Latest news with #1992
Time of India
28-07-2025
- General
- Time of India
Illegal building to car park in protected Aravalis: NGT serves notice to Haryana
Gurgaon: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has taken cognizance of environmental violations in the ecologically sensitive Aravali forest area near Suncity at Sector 54 and issued notices to Haryana govt, forest department and pollution department, seeking clarification. The next hearing is scheduled for Oct 29, 2025. The tribunal was hearing a petition filed by a resident, alleging that more than 10 acres of Aravali land in Sector 54 have been encroached upon. The plea claimed several violations on the forestland, including construction of an unauthorised building and a parking lot, installation of illegal borewells and light and noise pollution. It also highlighted concretisation of natural stormwater drains and operation of an unlicensed commercial cowshed, which are in violation of environmental laws and the 1992 Aravali Notification. You Can Also Check: Gurgaon AQI | Weather in Gurgaon | Bank Holidays in Gurgaon | Public Holidays in Gurgaon Petitioner Vaishali Rana has sought demolition and removal of all illegal structures, a halt to further construction on the forestland, protection and restoration of the wildlife corridor in the area, and formation of a joint monitoring committee to oversee compliance and submit quarterly reports to the tribunal. "Remove the 1.5km unauthorised motorable road built through the forest and initiate ecological restoration. Seal illegal borewells and impose environmental compensation for groundwater misuse, sewage discharge, and waste burning. Protect and restore the wildlife corridor in the area. Relocate over 250 cattle housed in the unlicensed gaushala. Form a Joint Monitoring Committee to oversee compliance and submit quarterly reports to the tribunal," the petition filed by Rana pleaded. The petition details a series of complaints dating back to Nov 28, 2024, when locals first contacted the principal chief conservator of forests. A site inspection by the divisional forest officer followed on Dec 14. Despite verbal instructions to trustees running the illegal building in early Jan 2025 and multiple written complaints to forest and environment authorities, violations reportedly continued. Also, key actions were taken after the inspection. On Jan 17, 2025, a forest offence report (FOR No. 014/0519) was issued, citing construction of an illegal parking lot. On June 23, fresh representations were made to the deputy commissioner and state pollution control board, alleging ongoing violations. The petition alleged inaction and regulatory lapses, even after formal findings by forest officials. Rana, trustee of the Aravalli Bachao Citizens Movement, said, "A large new structure was built over the past two months, including concretised areas, metal sheds and a cemented parking lot, now spanning over two acres. Loudspeakers installed on the premises play amplified music throughout the day, disturbing wildlife in the surrounding eco-sensitive zone." Activists have also reported installation of high-intensity floodlights, disrupting nocturnal wildlife movement. Asked about the allegation, a forest said, "We will submit details to the tribunal on the matter."
Fast Company
09-07-2025
- Health
- Fast Company
A disease we thought was gone is roaring back—here's why
An infectious disease once eradicated in the U.S. is making a grim comeback this year. New CDC data reported on Wednesday reveals that the country tallied its highest number of measles cases since 1992. As of July 8, the U.S. has reported 1,288 cases of measles across 39 states. Of those documented measles cases, almost 90% are concentrated in outbreaks of three or more cases. The 2025 case tally halfway through the year already exceeds the post-1992 record of 1,274 measles cases reported in 2019. While the official measles numbers are alarming as is, any published number is likely an undercount due to the likelihood of unreported cases. A wildly contagious virus that poses a particular risk to children, measles was once considered a disease of the past in the U.S. due to widespread uptake of a safe, effective vaccine. The CDC declared measles officially eliminated in the U.S. in 2000, a milestone the agency's website still hails as a historic achievement attributable to a 'highly effective vaccination program' in the country. Of the 1,288 reported measles cases this year, 29% were children under age 5 and two-thirds of the reported measles infections were people under the age of 19. Of those infected, 92% were either unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status, while 8% had received at least one dose of the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine. Of the total cases, 13% resulted in hospitalization and three measles deaths have been reported so far. Clusters of measles outbreaks While cases have been documented across most states, a major measles outbreak in Texas sent case counts soaring this year. By early July, Texas had reported 753 measles cases, mostly concentrated in a Mennonite community in Gaines County, near the border with New Mexico. Gaines County is one of the least-vaccinated areas of Texas, with almost 14% of school-aged children skipping at least one vaccine dose during the last school year. Beyond major outbreaks like the one in Texas, measles is making inroads in places that haven't reported cases in years. North Dakota recorded its first case in more than a decade in May, when the spread of measles was limited to 11 states. When it gains a foothold in unvaccinated communities, measles infections spread like wildfire. The virus is extraordinarily contagious and can survive in the air hours after an infected person sneezes or coughs. An estimated 9 out of 10 non-immune people exposed to the measles virus go on to become infected – a rate that outstrips COVID-19, the flu and even the deadly Ebola virus. While vaccines are required for students in all 50 states, the majority of states let students opt out for personal or religious reasons, including Texas. Around the country, more parents of school-aged children are taking that out and declining vaccines in recent years. From 2019 to 2023, measles vaccination rates fell from 95% to 92%. That 95% threshold is important: A community is considered protected against the measles virus when 95% of its members are vaccinated. In Texas, kindergarten vaccination rates are now under 95% in half of counties around the state. National vaccination rates aren't declining in a vacuum. Vaccine skepticism – once a fringe belief in the U.S. – has become supercharged in recent years, with a proliferation of misinformation powering its rise. Political leaders have seized on worries about vaccine safety to sow political divisions and in some cases to cash in on the millions flowing to anti-vaccine causes.
CNET
04-07-2025
- CNET
I Brought My Dad Back to Life With This Phone. I Don't Know How to Feel
My dad died just after my fourth birthday in 1992. Being so young, I have few memories of him and my family has only a small handful of home movie clips, filmed in the brief window before he died. But I do have a selection of still pictures and in my testing of a new phone, the Honor 400 Pro, I found I was able to bring him to life using AI. Honestly? I really don't know how to feel about it. The original still image of my dad (left) and the AI-created video of him (right). Andrew Lanxon/CNET The phone is the new Honor 400 Pro and while it's broadly a decent handset, it packs a tool that uses AI (powered by Google's VEO-2 model) to turn any image into a 5-second video. I was skeptical when I read the press release about it (as I usually am), but I found it genuinely fascinating to use. Here's how it works. You open the tool within the gallery app, choose your source image from any picture you have in your camera roll and hit go. It takes about a minute to analyze the image but then that picture suddenly springs to life, like a magical picture from the world of Harry Potter. Don't like the result? Simply tell it to generate again and you'll get a slightly different outcome. The original still image. Andrew Lanxon/CNET The AI-created video version (converted into a lower-quality gif format). Andrew Lanxon/CNET I've tried it on various images with mixed results. Sometimes it's pretty low-key (an image of someone reading a book simply resulted in them turning a page), while other times it goes weirdly hard. I loaded in a picture of a family of sheep on a Scottish island that I shot on Kodak Gold film (seen just below). In the moving AI version, there was suddenly a flood of sheep pouring through the frame before the camera angle cuts to an aerial view of a whole flock running across a meadow. I think that's what the kids call "extra." Ditto when I ran it on a picture of my cat and it threw in bizarre-looking titles for some baffling reason (seen further down). The original still image of this family of sheep. Andrew Lanxon/CNET The AI-created video version (converted into a lower-quality gif format). Andrew Lanxon/CNET But then I went another way. I've had my dad's photo on my shelf for decades. It shows him onstage playing bass in his band. It's an image I love for many reasons, but chiefly because I'm a musician myself and I've always liked that we've had that in common. But that one picture is all I've seen of him performing. I certainly never went to a show and I don't believe any video footage of him playing exists. Until now, that is. I fed the image into the app and with a certain sense of trepidation hit go. I waited for it to process and then suddenly there he was: My dad, moving around, jamming on his bass, visibly getting into the spirit of the performance. It transformed this small black and white picture I've treasured for so long into something more. Something alive. It actually made me quite emotional. But then another part of my brain spoke up. This isn't my dad. It's not him moving and vibing with the music. Not really. It's what Google's algorithm imagines he'd do. In many ways it's like he's a marionette being grotesquely controlled by some invisible puppeteer, trying to give the impression of lifelike movement. I ran it a few more times to see what options it would give but each one was basically a minor variation on him swaying and bopping while playing the bass. To be fair, the AI did a great job here. It looks realistic, with the shadows moving just right, the microphone staying in place and his hands actually looking like they're specifically playing a bass guitar. It's also still in black and white, with the film grain and various signs of aging to the image still present. The original image of my lovely cat Toulouse. Andrew Lanxon/CNET What the hell is this? Andrew Lanxon/CNET I think that made all the difference to me as it really did give me the impression of what he might have looked like on stage. I didn't have to squint to ignore any strange errors or random other elements the AI could have thrown in. Every time it produced a gentle clip of my dad playing his music. So I remain split in how I feel. On the one hand it's kind of gross in how it puppets a deceased loved one like this, based solely on Google's "best guess" of what would happen. I showed it to my brother who seemed to have much the same stance as me: "I'm not sure I like it, but I also don't think I dislike it. It's kind of spooky." On the other hand it's injected life into a picture that I've treasured for decades and given me a glimpse into what my dad might have been like onstage. And I liked seeing that, even if it's not exactly real. It's definitely not a perfect solution for me, and if I want to really remember him I'd rather turn to our actual home movies than AI-created imagery. But maybe AI tools like these will eventually bring real comfort to the many people in this world with passed loved ones, who right now only have a handful of static images to hold on to. And I'd like to think that, for all AI's faults, maybe this is one way it can do some good.
The Guardian
30-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Beat the Lotto review – how a small-time accountant tried to outwit Ireland's national lottery
Harking back to a simpler, more innocent, less gambling-saturated era, this Irish documentary tells the story of how a syndicate of entrepreneurs and semi-professional gamblers tried to game the Republic of Ireland's national lottery in 1992. Mustachioed ringleader Stefan Klincewicz, interviewed here, looks exactly like the kind of provincial accountant he originally was, neither a smooth master criminal nor a geeky Moneyball-style statistical genius. Klincewicz merely worked out that the capital needed to buy a ticket for every possible combination of the six numbers in the Lotto game would cost less than IR£1m. That strategy would significantly lower the 1 in 2m odds a punter usually faced, but only if they could manage to buy all the tickets needed. When a rollover weekend came around, making the pot worth the gamble, Klincewicz and his micro army of chancers, including teenage daughters and friends press-ganged into the effort, went to work. But the accordion-playing head of the national lottery at the time tried to foil their scheme by limiting how many tickets individuals could buy at once. The concern was that the public would feel discouraged from playing Lotto if they thought syndicates would usually win. The director, Ross Whitaker, works his way towards the inevitable conclusion, with its mixed success, by deploying lashings of 1990s TV footage, the low-resolution cinematography as endearing as the pre-millennium fashions worn by the interviewees of the time. There are clips from talkshows hosted not just by Irish institution Gay Byrne, but some of the many others, prompting the thought that Ireland must have more daytime talkshows than any other world economy of comparable size. But there is not much going on here in terms of wider contextualisation or deeper themes, just a very meat-and-potatoes, TV-friendly story of a scam played, as nearly everyone says, for 'the craic'. And the money, of course. Beat the Lotto is in Irish and Northern Irish cinemas, and Bertha DocHouse, London, from 4 July.
Yahoo
19-06-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Magic explains why winning a gold medal at the 1992 Olympics means more than NBA or NCAA titles: "I finally got the chance to play with Michael and Larry"
Magic explains why winning a gold medal at the 1992 Olympics means more than NBA or NCAA titles: "I finally got the chance to play with Michael and Larry" originally appeared on Basketball Network. When it comes to winning, Magic Johnson's resume is a masterclass in greatness. Five-time NBA champion, three-time league MVP, NCAA title at Michigan State, Olympic gold medalist, and the face of the Los Angeles Lakers Showtime dynasty that shaped the 1980s basketball. Advertisement Johnson's trophy cabinet is practically a museum packed with accolades that define what it means to be one of the all-time greats. But for all the rings, hardware, and moments, there's one title that still stands above the rest in Magic's heart. And no, it's not the '80 showdown with the Philadelphia 76ers in which he pulled a 42-point and 15-rebound stat line to close out the series in Game 6. It's not his epic rivalry with the Boston Celtics all through the decade. It's not even the 1987 Finals when he hit the "junior sky hook" in Boston Garden. The one that meant the most came in 1992 — when he finally got to share the floor with his rivals instead of against them. "I think the Gold medal, because of this…" said Johnson, while quickly continuing to explain, "I finally got the chance to play with Michael and Larry." Magic crossed off the final thing on his basketball bucket list By the time the 1992 Olympics rolled around, Magic had already announced his retirement from the NBA due to his HIV diagnosis. But when the call came to be part of Team USA's first-ever roster made up of professional players, he didn't hesitate. Advertisement That team wasn't just great — it was mythical, stacked with legends like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Scottie Pippen, David Robinson, and John Stockton, all anchored by Magic Man at point guard, orchestrating the game as the floor general of a squad that is still considered the best assembly of hoopers ever to walk on the hardwood. "On my bucket list, I've always wanted to just throw a pass to both of those guys. Like a no-look pass, lick coming down the middle. I'm coming down and there is Larry in the corner, just no-look him really fast and let him shoot that beautiful jump shot. And then Larry talks trash, I love that, he talks trash…. And then Michael coming down the middle with the tongue out, Nothing like it," the Hall of Famer added. It was pure basketball joy. Truth be told, the games weren't even competitive — the Dream Team beat opponents by an average of 44 points. But it didn't matter because the magic wasn't in the score. It was in the connection between legends who once went to war against each other, now sharing the same uniform and writing history that is still talked about to this day. Related: "I don't think I should defend myself anymore, I'm done with that in my life" - Allen Iverson on why he's had enough trying to defend his public image Brothers before rivals In a sport built on competition, Magic and Larry were the fiercest of rivals. Their battles began in the 1979 NCAA championship game and spilled over into nearly a decade of NBA Finals drama. And yet, underneath the competition was something deeper: mutual respect that defined their relationship. Advertisement It's the kind of thing that only happens once every four years — if that. Three all-time legends wearing the same jersey, fully bought in, sharing the ball, and soaking in the moment. But in Barcelona, that's exactly what unfolded. They were rivals, yes — but in that summer, they became brothers in basketball. And for Magic, no ring, no MVP, and no banner could match that feeling. Related: "Yeah, they'll probably have to do something" - Bird says the NBA will be forced to move the 3-point line back if high volume continues This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Jun 16, 2025, where it first appeared.
