Meanwhile, over in the Microsoft ecosystem, CNET reports:
You can ditch the subscription (with recurring charges) and snag a lifetime license of access to Microsoft’s Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, OneNote, Publisher and Access for just $30…
That’s back at the lowest price we’ve ever seen, and a whopping 91% off the usual price of $349.
However, this deal expires in just a few days, so be sure to get your order in soon.The offer, from StackSocial, applies to both the Windows and Mac version of the software.
Now, you can always opt to use the free online version of Microsoft Office (which has far fewer features). But compared to the online Microsoft 365 subscription suite that costs $10 per month or $100 per year, this downloadable version is a phenomenal bargain. The Mac deal ends today, but the Windows deal extends through December 28th, according to CNET’s article. “The two big caveats: You get a single key — which only works on a single computer — and there’s no Microsoft OneDrive Cloud Storage included.”
Just about everyone has heard of or used Microsoft Office at some point in their life, but not everyone may own a copy of it on their own computer. There are some alternatives that work online and while that can help in a pinch, it’s not a great long-term solution. If you find yourself spending more time creating documents, sending emails and fixing up PowerPoints, you’re going to want to check this out.
You can ditch the subscription (with recurring charges) and snag a lifetime license of access to Microsoft’s Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, OneNote, Publisher and Access for just $30 instead. That’s back at the lowest-ever price we’ve seen, and a whopping 91% off the usual price of $349. However, this deal expires in just a few days, so be sure to get your order in soon.
The offer, from StackSocial, applies to both the Windows and Mac version of the software.
Microsoft
This wildly popular offer for a Microsoft Office lifetime license is still available for $30. It’s available for both Mac and Windows, so be sure to grab the right one for the computer that you use regularly.
Now, you can always opt to use the free online version of Microsoft Office (which has far fewer features). But compared to the online Microsoft 365 subscription suite that costs $10 per month or $100 per year, this downloadable version is a phenomenal bargain.
While the price almost seems too good to be true, we tried it ourselves, and it worked like a charm. (The two big caveats: You get a single key — which only works on a single computer — and there’s no Microsoft OneDrive Cloud Storage included.) In fact, Stack has been offering a version of this deal since the beginning of 2022. But this lowest-ever price won’t last, so take the plunge while you can.
From students to professionals, Microsoft Office has long been hailed as a one-stop shop for everyone. The Professional Plus edition comes with a variety of tools for handling data, documents, presentations and more at a professional level, as well as all the standard software needed for tackling day-to-day computing needs.
You can ditch the subscription (with recurring charges) and snag a perpetual license for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, OneNote, Publisher and Access for just $30 instead. That’s back at the lowest-ever price we’ve seen, and a whopping 91% off the usual price of $349. However, this deal expires tonight, so be sure to get your order in soon.
The offer, from StackSocial, applies to both the Windows and Mac version of the software.
Microsoft
This wildly popular offer for a Microsoft Office lifetime license is still available for $30. It’s available for both Mac and Windows, so be sure to grab the right one for the computer that you use regularly.
Now, you can always opt to use the free online version of Microsoft Office (which has far fewer features). But compared to the online Microsoft 365 subscription suite that costs $10 per month or $100 per year, this downloadable version is a phenomenal bargain.
While the price almost seems too good to be true, we tried it ourselves, and it worked like a charm. (The two big caveats: You get a single key for a single computer, and there’s no Microsoft OneDrive Cloud Storage included.) In fact, Stack has been offering a version of this deal since the beginning of 2022. But this lowest-ever price won’t last, so take the plunge while you can.
The Biden administration said on Saturday it would lift a key oil sanction against Venezuela, marking the first significant crack in a years-long U.S. embargo that could eventually help ease the tight global energy market.
Chevron, the only remaining active U.S. oil company in Venezuela, is part of a joint venture with the country’s state oil company but has been barred by sanctions from operations there. Under a new Treasury Department license, it will be able to resume pumping oil. The limited license stipulates that any oil produced can only be exported to the United States. No profits from its sale can go to the Venezuelan state-owned company but must be used to pay off Venezuelan creditors in the United States.
The move came as the government of Nicolás Maduro held its first formal talks with Venezuela’s opposition coalition in more than a year. Meeting in Mexico City on Saturday, the two sides agreed to ask the United Nations to manage several billion dollars in government funds held in foreign banks that will be unfrozen to help assuage a humanitarian crisis in Venezuela.
The negotiators also agreed to continue talks next month to discuss a timetable for “free” elections in 2024 and human rights issues.
“We have long made clear we believe the best solution in Venezuela is a negotiated one between Venezuelans,” said a senior Biden administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity under rules set by the White House. “To encourage this, we have also said we were willing to provide targeted sanctions relief.”
The policy “remains open to further calibrating sanctions,” the official said. “But any additional action will require additional concrete steps,” including the release of political prisoners and recognition of opposition legitimacy, as well as unfettered access for U.N. humanitarian missions.
The official dismissed reports that the administration was acting to ease an oil shortage and high energy prices exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Allowing Chevron to begin to lift oil from Venezuela is not something that is going to impact international oil prices. This is really about Venezuela and the Venezuelan process,” the official said, where the United States is “supporting a peaceful, negotiated outcome to the political, humanitarian and economic crisis.”
Venezuela has the world’s largest oil reserves, slightly more than Saudi Arabia, although its thick crude is more difficult to extract. But its production faltered due to poor government management even before Maduro took over in 2013 after he death of Hugo Chávez, a former military officer who was elected in 1998.
U.S. sanctions against Venezuela that began 15 years ago on grounds of drug trafficking, corruption and human rights abuses gradually expanded, culminating under Donald Trump’s administration. Trump sharply tightened measures against the state oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. or PDVSA; the central bank; and individuals and companies. U.S. oil company activities there were almost completely banned.
The sanctions were an attempt to block global revenue from oil sales, and production fell sharply as black market exports have been sold primarily to China and India. When the Venezuelan opposition declared December 2018 elections illegitimate, it recognized Juan Guaidó, the opposition leader in the parliament, as interim president. The United States quickly followed suit, recruiting dozens of other Latin American countries to do the same.
But economic and political pressure on Maduro had little effect, and the Venezuelan people bore the brunt of a failing economy and repression, leading millions to flee to neighboring countries as well as to the United States, where the number of Venezuelan refugees has swelled.
President Biden came to office convinced that Trump’s Venezuela policy had failed, but he took few steps to reverse it, as powerful lawmakers vowed to block any action and the administration retained hopes of winning the midterm votes of anti-Maduro Venezuelans and other Latin Americans in Florida. As recently as the summer, Biden called Guaidó to assure him of continued American recognition and support, even as other governments and members of Guaido’s own opposition coalition were turning away from him and calling for negotiations with Maduro.
The Republican electoral rout in Florida appeared to convince the administration it was time to move. Chevron officials have said it will take some time to get their operations up and running again in Venezuela.
The sanctions change appears to be an agile circumvention of a main complaint of U.S. critics — the possibility that the Maduro government would benefit directly. Under the terms of the license, PDVSA is cut off from any profits its joint venture may make with Chevron.
But Maduro would not be any worse off than he is now, and one crack in the sanctions may lead to others. For the administration, assuming negotiations with the opposition continues toward democratic elections and human rights improvements, any loosening of global energy supply is seen as positive.
In a statement Saturday on the resumption of talks in Mexico, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a longtime hard-liner on Venezuela, said that “if Maduro again tries to use these negotiations to buy time to further consolidate his criminal dictatorship, the United States and our international partners must snap back the full force of our sanctions that brought his regime to the negotiating table in the first place.”
to resume pumping oil from its Venezuelan oil fields after President Nicolás Maduro’s government and an opposition coalition agreed to implement an estimated $3 billion humanitarian relief program and continue dialogue in Mexico City on efforts to hold free and fair elections.
Following the Norwegian-brokered agreement signed in Mexico City, the Biden administration granted a license to Chevron that allows the California-based oil company to return to its oil fields in joint ventures with the Venezuela national oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela SA. The new license, granted by the Treasury Department, permits Chevron to pump Venezuelan oil for the first time in years.
Biden administration officials said the license prohibits PdVSA from receiving profits from Chevron’s oil sales. The officials said the U.S. is prepared to revoke or amend the license, which will be in effect for six months, at any time if Venezuela doesn’t negotiate in good faith.
Venezuela produces some 700,000 barrels of oil a day, compared with more than 3 million in the 1990s.
Photo:
Isaac Urrutia/Reuters
“If Maduro again tries to use these negotiations to buy time to further consolidate his criminal dictatorship, the United States and our international partners must snap back the full force of our sanctions,” said Sen.
Robert Menendez
(D., N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The U.S. policy shift could signal an opening for other oil companies to resume their business in Venezuela two years after the Trump administration clamped down on Chevron and other companies’ activities there as part of a maximum-pressure campaign meant to oust the government led by Mr. Maduro. The Treasury Department action didn’t say how non-U.S. oil companies might re-engage with Venezuela.
Venezuela produces some 700,000 barrels of oil a day, compared with more than 3 million barrels a day in the 1990s. Some analysts said Venezuela could hit 1 million barrels a day in the medium term, a modest increment reflecting the dilapidated state of the country’s state-led oil industry.
Some Republican lawmakers criticized the Biden administration’s decision to clear the way for Chevron to pump more oil in Venezuela. “The Biden administration should allow American energy producers to unleash DOMESTIC production instead of begging dictators for oil,” Rep. Claudia Tenney (R., N.Y.) wrote on Twitter.
Biden administration officials said the decision to issue the license wasn’t a response to oil prices, which have been a major concern for President Biden and his top advisers in recent months as they seek to tackle inflation. “This is about the regime taking the steps needed to support the restoration of democracy in Venezuela,” one of the officials said.
The Wall Street Journal reported in October that the Biden administration was preparing to scale down sanctions on Venezuela’s regime to allow Chevron to resume pumping oil there.
Jorge Rodriguez led the Venezuelan delegation to the talks in Mexico City, where an agreement was signed.
Photo:
Henry Romero/Reuters
Under the new license, profits from the sale of oil will go toward repaying hundreds of millions of dollars in debt owed to Chevron by PdVSA, administration officials said. The U.S. will require that Chevron report details of its financial operations to ensure transparency, they said.
Chevron spokesman Ray Fohr said the new license allows the company to commercialize the oil currently being produced at its joint-venture assets. He said the company will conduct its business in compliance within the current framework.
The license prohibits Chevron from paying taxes and royalties to the Venezuelan government, which surprised some experts. They had been expecting that direct revenue would encourage PdVSA to reroute oil cargoes away from obscure export channels, mostly to Chinese buyers at a steep discount, which Venezuela has relied on for years to skirt sanctions.
“If this is the case, Maduro doesn’t have significant incentives to allow that many cargoes of Chevron to go out,” said
Francisco Monaldi,
director of the Latin America Energy Program at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. Sending oil to China, even at a heavy discount, would be better for Caracas than only paying debt to Chevron, he said.
The limited scope of the Chevron license is seen as a way to ensure that Mr. Maduro stays the course on negotiations. “Rather than fully opening the door for Venezuelan oil to flow to the U.S. market immediately, what the license proposes is a normalization path that is likely contingent on concessions from the Maduro regime on the political and human-rights front,” said
Luisa Palacios,
senior research scholar at the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy.
The license allows Venezuelan oil back into the U.S., historically its largest market, but only if the oil from the PdVSA-Chevron joint ventures is first sold to Chevron and doesn’t authorize exports from the ventures “to any jurisdiction other than the United States,” which appears to restrict PdVSA’s own share of the sales to the U.S. market, said Mr. Monaldi.
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The license prohibits transactions involving goods and services from Iran, a U.S.-sanctioned oil producer that has helped Venezuela overcome sanctions in recent years. It blocks dealings with Venezuelan entities owned or controlled by Western-sanctioned Russia, which has played a role in Venezuela’s oil industry.
Jorge Rodriguez,
the head of Venezuela’s Congress as well as the government’s delegation to the Mexico City talks, declined to comment on the issuance of the Chevron license.
Freddy Guevara,
a member of the opposition coalition’s delegation, said the estimated $3 billion in frozen funds intended for humanitarian relief and infrastructure projects in Venezuela would be administered by the United Nations. He cautioned that it would take time to implement the program fully. “It begins now, but the time period is up to three years,” he said.
The Venezuelan state funds frozen in overseas banks by sanctions are expected to be used to alleviate the country’s health, food and electric-power crises in part by building infrastructure for electricity and water-treatment needs. “Not one dollar will go to the vaults of the regime,” Mr. Guevara said.
Chevron plans to restore lost output as it performs maintenance and other essential work, but it won’t attempt major work that would require new investments in the country’s oil fields until debts of $4.2 billion are repaid. That could take about two to three years depending on oil-market conditions, according to people familiar with the matter.
PdVSA owes Chevron and other joint-venture partners their shares of more than two years of revenue from oil sales, after the 2020 U.S. sanctions barred the Venezuelan company from paying its partners, one of the people said. The license would allow Chevron to collect its share of dividends from its joint ventures such as Petropiar, in which Chevron is a 30% partner.
Analysts said the new agreement raises expectations that will take time and work to fulfill. “Ensuring the success of talks won’t be easy, but it’s clear that offering gradual sanctions relief like this in order to incentivize agreements is the only way forward. It’s a Champagne-popping moment for the negotiators, but much more work remains to be done,” said Geoff Ramsey, Venezuela director at the Washington Office on Latin America.
—José de Córdoba and Ginette Gonzalez contributed to this article.
Write to Collin Eaton at collin.eaton@wsj.com and Andrew Restuccia at andrew.restuccia@wsj.com
Using your PC for work and play is great, but no matter if you’re doing basic tasks or managing a business, sooner or later you will need a productivity suite to write, proofread, make some calculations, or create a presentation. Word, Excel, PowerPoint are industry standards but paying a subscription for Office 365 may not be in your immediate plans.
So how about grabbing Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for just $39.99, which includes all the essentials like Word and Excel, in addition to Outlook, Access, Publisher, and OneNote? That’s over 88% off the regular price for a standalone license, and it’s available for Windows and macOS, too.
Moreover, there’s an even better deal that gets you two Office 2021 Pro licenses for $59.99.
Buying an Office license outright is the perfect alternative to paying recurring fees on a subscription. Granted, Office 365 adds more online features, but if you simply want the best Office apps, this one-time purchase at a hefty discount is a no-brainer.
There are decent free options available like LibreOffice and FreeOffice, but Microsoft’s suite remains the most robust, feature-packed, and good looking for the job.
The most recent revisions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint include real-time co-authoring and collaboration from within the apps (an advantage to using browser-based tools), in addition to several new features and a modern UI that offers high DPI support and dark mode.
Microsoft Excel may just be one of the most useful tools ever created. It’s not just for accountants and finance gurus. Pivot tables help you leverage Excel’s most powerful tool to better present your data. Familiarize yourself with popular formulas and how to combine them to navigate and automate much of your office work. Work faster by using macros to automate tasks in Word, and discover tips & shortcuts to improve your PowerPoint efficiency, dive into making a presentation flow with charts, graphs and tables.
Boost your productivity with Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for just $39.99, available for Windows or Mac. Alternatively, buy two licenses for $59.99. Your software license keys are made available instantly for you to download and install Office 2021.
Kosovo and Serbia — two Balkan countries that fought a bloody war in the 1990s and have been living in uneasy coexistence ever since — are once again at odds, this time over moves by Kosovo to force ethnic Serbs living in its northern regions to obtain license plates issued by Kosovar authorities.
The seemingly mundane move is anything but, as the status of ethnic Serbs living near the border between Serbia and Kosovo is at the heart of a protracted conflict between the two governments. Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia in February 2008, but Serbia still considers Kosovo its province.
“The overall security situation in the Northern municipalities of Kosovo is tense,” NATO’s peacekeeping force in Kosovo said Sunday in a statement. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said, “We have never been in a more difficult situation.”
What are the tensions in Kosovo about?
The latest flare-up in tensions is tied to new rules over license plates and cross-border travel documents.
Under new regulations that were meant to take effect on Aug. 1, ethnic Serbs living in villages in northern Kosovo would have had to apply for license plates issued by Kosovar authorities for their vehicles. Since the 1998-99 war, some in that population had used Serbian license plates with a different status. Authorities in Kosovo tolerated the dual-track system to preserve the peace but said last year they would no longer do so.
Another rule would have forced Serbian nationals visiting Kosovo to get an additional entry-exit document from Kosovar authorities at the border. Previously, they could enter without it. Serbia imposes a similar rule on Kosovars seeking to cross its borders.
Kosovo-Serbia tensions flare; NATO peacekeepers track border protests
The government in Kosovo’s capital, Pristina, has been trying for years to assert full institutional control over the ethnic Serb-majority areas of northern Kosovo, but it has faced fierce resistance from residents who still consider their communities part of Serbia.
On Sunday, ethnic Serbs blockaded roads in northern Kosovo to protest the new rules, forcing Kosovar authorities to shut down two border crossings, Jarinje and Brnjak. Kosovar police said shots were fired in their direction during the protests, although no one was hurt, Reuters reported.
Belgrade argues that the new rules violate a 2011 agreement on freedom of movement between Kosovo and Serbia.
Kosovo’s allies, including the United States and European Union, called for calm and urged Pristina to delay implementation of the new rules. Late on Sunday, Kosovo agreed to a 30-day delay if all roadblocks were removed. Albin Kurti, Kosovo’s prime minister, accused the protesters of trying to “destabilize” Kosovo and charged that Serbia was orchestrating “aggressive acts” during the protests.
In cooperation with our international allies, we pledge to postpone implementation of decisions on car plates & entry-exit documents at border crossing points w/ Serbia for 30 days, on the condition that all barricades are removed & complete freedom of movement is restored. pic.twitter.com/oJNaQi0qPO
— Albin Kurti (@albinkurti) July 31, 2022
Josep Borrell, the E.U.’s top diplomat, welcomed Kosovo’s decision to postpone the new measures until Sept. 1 and said he expects “all roadblocks to be removed immediately.”
How is this related to the Serbia-Kosovo conflict?
The roots of the conflict between Serbia and Kosovo go back to the breakup of Yugoslavia in the early 2000s, which itself followed a drawn-out period of ethnic conflicts between the Yugoslav republics in the 1990s. Serbia and Kosovo fought a brutal war between 1998 and 1999 that ended with the involvement of NATO in a U.S.-backed bombing campaign against Serbian territory.
Serbia is a majority Orthodox Christian nation, but Kosovo — previously a province of Yugoslavia — is dominated by ethnic Albanians, who are largely Muslim, in addition to a minority of ethnic Serbs. Tensions flared between the groups, particularly over moves in 1989 by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, a nationalist Serb, to abrogate the autonomy of Kosovo enshrined in the Yugoslav constitution.
In response, Kosovar militants formed the Kosovo Liberation Army and staged attacks against Serbia in the following years as they pushed for the creation of a new state encompassing the region’s ethnic Albanian minorities. Members of the Kosovo Liberation Army were also accused of committing war crimes against ethnic Serbs in Kosovo and those they viewed as collaborators.
Authorities in Belgrade violently cracked down on the Albanian population of Kosovo, viewing them as supportive of the KLA and its separatist attacks. More than 1 million Kosovar Albanians were driven from their homes.
Western countries and NATO became involved, bringing the parties together in France in February 1999 to negotiate a truce. While the Kosovar side agreed to a truce, Yugoslavia — which by then encompassed only Serbia and Montenegro — did not. Atrocities committed against Kosovar Albanians continued in what the U.S. State Department at the time called a “systematic campaign” by “Serbian forces and paramilitaries” to “ethnically cleanse Kosovo.”
In response, NATO launched a devastating 11-week bombing campaign against Yugoslavia that ended in June 1999, when the country signed an agreement with NATO to allow a peacekeeping force into Kosovo.
Why is NATO in Kosovo, and what is its mandate?
NATO has had a peacekeeping force in Kosovo — Kosovo Force, or KFOR — since June 1999. The creation of the force was approved by a U.N. Security Council resolution.
KFOR’s initial goal was to prevent conflict from restarting between ethnic Serbs and Albanians after NATO and Yugoslavia signed a peace agreement allowing for the return of ethnic Albanians displaced by the war.
Since then, the force has gradually been reduced, from roughly 50,000 troops to fewer than 4,000 today. In its own words, it works to maintain security and stability in the region, support humanitarian groups and civil society, train and support the Kosovo Security Force and “support the development of a stable, democratic, multi-ethnic and peaceful Kosovo.”
In its statement about the protests in Kosovo on Sunday, KFOR said it was “monitoring” the situation and was “prepared to intervene if stability is jeopardized.”
How is this related to the Russia-Ukraine war?
The Balkans have not escaped the reverberations of the war in Ukraine.
Kosovo has supported Ukraine since Russia’s invasion, which Kurti, the prime minister, called “an attack against us all.” Ukraine has not recognized Kosovo’s independence.
Russia — a long-standing ally of Serbia — does not recognize Kosovo as an independent state, either, and has echoed Serbia’s president in blaming the government in Pristina for the renewed tensions in northern Kosovo.
Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for Russia’s Foreign Ministry, accused Kosovo on Sunday of using the new licensing laws and ID documents to discriminate against the Serbian population.
“We call on Pristina and the United States and the European Union backing it to stop provocation and observe the Serbs’ rights in Kosovo,” she said, according to Russia’s official Tass news agency.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has cited Kosovo to justify his recognition of two separatist provinces in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. “Very many states of the West recognized [Kosovo] as an independent state,” Putin told U.N. chief António Guterres when the two met in April. “We did the same in respect of the republics of Donbas.”
Rachel Pannett and Ishaan Tharoor contributed to this report.
Indie tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) designers will have some new rules to play with soon. Monte Cook Games announced last week that its core set of tabletop roleplaying game rules, known as the Cypher System, is switching to an open license that will allow anyone to design and sell content using its rules. The game system’s community of dedicated fans and indie game designers has jumped at the opportunity.
While the company isn’t the first to make this move (Wizards of the Coast has long distributed Dungeons & Dragons content under a similar open license) this is a first for Monte Cook Games, which rose to prominence in 2013 with Numenera when Monte Cook, industry veteran and co-designer of the third edition of D&D, launched the company after a record-setting Kickstarter.
The Cypher System is quite different from the likes of your typical Dungeons & Dragons format; the game focuses more on narrative concepts than mechanical frameworks. Put another way, language and thematic ideas are more central than specific classes and party functions played out over rounds of combat. The Cypher ruleset originally premiered in the 2013 publication of Numenera, and reappeared in the company’s follow-up game The Strange before getting its own genre- and setting-neutral release as The Cypher System Rulebook in 2015. A 2019 revision implemented some slight tweaks.
Today the Cypher System enjoys a passionate and dedicated community full of enthusiasm over its alternative takes on the TTRPG formula. Twitch channels like Cypher Unlimited have thriving communities on Discord and Facebook, and several other community members have published their own material via the previously established (and more limited) Cypher Creator System.In a brief comment to Kotaku, Cypher Unlimitedhost Anthony (known as Spiggs18), described the Cypher System’s new open licensing agreement as a “game changer” for the community. (Full disclosure: I composed the opening music for Cypher Unlimited’s streams.)
One of the first products slated to release under the open license comes from Cypher Unlimited itself, a very party-appropriate game titled GM Roulette. Each player gets a chance to reframe the story taking turns as the GM. I’ve had the chance to play an early version of this game on one of their streams and it’s a lot of fun to see a game take unexpected turns when the role of Game Master gets passed around over the course of a single game. It’s also the kind of rule-breaking playfulness that I think emerges very organically from community spaces.
G/O Media may get a commission
Accompanying Cypher Unlimited and GM Roulette in this round of early CSOL (Cypher System Open License) games are works from fellow community members and indie publishers Marlowe House and Ganza Gaming.
Marlowe House has released a number of cyberpunk supplements under the older Cypher Creator System license.Image: Marlowe House
Andrew Marlowe of Marlowe House described the freedom in securing funding for Cypher System products being of particular importance for the future of his content. “I’m a fledgling publisher” Marlowe told Kotaku, “and I’m limited in what I can afford to pay freelancers, artists, editors, layout etc.” Having legal clearance to crowdfund his game with an open license dramatically changes the scope of what he’s able to produce. His upcoming book, Blood and Chrome, a cyberpunk setting and sourcebook, was originally intended to come out under the older Cypher Creator System license, which would’ve come with more limits on funding options and limit where it could be sold. He also stated that he’s excited to see “the sorts of things that might be weird and experimental from the community.”
Christopher Robin Negelein of Ganza Gaming also told Kotaku that the CSOL has allowed him the freedom to work on a “licensed property like Mystery Flesh Pit National Park” and that he hopes the upcoming “expanded Cypher ecosystem” will let folks know there are other games besides D&D out there, especially when indie products using these rules will now have the freedom to crowdfund and use print-on-demand services. Part-time indie designers, Negelein said, “have to choose what we can accomplish with the limited time we have” and so having more freedom via an open license means that those choices can be more impactful.
Charles Ryan, CFO of Monte Cook Games, told Kotaku that folks familiar with Wizards of the Coast’s open game license should expect very familiar material here, though he stresses designers wait for the finalized license and source material before making any final product decisions.
Monte Cook Games first conceived of switching to an open license fairly early on, but wanted time to set expectations and standards around its Cypher System products first, similar to how Dungeons & Dragons established its own brand long before Wizards of the Coast launched its open game license with the third edition rules in 2000.
The core rules that powered Numenera will soon be available for anyone to build and sell original worlds with.Image: Monte Cook Games
Ryan said that with so many great creators producing solid material for the Cypher System Creator program, and with so many different settings and rules published by Monte Cook Games in the past 10 years, it’s now time to let community and indie designers help expand the Cypher System world, and his company’s looking forward to seeing what exciting products, both homebrew and commercial, will result.
Following the lead of the official Dungeons & Dragons “Systems Reference Document” (SRD), Monte Cook Games is promising to release a new Cypher System Reference Document this summer. This reference will contain the core rules for free copying and general usage, but several intellectual properties from Monte Cook Games, like the Numenera setting, remain under copyright.
Open licenses in TTRPGs are very much like when a video game developer builds in official mod support, just with added opportunities to transform them into sellable products with a clear legal framework to avoid intellectual property issues. A similar comparison might be the use of the Unreal and Unity engines by indie devs. D&D and others have enjoyed this flexibility across both commercial and homebrew projects for years. Now the Cypher System community will get its shot.
The U.S. Treasury Department renewed a license Friday for Chevron to operate its oil production in Venezuela, a country sanctioned by the U.S., potentially setting up a broader license agreement later in the year.
The U.S. has previously served as Venezuela’s largest oil market but oil activity between the countries has been limited amid ongoing political turmoil between Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his opposition, Juan Guaido, who the U.S. recognizes as Venezuela’s rightful leader, Reuters reported.
Under the current license, Chevron is allowed to continue to maintain its staff and operation infrastructure as well as payments on third-party invoices, local taxes and utility services.
The license allows Chevron to conduct “transactions and activities necessary for safety or the preservation of assets in Venezuela,” according to the report. The oil company is also able to participate in shareholder and board meetings.
The logo of Dow Jones Industrial Average stock market index listed company Chevron (CVX) is seen in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 12, 2016. (REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson/FILE / Reuters Photos)
DOW, S&P NAB MAY GAINS, OIL AT $115 WITH MEMORIAL DAY TRAVEL: LIVE UPDATES
Venezuelan leader Nicolas Madura. (Photo by Matias Delacroix/Getty Images / Getty Images)
According to the report, U.S. officials want talks between Maduro and Guaido to advance into a cohesive governing body before any broader license will be issued.
REPUBLICANS SLAM BIDEN FOR DRAINING OIL RESERVES AS GAS PRICES REMAIN AT RECORD HIGH
Chevron was previously permitted to trade oil from the South American country, from 2019 through April 2020, but a maximum pressure campaign by former U.S. President Trump to have Maduro removed ended the activity.
Jan 31, 2020 San Jose / CA / USA – Chevron gas station in south San Francisco bay area (iStock / iStock)
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Venezuelan leaders are soon expected to negotiate for free elections and the release of political prisoners, with Mexico hosting the meeting. A positive outcome of these meetings could result in restoring oil transactions between the U.S. and Venezuela.
Chevron’s new license extends its current agreement through the end of November.
Dr. Uché Blackstock went on a rant against Florida’s surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, on MSNBC’s “ReidOut” Wednesday, saying she was “shocked” his license had not been revoked over his stance on COVID-19.
“I mean, essentially, he’s violating the Hippocratic Oath – which is do no harm. So every time he gets up there at a press conference or a hearing, and says something that is anti-science, he’s violating the Hippocratic Oath. And at this point, I am shocked that his license hasn’t been suspended or revoked,” she said.
Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo and Gov. Ron DeSantis (Joe Cavaretta/Sun Sentinel/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
The segment highlighted a hearing at a Florida Senate committee in which Ladapo was grilled on vaccines. The legislature’s Democrats, disappointed with the responses, walked out of the hearing and said they would not vote to confirm Ladapo.
Ladapo had said during the hearing that he believes vaccines are effective at preventing severe COVID-19 cases.
“They [vaccines] reduce the risk of hospitalization and death from COVID-19 … I don’t think the objective of public health is coercion. I think it’s education, and I think it’s to allow people to make choices, so they don’t feel coerced,” said Ladapo to reporters.
Florida State Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo (Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Blackstock also said that she was “mortified” to have attended the same prestigious medical school as Ladapo, who was appointed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis in September. The MSNBC guest added an ominous statement saying, “We need to round up our girls and go down there and get this man because he is dangerous.”
FLORIDA SURGEON GENERAL, ATTACKED BY LEFT, PROMISES STATE WON’T BE ‘SENSELESS’ IN COVID RESPONSE
“I think [Ladapo] has ulterior motives: power, influence, money – is probably also very important to him. I don’t think he actually believes vaccines are [not] effective. I bet he is vaccinated and boosted. I bet his entire family is. I bet his children, if they’re eligible, are also vaccinated. So this is all because of politics, because he has not prioritized … his medical duties.”
Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
Florida’s Department of Health Communications Director Weesam Koury released a statement to Fox News following Joy Reid’s segment saying, “We wish Joy well and hope she finds peace.”
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“We don’t feel that we are getting any answers met,” a state Democrat said after the hearing. “We know that there is a long agenda today with a lot of bills. So the Florida Senate Democrats in this committee now are going to abstain, walk out and come back when we have more business to attend to.”
Even without their colleagues on the left side of the aisle, Republicans voted to confirm Ladapo.
