Techno

Techno is a form of electronic dance music that emerged in Detroit, Michigan, in the United States during the mid-to-late 1980s. The first recorded use of the word techno in reference to a specific genre of music was in 1988. Many styles of techno now exist, but Detroit techno is seen as the foundation upon which a number of subgenres have been built.

In Detroit techno resulted from the melding of African American music including Chicago house, funk, electro, and electric jazz with electronic music by artists such as Kraftwerk, Giorgio Moroder, and Yellow Magic Orchestra. Added to this is the influence of futuristic and fictional themes relevant to life in American late capitalist society, with Alvin Toffler's book The Third Wave being a notable point of reference. Pioneering producer Juan Atkins cites Toffler's phrase "techno rebels" as inspiring him to use the word techno to describe the musical style he helped to create. This unique blend of influences aligns techno with the aesthetic referred to as afrofuturism. To producers such as Derrick May, the transference of spirit from the body to the machine is often a central preoccupation; essentially an expression of technological spirituality. In this manner: "techno dance music defeats what Adorno saw as the alienating effect of mechanisation on the modern consciousness".

Fixer (comics)

The Fixer is the name of two different fictional characters appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

Publication history

The first Marvel Comics character known as the Fixer was Roscoe Sweeney. He first appeared in Daredevil #1 (Apr. 1964), and was created by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Bill Everett.

The second Fixer was a long-time supervillain who later became a member of the Thunderbolts, first appearing in Strange Tales #141 (February 1966) and was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. After some time away from the team, he appeared as a regular character in Thunderbolts beginning with issue #144, until he was forced to leave the team in issue #174.

Fictional character biography

Roscoe Sweeney

Roscoe Sweeney was a gangster and crooked fight promoter who was involved in extortion and illegal gambling who operated as the "Fixer." He paid boxer "Battling Jack" Murdock to take a fall and lose a fight. Murdock accepted the money, but when he saw his son, Matthew, in the audience, he became determined to continue the fight and eventually won by a knockout. The Fixer's right-hand man Slade killed Jack Murdock after the fight in retaliation. Matthew Murdock, learning of his father's murder, vowed to bring men like the Fixer to justice. Matt Murdock became a lawyer, and also the superhero Daredevil to do so. Fixer and Slade went to Fogwell's Gym where they encountered Daredevil. When Fixer and Slade ran for it upon them being disarmed, Daredevil pursued them into the subway station. After Daredevil tripped Slade, Fixer had a fatal heart attack when confronted by Daredevil and died. As Fixer's body fell onto the subway tracks, Daredevil stopped a subway from running over Fixer's body. Slade was arrested and sentenced to death by the electric chair.

Internet-related prefixes

Internet-related prefixes such as e-, i-, cyber-, info-, techno- and net- are added to a wide range of existing words to describe new, Internet- or computer-related flavors of existing concepts, often electronic products and services that already have a non-electronic counterpart. The adjective virtual is often used in a similar manner.

Cyber-, e-, i, and virtual

"Cyber-"

Cyber- is derived from "cybernetic," which comes from the Greek word κυβεÏ?νητικός meaning skilled in steering or governing. It is used in the terms cyberspace, cyberpunk, cybergoth, cyberlaw, cybercrime, cyberwarfare, cyberterrorism, cybersex, and cyberbullying, among others.

"E-"

E-, standing for electronic, is used in the terms e-mail, e-commerce, e-business, e-banking, "e-sports" and e-book.

"i"

The i prefix was used as early as 1994 by iVillage, an internet community site by and for women. More recent examples include the BBC's iPlayer, and Google's former iGoogle service. It has even been used by companies not in the IT sector for their websites, such as Coca-Cola's now-defunct icoke.com.

Noun

A noun (from Latin nÅ?men, literally meaning "name") is a word that functions as the name of some specific thing or set of things, such as living creatures, objects, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Linguistically, a noun is a member of a large, open part of speech whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition.

Lexical categories (parts of speech) are defined in terms of the ways in which their members combine with other kinds of expressions. The syntactic rules for nouns differ from language to language. In English, nouns are those words which can occur with articles and attributive adjectives and can function as the head of a noun phrase.

History

Word classes (parts of speech) were described by Sanskrit grammarians from at least the 5th century BC. In YÄ?ska's Nirukta, the noun (nÄ?ma) is one of the four main categories of words defined.

The Ancient Greek equivalent was ónoma (ὄνομα), referred to by Plato in the Cratylus dialog, and later listed as one of the eight parts of speech in The Art of Grammar, attributed to Dionysius Thrax (2nd century BC). The term used in Latin grammar was nÅ?men. All of these terms for "noun" were also words meaning "name". The English word noun is derived from the Latin term, through the Anglo-Norman noun.

Nocturnal (web series)

Nocturnal is a supernatural serial drama in the tradition of the classic Dark Shadows and the more recent NBC serial Passions. The series premiered on the internet in March 2007, and new webisodes continue to appear every month on its eponymous web site.

Plot synopsis

Shot on location in and around Pittsburgh, PA, (though the city has never been explicitly named) the series revolves around the mysterious circumstances surrounding the murder of a young woman named Natalie Brew (who, curiously enough, has never appeared in a single webisode).

Not unlike Twin Peaks, the identity of Natalie's killer is one of the series' overarching mysteries. And, as police investigators Archer Reilly and Sarah Pennington discover, there is no shortage of suspects. Did she run afoul of the wealthy and powerful Hawthorne family—led by its patriarch Jebediah—whose power came as a result of dealings with dark forces? Or was she another in the seemingly endless victims of Dr. Ulrich Von Der Linn, a vampire masquerading as a hypnotherapist?

Nocturnal (Yuna album)

Nocturnal is the third studio album and second international album by Malaysian singer-songwriter Yuna. It was released on 29 October 2013 by Verve Records. The album was preceded by the release of the lead single "Rescue", which was released on 27 August 2013. Nocturnal debuted and peaked at number 27 on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart.

Background and development

On September 4, 2013, Yuna released the cover artwork for Nocturnal, which depicts her in a floral foreground setting. The official track listing for the album was confirmed by ARTISTdirect on 13 September. On 25 October, the album was made available for streaming in full before it was released.

Singles

"Rescue" was released as Nocturnal's lead single on 27 August 2013. It garnered a positive review from MTV Hive, who described the song as a "kick-yourself-in-the-ass ray of sunshine". On 24 September, an official lyric video for the single was released, in which fans were asked to submit Polaroid images with the song's lyrics written beneath them.