Paris, France---Imagine opening your hotel room window to gaze upon the lavish grounds and famous palace of Versailles after spending a night on the estate itself.
That prospect could soon be reality -- at least for some of the wealthier visitors to France -- after a government body that manages Versailles put out a tender to build a hotel alongside the fabled grounds.
There are plans for three 17th century buildings on the border of the palace property to be converted into a luxury hotel, according to officials who confirmed a report in the newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.
Guests will have to enter the hotel from a road outside the estate, and not all the rooms will give on to the grounds.
But those that do will have a view across the Versailles gardens and, by craning necks to the right, a bit of the palace.
The company that wins the tender will have operating rights for 60 years, but will have to pay between eight million and 11 million euros to fix up the buildings' walls and roof, and touch up the interior.
The cash-strapped government has increasingly been forced to turn to the private sector to keep its heritage in a good state.
A source close to the managing body for Versailles said the plan was part of a culture ministry policy "to renovate and add value to historic monuments' spaces and installing economic activities".
One of the buildings served as the finance ministry under Louis XV, and up to the Revolution of the late 18th century.
Leading French hotel group AccorHotels, which reportedly is competing in the tender launched two weeks ago, told AFP it was a "logical" choice given its strength in the sector.
It is not the first time a hotel has been planned at the site.
In 2010, a company called Ivy International won a 30-year contract to build a 23-room hotel, but failed to go through with the scheme.
Anaheim, United States---Disney and its subsidiary Pixar on Friday announced a slew of new animated movies coming down the pipe, including a love story in the "Toy Story" series and a modern take on Jack and the Beanstalk.
John Lasseter, the chief creative officer of Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios, introduced clips from several of the new films at Disney's D23 Expo in California, in front of an audience of nearly 8,000 people.
The new Jack and the Beanstalk film, "Gigantic," is set for release in 2018 and will feature music from songwriters Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, who penned the hit "Let it Go" from the movie "Frozen."
"We're taking parts of the story we all remember and adding twists and turns, emotion and humor," director Nathan Greno said.
The film follows the adventures of Jack and Inma, a 60-foot-tall, 11-year-old girl.
Lasseter also announced "Coco," inspired by Mexico's Day of the Dead. He said the story follows Miguel, a fearless 12-year-old boy.
The fourth film in the "Toy Story" series this time will focus on a love story between the characters Woody and Bo Peep.
"It's the 20th anniversary of the original 'Toy Story,'" Lasseter said. "I'm sorry to make you feel old."
Disney delighted fans at the convention center with clips from the new film "Zootopia," which comes out in February and features the singer Shakira voicing one of the film's characters, a gazelle pop star.
Shakira made the announcement in a taped message.
Dwayne Johnson, the actor and former wrestler also known as The Rock, will voice mighty demi-god Maui in Disney's "Moana," which tells the story of a young Polynesian princess who embarks on a daring journey to prove to the world that she is a great explorer.
Along the way, she befriends Maui, a half-man, half-god played by Johnson. The film is set for release in November 2016.
The audience seemed to approve of a clip played on Friday, which showed a baby Moana playing in the crystal waters of her island.
"I'm half Samoan, half black, so to tell a story inspired by the South Pacific is a great honor," said Johnson, whose mother comes from the Samoan Islands.
The audience at the D23 Expo, which runs through Sunday, also caught an early glimpse of Pixar's "The Good Dinosaur," which follows Arlo, an Apatosaurus, and Spot, his unlikely human friend.
Disney also unveiled "Riley's First Date?" -- a short film about the first date of the star of this year's critically acclaimed "Inside Out."
The government-appointed panel overseeing the project released its longlist of designs, chosen from more than 10,000 public submissions.
The 40 will now be subject to further scrutiny, including an intensive intellectual property review, before being whittled down to four to be put to a public vote later this year.
A second referendum is planned for next year when the country will choose between the existing flag -- which features Britain's Union Jack -- and the most popular new design.
Project head John Burrows said the potential new flag had to be unmistakably from New Zealand and "celebrate us as a progressive, inclusive nation that is connected to its environment, and has a sense of its past and vision for its future".
"It is important that those designs are timeless, can work in a variety of contexts, are simple, uncluttered, balanced and have good contrast."
Common themes among the 40 flag offerings are silver ferns, the symbol used by New Zealand sports teams, and the Southern Cross constellation. Colour schemes are predominantly red, black or blue, and white.
Prime Minister John Key, who has pushed for a change, favours a silver fern design to replace the existing flag, which has the Union Jack in the top left corner and four red stars representing the Southern Cross constellation on a dark blue background.
Many New Zealanders who took to social media to comment on the flag designs questioned whether the issue was important enough to justify the NZ$26 million (US$17 million) price tag.
The longlist of flags can be viewed at www.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Flags/The-long-list.pdf.
Berlin, Germany—Germany, which has taken a tough line on Greece, has profited from the country's crisis to the tune of 100 billion euros ($109 billion), according to a new study .
The sum represents money Germany saved through lower interest payments on funds the government borrowed amid investor "flights to safety", the study said.
"These savings exceed the costs of the crisis -- even if Greece were to default on its entire debt," said the private, non-profit Leibniz Institute of Economic Research in its paper.
"Germany has clearly benefited from the Greek crisis."
When investors are faced with turmoil, they typically seek a safe haven for their money, and export champion Germany "disproportionately benefited" from that during the debt crisis, it said.
"Every time financial markets faced negative news on Greece in recent years, interest rates on German government bonds fell, and every time there was good news, they rose."
Germany, the eurozone's effective paymaster, has demanded fiscal discipline and tough economic reforms in Greece in return for consenting to new aid from international creditors.
Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble has opposed a Greek debt write-down while pointing to his own government's balanced budget.
The institute, however, argued that the balanced budget was possible in large part only because of Germany's interest savings amid the Greek debt crisis.
The estimated 100 billion euros Germany had saved since 2010 accounted for over three percent of GDP, said the institute based in the eastern city of Halle.
The bonds of other countries -- including the United States, France and the Netherlands -- had also benefited, but "to a much smaller extent".
Germany's share of the international rescue packages for Greece, including a new loan being negotiated now, came to around 90 billion euros, said the institute.
"Even if Greece doesn't pay back a single cent, the German public purse has benefited financially from the crisis," said the institute.
Greece and its creditors -- the European Central Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the European Stability Mechanism -- are working on the draft of a crucial new bailout of up to 86 billion euros ($94 billion) in exchange for further reforms.
They aim for a deal before the debt-ridden country must repay 3.4 billion euros to the ECB on August 20.
Both sides have indicated that the talks were going well, which would pave the way for the Greek parliament and eurozone finance ministers to approve the agreement ahead of that deadline.
However Germany on Monday warned that negotiations over a third bailout for Greece must emphasise "thoroughness over speed".
"A quick conclusion to the negotiations would of course be desirable but we must not forget that we are discussing a three-year programme, in other words a programme with a wide-ranging list of reforms," government spokesman Steffen Seibert told reporters.
Budapest, Hungary—Sweltering Budapest is about to get a whole lot hotter when the week-long Sziget festival, one of Europe's largest outdoor music bonanzas, kicks off on Monday evening, featuring more than 500 concerts by top international acts.
Set on an island of the Danube river in the heart of the Hungarian capital, the 22-year-old festival is one of the biggest in Europe.
Last year's edition drew a record 415,000 visitors from 87 countries.
British pop boasts a stellar presence this summer, with huge names like Alt-J, Florence and the Machine, Elie Goulding, Foals, Kasabian, as well as Robbie Williams, who will open the festival.
Other big acts set to rock the 50-odd stages include Kings of Leon, Avicii, Limp Bizkit, Interpol, Infected Mushroom, The Maccabees, Hollywood Undead, Goran Bregovic, Enter Shikari and Erotic Market.
The festival will also showcase emerging talents such as sizzling French art collective Fauve or award-winning reggae outfit Wailing Trees.
Launched in 1993, Sziget also features circus shows, sports competitions and movie screenings, among other activities.
Madrid, Spain —Collecting obscene amounts of money, writing illegal contracts, handing out bribes -- all things you can do with a new Spanish mobile app inspired by headlines of corruption in Spain.
"Corrupt Mayor Clicker" is a free game created by three young developers who were seeking a way to "criticise the corruption in a satirical way".
The aim of the game, which is available on iPhone and Android, is to collect as much money as possible through illegal activities.
"Be a good politician, trick and steal all that's possible until you amass an insane quantity of money in our Swiss bank," reads the description on the game's website, meigalabs.com.
"Make a killing!"
Javier Lopez Camba, one of the app's creators, told AFP on Monday that the game has already been downloaded more than 100,000 times.
"Every day, when we watch TV, a new corruption scandal hits," said Camba, 26.
Nearly all of the scenarios are inspired by "real facts" and the game will be updated with more examples taken from real-life corruption, he said.
But the developers have been careful include a disclaimer which reads: "Any resemblance to existing persons is purely coincidental."
New York, United States —Bjork has said she is working on new music after cutting short a tour for her deeply personal last album "Vulnicura," which she said had taken an emotional toll.
"I have started writing new songs and feel the best, most natural pathway to go is to let this beast flow its natural course and start anew," the Icelandic singer wrote over the weekend on Facebook.
Bjork in January released "Vulnicura," a string-backed exploration of her feelings as her long relationship with US artist Matthew Barney dissolved.
Bjork initially only scheduled intimate shows for the album at Carnegie Hall and other New York venues, which were accompanied by a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art.
She has since played larger shows but her management announced last week that due to a "scheduling conflict" she was cutting the tour short, scrapping two festival appearances in France and one in Iceland.
"Singing this album has been intense and the internal clock of it different to the other ones," wrote Bjork, who released the album digitally two months ahead of schedule after an online leak.
"It has sort of had to behave in its own little way. Both the urgency of the leak and now this sudden closure for reasons beyond my control is characteristic of that," she wrote.
Bjork -- known for her wide experimentation -- did not reveal the direction of her upcoming work or a release date.
Her last performance for the small "Vulnicura" tour took place Friday at the Wilderness Festival in the forest of Oxfordshire in England.
New York, United States —With the $37.2 billion deal to buy Precision Castparts announced Monday, US investment guru Warren Buffett is extending his storied Berkshire Hathaway holding company.
Here are some of the major acquisitions engineered by Buffett, 84, the world's third richest person with net worth of $72.7 billion, according to Forbes.
Duracell batteries
Announced in November 2014, Berkshire said it was buying the Duracell battery business from US consumer goods maker Procter & Gamble in a deal valued at $4.7 billion.
The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2015.
"I have always been impressed by Duracell, as a consumer and as a long-term investor in P&G and Gillette," Buffett said at the time.
Auto dealership Van Tuyl
The fifth-largest US auto dealership group, Van Tuyl fell into the Berkshire fold for $4.1 billion in the first quarter of 2015, in a deal announced in October 2014.
"The Van Tuyl Group enjoys excellent relations with the major auto manufacturers," Buffett said.
Public utility NV Energy
In May 2013, Berkshire announced a $10 billion cash-and-debt deal to acquire NV Energy, a supplier of electricity and gas in the western state of Nevada.
The Las Vegas-based NV Energy closed the transaction with Berkshire subsidiary MidAmerican Energy Holding Company in December that year.
Ketchup king Heinz
To gain control of H.J. Heinz, whose Heinz brand ketchup is an icon of American culture, Buffett's holding company joined forces with Brazilian investment firm 3G Capital, the owner of fast-food chain Burger King.
The transaction was valued at $28 billion, with $12 billion coming from Buffett, known as the "Sage of Omaha" for his investment savvy. Omaha, the largest city in the Midwestern state of Nebraska, is Buffett's birthplace and home and where his holding company is based.
That transaction closed in July 2015, leaving Berkshire with about a 27 percent stake in Heinz Holding, renamed The Kraft Heinz Company after its merger with Kraft Foods.
Chemical company Lubrizol
In March 2011, Buffett put $9.7 billion in cash on the table to buy Lubrizol, a specialty chemical company that notably makes lubricant additives for engine oils and additives for personal care products and pharmaceuticals.
"Lubrizol is exactly the sort of company with which we love to partner -- the global leader in several market applications," Buffett said. The transaction was completed in September that year.
Railroad operator Burlington Northern
Before the Precision Castparts deal, Buffett's largest acquisition was rail operator Burlington Northern Santa Fe. The deal, announced in November 2009, was valued at about $36.5 billion, including debt. Berkshire, which owned about 23 percent of the firm's shares, bought the rest in the transaction that closed in February 2010.
"Our country's future prosperity depends on its having an efficient and well-maintained rail system," Buffett said at the time.
"Most important of all, however, it's an all-in wager on the economic future of the United States," he said. "I love these bets."
Washington, United States—The use of software that blocks online ads is expected to cost websites some $21.8 billion globally in 2015, a study showed.
The study, by software group Adobe and Ireland-based consultancy PageFair, found that the number of Internet users employing ad-blocking software has jumped 41 percent in the past 12 months to 198 million.
The report said that while consumers have warmed to the idea of blocking online ads, they may not realize that the practice could hurt websites which rely on ad revenue.
Those losses are expected to grow to more than $41 billion in 2016, the study said.
"It is tragic that ad block users are inadvertently inflicting multi-billion dollar losses on the very websites they most enjoy," said PageFair chief executive Sean Blanchfield.
"With ad blocking going mobile, there's an eminent threat that the business model that has supported the open Web for two decades is going to collapse."
Consumers are able to install extensions on some Web browsers such as Google Chrome which block most ads. A similar tool is expected to become available on Apple devices with the release of the new iOS operating system later this year.
The report said that because of this growth, "ad blocking now poses an existential threat for the future of free content on the Internet."
In the US market alone, blocked ads resulted in $5.8 billion in losses in 2014 and are estimated to cost $10.7 billion this year, PageFair and Adobe found.
Campbell Foster, Adobe's director of product marketing, said he hopes the report sheds light on the online ecosystem
"Consumers, for the most part, accept the tradeoff that comes with 'free' -- I’ll give you information about me in exchange for your TV show, film, news article, or service -- but draw the line at advertising that's intrusive, annoying, irrelevant or downright creepy," he said in a statement.
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Ottawa, Canada—Couples who send each other sexually suggestive or explicit images by phone, commonly known as "sexting," have better sex, according to a study presented to a psychology convention in Toronto.
The practice is often portrayed as risky, yet American researchers found it is widespread and could actually help couples improve communication and increase intimacy.
"These findings show a robust relationship between sexting and sexual and relationship satisfaction," said Emily Stasko of Philadelphia's Drexel University.
She presented the results of an online survey of 870 Americans aged 18 to 82 at the American Psychological Association's 123rd Annual Convention in Toronto
More than eight out of 10 respondents said they have sexted. Three-quarters of them sent images to a boyfriend, girlfriend, husband or wife, and associated sexting with better relationship satisfaction.
That increased gratification, however, did not carry over to singles surveyed, nor to respondents who said they were in a "very committed" relation.
Despite its potential to enhance communication between partners, past studies -- and recent headlines -- have focused almost exclusively on negative outcomes from sexting.
Some of the best known examples include news last year about phone hacks that led to the leak of nude photos of celebrities including actress Jennifer Lawrence, pop icon Rihanna and top model Kate Upton.
In another notorious sexting case, US lawmaker Anthony Weiner quit the House of Representatives after confessing that he used social media to send sexually explicit pictures of himself to a number of women.
But such highly publicized negative outcomes said Stasko, fail to take into account the upside of sexting, which, when used by a loving couple, can increase the "potential positive effects of open sexual communication with a partner."
