Sunday, July 29, 2012

Adult Vacations: Choose Your Cruise



The concept of adult vacations means something different to everyone, but one thing is certain: it means no kids. For most people, this means adding one of two things into the mix: somewhat stifled, "boring", intellectual pursuits... or sexual activity. If you're in the latter group, you might find that a selection of mature cruises best meets your needs. One of the main reasons that cruises are best of this type of entertainment is that once you're in international waters, American laws no longer apply. This allows for a lot of leeway when it comes to what can be done. This is exactly the kind of freedom many travelers are looking for. If you count yourself among them, all that's left is to choose which type of cruise you want to take.

Cruise Only
Many cruises centering around adult vacations don't bother with the details of actually travelling to a destination. If you're more interested in having a sexy good time on the ship and don't really care to expand your cultural pursuits at the same time, you might want to look for a cruise that just stays on the water. Many cruise lines are only concerned with getting their guests out into international waters so the wild times can begin. Stopping at a port would just be taking away from the fun. If you're concerned that such a trip might get a bit monotonous, you probably don't have to worry. These ships are dedicated to making sure you don't get bored.

Destination Oriented Cruises
So maybe you're on the other side of the coin. You want to have a fun time on the ship, but you would also like to come back and actually tell people you went somewhere on your trip! Adult vacations can take one of two splits at this point. Some will have the wild, no-rules atmosphere on the ship but will then take their passengers to a traditional port of call where everyone gets dressed, puts on their best public behavior, and tours the area like any other group of tourists. Others will actually land at an adults-only resort where the debauchery will continue unabated.

Non Stop Party
While most cruises advertising adult vacations are going to have some form of party on the ship; a dedicated party ship is another matter altogether. These cruises throw restrictions to the wind and let their passengers go buck wild. On these ships, nudity is more common than not, the alcohol will be flowing hard, and there will be plenty of entertainment and games meant to keep the party going 24 hours a day.

Sunday, July 22, 2012

A Look at Antique and Contemporary African Art

I just happened to read an article in the New York Times about a new exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, which features both traditional African masks and masks created of cast off items by contemporary African artists.

This article raises many issues that may be of interest. First of all it indicates that the accessibility to purely traditional African masks and art is becoming more limited, and that the majority of people entering the international art market are turning to contemporary art.

This is explained because of the availability of contemporary art as compared to the traditional arts which are rapidly vanishing. Even traditional functional items which have attracted collectors in recent years are now becoming scarce when compared to readily available works by promising young contemporary artists. Thus galleries are forced to follow this trend and are overwhelmingly showing contemporary works.

This raises more related issues.

Traditional artists, like those who have carved masks for generations for their own tribal ceremonies or who are working in genres that are identifiable as "traditional" no longer have a customer base among their own people.

Thus they have turned to providing masks and other cultural items for an export or tourist market for the past few decades. So-called "cultural purists" have objected to these items which they identify as "copies", as if Africa is frozen forever in a time warp and can neither go backwards or forwards.

IF these objects are no longer used in traditional ceremonies, what are these traditional African masters (and their heirs) supposed to do? Stop the only craft or trade they have ever known because their customers are no longer their neighbors?

This "purism" among the art community in the West has taken on ridiculous forms. Certain buyers of masks for shops in Western museums or galleries want proof that the mask has been "danced", so "dances" may be conveniently arranged so that the mask passes this first test of provenance.

A museum director of one of the leading museums in Los Angeles insisted that all the new masks be remove from the museum shop due to criticism from "purists" that these items are " fake".

I do not think that such a patronizing attitude exists in relation to other cultures as compared to African items.

Certainly museum shops cannot be expected to sell only "old" items, nor could their customers afford to buy them. This problem is easily solved with labeling.

When I owned African Heritage, I always carefully labeled items as to whether they were produced by a craftsman from the culture it represents and its approximate age.

However, if (for instance) an Ashanti AkuAbua (fertility doll) was carved by a Kamba carver in Kenya, it was so labeled and the price reflected this.

So just at the time that the old items are disappearing and there is no longer a ready market for them in Africa, the Western "cultural purist" comes along and tells them to stop work, that they should no longer produce these "new" items with no consideration at all given to the history and expertise of the maker or the quality of the objects he makes.

Furthermore this attitude is devastating to Africans who want to buy "traditional" items, especially the younger generation.

I think there should always be a place to show high quality items produced by master traditional artists and that there should always be some latitude for changes from the traditional base, to allow for the artist's own originality.

At the other end of the spectrum I am not complaining about artists who make masks from old plastic cans and camera lenses (like those displayed in the subject exhibition at MOMA).

Far from it, I think what has become known as 'Junk" art can be extremely artistic and clever, but is it art?

There are many different variations of "Junk" art now appearing in galleries.

The mammoth "hangings" created entirely of bottle tops and metal debris by Ghanaian artist El Anatsui are excrutiatingly beautiful and they are based entirely on Ashanti textile traditions, ie the famous royal Kente and Adinkira cloths worn for royal ceremonies.

These spectacular works of art have caused a stir in art circles and critics struggle with words for them.

And the "Mass Communications" (left image) metal sculptures fashioned by Uganda John Odochameny from the debris of the technological age (recent ones include the addition of cell phones) are more than intriguing and have found quite a following.

However, I do not mean to get away from attempts to concentrate on traditional forms, rather I applaud what Jones and Key and others have done and continue to do.

I always tell my visitors to African Heritage House, that if they want to collect and preserve and protect tribal art, now is the time to do it.

When I finished African Heritage House in 1994, one could find masses of items on the market of almost all the items on display in the house, now they are gone.


Sunday, July 15, 2012

A Look at Antique and Contemporary African Art

A museum director of one of the leading museums in Los Angeles insisted that all the new masks be remove from the museum shop due to criticism from "purists" that these items are " fake".

I do not think that such a patronizing attitude exists in relation to other cultures as compared to African items.

Certainly museum shops cannot be expected to sell only "old" items, nor could their customers afford to buy them. This problem is easily solved with labeling.

When I owned African Heritage, I always carefully labeled items as to whether they were produced by a craftsman from the culture it represents and its approximate age.

However, if (for instance) an Ashanti AkuAbua (fertility doll) was carved by a Kamba carver in Kenya, it was so labeled and the price reflected this.

So just at the time that the old items are disappearing and there is no longer a ready market for them in Africa, the Western "cultural purist" comes along and tells them to stop work, that they should no longer produce these "new" items with no consideration at all given to the history and expertise of the maker or the quality of the objects he makes.

Furthermore this attitude is devastating to Africans who want to buy "traditional" items, especially the younger generation.

I think there should always be a place to show high quality items produced by master traditional artists and that there should always be some latitude for changes from the traditional base, to allow for the artist's own originality.

At the other end of the spectrum I am not complaining about artists who make masks from old plastic cans and camera lenses (like those displayed in the subject exhibition at MOMA).

Far from it, I think what has become known as 'Junk" art can be extremely artistic and clever, but is it art?

There are many different variations of "Junk" art now appearing in galleries.

The mammoth "hangings" created entirely of bottle tops and metal debris by Ghanaian artist El Anatsui are excrutiatingly beautiful and they are based entirely on Ashanti textile traditions, ie the famous royal Kente and Adinkira cloths worn for royal ceremonies.

These spectacular works of art have caused a stir in art circles and critics struggle with words for them.

And the "Mass Communications" (left image) metal sculptures fashioned by Uganda John Odochameny from the debris of the technological age (recent ones include the addition of cell phones) are more than intriguing and have found quite a following.

However, I do not mean to get away from attempts to concentrate on traditional forms, rather I applaud what Jones and Key and others have done and continue to do.

I always tell my visitors to African Heritage House, that if they want to collect and preserve and protect tribal art, now is the time to do it.

When I finished African Heritage House in 1994, one could find masses of items on the market of almost all the items on display in the house, now they are gone.


Sunday, July 8, 2012

Google Page Layout Algorithm Update

I just happened to read an article in the New York Times about a new exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, which features both traditional African masks and masks created of cast off items by contemporary African artists.

This article raises many issues that may be of interest. First of all it indicates that the accessibility to purely traditional African masks and art is becoming more limited, and that the majority of people entering the international art market are turning to contemporary art.

This is explained because of the availability of contemporary art as compared to the traditional arts which are rapidly vanishing. Even traditional functional items which have attracted collectors in recent years are now becoming scarce when compared to readily available works by promising young contemporary artists. Thus galleries are forced to follow this trend and are overwhelmingly showing contemporary works.

This raises more related issues.

Traditional artists, like those who have carved masks for generations for their own tribal ceremonies or who are working in genres that are identifiable as "traditional" no longer have a customer base among their own people.

Thus they have turned to providing masks and other cultural items for an export or tourist market for the past few decades. So-called "cultural purists" have objected to these items which they identify as "copies", as if Africa is frozen forever in a time warp and can neither go backwards or forwards.

IF these objects are no longer used in traditional ceremonies, what are these traditional African masters (and their heirs) supposed to do? Stop the only craft or trade they have ever known because their customers are no longer their neighbors?

This "purism" among the art community in the West has taken on ridiculous forms. Certain buyers of masks for shops in Western museums or galleries want proof that the mask has been "danced", so "dances" may be conveniently arranged so that the mask passes this first test of provenance.

Google Page Layout Algorithm Update - quicker to recover from?

Google has attempted in their recent algorithm update, Google Page Layout Algorithm Update to make webmasters happier; design matters! What is now required is a decent amount of content above the "fold" area on a page. So if you have a load of adverts on the top half of your page, and viewers have to scroll down to find the content, Google may now keep you from ranking in search results compared to your competitors who went out with a more Google-approved layout.

On Tuesday, Google's Matt Cutts announced that Google has launched an update to its Google Page Layout Algorithm Update. The algorithm was initially announced back in January, and essentially aims to rank higher, sites that have relevant pages with a good amount of content "above the fold."

What does this mean?

Google wants users to get to the relevant information FAST. If you and a competitor both have equally relevant content, but your competitor has it closer to the top of the page, and the user has to scroll down on yours to find it, chances are Google will give the edge to your competitor. That is if the Page Layout algorithm is doing its job. Of course, there are still over 200 signals that Google is taking into account, so it's entirely possible that you're doing enough other things better than your competitor that your page could still rank higher. But we don't know how much weight this particular signal gets in the algorithm.

Google talked about this update, Google Page Layout Algorithm Update, last year and wants relevant, regular updated content that is easy to find. If a viewer has to scroll down past adverts to find the content, then you'll get ranked lower in SERPS.

In January 2012, the latest update was scheduled.

"As we've mentioned previously, we've heard complaints from users that if they click on a result and it's difficult to find the actual content, they aren't happy with the experience," Cutts wrote. "Rather than scrolling down the page past a slew of ads, users want to see content right away. So sites that don't have much content 'above-the-fold' can be affected by this change. If you click on a website and the part of the website you see first either doesn't have a lot of visible content above-the-fold or dedicates a large fraction of the site's initial screen real estate to ads, that's not a very good user experience. Such sites may not rank as highly going forward."

"We understand that placing ads above-the-fold is quite common for many websites; these ads often perform well and help publishers monetize online content," he continued. "This algorithmic change does not affect sites who place ads above-the-fold to a normal degree, but affects sites that go much further to load the top of the page with ads to an excessive degree or that make it hard to find the actual original content on the page. This new algorithmic improvement tends to impact sites where there is only a small amount of visible content above-the-fold or relevant content is persistently pushed down by large blocks of ads."

Initially, according to Cutts, the Google Page Layout Algorithm Update from January affected less than 1% of searches globally. "That means that in less than one in 100 searches, a typical user might notice a reordering of results on the search page," he said at the time. "If you believe that your website has been affected by the page layout algorithm change, consider how your web pages use the area above-the-fold and whether the content on the page is obscured or otherwise hard for users to discern quickly."

The Google Page Layout Algorithm Update affected about 0.7% of English queries.

How quick can you recover IF you've been hit?

If you were hit by this Google Page Layout Algorithm Update, it should be easier to recover from than some other Google updates (like Penguin, for example). That is, in theory. This particular algorithm takes into account your pages' layout every time it crawls the page, so you don't have to wait six months for Google to launch another refresh, for Google to see any changes you've made.

Cutts explains in the original January post, "If you decide to update your page layout, the page layout algorithm will automatically reflect the changes as we re-crawl and process enough pages from your site to assess the changes. How long that takes will depend on several factors, including the number of pages on your site and how efficiently Googlebot can crawl the content. On a typical website, it can take several weeks for Googlebot to crawl and process enough pages to reflect layout changes on the site."

Even if it takes weeks, that's still a great deal shorter than the length of time webmasters and SEO companies have had to wait for the latest Penguin refresh.


Sunday, July 1, 2012

Winning The Lottery and What To Do When You Win



There are a lot of people that play the lottery, but not so many individuals that have the ability to win the lotto. Quite a few players have won many times, which demonstrates they've got a talent for the lottery system. Several multiple-lottery winners possess systems for winning.

A lot of people could very well buy a ticket and win some cash, and take the money they won and call it a day. That is not really the best method to use, as consistent lottery winners have learned. In the event you play $1 and win $20, it's essential to put the entire twenty dollars that you have won back into the lottery to give you a chance at winning a bigger prize. Using this method, if you end up losing, you will have actually only lost that one original dollar that you used to buy that first ticket. This system has given some lucky winners multiple trips to the lottery prize office. Using your winnings to purchase more tickets will help lower your actual realized losses, much like if you buy a stock and it goes down your loss is not realized until you get out of that stock.

For frequent losers, and a lot of us will be at one time or another, it requires much more than dedication to overcome the challenges to succeed in the lottery. Consider the lottery just as if it were your job. Don't hesitate to apply more hours to understanding lottery game probabilities, to further improve your success. Gambling with an informed method creates an improved chance of winning bigger prizes.

Some say that you should treat the lotto like you should almost any other investment, instead of a game of pure chance. You just aren't going to just play a ticket here and there and give yourself a good chance to win whenever you play the lottery. You should put cash into a good lottery system to be able to have any realistic chance at being successful with the lottery.

Lots of lottery game winners have spent all of their winnings and ended up bankrupt and without a home. It is important also to know what to do when you win the lotto. If you wager appropriately, and don't spend most of your winnings, you will not have to bother about having any setbacks to your earnings. You might want to buy a few things, obviously, but don't spend all of your winnings.

Invest some of your winnings, as well as taking some of it to re-invest into your lottery investments. It is a good idea not to throw away your losing tickets. When you win the lottery, you can use the cost of all of those non-winning lottery tickets to help offset any taxes you may have to pay for the cash that you have gained from your lottery winnings. A few taxes may be taken out once you win, however it is not usually not a sufficient amount, and you do not want to owe the IRS if you have had several large lottery winnings.

Whenever you play the lotto, you should use common sense. Those who play the game more, have certainly increased the likelihood of success. You shouldn't spend any cash that you need for necessities, though. Your chances aren't going to be any better if you buy more tickets, nonetheless it does not hurt to buy more lotto tickets as long as that cash is not dedicated to your normal obligations.

To win the largest of the lottery jackpots, it's a must to better the odds in your favor. If you are a fully dedicated lottery gambler, it is possible to take even more steps to have a better odds with succeeding. You could use computer applications that analyze the most likely winning numbers that you can play. Nevertheless it doesn't make a difference whose systems you use or precisely what applications you make use of, there surely has not been a guaranteed approach to win the lotto.

Your odds of winning the multiple state lotteries like the Power-ball in the United States is approximately one in One hundred twenty million, so playing only one game a week will never guarantee that you will win anything at all. However life is full of risk, so you shouldn't let the odds frighten you away. As the saying goes, someone is going to win, and so it may as well be you. Stay positive after you learn how to win the lottery game more consistently as it is only a matter of time for you to hit the big one.

Picking lucky numbers that are relevant to you is a good method to better your chance to win. Have confidence in your self when you purchase your lottery tickets, and employ figures that you're most likely optimistic about. Another method that many people use that is not good for winning is with playing a common date, because that limits the opportunity you'll have to win by limiting the numbers you can choose from. You may win using that method, however the days and months are normally used, and you may have to divide the prize with other people who played the same numbers.

Lottery pools provide you an opportunity to win money without having to spend as much. A pool is where a group of people put money in to buy many tickets at once, greatly increasing the chances that you have to win. Plenty of businesses and other groups of people have lotto pools. You will have to share the money with the other pool members in the event you win, but you're going to get an obviously better probability of winning than if you just play a few tickets on your own.

When the lottery's top prize is unusually large, far more people purchase tickets, so it will be far more vital that you dedicate a greater amount of cash in that week's lotto, if your financial situation allows it. Pick the appropriate games to participate in should you wish to improve your chance of succeeding. Research the odds on every one of the lottery games before deciding what one to play. State lotteries, as opposed to multi-state lotteries, typically have a lower amount of entries, since you have to be in that state when you purchase your tickets.

If you see a lotto ticket that somebody else has left behind, pick it up. It truly is well worth the hassle it takes to check its numbers and see if it is a winner. That ticket may also be eligible for a second chance drawing.

Always be sure that you check and recheck your numbers on your tickets whenever you are checking to find out whether or not you lost. How would you feel if you had the winning ticket but did not claim it since you mistakenly thought it was a loser? And if your tickets did not win in that particular drawing, they may still be able to be entered into a 2nd chance drawing.

You should always sign your lotto tickets after you purchase them, even before you find out if it is a winner. The signature can help show that the lottery ticket is yours, just in case it is stolen or lost. Check your tickets yourself to see that you've won, instead of handing the lotto ticket to a worker at the lottery ticket store. There is a rising trend of store associates telling customers that their ticket is a loser when it actually is not. They then claim the ticket as their own.