Top News Stories –

Apple Music changes policy after Taylor Swift stand –
Apple Music has reversed its payment policy, a day after the singer Taylor Swift said she was refusing to allow the company to stream her album 1989. In an open letter to Apple, Swift said she was withholding the record as she was unhappy with the three-month free trial offered to subscribers. Now Apple says it will pay artists for music streamed during trial periods. “We hear you @taylorswift13 and indie artists. Love, Apple,” tweeted executive Eddy Cue. Mr Cue said he did not know if the Shake It Off singer would now make her album available on Apple Music – but he praised her for taking a stand. “When I woke up this morning and I saw Taylor’s note that she had written, it really solidified that we needed to make a change,” he told Associated Press. [BBC]
Eddie Cue Tweet

Skinny jeans given health warning –
A 35-year-old woman had to be cut out of a pair after her calves ballooned in size, they described in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry. She had spent hours squatting to empty cupboards for a house move in Australia. By evening, her feet were numb and she found it hard to walk. Doctors believe the woman developed a condition called compartment syndrome, made worse by her skinny jeans. Compartment syndrome is a painful and potentially serious condition caused by bleeding or swelling within an enclosed bundle of muscles – in this case, the calves. The condition caused the woman to trip and fall and, unable to get up, she then spent several hours lying on the ground. [BBC]

Vine’s Carter Reynolds pressures his ex for oral sex in leaked video –
An x-rated video of Vine star Carter Reynolds leaked Sunday that purportedly shows him pressuring his ex-girlfriend for oral sex, raising issues of consent and spurring Internet backlash. The video is filmed from Reynolds’ point of view, with his pants pulled down and his erect penis exposed. His ex-girlfriend, Instagram celeb Maggie Lindemann, tells him “I don’t think I can” and repeatedly stresses “I am really uncomfortable.” Reynolds tells her to “do it,” and “just pretend (the camera) isn’t there.” Lindemann eventually curls up and stops looking at the camera. It ends with Reynolds saying, “Oh my gosh, Maggie.” Lindemann is 16 years old, and Reynolds recently turned 19, leaving issues of consent and statutory rape on the table depending when and where the clip was filmed, as well as child pornography issues depending on how old Reynolds is in the video. [Daily Dot] “Carter” tops Twitter trends Worldwide –  See Top Twitter Trends below
Carter Reynolds Tweet @Carterreynolds

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Other News Stories –

Armed conflicts and attacks

• War in Afghanistan (2015–present)
  • The Afghan National Assembly building is attacked after a suicide bombing, all 6 of the gunmen are killed and 18 people are injured. (BBC)
• Four people are killed and thirty injured in grenade attacks in Burundi. (AFP via Twitter), (BBC)
• Syrian Civil War
  • Hundreds of Syrian refugees return from Turkey to the border town of Tell Abyad after the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant are expelled byKurdish People’s Protection Units. (Reuters via Daily Star)
• Boko Haram insurgency
  • At least 20 people are killed after a female suicide bomber attacks a fish market in Nigeria’s north-eastern city of Maiduguri. The militant Islamist group Boko Haram is suspected to be behind the attack. (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

• Over 200 die of heatstroke in Pakistan‘s Karachi over the weekend in a record heatwave. (DAWN), (CNN)
• A light plane belonging to American composer James Horner crashes in Ventura County, California resulting in his death. (KSBY), (Hollywood Reporter)

Health

• 2015 Middle East respiratory syndrome outbreak in South Korea
  • The number of deaths from MERS in South Korea rises to 27 with three new cases reported. The government is taking unprecedented precautions in terms of public sanitation and quarantine.(Yonhap)

International relations

• Japan announces plans to resume whale hunting in the Antarctic during the southern hemisphere summer. Whaling has been banned for over 30 years by the International Whaling Commission. (AFP via Straits Times)
• 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict
  • A United Nations report finds evidence that both Hamas and Israel committed war crimes during the 2014 conflict. (Haaretz)
• Office of Personnel Management data breach
  • The CNN reports that the size of the Office of Personnel Management data breach could be as large as 18 million past, present and prospective employees of the United States Government. (CNN)

Law and crime

• Charleston church shooting
  • The Governor of South Carolina Nikki Haley calls for the Confederate battle flag to be removed from the U.S. Civil War memorial on the grounds of the South Carolina State House. (Washington Post)
  • Walmart, the largest store in the United States, announces that it will withdraw all merchandise featuring the Confederate flag from sale at its stores and online. (CNN)

Politics and elections

• Maryland Governor Larry Hogan reveals that he has advanced stage lymphoma. (AP via ABC)

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