Pope says 'never again' to tragedies like Armenian genocide

By sonkoh

A somber Pope Francis, "with pain in my heart," paid tribute on Saturday to the 1.5 million Armenians massacred in 1915, an event which he has labeled a genocide, risking Turkey's ire.

Francis, on the second day of his trip to Armenia, made an early morning stop at the Tzitzernakaberd, the "Genocide Memorial and Museum," a towering granite needle flanked by an eternal flame on a hillside overlooking the Armenian capital.

There, visibly moved, he took part in a prayer service along with President Serzh Sarksyan and leaders of the Armenian Apostolic Church.

"Here I pray, with pain in my heart, so that never again will there be tragedies like this, so that humanity does not forget and knows how to overcome evil with good," he wrote in the guest book in Italian.

On Friday night in a speech to the president, the government and diplomats, Francis departed from his prepared text to use the word "genocide," a description that infuriated Turkey when he said it a year ago.
As of Saturday morning there was no official reaction from Turkey, which last year recalled its ambassador to the Vatican after the pope used the 'genocide' term. The envoy was kept away for 10 months.
Turkey accepts many Christian Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire were killed in clashes with Ottoman forces during World War One, but contests the figures and denies the killings were systematically orchestrated and constitute a genocide. It also says many Muslim Turks perished at that time.
"There is no reason not to use this word in this case," Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi told reporters on Friday night. "The reality is clear and we never denied what the reality is."
At the Saturday morning ceremony, Francis chatted with descendants of Armenian orphans who were sheltered at the papal summer residence south of Rome at the start of the 20th century.
"May God grant the beloved Armenian people and the entire world peace and consolation. May God protect the memory of the Armenian people. Memory should not be diluted or forgotten. Memory is a source of peace and the future," he wrote in the guest book.

After the memorial service the pope flew to say a Mass in the provincial city of Gyumri, near the border with Turkey and within sight of Mount Ararat, where the Bible says Noah's Ark landed after the Great Flood.

Pope Francis (C) and Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II (R) leave at the end of a mass at Vardanants Square in Gyumri, Armenia, June 25, 2016.

Reuters/Alessandro Bianchi

 

Comrade nursing wounds after being caught stealing sukuma wiki

By Reuben Wanyama

A man at the suburbs of Moi university commonly referred to as "the stage"  is nursing wounds after he was roughed up by a furious mama mboga  who caught him stealing kales (Sukuma wiki) at her shed (kibanda).

It is alleged that the young man surnamed Ouma, was yesterday evening at 8.00 pm caught red handed stealing sukuma wiki after he noticed that the kibanda was unattended, the woman raised an alarm and the neighbouring mama mbogas responded quickly and got hold of the man who was beaten thoroughly.

Upon being grilled on why he was stealing, the man gave a lame excuse saying that he lacked vegetables to prepare for supper. This surprised mama mbogas' who could not understand how a student could steal sukuma wiki costing 10 bob.

After the mama mbogas' descended on him with kicks and blows, he was  rescued by his fellow comrades  and taken to Moi university dispensary where he is nursing his wounds.

LIFE AFTER CAMPUS

BY VINCENT
You've been in school for the good part of your life. What will your life be like now that you are graduating from campus? How will you adapt?
The transition from campus student to working professional affects almost all aspects of your life. Not only will you have to adapt at work, but you will also have to adapt to your new life outside of work. After graduating from campus, you may find it difficult to progress into the "real world." Here are some tips to help you out.
Make new friends. After graduation, you and your college friends may disperse to other states in order to pursue careers. Eventually, you may lose touch with even your closest of friends. If this happens, it is imperative that you build new relationships. Make friends with people you work with or get involved with
your community in order to meet new people.
Change sleeping habits. Once you enter the "real world," there will be no more staying up until nine in the morning. Nine o’clock will more than likely be the time you have to get up and get ready for work. Say goodbye to nap time too. With a standard forty-hour work week, you won't get to take five-hour naps anymore. Try to go to bed at a decent hour so you will be refreshed for work. You should try to get around eight hours of sleep per night.
Purchase work attire. Transitioning from a college student to a working professional means trading in those torn jeans and sneakers for more appropriate attire. If you want to be seen as a professional, you have to look the part. Save the t-shirts for the weekend and invest in a business appropriate wardrobe to wear through the week.
Be prepared for entry-level jobs. Even though you have a degree, don't expect to have the perfect job and bring in a huge paycheck. A large number of the jobs available to new grads are entry-level. These jobs often require long hours, low pay, and hard work. Most employers want to see all employees start at a certain level in order to better understand the business. Working hard at this entry-level job will show your employer that you are dedicated and thus open up new doors for you.

Knowing what to expect after graduation and following some of these guidelines should help launch your post campus life on a positive note. The transition into the "real world" may be shocking at first, but you will become acclimated to it after a while. Good luck!

Top website domains are vulnerable to email spoofing

A security firm found lax use of email authentication systems by more than half of the world's top websites

By Muthusi Mutinda

Don't be surprised if you see spam coming from the top websites in the world. Lax security standards are allowing anyone to "spoof" emails from some of the most-visited domains, according to new research.

Email spoofing -- a common tactic of spammers -- basically involves forging the sender's address. Messages can appear as if they came from Google, a bank, or a best friend, even though the email never came from the actual source. The spammer simply altered the email's "from" address.

Authentication systems have stepped in to try and solve the problem. But many of the top website domains are failing to properly use them, opening the door for spoofing, according to Sweden-based Detectify, a security firm.

The company analyzed the top 500 websites ranked by Alexa and found that 276 of the domains are vulnerable as a result, it said in a blog post on Monday.

Of those vulnerable, 40 percent were news and media sites, and 16 percent were software-as-a-service sites, Detectify said in an email.

A common way these domains are trying to prevent email spoofing is through a validation system called Sender Policy Framework or SPF. It essentially creates a public record, telling the internet which email servers are allowed to use the domain. Ideally, any messages impersonating the domain will be detected as spam and rejected before delivery.

In practice, however, the system can often come up short. The SPF will filter out spam emails best when on the so-called "hardfail" setting, but many website domains decide to implement the SPF at the "softfail" level. Although this will flag any forged emails as suspected spam, the messages will still be sent out to the recipient.

Companies in charge of the website domains do this to avoid losing legitimate emails that might be falsely flagged, said John Levine, a long-time email infrastructure consultant.

"There are a lot of ways to send mail legitimately, and SPF can only describe some of them," he added.

Email providers such as Gmail can also skip marking any messages as spam, even if an SPF system softfail was used, Detectify said.

The 276 web domains found vulnerable were using no SPF system or had set their SPF system on softfail. Others had misconfigured their email validation systems to do nothing when detecting spam, Detectify said.

Companies in charge of these domains are either unaware of the problem, or assume they're already protected, Detectify said. Enacting better email validation systems can also be complicated, and some companies don't see it as a priority.

"Many people falsely think they're protected using SPF only," Detectify added. The security firm is advising companies use a newer email validation system, called DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance) to prevent the problem.

DMARC is gaining wider adoption in the IT industry, including from Yahoo and Google. The protocol is essentially designed to streamline the process of email spoofing detection, but still not everyone is using it.

Detectify's research found that only 42 percent of the top 500 sites in the world use DMARC.

Although DMARC is "far from foolproof," the system has been effective in preventing email-based attacks, Levine said.

For instance, phishing attacks against Paypal users may have dropped as a result of email providers adopting DMARC, security firm Kaspersky Lab said in 2015

Embrace person's with disabilities.....

By Reuben Wanyama

It saddens me to see a number of disabled person who are holders of Degrees Masters and PHDs certificates still moving from pillar to post in search of employment. It angers me when I see persons with disability being locked up in rooms because people are ashamed of them and see them as outcasts. It makes me cry when I see persons with disability being victims of rape and there is no justice for them. It breaks my heart completely when I see the discrimination persons living with disability go through here in Kenya. Sometimes I ask myself where our humanity is. Aren’t they human beings? Don’t they breathe the same air we do breathe?

It’s a shame that even after the provision by constitution, persons with disability are still not treated with dignity and respect, they still don’t have reasonable access to all places, public transport and information, they cannot access educational institutions and facilities for persons with disabilities and finally they cannot access materials and devices to overcome constraints arising from the person’s disability.

Most people with disability don’t know their rights.  They lack awareness and knowledge of their rights and don’t know where to go if they feel their rights is being violated.  Poor education opportunities, limited accessible information, lack of control over their own lives, limited support, limited means of communication for them to communicate to others has contributed to lack of knowledge about their rights.

Just because one is disabled it doesn’t make him or her to be less human. We have to understand that it not disability that defines a person and when we judge them based on their disability then we miss out their abilities, beauty and uniqueness. Their ability is stronger than their disability and we need to give persons with disability a chance since every person deserves a chance to reach his or her full potential. Let’s change our bad attitude towards persons with disability and be kind to them because kindness is a language the deaf can hear and the blind can see.

Campus foods with high demand

By Reuben Wanyama

Surviving through the semester could be one of the toughest times for a student more so, when any rumors concerning HELB are not forthcoming because the application was just done the other week and it would take not less than 3 months for Ringera to respond. This time of the semester, you pass by your favorite sukuma wiki spot only to be told ‘customer your late come early tomorrow’.

You come the next day thirty minutes earlier and the same answer resurfaces. You ask yourself what’s happening .Why does vegetables deplete so fast of late? And the answer is ‘demand is high’. Comrades turn into being herbivorous then you realize heaven has broken lose. During that period, the following foodstuffs are like gold, everyone hunts for them and the demand curve shoots high. Vegetables such as sukuma wiki, cabbage and spinach are rare to find in the stalls.

Comrades throng at these vegetable outlets and book everything .Parents also having hard time balancing between sending you money and paying school fees. In every ten students, seven could be adding vitamins with vegetables to a point where the indigenous types resurface. Corridors are smelling omena it’s like everyone is striking by cooking them. Some call home and make their order as some depend on the little amount supplied by the locals .Even those who swore not to eat them move up and down seeking cooking tutorials .everyone wishes to ask the academics director when HELB is coming.

Eggs, as much as rumors have it that they causes low libido, people still go for them without any second thought. Most people would serve it with vegetables and ugali and at that time of the semester it’s one of the best meals. Those cheeky and cunning ladies who claim they never take dagaa because they fear their so called pseudo socialite reputation will get ruined stock them you would think they are planning to start an egg deport.
Potatoes; this staple food for most families from central Kenya doesn’t miss customers, it’s preferred because you easily get full if you want to take an ugali break. You serve it with rice and call it a meal. Prices shoot and every potato lover complain all the way from the market to the room. Business explains it all the relationship between demand, prices and quantity. Some ladies would even make their own French fries to quench their insatiable appetite for chips.

Nodules; lazy ladies love nodules because they are easy to prepare and are cheap. They go from as low as twenty shillings served with rice and they call it a meal. Most of my male friends say they would rather go hungry than take nodules. “If your lady makes you nodules more so for supper, they fail the wife material test” so they say. The cycle goes on and on till sponsors or parents earn salaries, loans mature thanks to M-shwari, KCB M-pesa And HELB.

Google’s Robotics Division Reveals Its Latest Monstrosity

Boston Dynamics, the robotics company that is, for now, owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is perhaps best known for its terrifyingly human-like and animal-like robots, which have been caught outdoors on video walking down a snowy hill on two legs or frolicking about outside.
Now, Boston Dynamics has unveiled its latest bionic creation: an all-electric version of its Spot robot, called the SpotMini. SpotMini has four legs and an attachable elongated neck, which can gracefully and delicately move objects around. The dystopian household pet is featured in the company’s latest video traipsing around the house, helping load the dishwasher, walking up a flight of stairs, and ultimately wiping out on a banana peel, cartoon-style.
you can view the video here
https://youtu.be/tf7IEVTDjng
Earlier this year, Google hung up the for-sale sign on Boston Dynamics, and for now, it’s still the owner. The robotics upstart was part of a group of companies called Replicant that Google bought in 2013. Boston Dynamics had reportedly languished in the absence of Andy Rubin, who joined Google when it acquired his start-up, Android, and oversaw Google’s robotics division until he left the company late in 2014. Last year, Google consolidated Replicant into Google X’s lab—the part of the company responsible for Google’s audacious “moonshots.” Google never found new leadership for the division, however, and Google and Alphabet ultimately decided only to invest resources and time on more practical projects that would generate returns and get products to market. Now, Boston Dynamics’s potential buyers reportedly include automaker Toyota and other Google rivals like Amazon. Hopefully one of its suitors can give SpotMini a good home.  
Courtesy of 
HIVE
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/06/google-boston-dynamics-reveals-spotmini-robot

BitTorrent Now music and video streaming app launches on Android

The name BitTorrent conjures up the specter of piracy, but the BitTorrent the company has been working on a few legitimate ventures based on the same peer-to-peer technology that lets you download the latest Game of Thrones. The newly launched BitTorrent Now is a music and video streaming platform aimed mostly at independent artists you're probably not familiar with.

Everything available in BitTorrent Now is supposed to be provided by the content creator—it's not a platform for piracy. It's also not entirely free. A lot of the content in BitTorrent Now will be free, but some of it will be supported by ads or require payment to access. BitTorrent is using its "Bundle" format for paid content. You can usually get a few files for free, then essentially pay for access to a torrent that has the premium content. The artists can set a minimum price for their Bundles, but you can pay more if you want.

All the "torrent" parts of BitTorrent are transparent to the user. You open the app (Android now, iOS soon) or the website and just start streaming music. In the future, BitTorrent Now could include more content like VR. You can sign in with Google, Facebook, or an email. The app seems bogged down at the moment, but it's launch day. I guess bugs happen.

MUST WE RIOT

By willy kiprono

 

I am left wondering if the only language that Moi University administration understands in regard to academic trips is demonstration.

The same behavior has been used by the government in dealing with teachers’ strikes and the varsity administration is embracing the ‘norm’ wholeheartedly.

Students pursuing different courses end up resolving to demonstration due to laxity of either the finance office or person in charge to get the cheque needed for that trip.

It is a shame that an institution of higher learning where dialogue is usually emphasized as a vital conflict resolution method only understands the opposite. Most students are left speculating if they must be ‘Sossions’ so that they can go for an educational excursion they have fully paid for.

Fourth years in the department of Linguistics and Foreign languages on late last year had to riot outside their Dean’s office awaiting for a cheque that had taken too long to be signed. This is after their trip was postponed for the second time and no official communication had been given on Monday; the same day they were to leave for their academic trip.

Barely a month before then, students from the school of Business did the same and they were promised a refund of their money, and on Friday last week, the admin bowed to their demands. History will prove me right that the previous group of LMC and Economic students did the same and they even locked up some varsity workers in the administration block.

It’s very ironical that one cannot do exams without fully paying their school fees in full yet the same effect is not applied in a field.

The varsity should tell us if we must follow KNUT and KUPPET way so that we can go for a trip on a course that were have registered and fully paid for.

Varsity student in trouble after mismanaging pocket money

By Reuben wanayama

A Moi University student has left his fellow comrades in rude shock after he carelessly spent Ksh. 14,000 under unclear circumstances on a single day. The continuing student now pirates at his friends. Sources privy to this information reveal that the student was given pocket money by his parents to cater for rental and other expenses since the university does not offer accommodation services to students who have not for it.

When the parents asked him, the young man lied that he had sent money to his fellow student who would secure a room for him and report at a later date.
“I have sent money to my colleague at Moi University to secure a room for me and I will report on a later date” said the young man.

Unknown to them, the young man had parted with Ksh. 5000 to give to her girlfriend, a high schooler who had been accused for misplacing school books.  To confirm whether the young man had indeed secured a room, he was escorted by his two siblings to the university.

The young man crafted a scheme and organized with a friend where he would feign to have secured a room upon arriving with his two siblings who had been sent to spy on him. The student is now living under the mercy of his generous friends lest he would be a squatter at mabs.

Counties Meet the "microcomrades"

By Reuben wanyama

When one gains admission into public universities, it is clearly stipulated in the rules that cohabiting in the halls of residence is a crime. Contravening this rule attracts punitive punishment from the administration. Whilst the aforementioned rule applies to date, there seems to have emerged a natural phenomenon, in the recent past that violates it word by word.

 Sources from two renowned public universities indicate that students who reside in university hostels have come to accept bedbugs or “microcomrades” as they are popularly referred to in the academic arena, as fellow roommates. In fact, word has it that these folks have even deliberated on the amount of blood that these “micromonsters” can suck from them in a given night. For those who don't know bed bugs, they are parasitic insects of the cimicidae family that feed exclusively on blood. Cimex lectularius, the common bed bug, is the best known as it prefers to feed on human blood.

Simply put, these are just crawling insects slightly larger than fleas. They are very active at night sucking the life out of you while sound asleep. Besides my googled definition of these “micromonsters” which might not paint a clear mental picture, here is a sneak peek of what these characters are known for:   When you kill them by the usual pressing between two hard surfaces, they produce a characteristic strong odor that is strong enough to send your better half scampering for the safety of their respiratory system.

They are so fast when sucking your blood such before that itchy feeling hits you, they have probably forgotten that they have just sucked blood. They are out to ruin your precious moments on earth.  A normal day for student loans residing in the University halls of residence consists of making endless trips to mama mboga to purchase supplements (read cabbage and Sukuma wiki) to replenish the blood donated to “microcomrades” if not thinking of ways to control the ever increasing population of these monsters.

 Just to  put the latter in perspective,  the grassy compound next to the hostels is covered with mattresses on a normal sunny day which would be mistaken for a bedwetting spree on the nights before but these are  “microcomrades” being accorded their fair share of vitamin D.

Moi university's Jairo Moses' supporters prove the strength of comrades power

By Reuben Wanyama

 It was business unusual for Moi university administration officials after a memo calling for the suspension of the academics director, Jairo Moses on 21st June under unclear circumstances. The news was met by the wrath of angry students who went ahead to prove that comrades power is stronger than Kenya power.
A memoir drafted by the Deputy Vice Chancellor in charge of Academics Prof Kimengi alleged that the director contravened section 7.4 group ii (I) unauthorized material in an examination room written on paper, section 7.4 group ii (I) copying from or attempting to copy form or making references to unauthorized materials in the examination room . 7.4 group IV (VI) obstructing the invigilator from carrying out his/her duties, 7.4 Group IV (I) carrying out his examination script out of the examination room.

 From these allegations, his REL 321 :RELIGIONS IN KENYA exam was to be cancelled, get suspended from the University for two academic years upon which he would be expected to sit for supplementary examinations of the said course upon resuming.

According to Jairo he only intervened upon an examination feud involving a lecturer and students who were allegedly caught in the act of cheating and pleaded with the lecturer to hand them new booklets so that they continue with their papers . “I never thought this would result into irregularity allegations directed to me “says Jairo.

 Perhaps Jairo would not have been the first director in service to be suspended as the latest case was that of George Bush who held the position of the Prime Director ( a position that was created as a result of election malpractice of the 27th SGC) and was suspended on accounts of giving unwanted information to the media. The late Mwalimu Doghana was also suspended among others including the current Kericho senator Aaron Cheruiyot.

According to experts, his suspension would have caused harm than good bearing in mind his massive political fan base and the current political status of the university ahead of next month’s 30th MUSO elections. The vibrant Moses whose commands masses at the institution can now smile after the matter was amicably solve upon realization that all the accounts were baseless and sheer innuendo propagated by a section who felt offended by his actions to demand results for students.