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DOJ has analysis for against Apple; Sources: Apple to roll out its system to update packaged iPhones’ software for its US stores in April 

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:

 

 

—  With its lawsuit against Apple, the Justice Department focuses on outdated issues and irrelevant points, missing an opportunity to address more pressing concerns.

— Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook holding an iPhone 15 Pro Max. — Photo by David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

 

Also: Why the company is talking to generative AI partners; Sonos readies a fresh Roam speaker; and Apple prepares a wide rollout of a nifty new retail store feature.

Last week in Power On: Apple’s new CarPlay becomes its last hope to crack the automotive industry.

The Starters

— Merrick Garland, the US attorney general, unveiled the antitrust case against Apple last week. — Photo by Nathan Howard/Bloomberg

Despite the friendly image that Apple Inc. cultivates, it’s a hard-driving company behind the scenes. Just ask the many suppliers that Apple has abruptly dropped or the app developers it has put out of business.

 

Apple also hasn’t been one to welcome openness or competition. It refused to bring its iMessage app to Android phones and only agreed to adopt the cross-platform RCS messaging system under mounting pressure. Apple makes developers use its in-app purchase system, shuns cloud-gaming services and has been reluctant to open up its tap-to-pay chip to outside apps — all because it wants to protect its kingdom from rivals.

That’s provided the US Department of Justice with plenty of fodder for its antitrust lawsuit, which was filed on Thursday. But the case relies mostly on outdated arguments and cites problems that Apple is already resolving. It even levels the dubious claim that Apple makes its products worse in order to harm rivals. (The DOJ also takes credit for Apple’s success, attributing the company’s rise to a Microsoft Corp. antitrust settlement in 2001).

But perhaps the biggest flaw in the case: It does little to prove that Apple has harmed consumers.

The lawsuit claims that the main reason people hold on to their iPhones is because Apple makes it difficult to switch, not because people — I dunno — actually like their iPhones. The DOJ goes as far as to claim that Apple is trying to hurt automakers with a new version of CarPlay that takes over more of the instrument panel. But that service is completely optional for both consumers and auto brands (and, let’s face it, not at risk of being widespread anytime soon).

The government even makes the fairly silly assertion that Apple’s control over the iPhone led to the very public failures of Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft in smartphones. It argues that cloud-gaming apps were barred in order to sell pricier iPhone hardware and that Apple is responsible for the learning curve that makes it more difficult to switch to Android.

There are very real concerns with some of Apple’s practices. But the Justice Department spends less time on those issues, focusing instead on half-baked claims that suggest a lack of familiarity with modern technology.

 

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— Techmeme

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How the restructure of Diamond Sports, with lifeline from Amazon, might offer new model for on air local sports fixtures that stream in this digital era

—  A lifeline to the bankrupt Diamond Sports Group might offer a new model for airing local fixtures in the streaming era

 

Financial Times:

 

Diamond Sports Group, a consortium of a few dozen regional sports networks scattered across the U.S., was valued at $11bn as recently as 2019.

 

By the end of last year, however, it was in bankruptcy and near ready to liquidate. What then ensued could be described, in baseball terms, as a bottom-of- the-ninth-inning rally. In a surprise move in January, Amazon agreed to pump in $115mn in cash into Diamond, an infusion that is the centrepiece of a newly-crafted, intricate restructuring plan.

 

If approved by a bankruptcy court in the coming weeks, the deal will allow the broadcaster to continue airing basketball, hockey and baseball fixtures across American cities. The Diamond saga is more than just a run-of-the-mill corporate restructuring. The case has become a proxy war for the future of live sports and television broadcasts in the U.S., as leagues and distributors debate the proposition of when, or even if, live fixtures migrate entirely away from linear television and on to digital streaming platforms.

 

The number of subscribers to cable and satellite pay-TV packages in the US has dipped from about 100mn a decade ago to roughly 60mn today. Diamond’s portfolio of live sports is accessed almost exclusively through cable television packages and its subscriber count has fallen by almost a quarter since it was acquired by Sinclair Broadcast Group from Fox just before the pandemic, near the high-water mark of the pay-TV market. “Sports leagues have to figure out the right pricing models to watch their games,” said longtime media analyst and consultant Brian Wieser.

 

“The risk of getting that wrong is turning into a niche sport like boxing, which decided its best fights would only be on pay-per-view.”

 

At the time of its bankruptcy filing last year, 40 clubs across three major professional sports leagues — Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, and the National Hockey League — had contracts with Diamond to air local fixtures.

 

The regional sports network is a quirk of U.S. broadcasting, given the nation’s size and span across four time zones in the contiguous 48 states alone. With multiple MLB, NBA and NHL matches airing simultaneously each night, a cable subscriber in Kansas City wants access to a different 7pm game than a subscriber in Milwaukee. The strongest and largest media markets in the U.S., including in New York, Boston, and Los Angeles, have successful standalone regional sports networks supported by millions of local subscribers.

 

By contrast, Diamond Sports Group consolidated dozens of regional networks in midsize markets from Texas to Florida to Arizona. But the continuing shift from linear broadcast and pay television to digital streaming had shattered Diamond’s business model, which depended on elevated levels of pay-TV subscribers.

 

In the run-up to its 2023 bankruptcy filing, Diamond halted some contractual payments it owed to many of those teams, leaving leagues and club owners scrambling to find emergency broadcasting options, in some cases in the middle of their seasons.  Some, such as the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, yanked their fixtures off Diamond-owned Bally Sports and put the games on free-to-air television. The MLB also took the opportunity to test out something new: pulling the local rights of the Arizona Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres away from the individual clubs and into its own control.

 

Diamond’s creditors, who collectively held $8.9bn debt, were, at the nadir, probably set to recover only a few nickels on the dollar. At one point, the sides had even favoured a “wind-down” plan where Diamond would collect fees for the final 2023-2024 sports season, pay out the meagre proceeds to stakeholders and then cease operations for good. In that scenario, Major League Baseball could then have had the opportunity to centralise individual franchise streaming rights for clubs that had been contracted to Diamond into a league-controlled bundle.

 

MLB declined to comment. Diamond’s bankruptcy advisers approached Amazon as they were exploring their options last year, according to a person familiar with the matter. Diamond bondholders such as Prudential and Hein Park Capital were also scrambling to assemble a go-forward plan that could save their investment. The tech giant saw a strategic opportunity to capture more of the US live sports market, for which it currently has a hodgepodge of rights ranging from Thursday night National Football League games to an assortment of U.S. professional women’s soccer and basketball. Media and technology observers believe Amazon’s sports push has two motivations.

 

First, by adding another plank to its Prime service, it can create more loyalty among customers who are charged nearly $200 a year for free package deliveries as well as streaming video. Second, Amazon in recent years has become a digital advertising powerhouse and the addition of streaming hundreds of games would provide even more inventory to pitch marketers. Amazon declined to comment.

 

By mid-January, Diamond had surprised Wall Street and the sports world by announcing it had struck a deal with a majority of its creditors to stand up a reorganised company. As a part of the deal, Amazon would buy a $115mn convertible note that could swap into 15 per cent of the equity of the new Diamond as well as a separate option to put in another $50mn of equity at a $500mn equity valuation.

 

In addition to the Amazon investment, junior creditors are providing $450mn of bankruptcy process and exit financing that will give them the bulk of the ownership of new Diamond. Sinclair has also agreed to pay Diamond $495mn to settle claims that the parent had siphoned billions in fees and dividends from the subsidiary.

 

Recommended LexStreaming services Disney, Fox and Warner sports streaming platform foreshadows consolidation Premium content However, much of the cash infusion is already spoken for in repayments to senior creditors and money owed to teams. It is also unclear how much critical mass Amazon can really accumulate as Diamond only has the streaming rights for five baseball teams. Diamond will publish its targeted valuation as a reorganised company in the coming weeks.

 

In January, projections disclosed in the Amazon negotiations showed that Diamond expected its linear revenue to fall from $2.5bn to $1.8bn between 2023 and 2026. Streaming revenue, however, is to jump from $50mn to nearly $700mn over that period. These projections may be revised in April to account for any new deals struck.

 

Sports teams will have their respective linear TV agreements with Diamond while five of those baseball teams, as well all Diamond’s more than 25 NBA and NHL franchises, have given the network its streaming rights. This Diamond direct-to-consumer content will be distributed via Amazon Prime. The reorganised Diamond is expected to be valued at about $1bn based on previous debt trading levels and guidance from people close to the deal.

 

For Amazon, the modest investment could, if successful, set a new standard for distributing streaming sport content. One person involved in the Amazon negotiations for Diamond described the deal with the Seattle-based behemoth using a sports analogy: Diamond was like a player with an expiring contract acquired at the midseason trade deadline.

 

If there were long-term synergies, a longer arrangement could be later struck, leaving the interim period as like a trial period. “This way they get to see if there is a cultural fit,” said this adviser. “Amazon loves live sports. The deal puts them in position to be the provider down the road.”

 

 

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— Techmeme

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Mercer County Improvement Authority announces availability of free recycling buckets, again

Mercer County — On March 6, the Mercer County Improvement Authority announced that free recycling buckets are available again for Mercer County residents.

“We have ordered an additional 2,500 free recycling buckets to ensure everyone can get one if they need it,” said Mercer County Executive Dan Benson.

“Recycling coordinators across the county are prepared to provide a county recycling bucket to any resident in need. If residents are unable to obtain a bucket, they can call the Improvement Authority …” explained Mercer County Improvement Authority Director Anthony S. Verrelli.

Due to an increase in contractor employee’s collection-related injuries, County residents are asked to please utilize county provided recycling buckets.

The Mercer County Improvement Authority will continue picking up all flattened cardboard outside of the bucket.

For replacement buckets, please contact your municipality’s Recycling Coordinator using the information below.

Please note that Hightstown and East Windsor do not participate in the county-wide recycling program.

Free recycling buckets are also available to Mercer County residents, at The Mercer County Connection Route-33 at the Acme Shopping Center in Hamilton. Residents can reach the County Connection by calling (609) 890-9800.

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‘Lupin’ star Omar Sy, ‘Fast X’ director Louis Leterrier and Producer Thomas Benski launch Carrousel Studios

“Lupin” star Omar Sy, “Fast X” director Louis Leterrier and “Gangs of London” producer Thomas Benski have launched Carrousel Studios, a European independent production company with offices in Paris, London, Los Angeles and Senegal.

 

The banner will finance and produce film and TV projects, with an emphasis on elevated action, thrillers, sci-fi, fantasy and comedy. The company will look to tap into tax credits, European incentives and brands to finance content. CAA Media Finance architected the financing for the venture.

 

Sy, Leterrier and Benski, who have worked together on several series and films, said the name of the company, Carrousel, reflects its inclusive DNA. “A carrousel’s sole purpose is to entertain, no matter where the riders come from, no matter their age or background,” explained the trio in a joint statement.

 

“Additionally, the word carrousel is understood around the globe and associated with magical moments. Our Carrousel will have that same feel, with a modern approach to making global content in an artists-first environment.”

 

They said this principle is the “driving force and the culture of our company.” We have a great deal of respect for our diverse backgrounds and varied experiences, and what they both bring to the company,” they added.

 

A BAFTA, Grammy and Emmy award-nominated producer, Benski co-founded and served as the CEO of Pulse Films before selling and ultimately leaving the company in 2022. His credits include Andrea Arnold’s Cannes Jury Prize winner “American Honey,” as well as the series “Gangs of London,” the AppleTV+ music documentary “Beastie Boys Story” and the BAFTA-nominated “Mogul Mowgli” starring Riz Ahmed.

 

Leterrier, meanwhile, recently directed “Fast X” and will next direct the final installment of the $7.5 billion “Fast and Furious” franchise.  His credits include the “Transporter” franchise, “The Incredible Hulk,” “Clash of Titans,” “Now You See Me” and “Lupin” starring Sy.

 

Sy recently resumed the lead role in the third season of “Lupin,” which debuted in 2021 and is ranked third in Netflix’s list of most-watched non-English series at almost 100 million views. His credits include “Intouchables,” “The Takedown,” Jeymes Samuel’s “The Book of Clarence” and “X-Men: Days of Future Past.” He’ll next be seen in John Woo’s remake of “The Killer.”

 

Sy, Benski and Leterrier are represented by CAA. Leterrier is also represented by Entertainment 360, LBI, Sloane, Offer, Weber and Dern and UBBA in France. Sy is also represented by Agence Adéquat in France.

 

 

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— Variety

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Google rolls out updates to its Search ranking to counter the spread of AI content in results, which includes down-ranking content that summarizes others’ work

There are always new ways to try to game Google with crappy content — and now the company is fighting back against the worst of it

 

David Pierce / The Verge:

 

 

—  Google is rolling out a few new changes to its ranking systems in search, which are designed to help surface good content in your results and hide some of the worst and most cynical stuff on the web.

 

The company says that it is doing a better job of downranking content that exists only to summarize other content — which can sometimes be normal SEO stuff but is also increasingly a job for generative AI tools— and in combatting some of the tricks people use to trick its ranking systems.

 

There are always people trying to manipulate their way to the top of Google results. That’s just a fact of the web and a fact of life for Google’s search teams. Google is always making changes to its ranking algorithms, too, in an effort to improve search results. We never hear about most of those changes.

 

“You only see the ones that sort of slipped by the controls, as it were,” says Pandu Nayak, a VP of search at Google. “Unfortunately, these are not things you can just wave a magic wand and get rid of.”

 

For Google to announce the changes it’s making signals two things. First, that these are big changes that could meaningfully change your search experience — Nayak says that Google’s measurements show a reduction in “unhelpful content” by up to 40 percent. And second, that Google is sending a message to the web: your spammy, sketchy behavior ends now.

 

       — Google is sending a message to the web: your spammy, sketchy behavior ends now

 

Nayak lays out three examples of what Google now considers spammy behavior and intends to downrank. The first is content at scale: the sites that create thousands of low-quality articles a day, either through low-paid contractors or AI generators, and target that content at search results. Nayak points to obituary spam — which The Verge’s Mia Sato recently wrote about — as an example of a problem to be solved here.

 

The second spammy behavior is what Nayak calls “site reputation abuse.” This is when an otherwise respectable website rents out part of its site for spammy nonsense; I won’t name and shame anyone here, but you’ve surely seen the sites that make you wonder why they have coupons or why there’s a whole part of the site that seems irrelevant and AI-generated. The third is “expired domain abuse,” which is when someone buys an abandoned but high-ranking domain and fills it with crummy content that then jumps to the top of search. The current state of The Hairpin is one example of how this can happen, which Wired has covered well in recent weeks.

 

For those engaging in site reputation abuse, Nayak says Google is giving the sites 60 days to cut it out before it makes the ranking changes. The others go into effect now. Google has a spam problem, it knows it, and it’s trying to shut it down. “The healthy, high-quality ecosystem is exactly the one that gets affected when spammers and low-quality purveyors of information get control of ranking,” Nayak says.

 

The job is not done, of course. The reckoning over AI-generated content — what it means, who wants it, how it should rank — is only just beginning and will cause Google plenty of internal headaches as it both tries to bring AI to everyone and tries to save the web from being overrun by it. (Even Google’s own search engine is increasingly an AI machine.) And there will always be new, sneakier ways to game your way to the top of search results. This is a headache of Google’s own making: most of the chum on the web exists entirely to game Google, and so Google will always be one step behind.

 

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— Techmeme

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Mercer County Exec-elect Dan Benson Transition Team introduces the 17 transition committees

MERCER COUNTY, N.J. — Following his recent election as Mercer County Executive, on Feb. 22 the Benson Transition Team released a 49-page report that contains recommendations from their 17 transition committees.

“Building a better future demands bold action. With the Transition Team’s unique insights, we have developed a bold and comprehensive set of goals for our administration. I look forward to turning this vision into action,” said County Executive Dan Benson.

“This was a thorough process of coordinating efforts across 17 teams and assessing hundreds of detailed and thoughtful recommendations,” said Transition Co-Chair Sharon Shinkle Gardner.

“We’re so proud of the hard work and passion that our members brought to their transition committees — it is reflected in the quality of the report,” Transition Co-Chair Jeannine Frisby LaRue said.

The Transition Team was tasked by County Executive Dan Benson with evaluating the wide range of responsibilities of Mercer County government and offering recommendations for the new administration. It was made up of a diverse group of more than 100 Mercer County residents. Each committee brought together voices from across the county to help explore a key piece of government and provide their perspectives on how to move Mercer forward.

County Executive Benson continued, “I am grateful to have a Transition Team that is so dedicated to our community and our shared values. We have already begun to implement a number of our report’s suggestions and are excited for the road map it provides for our first term.”

The full transition report can be found at BensonTransition.com.

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Best’s Review’s most popular stories: Top Audit and Actuarial Firms and more

OLDWICK, N.J. — (BUSINESS WIRE) — In the last 90 days, Best’s Review readers have been most interested in the following stories:

 

 

Best’s Review is AM Best’s monthly insurance magazine, covering emerging issues and trends and evaluating their impact on the marketplace. Access to the complete content of Best’s Review is available here.

 

AM Best is a global credit rating agency, news publisher and data analytics provider specializing in the insurance industry. Headquartered in the United States, the company does business in over 100 countries with regional offices in London, Amsterdam, Dubai, Hong Kong, Singapore and Mexico City. For more information, visit www.ambest.com.

 

Copyright © 2024 by A.M. Best Company, Inc. and/or its affiliates. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

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With booming AI growth, data centers struggle to meet self-imposed sustainability goals due to electricity increases, which strain power grids

—  Artificial intelligence’s booming growth is radically reshaping an already red-hot data center market, raising questions about whether these sites can be operated sustainably

 

 

Patrick Sisson / New York Times:

 

 

West Texas, from the oil rigs of the Permian Basin to the wind turbines twirling above the High Plains, has long been a magnet for companies seeking fortunes in energy.

 

The carbon footprint from the construction of data centers and the racks of expensive computer equipment is substantial, and the sites’ power needs have grown considerably. Credit: Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Now, those arid ranch lands are offering a new moneymaking opportunity: data centers.

 

Lancium, an energy and data center management firm setting up shop in Fort Stockton and Abilene, is one of many companies around the country betting that building data centers close to generating sites will allow them to tap into underused clean power.

 

“It’s a land grab,” said Lancium’s president, Ali Fenn.

 

In the past, companies built data centers close to internet users, to better meet consumer requests, like streaming a show on Netflix or playing a video game hosted in the cloud. But the growth of artificial intelligence requires huge data centers to train the evolving large-language models, making proximity to users less necessary.

 

But as more of these sites start to pop up across the United States, there are new questions on whether they can meet the demand while still operating sustainably. The carbon footprint from the construction of the centers and the racks of expensive computer equipment is substantial in itself, and their power needs have grown considerably.

 

Just a decade ago, data centers drew 10 megawatts of power, but 100 megawatts is common today. The Uptime Institute, an industry advisory group, has identified 10 supersize cloud computing campuses across North America with an average size of 621 megawatts.

 

This growth in electricity demand comes as manufacturing in the United States is the highest in the past half-century, and the power grid is becoming increasingly strained.

 

The Uptime Institute predicted in a recent report that the sector’s myriad net-zero goals, which are self-imposed benchmarks, would become much harder to meet in the face of this demand and that backtracking could become common.

 

“This is not just about data centers,” said Mark Dyson, a managing director at RMI, a nonprofit organization focused on sustainability. “Data centers are a practice round for a much bigger wave of load growth that we are already seeing and are going to continue seeing in this country coming from electrification of industry, vehicles and buildings.”

 

The data center industry has embraced more sustainable solutions in recent years, becoming a significant investor in renewable power at the corporate level. Sites that leased wind and solar capacity jumped 50 percent year over year as of early 2023, to more than 40 gigawatts, capacity that continues to grow. Still, demand outpaces those investments. And the need for more processing power is backing up the interconnection queue and creating stopgap solutions.

 

Equinix’s data center in San Jose, Calif. The company operates 260 data centers across the globe. Credit: Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Power-hungry data centers in full force further complicate the balance. Data centers in the construction pipeline would, when complete, use as much power annually as the San Francisco metro area, according to a report released on Wednesday by the real estate services company JLL. Most sites coming online this year are already leased; in popular markets, significant space will not open up for at least two years.

“You have to get as many gigawatts live as you possibly can, as fast as you can,” Ms. Fenn of Lancium said. “People are going to cobble that together in whatever way they can.”

 

That has quickly expanded development beyond the established first- and second-tier markets, such as Northern Virginia, Dallas and Silicon Valley.

 

Competition is growing in parts of the country offering cheap land and available power. Amazon, for instance, announced last month that it was planning a $10 billion project in Mississippi, the state’s largest economic development project, which includes data centers and solar generating sites.

 

“Anybody who has any significant source of power has now become a new data center market,” said Jim Kerrigan, managing principal of North American Data Centers, an industry consultancy.

 

A.I. is only a small percentage of the global data center footprint. The Uptime Institute predicts A.I. will skyrocket to 10 percent of the sector’s global power use by 2025, from 2 percent today.

 

“They have been building at a breakneck pace with so many other kinds of drivers for demand,” said Andy Lawrence, executive director of research at the institute. “A.I.’s kind of the froth on top.”

 

Last year, construction of data centers was up 25 percent, according to the real estate firm CBRE. And Nvidia, which supplies most of the high-tech chips powering this technology, last week reported record profit in data center sales, with 2023 revenue hitting $47.5 billion, a 217 percent jump from the year before.

 

The nation’s energy grids cannot handle that kind of demand, said Christopher Wellise, vice president of sustainability at Equinix, a global data center operator. “Technology is moving faster than our infrastructure has evolved,” he said.

 

On top of that, the transition toward electrification and renewable power has created new challenges. Orders for the large transformers needed to deliver power have a three-year backlog, and even the diesel generators that provide backup power can take nearly two years to arrive.

 

Developers are focusing on squeezing additional efficiency out of their operations. Meta has teamed up with a Texas battery storage provider to better use the state’s wind and solar resources. Google signed a deal with Fervo, a company developing utility-scale geothermal resources.

 

 

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— Techmeme

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Korean hit film ‘12.12: The Day’ sets North American digital release – Global Bulletin

NORTH AMERICAN DIGITAL RELEASE

 

— North American digital distributor Echelon Studios has come on board “12.12: The Day,” the highest grossing film from Korea last year.

 

The film has been on theatrical release in North America, through 815 Pictures since last year and grossed over $1 million. Echelon said that the film will have a streaming release later this year. It will also be available to pre-order to own on iTunes, Apple TV, Google Play, YouTube Movies, Vudu, Vimeo OnDemand and OnDemand Korea shortly.

 

Directed by Kim Sung-su and with a Korean gross exceeding $90 million, the action drama is based on true events in December 1979, which resulted in an eight-year military junta in South Korea.

 

The film stars Hwang Jung-min (“Deliver Us from Evil”), Jung Woo-sung (“Asura: The City of Madness”), Lee Sung-min (“The Spy Gone North”), Park Hae-joon (“Believer”), Kang Gil-woo (Netflix series “The Glory”), and Jung Hae-in (Netflix’s “D.P.”).

TREASURE ISLAND

Principal photography has now wrapped on Kent Donguines’ feature documentary, “Treasure of the Rice Terraces,” produced by Crawford Filmworks and Aimer Films. Donguines is the first Filipino-Canadian filmmaker to travel to Buscalan, a secluded mountain community in Tinglayan, Kalinga, Philippines, to find the legendary artist Apo Whang-Odand her apprentices to learn about the history and symbolism of Kalinga tattoos.

 

“Treasure of the Rice Terraces” explores how this old practice, once banned and despised in Philippine society, is evolving into a chic and in-demand type of body art that has become a source of pride and belonging for many Filipinos, both at home and abroad. The documentary highlights the importance of preserving the tattoo culture for future generations and the challenges faced by the community in doing so. It also delves into the issues of stolen mummified bodies, cultural appropriation, stigmatization, and discrimination faced by tattooed individuals.

 

Anthropologist, Lars Krutak, Kim “Kuya Kim” Atienza, Miss Universe Philippines 2023 Michelle Dee, and Designer Mark Bumgarner are among the people interviewed for this documentary. Knowledge Network has the Canadian rights to the film.

 

SILENT SEASONS

Rabbit Films is to give birth to two additional seasons of “Silent Library Suomi,” a Finnish adaptation of a Nippon TV format. The first two seasons aired on the Walt Disney Company-owned Star Channel with 36 episodes in 2023, and a fourth season is also planned for autumn 2024. Riku Rantala, the multi-talented reporter, author, and host of a popular local documentary program, will continue to navigate the series.

 

First airing in 2001 on Nippon TV, Silent Library has been a primetime, family-oriented television sensation in Japan. It was created by the legendary Japanese comedian Matsumoto Hitoshi from the famed duo DOWNTOWN, and is produced by Nippon TV in association with Yoshimoto Kogyo.

 

Since its launch as an international format in 2007, local versions of Silent Library have been developed in more than 20 countries around the world, including MTV in the U.S.

 

 

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— Variety

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The AACCNJ hosts  town hall meeting with over 200 in attendance — Topic: ‘The Fierce Urgency of Now’

TRENTON, N.J. —  The African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey (AACCNJ) hosted a town hall on Feb. 7 , from 3 to 6 p.m., with over two hundred in attendance at the Crowne Plaza Princeton, Conference Center in East Windsor, N.J.

 

The meeting was convened to provide an open forum for discussion and included a presentation on the State’s newly released Disparity Study, conducted by Mason Tillman Associates, LTD.

 

The Presentation was led by Dr. Denise Anderson, Founder & CEO, Denise Anderson & Associates (DA&A) LLC, and moderated by John E. Harmon, Sr., IOM, Founder, President & CEO, AACCNJ, and included a lengthy Q&A session with the audience, which consisted of AACCNJ members, and stakeholders, elected officials, representatives from the state government, and Chambers of Commerce.

 

The State’s commissioned study documented institutional discrimination to African American businesses in NJ.  Dr. Denise Anderson received a positive response to her statement “Disparities need to be addressed between Blacks and Whites and within minority groups. We need specific solutions for different populations based on the data and their needs. Regardless of how we are classified – lumping us as “minority” does not make us monolithic.”

 

Dr. Anderson’s presentation was met with a standing ovation at the conclusion.  Dr. Anderson also quoted Frederick Douglass and James Baldwin in her presentation, quotes that resonated with the audience.

 

“Each day the AACCNJ and its members continue to fight what Dr. King called the ‘soft bigotry of low expectations,’ and we prove time and time again, that when the opportunity presents itself, we are ready,” said John E. Harmon, Sr.

 

Harmon set forth a call to action to those in attendance, to reach out to their local and state elected officials to voice their concerns, and to let them know they were in attendance.  CEO Harmon fielded more than two dozen questions during the audience Q& A segment.

 

“I knew that we invited the right person to make a presentation to our constituents on the Disparity Study, Dr. Anderson’s knowledge and analysis of the data was excellent and was presented in a straightforward manner to the audience,” said Gary Mann, AACCNJ, Chairman of the Board.

 

“Tuesday marks two weeks since the state released the long-promised disparity study — one that showed all minority groups, as well as females, have received nowhere near their “fair share” of state contracts, based on their population size and their ability to do the work.

 

The 221-page report, commissioned in 2020, was filled with stunning data, including this fact: Even though Black-owned companies in the state represent 9.19% of the available construction businesses, they received only 0.14% of the dollars on construction contracts valued over $65,000 to $5.71 million. (The report estimates this potentially cost these businesses $209 million).

 

More stunning: These numbers didn’t surprise anyone, including state officials.

 

Even more stunning: The state, after releasing this report, seemingly has done little to address the issue. No focus groups, roundtable discussions, executive orders or legislative proposals have been announced.

 

After years of saying it needed a study to be able to do something, the state has not made any public announcements on how it will address the findings.”1

 

“The Study, as expected, revealed that African American businesses received little of the $ 18.5 billion the Murphy administration spent on contracts for construction, professional services and goods and services from 2015 to 2020,” said John E. Harmon, Sr.

 

“While expecting the worst, little did we know that the Study would document African Americans received less than one (1) percent of the $18.5 billion dollars the State awarded to contractors.  African American businesses received a pittance despite the fact that we represent, 14 percent of the population, and over 10 percent of the businesses in New Jersey willing and able to contract with the State.”

 

“As we move forward, we ask the Governor and his administration to also hold a statewide meeting, to discuss the results of the disparity study,” said Harmon.

 

“The Administration needs to establish a race and gender-based program with minority and woman-owned business utilization goals to end the discriminatory practices in its award of contracts,” said Harmon. “Our mutual goal henceforth is to have a more equitable participation in every area of the public sector wherein economic opportunities exist.”

 

The AACCNJ has convened a Disparity Study Task Force Committee to work with the Murphy administration to outline our engagement plan with the state and develop a strategy to address disparities and underperformance among Blacks in New Jersey.  The task force will be co-chaired by Dr. Denise Anderson, Denise Anderson and Associates and Ferlanda Nixon, Esq., Chief of Public Policy & External Affairs, AACCNJ.  Committee Members include John E. Harmon, Sr., President  CEO, AACCNJ, Gary Mann, Chairman of the Board, AACCNJ, Tammeisha Smith, Vice Chair of the Board, Stan Prater, Senior Advisor to AACCNJ President & CEO, Tanya Freeman, Esq, Chair of the Board, NY State Black Business Alliance (NYSBBA), Robert Johnson, Esq., Secretary, AACCNJ, Board of Directors, Marcus Dyer, CPA, Treasurer, AACCNJ, Board of Directors, Robert Warrington, Esq., AACCNJ Board of Directors, and Monique Nelson, Executive Chair, UWG.

 

1  https://www.roi-nj.com/2024/02/06/diversity-inclusion/2-weeks-after-release-of-shocking-disparity-study-state-seemingly-has-done-little-to-address-issue/

 

About the African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey

The African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey (AACCNJ) performs an essential role in the economic viability of New Jersey. While providing a platform for New Jersey’s African American business leaders, to speak with a collective voice, the AACCNJ advocates and promotes economic diversity fostering a climate of business growth through major initiatives centering on education and public policy. The Chamber serves as a proactive advocacy group with a 501(c) 3 tax exemption, which is shared by the National Black Chamber of Commerce.