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Sunday, August 23, 2020

Jennifer Williams responds to Tami Roman’s hit on Tim Norman case: ‘Tami is classless’

‘I’m saddened a Black woman is tearing another one down,’ the ‘Basketball Wives’ star says in a response to cast mate Tami Roman

Tami Roman drew a sharp response from fellow VH1 “Basketball Wives” star Jennifer Williams after poking fun at Tim Norman‘s serious legal charges.

Roman spoke on Norman’s recent arrest in an Instagram video Thursday under her Bonnett Chronicles profile, which features video clips of her waxing humorous poetic about situations while wearing a hair bonnet and bathrobe.

Norman, who starred in the OWN reality series “Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s” faces murder-for-hire charges in the killing of his nephew over a $450,000 life insurance policy.

READ MORE: Tami Roman says ‘Basketball Wives’ ruined friendship with Shaunie O’Neal

Despite posting “May his family find peace and his nephew rest in Heaven” in the caption, she took an opportunity to talk down to her reality show foe Williams, who split with Norman in 2018.

“Jennifer, you escaped it girl… If he would do that to his nephew, bitch you didn’t have a chance,” Roman said in the video. “And he probably wouldn’t have got caught because no one would’ve gave a f–k.”

Williams, in a statement to Page Six, wasn’t pleased with the video.

READ MORE: Sweetie Pie’s owner charged in murder for hire plot in nephew’s death

“I don’t talk to Tami and I don’t know why she is making fun of a horrific situation where a life was lost.”

“Tami is classless, and it was done in poor taste while a family is trying to come to terms with the ultimate betrayal from one of their own,” she said. “That’s all I have to say about Tami’s tacky ass… With everything going on in the world and the climate within the Black community, I’m saddened a Black woman is tearing another one down.”

Norman allegedly hired Waiel “Wally” Yaghnam to perform the murder on 21-year-old Andre Montgomery in 2016, according to Riverfront Times.

Yaghnam, who was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud, helped produce numerous songs on Nelly‘s 2002 multi-platinum album Nellyville, including the hit single “#1.”

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Black-owned bookstores want action after influx in business

Phoenix’s only Black-owned bookstore received more orders for books on race relations in two days than it did since opening in September

PHOENIX (AP) — A renewed focus on social justice in the wake of police killings of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd has seen sales soar at Black-owned bookstores around the country as customers seek out knowledge from their own communities.

The stores have always served as a community space for Black people to gather and educate themselves and their communities about their culture and history.

Sales increased exponentially after calls on social media in June encouraged people to spend their money at Black-owned businesses amid national tension.

Ali Nervis, the owner of Grassrootz Books and Juice Bar, Phoenix’s only Black-owned bookstore, said in two days his store received 200 orders for books on race relations, more than all they had received since opening in September 2019.

“People have this sense to be educated on what is happening in the country and what led up to this point,” Nervis said of protests and community tension in Phoenix. “We carry a lot of books about social commentary, history and books written by Black authors. I think that is part of the reason why we’ve seen a dramatic increase in our book sales.”

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Nervis has since caught up with an increase in sales and has taken time to reflect on what is happening in society, like other Black leaders in the industry.

“It’s wonderful that Black people are wanting to support Black people — it’s not new, but support has expanded, interest has increased and more people have taken it on,” said Paul Coates, owner of Black Classic Press, a Black-owned publishing and printing company based in Baltimore.

“I’ve seen increases in demand before. There was a bump during the Civil Rights Movement and during the Black Power Movement. People were searching for information. There was interest around the time Roots came out too.”

“Roots,” written by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alex Haley, became a wildly popular nine-hour miniseries that gripped the country in 1977. Haley based the epic tale on his own family history from his ancestors’ enslavement though several generations to their liberation.

Black Classic Press has operated as a publisher for 42 years and a book seller for eight years, Coates said, adding that he has seen books help power movements for decades.

Donya Craddock, co-owner of The Dock Bookshop in Fort Worth, Texas, said she could attest to the correlation.

“Every time we have a community crisis, the bookstore is a place for people to vent on,” she said. “We have created a space for people to gather, and talk about their frustrations.”

She has always seen parallels with what is going on in the community and in the bookstore because it energizes people. “People want to share their emotions, people are hurt, and everybody don’t want to go to a bar believe it or not,” she said.

Craddock opened The Dock Bookshop with her sister, Donna, in 2008. The store serves to educate people about Black history and culture through books, in-person events and other programs. It is one of the largest Black-owned bookstores in the Southwest.

The owners not only want to educate their communities, but also encourage people to use what they learn to take action against systemic racism.

The owners of Turning Page Bookshop have said Goose Creek, South Carolina, does not have a large African American community, but they provide and serve surrounding communities, such as Charleston and Summerville since opening in June 2019.

“From June 2 until about July 25 we received from 75 to 150 orders a day,” said VaLinda Miller, who runs the store with her best friend Arrylee Satterfield.

She said some of the biggest sellers included “White Fragility,” “Me and White Supremacy” and “How to Be an Antiracist.”

Miller said she didn’t want people to just buy the books because they were popular, but to help them understand how the system has made them the way they are. “I don’t want you to stop learning after reading the book. I want you to take that book and go out and look for something else to listen to and learn from.”

There has to be some action that follows the education, Nervis said, adding that he is not optimistic interest will last much longer. “That’s why we continue to do what we do and ask for the support. Not just our bookstore, but everyone doing work in Black communities.”

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Lakers, California county to honor Kobe Monday for ‘Kobe Bryant Day’

Basketball and Kobe Bryant fans are celebrating the birthday of the Laker great for the first time since his untimely death earlier this year

Sunday, Aug. 23 was supposed to be the day Kobe Bryant celebrated his 42nd birthday.

It was supposed to be a day he could reflect on what he had to look forward to: his former team, the Los Angeles Lakers, making a playoff run for another championship and prepping his acceptance speech for the 2021 Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame ceremony.

Sadly, he never got the chance, as he, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others tragically lost their lives in a late-January helicopter crash. Still, those who knew him best continue to celebrate him.

Current Laker and four-time NBA MVP LeBron James fostered a close friendship with Bryant while battling it out over the years on the court and winning gold medals together as teammates on the 2008 and 2012 U.S. Olympic teams.

READ MORE: Kobe Bryant memorialized during Michael Jordan’s ‘The Last Dance’ docuseries

“A day doesn’t go by where I don’t think about him,” James told USA Today.

LeBron James (L) and Kobe Bryant (R) look on during a basketball press conference ahead of the London 2012 Olympics on July 27, 2012 in London, England. (Photo by Jeff Gross/Getty Images)

Lakers All-Star Anthony Davis also played with Bryant on the 2012 Olympic team. Bryant became an active mentor to him after that.

“Not a day goes by that we don’t remember him,” Davis said to the Los Angeles Times.

Davis and James, once opponents and now Lakers teammates, want to win the title in honor of Bryant’s legacy with the team he helped lead to five championships.

“Now we have the opportunity to finish this season off and make him proud,” Davis continued. “We know that’s what he would want. He would want us to go out there and compete and bring another championship home. Any time we step on the floor, we play for his memory.”

(L-R) Anthony Davis, LeBron James, Quinn Cook and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope of the Los Angeles Lakers reacts at the end of the National Anthem during a ceremony to honor Kobe Bryant before the game against the Portland Trail Blazers at Staples Center on January 31, 2020 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)

READ MORE: Lakers will wear Black Mamba jerseys to honor Kobe Bryant during playoffs

Monday, Aug. 24 has been designated Kobe Bryant Day by California’s Orange County commissioners, the county where Bryant lived with his family. This is in recognition of the numbers 8 and 24, which were Bryant’s jersey numbers during his 20-year tenure with the Lakers.

The Lakers organization will honor Bryant on that day as well, wearing Black Mamba uniforms for Game 4 of their playoff game against the Portland Trailblazers, though the game will be played thousands of miles away without fans in the NBA bubble in Florida.

“Black Mamba” was Kobe’s self-proclaimed nickname.

“We still wear 24 and 8 and the No. 2 with pride and remember how great they were,” James said in his comments to USA Today, referencing the jersey number of Bryant’s daughter, Gianna, who, like her dad, excelled at the game.

Kobe Bryant #24 of the Los Angeles Lakers and the Western Conference warms up with daughter Gianna Bryant during the NBA All-Star Game 2016 at the Air Canada Centre on February 14, 2016 in Toronto, Ontario. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)

Bryant’s devotion to Gianna and his three other daughters, Natalia, Bianca and Capri, was well documented. Lakers President Rob Pelinka, a close friend of Bryant’s, spoke fondly at Bryant’s memorial fondly about how much his kids meant to the basketball legend.

“He just loved his girls, and there was nothing in the world that meant more to him,” Pelinka said.

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Tensions heightened over fatal police shooting of Louisiana Black man

Activists in Lafayette, Louisiana are calling for an investigation after the third police-involved shooting in the city since mid-July

LAFAYETTE, La. (AP) — Community activists said they will present their frustrations and demand racial justice from the leaders of a Louisiana city on Sunday, following a night of violence that erupted after police shot and killed a Black man.

Dozens of people took to the streets of Lafayette on Saturday in response to the death of Trayford Pellerin, 31. On Friday night, officers followed Pellerin on foot as he left a convenience store where he had created a disturbance with a knife, Louisiana State Police said. Stun guns failed to stop him, and the officers shot Pellerin as he tried to enter another convenience store, still with the knife, according to a news release.

The shooting was captured on video, and the state ACLU condemned what it described as a “horrific and deadly incident of police violence against a Black person.” Both the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center quickly called for an investigation.

Saturday afternoon’s protest started peacefully, but violence broke out as night fell — leading to officers clearing the crowd with smoke canisters, Trooper Derek Senegal said.

Officials said at a news conference late Saturday that fireworks had been shot at buildings and fires set in the median of a road where demonstrations had taken place.

“Our intent is not going to be to just let people disrupt our town and put our citizens and our motorists and our neighborhoods in danger,” Interim Police Chief Scott Morgan said.

READ MORE: Black man shot 11 times as he walked away from police

Arrests were made, Morgan said, but an exact number wasn’t immediately available.

“We do support people’s First Amendment rights,” Lafayette Parish Sheriff Mark Garber said. “However, when it comes to the destruction of property, we are not going to have Lafayette set on fire.”

The activists attempted to attend the news conference but were “escorted out” because Lafayette Mayor-President Josh Guillory said it was private, Lafayette NAACP President Marja Broussard said. They planned to confront Guillory on Sunday at 5 p.m. at Lafayette City Hall.

Devon Tre Norman speaks at a vigil and protest, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020, in Lafayette, La., for 31-year-old Trayford Pellerin, who was shot and killed by Lafayette police officers while armed with a knife the night before. (Scott Clause/The Daily Advertiser via AP)

Activist Jamal Taylor said the demonstrators who caused destruction Saturday night came from out of town.

“They picked the wrong city to do this in,” Taylor said. “If you’re one of these bad actors that comes in and sets fires and throws rocks and pops firecrackers, you’re not welcome here in Lafayette.”

The activists also expressed discontent that leaders did not offer condolences to Pellerin’s family at the news conference.

“Josh Guillory is lower than a dog for that,” Taylor said.

Tensions surrounding the fatal shooting follow a global reckoning over police tactics and racial injustice that stem from the death of George Floyd on May 25 under the knee of a white Minneapolis police officer.

Protesters take to the street and block traffic at the intersection of Willow Street and Evangeline Thruway after a vigil held Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020, in Lafayette, La., for 31-year-old Trayford Pellerin, who was shot and killed by Lafayette police officers while armed with a knife the night before. (Scott Clause/The Daily Advertiser via AP)

National civil rights attorney Ben Crump said he was representing Pellerin’s family, and that he and Baton Rouge attorney Ronald Haley have begun their own investigation by interviewing witnesses.

“The officers involved should be fired immediately for their abhorrent and fatal actions,” Crump said in a statement Saturday.

Pellerin’s mother said her son was intelligent, shy and had sought therapy for social anxiety. Pellerin became anxious in groups and may have been frightened by the officers, Michelle Pellerin told The Advocate. He had sought professional help earlier this year, she said.

The family believes Pellerin may have been having a mental health crisis, Crump said.

Lafayette police asked state police to investigate — standard procedure in the state for shootings by local officers.

Rikasha Montgomery, who took a video of the shooting, told The Advertiser that a man holding what looked like a knife kept walking down the highway while some officers fired stun guns at him. Officers holding guns shouted at him to get onto the ground, said Montgomery, 18.

READ MORE: Louisiana Supreme Court refuses to review life sentence for Black man imprisoned for stealing clippers

She said they fired when the man reached the door of a Shell gas station.

A makeshift memorial lies on the ground at a Shell station, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020, in Lafayette, La., for 31-year-old Trayford Pellerin, who was shot and killed by Lafayette police officers while armed with a knife the night before. (Brad Kemp/The Advocate via AP)

“When I heard the gunshots, I couldn’t hold my phone like I was first filming,” she said. “I feel kind of scared about it. I’m traumatized. You’re so used to hearing about this, but I never thought I would experience it.”

The incident was the third shooting by Lafayette police since mid-July. State police said a man was critically wounded last month after being shot during an altercation with police. Another man was in stable condition after being shot during a burglary investigation earlier this month.

Haley told The Advocate that he and Crump will be seeking reform and policy changes in the police department as well as damages.

“We want policy changes as well, so that Ben and I are not in the living room with another family in Lafayette dealing with this,” Haley said.

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Trump’s eldest sister makes damning claims about brother in surfaced audio: ‘Donald is cruel’

Maryanne Trump Barry says Donald Trump ‘was a brat’ and ‘has no principles’ in a newly released interview

Mary Trump, with her best selling tell-all-book, has been the only relative of Donald Trump to criticize the president publicly.

That’s no longer the case, now that secretly recorded audio clips, featuring words from the sister of the businessman-turned-politician, have surfaced.

In preparation for the release of “Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created The World’s Most Dangerous Man,” Mary Trump, the president’s niece, interviewed her aunt Maryanne Trump Barry in 2018 and 2019. Mary Trump shared audio from the 15-hours worth of their conversation with the Washington Post to help corroborate claims that she made about her uncle.

READ MORE: Mary Trump says Trump is ‘virulently racist,’ has used racial slurs

In the clips, Trump Barry, 83, made damning statements about her brother.

“He was a brat,” Trump Barry, a former U.S. circuit judge, said of her brother, claiming she did his homework and “drove him around New York City to try to get him into college.”

Donald Trump prides himself on having an Ivy League education, touting the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania as his alma mater, but Mary Trump and Barry both question that merit.

The two say that Donald Trump attended a hand full of classes at the prestigious school, but attended different colleges, under nefarious circumstances.

“He went to Fordham for one year [actually two years] and then he got into University of Pennsylvania because he had somebody take the exams,” Trump Barry said.

Trump Barry even recalled Joe Shapiro, who she said took her younger brother’s college entrance exam, though this claim has not been verified, according to Washington Post.

READ MORE: College Cheating Scandal: Aunt Becky’s kids will be fine, but what about the deserving Black kids who never get a shot?

The statements, however, corroborate similar claims Mary Trump makes in her book, which was released in July. Mary Trump said her uncle, worried that he did not have the strongest grades to get into the college that he wanted, paid someone to take the standardized college admission test for him.

“To hedge his bets he enlisted Joe Shapiro, a smart kid with a reputation for being a good test taker, to take his SATs for him,” Mary Trump wrote. “That was much easier to pull off in the days before photo IDs and computerized records.

Those allegations come public in the midst of court rulings in the wide-reaching college admissions scam that led to charges against more than 50 people across the country. Lori Loughlin of “Full House” and husband Mossimo Giannulli, a fashion designer, on Friday were fined and sentenced to months in prison for helping their daughters pose as athletic recruits on their applications to get into the University of Southern California, Reuters reports.

In regards to his job as president, Trump Barry sharply condemned “what they’re doing with kids at the border,” in reference to the child separation policies the Trump administration enforced on families crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

She stated that his actions and rhetoric were only to incite his supporters.

“All he wants to do is appeal to his base,” Barry said. “He has no principles. None. None. And his base, I mean my God, if you were a religious person, you want to help people. Not do this.”

Trump Barry told her niece that the President was not to be trusted and has been narcissistic most of his life.

“Donald is out for Donald, period,” Trump Barry stated.

“It’s the phoniness of it all. It’s the phoniness and this cruelty. Donald is cruel,” she said.

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Hollywood Makeup Artist Gives Back to Community Through Nonprofit Triumphant Transitions

LaTrice L. Edwards of Triumphant Transitions

Triumphant Transitions Inc. was was founded by Gary, Indiana, native and Ball State University graduate LaTrice L. Edwards. It is a true revelation of purpose for the celebrity makeup artist and entrepreneur.

The impact of the organization’s service has resulted in client testimonials of increased self-esteem, job readiness, and improved relationships. Triumphant Transitions has also partnered in various community service efforts including: back to school rallies, spa days for Hurricane Katrina survivors, and wig drive sponsorships supporting the American Cancer Society.

It has served several hundred clients directly and indirectly, with grassroots efforts for 15 years. Clients have experienced its unique community and empowerment services in Gary-Northwest and Indianapolis, as well as Chicago. Triumphant Transitions has also supported African missions in Abuja, Nigeria, and the United Republic of Tanzania.

What made you start your nonprofit?

Triumphant Transitions Inc. is actually a God-given idea I wrote on a Post-it note one night 16 years ago. So it started from obedience to answer the call to serve my community. I want to encourage and empower those in need by putting God’s love in action through serving.

Why is it so important for you to give back?

I am really doing what I grew up watching my parents do. I always saw my parents serving in ministry, teaching, giving back to the community, helping our family and people in need. So, I guess you can say it’s in my blood, it’s in my DNA to serve and it’s important to keep their legacy going.  I also base the importance of serving on one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., which states, “Everybody can be great … because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.”

This quote is 1,000% true! It really doesn’t take much to serve. You can do it by volunteering, donating to a good cause, getting groceries or running errands for the elderly during this pandemic. When it comes to serving, a heart full of grace and a soul generated by love really are the best tools to start with.

What are some of the highlights of your organization in the last 15 years that you want people to know about?

Wow, there are so many wonderful memories through the years, from pampering women overcoming domestic violence, to empowerment workshops to aid those recovering from substance abuse, to being a triage organization during Hurricane Katrina in Illinois and Indiana, plus our community health events. As well as merging my career in film/TV with my youth empowerment program to supporting African missions and seeing girls in Tanzania in my empowerment shirts. However, I think my most favorite highlight is when a woman, who was a part of my very first program in February 14, 2005 and a client of the women’s shelter we served, noticed my mother and I at an event. I will never forget her excitement when she saw us. She reminded me of who she was and that she had been through my program a few years prior. After sharing her triumphant progress with us, she then hugged my mother and thanked her for having me. She said it was because of my mother that I am here to help women like her.

What are you doing to stay afloat during COVID-19?

I am actually doing what I always do … serve. Triumphant Transitions Inc. has operated on a volunteer/donation base over the last 15 years. Donations solely support our mission and projects, so COVID-19 really has not had a negative impact on the organization. If anything, it’s revealed and motivated me to address greater needs in the community and to expand my service projects beyond the Midwest region. In April, I started a COVID-19 relief initiative by feeding ER, maintenance, and security staff that worked the night shift in the Gary/Northwest Indiana region. In May, I did a community giveaway where we gave out diapers, wipes, masks, and sanitation products. It was during this event God revealed a greater need to me. The diaper giveaway was totally a “God idea.” I didn’t realize how scare diapers were in my community during this time. The residents were so appreciative. We will have our next diaper giveaway Aug 29. This time we are including household goods as well as partnering with other organizations.  I will do more as God leads me to do them.

 


Dr. Jessica Mosley is a serial entrepreneur who loves teaching fellow CEO women how to show up in their truth and power. As steward owner of MizCEO Entrepreneurial Media Brand, Sovereign Care Home Care, Sovereign Care Medical Training Center, and Deborah’s Place for Battered Women, Jessica is busy making moves that impact her community and those connected to her.



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A New Botnet Is Covertly Targeting Millions of Servers

FritzFrog has been used to try and infiltrate government agencies, banks, telecom companies, and universities across the US and Europe.

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A Fleet of Computers Helps Settle a 90-Year-Old Math Problem

By translating Ott-Heinrich Keller’s conjecture into a computer-friendly search, researchers confirmed a conjecture about seven-dimensional space.

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How to Rid Your Phone of Those Default Apps You Never Use

Even the best phones come with bloatware, preinstalled apps that take up precious storage space. Here's how to remove them and speed up your device.

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Police Want Your Smart Speaker—Here's Why

Requests are rising from law enforcement for information on the devices, which can include internet queries, food orders, and overheard conversations.

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What Causes Mascne (Face Mask Acne), and How to Treat It

Just in case you needed more to worry about, mask-related acne is also breaking out nationwide. Here's what's causing it and how to get it under control.

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Saturday, August 22, 2020

dplyr filter(): Filter/Select Rows based on conditions

dplyr, R package that is at core of tidyverse suite of packages, provides a great set of tools to manipulate datasets in the tabular form. dplyr has a set of useful functions for “data munging”, including select(), mutate(), summarise(), and arrange() and filter().

And in this tidyverse tutorial, we will learn how to use dplyr’s filter() function to select or filter rows from a data frame with multiple examples. First, we will start with how to select rows of a dataframe based on a value of a single column or variable. And then we will learn how select rows of a dataframe using values from multiple variables or columns.

Let us get started by loading tidyverse, suite of R packges from RStudio.

library("tidyverse")

We will load Penguins data directly from cmdlinetips.com‘s github page.

path2data <- "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cmdlinetips/data/master/palmer_penguins.csv"
penguins<- readr::read_csv(path2data)

Penguins data look like this

head(penguins)
## # A tibble: 6 x 7
##   species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g sex  
##   <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl> <chr>
## 1 Adelie  Torge…           39.1          18.7              181        3750 male 
## 2 Adelie  Torge…           39.5          17.4              186        3800 fema…
## 3 Adelie  Torge…           40.3          18                195        3250 fema…
## 4 Adelie  Torge…           NA            NA                 NA          NA <NA> 
## 5 Adelie  Torge…           36.7          19.3              193        3450 fema…
## 6 Adelie  Torge…           39.3          20.6              190        3650 male

Let us subset Penguins data by filtering rows based on one or more conditions.

How to filter rows based on values of a single column in R?

Let us learn how to filter data frame based on a value of a single column. In this example, we want to subset the data such that we select rows whose “sex” column value is “fename”.

penguins %>% 
  filter(sex=="female")

This gives us a new dataframe , a tibble, containing rows with sex column value “female”column.

## # A tibble: 165 x 7
##    species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g
##    <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl>
##  1 Adelie  Torge…           39.5          17.4              186        3800
##  2 Adelie  Torge…           40.3          18                195        3250
##  3 Adelie  Torge…           36.7          19.3              193        3450
##  4 Adelie  Torge…           38.9          17.8              181        3625
##  5 Adelie  Torge…           41.1          17.6              182        3200
##  6 Adelie  Torge…           36.6          17.8              185        3700
##  7 Adelie  Torge…           38.7          19                195        3450
##  8 Adelie  Torge…           34.4          18.4              184        3325
##  9 Adelie  Biscoe           37.8          18.3              174        3400
## 10 Adelie  Biscoe           35.9          19.2              189        3800
## # … with 155 more rows, and 1 more variable: sex <chr>

In our first example using filter() function in dplyr, we used the pipe operator “%>%” while using filter() function to select rows. Like other dplyr functions, we can also use filter() function without the pipe operator as shown below.

filter(penguins, sex=="female")

And we will get the same results as shown above.

In the above example, we selected rows of a dataframe by checking equality of variable’s value. We can also use filter to select rows by checking for inequality, greater or less (equal) than a variable’s value.

Let us see an example of filtering rows when a column’s value is not equal to “something”. In the example below, we filter dataframe whose species column values are not “Adelie”.

penguins %>% 
  filter(species != "Adelie")

We now get a filtered dataframe with species other than “Adelie”

## # A tibble: 192 x 7
##    species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g
##    <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl>
##  1 Gentoo  Biscoe           46.1          13.2              211        4500
##  2 Gentoo  Biscoe           50            16.3              230        5700
##  3 Gentoo  Biscoe           48.7          14.1              210        4450
##  4 Gentoo  Biscoe           50            15.2              218        5700
##  5 Gentoo  Biscoe           47.6          14.5              215        5400
##  6 Gentoo  Biscoe           46.5          13.5              210        4550
##  7 Gentoo  Biscoe           45.4          14.6              211        4800
##  8 Gentoo  Biscoe           46.7          15.3              219        5200
##  9 Gentoo  Biscoe           43.3          13.4              209        4400
## 10 Gentoo  Biscoe           46.8          15.4              215        5150
## # … with 182 more rows, and 1 more variable: sex <chr>

dplyr filter() with greater than condition

When the column of interest is a numerical, we can select rows by using greater than condition. Let us see an example of filtering rows when a column’s value is greater than some specific value.

In the example below, we filter dataframe such that we select rows with body mass is greater than 6000 to see the heaviest penguins.

# filter variable greater than a value
penguins %>% 
  filter(body_mass_g> 6000)

After filtering for body mass, we get just two rows that satisfy body mass condition we provided.

# # A tibble: 2 x 7
##   species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g sex  
##   <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl> <chr>
## 1 Gentoo  Biscoe           49.2          15.2              221        6300 male 
## 2 Gentoo  Biscoe           59.6          17                230        6050 male

Similarly, we can select or filter rows when a column’s value is less than some specific value.

dplyr filter() with less than condition

Similarly, we can also filter rows of a dataframe with less than condition. In this example below, we select rows whose flipper length column is less than 175.

# filter variable less than a value
penguins %>% 
  filter(flipper_length_mm <175)

Here we get a new tibble with just rows satisfying our condition.

## # A tibble: 2 x 7
##   species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g sex  
##   <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl> <chr>
## 1 Adelie  Biscoe           37.8          18.3              174        3400 fema…
## 2 Adelie  Biscoe           37.9          18.6              172        3150 fema…

How to Filter Rows of a dataframe using two conditions?

With dplyr’s filter() function, we can also specify more than one conditions. In the example below, we have two conditions inside filter() function, one specifies flipper length greater than 220 and second condition for sex column.

# 2.6.1 Boolean AND
penguins %>% 
  filter(flipper_length_mm >220 & sex=="female")
## # A tibble: 1 x 7
##   species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g sex  
##   <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl> <chr>
## 1 Gentoo  Biscoe           46.9          14.6              222        4875 fema…

dplyr’s filter() function with Boolean OR

We can filter dataframe for rows satisfying one of the two conditions using Boolean OR. In this example, we select rows whose flipper length value is greater than 220 or bill depth is less than 10.

penguins %>% 
  filter(flipper_length_mm >220 | bill_depth_mm < 10)
## # A tibble: 35 x 7
##    species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g
##    <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl>
##  1 Gentoo  Biscoe           50            16.3              230        5700
##  2 Gentoo  Biscoe           49.2          15.2              221        6300
##  3 Gentoo  Biscoe           48.7          15.1              222        5350
##  4 Gentoo  Biscoe           47.3          15.3              222        5250
##  5 Gentoo  Biscoe           59.6          17                230        6050
##  6 Gentoo  Biscoe           49.6          16                225        5700
##  7 Gentoo  Biscoe           50.5          15.9              222        5550
##  8 Gentoo  Biscoe           50.5          15.9              225        5400
##  9 Gentoo  Biscoe           50.1          15                225        5000
## 10 Gentoo  Biscoe           50.4          15.3              224        5550
## # … with 25 more rows, and 1 more variable: sex <chr>

Select rows with missing value in a column

Often one might want to filter for or filter out rows if one of the columns have missing values. With is.na() on the column of interest, we can select rows based on a specific column value is missing.

In this example, we select rows or filter rows with bill length column with missing values.

penguins %>% 
 filter(is.na(bill_length_mm))

In this dataset, there are only two rows with missing values in bill length column.

## # A tibble: 2 x 8
##   species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g sex  
##   <fct>   <fct>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <int>       <int> <fct>
## 1 Adelie  Torge…             NA            NA               NA          NA <NA> 
## 2 Gentoo  Biscoe             NA            NA               NA          NA <NA> 
## # … with 1 more variable: year <int>

We can also use negation symbol “!” to reverse the selection. In this example, we select rows with no missing values for sex column.

penguins %>% 
  filter(!is.na(sex))

Note that this filtering will keep rows with other column values with missing values.

## # A tibble: 333 x 7
##    species island bill_length_mm bill_depth_mm flipper_length_… body_mass_g
##    <chr>   <chr>           <dbl>         <dbl>            <dbl>       <dbl>
##  1 Adelie  Torge…           39.1          18.7              181        3750
##  2 Adelie  Torge…           39.5          17.4              186        3800
##  3 Adelie  Torge…           40.3          18                195        3250
##  4 Adelie  Torge…           36.7          19.3              193        3450
##  5 Adelie  Torge…           39.3          20.6              190        3650
##  6 Adelie  Torge…           38.9          17.8              181        3625
##  7 Adelie  Torge…           39.2          19.6              195        4675
##  8 Adelie  Torge…           41.1          17.6              182        3200
##  9 Adelie  Torge…           38.6          21.2              191        3800
## 10 Adelie  Torge…           34.6          21.1              198        4400
## # … with 323 more rows, and 1 more variable: sex <chr>

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Brandy and Monica are set to battle on Verzuz

The battle will take place on Monday, August 31 at 8 p.m. ET.

A Verzuz battle between 90s R&B icons, Brandy and Monica, is set to take place at Tyler Perry‘s studio.

Announced on producer Timberland’s Instagram page, Brandy and Monica have signed the paperwork and the battle will be streamed live on Instagram and on Apple Music.

Less than an hour after the announcement, Timberland’s post has garnered more than 60,000 likes. The post sparked excitement and debates from fans on who has the better catalog and which songs will be performed by the artists.

READ MORE: Black Twitter debates potential Usher, Chris Brown Verzuz battle

The event, which is being sponsored by Ciroc, will be “historical,” according to Monica, who tweeted about the event. Brandy also used the hastag #history after the announcement on Twitter.

The battle between the two singers was said to be in the works for a while, with Monica initially rejecting the offer two months ago, saying, “people have put us against each other for 20-something years,” The Source reported.

Brandy also made an appearance on Frank Ski‘s IG program, confirming that Monica decline to do a Verzuz with her.

The two singers also have a complex and long-standing relationship.

READ MORE: Teddy Riley and Babyface’s ‘Verzuz’ battle was a teachable moment

Their Grammy Award-winning duet, “The Boy Is Mine,” helped both stars launch their careers and many assumed that the two young stars were friends.

After a few years of being in the industry, there were conflicting reports that Monica disliked Brandy from the beginning, and that the two singers had a physical altercation.

It was said that Monica punched Brandy in the stomach, according to the executive producer of Monica’s first two albums, Dallas Austin.

It seems that the issues have been put behind them as the two are kind to each other on social media. The battle will take place on Monday, August 31 at 8 p.m. ET.

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House Democrats want to give the USPS $25 billion

The Republican-controlled Senate said that they would “absolutely not pass” the stand-alone bill.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the rest of the Democratic House of Representatives, has voted to provide $25 billion to the USPS and stop any policy changes that would affect the election.

The “Delivering for America Act” was written to ensure that mail-in ballots will not be delayed or not accounted for after the removal of postboxes and the USPS corporate restructuring.

READ MORE: Postal Service backlog creates worry about November election

Pelosi called out incumbent President Donald Trump for bashing mail-in voting, calling it a concerted effort to suppress voting alongside Trump’s demands for law enforcement officers to monitor voting at polling places, Reuters reported. 

“The American people do not want anyone messing with the Post Office. They certainly do not want it to be politicized. They just want their mail, they want their medicines and they want their mail-in ballots delivered in a timely way. And that is exactly what our bill does,” Democratic Representative Carolyn Maloney, who authored the legislation, said.

However, the Republican-controlled Senate, led by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a statement that the Senate would “absolutely not pass” the stand-alone bill, Reuters reported.

The White House also strongly opposed the legislation, calling on President Trump to veto the proposal.

READ MORE: Postmaster General DeJoy to ‘suspend’ operational changes until after the election

Maloney also released a Postal Service document showing there is a correlation between an 8% slowdown in the processing of first-class mail and Louis DeJoy, a close ally of Trump, theGrio previously reported, becoming postmaster in June.

Despite there being a slim chance of this bill getting passed in the Senate, more than two dozen Republicans have sided with Democrats on the issue this Saturday.

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Mariah Carey releases ‘Save the Day’ featuring Lauryn Hill, from upcoming album

In addition to her upcoming album, Carey is also set to release her first memoir.

On Friday, Grammy-Award winning singer/songwriter, Mariah Carey, 50, dropped her eagerly awaited single, “Save the Day.” The song that was produced by longtime collaborator Jermaine Dupree, features Lauryn Hill and is from Carey’s upcoming album, The Rarities.

Hill fans hoping for new material from the elusive diva might be disappointed as “Save the Day” only samples Hill’s vocals from the bridge of “Killing Me Softly,” a hit recorded by Hill’s group, Fugees, back in 1996.

READ MORE: Mariah Carey announces new memoir

Carey revealed the new album cover and announced its upcoming release via Twitter on Tuesday night. “This one is for you, my fans,” the pop icon tweeted. “It’s to celebrate us, and to thank you for years of pure love and support. I am so grateful to you. The RARITIES album is out October 2.”

Although Carey and Dupri recorded “Save the Day” in 2011, they held on to the empowering new song until now. The Rarities album is a collection of unreleased music and some of Carey’s #1 hits including “Always Be My Baby” and “Hero.”

“The truth is, most of the songs I had completely forgotten about,” Carey told The Sun. “I had recorded them way back when and put them in the vault just because they didn’t end up making an album. From every era, there’s a song that could have made it to an album.”

Hoping that the song will inspire change in 2020, Carey sings, “We’re all in this together,” while Hill’s vocals play in the background.

It’s been two years since Carey’s last album, Caution, which was released in November 2018 and debuted at number 5 on the U.S. Billboard 200 with 51,000 album-equivalent units, of which 43,000 were pure album sales.

In addition to her upcoming album, the global superstar is also set to release her first memoir, The Meaning of Mariah Carey on September 29. Written with Michaela Angela Davis, the unfiltered autobiography promises to “finally tell the story of her life in a way that only she could.”

READ MORE: Video of comic Sandra Bernhard calling Mariah Carey the n-word resurfaces

According to Entertainment Weekly, Audible will exclusively release the audiobook performed by Carey, with special musical components interwoven with her words.

Celebrating 30 years of unprecedented success, Mariah Carey has sold over 200 million records worldwide.

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It's tempting to think that GP3 will solve all NLP problems but it does not

In my previous blog what is driving the innovation in nlp and gpt3 , I talked about how GPT3 has evolved from the basic transformer architecture.

Based on that blog, a start-up approached me saying that they had an idea which they felt could only be implemented by GPT3.

They were eagerly waiting to be approved (isn’t everybody - he he!)

Apart from waiting for GPT3- there was another critical flaw in their argument

Their idea was not generative i.e. it did not need GPT3 in the first place (or for that matter any similar architecture)

It’s tempting to think that GPT-3 will solve all the NLP problems .. but it does not

let me explain by this what I mean by this

Below is the basic flow of NLP services and a listing of NLP applications

NLP services include:

  • Text Summarization
  • Text Generation
  • Chatbots
  • Machine Translation
  • Text to Speech
  • Text Classification
  • Sentence Similarity
  • Finding similar sentences

 

Image source – Dr Amita Kapoor

While many of these are generative- not all of them are.

The GPT3 and transformer-based applications basically address the generative elements of NLP

That still leaves a large number of other applications which use NLP but are not generative (for example Text classification or Text summarization).

 

You can also look at the same situation from the perspective of word embeddings. Word embeddings are a type of word representation that allows words with similar meaning to have a similar representation.

Historically, word2vec and GloVe have worked well for word embeddings but these were shallow approaches. Transformers solve this problem by providing a functionality similar to what we see in transfer learning for CNNs (thereby not all layers need to be trained if you use a pre-built model)

 

To conclude

Hence, we can say that GPT3 is very interesting and will continue to be so.

However, there will be always a subset of NLP applications which will not be covered by any of the transformer-based approaches because they are not generative.

 



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Alternative to the Arithmetic, Geometric, and Harmonic Means

Given n observations x1, ..., xn, the generalized mean (also called power mean) is defined as 

The case p = 1 corresponds to the traditional arithmetic mean, while p = 0 yields the geometric mean, and p = -1 yields the harmonic mean. See here for details. This metric is favored by statisticians. It is a particular case of the quasi-arithmetic mean

Here I introduce another kind of mean called exponential mean, also based on a parameter p, that may have an appeal to data scientists and machine learning professionals. It is also a special case of the quasi-arithmetic mean. Though the concept is basic, there is very little if any literature about it. It is related to the LogSumExp and the Log semiring. It is defined as follows:

Here the logarithm is in base p, with p positive. When p tends to 0, mp is the minimum of the observations. When p tends to 1, it yields the classic arithmetic mean, and as p tends to infinity, it yields the maximum of the observations. 

I tested both means (exponential and power means) for various values of p ranging between 0 and 2. See above chart, where the X-axis represents the parameter p, and the Y-axis represents the mean. The test data set consists of 10 numbers randomly chosen between 0 and 1, with an average value of 0.53. Note that if p = 1, then mp = Mp = 0.53 is the standard arithmetic mean. 

The blue curve in the above chart is very well approximated by a logarithm function, except when p is very close to zero or p is extremely large. The red curve is well approximated by a second-degree polynomial. Convergence to the maximum of the observations (equal to 0.89 here), as p tends to infinity, occurs much faster with the power mean than with the exponential mean. Note that the minimum is 0.07, and the exponential mean will start approaching that value only when p is extremely close to zero.

Finally, the central limit theorem applies both to the power and exponential means, when the number n of observations becomes larger and larger.



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Trump accuses FDA of slowing COVID-19 vaccines

Two FDA officials have threatened to leave their jobs if Trump approves a vaccine that does not work.

President Donald Trump believes, without giving any proof, that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is intentionally slowing down the testing of COVID-19 vaccines to hurt his chances of reelection in November.

In a tweet posted on Friday, Trump said that the FDA is part of the deep state and they are manipulating drug companies into slowing down their enrollment of test subjects, thus delaying an approved vaccine, according to Reuters.

READ MORE: Trump touts another unproven coronavirus cure backed by a top donor

Publicly calling out agencies for being part of a Democratic deep state has been one of Trump’s common tactics. Critics believe he uses it to intimidate those who are seemingly undermining his agenda in order for them to change their minds and accept his demands.

Public health officials and lawmakers are reportedly worried that the Trump administration will pressure the FDA into approving a vaccine that does not work.

In an exclusive statement obtained by Reuters, a top FDA official said he would resign if Trump approved a vaccine without the agency’s approval of safety and effectiveness.

“Obviously, they are hoping to delay the answer until after November 3rd. Must focus on speed, and saving lives!” Trump wrote, dragging FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn in the tweet.

Although Hahn did not directly respond to the president’s tweet, the commissioner tweeted a link of the FDA’s daily updates on how it is fighting the disease.

READ MORE: Los Angeles mayor wants DIY coronavirus kit

In compliance to the FDA and National Institutes of Health (NIH), drug manufacturers are rapidly producing a vaccine to treat COVID-19 as the diease has already claimed 800,000 lives worldwide.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi chimed in on the president’s statement, calling it “dangerous” and “beyond the pale” for insinuating that the FDA is playing politics.

Trump’s tweet has also prompted the director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, Peter Marks, to threaten to quit his job last week. Marks told government officials, pharmaceutical executives, and academics in a conference call that he would leave if the agency released an unproven vaccine.

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California is experiencing one of its worst wildfires

The Friday firestorm involved about two dozen major incidents.

A series of lighting strikes on Friday has exacerbated a wildfire in California. The fire killed six people, incinerated nearly 700 buildings, and jeopardized nearly 14,000 firefighters who are currently working to control the flames.

The fire is said to be one of the worst that California has ever seen and is currently raging between San Francisco and Sacramento.

READ MORE: At least 5 people killed in Northern California wildfires

The Friday firestorm involved about two dozen major incidents which spread across other local jurisdictions in California, Reuters reported.

As reported by USA Today, the thunder hit the forest areas and the dry humid air evaporated the rainwater that could have reached the ground. Had this water not evaporated, it had the potential to stop the fire from spreading.

In addition to the lack of rainwater, the fire was easily spread due to the persistent heat in California and low humidity, which made the forest dry and crunchy, USA Today reported.

Firefighters, in the words of fire marshal Jay Tracey of Fresno, were “scrambling for bodies” in the 314,000 acre spread.

The southern part of the fire is being contained by firefighters, but winds are fanning the flames, making the fire harder to put out. This is also true in the northwest part of California where towns like of Healdsburg and Guernville grow wine, according to Tracey.

As the fire continues to burn away the state’s winery resources, the fire department’s resources are growing scarce, with many firefighters being stationed at home.

One pilot, who was on a water-dropping mission in central California, died Wednesday when his helicopter crashed.

READ MORE: California resident tests positive for plague, first time in 5 years

The damage from the fire is likely to continue over the weekend with more lightning storms expected, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFire) spokesman Daniel Berlant said. 

As theGrio previously reported, Gov. Gavin Newsom called the flames a clear sign of climate change in a last-minute video recorded for the Democratic National Convention from a forest near Watsonville after he visited an evacuation center.

On Saturday, the fire has already doubled in size since it began.

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