#The Bloomberg Commission

[mildlycuriousdragon]

Another commission for @herestoyoumsholly ^^

#dc #rose wilson #rose worth wilson #ravager #eddie bloomberg #red devil #kid devil #commissions #commission #mcddraws #cutie patooties!!!

[fire-fira]

Internally screeching about Devilfish, and La'gaan and Eddie in general.

#Devilfish #La'gaan #Eddie Bloomberg #Lagoon Boy #Kid Devil #my life #gods if I could magically generate visual art there'd be SO DAMN MUCH #and before anyone says 'just commission an artist' I have no income or I WOULD

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and right-wing Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia on Thursday introduced legislation that would prevent a federal agency from banning gas stoves.

Cruz and Manchin's bill to preempt the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) from banning gas stoves—titled the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act and described by progressive advocacy group Food & Water Watch as "absurd"—comes even though the agency says it has no plans to implement such a prohibition.

Climate and public health advocates celebrated last month after CPSC Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. told Bloomberg News that gas stoves are "a hidden hazard" and suggested that new ones should be banned.

However, as Reuters reported Thursday, Trumka "walked back those comments after conservatives and energy industry groups seized on them as a way to criticize the Biden administration for allegedly overreaching with its climate and environmental policy agenda."

Food & Water Watch observed that while "there is currently no plan" to ban gas stoves, "there is substantial research documenting the hazards associated with the air pollution" the methane-powered appliances create.

A widely shared recent study found that 12.7% of childhood asthma cases in the U.S. can be tied to indoor air pollution caused by gas stoves. The findings bolstered calls from environmental justice advocates and public health experts to prohibit the sale of new gas stoves and expedite the switch to cleaner and safer electric ones, but the CPSC has yet to propose regulatory action.

"Manchin is doing his part to fuel the ridiculous right-wing panic over a nonexistent war on gas stoves," Food & Water Watch policy director Jim Walsh said Thursday. "But his intent behind this legislation is serious: to inhibit climate action and undermine agencies charged with protecting public health and safety—all in the interest of propping up his fossil fuel funders."

"As state and local governments are increasingly looking to turn away from gas in new construction—moves that will improve air quality and public health, and reduce climate pollution—Sen. Manchin continues looking backward," said Walsh.

Manchin is the top congressional recipient of cash from the fossil fuel industry, which has fought aggressively against increasingly popular campaigns to outlaw gas stoves at the state and local levels.

However, the coal baron who leads the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee is far from alone in his defense of planet-heating and illness-inducing gas stoves.

As The Washington Post reported Thursday, Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future—a nonprofit group founded by a half-dozen gas companies—"has enlisted prominent Democratic politicians and pollsters to help enhance gas' reputation among liberal voters."

Former Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) and former Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) are among those going to bat for the fracking and gas utility industries.

"Natural Allies is backed by TC Energy, the Canadian pipeline giant behind the controversial Keystone XL project, and Southern Company, one of the biggest U.S. utilities," the Post reported. "Launched shortly before the 2020 election, the group is led by Susan Waller, a former executive at the pipeline firm Enbridge."

#us politics #news #common dreams #2023 #us senate #sen. ted cruz #sen. joe manchin #U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission #Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act #Food & Water Watch #Richard Trumka Jr. #Bloomberg News #reuters #Jim Walsh #Chris D'Angelo #Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee #Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future #Mary Landrieu #Tim Ryan #Heidi Heitkamp #TC Energy #keystone xl pipeline #Southern Company #Susan Waller #Enbridge #natural gas

[nerdwelt]

Die Rolle von Microsoft bei Datenschutzverletzungen ist Teil der US-Cyber-Untersuchung – Bloomberg News

Ein Cybersicherheitsgremium der USA wird die Risiken im Bereich Cloud Computing untersuchen und dabei auch die Rolle von Microsoft bei dem kürzlichen Angriff auf Regierungsbehörden durch mutmaßliche chinesische Hacker analysieren. Das berichtet Bloomberg News. Das Cyber Safety Review Board (CSRB) wird sich auf verschiedene Bereiche konzentrieren, darunter Identitäts- und…

View On WordPress

#Bloomberg News #Cloud Computing #E-Mail #Federal Trade Commission #Hacker #Microsoft #Ron Wyden #Sicherheitslücke

[davidbrussat]

FBI headquarters (1975) in Washington, the sort of federal building we usually get. (FBI) Washington, D.C., should be built in a manner that seeks to exalt Americans’ reverence for the principles of our founders, as embodied in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights. Congress seeks to accomplish this lofty goal for federal buildings via legislation. The two…

View On WordPress

#Bloomberg #Commission of Fine Arts #FBI Headquarters #kriston capps #President Biden #Trump Executive Order on Beauty

[devine-fem]

“How could I live with that?”

“Hah, beetle would have laughed at that…”

“Thank you, Eddie Bloomberg… and goodbye.”

art commission from @ookamihanta (c)

Laughed? Not really, just sad when somtimes you wish you said “I love you” when you couldn’t even say “goodbye.” ☪︎

I already did a com where Jaime finds Eddie after he comes back to life. Here it is if you want to see it: Link. This ship is everything to me…

#a friend named ama told me they wish eddie’s body was shown so beetle could at least hold that and i was like man i gotta see that #listen im sorry but hellbeetle angst is best angst #imagine how much his death must have hurt? how much eddie was just happy he couldnt hurt jaime UGH #theyre so underrated they have so much potential #gay people just can never be happy #not my art #jaime reyes #dc comics #blue beetle #art commisions #hellbeetle #dc fanart #eddie bloomberg #kid devil #red devil #dc #batman comics #teen titans #teen titans 2003 #blue devil

[zvaigzdelasas]

The US extended its claims on the ocean floor by an area twice the size of California, securing rights to potentially resource-rich seabeds at a time when Washington is ramping up efforts to safeguard supplies of minerals key to future technologies. The so-called Extended Continental Shelf covers about 1 million square kilometers (386,100 square miles), predominantly in the Arctic and Bering Sea, an area of increasing strategic importance where Canada and Russia also have claims. The US has also declared the shelf’s boundaries in the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf of Mexico.[...]

Under international law, countries have economic rights to natural resources on, and under, the seabed floor based on the boundaries of their continental shelves.

“It’s a huge deal because it’s a huge amount of territory,” said Rebecca Pincus, director of the Polar Institute at the Wilson Center in Washington, which has devoted an entire web page to the ramifications of this week’s news. “It’s US sovereignty over the seabed floor, and so whether it’s seabed mining, or oil and gas leasing, or cables, or what have you, the US is announcing the borders of its ECS and will have sovereignty over those decisions.” The US State Department said that the development “is about geography, not resources.”[...]

While it’s unclear what materials, if any, can be exploited, the claims come as Washington seeks to boost access to so-called critical minerals that are necessary for electric vehicle batteries and renewable energy projects, industries the Biden administration has tagged as key national security concerns.[...]

More than half of America’s extended continental shelf — 520,400 square kilometers — stretches in a large wedge north of Alaska toward the Arctic Ocean, including an area that overlaps with Canadian claims to the seabed floor, according to the US statement. Another 176,300 square kilometers lies in the Bering Sea, between Alaska and Russia, but falls on the US side of the maritime boundary between the two countries. Canada and the US don’t have a maritime boundary agreement in the Arctic and establishing the US outer limits in the Arctic “will depend on delimitation with Canada,” the State Department said in its executive summary. Canada’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs didn’t respond to a request for comment. [...]

The decision to unilaterally delineate its continental shelf boundary, rather than to ratify UNCLOS and then submit a claim through the commission, may raise the ire of other countries, said Pincus at the Wilson Center. “I think a lot of other countries around the world are going to have thoughts about how the US has done this,” she said. It also may reduce the likelihood of the US ever ratifying the law since a major reason for doing so would have been to make a CLCS claim, she said.

23 Dec 23

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Johnson and Johnson's bankruptcy gambit fails

The Third Circuit Court of Appeals has foiled Johnson & Johnson’s plan to use a bankruptcy scam called the Texas Two-Step to escape paying 40,000 women who were injured when the pharma giant sold them asbestos-tainted talcum powder to dust over their vulvas, leading to gruesome cancers:

https://www.wxxinews.org/2023-01-30/appeals-court-clears-the-way-for-more-lawsuits-over-johnsons-baby-powder

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/01/j-and-j-jk/#risible-gambit

Back in 2018, a jury awarded $4.69 billion to 22 women whose ovarian cancer was caused by J&J’s toxic product, $4.14b of which was punitive, awarded because J&J ignored the link between applying talcum powder to one’s genitals and cancer, and continued to market its products as a “Shower to Shower” genital deodorant:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/13/health/4-69-billion-verdict-johnson--johnson-talcum-powder/index.html

With thousands more lawsuits in the pipeline, the company sprung into action, restructuring in Texas using a quirk of the state’s merger laws that allows a single company to “merge” into two separate entities.

https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/BO/htm/BO.10.htm

The Texas Two-Step is a corrupt gambit that uses this quirk to allow large companies to escape liability for their misdeeds, by creating one company that holds the assets and profitable businesses of the firm, and another company that holds the firm’s toxic products and the liabilities they produced. The “bad” company then declares bankruptcy, leaving the “good” company to walk away with the billions it made by harming people, and leaving the victims to squabble over the meager assets from the bankruptcy.

To maintain the pretense that this maneuver isn’t just a ruse to escape liability, companies undertaking the Texas Two-Step have the “good” company guarantee some of the liabilities of the “bad” company. That’s what J&J did, and the women it injured sued over it:

https://www2.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/222003p.pdf

The appeals court didn’t find J&J’s bankruptcy persuasive. They found that any bankruptcy for the “bad” company should come after it had exhausted all guarantees the “good” company had made. Summarizing the court opinion Bloomberg’s Matt Levine writes, “You want to file for bankruptcy while you still have plenty of money to pay claims, but not too much money.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-01-31/matt-levine-johnson-johnson-s-jnj-bankruptcy-didn-t-work

J&J has vowed to appeal. If their appeal succeeds, it will be another blow against corporate accountability and against the bankruptcy system, both of which have are at their lowest ebb in living memory. Just the fact that J&J is still in business is remarkable. Poison talcum powder is only the latest salvo in J&J’s war on women’s reproductive organs — just a year ago, the company was ordered to pay hundreds of millions for selling women vaginal meshes, aggressively marketed for incontinence and prolapse, long after it learned that these meshes could permanently fuse with patient’s pelvic floors, leading to “severe pain, bleeding, infections, discomfort during intercourse.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/13/johnson-johnson-pelvic-mesh-implant-ads-case

J&J was also neck-deep in the opioid crisis, going to far as to commission a report from McKinsey entitled “Maximizing Value of the Narcotics Franchise,” on how to use its dominance of poppy-extract to corner the market on opioids:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/30/mckinsey-mafia/#everybody-must-get-stoned

It was the opioid sector that brought popular attention — and well-earned disgust — to the US bankruptcy. The criminal Sackler family, owners of Purdue Pharma and proprietors of OxyContin, used a nakedly corrupt move to shift their bankruptcy proceeding to Judge Robert Drain of the Southern District of New York:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/07/hr-4193/#shoppers-choice

Drain is notoriously tolerant of corporate crime and is an enthusiastic booster for the principle of using bankruptcies to escape consequences for corporate mass-murder. Which is exactly what the Sacklers did, cramming through a bankruptcy deal that let them walk away with billions, stiffing the survivors of their opioid business:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/29/impunity-corrodes/#morally-bankrupt

J&J told women to put carcinogens down their underwear. For decades. It gave tens of thousands of women ovarian cancer. Then it tried to use Texas’s courts to walk away with billions. But this time, a court stopped them. This time there’s no separate system of justice, like the one that gave the Sacklers billions in dirty money. This time, the company might just have to pay for its crimes.

Image: James Wagstaff (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/jesse/2256760407/

Mike Mozart (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/jeepersmedia/26191532093

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

[Image ID: A picture of a white-out dust storm at Burning Man. A giant tulip rises out of the dust. Its petals are suggestive of a vulva. A giant bottle of Johnson and Johnson baby powder enters the frame from the top right corner.]

#pluralistic #j&J #johnson and johnson #bankruptcy #texas two-step #corporate murder #corruption #asbestos

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Paul Blest at More Perfect Union:

The Federal Trade Commission voted Tuesday to ban new noncompete agreements for all workers and make existing noncompetes null and void for everyone except senior executives. These agreements are used to restrict 30 million American workers from changing jobs or starting their own businesses due to claims that they could use “trade secrets” in their new roles.  Noncompete agreements can restrict job mobility based on geographic area (i.e., a doctor joining a new practice within 50 miles of their old one) or a time period after leaving the position (anywhere between several months to more than a year). They have been banned in multiple states in the past few years. 

But the FTC has issued a uniform ban that will cover hundreds of millions of workers following a 180-day period for for-profit companies to enter into compliance. More than 26,000 comments were submitted on the rule, more than 25,000 of which supported a noncompete ban, FTC staff said Tuesday.  The FTC estimated that the new rule will increase workers’ wages by up to $488 billion over 10 years, which FTC staff said would mean a $524 increase in annual wages for the average worker. The FTC also estimated that the rule would lead to more than 8,500 new businesses per year.   “Right now workers are stuck in place because of these noncompetes,” FTC chair Lina Khan told More Perfect Union in an interview about the rule. “So even if they get a better job opportunity with higher wages, with better benefits, they can't actually switch jobs, which is bad for those workers. It's also bad for other workers who won't have the opportunities that are not being created because of these noncompetes.”

Five states have passed bans on noncompetes, not including New York, where lawmakers passed a ban last year that was then vetoed by Gov. Kathy Hochul. After Oregon banned noncompete agreements in 2008, researchers found, average hourly wages for all workers were boosted by up to 3 percent; the same analysis found that low-wage workers subjected to noncompetes saw a substantial negative impact on their wages.  The final rule differs from the proposal in that “senior executives,” those in a “policy-making position” making more than $151,000 per year, will still be subjected to noncompete agreements signed before the effective date of the new rule.

Since announcing the proposal in early 2023, the FTC’s rule has come under fire from the business lobby. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said before Tuesday’s meeting that it will file a lawsuit to block the proposal as soon as Wednesday. A top Chamber official said earlier this week that the rule “opens up a Pandora’s box where this commission or future commissions could be literally micromanaging every aspect of the economy,” Bloomberg reported.  But the FTC argues that noncompete agreements are “an unfair method of competition” that affect both high- and l0w-wage earners. In the medical profession, nearly half of all physicians are subject to noncompete agreements, according to the American Medical Association, which backs the effort to end the practice. (The FTC estimated that the new rule will result in “$74-$194 billion in reduced spending on physician services over the next decade.”)

The Federal Trade Commission voted to ban competition-stifling noncompete agreements except for senior executives.

#Noncompete Agreements #Business #FTC #Federal Trade Commission #Workers' Rights

[fatehbaz]

The New York State Urban Development Corporation saw in the piers a sacrificial milieu of impurity and devaluation. Rivera described the event as follows: “It’s called a sweep. Not even a fucking eviction. A sweep, like we’re trash.” [...]

The clearance operation of the piers took place under the New York Slum Clearance Commission and Law and its frothy utopian verbiage of “sanitizing” an environment [...] unsuitable for human life. [...] The demolition of the piers showed the violent clash of two confronting forms of urbanism. [...] [Manhattan’s] working class industrial base was transformed into a corporate and service-based economy and New York State Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller, together with city planners, implemented policies to frame Manhattan as a place for work, but not living. [...] At the same time, these discussions were imbricated with racial depictions and xenophobic targets: most of the constructions beleaguered in this operation were inhabited or used by black people, Latin Americans, migrants, and displaced communities. [...]

---

The piers thrived with life. [...]

The notion of the piers as insalubrious areas that needed to be wiped out gained traction in the 1980s -- during the peak of the HIV/AIDS crisis [...]. This narrative concerning the piers was active in New York City until the early 2000s, until Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Governor George Pataki opened the Greenwich Village segment of Hudson River Park on May 30, 2003. The highway was finally demolished [...] and a series of gates were erected to keep Pier 45 closed after 1am [...]. The previous residents of these spaces were just routine casualties.

The new proposal opted for a unitary, straightforward, apparently open but constantly surveilled set of facilities, where constant circulation (by car, skate, bike, foot) was central, and framed the conception of the piers as a passing point. This contrasted the labyrinthic and fragmented former setting, with multitudes of hidden spaces that provided a sense of privacy and safety [...].

---

Members of these groups were ostracized and deprived of typical considerations during the outbreak of an epidemic: protocols of announcement, transparency in information, research, and measure-taking. Meanwhile, the communities that congregated around the piers, and the piers themselves, helped spread information about AIDS, made transparent the available data, and offered care among affected communities. [...]

This environmental activism, where kin was formed [...], happened in places like the piers. [...] They were an escape from the constant scrutiny of authorities and from homophobic attacks [...].

---

GRID (Gay Related Immune Deficiency), as well as the common “gay plague” and “gay cancer” epithets, strengthened the idea of a specifically gay disease related to a certain environment-specific villain. Journalists, following the views of public health authorities, blamed the epidemic on [...] the places gay people frequented. [...] Physicians thus described a spatial configuration located in downtown Manhattan [...] which [...] posed a threat [...]. This claim had terrible consequences for the activist spaces and urban fabrics that confronted the epidemic [...]. The remnants of Pier 45 were demolished. The activist history of these places was “cleared.” [...]

---

When Sylvia Rivera shouted to the authorities “stay away from my house!” while being evicted, “house” not only referred to the physical construction of her home. She was confronting teleological progress with the project of a[n] [...] assemblage based on [...] mutual caring [...] and defying colonial narratives of race, sex, gender, and nature. The territorialization of epidemics, identities, and citizenship not only shape the built environment, but the built environment shapes them in return. Architecture thereby assumed the form of an expanded spatial practice [...].

When Rivera was trying to save her home from demolition, she said, “there’s so many fucking buildings in this fucking Manhattan.”

What New York City was losing with the demolition of Pier 45 was not just a series of dwellings. It was losing a complex ecosystem of coexistence.

---

All text above by: Iván López Munuera. “Lands of Contagion”, e-flux (Sick Architecture series). November 2020. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

#abolition #health #medical #colonial #imperial #ecology #landscape

[beardedmrbean]

People still thinking the president or any other single world leader has any say on the sway of the economy and the price of things is wild. Trump becoming president again won't change inflation or any of that, and he's a clown for thinking he can, just as much as he is for anything else that clumsily tumbles out of his mouth from his syphilitic brain.

The only thing him becoming president again will affect in economic regard is it will arguably get potentially worse; all the billionaire parasites back him, because they know he'll be fine with them continuing to greedily gouge the rest of us. Remember: they saw record profits equal to the number which was the net amount that the middle class lost, during 2020/the first year of the pandemic.

America is kind of fucked for the next four years regardless. We haven't had such a "pick the lesser of two evils" choice like this in a long, long time.

POTUS sets the budget and economic policy for the fiscal year, congress approves it or makes changes and sends it back.

State department with all the various ambassadors and such that do the wheeling and dealing with other countries on trade deals are part of the executive branch, of which the president is the head.

The only thing him becoming president again will affect in economic regard is it will arguably get potentially worse; all the billionaire parasites back him, because they know he'll be fine with them continuing to greedily gouge the rest of us.

Three years ago, Joe Biden spoke onstage at a think tank event, opining on wealth in America. “I love Bernie, but I’m not Bernie Sanders. I don’t think 500 billionaires are the reason why we’re in trouble,” he explained. “The folks at the top aren’t bad guys. I get in trouble in my party when I say wealthy Americans are just as patriotic as poor folks. I’ve found no distinction.”

And, based on who they supported during the 2020 election, billionaires don’t think Joe Biden is such a bad guy, either. About 25% of America’s billionaires donated to his election efforts, either directly or through a spouse, according to an analysis of records filed with the Federal Election Commission. By contrast, Donald Trump received money from only 14% of American billionaires.

The 230 Biden backers include the founders of companies like Patagonia, DoorDash and Netflix, Democratic megadonors like George Soros and Henry Laufer, as well as billionaire members of some of the country’s richest families like the Waltons, the Pritzkers and the Lauders. Broadly, they tended to hail from the coasts. More than one third live in California. Another 27% are based in New York. It makes sense, then, that about a quarter of them got rich in tech and a third made their fortunes in finance. On average, the billionaires gave about $170,000 to the Biden campaign and its joint-fundraising committees, which split their receipts with the Democratic Party.

Mike Bloomberg never donated directly to Biden’s campaign, but he threw $100 million into super-PACs supporting the Democratic nominee. ___________________________________________

America is kind of fucked for the next four years regardless. We haven't had such a "pick the lesser of two evils" choice like this in a long, long time.

Covid messed a bunch of stuff up the economy was one of the bigger things for sure, right up till then things were starting to look like they were going to pick up big time for us over here.

Successful renegotiation of NAFTA that looked to put more money in everyone's pockets especially Mexican citizens in Mexico because of the various worker protections baked into the agreement.

Had a good trade deal with China ready to go and both sides were on board, that one would have favored us here in a lot of places too, we had some pretty good leverage at the time that helped.

Not sure if he managed to get NATO countries to start paying their fair share or not, but he did try.

President can only do so much it's true, it takes two to tango so the nations we're trying to set up trade deals with need to play ball as well, that and the congressional rubber stamp.

Guy made some bad moves too, printing trillions of dollars was not a good plan for one, but that's not the point really.

Point is that the president as the head of the executive branch has a lot to say about the economic future of the nation.

Another point is ya I agree, giant douche or turd sandwich.

I won't vote for either, I'll try and find someone I can agree with on the majority of issues so long as they don't cross any of my red lines.

#anonymous

[blurban-form]

This is a summary of the article that appeared in Bloomberg BusinessWeek, April 3, 2024. I summarized it a fair bit to focus on what was interesting to me in the article. That said, this is still a long read.

Watch out, a couple of swear words in here.

Bluey may be acquired by Disney which would help Disney: 20% of all TV views on the streaming service Disney+ are “Bluey”. In the fourth quarter of 2023 (excluding movies). Americans watched 731 million hours of “Bluey”.

Brumm accepts an award for best children’s program from the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts in 2019.Photographer: Brendon Thorne/AFI/Getty Images

Joe Brumm is 46, likes sports and surfing, and is brash and unpolished; he seems a little like James Dean in that he’s talented but uncomfortable with fame and having to follow Hollywood conventions and rules… It was noted that Joe Brumm had public relations minders/handlers with him from Disney and the BBC to watch what he said when he was interviewed.

Brumm’s influences include Simpsons, South Park, Peanuts, and Calvin and Hobbes. “Peanuts just meant so much to me growing up” said Brumm. He studied animation in the 2000s at the University of Brisbane and worked in London for the BBC before returning to Australia in 2010 to start Ludo animation.

He came up with Bluey himself, and it was a hard sell initially that the show would be targeting adults and children. He used a lot of his own experiences with his kids to come up with story ideas.

For a while there was the idea of making the show something like an R-rated version of “Peppa Pig”, but that idea was dropped because there was already a similar adult Australian sitcom about raising kids being piloted.

The Australian Broadcasting Company liked the concept of “Bluey” and provided Brumm with A$20,000 ($13,000 US) to create a pilot, which became “The Weekend” episode of Season 1, which was screened at the Asian Animation Summit in November 2016.

Bluey is created at Ludo’s headquarters in Brisbane rather than contracting out the animation overseas, which allows Brumm to continue to tweak episodes up until the last minute. If there’s something he doesn’t like them. He also uses local vocal talent.

The ABC and BBC put up A$6 million to complete the first season of “Bluey”. The BBC made it possible to do this, providing the lion’s share of funding in exchange for distribution and merchandising rights. Australia didn’t have the resources to make the show happen otherwise.

Brumm was very angry when an early critique of Bluey in 2018 said the show made fun of stay-at-home dads; Blumm said he thought to himself “go fuck yourself”.

Within seven months, Bluey was the most watched series ever on the ABC streaming service with 75 million plays of episodes, which led to the BBC commissioning a second season of the show.

Ludo was able to retain control the show, and Brumm was entitled to a share of the revenue.

By 2019, networks in the US were interested in Bluey: Nickelodeon wanted “Bluey”, but they were worried about the name, because it was too close to “Blue’s Clues”. Other networks wanted to change the accents of the characters, and this was a dealbreaker for Ludo and Brumm.

This created an opening for Jane Gould, who was at the time the executive vice president of research and scheduling at Disney’s general entertainment division, who had a comfort level with Bluey because she hailed from Brisbane, and she understood the desire of Brumm and Ludo to keep the show Australian. She didn’t think this was a problem, and she borrowed two episodes to test screen in the US; the kids and parents didn’t have a problem with the Australian aspects of the show. Disney acquired the rights from BBC Studios to air Bluey everywhere except Australia, New Zealand and China.

“Bluey” didn’t get the same marketing push as shows like “The Mandalorian” when Disney+ began broadcasting "Bluey" in June 2020, but soon begin to dominate viewership numbers, in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (There was a lot of families spending time watching television and they watched a lot of Bluey.)

The ABC didn’t have a problem with the off-colour humour in “Bluey”, like the use of the word “poo”, and seeing a pony poop in “Markets” and this had to be edited out. Brumm said he hated making these edits... Disney defended these edits saying they were trying to be respectful of different cultural sensitivities, and it’s noted that Disney has since released the uncensored versions of the episodes.

Brumm likes to control his creation. He was upset with some of the early prototypes of Bluey toys because Bandit didn’t look right, he looked like a fridge. He was also concerned that at the beginning that there was too much of a focus on Bluey herself and there weren’t enough toys of all the characters. This concern turned out to be accurate; people wanted toys of all of the characters in the show.

Brumm originally was not sure he wanted to do a second season of “Bluey”, fearing it might not be as good as the first. Brumm doesn’t want to repeat himself in terms of episodes. He wants to make sure that each season is better than the previous one. He was also worried that Bluey would have to stop when Brisbane shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the show continued, with staff working from home.

The “Rain” episode was dialogue-free because Brumm wanted to take a break from writing dialogue at the time.

In Australia, the public and the media have publicly questioned why the ABC didn’t try harder to retain control of the profits from "Bluey" merchandise sales. There was an article in the “Australian Financial Review” that lamented that the ABC had let a gold mine slip through its fingers. It was thought that this decision was shortsighted, but the ABC responded saying they made the best deal at the time that they could. Disney has also been said to have made an error in passing on theme park rights and allowing BBC Studios to retain those rights; people go to Disney parks and ask why they can’t see Bluey there.

Disney isn’t releasing details on whether it’s explored buying “Bluey”, but Ludo says Bluey isn’t for sale, but this could change.

It is noted that there hasn’t been a clear announcement of a fourth season. Brumm has stated previously there will be a hiatus and he’s concerned about the children’s voices changing. His preference not to have to replace the voice actors, and he knows he can’t continue to draw upon his own kids experiences because they’ve grown up.

During the interview, Brumm’s handlers interjected and couldn’t said he couldn’t discuss the final episode.

Speaking anonymously, someone familiar with Disney’s “Bluey” dealings said that Brumm is trying to decide whether he’s comfortable letting other people write for the show, which would make it easier to continue to create episodes, and possibly smooth the way for a Disney acquisition in the future, as Disney would be reluctant to spend billions on a show with only three seasons of episodes.

Brumm said over email that he’s already collaborated on writing some additional episodes and ultimately it isn’t his decision who writes Bluey as he doesn’t own the show.

He thinks the final episode is magical and it sums up everything Bluey has tried to do in the last few years.

#Bluey long reads #Imagine an R-rated Bluey. Wow! #Interesting stuff #Bluey

[mtaartsdesign]

The subway is filled with timeless works of art, some newly commissioned and others dating back to the early days of our program. Take our self-guided tour “Selections from the Beginning 1986-1996 (1 line)” on the Bloomberg Connects app to explore artworks that built the foundation of our ever-growing collection. Beginning at Houston St (1) station with Deborah Brown’s mosaic artwork "Platform Diving" (1994), continue on the 1 line to see artworks by Lee Brozgol, Norman B Colp (accessible off the 1 at Times Sq-42 St, located in the passage near the A,C,E at 42 St-Port Authority), Liliana Porter, Nitza Tufiño, Michelle Greene, and Steve Wood.

📸: MTA A&D/Rob Wilson

#mtaarts #publicart #mosaic #permanent art #BloombergConnects

[cultml]

[mariacallous]

Europe changed the rules of the internet this week when the Digital Markets Act took effect, holding the biggest tech companies to tough new standards. Now the world is waiting to see which giant will be first to fall foul of the law. One of the architects of the DMA says Apple is a strong candidate for the first formal investigation, describing the company as “low hanging fruit.”

Apple has faced intensifying pressure in recent years from competitors, regulators, and courts in both Europe and the US, over the restrictions it places on app-makers who must rely on its App Store to reach millions of users. Yesterday Apple terminated the developer account of Fornite publisher Epic Games which has challenged the company in US courts and recently announced its intention to launch a rival to the Apple App Store.

German MEP Andreas Schwab, who led the negotiations that finalized the DMA on behalf of the EU Parliament, says that makes Apple a likely first target for non-compliance. “[This] gives me a very clear expectation that they want to be the first,” he tells WIRED. “Apple’s approach is a bit weird on all this and therefore it's low hanging fruit.”

Schwab is not involved in enforcement of the DMA. That’s overseen by the European Commission, which has already demanded “further explanation” as to why Apple terminated Epic’s account and is evaluating whether this violates the DMA.

“Apple’s approach to the Digital Markets Act was guided by two simple goals: complying with the law and reducing the inevitable, increased risks the DMA creates for our EU users,” says the company in a statement sent to WIRED by Apple spokesperson Rob Saunders. Apple has said on its website that alternative app stores carry the risk of malware, illicit code and other harmful content.

The DMA’s rules that aim to “break open” tech platforms require Apple to allow iPhone users to download apps from places other than Apples’ official App Store. The Epic Games Store, announced in January, intended to be launched by the Fortnite-maker Epic, would have been the first alternative app store to take advantage of the new system.

Apple tells WIRED it had the right to terminate Epic’s accounts according to a 2021 California court ruling. Epic CEO Tim Sweeney has been a vocal critic of what he styles as Apple’s “app store monopoly” for years, although in January the US supreme court denied a request to hear the latest episode in a lengthy antitrust dispute between the two companies in a victory for the smartphone maker.

The DMA went into force at midnight on March 7 in Brussels—3 pm in Silicon Valley. From that moment, six of the world’s biggest tech companies—Apple, Alphabet, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, and TikTok’s Beijing-based owner ByteDance—must comply with a suite of new rules designed to improve competition in digital markets.

In addition to Apple having to allow outside apps, Microsoft Windows will no longer have Microsoft-owned Bing as its default search tool; users of Meta’sWhatsApp will be able to communicate with people on rival messaging apps; and Google and Amazon will have to tweak their search results to create more room for rivals. Companies that don’t comply with the new rules can be fined up to 20 percent of their global turnover.

The new rules should cause the European internet to “change for the better,” says Schwab, a center-right MEP. “To allow more openness, more fairness, and most of all more innovation and therefore new services—that’s the idea.”

Schwab’s comments add to a recent chorus of criticism targeting Apple. The EU’s antitrust chief, Margarethe Vestager, told Bloomberg earlier this week that the DMA will initially focus on sorting out big tech’s app stores. “I think it’s important you can have more than one app store on your phone,” she said on Tuesday.

Following Apple’s removal of Epic, the tone in the hallways of the Commission had become more urgent. “Under the #DMA, there is no room for threats by gatekeepers to silence developers," said Thierry Breton, the EU's industry chief, on X on Thursday, apparently referring to allegations by Epic's Sweeney that Apple had blocked the company's account because of the CEO’s critical Tweets. “I have asked our services to look into Apple’s termination of Epic’s developer account as a matter of priority.”

Flexing the DMA’s powers on Apple’s App Store would advertise how the law can improve life online for the general public, Schwab says. “I think the App Store would be a good example to show what we want to achieve with the DMA,” he says. “They will just see more apps and they will like these apps.”

Giving people choice over where they get mobile apps by requiring Apple and Google to permit alternative app stores on devices is seen as a key pillar of the DMA. In addition to giving users more choice, app developers will also gain more opportunities to to innovate, increasing competition, says Schwab. “With alternative app stores we can make markets a bit broader.”

[zvaigzdelasas]

Khan’s nomination papers to contest from his hometown Mianwali, as well as Lahore were rejected, the Election Commission of Pakistan’s Secretary Omar Hamid Khan said in text message on Sunday. Khan has also sought to contest from capital Islamabad, according to his lawyer Naeem Haider Panjutha.[...]

Khan’s political party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, in a post on X, said that almost 90% of the nomination papers of key leaders, including Khan, were rejected while all of the nomination papers of other parties were accepted.

“We are going to stay in the election race, we are not going to step out, we are not going to back off,” said Raoof Hassan, PTI’s central information secretary. “We are going to use our constitutional, legal and political options.”

31 Dec 23