Saturday, September 10, 2016

Seven degrees of separation

Proof! Just six degrees of separation between us
After checking 30 billion electronic messages, Microsoft researchers say the theory stands up
 The Dalai Lama arrives outside his hotel in central London, at the start of an 11-day visit to Britain.
 Just six degrees of separation or fewer between the Dalai Lama and everyone else. Photograph: Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images
David Smith, technology correspondent
Saturday 2 August 2008 19.01 EDT Last modified on Tuesday 12 August 2008 10.12 EDT
Share on LinkedIn Share on Google+  This article is 8 years old
 Save for later
In a world of 6.6 billion people, it does seem hard to believe. The theory of six degrees of separation contends that, because we are all linked by chains of acquaintance, you are just six introductions away from any other person on the planet.

But yesterday researchers announced the theory was right - nearly. By studying billions of electronic messages, they worked out that any two strangers are, on average, distanced by precisely 6.6 degrees of separation. In other words, putting fractions to one side, you are linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances to Madonna, the Dalai Lama and the Queen. The news will come as no surprise to film buffs who for years have been playing the parlour game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, in which they link other actors to Bacon in six films or fewer.

Researchers at Microsoft studied records of 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people in various countries, according to the Washington Post. This was 'the first time a planetary-scale social network has been available,' they observed. The database covered all the Microsoft Messenger instant-messaging network in June 2006, equivalent to roughly half the world's instant-messaging traffic at that time.

Eric Horvitz and fellow researcher Jure Leskovec considered two people to be acquaintances if they had sent one another a message. They looked at the minimum chain lengths it would take to connect 180 billion different pairs of users in the database. They found that the average length was 6.6 hops, and that 78 per cent of the pairs could be connected in seven steps or fewer. But some were separated by as many as 29 steps.

The researchers wrote: 'Via the lens provided on the world by Messenger, we find that there are about "seven degrees of separation" among people.'

Horvitz told the Post: 'To me, it was pretty shocking. What we're seeing suggests there may be a social connectivity constant for humanity. People have had this suspicion that we are really close. But we are showing on a very large scale that this idea goes beyond folklore.'

Advertisement

A 'degree of separation' is a measure of social distance between people. You are one degree away from everyone you know, two degrees away from everyone they know, and so on. The concept was popularised by John Guare's 1990 play, Six Degrees of Separation, which was turned into a film starring Will Smith, Stockard Channing, Donald Sutherland and Ian McKellen. One of the characters says: 'I read somewhere that everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people. Six degrees of separation between us and everyone else on this planet. The President of the United States, a gondolier in Venice, just fill in the names. I find it extremely comforting that we're so close. I also find it like Chinese water torture, that we're so close because you have to find the right six people to make the right connection ... I am bound, you are bound, to everyone on this planet by a trail of six people.'

Then in 1994 students at Pennsylvania's Albright College invented the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, in which the challenge was to connect every film actor to Bacon in six cast lists or fewer. Bacon thought the joke would die out, but when it didn't he launched a website, sixdegrees.org, bringing together people interested in helping good causes. He said: 'I thought it was definitely going to go the way of eight-track cassettes and pet rocks. But it's a concept that has sort of hung around in the zeitgeist.'

Attempts to prove the theory stretch back further and keep coming up with six or thereabouts. In a 1969 study, researchers Stanley Milgram and Jeffrey Travers asked 296 people in Nebraska and Boston to send a letter through acquaintances to a Boston stockbroker. Only 64 of the letters reached the stockbroker. Of those letter chains that were complete, the average number of degrees of separation was 6.2.

In 2003 researchers at Columbia University in New York experimented using the internet as the ultimate laboratory of the connected world. More than 24,000 volunteers tried to send an email via acquaintances to one of 18 target people in 13 countries, including a police officer in Australia, a vet in the Norwegian army and a professor at an Ivy League university in America. Only 384 of the chains were completed, using an average of four steps. But the researchers estimated the average length in all the chains was between five and seven steps. Facebook, the online social network, has a 'six degrees' application to test the theory through the connections of Facebook users. That may reduce a degree or two: Barack Obama already has well over a million Facebook friends.

the best way to make most money for women "Marry a billionaire without a prenup'


Image result for Howard Sosin
 Marry a billionaire without a prenup
Howard Sosin
Business person
Howard Sosin was born in Illinois and became a financial whiz. He was for a time an associate Professor at the Columbia Business School. He founded American International Group Financial Products in 1987 and remained there until 1993.Wikipedia

Wife Cheats on Husband, Gets $40M in Divorce
Published March 25, 2005  Associated Press
Facebook Twitter Email Print
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. –  A judge has awarded the former wife of a multimillionaire businessman a divorce settlement worth more than $40 million even though she admitted having affairs with her rock-climbing guide and a man she met on a flight to China.

In addition to a $24 million payment, Susan Sosin (search) will keep the couple's $3.6 million Manhattan apartment, $2 million Utah ski house and $800,000 home in Wallkill, N.Y. (search). But she has to vacate the couple's two mansions in Connecticut and three desert properties in Arizona.

In the divorce granted Wednesday, she also gets to keep $6 million in her brokerage accounts, eight cars and $2.9 million in jewelry, including a ruby piece her husband had bought for her but hadn't given to her prior to their divorce.

Richard Albrecht (search), attorney for Sosin's husband, Howard, estimated the total value of the award at $43 million, or 27 percent of the estate. She wanted half, he said.

"My opinion is her conduct in this matter affected the award," Albrecht said.

Susan Sosin's lawyer, Frederic J. Siegel, estimated the total value of the award was about $45 million and said his client asked for about 45 percent of the estate.

"By anybody's standards, it's a large amount of money," Siegel said. "Both parties will be able to move on with their lives."

Siegel said both sides were at fault for the divorce and defended his client as a good mother.

Howard Sosin, 54, who founded AIG Financial Products (search) in 1987, filed for divorce after discovering his wife's relationships in February 2003. During an upgrade of their computer system, he found hundreds of e-mails between his wife and her lover, according to testimony.

Susan Sosin, 51, admitted in testimony that she had become intimate with a guide while rock climbing in 1996, though she said it was a spontaneous and isolated occurrence. During a flight to China in 2000, she met a married man, and that led to a lengthy affair, according to testimony.

"The parties' marriage has been undeniably marred by the defendant's infidelity," Superior Court Judge Howard Owens stated in his verdict. "Although her sexual relationship was not the sole cause of the breakdown, it did effectively terminate the marriage."

Howard Sosin's wealth was estimated at $168 million. Among the assets he gets to keep are $89 million in bank accounts, 10 of the couple's 18 cars, $960,000 worth of private club memberships and $22 million in fine art.

The couple met in 1978 when Howard Sosin was an assistant professor at Columbia University. At the time, she was married to another man and working in retail.

Howard Sosin served as the president and chief operating officer of AIG Financial Products until 1993 when he left the company. Following litigation, he received $182 million from AIG.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/2005/03/25/wife-cheats-on-husband-gets-40m-in-divorce.html


from wikipedia 

"American Pie" singer and songwriter Don McLean and his wife have finalized their divorce and agreed to a $10 million settlement.Don McLean
A spokesman for McLean said Monday that the singer "chose to ignore a premarital agreement" and provide the settlement.
McLean's wife Patrisha, an author and photographer, filed for divorce citing "adultery, cruel and abusive treatment, and irreconcilable differences" in legal papers.
The couple had been married for about 30 years. They have two adult children





SAUDI BILLIONAIRE AND FORMER MODEL SETTLE $100 MILLION DIVORCE

“[Anything more] would drive this case into fantasy territory.”





By Dan Kitwood/Getty Images.


The union between Christina Estrada and Sheikh Walid Juffali will never achieve the happily-ever-after potential that the love story between the Pirelli calendar model and the Saudi billionaire promised. But there is no question that Estrada walked away with a fairy-tale divorce. Her lawyers said she was awarded a £75 million, or about $100 million, settlement—a £53 million cash payment and £20 million of her own assets. They called this the “largest needs award ever made by an English court,” according to the BBC.

Estrada said in a statement that she is extremely grateful for the settlement, but even a lump sum of more than £50 million is a letdown compared to the £238 million she had initially asked for from her ex-husband, whom she claimed is worth £8 billion (a fact he flatly denied). Estrada testified in court that she needed £1 million a year for clothes—a sum made up of £109,000 for couture dresses, £40,000 for fur coats, and £21,000 for shoes, according to The Guardian. She also reportedly had budgeted £58,000 for two super-special handbags every year, £23,000 for six more casual, knock-around bags, and £35,000 on 10 clutches annually. There was also travel factored in—£2.1 million in total, including £600,000 for private aviation—and, of course, real estate. Estrada said she required enough support to maintain a home worth around £60 million in London and a £4.4 million home in Henley-on-Thames. For her cell-phone bill, she asked for £26,000 a year, and £495,000 for five cars, according to The Guardian.

At the time, Estrada told the London court, “I have lived this life. This is what I am accustomed to. It is difficult to convey the extraordinary level of luxury and opulence we were fortunate enough to enjoy.”
After 12 years of marriage and having a daughter together, Estrada’s opulent life all changed in 2014, when, without her knowledge, the sheikh divorced her in Saudi Arabia under Islamic law. Two years earlier, he wed a 25-year-old Lebanese model with whom he has two children while he and Estrada were still married. The Guardian reported that Juffali could not attend the court proceedings because he is being treated for advanced lung cancer. In a statement, he said he had left the bulk of his fortune to his three oldest children, including his daughter with Estrada.
“[Awarding] £53 million to a lady who has £20m [in her own assets] is an astonishing amount of money,” his lawyer said. “[Anything more] would drive this case into fantasy territory.”
In her own statement to The Guardian, Estrada called the process “incredibly bruising and distressing” and that she had wanted to resolve the matter amicably after she found about the second wife and divorce.
“I never wanted to be here,” she said. “Having grown up in a middle-class family and having enjoyed a successful career until my marriage, I am fully aware that the spectacular life Walid and I led was immensely fortunate and rarefied. And I fully understand how this can be perceived in the wider world.”

Seven degrees of separation

Proof! Just six degrees of separation between us
After checking 30 billion electronic messages, Microsoft researchers say the theory stands up
 The Dalai Lama arrives outside his hotel in central London, at the start of an 11-day visit to Britain.
 Just six degrees of separation or fewer between the Dalai Lama and everyone else. Photograph: Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images
David Smith, technology correspondent
Saturday 2 August 2008 19.01 EDT Last modified on Tuesday 12 August 2008 10.12 EDT
Share on LinkedIn Share on Google+  This article is 8 years old
 Save for later
In a world of 6.6 billion people, it does seem hard to believe. The theory of six degrees of separation contends that, because we are all linked by chains of acquaintance, you are just six introductions away from any other person on the planet.

But yesterday researchers announced the theory was right - nearly. By studying billions of electronic messages, they worked out that any two strangers are, on average, distanced by precisely 6.6 degrees of separation. In other words, putting fractions to one side, you are linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances to Madonna, the Dalai Lama and the Queen. The news will come as no surprise to film buffs who for years have been playing the parlour game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, in which they link other actors to Bacon in six films or fewer.

Researchers at Microsoft studied records of 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people in various countries, according to the Washington Post. This was 'the first time a planetary-scale social network has been available,' they observed. The database covered all the Microsoft Messenger instant-messaging network in June 2006, equivalent to roughly half the world's instant-messaging traffic at that time.

Eric Horvitz and fellow researcher Jure Leskovec considered two people to be acquaintances if they had sent one another a message. They looked at the minimum chain lengths it would take to connect 180 billion different pairs of users in the database. They found that the average length was 6.6 hops, and that 78 per cent of the pairs could be connected in seven steps or fewer. But some were separated by as many as 29 steps.

The researchers wrote: 'Via the lens provided on the world by Messenger, we find that there are about "seven degrees of separation" among people.'

Horvitz told the Post: 'To me, it was pretty shocking. What we're seeing suggests there may be a social connectivity constant for humanity. People have had this suspicion that we are really close. But we are showing on a very large scale that this idea goes beyond folklore.'

Advertisement

A 'degree of separation' is a measure of social distance between people. You are one degree away from everyone you know, two degrees away from everyone they know, and so on. The concept was popularised by John Guare's 1990 play, Six Degrees of Separation, which was turned into a film starring Will Smith, Stockard Channing, Donald Sutherland and Ian McKellen. One of the characters says: 'I read somewhere that everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people. Six degrees of separation between us and everyone else on this planet. The President of the United States, a gondolier in Venice, just fill in the names. I find it extremely comforting that we're so close. I also find it like Chinese water torture, that we're so close because you have to find the right six people to make the right connection ... I am bound, you are bound, to everyone on this planet by a trail of six people.'

Then in 1994 students at Pennsylvania's Albright College invented the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, in which the challenge was to connect every film actor to Bacon in six cast lists or fewer. Bacon thought the joke would die out, but when it didn't he launched a website, sixdegrees.org, bringing together people interested in helping good causes. He said: 'I thought it was definitely going to go the way of eight-track cassettes and pet rocks. But it's a concept that has sort of hung around in the zeitgeist.'

Attempts to prove the theory stretch back further and keep coming up with six or thereabouts. In a 1969 study, researchers Stanley Milgram and Jeffrey Travers asked 296 people in Nebraska and Boston to send a letter through acquaintances to a Boston stockbroker. Only 64 of the letters reached the stockbroker. Of those letter chains that were complete, the average number of degrees of separation was 6.2.

In 2003 researchers at Columbia University in New York experimented using the internet as the ultimate laboratory of the connected world. More than 24,000 volunteers tried to send an email via acquaintances to one of 18 target people in 13 countries, including a police officer in Australia, a vet in the Norwegian army and a professor at an Ivy League university in America. Only 384 of the chains were completed, using an average of four steps. But the researchers estimated the average length in all the chains was between five and seven steps. Facebook, the online social network, has a 'six degrees' application to test the theory through the connections of Facebook users. That may reduce a degree or two: Barack Obama already has well over a million Facebook friends.

Seven degrees of separation

Proof! Just six degrees of separation between us
After checking 30 billion electronic messages, Microsoft researchers say the theory stands up
 The Dalai Lama arrives outside his hotel in central London, at the start of an 11-day visit to Britain.
 Just six degrees of separation or fewer between the Dalai Lama and everyone else. Photograph: Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images
David Smith, technology correspondent
Saturday 2 August 2008 19.01 EDT Last modified on Tuesday 12 August 2008 10.12 EDT
Share on LinkedIn Share on Google+  This article is 8 years old
 Save for later
In a world of 6.6 billion people, it does seem hard to believe. The theory of six degrees of separation contends that, because we are all linked by chains of acquaintance, you are just six introductions away from any other person on the planet.

But yesterday researchers announced the theory was right - nearly. By studying billions of electronic messages, they worked out that any two strangers are, on average, distanced by precisely 6.6 degrees of separation. In other words, putting fractions to one side, you are linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances to Madonna, the Dalai Lama and the Queen. The news will come as no surprise to film buffs who for years have been playing the parlour game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, in which they link other actors to Bacon in six films or fewer.

Researchers at Microsoft studied records of 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people in various countries, according to the Washington Post. This was 'the first time a planetary-scale social network has been available,' they observed. The database covered all the Microsoft Messenger instant-messaging network in June 2006, equivalent to roughly half the world's instant-messaging traffic at that time.

Eric Horvitz and fellow researcher Jure Leskovec considered two people to be acquaintances if they had sent one another a message. They looked at the minimum chain lengths it would take to connect 180 billion different pairs of users in the database. They found that the average length was 6.6 hops, and that 78 per cent of the pairs could be connected in seven steps or fewer. But some were separated by as many as 29 steps.

The researchers wrote: 'Via the lens provided on the world by Messenger, we find that there are about "seven degrees of separation" among people.'

Horvitz told the Post: 'To me, it was pretty shocking. What we're seeing suggests there may be a social connectivity constant for humanity. People have had this suspicion that we are really close. But we are showing on a very large scale that this idea goes beyond folklore.'

Advertisement

A 'degree of separation' is a measure of social distance between people. You are one degree away from everyone you know, two degrees away from everyone they know, and so on. The concept was popularised by John Guare's 1990 play, Six Degrees of Separation, which was turned into a film starring Will Smith, Stockard Channing, Donald Sutherland and Ian McKellen. One of the characters says: 'I read somewhere that everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people. Six degrees of separation between us and everyone else on this planet. The President of the United States, a gondolier in Venice, just fill in the names. I find it extremely comforting that we're so close. I also find it like Chinese water torture, that we're so close because you have to find the right six people to make the right connection ... I am bound, you are bound, to everyone on this planet by a trail of six people.'

Then in 1994 students at Pennsylvania's Albright College invented the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, in which the challenge was to connect every film actor to Bacon in six cast lists or fewer. Bacon thought the joke would die out, but when it didn't he launched a website, sixdegrees.org, bringing together people interested in helping good causes. He said: 'I thought it was definitely going to go the way of eight-track cassettes and pet rocks. But it's a concept that has sort of hung around in the zeitgeist.'

Attempts to prove the theory stretch back further and keep coming up with six or thereabouts. In a 1969 study, researchers Stanley Milgram and Jeffrey Travers asked 296 people in Nebraska and Boston to send a letter through acquaintances to a Boston stockbroker. Only 64 of the letters reached the stockbroker. Of those letter chains that were complete, the average number of degrees of separation was 6.2.

In 2003 researchers at Columbia University in New York experimented using the internet as the ultimate laboratory of the connected world. More than 24,000 volunteers tried to send an email via acquaintances to one of 18 target people in 13 countries, including a police officer in Australia, a vet in the Norwegian army and a professor at an Ivy League university in America. Only 384 of the chains were completed, using an average of four steps. But the researchers estimated the average length in all the chains was between five and seven steps. Facebook, the online social network, has a 'six degrees' application to test the theory through the connections of Facebook users. That may reduce a degree or two: Barack Obama already has well over a million Facebook friends.

the best way to make most money for women "Marry a billionaire without a prenup'


Image result for Howard Sosin
 Marry a billionaire without a prenup
Howard Sosin
Business person
Howard Sosin was born in Illinois and became a financial whiz. He was for a time an associate Professor at the Columbia Business School. He founded American International Group Financial Products in 1987 and remained there until 1993.Wikipedia

Wife Cheats on Husband, Gets $40M in Divorce
Published March 25, 2005  Associated Press
Facebook Twitter Email Print
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. –  A judge has awarded the former wife of a multimillionaire businessman a divorce settlement worth more than $40 million even though she admitted having affairs with her rock-climbing guide and a man she met on a flight to China.

In addition to a $24 million payment, Susan Sosin (search) will keep the couple's $3.6 million Manhattan apartment, $2 million Utah ski house and $800,000 home in Wallkill, N.Y. (search). But she has to vacate the couple's two mansions in Connecticut and three desert properties in Arizona.

In the divorce granted Wednesday, she also gets to keep $6 million in her brokerage accounts, eight cars and $2.9 million in jewelry, including a ruby piece her husband had bought for her but hadn't given to her prior to their divorce.

Richard Albrecht (search), attorney for Sosin's husband, Howard, estimated the total value of the award at $43 million, or 27 percent of the estate. She wanted half, he said.

"My opinion is her conduct in this matter affected the award," Albrecht said.

Susan Sosin's lawyer, Frederic J. Siegel, estimated the total value of the award was about $45 million and said his client asked for about 45 percent of the estate.

"By anybody's standards, it's a large amount of money," Siegel said. "Both parties will be able to move on with their lives."

Siegel said both sides were at fault for the divorce and defended his client as a good mother.

Howard Sosin, 54, who founded AIG Financial Products (search) in 1987, filed for divorce after discovering his wife's relationships in February 2003. During an upgrade of their computer system, he found hundreds of e-mails between his wife and her lover, according to testimony.

Susan Sosin, 51, admitted in testimony that she had become intimate with a guide while rock climbing in 1996, though she said it was a spontaneous and isolated occurrence. During a flight to China in 2000, she met a married man, and that led to a lengthy affair, according to testimony.

"The parties' marriage has been undeniably marred by the defendant's infidelity," Superior Court Judge Howard Owens stated in his verdict. "Although her sexual relationship was not the sole cause of the breakdown, it did effectively terminate the marriage."

Howard Sosin's wealth was estimated at $168 million. Among the assets he gets to keep are $89 million in bank accounts, 10 of the couple's 18 cars, $960,000 worth of private club memberships and $22 million in fine art.

The couple met in 1978 when Howard Sosin was an assistant professor at Columbia University. At the time, she was married to another man and working in retail.

Howard Sosin served as the president and chief operating officer of AIG Financial Products until 1993 when he left the company. Following litigation, he received $182 million from AIG.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/2005/03/25/wife-cheats-on-husband-gets-40m-in-divorce.html


from wikipedia 

"American Pie" singer and songwriter Don McLean and his wife have finalized their divorce and agreed to a $10 million settlement.Don McLean
A spokesman for McLean said Monday that the singer "chose to ignore a premarital agreement" and provide the settlement.
McLean's wife Patrisha, an author and photographer, filed for divorce citing "adultery, cruel and abusive treatment, and irreconcilable differences" in legal papers.
The couple had been married for about 30 years. They have two adult children




SAUDI BILLIONAIRE AND FORMER MODEL SETTLE $100 MILLION DIVORCE

“[Anything more] would drive this case into fantasy territory.”




By Dan Kitwood/Getty Images.


The union between Christina Estrada and Sheikh Walid Juffali will never achieve the happily-ever-after potential that the love story between the Pirelli calendar model and the Saudi billionaire promised. But there is no question that Estrada walked away with a fairy-tale divorce. Her lawyers said she was awarded a £75 million, or about $100 million, settlement—a £53 million cash payment and £20 million of her own assets. They called this the “largest needs award ever made by an English court,” according to the BBC.

Estrada said in a statement that she is extremely grateful for the settlement, but even a lump sum of more than £50 million is a letdown compared to the £238 million she had initially asked for from her ex-husband, whom she claimed is worth £8 billion (a fact he flatly denied). Estrada testified in court that she needed £1 million a year for clothes—a sum made up of £109,000 for couture dresses, £40,000 for fur coats, and £21,000 for shoes, according to The Guardian. She also reportedly had budgeted £58,000 for two super-special handbags every year, £23,000 for six more casual, knock-around bags, and £35,000 on 10 clutches annually. There was also travel factored in—£2.1 million in total, including £600,000 for private aviation—and, of course, real estate. Estrada said she required enough support to maintain a home worth around £60 million in London and a £4.4 million home in Henley-on-Thames. For her cell-phone bill, she asked for £26,000 a year, and £495,000 for five cars, according to The Guardian.
At the time, Estrada told the London court, “I have lived this life. This is what I am accustomed to. It is difficult to convey the extraordinary level of luxury and opulence we were fortunate enough to enjoy.”
After 12 years of marriage and having a daughter together, Estrada’s opulent life all changed in 2014, when, without her knowledge, the sheikh divorced her in Saudi Arabia under Islamic law. Two years earlier, he wed a 25-year-old Lebanese model with whom he has two children while he and Estrada were still married. The Guardian reported that Juffali could not attend the court proceedings because he is being treated for advanced lung cancer. In a statement, he said he had left the bulk of his fortune to his three oldest children, including his daughter with Estrada.
“[Awarding] £53 million to a lady who has £20m [in her own assets] is an astonishing amount of money,” his lawyer said. “[Anything more] would drive this case into fantasy territory.”
In her own statement to The Guardian, Estrada called the process “incredibly bruising and distressing” and that she had wanted to resolve the matter amicably after she found about the second wife and divorce.
“I never wanted to be here,” she said. “Having grown up in a middle-class family and having enjoyed a successful career until my marriage, I am fully aware that the spectacular life Walid and I led was immensely fortunate and rarefied. And I fully understand how this can be perceived in the wider world.”