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Before Steve Moore became an entrepreneur, he led record-breaking expeditions.

The co-founder of Flight Club a chain of venues where punters play rounds of social darts can trace his start-up journey to 2010, when he embarked on a nine month-long circumnavigation of the globe, executing the epic trip in a mode of transport more suited to a dozen miles than 25,000: a fire engine.

The whole project was ridiculously ambitious, remembers Moore, who lost his firefighter father to lung cancer the year before and wanted to raise money for charity. We planned for 28 countries and five continents plus a Guinness World Record for the longest journey in a fire engine.

It was a mammoth operation that required an intense year of preparation and research. There was a crew of 25 co-drivers, who would swap in and out along the way, plus fixers in most of the countries.

There were about 200 people involved, says Moore, who knew nothing about logistics and project management at the time. I took some truck maintenance and Russian classes, and went on an SAS survival course.

Returning to London in 2011 and having raised 120,000, Moore reflects that he was inspired, if a little sore from his off-road adventure. The biggest takeaway was realising the potential of what you could achieve with just people getting them to work together and calling in favours.

People-power is precisely what Moore would use when he swapped fire engines for dart flights a year later. In 2012, he and Paul Barham, an old friend and Flight Clubs other co-founder, were catching up in a Croydon pub. There were some young people having a blast playing [knockout game] Killer on a dart board. We saw an opportunity.

The duo wanted to bring that same energy and fun back to darts, which they felt had become dated and dull. The plan was to launch with a London venue: a fully-functional bar that served food and hosted competitive darts party games in booths.

Moore drew on his experience of putting together a team for the fire truck trip, surrounding himself with people who knew what he didnt.

I had never owned a bar, but a friend from school ran nine in the capital, so we got hold of him. A friend from university also owns an accounting company, so we asked for some help. Calling in favours is crucial when starting a company, he adds.

We went nuts on focus groups, doing three or four a week for about 18 monthsSteve Moore, Flight Club

Answers were less forthcoming for the darts experience itself. Moore's Flight Club vision was to have camera-based, auto-scoring technology at every oche, to show where on the board the darts hit.

The scores would be recorded live, flashing up on a screen next to the players, who wouldnt have to spend time chalking-up points and doing mental sums to work out the scores.

The problem was that it hadnt been built yet.

We knew that [sports tech company] Hawk-Eye had tried it, but failed, says Moore, who even put the challenge to PhD students as part of a country-wide university competition. No one could figure it out. Again, Moore leaned on other people, leveraging his network of contacts to solve the fundamental issue and secure a key hire.

We knew a camera systems contact who supplied Hawk-Eye with its kit, says Moore. He knew a specialist who worked with Nasa [on autonomous in-flight refuelling systems] and who might have the answer. That person was Dr Jason Dale and he did. Hes now the companys technical director.

With Dales tech, the co-founders could finally build a working system, having brainstormed dozens of darts games with chalkboards and Excel spreadsheets on a test board in Moores living room.

We went nuts on focus groups, doing three or four a week for about 18 months, he adds.

The team was still very nervous when a dozen oches were installed at their launch venue in Shoreditch. When we opened the doors [in 2014], we thought that a few people would come in and play, but we were full, says Moore.

I remember thinking: this sytem was just in my loungeand now weve got hundreds of people using 12 of them.

That first day was so unenjoyable, says the co-founder, who admits that the team took a huge risk on the tech side, having tested it in such a limited environment before rolling it out for commercial launch.

The business employed a neat trick to deal with any blips, by selling the first few weeks as a hackathon, making the experience of finding a glitch a fun game, rather than a disappointment. If people found bugs, we would offer them a free drink, which they loved, jokes Moore.

We put every single penny back into the productSteve Moore, Flight Club

Today the company employs 20 people in its tech team. Theres more rigorous testing and constant innovation, which prevents Flight Club from becoming a one-trick pony, where a customer might play all the games, experience the lot and never come back, thinks the business owner.

Refreshes and new releases are written into our business objectives we launch four new things a year, explains Moore. Instant video instant replays, for example, will be available to players by the end of September.

Business owners must beware of resting on their laurels, warns the co-founder. Even though were booked out five months in advance, were constantly refreshing the games, even the interior design, to keep people coming back. There are companies in our sector that are now coming off their peak, because theyre not reinvesting, butwe put every single penny back into the product.

Moore also invests in staff. For a small company, we put a lot into our training academy, because youre only as good as your general manager, he says. Were in a sector with traditionally high staff turnover, but retention for us is great, because were growing at a rate that can fulfil a lot of peoples career ambitions.

Poetically, Flight Club employs 180 people across its two sites (the second is in Bloomsbury). Last year it registered turnover of 8m and its website claims that more than 19.5 million darts have been thrown so far.

On the horizon are new venues, with a Chicago Flight Club opening in February 2018. Moore says that hes also looking at Melbourne, Oslo and Hong Kong, as well as new locations in the UK, such as Bristol and Manchester.

Weve had zero issues, he explains. Theres never any trouble, beacuse people are so engaged in the activity.

"The biggest credit to us and what we do is mobile use; no one is on their phone at a Flight Club venue anywhere else, people have their heads down, texting and browsing Facebook.

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Flight Club co-founder: Innovation is written into our business objectives - Telegraph.co.uk

Jul. 7, 2017 at 11:04 AM

During last years presidential campaign, Donald Trump and his supporters predicted an economic boom if he won the White House; his critics warned of a recession. Instead, nearly six months into Trumps presidency, the U.S. economy is fine. Consumers report being more confident, but their actual spending hasnt accelerated. The stock market has surged, but key industries, including retailers and auto manufacturers, are struggling. Overall economic growth, sticking to its pattern of recent years, was slow early in the year but has picked up a bit more recently.

The latest jobs data, released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday, told a similar story. Employers added 222,000 jobs in June, more than in May and ahead of economists expectations. The unemployment rate ticked up but remained low at 4.4 percent. Average earnings rose a modest 4 cents an hour.

Overall, the June figures were improved from May, when decent headline numbers masked more troubling details. But neither months data did much to change the bigger picture: Years of steady job growth have succeeded in putting most Americans back to work after the Great Recession but havent yet translated into strong gains in workers paychecks. That was the overarching economic story under Barack Obama, and it remains the story under Trump.

It shouldnt be too surprising that the economy hasnt changed direction since the election. Presidents, despite their promises, have limited influence over the economy, especially in the short-term. And Trump, of course, has yet to enact the big policies on taxes, trade and other issues that are most likely to affect the economy, for good or ill.

The larger questions facing the job market have little to do with politics: How long can a record streak of job growth now at 81 straight months continue? When, if ever, will the falling unemployment rate spur faster growth in wages? And, crucially, how much more room does the job market have to improve?

On that last question, at least, Fridays report was encouraging. In recent months, a growing number of economists have suggested the U.S. could be at full employment, the point at which essentially everyone who wants a job has one. But the solid pace of job growth suggests that isnt the case. Instead, the strong job market appears to be pulling more Americans off the economys sidelines the labor force grew by 361,000 people in June. There are signs the recovery is spreading to hard-to-reach corners of the job market: The unemployment rate dropped sharply in June for teenagers, African-Americans and Hispanics, and there is anecdotal evidence that companies are becoming more willing to hire people with criminal records.

The downside of the expanding pool of workers is that it puts less pressure on employers to raise pay. Economists have repeatedly predicted that the low unemployment rate would lead to wage gains as companies compete to retain employees. But there has been little sign of that happening. Average hourly earnings in June were up 2.5 percent over the prior year. Thats ahead of inflation, which is averaging about 2 percent per year, but its not enough to reverse years of anemic wage growth and actually represents a slowdown from late 2016.

The good news from Fridays report, then, is that the recovery in the job market is spreading rather than slowing. The bad news is that many workers are still waiting on their long-delayed pay raises. They are no doubt hoping that the clock doesnt run out on the recovery before they get them.

Here are a few more observations from Fridays report:

A gradual slowdown: The government revised up its estimates of job growth in April and May by a combined 47,000 jobs. The economy has averaged 180,000 new jobs per month over the first half of 2017, down a bit from the 193,000-job average from the previous six months but essentially unchanged from the first half of 2016.

Over the somewhat longer term, the pace of job growth has slowed a bit from the torrid pace of 2014, when the economy added 250,000 new jobs per month. But some slowdown was probably inevitable as the huge pool of workers displaced by the Great Recession began to dry up. Employers have added more than 2 million jobs over the past year, a healthy pace by any measure.

A good increase in the unemployment rate: The government only considers people unemployed if they are actively searching for work. That means the unemployment rate can rise for bad reasons (because people lost jobs) but also for good ones (more people started looking for work). Junes increase fell into the latter category: The labor force grew as more people started looking for work. The so-called participation rate the share of adults either working or looking for work rose a tenth of a percentage point, partially reversing declines in April and May.

One way to overcome the muddy definition of unemployment is instead to focus on how many people are working. The rate of employment among adults ages 25 to 54 an age range chosen to avoid the effects of retiring baby boomers rose a tenth of a percentage point to 78.5 percent in June. Thats up substantially from a low point of 74.8 percent in the early days of the economic recovery, but still below the 80 percent mark when the recession began.

Retail rebound: Steep job losses in the retail sector in recent months have contributed to fears that Amazon and other online sellers are doing permanent damage to a key source of employment for less-educated workers. In June, however, retailers added 8,100 jobs, the first increase since January. (A similar small gain in April was wiped out by subsequent revisions, something that could happen again.) Still, the sector has lost 36,000 jobs so far this year.

Other industries posted mixed results in June. Manufacturing employment was essentially flat, and automakers cut jobs for the third straight month. But the mining sector, which includes oil and gas producers, continued its recent rebound after shedding jobs in 2015 and 2016. The health care industry added 59,100 jobs, continuing a long trend of strong growth.

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The Trump Job Market Looks A Lot Like The Obama Job Market - FiveThirtyEight

On Thursday, the former White House photographer used his Instagram account to troll Vladimir Putin.

In anticipation of President Donald Trumps Friday meeting with the Russian leader at the G-20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, Souza posted a snap of Putin alongside lyrics from The Whos Behind Blue Eyes:

Happened to hear this song today in Italy, wrote Souza, before noting the words to the track.

No one knows what its like to be the bad man to be the sad man behind blue eyes, he posted. No one knows what its like to be hated to be fated to telling only lies...

Souza, who regularly uses pictures he took during Barack Obamas administration to criticize the current White House,posted his snap on the same day that Trump appeared to cast doubt on Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.

I think it was Russia, but I think it was probably other people and/or countries, he told a press conference in Warsaw, Poland. I see nothing wrong with the statement. Nobody really knows, nobody really knows for sure.

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Obama Photographer Trolls Vladimir Putin With The Who Lyrics - HuffPost

Former Energy Secretary Ernest MonizErnest MonizObama energy secretary criticizes Trump on oil reserve Obama energy secretary launches nonprofit Overnight Energy: Zinke, Perry take heat over Trump budget MORE is criticizingthe Trump administration's policy toward the federal government's oil reserve, saying the administration should improve on its usefulness.

Moniz, who led the Department of Energy from 2013 to 2017 under former President Barack ObamaBarack ObamaTillerson: Trump and Putin had 'positive chemistry' White House limiting number of troops to Afghanistan: report Tillerson: Trump pressed Putin on election interference MORE, argued in aHouston Chronicleop-ed published Thursday that the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) should not be dramatically reduced, as President Trumps budget proposes.

The former Energy chief argued that while the nations oil and energy systems are dramatically different from 40 years ago, when the SPR was established, it still serves a vital purpose.

Moniz wrote that the rationale that the SPR is unnecessary with a boom in domestic oil production appears to be grounded in a view of oil markets in 1973."

The SPR its value to domestic and global energy security, U.S. consumers and our economy needs to be viewed instead through the lens of the dramatic changes that have taken place in the last 40 years, he wrote.

Moniz called for modernizing the SPR, including through updating its infrastructure to better be able to release oil quickly in the case of a supply disruption or other problem.

Congress has acted a handful of times in recent years to sell off some of the approximately 690 million barrels of oil in the SPR to pay for other programs.

Those proposals frequently face cautious opposition among some lawmakers, and the Obama administration resisted large-scale sell-offs.

Moniz said Trump and current Energy Secretary Rick Perry should realize the domestic and international benefits of the SPR and work to improve its usefulness, not reduce it.

We should support the view of Congress that the SPR is one of our most valuable security assets, he said. In today's world of changed markets, unrest, and collective energy security responsibilities, we should be modernizing the SPR, not selling it off.

The rest is here:
Obama energy secretary criticizes Trump on oil reserve - The Hill

The establishment media went nutswhen President Trump said Thursday in Polandthat countries other than Russia may have been involved with meddling in the 2016 U.S. election.

In a vacuum, the president saying that he thinks Russia meddled in the election, but it could have been others too would not cause so much controversy. But with a media so heavily invested in the Russia-Trump narrative leading to multiple misreports, retractions, and resignations, it makes sense that this is what the media would direct its laser focus on.

What they are ignoring, however, is the presidents broader point of questioning then-President Obamas role as commander in chief during the alleged Russian meddling, which CNN curiously labeled as Trump blamingObama.

From another, perhaps more sober viewpoint, Trump posed a legitimate question for those genuinely concerned about Russian hacking:

Why did [President Obama] do nothing about it? He was told it was Russia by the CIA and he did nothing about itThey said he choked. I dont think he choked I think what happened was he thought Hillary Clinton was going to win the election and he said lets not do anything about it. Had he thought the other way, he would have done something about it.

The president makes a serious allegation about a former president ignoring cyber security breaches instead the media ignores and obfuscates by breathlessly reporting his claims that others may have been involved as well. The presidents allegation is not without merit, but Obamas culpability in the Russian hacking is a question seldom asked, let alone answered.

A Washington Postreport revealed that the CIA briefed the Obama White House as early as August 2016 that Russian President Vladamir Putin had ordered the interference of the 2016 election with the express purpose of helping elect Donald Trump. It was not until Oct. 7 that Obama revealed Russia was behind the hacking, and Putins role in directly ordering it was not released until December, an entire month after the election.

After Trumps victory in the 2016 election, the Obama camps buyers remorse kicked in, with one anonymous senior official saying that they sort of choked. Another senior official remarked that [t]he White House was mortified and shocked after Trump won the election, and a sense of wow, did we mishandle this overtook the national security team.

FactCheck.orgcalled President Trumps claim Obama did nothing misleading Thursday, but the conclusion flies in the face of comments fromformer high ranking intelligence officials in the Obama Administration.

In May, former acting CIA director under Obama, Micheal Morell, was struck that the administration was concerned enough about hacking to ask the Russians to stop but did nothing after the warning had fallen on deaf ears. Obamas former homeland security director, Jeh Johnson, said the inaction left him with a sense of cognitive dissonance.

Democratic Sen. Al Franken of Minnesota, in a recent TV appearance,said that the Obama administration did think Hillary would win and that they did not want to be seen as putting their thumb on the scale. The Washington Posts, Aaron Blake, concludes that if Hillary Clinton had won the election Russian meddling would not be a big deal today, but since Trump pulled off a narrow upset, any number of factors could have tipped the scales. These comments can lead one to conclude that the Trump-Russia probe is little more than sour grapes in political circles and media outlets, and an attempt to act after the fact.

If Obama had thought Trump was going to win, would that have forced him to protect the country against cyberattacks. Was his inaction to intelligence reports of Russian meddling in the election politically motivated, and perhaps left our election processes vulnerable to foreign adversaries?

These are questions that demand answers from former Obama administration officials. But with an establishment media singularly focused on a narrative rather than journalistic integrity and duty, they are questions that will most likely remain unanswered.

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Media Obsessed With Trump-Russia Narrative, Dismiss Obama Culpability - The Daily Caller