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Thailand’s University Students Don Local Fabric to Boost Villagers Incomes
From student uniforms to graduation gowns, Thailand is encouraging University students to use local fabric to make clothing and boost incomes in villages hit hard by the coronavirus.
The nationwide move follows the success of Nakhon Si Thammarat Rajabhat University (NSTRU). A public university in southern Thailand that this year began using locally-made quilting fabric for a range of clothing under a government-backed scheme.
“During Covid-19, there has been no tourists, so we need to help communities to stimulate the domestic economy,” said Dr Kitipong Promwong, president of the government’s Office of National Higher Education Science Research and Innovation Policy Council (NXPO).
“Many universities are keen to participate, as some of them have already started (using local fabric),” said Dr Kitipong. Whose organization is run by the higher education, science, research and innovation ministry.
Thailand’s central bank expects a record contraction in economic activity this year. With the economy taking at least two years to return to pre-pandemic levels as the key tourism industry reels from a ban on foreign visitors.
Fabric Scheme generates income for villagers
The NXPO said the South-east Asian nation’s 180 universities can be a large growth engine for local economies. It has estimated that the nationwide fabric scheme could generate about 1.8 billion baht in income for communities.
In June, the Prime Minister encouraged people to wear clothes made from traditional Thai fabric at least two days a week to help communities.
At present, six communities in Nakhon Si Thammarat are involved in producing fabric for student uniforms and accessories for students and faculty members.
NSTRU director Surasak Kaewon said the project will generate 10 million baht for local communities each year, largely from graduation gowns for about 3,000 students.
The new gowns, which use rare cloth woven only in Nakhon Si Thammarat to replace velvet produced by factories, are expected to be used in next year’s graduation ceremony following approval from the Cabinet.
NSTRU is among seven universities that have each received a 1.5 million baht grant from the government to come up with pilot projects to help villages generate income.
In Nakhon Si Thammarat’s Phipun district, 52-year-old Kamonwat Danghangsince lost all her income from selling items made from tie-dye fabrics during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Ms Kamonwat is still struggling to make money due to the lack of tourists, but she hopes NSTRU’s orders to produce student uniforms will help boost income for her cooperative.
“When Covid-19 came, it’s like everything stopped,” Ms Kamonwat told Reuters.
“But now it’s a good opportunity for us to sell to the university, especially since they don’t bargain.”
Fabric making in northern Thailand
Thailand has a rich tradition of fabric making and is known for its beautiful textiles. The country has a long history of producing various types of fabrics using traditional techniques. Here are some key aspects of fabric making in Thailand:
1. Thai Silk: One of the most famous types of fabric in Thailand is Thai silk. Thai silk is renowned for its lustrous texture and vibrant colors. It is traditionally handwoven from the cocoon of the silkworm, and the process involves various steps, including rearing silkworms, spinning silk threads, dyeing the threads, and weaving them into fabric. The northeastern region of Thailand, particularly the province of Surin, is well-known for its silk production.
2. Traditional Weaving: Thailand has a rich heritage of traditional weaving techniques that have been passed down through generations. Various regions in Thailand have their own distinct weaving styles and patterns. For example, the hill tribes in northern Thailand, such as the Karen and Hmong, are known for their intricate woven textiles. The weaving process involves using a loom and hand-operated techniques to create intricate patterns and designs.
3. Cotton Fabrics: Besides silk, cotton is another commonly used fabric in Thailand. Cotton fabrics are often handwoven using traditional techniques. The patterns and designs on cotton fabrics can vary based on the region and the specific weaving methods employed.
4. Batik: Batik is a fabric dyeing technique that involves creating intricate patterns using wax-resistant dyeing. Although batik is not originally from Thailand, it has been incorporated into Thai fabric making. Thai artisans create beautiful batik fabrics by applying wax to specific areas of the fabric and then dyeing it. The waxed areas resist the dye, resulting in unique and visually appealing patterns.
5. Natural Dyes: Traditional fabric making in Thailand often involves the use of natural dyes derived from plants, roots, and other natural sources. Artisans extract colors from plants and use them to dye fabrics, creating a wide range of hues and shades. Natural dyeing techniques are valued for their eco-friendliness and the unique color variations they produce.
6. Contemporary Fabrics: In addition to traditional fabric making, Thailand has a thriving contemporary textile industry. Modern textile factories produce a wide range of fabrics using advanced machinery and techniques. These fabrics cater to both domestic and international markets, and they can be found in various industries, including fashion, upholstery, and home decor.
Thailand’s fabric making industry is not only a source of beautiful textiles but also an important cultural heritage. Visitors to Thailand can explore local markets, textile villages, and artisan workshops to learn more about the intricate process of fabric making and to purchase unique and handcrafted textiles.

News
Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding, But Still Accounting 48% Search Revenue

Google is so closely associated with its key product that its name is a verb that signifies “search.” However, Google’s dominance in that sector is dwindling.
According to eMarketer, Google will lose control of the US search industry for the first time in decades next year.
Google will remain the dominant search player, accounting for 48% of American search advertising revenue. And, remarkably, Google is still increasing its sales in the field, despite being the dominating player in search since the early days of the George W. Bush administration. However, Amazon is growing at a quicker rate.
Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding
Amazon will hold over a quarter of US search ad dollars next year, rising to 27% by 2026, while Google will fall even more, according to eMarketer.
The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the forecast.
Lest you think you’ll have to switch to Bing or Yahoo, this isn’t the end of Google or anything really near.
Google is the fourth-most valued public firm in the world. Its market worth is $2.1 trillion, trailing just Apple, Microsoft, and the AI chip darling Nvidia. It also maintains its dominance in other industries, such as display advertisements, where it dominates alongside Facebook’s parent firm Meta, and video ads on YouTube.
To put those “other” firms in context, each is worth more than Delta Air Lines’ total market value. So, yeah, Google is not going anywhere.
Nonetheless, Google faces numerous dangers to its operations, particularly from antitrust regulators.
On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Google must open up its Google Play Store to competitors, dealing a significant blow to the firm in its long-running battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games. Google announced that it would appeal the verdict.
In August, a federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on search. That verdict could lead to the dissolution of the company’s search operation. Another antitrust lawsuit filed last month accuses Google of abusing its dominance in the online advertising business.
Meanwhile, European regulators have compelled Google to follow tough new standards, which have resulted in multiple $1 billion-plus fines.

Pixa Bay
Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding
On top of that, the marketplace is becoming more difficult on its own.
TikTok, the fastest-growing social network, is expanding into the search market. And Amazon has accomplished something few other digital titans have done to date: it has established a habit.
When you want to buy anything, you usually go to Amazon, not Google. Amazon then buys adverts to push companies’ products to the top of your search results, increasing sales and earning Amazon a greater portion of the revenue. According to eMarketer, it is expected to generate $27.8 billion in search revenue in the United States next year, trailing only Google’s $62.9 billion total.
And then there’s AI, the technology that (supposedly) will change everything.
Why search in stilted language for “kendall jenner why bad bunny breakup” or “police moving violation driver rights no stop sign” when you can just ask OpenAI’s ChatGPT, “What’s going on with Kendall Jenner and Bad Bunny?” in “I need help fighting a moving violation involving a stop sign that wasn’t visible.” Google is working on exactly this technology with its Gemini product, but its success is far from guaranteed, especially with Apple collaborating with OpenAI and other businesses rapidly joining the market.
A Google spokeswoman referred to a blog post from last week in which the company unveiled ads in its AI overviews (the AI-generated text that appears at the top of search results). It’s Google’s way of expressing its ability to profit on a changing marketplace while retaining its business, even as its consumers steadily transition to ask-and-answer AI and away from search.
Google has long used a single catchphrase to defend itself against opponents who claim it is a monopoly abusing its power: competition is only a click away. Until recently, that seemed comically obtuse. Really? We are going to switch to Bing? Or Duck Duck Go? Give me a break.
But today, it feels more like reality.
Google is in no danger of disappearing. However, every highly dominating company faces some type of reckoning over time. GE, a Dow mainstay for more than a century, was broken up last year and is now a shell of its previous dominance. Sears declared bankruptcy in 2022 and is virtually out of business. US Steel, long the foundation of American manufacturing, is attempting to sell itself to a Japanese corporation.
SOURCE | CNN
News
2024 | Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

Washington — Trump Media, The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will not hear an appeal from social media platform X about a search warrant acquired by prosecutors in the election meddling case against former President Donald Trump.
The justices did not explain their rationale, and there were no recorded dissents.
The firm, which was known as Twitter before being purchased by billionaire Elon Musk, claims a nondisclosure order that prevented it from informing Trump about the warrant obtained by special counsel Jack Smith’s team violated its First Amendment rights.
The business also claims Trump should have had an opportunity to exercise executive privilege. If not reined in, the government may employ similar tactics to intercept additional privileged communications, their lawyers contended.
Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case
Two neutral electronic privacy groups also joined in, urging the high court to hear the case on First Amendment grounds.
Prosecutors, however, claim that the corporation never shown that Trump utilized the account for official purposes, therefore executive privilege is not a problem. A lower court also determined that informing Trump could have compromised the current probe.
Trump utilized his Twitter account in the weeks preceding up to his supporters’ attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, to spread false assertions about the election, which prosecutors claim were intended to create doubt in the democratic process.
The indictment describes how Trump used his Twitter account to encourage his followers to travel to Washington on Jan. 6, pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to reject the certification, and falsely claiming that the Capitol crowd, which battered police officers and destroyed glass, was peaceful.
Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case
That case is now moving forward following the Supreme Court’s verdict in July, which granted Trump full immunity from criminal prosecution as a former president.
The warrant arrived at Twitter amid quick changes implemented by Musk, who bought the company in 2022 and has since cut off most of its workforce, including those dedicated to combating disinformation and hate speech.
SOURCE | AP
News
The Supreme Court Turns Down Biden’s Government Appeal in a Texas Emergency Abortion Matter.

(VOR News) – A ruling that prohibits emergency abortions that contravene the Supreme Court law in the state of Texas, which has one of the most stringent abortion restrictions in the country, has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States. The United States Supreme Court upheld this decision.
The justices did not provide any specifics regarding the underlying reasons for their decision to uphold an order from a lower court that declared hospitals cannot be legally obligated to administer abortions if doing so would violate the law in the state of Texas.
Institutions are not required to perform abortions, as stipulated in the decree. The common populace did not investigate any opposing viewpoints. The decision was made just weeks before a presidential election that brought abortion to the forefront of the political agenda.
This decision follows the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ended abortion nationwide.
In response to a request from the administration of Vice President Joe Biden to overturn the lower court’s decision, the justices expressed their disapproval.
The government contends that hospitals are obligated to perform abortions in compliance with federal legislation when the health or life of an expectant patient is in an exceedingly precarious condition.
This is the case in regions where the procedure is prohibited. The difficulty hospitals in Texas and other states are experiencing in determining whether or not routine care could be in violation of stringent state laws that prohibit abortion has resulted in an increase in the number of complaints concerning pregnant women who are experiencing medical distress being turned away from emergency rooms.
The administration cited the Supreme Court’s ruling in a case that bore a striking resemblance to the one that was presented to it in Idaho at the beginning of the year. The justices took a limited decision in that case to allow the continuation of emergency abortions without interruption while a lawsuit was still being heard.
In contrast, Texas has been a vocal proponent of the injunction’s continued enforcement. Texas has argued that its circumstances are distinct from those of Idaho, as the state does have an exemption for situations that pose a significant hazard to the health of an expectant patient.
According to the state, the discrepancy is the result of this exemption. The state of Idaho had a provision that safeguarded a woman’s life when the issue was first broached; however, it did not include protection for her health.
Certified medical practitioners are not obligated to wait until a woman’s life is in imminent peril before they are legally permitted to perform an abortion, as determined by the state supreme court.
The state of Texas highlighted this to the Supreme Court.
Nevertheless, medical professionals have criticized the Texas statute as being perilously ambiguous, and a medical board has declined to provide a list of all the disorders that are eligible for an exception. Furthermore, the statute has been criticized for its hazardous ambiguity.
For an extended period, termination of pregnancies has been a standard procedure in medical treatment for individuals who have been experiencing significant issues. It is implemented in this manner to prevent catastrophic outcomes, such as sepsis, organ failure, and other severe scenarios.
Nevertheless, medical professionals and hospitals in Texas and other states with strict abortion laws have noted that it is uncertain whether or not these terminations could be in violation of abortion prohibitions that include the possibility of a prison sentence. This is the case in regions where abortion prohibitions are exceedingly restrictive.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which resulted in restrictions on the rights of women to have abortions in several Republican-ruled states, the Texas case was revisited in 2022.
As per the orders that were disclosed by the administration of Vice President Joe Biden, hospitals are still required to provide abortions in cases that are classified as dire emergency.
As stipulated in a piece of health care legislation, the majority of hospitals are obligated to provide medical assistance to patients who are experiencing medical distress. This is in accordance with the law.
The state of Texas maintained that hospitals should not be obligated to provide abortions throughout the litigation, as doing so would violate the state’s constitutional prohibition on abortions. In its January judgment, the 5th United States Circuit Court of Appeals concurred with the state and acknowledged that the administration had exceeded its authority.
SOURCE: AP
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