Tribute

A tribute (from Latin tributum, contribution) is wealth, often in kind, that a party gives to another as a sign of respect or, as was often the case in historical contexts, of submission or allegiance. Various ancient states exacted tribute from the rulers of land which the state conquered or otherwise threatened to conquer. In case of alliances, lesser parties may pay tribute to more powerful parties as a sign of allegiance and often in order to finance projects that benefited both parties. To be called "tribute" a recognition by the payer of political submission to the payee is normally required; the large sums, essentially protection money, paid by the later Roman and Byzantine Empires to barbarian peoples to prevent them attacking imperial territory, would not usually be termed "tribute" as the Empire accepted no inferior political position. Payments by a superior political entity to an inferior one, made for various purposes, are described by terms including "subsidy".

The ancient Persian Achaemenid Empire is an example of an ancient tribute empire; one that made relatively few demands on its non-Persian subjects other than the regular payment of tribute, which might be gold, luxury goods, animals, soldiers or slaves. However failure to keep up the payments had dire consequences. The reliefs at Persepolis show processions of figures bearing varied types of tribute.

Tribute (song)

"Tribute" is the first single of Tenacious D's self-titled debut album. It was released July 16, 2002. "Tribute" was the most requested video on Kerrang! TV in 2002. The song is a tribute to what Gass and Black refer to as "The Greatest Song in the World" (often confused as the song's title), which Tenacious D themselves came up with, but have since forgotten. It was released as a downloadable track for Rock Band in addition to appearing as a playable track for Guitar Hero Live.

History

Tribute was the first song Black and Gass played live as Tenacious D. The song, like many other songs that were recorded on Tenacious D, was originally played on the TV series. During earlier performances of this song Kyle Gass played the opening to "Stairway to Heaven". The two songs are both in A minor and have very similar chord progressions, and critics have said the songs sound alike. A slightly different version of the song first appeared on the band's TV show on HBO.

Synopsis

The song chronicles the band members' encounter with a demon who demands the duo play "the best song in the world" or have their souls eaten. Having nothing to lose from trying, they play "the first thing that came to our heads", and it "just so happened to be the best song in the world."

Tribute (Roy Rogers album)

Tribute is the fourth studio album by American country music artist Roy Rogers. It was released in 1991 via RCA Records. The album peaked at number 17 on the Billboard Top Country Albums chart.

Track listing

Chart performance

References

Greeks (finance)

In mathematical finance, the Greeks are the quantities representing the sensitivity of the price of derivatives such as options to a change in underlying parameters on which the value of an instrument or portfolio of financial instruments is dependent. The name is used because the most common of these sensitivities are denoted by Greek letters (as are some other finance measures). Collectively these have also been called the risk sensitivities,risk measures or hedge parameters.

Use of the Greeks

The Greeks are vital tools in risk management. Each Greek measures the sensitivity of the value of a portfolio to a small change in a given underlying parameter, so that component risks may be treated in isolation, and the portfolio rebalanced accordingly to achieve a desired exposure; see for example delta hedging.

The Greeks in the Black–Scholes model are relatively easy to calculate, a desirable property of financial models, and are very useful for derivatives traders, especially those who seek to hedge their portfolios from adverse changes in market conditions. For this reason, those Greeks which are particularly useful for hedging—such as delta, theta, and vega—are well-defined for measuring changes in Price, Time and Volatility. Although rho is a primary input into the Black–Scholes model, the overall impact on the value of an option corresponding to changes in the risk-free interest rate is generally insignificant and therefore higher-order derivatives involving the risk-free interest rate are not common.

Lotna

Lotna is a Polish war film released in 1959 and directed by Andrzej Wajda.

Overview

This highly symbolic movie is both the director's tribute to the long and glorious history of the Polish cavalry, as well as a more ambiguous portrait of the passing of an era. Wajda was the son of a Polish Cavalry officer who was murdered by the Soviets during the Katyn massacre.

The horse Lotna represents the entire Romantic tradition in culture, a tradition that had a huge influence in the course of Polish history and the formation of Polish literature. Lotna is Wajda's meditation on the historical breaking point that was 1939, as well as a reflection on the ending of an entire era for literature and culture in Poland and in Europe as a whole. Writing of the film, Wajda states that it "held great hopes for him, perhaps more than any other." Sadly, Wajda came to think of Lotna "a failure as a film."

The film remains highly controversial, as Wajda includes a mythical scene in which Polish horsemen suicidally charge a unit of German tanks, an event that never actually happened.

Speed (ride)

Speed is an amusement ride design produced by the Dutch company KMG.

It is commonly referred to as KMG Booster, due to its similarity with the Fabbri Booster ride.

It has become an extremely common ride on European travelling funfairs, particularly in the UK. This is due to a combination of the ride's spectacular visual impact, and its highly practical operation. The ride can be transported on only one trailer, and requires just three hours to build up.

Design and operation

The ride is primarily a 37-metre arm, connected midway to the main support of the ride. Two sets of two seats are mounted at the end of each arm, back to back. Each four-seat assembly can swing through 360 degrees.

The arm rotates at up to 13 revolutions per minute, producing an acceleration of 3.5 g on the riders.

Incidents