This week is National Suicide Prevention Week. I just wanted to share some resources for anyone out there that may need help. Here’s some numbers you can call in a variety of different countries, and the SuicidePreventionLifeline is full of resources.
If you were affected by the Equifax breach, I’ve found these resources to be helpful in sharing with friends and family.
In the meantime, here’s hoping that this breach is the nudge you need to finally sign up for permanent freezes on your credit files. I’ve used them for years, and here’s how they work. You sign up (and pay some fees, because you knew it wasn’t going to be free to protect data that you didn’t ask these companies to store, right?) at Equifax’s, Experian’s and TransUnion’s websites.
This breach actually happened three months ago, so there’s a chance that your information is already being used. Check your credit report and make sure there’s nothing out of the ordinary happening.
If you do nothing else, place an initial 90 day fraud alert on your file. This is free and will require lenders to contact you if someone (including yourself) tries to apply for credit.
I’m here to tell you that if you’re an American, your basic personal data is already for sale. What follows is a primer on what you can do to avoid becoming a victim of identity theft as a result of all this data (s)pillage.
U2’s The Edge will be helping to raise funds via Music Rising to replace instruments lost in Hurricane Harvey:
Music Rising is raising money to help replace the instruments lost in schools affected by the devastation of Hurricane Harvey. We are taking donations through our partner the Mr. Hollands Opus Foundation. 100% of all donations go straight into our efforts.
It had a massive opening weekend, breaking records with its $123 million haul:
With a monster, $123 million opening weekend Warner Bros. and New Line’s It has delivered a record-breaking opening, breathing a little life back into the slumping domestic box office. The film has claimed the largest September opening, largest Fall opening, the largest opening for an R-rated horror film, not to mention the largest opening weekend for a horror film of any MPAA rating, and tops Open Road’s new release Home Again in second place by nearly $110 million. Overall, the film accounted for more than 75% of the combined gross for the weekend’s top twelve, and we’ve only just begun.
Come on, I get one really bad headline every once in a while.
Dan Goodin, writing for Ars Technica:
The breach Equifax reported Thursday, however, very possibly is the most severe of all for a simple reason: the breath-taking amount of highly sensitive data it handed over to criminals. By providing full names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and, in some cases, driver license numbers, it provided most of the information banks, insurance companies, and other businesses use to confirm consumers are who they claim to be. The theft, by criminals who exploited a security flaw on the Equifax website, opens the troubling prospect the data is now in the hands of hostile governments, criminal gangs, or both and will remain so indefinitely.
I cannot recall a previous data breach in which the breached company’s public outreach and response has been so haphazard and ill-conceived as the one coming right now from big-three credit bureau Equifax, which rather clumsily announced Thursday that an intrusion jeopardized Social security numbers and other information on 143 million Americans.
On August 25, Florida rapper XXXTentacion released his debut album, 17, which entered at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 chart. The music arrived amid online debate over the criminal case against the 19-year-old, whose real name is Jahseh Onfroy. Last October, prosecutors charged him with aggravated battery of a pregnant woman, domestic battery by strangulation, false imprisonment, and witness-tampering. […]
Now, Pitchfork has obtained a 142-page transcript of testimony by XXXTentacion’s reported victim, delivered over two and a half hours in January at a public defender’s office in Miami.
Sarah Perez, writing at TechCrunch:
Hulu and Spotify announced a partnership today that will see the two companies working together to market entertainment bundles offering both services which will be jointly sold through a single subscription plan. Initially, this bundle will be targeted towards U.S. college students and will cost just $4.99 per month – the same as Spotify’s existing student plan. The bundle includes access to Spotify Premium, the company’s on-demand music service, and Hulu’s “Limited Commercials” plan.
The upcoming Veep season will be it’s last:
Separately, both Louis-Dreyfus and Mandel say that as they mapped out the arc of the seventh season, not repeating themselves and staying true to the often daring twists of the story were paramount. “It was just a very natural thing,” Mandel says. “We don’t want to repeat ourselves or be boring. It’s bittersweet but it’s right.”
Batman: The Animated Series turned 25 recently. The Hollywood Reporter has an oral history of the classic TV show:
“As a kid, I had a very conservative Irish-Catholic upbringing. So when Bruce Timm asked me what I knew about Batman, I immediately mentioned the TV show and he screamed, ‘No, no, no! That’s not what we’re doing. Erase that!’ ” says Conroy. “He explained the dark, noir story and Bruce’s vow to his parents which leads to the dual identities. It was sort of Shakespearean tragedy, so I approached it like you would Hamlet or Edgar in King Lear.”
I was on a podcast talking about this show a few months ago, it really does hold up.
Colin Trevorrow will no longer be directing Star Wars: Episode IX. A statement has been released from Lucasfilm:
Lucasfilm and Colin Trevorrow have mutually chosen to part ways on Star Wars: Episode IX. Colin has been a wonderful collaborator throughout the development process but we have all come to the conclusion that our visions for the project differ. We wish Colin the best and will be sharing more information about the film soon.
My first vote is to let Rian Johnson direct another. If that’s a no, I’d love to see Ava Duvernay behind the lens.
Facebook Inc. is offering major record labels and music publishers hundreds of millions of dollars so the users of its social network can legally include songs in videos they upload, according to people familiar with the matter.
The posting and viewing of video on Facebook has exploded in recent years, and many of the videos feature music to which Facebook doesn’t have the rights. Under current law, rights holders must ask Facebook to take down videos with infringing material.
Dara Lind, writing for Vox:
The Trump administration’s announcement Tuesday, that it will end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program — removing deportation protection and work permits from nearly 800,000 young unauthorized immigrants — unless Congress passes a bill in the next six months to protect DACA recipients, isn’t a punt or a reprieve. It’s an opportunity to deflect, or share, the responsibility for what would be an unprecedented act in US history.
There’s never really been a time when a generation of people, raised and rooted in the United States, has been stripped of official recognition and pushed back into the precarity of unauthorized-immigrant life.
Beats have announced their new, over the ear, Studio3 wireless headphones:
Beats Studio3 Wireless headphones deliver a premium listening experience with Pure Adaptive Noise Cancelling (Pure ANC) to actively block external noise, and real-time audio calibration to preserve clarity, range and emotion. It continuously pinpoints external sounds to block while automatically responding to individual fit in real-time, optimising sound output to preserve a premium listening experience the way artists intended.
Taylor Swift’s new single “Look What You Made Me Do” has climbed to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 charts:
Swift has now officially climbed to the top — the top of the Billboard Hot 100, that is. With her new single “Look What You Made Me Do,” Swift has hit No. 1 on the chart, knocking Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee’s “Despacito” down from its 16-week reign.
Jon Blistein, writing for Rolling Stone:
Metallica, Logic, Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic and pop singer Halsey are among the various musicians set to participate in a new mental health awareness and suicide prevention campaign, “I’m Listening.” The broadcast company Entercom organized the initiative, which will include a two-hour radio special airing live from Seattle on World Suicide Prevention Day, September 10th, at 10 a.m. ET on all Entercom platforms. […]
Other musicians set to participate include Passion Pit’s Michael Angelakos, Alice in Chains’ William DuVall, Bleachers’ Jack Antonoff, Khalid, Disturbed’s David Draiman, country star Gary Allan and Phantogram’s Sarah Barthel. Seattle-based radio DJ, BJ Shea of KISW FM, will host the show.
