element of the games. They looked weird and offbeat and sketchy.

This appealed to the kids making games at the time; kids brought up on Monty Python and Pink Floyd, punk and The Young Ones. Games such as Jet Set Willy and Skool Daze were slightly anarchic, miniature alternative comedy sitcoms.They drew on what it meant to be an adolescent in the 80s, with its recession and unrest. The Darling Brothersthe Oliver TwinsMatthew Smith … they were the technological equivalent of the bedroom indie pop stars of the era, and the Spectrum was their secondhand Telecaster, their Roland 808 drum machine.

I owned a Commodore 64 but my cooler friends had Spectrums. When we played together they dug out strange games I’d never seen – Atic Atac, Travel With Trashman, Fat Worm Blows a Sparky – and these experiences were as important to me as the first time I heard Afrika Bambaataa or Madonna, or the first time I saw Blade Runner on a knackered videotape. Those games came to us because of the affordable and unorthodox Spectrum, and the culture of bedroom game development it fostered.

Later, while at university, I did some summer work for Codemasters, the software studio set up by brothers Richard and David Darling with the intention of selling cheap, fun game cassettes for a couple of quid each. This was where classics such as Dizzy and BMX Simulator were born. I worked with a team named Big Red Software which handled various projects for Codies, including two Spectrum games in the winter of the machine’s life: CJ’s Elephant Antics and Wild West Seymour. Here, I worked with two brilliant programmers, Fred Williams and my lifelong friend Jon Cartwright. I got to see how clever this machine was, how adaptable, and how much joy there was still to be found in wrestling images from its ageing hardware.

“The first time I coded a Spectrum was when I blagged my way into a summer job at Big Red,” recalls Jon. “I ended up writing Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk. I enjoyed coding on the Spectrum. It didn’t have the hardware sprites of the Commodore 64, and of course it had all the attribute issues of only allowing you to have two colours in each 8x8 pixel region. But honestly, those limitations drove the design of the best games.

“Shahid Kamal Ahmad’s recent Twitter thread about porting Jet Set Willy to Commodore 64 covers that well. If Jet Set Willy had been born on the C64 it would have looked and sounded so different. There were artists that specialised in doing loading screens for Speccy games. Given its limitations, it really was quite a skill. There was an anticipation too, as the screen slowly loaded in, line by line, often in black and white, almost unintelligible until finally the attributes for each 8x8 block were coloured in and it all made sense.

Even now, whenever I write about games for the Guardian, the classic titles that get readers chatting most fondly in the comments sections are Spectrum games. Jet Set Willy. Horace Goes Skiing. Knight Lore. For my generation, they retain a hold on the collective imagination and on our sense of 80s popular culture. To us, the bedroom coders that Clive Sinclair facilitated were like poets and comedians and rock stars, and they did what all struggling artists do: they made use of a tool that was affordable, expressive and open to manipulation and accident. Sinclair was as much our Brian Eno as he was our Bill Gates – he made game designers and artists and electronic musicians of so many people. I hope he realised that. I hope he knew.

Sadly our old ZX81 is long gone, though I kept it for many years. I wish I still had it. I guess everything I’ve done in my life as a professional writer started that day my dad brought that funny-looking computer home, and with it, the future.


Sinclair Computers: Gone But Not Forgotten
October 8, 2020

For many, the 1980s was the golden era in home computing. Low cost 8-bit systems brought arcade games to the masses, while offering the ability to handle basic office tasks at the same time. Companies such as Acorn, Commodore, and Dragon rapidly become household names.

And fighting for sales amongst them all, was a tiny British company. Their computers were cheap and basic, but helped give rise to the world of bedroom programming and some very familiar game developers. Join us, as we reminisce about the brief life of Sinclair computers.

The early battles for success

British inventor and entrepreneur, Clive Sinclair, set up his first company, Sinclair Radionics Ltd. in 1961, selling a variety of electrical and electronic products for the home. It performed well for over 10 years, thanks to the buoyant economy at the time, and a highly successful product -- a digital calculator, called the Sinclair Executive.

Unfortunately, disastrous flirtations with the development of portal televisions and digital watches drained the bank balance, resulting in the company closing its doors. But Sinclair didn't let this get in the way of his desire to innovate and by the late 1970s, he was back again, in the form of Science of Cambridge Ltd.

Encouraged by developments made in the microprocessor world, his tiny group of engineers created the MK14 -- one of the first home computers made in the UK (sold in kit form). Its unexpected success proved that there was a market for this product, and following another change in the company name (Sinclair Computers Ltd), they had their next big success.


Despite its flaws, the ZX80 was very popular. Source: Wikipedia

By today's standards, the ZX80 might seem like a complete joke, but $230 (£100) in 1980 got you an 8-bit 3.25 MHz Zilog Z80 clone processor, 1 kB of 8-bit wide SRAM, and 4 kB of ROM -- a surprising amount of technology for that budget.

It did come with some drawbacks, though, due to the cost cutting: there was no audio output, nor any real hardware to create the video signal. The visual output was mostly handled by the Z80 chip, in an interrupt mode; so pressing any key on the pad or executing any code would result in an momentary loss of the screen!

The visual output was mostly handled by the Z80 chip, in an interrupt mode; so pressing any key on the pad or executing any code would result in an momentary loss of the screen!

Despite these issues, the ZX80 repeatedly sold out, and put Sinclair firmly on the map, as a serious competitor in the home computer market.

In 1981, the company was renamed yet again to become Sinclair Research Ltd, and shortly after they launched the ZX80's successor, the ZX81.



Attached to the rear of this ZX81 is the notorious 16 kB RAM expansion pack. Source: Wikipedia

Much of the architecture and specifications remained the same, but it was cheaper to manufacture (using an uncommitted logic array chip, ULA, to replace a raft of logic components) and had double the ROM, enabling a better instruction set to be used. The screen blanking problem was gone, and there was even basic audio output.

The ZX81 was somewhat rushed, and had reliability flaws, but it cost 30% less than its predecessor -- naturally, it sold by the proverbial bucket load, and earned Sinclair Research a small fortune. And the best was yet to come.

Sinclair's zenith

The biggest criticism of the ZX81 was the paucity of RAM -- just 1 kB of it, although it could be expanded, by use of a very wobbly add-on board, to 16 kB or 56 kB. For games and other graphics-based programs, the restrictive monochrome 64 x 48 pixel resolution was also commonly berated.

Some clever programming could get around the resolution limitation, but what was really needed, was more capable hardware. Sinclair Research was aware of this, and their answer came in April 1982: the ZX Spectrum.



The original ZX Spectrum, replete with the 'dead flesh' chiclet keyboard. Source: Wikipedia

Two versions were available that differed only in price and the amount of memory installed: 16 kB for $220 (£125) and 48 kB for $310 (£175). This was a substantial increase in price over the ZX81, but the various improvements justified the rise.

Like its predecessor, the Spectrum used a ULA to perform many of the standard functions, but this time it provided a real hardware solution for creating the frame raster. This was previously handled by the Z80 processor and freed from that task, it could be dedicated entirely to executing programs.

It also gained a small clock improvement to 3.5 MHz -- altogether, the Spectrum's processing capability was roughly four times better than the ZX81. The hardware raster was also much higher in resolution (256 x 192 pixels) and was finally in color.

This aspect was handled in 8 x 8 pixel blocks of just 15 possible colors: black, and two levels of brightness for 7 base colors. Unfortunately, due to memory restrictions, only a single foreground and background color could be set for the whole block.

The effect of this was something called attribute clash, where changing just one pixel in the block would switch the rest to the same color, leading to undesirable visuals, especially in animation.

Early game developers for the platform didn't bother to avoid the problem, but later titles demonstrated some ingenious tricks to mask it.



The price resulted in the use of off-the-shelf components and suspect build quality. Source: Wikipedia

The ZX80/81's use of SRAM was gone, too, replaced by 2.7 MHz 1-bit wide DRAM. While not as good as SRAM, the change was necessary to increase the memory footprint and still keep the cost down. Other aspects of the Spectrum pointed to sale price restrictions, the most notable of which was the keyboard. The rubber block keys were considered to be unpleasant to use, and the membrane underneath often developed faults.

Home computers of this era were almost entirely assembled by hand, leading to the occasional problem with soldering quality, and misplaced or incorrect components being fitted. But it didn't really matter -- Sinclair had another huge hit on their hands and revenue almost tripled within 2 years (aided by a significant price drop 12 months after launch).



The first major update: 128 kB of RAM and a big heatsink to burn your hand on. Source: Wikipedia

Over a period of four years, the ZX Spectrum was updated twice: the Spectrum+ arrived in October 1984 (same internals with a better keyboard) and the Spectrum 128 in the latter months of 1985. This version offered 128 kB (in the form of two 64 kB switchable banks), a dedicated audio chip, and more ports for expansion and video options.

It was also to be Sinclair's final home computer -- for all its popularity, the Spectrum couldn't save the company from suffering crippling losses. So what exactly went wrong?

It was all so brief

In 1982, Sinclair agreed to a licencing deal with Timex Corporation, an American producer of clocks and watches. They were already the primary manufacturer of Sinclair's product (the production line being based in Dundee, Scotland) and the boom in home computing tempted the firm to try their hand at expanding their product portfolio, to offset falling sales in their main sector.

The joint venture, labelled Timex Sinclair, did more than just sell rebranded ZX81 and Spectrum machines -- instead, Timex attempted to enhance the base platform, either in the form of additional RAM, better chips, or additional expansion systems.

How much income this generated for Sinclair is uncertain, but poor sales in America forced Timex to withdraw from that region by 1984, although they carried on in other countries until the early 1990s.



The last Timex Sinclair home computer to be sold in the US. Source: Wikipedia

Where the ZX Spectrum was the best selling home computer in the UK, Timex Sinclair machines didn't sell anywhere near as well. The likes of Commodore and Atari were far more competitive on price and product development. In 1985, the former company released the Amiga 1000, a very powerful (and expensive) machine.

Its capabilities were far superior to the likes of the lowly ZX Spectrum and was well received in business sectors. Sinclair Research had tried to penetrate the same market a year earlier, with the Sinclair QL ('Quantum Leap').

Both the Amiga 1000 and the QL used a Motorola 68000 series chip for the main processor. This was a hybrid device: it had 32-bit registers and the same size internal data bus, but the memory address bus was 24-bits, the logic units and external data bus were 16-bits wide.



Despite this complexity, the Motorola processor was easy to work with and very capable. For the QL, Sinclair used the cheaper 68008 version -- the clock speed was an impressive 7.5 MHz, but the address and external memory buses were narrower, at 20 and 8 bits, respectively.

The base price for this computer was $560 (£400), sporting 128 kB of RAM, and twin Microdrive slots (a proprietary magnetic tape storage system). It should have been very tempting for smaller firms with a tight budgets or government bodies looking to cut costs. However, the whole project was both rushed and delayed, and launched with numerous bugs and reliability problems.

It also looked almost identical to the ZX Spectrum+, which was universally recognised as a gaming computer for children. Unsurprisingly, it sold poorly and was officially discontinued after just two years.



The very last Sinclair badged home computer. Source: Wikipedia

Sinclair Research had also tried to develop and sell other products: a wrist watch with a built-in FM radio, an electric tricycle, and a pocket television, but they were all commercial failures and pushed the firm into bankruptcy.


With Clive Sinclair losing millions of his own money, the inevitable happened in 1986 -- the Sinclair brand name and all products were sold to another British electronics firm, Amstrad.

This company continued to develop the ZX Spectrum but by December 1990 it was all over. Business users had moved onto Windows-based PCs, and gamers favored the likes of the Atari ST and consoles. Production of the old favorite was called to a halt and Sinclair computers passed into history.

A golden legacy


So why should we be recounting the tales of company that had such a brief moment of glory? The hardware wasn't particularly unique, especially compared to its immediate competitors, although it was cheaper. The ZX81 and ZX Spectrum sold incredibly well in the UK, but significantly less so in other markets.

It is precisely because of these that we still talk about the likes of the ZX Spectrum. Its limitations and large user base gave rise to some of the best known game creators today. British developers, Ultimate Play The Game, achieved critical success on the platform, pathing their way to becoming Rare (makers of Donkey Kong, GoldenEye 007, Banjo-Kazooie, and many other famous games).



Ultimate's Knight Lore - a seminal achievement in gaming history. Source: Wikipedia

Codemasters, purveyors of countless racing games, cut their programming teeth on 8-bit computers -- all from the comfort of their bedrooms, after school. And Rockstar North can trace their history back to the mid-1980s, where they were no strangers to the joys of programming a Sinclair machine.

So it should come as no surprise to learn that the ZX Spectrum still lives on, in the form of emulators and numerous fan websites. There's even been several attempts to hop onto the mini-console nostalgia bandwagon, in the form of crowd-funded projects such as the Spectrum Vega and Next.

But even if you never owned one, or haven't even heard of it before, the games you play today owe no small debt to the plucky little box. Gone, but absolutely not forgotten.




Clive Sinclair - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clive_Sinclair

Sir Clive Marles Sinclair (born 30 July 1940) is an English entrepreneur and inventor, most commonly known for his work in consumer electronics in the late 1970s and early 1980s. After spending several years as assistant editor of Instrument Practice, Sinclair founded Sinclair Radionics in 1961, where he produced the first slim-line electronic pocket calculator in 1972 (the Sinclair Executive). Sinclair later moved into the production of …

Sinclair's father and grandfather were engineers; both had been apprentices at Vickers the shipbuilders. His grandfather George Sinclair was an innovative naval architect who got the paravane, a mine sweeping device, to work. George Sinclair's son, George William "Bill" Sinclair, wanted to take religious orders or become a journalist. His father suggested he train as an engineer first; Bill became a mechanical engineer and remained in th…

Wikipedia · Text under CC-BY-SA license


FIRST WOLVES NOW GRIZZLIES

Wyoming wants US to end grizzly bear protections


Wyoming will ask the federal government to remove its protections for grizzly bears in the Yellowstone region. If approved, it would potentially allow hunting of the big bruins in certain areas (Sept. 16)




Thursday, September 16, 2021

In remote Indian village, teacher turns walls into blackboards to close school gap

By Rupak De Chowdhuri 
© Reuters/RUPAK DE CHOWDHURI Children use microscopes as they attend an open-air class outside houses with the walls converted into black boards at Joba Attpara village

PASCHIM BARDHAMAN, (INDIA), (Reuters) - In a small tribal village on the eastern tip of India, an enterprising teacher has turned walls into blackboards and roads into classrooms, trying to close the gap in learning brought on by prolonged school shutdowns in the country
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© Reuters/RUPAK DE CHOWDHURI Children use laptops in an open-air class outside a house with the walls converted into black boards at Joba Attpara village

Deep Narayan Nayak, 34, a teacher in the tribal village of Joba Attpara in Paschim Bardhaman district of the eastern state of West Bengal, has painted blackboards on the walls of houses and taught children on the streets for the past year. The local school shut down after strict COVID-19 restrictions were imposed across the country in March 2020.
© Reuters/RUPAK DE CHOWDHURI Deep Narayan Nayak teaches children how to use microscope in an open-air class outside the houses with the walls converted into black boards at Joba Attpara village

On a recent morning, children wrote on one such wall with chalk and peered into a microscope as Nayak watched over them.

"The education of our children stopped ever since the lockdown was imposed. The children used to just loiter around. The teacher came and started teaching them," Kiran Turi, whose child learns with Nayak, told Reuters.

Nayak teaches everything from popular nursery rhymes to the importance of masks and hand-washing to about 60 students and is popularly known as the "Teacher of the Street" to the grateful villagers.

Schools across the country have gradually begun reopening starting last month. Some epidemiologists and social scientists are calling for them to open fully prevent further loss of learning in children
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© Reuters/RUPAK DE CHOWDHURI Children help their teacher Deep Narayan Nayak pull a rack of books during their open-air classes outside the houses with the walls converted into black boards at Joba Attpara village

An August survey of nearly 1,400 schoolchildren done by a scholars' group https://roadscholarz.net found that in rural areas, only 8% were studying online regularly, 37% were not studying at all, and about half were unable to read more than a few words. Most parents wanted schools to reopen as soon as possible, it said.

Nayak said he was worried that his students, most of whom are first-generation learners and whose parents are daily wage-earners, would away from the education system if they didn't continue with school.

"I would see children loitering about the village, taking cattle for grazing, and I wanted to make sure their learning doesn't stop," he told Reuters.
© Reuters/RUPAK DE CHOWDHURI A woman holding an umbrella walks past houses with the walls converted into black boards that children use during their open-air classes at Joba Attpara village

(Writing by Shilpa Jamkhandikar. Editing by Gerry Doyle)
Analysis: India may corner nearly half of global rice trade as exports soar to record

© Reuters/RUPAK DE CHOWDHURI FILE PHOTO: A worker collects boiled rice to spread it for drying at a rice mill on the outskirts of Kolkata

KAKINADA, India (Reuters) - India could account for as much as 45% of global rice exports in 2021 as expanded port-handling capacity allows the world's second largest rice grower after China to ship record volumes to buyers across Africa and Asia.

The world's top exporter could ship as much as 22 million tonnes of rice this year, or more than the combined exports of the next three largest exporters Thailand, Vietnam and Pakistan, said Nitin Gupta, vice president of Olam India's rice business.

"Along with traditional buyers, this year China, Vietnam and Bangladesh are also making purchases from India," he said.

India's exports in 2020 jumped 49% from the year before to a record 14.7 million tonnes, as shipments of non-basmati rice spiked 77% to a record 9.7 million tonnes.

India on course to dominate global rice trade in 2021 as new port capacity boosts shipment potential https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/ce/mypmnogrzvr/IndiaSEAsiaRice.png

In 2021, non-basmati rice shipments could nearly double from a year ago to 18 million tonnes, while premium basmati rice exports are seen steady at 4 million tonnes, Gupta said.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture projects global rice exports of 48.5 million tonnes in the 2021-22 season.

LOGISTICAL BOTTLENECK

Indian rice has been consistently cheaper than supplies from Thailand and Vietnam since last March, while global demand for rice has scaled record highs.

India rice export prices sustain steep discount to Southeast Asian prices since early 2020 https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/ce/xmpjoklwmvr/IndiavsSEAsiaRicePrices.png

However, limited infrastructure at Kakinada Anchorage, India's main rice port, led to persistent congestion and lengthy loading delays last year, prompting some buyers to switch suppliers.

India was offering a discount of more than $100 per tonne over other exporters, but much of the discount was wiped out by higher demurrage charges tied to the delays, says exporter Brahmananda Gudimetla.

To ease the congestion, the southern state of Andhra Pradesh in February allowed the use of an adjoining deepwater port at Kakinada for rice shipments.

"Vessel waiting period has gone down after the deepwater port started handling rice. Demand that could have shifted to other countries remained with us," said B.V. Krishna Rao, president of the Rice Exporters Association of India.

India exported 12.84 million tonnes of rice in the first seven months of 2021, up 65% from a year ago, according to provisional data from the commerce ministry.

At least one million tonnes of rice would be shipped from the deepwater port in 2021, said M Muralidhar, chief operating officer of Kakinada Seaports Ltd.

SHIPPING SHAKEUP


Despite extra port capacity, Kakinada's loading rate still lags well behind Southeast Asian ports due to a lack of dedicated rice-handling infrastructure.

"Here in Kakinada, it takes nearly a month to load around 33,000 tonnes of rice from the time we drop the anchor. In Thailand it takes only 11 days for the same quantity," says Fahim Shamsi, caption of a ship that was loading rice at Kakinada this month.

Strain on the Kakinda port has increased after the cost of shipping rice by container surged, forcing rice shippers to switch from containers to bulk vessels, said Gupta of Olam.

Kakinada can export an additional 2 million tonnes of rice if infrastructure was upgraded and the process mechanized, Rao said.

India's exports of non-basmati rice go mainly to African and Asian countries, while premium basmati rice goes to the Middle East, the United States and Britain.

(Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by Gavin Maguire, Robert Birsel)
The racial history of the 1928 Okeechobee hurricane


On September 6, 1928, the Okeechobee hurricane formed near the west coast of Africa. The storm ended up being one of the deadliest storms in Atlantic history. Okeechobee set many records, including being the only Category 5 hurricane to hit Puerto Rico. By the time the storm dissipated, it killed more than 4,112 people and caused $100 million (1928 USD, $1.51 billion in 2018) worth of damage.

Overall, the hurricane impacted areas from West Africa to Eastern Canada, including Cape Verde, Guadeloupe, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, Florida and Georgia.

© Provided by The Weather NetworkCourtesy of NOAA

On Sep. 12, Okeechobee's eye moved over Guadeloupe as a Category 4 storm. Apparently, the hurricane hit without warning and killed 1,200 people. It also left around 75 per cent of the island's residents homeless. In the town of Saint-François, only the police station was left standing as it was constructed with reinforced concrete.

Okeechobee destroyed around 85 per cent to 95 per cent of banana crops, 70 per cent to 80 per cent of tree crops, and 40 per cent of the sugar cane crop. After the storm, residents struggled to survive on the island.

© Provided by The Weather Network"Approximate area of the flood. Note: The Palm Beach County label is misplaced. North of Canal Point has been in Martin County since 1925." Courtesy of Wikipedia

In the U.S., Florida was severely hit, with a death toll of more than 2,500 people. Okeechobee also left thousands homeless in the state.

The hurricane got its name from the destruction it caused to Lake Okeechobee. Before the hurricane, the area received heavy rainfall, so when the storm hit, water levels were pushed even further.

The storm surge caused a dike to overflow, resulting in 6m-high floods. The floods swept houses off their foundations and subsequently destroyed them.

Houses were floated off their foundations and dashed to pieces against any obstacles encountered.

Though the hurricane led a path of destruction in Florida, areas in the low-lying Lake Okeechobee ground were the most impacted in terms of the death toll. Approximately 75 per cent of the people who died in that area were Black migrant farm works.

© Provided by The Weather Network"Aftermath of the hurricane in southern Florida." Courtesy of Wikipedia

Black workers also led most of the hurricane cleanup. The authorities in the area reserved the limited coffins for white victims and burned the Black victims in funeral pyres.

After the hurricane, a resident of West Palm Beach, Robert Hazard, started the Storm of '28 Memorial Park Coalition Inc. to establish recognition of the Okeechobee's Black victims.


To learn more about the 1928 Okeechobee hurricane, listen to today's episode of "This Day In Weather History."


This Day In Weather History is a daily podcast by Chris Mei from The Weather Network, featuring stories about people, communities and events and how weather impacted them.

Subscribe to 'This Day in Weather History': Apple Podcasts | Amazon Alexa | Google Assistant | Spotify | Google Podcasts | iHeartRadio | Overcast'
Moroccan cave yields oldest clues about advent of human clothing


By Will Dunham

(Reuters) - People may take the necessity and existence of clothing for granted, from shirts to pants to dresses, coats, skirts, socks, underwear, bow ties, top hats, togas, kilts and bikinis. But it all had to start somewhere.

Scientists on Thursday said artifacts unearthed in a cave in Morocco dating back as far as 120,000 years ago indicate that humans were making specialized bone tools, skinning animals and then using tools to process these skins for fur and leather.

The items from Contrebandiers Cave, located roughly 800 feet (250 meters) from the Atlantic coastline in the town of Temara, appear to be the oldest-known evidence for clothing in the archaeological record, they added.


Our species, Homo sapiens, first appeared more than 300,000 years ago in Africa, later spreading worldwide. The advent of clothing was a milestone for humankind, reflecting cultural and cognitive evolution.

"We assume that clothing was integral to the expansion of our species into cold habitats," said evolutionary archaeologist Emily Hallett of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany, lead author of the study published in the journal iScience.

The scientists found 62 tools made from animal bones and also identified a pattern of cut marks on the bones of three small carnivore species - a fox, jackal and wildcat - indicating they had been skinned for fur, not processed for meat. Antelope and wild cattle bones suggested that the skins of these animals may have been used to make leather, while the meat was eaten.


"Clothing is a unique human innovation," said evolutionary archaeologist and study co-author Eleanor Scerri, also of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.

"We use clothes in a practical sense, to stay warm, for example, or to protect our skin. We also use clothes symbolically, to express something about who we are, and they also meet a plethora of social conventions that articulate with our diverse global cultures," Scerri added.

The cave artifacts date to a time period when evidence of personal adornment and other signs of human symbolic expression appear at various archaeological sites.

Fur, leather and other organic clothing materials are highly perishable over time, and no actual prehistoric clothing was found at the cave. The tools were made during a period when the cave was occupied by members of our species from approximately 120,000 years ago to 90,000 years ago. The nature of the clothes they may have fashioned remains unclear.

Of particular interest were tools with a broad rounded end, called spatulate tools.

"There are striations on the spatulate bone tools that are the result of use, and the sheen on the ends of the bone tools is the result of repeated use against skin. Bone tools with this shape are still used today to prepare pelts because they do not pierce the skin, they are durable and they are effective at removing connecting tissues without damage to the pelt," Hallett said.

Until now some of the oldest evidence for Homo sapiens clothing was bone needles about 45,000-40,000 years old from Siberia.

The researchers suspect that our species had begun making clothing thousands of years before the date of the Morocco artifacts, though archeological evidence is lacking. Genetic studies of clothing lice by other researchers suggest an origin for clothing by perhaps 170,000 years ago in Africa.

It also is likely that Neanderthals, a close human cousin who entered Eurasia before Homo sapiens, made clothing, considering the cold regions they inhabited, the researchers said. They cited evidence for leather-working bone tools made by Neanderthals from roughly 50,000 years ago.


(Reporting by Will Dunham in Washington, Editing by Rosalba O'Brien)

Engels succeeded in showing the dialectical relationship between biological and cultural development. Once it became a part of mankind's necessary lifestyle, labour perfected the human hand and brain. But labour, or social production, also achieved an impetus of its own - an extension of, but a qualitative development from, biological evolution.
www.marxist.com/engels-human-development150600.htm
www.marxist.com/engels-human-development150600.htm

  1. The Part Played by Labor in the Transition From Ape to Man

    https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1876/part-played-labour/...

    Thus the hand is not only the organ of labour, it is also the product of labour. Only by labour,