Across the US every March, the flowers bloom, the trees grow new leaves — and everyone is glued to their TV screens for March Madness, the annual college basketball tournament.
The tournament is run by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and pits the nation's top university basketball teams against each other in a fierce competition that has taken place almost every year since 1939.
The competition was cancelled in 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the only time in history it was not held.
The single-elimination tournament involves 68 teams that compete in seven rounds for the national championship, with the second-to-last round known as the Final Four, when only four teams are left.
How are the teams chosen?
There are two ways that a team can earn a bid for the tournament, according to the NCAA. The 32 Division I conferences all receive an automatic bid, which they each award to the team that wins the postseason conference tournament.
The second way is receiving an at-large bid, which goes to the highest-scoring eligible teams across different levels, meaning even schools without big, expensive athletic departments have a chance to play.
Once the field of 68 teams is finalised, they are assigned a seed and sorted into four regions, which determines their first-round matchups and their path to the championship, according to the NCAA.
The tournament is wildly popular and even those not normally interested in college sports participate.
The big draw for fans isn't necessarily free-throw strategies or hook shots, however — it's the brackets.
At the beginning of every tournament, fans fill out a bracket, picking the teams they think will win in each game as well as which team will be the ultimate champion.
The craze attracts tens of millions of Americans every year and major sport channels such as ESPN and Fox Sports host online bracket tournaments in which winners can win hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Why do they call it March Madness?
The most obvious answer is because it mostly takes place in March. This year's tournament kicked off on Tuesday with the First Four - four games between lower-ranking teams to determine the last four in - and will continue to the NCAA championship game April 3.
The term was coined during the first year of the tournament in 1939, when Illinois high school official Henry V Porter wrote in a piece for a local magazine that “a little March madness may complement and contribute to sanity and help keep society on an even keel".
The ensuing sanity, however, might have a lot to do with whether your teams do as well as you hope they will.
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Most smart home devices are controlled via the owner's smartphone. Therefore, if you are using public wi-fi on your phone, always use a VPN (virtual private network) that offers strong security features and anonymises your internet connection.
Keep your smart home devices’ software up-to-date. Device makers often send regular updates - follow them without fail as they could provide protection from a new security risk.
Use two-factor authentication so that in addition to a password, your identity is authenticated by a second sign-in step like a code sent to your mobile number.
Set up a separate guest network for acquaintances and visitors to ensure the privacy of your IoT devices’ network.
Change the default privacy and security settings of your IoT devices to take extra steps to secure yourself and your home.
Always give your router a unique name, replacing the one generated by the manufacturer, to ensure a hacker cannot ascertain its make or model number.
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The Federal National Council is one of five federal authorities established by the UAE constitution. It held its first session on December 2, 1972, a year to the day after Federation.
It has 40 members, eight of whom are women. The members represent the UAE population through each of the emirates. Abu Dhabi and Dubai have eight members each, Sharjah and Ras al Khaimah six, and Ajman, Fujairah and Umm Al Quwain have four.
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The FNC’s main functions include passing, amending or rejecting federal draft laws, discussing international treaties and agreements, and offering recommendations on general subjects raised during sessions.
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Since 2006, half of the members have been elected by UAE citizens to serve four-year terms and the other half are appointed by the Ruler’s Courts of the seven emirates.
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