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The Blockbuster Syndrome
frank rose writes about and consults on digital culture. His most recent book is The Art of Immersion: How the Digital Generation Is Remaking Hollywood, Madison Avenue and the Way We Tell Stories.
Illustrations by Sean McCabe
July 28, 2014
Fifteen years ago, while reporting for Fortune on Seagram's troubled acquisition of Universal, I was told by a studio executive about number crunchers flying in from New York, calculating that mega-budget movies generally produce the highest returns, and wanting to know why the studio didn't make just six giant pictures a year. "Literally," he declared in disbelief, "that was a conversation."
Today the disbelief is long gone. Variants of this conversation have been held all over Hollywood – and the result is what you see at the multiplex: a demolition derby of sequels, franchises, tent poles and mega-flops, with the occasional mid-range picture tossed in for Oscar bait.
Aesthetically, it's widely agreed, the result is a disaster – but commercially? Depending on which end of the spectrum you're looking at, 2013 was either the best of years or the worst of years for Hollywood.
The best in the sense that a dozen movies, almost all of them costing well over $100 million to produce and another $100 million or more to market, brought in a total of nearly $10 billion at the box office worldwide – roughly half of which went back to the studios. The worst in that another dozen pictures, made by the same studios for roughly the same amount of money, yielded ticket sales of only $3 billion, a dismal tally that in some cases led to spectacular write-downs.
George Lucas and Steven Spielberg had predicted as much in a public appearance at the University of Southern California last June. Surveying the current landscape, the two filmmakers – the very people who less than 40 years ago invented the blockbuster as we know it with Star Wars and Jaws – saw little to be sanguine about. "There's going to be an implosion," Spielberg said, "where three or four or maybe even a half-dozen mega-budget movies are going to go crashing into the ground, and that's going to change the paradigm."
In the following weeks, the implosion played out as forecast: White House Down on June 28, The Lone Ranger on July 3, Pacific Rim on July 12, Turbo on July 17, R.I.P.D. on July 19, Elysium on Aug, 9. All told, close to $1 billion in production costs alone went up in smoke, with more disasters to come at Christmas. But the paradigm didn't change at all. This year, the studios are releasing so many would-be blockbusters that they had to start in February, in the midst of Oscar distractions, with Sony's $100 million remake of RoboCop.
What explains such apparent madness? One thing: as big as the losses from Hollywood's blockbuster strategy can be, the wins have proved even bigger. Gone are the days, apparently, when a single outsize disaster might sink a studio into the Pacific, as Heaven's Gate did to United Artists in 1980. Universal Studios lost millions last year on R.I.P.D. and the holiday stinker 47 Ronin, but that barely mattered next to the nearly $1.8 billion taken in by Despicable Me 2 and Fast & Furious 6. The $190 million write-down that Disney took on The Lone Ranger was made up over just a couple of weekends by the gushers of cash from Iron Man 3 and the animated feature Frozen. And so on, all across Tinseltown.
It's conceivable that, so far, the studios have simply been lucky. But in her recently published book, Blockbusters, Anita Elberse of the Harvard Business School offers intellectual justification for Hollywood's bet-the-farm strategy. Though the safer course might appear to involve making a larger number of pictures at smaller budgets, she writes, "content producers can't afford to walk away from big bets – doing so would actually increase their chance of failure in the long run."
The "laws of consumer behavior" that explain this, Elberse argues, apply not just to Hollywood, but to entertainment of every stripe. What's more, she asserts, the conventional wisdom that the digital era will prove inhospitable to the mega-hit is wrong. From Justin Bieber to Lady Gaga, "blockbusters will become more – not less – relevant to popular culture, and blockbuster strategies will thrive."
This is a message that embattled mass-media entertainment executives have been longing to hear. But does the evidence back up the claim? Obviously, neither hits nor stars have gone away. Yet that is hardly the same as saying that mass-appeal blockbusters will be the signature mode of entertainment in the digital age. Indeed, on closer examination, the pattern now emerging is actually quite different. Not fewer hits but more, and many of them not undifferentiated world beaters but smaller data-driven hits tailored to the tastes of specific audiences. Not M*A*S*H, whose 1983 TV finale was watched in three out of every five American households, but Netflix's House of Cards. Not mega-hits, but smart hits.
A Formula for the Digital Age?
The claim that blockbusters will prevail in the digital era is certainly a provocative one. Ever since 2006, when Chris Anderson published The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More, many have considered it axiomatic that once the world is liberated from the physical constraints of shelf space, infinite choice will flourish. Anderson – who wrote the book when he was editor-in-chief of Wired, where I was a regular contributor – did not in fact predict the end of hits. His model of demand, like that employed by Elberse and others who study this phenomenon, was a "power law" curve, with a small number of hits clustered at one end of a graph and a large number of far less popular items – the "long tail" – trailing off at the other.
In the physical world, the need to show movies in theaters or display products in stores puts an obvious limit on how much of this long tail will be available to any given consumer. But in a digital environment, Anderson pointed out, such limits don't exist. This, he argued, would spell the end of "the water cooler era," with its emphasis on a common culture of hits, and the advent of "the micro-culture era, when we're all into different things." A result: "The companies that will prosper will be those that switch out of lowest-common-denominator mode and figure out how to address niches."
Eight years on, we can see that it hasn't quite worked out that way. Even two years after the book came out, Google's chairman, Eric Schmidt, an early supporter of Anderson's long-tail theory, admitted to second thoughts. In an interview published in McKinsey Quarterly and quoted by Elberse, he explained, "I would like to tell you that the Internet has created such a level playing field that the long tail is absolutely the place to be – that there's so much differentiation, there's so much diversity, so many new voices. Unfortunately, that's not the case. … So, while the tail is very interesting, the vast majority of revenue remains in the head," the part of the curve where the hits reside. "And this is a lesson that businesses have to learn. While you can have a long tail strategy, you better have a head, because that's where all the revenue is."
In Schmidt's revised view, the Internet will accelerate the transition to the kind of world described by the economists Robert Frank of Cornell and Philip Cook of Duke in their 1995 book, The Winner-Take-All Society. This is a world in which "the value of what gets produced," as they put it, "often depends on the efforts of only a small number of top performers, who get paid accordingly." It is a world dominated by superstars – some of them household names, others all but unheard-of outside their chosen fields, be it law or banking or academia.
Globalization encourages the development of winner-take-all markets because it broadens the talent pool enormously. It puts opera singers in New York in competition with divas in Moscow, software engineers from Silicon Valley in competition with their counterparts in Beijing, automobile designers in Detroit in competition with those in Stuttgart and Turin. With the triumph of the Internet, Schmidt predicted "larger blockbusters and more concentration of brands" as well as the rise of global superstars – "global brands, global businesses, global sports figures, global celebrities, global scandals, global politicians."
Around the time that the Schmidt interview came out, Elberse addressed the issue in a Harvard Business Review article titled "Should You Invest in the Long Tail?" Producers will find little profit there, she concluded after a bout of number crunching, so they should limit their exposure and focus on potential hits. Retailers might want to adopt a long-tail strategy in order to keep their biggest customers happy, since people who buy a lot of music or books or whatever tends to be the heaviest consumers of niche offerings in these mediums. But there won't be much profit in this, so costs will need to be kept to a minimum. And most people will never go beyond the hits.
All of which seemed quite reasonable. But as she developed and extended this argument for the book, Elberse ventured into dubious territory. Figures that appear to reveal an increasing concentration of sales at the hit end of the spectrum in fact mask a quite different pattern – one of an expanding number of hits, most of them on a considerably smaller scale than hits in the past. At the same time, Elberse conflates blockbusters – aberrant mega-hits of the type currently beloved by Hollywood – with ordinary hits and the stars who typically power them. She even writes about "blockbuster" operas (La Bohème or La Traviata as opposed to, say, Reiner Bredemeyer's rarely performed Der Neinsager) and the Metropolitan Opera's Live in HD program, which simulcasts popular productions in movie theaters from Albania to Uruguay.
Opera is certainly a winner-take-all enterprise, and the Met is unquestionably a winner. But if simulcasts of La Traviata and its ilk can be considered blockbusters when they run once in the same multiplex that plays Despicable Me 2 ad infinitum, you have to wonder: does this term still mean anything?
Jaws and the Hollywood Blockbuster
Hits and stars are nothing new. We've had them at least since the era of Charles Dickens and Jenny Lind – which is to say, since the advent of mass media in the mid-19th century. Blockbusters are a much more recent phenomenon. The movie industry has always delivered a smattering of outsized hits, Gone with the Wind being one of the earliest examples. But until 1975, when Universal released Jaws, high-quality pictures generally opened in a few dozen theaters and built slowly over time.
After Jaws, this all changed. The Hollywood studios and their corporate parents started going for a fast payback, which meant wide releases backed by pricey television advertising. By the end of the 1990s, studio executives like Alan Horn of Warner Bros. had evolved this into a "blockbuster strategy," allocating a disproportionate share of resources to a handful of pictures on the theory that, on average, they would generate wildly disproportionate sales. Book publishers and record labels have employed similar game plans.
Yet much of the success that Hollywood has enjoyed with its blockbuster strategy to date is a function of circumstances unique to the movie business – in particular, the ever-growing sophistication of digital effects (including 3-D) and the extraordinary rise of the international box office. Foreign sales, once an afterthought, accounted for nearly 70 percent of the industry's box-office receipts by 2012. Razzle-dazzle effects and a spate of new theater construction around the globe, combined with a spectacular rise in consumers' discretionary income, have turned what had largely been a domestic business into one dominated by non-English-speaking territories – markets where, much as with American teens, subtleties of characterization and dialogue are hard- pressed to compete with action sequences.
Even so, it's difficult to make a convincing case that Hollywood's blockbuster strategy is a uniquely digital-age formula for success. Compared with music and the print media, the movie business is still at a relatively early stage of disruption. In their early phases, digital technologies often favor established industries that are smart enough to adopt them because digital can lower costs or facilitate price increases, or both. This was the case with CDs and the music industry in the 1980s and 1990s, with DVDs and the movie and television industries in the 1990s and early 2000s, and with digital 3-D and digital distribution to theaters for the movie business in the 2010s.
But once digital starts to bypass physical objects (like CDs and DVDs) and enable direct online distribution via downloads and streaming, these advantages can quickly vanish. When CD sales collapsed, for example, sales of recorded music fell by half – and not just because of piracy.
This is currently happening with home video. A decade ago, home video provided half of Hollywood's profits. But DVD sales peaked in the United States in 2006, and in 2007 the number of households with broadband Internet access passed 50 percent. As people realized that it's cheaper and easier to stream than to own, they began to forsake $15 DVD purchases from Blockbuster Video (now defunct) in favor of $3 rentals from Amazon and iTunes, or all-you-can-watch binges from Netflix.
In response, studio executives have attempted to mitigate their exposure by making huge bets on properties they perceive as low risk. Since they lack any real data about audience tastes, this generally means retreads of whatever worked in the past. The magic word is "pre-awareness" – a quality possessed by Batman and Spider-Man and anything else the audience already knows about, as opposed to an original idea. Sometimes this works: Fast & Furious 6, Iron Man 3, Despicable Me 2. With The Hangover Part III, not so much.
In other respects, however, Hollywood is still on the golden side of digital. The studios are saving on distribution costs because it's far cheaper to send files to movie theaters electronically than it is to reproduce and deliver reels of film. At the same time, theaters have been able to charge more for tickets – in the case of 3-D, significantly more. And while the elaborate digital effects so typical of blockbusters cost plenty of money, they also serve as a powerful draw to audiences and as an even more powerful barrier to entry. As Alan Horn, now chairman of Walt Disney Studios, remarked to Elberse: "Very few entities in this world can afford to spend $200 million on a movie. That is our competitive advantage."
Nonetheless, a deep-seated malaise has gripped the industry. The collapse in DVD sales has everyone spooked. And the relentless focus on blockbusters has demoralized even moviemakers as big as George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. As Lynda Obst, producer of the 1993 hit Sleepless in Seattle and now author of the book Sleepless in Hollywood, said in a recent interview: "All formulas will only work for a while. How many times can you see the same cities destroyed? How many ways are there to destroy them?"
Last year, even the geeks at Comic-Con, the annual comics convention that the studios have turned into a Cape Canaveral for blockbusters, were said to be disappointed by the sameness of the fare at hand. Far from a savvy game plan for the digital future, Hollywood's embrace of the blockbuster appears to be the last-ditch strategy of an industry on the verge.
Justin Timberlake, meet Michael Jackson
At least people are still buying movie tickets. Not quite as many as before – in the United States and Canada, anyway, where annual per-capita sales fell from 4.9 in 2003 to 4.1 in 2012. But ever-rising ticket prices and the still-growing international market are making up for that. The same cannot be said for books, recorded music and most other media. Across the board, "blockbusters" are almost never what they used to be.
Take Justin Timberlake's The 20/20 Experience, which according to Nielsen SoundScan was America's best-selling album of 2013 – even though it sold only about 2.4 million copies, making it the smallest best seller since SoundScan began in 1991. Timberlake's was the only album to crack the two million mark last year. Adele had a truly outsized success in 2011 and 2012 with 21, which sold more than 10 million copies to become the top-selling album for both years running. During that same period, however, only three other albums topped two million. In fact, of the 20 best-selling albums, according to SoundScan, Adele's was the only one to come out after 2004 – and it didn't begin to compare in sales with albums released in earlier decades by Michael Jackson, the Eagles, Led Zeppelin or AC/DC, even though the U.S. population has grown by a quarter since 1991. Globally as well, Adele was far outsold by earlier stars.
Album sales have been hit particularly hard in recent years because people downloading from iTunes and the like tend to cherry-pick individual songs – a prime example of "unbundling," which is one of the signature effects of digital. So perhaps we should look at songs, as Elberse does in Blockbusters. Examining the SoundScan numbers for 2007, 2009 and 2011, she finds a pattern of increasing dominance by a tiny percentage of superhits.
In 2007, of the 3.9 million tracks sold, fewer than 0.001 percent sold more than a million copies, while a remarkable 91 percent sold fewer than 100. Two years later, 6.4 million tracks were sold; this time, a little over 0.001 percent sold more than a million copies – but that tiny percentage made up 12 percent of the total sales volume, even more than the 7 percent in 2007. And of the eight million tracks sold in 2011, again 0.001 percent sold more than a million copies, this time accounting for 15 percent of total sales. Meanwhile, at the other end of the chart that year, 94 percent sold fewer than 100 copies and fully 32 percent sold just a single copy. So much for the long tail. "It is staggering to see how few titles at the top contribute to a significant portion of sales," Elberse declares, "and how many titles at the bottom fail to do the same."
That's one way of looking at it. But in focusing on the lack of promise in the long tail, Elberse misses another pattern entirely. As the total number of single songs on sale grew from 3.9 million to 6.4 million to 8 million, the number that sold more than a million copies went up at an even greater rate, from 36 to 79 to 112. At the same time, the average number of copies that each song sold actually fell slightly. In other words, a growing supply of songs produced a growing number of hits, even as the average size of those hits declined. The tail got a great deal longer and flatter, but the head did not get commensurately taller and thinner. Except for a couple of outliers like Adele, it actually got a bit shorter and wider.
In television, this is even more apparent. The percentage of TV households tuned to the season's top series has been dropping at least since the 1960s. NCIS, the top-rated show of the 2012-13 season, had roughly half the 36 rating that The Beverly Hillbillies enjoyed in 1962-63. It didn't even rise to the level of The Flintstones, a middling hit a half century before. And the shows that have people talking about a third golden age of television, as the medium's current creative renaissance has been dubbed (with cable series like AMC's Mad Men, Showtime's Homeland and HBO's Girls) pull in far fewer viewers than that. Only AMC's The Walking Dead gets ratings big enough to rival even the slimmed-down hits on broadcast television today.
So while the top of the curve is still where the money is, the pattern does not conform to the prediction that the Internet will lead to ever-bigger blockbusters. We do indeed live in a winner-take-all economy, and electronic media certainly encourage the rise of global superstars. But that's as true of broadcast TV as it is of the Internet, as true of the Beatles as of Adele. As Internet usage takes hold, hits – even the superhits – appear to be shrinking in size and growing in number. Which raises an interesting question: if neither the blockbuster hypothesis nor the long-tail theory holds, then what?
Data is the New Gut
Elberse argues in Blockbusters that Netflix, the Silicon Valley outfit that once "took pride in calling itself a long-tail company," has started "acting more like an old-school television network" by producing expensive, star-laden series like House of Cards, the Kevin Spacey-Robin Wright vehicle that won three Emmys in its first season. True, there's nothing small about House of Cards, but there's nothing old-school television about it either. Neither long tail nor blockbuster, House of Cards is, in fact, the media property that most plausibly suggests a blueprint for the digital future.
In broadcasting, as in Hollywood, the key decisions have always been made by people acting more on instinct than information. In the old days, when the entertainment industry was run by showmen (women didn't get to run things back then), that meant they went with their gut – a phrase that gained resonance with the discovery that the intestine is lined with about 100 million neurons. But the MBAs who run movies and television today are expected to base their decisions on something more reliable, more quantifiable or at least more professional-sounding than their digestive tracts.
Unfortunately, that doesn't leave them with much. So they rely on formulas and sequels and "pre-awareness," and they give copious notes in an effort to smooth out rough edges and justify their own salaries, and they demand recuts and reshoots and sometimes entirely new endings on the basis of whatever feedback they get from test screenings. "You've got people who don't know movies and don't watch movies for pleasure deciding what movie you're going to be allowed to make," Steven Soderbergh declared in a State of the Cinema address at last year's San Francisco Film Festival, shortly before the debut of his celebrated Liberace biopic, Behind the Candelabra – on HBO.
Netflix doesn't employ such people. And far from using a blockbuster strategy, it relies on a data strategy. Unlike the movie studios and all but a handful of television networks, it has a direct relationship with its customers – 44 million subscribers worldwide who constantly feed it information about their likes, their dislikes and their viewing habits. Where a blockbuster strategy depends on mass appeal and instant success, a data strategy is targeted, specific, patient and "smart." Both aim to generate hits. But there, the similarities end.
With access to billions of data points, Netflix can build statistical models to produce a risk profile of any show it might want to license or produce based on such variables as genre, subject matter, stars and Emmy and Oscar wins. When the film director David Fincher was pitching House of Cards, a remake of a BBC political drama in which Spacey would play a scheming congressman, Netflix's chief content officer, Ted Sarandos, knew how many subscribers had watched the original, how many had watched The West Wing, how many liked David Fincher movies and how many were Kevin Spacey fans. This enabled Sarandos – a college dropout who got his start running a mom-and-pop video store in a Phoenix strip mall in the 1980s – to do what no television executive ever had: offer a reported $100 million for two 13-episode seasons without even asking for a pilot. Then, in an appeal to audiences' demand for control and a growing appetite for binge viewing, he released each season's episodes all at once.
Nielsen doesn't measure Netflix streams, but Procera, a company that works with broadband providers to enhance network performance, estimates that when the second season was made available last February, as many as five million subscribers watched at least one episode during the first weekend and more than 500,000 of them gulped down the whole thing. Five million people is less than a quarter of the viewership CBS gets for NCIS, but it's only a couple of million below the prime-time averages for ABC, NBC and Fox.
In any case, Netflix gets its revenue from subscribers, not advertising, and the buzz around House of Cards and other original shows like Orange Is the New Black has sent subscriber growth skyward. In 2013, only a couple of years after a misguided restructuring and price increase sent the company spiraling into a near-death experience, annual profit rose by more than sixfold.
Data has been central to the company's success. But it isn't just what Sarandos has done with all the information at his command; it's also what he hasn't done. Having decided that the combination of elements in House of Cards would work, he gave total creative freedom to Fincher and his partners.
"Netflix was the only network that said, 'We believe in you,' " Spacey declared in the MacTaggart Lecture he delivered at last summer's Edinburgh Television Festival, the annual confab for UKTV. He contrasted this with a 1980 NBC memo that's quoted in Difficult Men, a book on the producers who are driving television's current creative renaissance. The memo summed up the reaction in focus groups to the pilot for Hill Street Blues, the landmark series that was about to kick off the second golden age of television: " 'The most prevalent audience reaction indicated that the program was depressing, violent and confusing.' … 'Too much was crammed into the story.' … 'The main characters were perceived as being not capable and having flawed personalities. Professionally, they were never completely successful in doing their jobs and personally their lives were in a mess.' … 'Audiences found the ending unsatisfying. There are too many loose ends.' "
Fortunately for NBC, the showrunner, Steven Bochco, had been guaranteed autonomy. After a slow start, Hill Street Blues went on to win multiple Emmys and become one of the most popular and influential TV dramas of the 1980s. As Spacey declared in his talk, "It's the creatives, stupid."
The Unpredictable Business of Entertaining Humans
Hits are hits, and we all want more of them. But the blockbusters we have today are not smart, in any sense of the word. The problem is not that it's inherently reckless to spend upward of $200 million to make and market a film, or even to do it over and over. Properly executed, in the current environment, this can be a formula for success, as Elberse demonstrates. The problem is that it's reckless to do it the way Hollywood does now – with minimal understanding of the market, little faith in the people who actually create the stuff, a naïve conviction that whatever worked in the past will continue to work in the future, and the false sense that audiences will grow ever larger.
To the frequent consternation of those who try to run it, the entertainment business is inescapably in the business of entertaining humans, a species that craves novelty as much as it craves spectacle – and one prone to sudden and unpredictable shifts in taste. Any theory that fails to take this into account is unlikely to survive the next cycle.
related topics: Business, Innovation


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Winnipeg, MB - This month North Americans will spend billions on costumes, scary décor, and candy. It’s the second largest shopping holiday next to Christmas. The problem, however, is that many stores that sell spooky items only show up once a year.
Every year, shoppers report missing or damaged pieces and unclear return policies. When customers go to exchange or report a problem, the store has packed up and left without a trace or has a “no refund” policy.
To avoid becoming a victim, BBB recommends consumers buy from companies they are familiar with, research new stores and ask for year-round contact information for seasonal stores. Consumers should also save receipts, ask about return policies and remember to use companies that have operated in the community for a number of years and have a good reputation if possible.
Finally, if the store allows, it is always wise to try on the costume while at the location in order to avoid future problems. In this manner, consumers can be sure that the costume fits well and is complete as advertised on the package.
BBB offers the following tips to avoid problems shopping at seasonal Halloween stores:
“This is also a time for the public to be good consumers,” says Len Andrusiak, President and CEO of BBB serving Manitoba and NW Ontario. “This is one of those holidays where ‘wardrobing’ can be a problem. Wardrobing is when a consumer buys a bunch of stuff with the intent of returning it right after the big event for a full refund. BBB sees this as a deceptive practice and can cost a business money. Trust goes both ways in a marketplace.”
Len Andrusiak, President & CEO
Better Business Bureau of Manitoba and NW Ontario
1030 B Empress Street
For more than 100 years, Better Business Bureau has been helping people find businesses and brands they can trust. In 2016, people turned to BBB more than 165 million times for BBB Business Reviews, all available for free at bbb.org. BBB Serving Manitoba and NW Ontario, founded in 1930 and is one of 108 local, independent BBBs in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. In 2016, consumers turned to BBB Serving Manitoba and NW Ontario more than 375 thousand times for Business Reviews.

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TAKE THAT, MASTERCARD! CANADIANS CAN PAY MASTERCARD AND VISA CREDIT CARD BILLS WITH BITCOINS
MasterCard may be trying to stomp out Bitcoin in places like Australia, but what they’re not realizing is the fact that people want to use their Bitcoin to pay for everyday expenses, bills and utilities. Even still, rather than find a way to integrate Bitcoin technology into their business model, they’re trying to find a way to get rid of it through regulation.
Not only did the company use the Australian Senate investigation as a tool to express deep concern about the illegal use of bitcoins, they also released this video on the need for digital currencies.
This post was published at Crypto Coins News on December 16, 2014.


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Labor group seeks injunction against Walmart
Washington, D.C. – The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) is seeking an injunction from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. relating to the closure of five stores.
The UFCW wants the NLRB to force Walmart to rehire 2,200 store employees who are currently on paid leave while the stores are closed for what the retailer said are necessary plumbing repairs. The UFCW claims the stores were actually shut down to punish employees who protested for higher pay and benefits.
In a statement, Walmart said it does not believe there is any basis for an injunction.
“As we have said all along, these stores were closed temporarily so we could fix the ongoing plumbing issues and it would be unfortunate if this outside group attempts to slow this process down for our associates and customers,” the retailer said. “Each of these five locations had more than 100 plumbing problems reported over the last two years, the most out of our more than 5,000 stores in the U.S.”
After two months, full-time employees who do not find a job at another Wal-Mart store may be eligible for severance. Part-time employees will not receive any severance.
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With the 2013 Frankfurt Auto Show about a month away, the slow strip tease of new models are about to begin. Audi is the first to give us a taste of what to expect of their presence at the show, with what looks like the new 2015 Audi A8 sedan.
Audi uploaded a short 30-second long video to its YouTube channel Sunday, hinting at a new vehicle which will be unveiled at this years Frankfurt show. The video shows two cars covered up, likely one being the traditional A8 sedan, while the other is the more punchy S8 model.
The video also teases some high-performance braking equipment and sporty looking wheels on the covered up car, furthering the notion that we’re looking at a S8.
September is also the same time that the Mercedes-Benz S-Class is expected to hit dealers. Perhaps Audi is looking to deflate the potential success of the S-Class by unveiling its latest iteration of the A8 luxury sedan.
Check out the video below.
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The GCC mobile phone market has experienced mild seasonal growth during the last quarter of 2017, according to the latest data revealed by IDC.
The global technology research and consulting firm’s newly released Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker shows overall shipments for the quarter totaled 6.6 million units, reflecting an increase of 2.1 percent quarter on quarter (QoQ).
According to the research firm, this has helped offset the 2.0 percent decline in smartphones shipments. This inverse trend characterised the market throughout 2017, with feature phone shipments increasing by an average of 11.4 percent in each of the previous three quarters, while smartphone shipments fell by a quarterly average of 2.7 percent over the same period.
The UAE was the region’s top-performing market in Q4 2017, with mobile phone shipments to the country increasing 12.3 percent QoQ. Bahrain and Kuwait also saw QoQ growth, with shipments up 7.1 percent and 2.7 percent, respectively.
In contrast, Qatar, Oman, and Saudi Arabia all experienced QoQ declines, with mobile phone shipments down 5.2 percent, 2.0 percent, and 0.8 percent, respectively, in Q4 2017.
IDC noted that Qatar is still undergoing adjustments as the channel is facing issues with import embargos due to macro-political factors, while the Saudi market is still coming to terms with the introduction of various new government regulations.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia smartphone shipments have been declining for three consecutive quarters, resulting in a 13 percent year-on-year (YoY) drop in shipments for 2017 as a whole, said the report.
In terms of vendors, Nokia dominated the feature phone market garnering 87 percent share of the GCC market in Q4 2017. Samsung continued to lead the smartphone space with 31 percent share, while Apple followed in second place with 27.1 percent share – its biggest ever slice of the GCC smartphone market. This also represents the smallest gap between the two giants since 2011.
Huawei ranked third with 13.4 percent share, with various other brands such as OPPO and Xaiomi, also actively trying to make headway in the region. However, beyond the top three it is a very fragmented market and hard for any brand to really differentiate itself enough to capture significant share.
The recent introduction of VAT in Saudi Arabia and the UAE has put a further strain on consumer spending, and it will take some time for the market to adjust to this change and for consumer purchasing behaviour to return to normal, said the firm. IDC expects the overall GCC mobile phone market to decline 6.3 percent YoY in 2018, as a result of sharp downturns in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE caused by the challenging macroeconomic environment.


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Lagardere SCA (MMB.FR) expects to sell its full stake in Airbus-owner European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co. (EAD.FR) by the end of July, the company said Thursday, drawing to a close an investment that helped create the aerospace giant more than a decade ago.
Lagardere plans to sell the bulk of its roughly 7.5% of EADS both through a buyback plan that the aerospace company agreed to in December, the company said Thursday. The rest of the sales would come on the open market, with the totality sold before July 31, the company said.
"This is going to start happening in coming weeks," said Arnaud Lagardere, the company's chief executive, in a conference with analysts and journalists to present annual results.
Lagardere has been signaling for years that it would like to sell its minority stake in EADS. But the opportunity to do so came into focus last year, after EADS's proposed merger with the U.K.'s BAE Systems fell apart.
In the wake of that deal, the French and German governments came to an agreement aimed at reducing government interference in the company. As part of that deal, EADS agreed to buy at least 5.5% of Lagardere's stake in the company.
EADS isn't the only minority stake Lagardere wants to shed. The company also wants to sell its 20% stake in Canal Plus France, but that deal has been slowed down by wrangling with Canal Plus' majority owner, Vivendi SA. Lagardere brought a lawsuit over one element of Canal Plus' governance last month, a suit that Vivendi said was unfounded.
Write to Sam Schechner at email@example.com, Twitter: @samschech
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Petrol station and M&S plans for Market Deeping are revised
Amended plans for a new petrol station and convenience store have been submitted to South Kesteven District Council.
Plans for the petrol filling station off the A15/A1175 roundabout in Market Deeping were previously approved after being taken to appeal by the applicant, the Lindum Group.
Now, an amended application has been submitted which seeks to increase the number of electric vehicle charging bays from one to eight and include the addition of three jet wash bays.
The applicants also hope to move the fuel tanker location point to benefit the operation and function of the scheme.
Twenty-five jobs are set to be created through the creation of the 24-hour BP filling station and Marks and Spencer convenience store.


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A rapidly-growing Springfield appliance store is getting ready to build a new facility. Dick Van Dyke Appliance World will break ground next week on a new store that will go up next to the AMC Showplace 12 on West Wabash.
The retailer’s current west side store in White Oaks Plaza will remain open until the new store is completed in June of 2013. Dick Van Dyke Appliance World was started in Springfield and now has four Central Illinois stores.
It’s been ranked as the fastest-growing home appliance dealer in the U.S. for two of the past four years.


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London, December 16, 2019 – London-based video virtual sports specialist Highlight Games Limited today announces that its SOCCERBET product is now live with leading Italian gaming operator Snaitech, just four months post signature of contract.
SOCCERBET, which features archive footage from the biggest clubs in Italian Serie A and is currently the #1 performing product in the Italian virtual sports market, is now available to Snaitech customers in both league and single match formats in retail locations and via mobile and online channels.
Highlight Games’ Italian Serie A SOCCERBET games can be viewed here
Nick Gardiner, Director, Highlight Games, said, “I’m delighted to announce that SOCCERBET is now live with another leading operator in Italy and that Highlight Games’ speed of integration from signature to go-live is growing ever more efficient. This flagship product has had a significant impact on the Italian virtual sports market since its launch earlier this year, and I am confident that its performance will be further bolstered through its availability via retail, online and mobile channels with Snaitech.”
Alessandro Graziosi, Snaitech Retail Betting & Customer Operations Director, commented, “Snaitech is proud to guarantee only premium content to its customers, such as Highlight Games’ SOCCERBET. It is an outstanding product that will strongly enrich the gaming portfolio in our betting shops and it soon will also be online, in a safe, controlled and technologically innovative gaming environment. Italians, as a matter of fact, are crazy about football and our players will appreciate the opportunity to place their bets watching archive footage of the biggest Serie A clubs.”


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The upcoming android tablets from Sony are looking very interesting!
Recently in Tokyo, Sony has announced that they will be releasing not just one but two Android tablets. For now these tablets were not yet officially named, but code names were given as S1 and S2.
Accordingly, they will be part of the new “Sony Tablet” brand, which is really exciting! The S1 is a 9.4-inch tablet that has a strange rolled shape, which is supposed to make holding it easier. The S2 is a dual screen tablet with a pair of extra-wide 5.5-inch screen. The S1 will have a Tegra 2 processor, which means to say that it will be able to play HD content. It has got an IR port and will work well with Sony’s Bravia line of HDTVs. Also, the screen has a 1,280×800 resolution, with 512 MB or RAM and 36 GB of storage while on the S2, the two 1,024×480 displays can be used “together” as a large screen.
Both of these new tablets focus on Sony’s Qriocity platform, which combines music, video, and other services. While people are getting excited with the S1 and S2, still we will have to see how they compare to other tablets before we can say any further about them.
Sony hasn’t announced prices or a release date yet for the S1 and S2 tablets. But one thing is sure about it. Sony will not give you any opportunity to miss these anticipated gadgets. As we all know, big corporations in Japan like Sony are expected to double their effort as they are one of those who can help rebuild their recently devastated economy due to the 9.2 magnitude earthquake. For that, I’m just hoping that through these release, it can make an impact for Japan’s economy.


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GLORY, the world’s premier stand-up combat league, today announced a global equipment partnership with Fairtex, engineers of the top performing boxing and Muay Thai gloves.
As the kickboxing leader’s official glove provider, Fairtex will outfit all GLORY athletes on fight night, beginning immediately with GLORY 50 Chicago next month and extending to every live event held during the multi-year partnership.
“Two of the most well-known brands in combat sports are joining forces, but this announcement represents much more than that,” said Jon J Franklin, GLORY Chief Development Officer. “We strive as an organization to put on the biggest and best fights possible, with our world-class athletes setting an incredible standard for excellence. With Fairtex as a partner supporting that endeavor, the fighters can perform with confidence that their equipment is held to the same standard of excellence.”
As part of the partnership, Fairtex will be prominently featured throughout GLORY’s massive global network, including presence on the promotion’s broadcast and digital platforms and logo placement on marketing materials and at live events.
“As companies, both GLORY and Fairtex have been unceasingly committed to pursuing the passion of combat sports, “said Philip Wong, Fairtex Chairman and Founder. “We’ve long felt that Fairtex should be part of the best kickboxing events worldwide, so I’m honored to finally be working with GLORY to make that a reality.”


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In response to Walmart’s announcement that it would ban open carry, discontinue the sale of certain ammunition, and push the Trump administration to pursue greater gun control measures, presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren declared that the decision is a “good start” but “not nearly enough.”
In the wake of last weekend’s mass shooting in Texas, Walmart CEO Doug McMillon issued a statement in which he said that open carry in stores “could lead to tragic results.” He added that the company would send “letters to the White House” to ask for “common sense measures” on firearms. Walmart is also discontinuing the sale of ammunition for AR-15s and AK-47s, and will cease all handgun sales in the state of Alaska.
“This is a good start—but it’s not nearly enough,” Warren tweeted. “Walmart can and should do much more. And we need real gun reform, now.” Gun reform sounds innocuous, but for Democrats it means totalitarian measures such as confiscating “assault weapons” and/or jettisoning the 2nd Amendment altogether.


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Tag: Bill Campbell
Apple CEO Time Cook recently made a $291,791 donation to Pennsylvania's Steel Valley School District in honor of former Apple board member Bill Campbell. who stepped down from the board this past July after 17 years of service. The Steel Valley School District includes Campbell's hometown of Home...
Apple announced today that longtime board member Bill Campbell is stepping down after 17 years of service. In his place steps in Susan Wagner, the co-founder of the global investment management company BlackRock. "Sue is a pioneer in the financial industry and we are excited to welcome her to Apple...
Software Updatesmore updates
- Apple Remote Desktop updated with Yosemite support
- OS X Yosemite 10.10.2, iOS 8.1.3 updates now available
- Sports Illustrated 120 SPORTS channel comes to Apple TV
- Logic Pro X update brings AirDrop support, new effects, tools, and more
- Parallels Access 2.5 released, adds file manager, computer-to-computer remote access
- The Google Translate iOS app is about to get a lot smarter


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Since its inception, Apple has primarily been a hardware company. It came up with the Mac, then subsequent computing machines, laptops and in a more recent age, music players, smartphones and tablets. However, Tim Cook reminds us, Apple is not just a hardware company, the software component is also becoming a critical part of it.
Cook cited Apple’s performance during the last quarter to go with these huge claims. According to him, Apple’s revenue from the sales of software and services has totaled $3.75 billion during the last quarter alone. That is an insanely huge amount, compared to what most other vendors earn against their services and software.
The revenue includes the sum generated from the sales of iTunes music, apps, subscription services and a lot more offered by Apple. Although the company still earns more from the sales of actual hardware, such as iPhone and iPad, let’s not forget that a significant part of these iOS devices also comprises of Apple software and services.
Even after the purchase, millions of iOS users come back to Apple’s iTunes Store and other services to avail them. In other words, the company has a very sustained and growing user base which hooks up to its software/services ecosystem. Precisely because of the central importance of its software and services, Cook revealed that Apple is now dedicating some of its best resources to the software side of the company.
Clearly, Apple has plans of expanding the software side into more profitability. Cook resounded the same sentiment when he said, “Because we’re not a hardware company, there are other things we are doing and could do to have revenue and have profit flow.”


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"We love the opportunity to bring attention to the enormous financial and environmental impacts of LED lighting. Our NASCAR sponsorship this year and the impressive efforts by the #36 team have helped our mission to bring this technology deeper into the automotive industry. Now that the big auto makers are on board, the next step is to integrate the secondary and downstream suppliers as well."
Based on a Center for Automotive Research report, there are 975 auto industry related manufacturing plants and over 63,000 auto parts stores nationwide so the financial and ecological impacts would be substantial.
Wadhwani expects that businesses who service the automotive industry will be next to adopt the technology, with dealerships, auto parts stores, repair and tire shop franchises topping the list. Corporations with locations in the dozens, or even hundreds, stand to benefit tremendously from the savings.
ThinkLite has a global footprint in 14 countries and is the only LED manufacturer that delivers the full 'Manufacture to Installation' value chain. Some consider them the Tesla of lighting. They manufacture proprietary LED technologies, are a national utility incentive expert, provide turn-key installations, and act as the onsite project manager. This end to end capability is a customer journey that very few can provide.


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By Chris Lang EcoPlanet Bamboo, according to the company’s website, “is leading the industrialization of bamboo as a viable and environmentally attractive alternative fiber.” The company claims to have established bamboo plantations in Nicaragua, South Africa, and Ghana.
On 19 April 2018, a company called BAP Industries of Guatemala announced that it had signed a 10 year Bamboo Purchase Agreement with EcoPlanet Bamboo. Under the agreement, BAP Industries agreed to buy bamboo from EcoPlanet Bamboo’s plantations in Nicaragua.
A recent article by Angeli Mehta on the website Ethical Corporation reports on a “young company” called EcoPlanet Bamboo. Mehta writes that “EcoPlanet Bamboo is creating permanent jobs for communities.”
At the beginning of December 2015, Troy Wiseman was in Paris. The CEO and co-founder of EcoPlanet Bamboo was there as part of the Nicaraguan government delegation to COP 21, the UN climate change negotiations. Wiseman’s Paris trip came just a few days before Wiseman wrote to the people unfortunate enough to have invested in…


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Skittish Apple Withdraws Black Hat Presentation
Apple's security team has long been shrouded in secrecy, and the discussion would have been one of the headline attractions at Black Hat, which is being held this week in Las Vegas.
Jeff Moss, director of the Black hat conference, which is owned by ChannelWeb parent company UBM, said Apple's marketing team was behind the decision to pull the plug on the presentation, which was titled 'Meet the Apple Security Experts.'
"We had a lot of people from government agencies saying they'd love to know more about the security engineers at Apple, because it's such an opaque company," said Moss.
Kevin Finisterre, a security researcher who has discovered numerous vulnerabilities in Apple products, says Apple's marketing team has often made the task of reporting security issues a difficult one.
"I found that when I reported a bug, and#91;Apple'sand#93; security team could not even really talk to me, because the conversation was not approved," Finisterre said in an email. "They were also not able to give me realistic dates on when patches would come out, for similar reasons."
Although Apple representatives didn't respond to requests for comment, it's possible that Apple simply had second thoughts about its security engineers facing a crowd of security experts that includes the likes of H.D. Moore, L.M.H, and Finisterre, all of whom have highlighted Apple vulnerabilities in the past, most notably in the Month Of Apple Bugs.


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Kendall Jenner has just been crowned the highest paid model in the world
Only 22-years-old and absolutely killing it.
Yes, Kendall Jenner has taken the long lasting crown off Gisele Bündchen as the highest earning model in the world.
Brazilian model Gisele has been listed as the highest earner on Forbes list for the last 15 years and now, Kendall Jenner has swooped in and taken the title, earning a cool $22 million (€19 million) over the past year. Woah.
Between her magazine deals, Instagram collaborations, partnerships with brands such as La Perla, Estée Lauder and Adidas, as well as Keeping Up With The Kardashians and her clothing range, Kendall has taken the world by storm this year, and it's showing.
According to Forbes, the model's stellar year has caused her to kick all other competition overboard.
Gisele Bündchen on the other hand, had a much quieter year than previously, with net earnings dropping by 43 percent. The model made €14.6 million in the past year. Still extremely impressive to us.
Others included in the list were Hadid sisters Gigi and Bella, Chrissy Teigen (for her deals with Smirnoff and Vita Coco), as well as Ashley Graham.


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Cresco Labs CEO and Charlie Bachteu and Alexis Keenan of Yahoo Finance discuss the process of growing marijuana and how legalization in Illinois is changing the way cannabis is processed and distributed.
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Proof positive that newspaper advertising works.
Two Manhattan dope peddlers promoted their 24-hour pot and cocaine delivery service by strategically placing their business cards — one with the Coca-Cola logo and another with the words “Purple Rain/Up in Smoke” — inside copies of the Village Voice.
“I have seen loads of Craigslist cases,” said an incredulous Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Laura Ward. “But I’ve never seen something as inventive as this. So this is actually something a little different for me.”
Convicted drug felons Thomas “Biggie” Zenon, 40, and Miguel “G” Guzman, 43, supplied as many as 200 customers with high-quality, low-priced drugs delivered right to their doors, prosecutors charged.
They allegedly removed stacks of the free paper from distribution sites, inserted their cards and returned them.
Over four months, the dealers allegedly made numerous sales to undercover cops. The two pleaded not guilty and were held on $1 million bail.
The cards were distributed widely in the East Village, Lower East Side and TriBeCa — and were even left at the doors of random apartments, according to Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan.
On the busiest nights, each of the cellphones listed on the cards registered 170 incoming calls, officials said.
Guzman was busted Thursday night as he allegedly got ready to make a delivery to a customer on the Upper West Side. He was carrying 16 grams of cocaine, more than $1,600 cash and four cellphones — plus a small stack of the “Coca-Cola” cards, authorities charged.
Zenon, who was on probation, was busted the same night in a restaurant in Washington Heights. Cops found 20 bags of marijuana in a coffee thermos in his car, as well as more “Purple Rain” cards, officials said.
Their attorney, Barry Weinstein, downplayed the arrests. “In all these months, they [undercover cops] were unable to get an A-1 sale out of these guys. These are not giants of industry,” he said.
Additional reporting by Chuck Bennett


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German optics manufacturer Zeiss and telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom have notified the European Commission of a proposal to enter into a joint venture.
Zeiss confirmed to OT that the company is collaborating with Deutsch Telekom to produce data glasses.
“The goal is to explore and drive the application potential and future of data glasses. Therefore, we have now initiated the formal steps to establish a joint venture,” managing director of Carl Zeiss Smart Optics, Dr Kai Stroeder, told OT.
The two companies are seeking joint control of Carl Zeiss Smart Optics, an internal start-up that set out to design spectacles that feature augmented reality functions for the mass market.
Glasses would feature a ‘flying screen’ that appears in front of the eyes that can only be seen by the viewer.
The European Commission has stated that on preliminary examination, the transaction could fall within the scope of merger regulation. As a result, interested third parties have been invited to submit their observations on the proposal.


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Business award win six months after launch gave Poppy’s Paws encouragement
- Credit: Archant
Poppy’s Paws won the Exmouth Business Award for the best new business
Winning a business award just six months gave Poppy’s Paws encouragement they were going in the right direction.
The Rolle Street pet shop was recognised as the best new firm of 2018 at the Exmouth Business Awards.
Lance Vernon, who runs Poppy’s Paws, says winning last year has helped them become a ‘one-stop shop’ for pet products.
He said: “To win this award meant a great deal as we had only been open for six months upon winning, so this award gave us huge encouragement going forward.
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“Winning this award gave us a huge boost with a significant growth on sales.
“From day one we have strived to make this a one stop shop where we can cater for all your animals needs along with free nutritional advice amongst other services.
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“This is something we pride ourselves in every day along side doing our upmost to meet all our customers needs to the best of our ability.”
Lance has worked within the pet trade for a number of years as a dog nutritionist and felt there was space in Exmouth for a shop that could offer the services they do.
The idea for starting the business came in 2013 but Lance couldn’t find the right shop space to meet the needs of the business.
That was until November 2017, when the opportunity to open Poppy’s Paws – named after a family pet - in Rolle Street.
Poppy’s Paws is stocked with products specifically chosen to help keep pets healthy.
The award for best new business was previously won by I.Nova, Bar Fever and Extra Hands.
So, what advise has Lance got for businesses thinking of entering?
“Try and make yourself stand out from the rest and to give yourself your own unique selling point,” said Lance.
The deadline for nomination for this year’s awards is this Friday (April 19), at 6pm. A shortlist will be published on Thursday, April 25. The Exmouth Business Awards will take place at Woodbury Park with East Devon MP Sir Hugo Swire presenting.
Form can be found on the Exmouth Chamber of Commerce website.


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Dayton, Ohio Teradata Corp., the world’s largest company solely focused on data warehousing and enterprise analytics, announced that Red Apple, a leading supermarket-convenience store chain and fuel distributor based in New York, has selected a Teradata Data Warehouse Appliance and related services to deliver integrated, enterprise-class business intelligence.
“Red Apple is taking a proactive approach to growing our business insight amid the rising complexity of data across our markets -- leveraging a Teradata data warehouse appliance with Microsoft Business Intelligence and Workflow. This will accelerate enterprise intelligence to our system users -- and has already proven its power to increase performance for us,” said Chris McCrae, chief information officer, Red Apple, whose holdings include the 36-store Gristede's Foods.
The data warehouse appliance platform will provide detailed information for business critical reporting and decision making, which includes complex analysis -- much faster and more accurately than before, according to Taeradata. The infrastructure deployment will involve consolidating data from multiple sources across the organization into one integrated, centralized data warehouse. Benefits include economic savings, near-real time access to actionable information, and smooth system scalability as Red Apple requirements for deep data visibility grow.
“Query performance in particular has dramatically improved,” McCrae said. “We’ve seen tough queries that once took much time and manual intervention -- now receiving responses in just seconds.”


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Shanghai, Hangzhou is the luxury travel top destination for International jetsetters. Located just 100 miles from Shanghai, Hangzhou is a lavish and convenient destination for international jetsetters. The city is home to 23+ five star properties, including the sophisticated JW Marriott Hangzhou, where the U.S. delegation stayed during the summit. Global hospitality brands such as Sheraton, Shangri-La, Hyatt, Wyndham, Starwood and Four Seasons pepper Hangzhou’s skyline, offering unique services and experiences exclusive to the city. Offerings range from row boat hotel arrival to cloistered board rooms to top rated restaurants.
Even President Obama, along with representatives from the world’s most influential government bodies and central banks, convened in Hangzhou at its futuristic Olympic Sports and International Expo Center Complex for the annual G20 summit. The event has further aided in the rise of this ancient Chinese city, as it has transitioned from homeland treasure to global destination. The experience provided guests with a chance to explore all that the city has to offer, from its enchanting natural beauty – including picturesque tea fields and lake-front sanctuaries – to its bourgeoning business districts. Furthermore, additional investment in advance of the G20 solidified the city’s strength as a top destination for luxury excursions, fit to host dignitaries, the business elite and the travelers seeking rich amenities.
Hangzhou’s impressive repertoire of luxury hotel properties continues to blossom with several more expected to launch in the coming year, including the Park Hyatt Hangzhou and the Fairmont Hangzhou. The hotel boom further diversifies the welcoming comforts as well as business necessities available in the city, comprised of palatial meeting spaces, world-class dining and exclusive accommodations.
The city’s undeniable appeal has a strong effect on many who experience the destination, as many of Hangzhou’s visitors have begun acquiring residences in the city. Replete with global businesses like Alibaba and history that is key to Chinese history throughout the centuries, Hangzhou has emerged as an ideal purchasing choice for a growing number of buyers. They offer both the On Sunday, September 18, just weeks after the G20 summit, 5,105 homes were sold in its downtown area, totaling more than a billion dollars in sales – a record for the city, according to the Hangzhou’s housing authority.
Matching the city’s dazzling properties, Hangzhou features opulent experiences that can mesmerize even the most well-traveled individuals. President Obama, for example, was treated to a glittering one-time performance based on the city’s fabled Impressions West Lake show. Built a mere three centimeters below the lake’s surface, the stage showcased performers who appear to dance on the water. The show was directed by Zhang Yimou, mastermind of the inimitable opening and closing ceremonies of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing and director of the upcoming film The Great Wall, starring Matt Damon. Besides the West Lake, Hangzhouprocesses another UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Grand Canal. Ancient stone arch bridge, Gongchen Bridge and the intangible heritage handicraft experience bring you back to thousand years ago.
Hangzhou has long been a bastion for Chinese residents seeking an idyllic getaway. Now, the city’s heightened status as a business hub and second-to-none offerings for travelers seeking an elegant escape solidify its status as an essential destination for luxury travel.
Hangzhou Tourism Commission offers information for tourism experience available in Hangzhou.


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Meals on wheels
Food truck season is upon us once again
A sure sign that the seasons have changed is the arrival of the neighbourhood food truck.
From fries to gourmet burgers to deep fried chocolate bars, these rolling vendors offer customers a variety of fare that can sometimes change on the hour.
“I just want the customer to have a good experience,” said John Mazalin, owner/operator of the Sydney-based Patty Wagon.
This year’s marks his sixth year in operation and Mazalin will be joined by Chef John McDuff who is promising some unique surprises for patrons this season.
“We will still be offering our gourmet burgers but also we’ll being doing some different twists on poutine, sandwiches and deserts,” said McDuff, who is making his first foray into food truck service after a 30year career that took him from fast food to white glove service.
McDuff said a unique aspect of food truck dining is the flexibility to change the menu from one day to the next.
“That can keep customers coming back as they wonder what changes are being made daily,” he said.
“I’m excited about this and looking forward to meeting the customer face-to-face which doesn’t happen much when you are in a restaurant kitchen,” he said.
It is that kind of personal contact that Mazalin said he very much enjoys.
“You get to me more hands on with the customer and I think that is an important part of the food truck experience,” he said, adding his operation will officially open May 2.
Last year, there were 10 such operations in Sydney alone, from the Bacon Bus to Bee’s Knees to the Little Rollin Bistro and the long-serving Fuzzy’s Fries.
Each vendor tries to offer something different from the other by creating their own specialities in a bid to keep customers coming back.
Another feature of the food truck is its portability that allows the vendor to sometimes change locations. During the summer festival of Action Week, many of the local food truck vendors come together in one location for a roundup, allowing customers a chance to try a little something from everyone.
Mazalin offers several reasons why he thinks food trucks have become so popular.
He said customers don’t have to wait for a seat but rather just line up at a window. Also, depending where they live, they can easily go out for walk and stop to buy a treat at such vendors.
Menu choices are also key, he said, noting food truck vendors are becoming very creative with their choice offerings that can give customers an opportunity to dive into some new cuisine at a relatively inexpensive price.
John Mazalin, left, owner/operator of The Patty Wagon, and Chef John McDuff are ready to go May 2 with the opening of the food truck operation. The pair is promising some unique twists on this year’s menu offerings.


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Philly’s Soda Tax Is Back in Court Today
On Wednesday, a panel of Commonwealth Court judges in Pittsburgh will hear arguments over the legality of Mayor Kenney’s landmark sweetened beverage tax.
Levied just four months ago, the soda tax brought in about $12 million in its first two months to fund key city initiatives including pre-K expansion, the establishment of community schools and the revitalization of city parks libraries and recreation centers. The city expects to bring in $92 million each year with the tax.
But a lawsuit filed in September against the tax by the American Beverage Association, local residents, and business owners argues that 1.5-cents-per-ounce tax on sweetened beverages is unconstitutional. In December, a Common Pleas Court judge dismissed the lawsuit and upheld the soda tax.
Today, counsel for the ABA will argue that the lower court’s decision should be overturned and the soda tax halted. Challengers argue that the practical effect of the levy is double taxation — consumers are being forced to pay an additional sales tax on beverages already taxed by the state.
The city maintains that the soda tax is not a sales tax because it is levied at the distributor level. The city doesn’t intend to have the tax be carried by the consumer.
Challengers, who have spent more than $10.6 million lobbying against the tax, have also argued that the tax violates the state’s uniformity clause, which requires similar products to be taxed equally. The lawsuit also claims that the tax (if considered a sales tax) impinges on state and federal laws about the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps, which are supposed to be exempt from sales taxes.
“The tax is having a devastating impact on Philadelphia families and local businesses,” Anthony Campisi, spokesman for the Ax the Bev Tax coalition, told Philadelphia magazine. Prices have gone up for working families. The tax has also forced layoffs, as well as cuts in hours. The mayor projected steep declines in sales when he pushed through this tax. Now he has to reckon with the consequences: good-paying, family-sustaining union jobs are being lost.”
Philadelphia is the first major American city to pass a soda tax, and some of the city’s pre-K centers have already experienced growth due to the new funds. The city also rolled out its $40 million plan for community schools this week.
Follow @fabiolacineas on Twitter.


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Blacks Leisure back in top gear
THE fresh-air brigade is back in force at Blacks Leisure, splashing out on hiking boots, tents and other outdoor equipment in a dramatic rebound since the end of the foot-and-mouth outbreak.
Like-for-like sales at Britain's biggest retailer in the market soared 22% in the 11 weeks to 18 May, compared with the dismal performance a year earlier when Blacks reported a 2% decline.
Roy Crosland, who takes over as chief executive today from Simon Bentley, said: 'We expected demand to return but it has come back much more than we expected. Foot-and-mouth was a blip in a pretty strong growth trend for our outdoor business.' He added that the figures justified the sale to JD Sports of the mainstream sportswear business First Sport.
Pre-tax profits in the year to 28 February slumped to £10.2m from £19.8m a year earlier on sales of £363.2m compared with £310.9m previously. Shareholders receive a total dividend of 6.65p, the same as last year.
Crosland said Blacks would now focus on converting the 47-strong chain of Famous Army Stores, bought from receivers in February, to Millets and Blacks fascias.
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FBM Announces First Quarter 2020 Results and Provides COVID-19 Business Update
Foundation Building Materials, Inc. (the “Company”), one of the largest specialty building products distributors of wallboard, suspended ceiling systems and metal framing in North America, reported first quarter 2020 financial results and provided a COVID-19 business update.
“We continue to extend our thoughts and prayers to those affected by the COVID-19 Pandemic,” said Ruben Mendoza, President and Chief Executive Officer. “While our first quarter results reflect the resiliency of our employees and operations, we have implemented a number of strategic actions and cost-saving initiatives in response to the current market environment. Our company continues to operate the vast majority of its branches in the United States and Canada utilizing safety precautions based on recommendations from federal, state and local authorities, and we believe our company is well-positioned to successfully navigate this challenging time.”
2020 First Quarter Results
Net sales for the three months ended March 31, 2020, were $524.3 million compared to $514.9 million for the three months ended March 31, 2019, representing an increase of $9.4 million, or 1.8%. There was one more business day in the current period as compared to the prior year period. Average daily net sales increased 0.2% over the prior year period. Net sales from base business branches decreased $1.5 million compared to the prior year period, and average daily base business net sales decreased by 1.9% over the prior year period. Net sales from acquired branches and existing branches that were strategically combined contributed $10.9 million of the net sales increase. The base business net sales decrease was primarily driven by the impacts and disruptions caused by the novel coronavirus COVID-19, which was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020 (the “COVID-19 Pandemic”).
Gross profit for the three months ended March 31, 2020, was $162.2 million compared to $153.0 million for the three months ended March 31, 2019, representing an increase of $9.2 million, or 6.0%. Gross profit increased due to an expansion of our gross margin and an increase in sales from acquisitions. Gross margin for the three months ended March 31, 2020, was 30.9% compared to 29.7% for the three months ended March 31, 2019. The increase in gross margin was primarily due to improved profitability across our wallboard, metal framing, and complementary and other products lines driven by our ongoing pricing and purchasing initiatives.
Selling, general and administrative (“SG&A”) expenses for the three months ended March 31, 2020, were $123.1 million compared to $117.2 million for the three months ended March 31, 2019, representing an increase of $5.9 million, or 5.0%. As a percentage of net sales, SG&A expenses were 23.5% for the three months ended March 31, 2020, compared to 22.8% for the three months ended March 31, 2019. The increase in SG&A expenses as a percentage of net sales was primarily due to loss of sales leverage resulting from the COVID-19 Pandemic, our continued investment in various company-wide initiatives and higher labor costs.
Net income from continuing operations for the three months ended March 31, 2020, was $14.4 million, or $0.33 per share, an increase of $9.5 million compared to $4.8 million, or $0.11 per share, for the three months ended March 31, 2019. Adjusted net income(1) for the three months ended March 31, 2020, was $9.7 million, or $0.23 per share, an increase of $3.7 million compared to $6.1 million, or $0.14 per share, for the three months ended March 31, 2019.
Adjusted EBITDA(1) was $40.3 million and adjusted EBITDA margin(1) was 7.7% for the three months ended March 31, 2020, compared to adjusted EBITDA(1) of $37.5 million and adjusted EBITDA margin(1) of 7.3% for the three months ended March 31, 2019.
COVID-19 Pandemic Business Update
On April 8, 2020, we withdrew our full year financial guidance. Through April 2020, the COVID-19 Pandemic has had a negative impact on most of the markets in which the Company operates, with low single digit daily sales decreases as compared to last year. In a select number of states, including Washington, California, Michigan, New Jersey, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, stronger restrictions are or have been in place, and the Company has experienced more significant year over year headwinds and has not seen the typical seasonal improvements. As a result, consolidated April net sales are down approximately 20% year over year. The Company continues to monitor the current environment and anticipates its future financial performance will be adversely impacted due to the effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Given the uncertainty related to the magnitude and duration of the COVID-19 Pandemic, the Company cannot reliably provide financial guidance for the full year at this time.
On February 3, 2020, the Company acquired the operations of two branches and certain assets of Insulation Distributors, Inc. (“IDI”), which resulted in the addition of two specialty building products branches in Maryland. For 2020, the former IDI branches are expected to contribute between $16.0 million and $18.0 million to net sales. The Company has temporarily suspended acquisition activity due to the COVID-19 Pandemic.
For the full first quarter results, click here.
About Foundation Building Materials
Foundation Building Materials is a specialty building products distributor of wallboard, suspended ceiling systems, and metal framing throughout North America. Based in Santa Ana, California, the Company operates more than 175 branches across the United States and Canada. Learn more at www.fbmsales.com or follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook.
John Moten, IRC – Vice President Investor Relations – firstname.lastname@example.org – (657) 900-3200
Source: Foundation Building Materials, Inc.


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Cruise LLC Chief Executive Officer Dan Ammann had a slate of meetings on Dec. 16 when he got an early afternoon call from General Motors Co. CEO Mary Barra. She told Ammann he was being dismissed from the robotaxi startup that GM controls through a majority stake, say people familiar with the events.
What seemed abrupt to outsiders and people working at Cruise had been building for months. The two executives didn’t agree on how to focus the breakthrough self-driving technology that the Silicon Valley unit is preparing to launch with a taxi service. Barra and GM’s board were pushing a grand vision that included transferring that knowledge to create luxury Cadillacs, self-driving cars sold at retail or delivery vehicles for GM’s new electric-van business. The opportunities, and their potential value, were immense.


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The Pirate Party condemns the passage of the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Bill 2015 through both Houses of Parliament. The legislation means that Australia now joins a list of countries that allows individuals and companies to seek orders to censor websites they allege infringe copyright.
“Today we saw the payoff for rights holders such as Village Roadshow, who have poured over half a million dollars into the coffers of the major parties over the last financial year. These donations show the influence of money on the direction of Australian politics, where censorship will now be employed to prop-up failing business models,” said Simon Frew, Deputy President of the Pirate Party. “This is at best a misguided attempt to protect rights holders from the ‘menace’ of piracy.
“This legislation does not address the underlying reasons why Australians are at the top of the list for online infringement,” Mr Frew continued. “Content for Australian audiences is often released weeks or months after other countries, and often at a higher price, in formats that make access inconvenient, or locked to devices they do not want to use. File-sharing websites provide timely access and often in high-quality formats that consumers can easily use.
“Most Australians are willing to pay if the price is reasonable, and access is both convenient and timely. You only have to look at the rapid uptake of Netflix since it became available in Australia two months ago to see this in action. Giving consumers what they want, when they want it, and at a reasonable price is the most effective way to tackle online copyright infringement.”
Today is a dark day for Australians and the Internet as the Labor Party caucus approves data retention and the Coalition prepares to introduce misguided new legislation aimed at combatting online copyright infringement. To encourage Australians to join us in fighting back, the Pirate Party is offering pay-what-you-want memberships with no minimum amount at http://pirateparty.org.au/join
Pirate Party Deputy President Simon Frew said: “The Government and the Opposition have effectively declared war on the Internet and war on our privacy. The Labor Party has rolled over on data retention, meaning all Australians will be subjected to mass surveillance until this appalling legislation is repealed.
“At the same time, legislation to give copyright holders an easy mechanism to get websites blocked will mean we are subjected to a censorship regime. The Government has opted for a long and pointless game of whack-a-mole — as soon as a site is blocked it will pop up in several new places and copyright infringement will continue.
The Pirate Party is bewildered that Hotline Miami 2 is being refused classification and is therefore effectively banned from the Australian retail market. While the Pirate Party does not endorse sexual violence, it is critical of the double standard by which video games are treated as inherently different to other mediums. It is unacceptable and unnecessarily paternalistic to deny adults access to content that would be permitted in other mediums.
With the introduction of an adult rating (R18+) for video games at the beginning of 2013 the community expected a sensible approach to the classification of games. Previously the highest classification level available for games was MA15+, and, due to the adult nature of some games, those that exceeded the MA15+ guidelines were banned from sale in Australia. Unfortunately games continue to be judged by a stricter standard and a number of games have been refused classification since then. Today we see yet another example with the banning of Hotline Miami 2.
“The Australian Classifications Board has a long history of banning films, video games and generally treating Australian adults as children,” commented Simon Frew, Deputy President of the Pirate Party. “There have been a number of films that have been banned over the last decade or so, but video games seem to attract undue attention from the censors. Games like Hotline Miami 2 are designed specifically for adults and adults should be allowed to choose the content they consume.”
The new classification scheme for video games was firmly seated in an acceptance of the fact that gaming now crosses all demographic borders and there are far more mature adults playing than there are impressionable children. The new scheme fails to adequately accommodate the wide range of content available for the varying consumer tastes driving industry demand, and instead places a blanket ban on the legal sale within Australia of major international game titles.
The Australian Government today announced it is going ahead with an ineffective “strategy” to “tackle” online copyright infringement, which puts a gun to the head of ISPs by requiring undue compromise with the copyright industry or face legislative regulation. Despite being demonstrably futile, the Government will be pursuing both a notification scheme and court-ordered website blockades. The Pirate Party opposed both as neither will reduce infringement in Australia and do not address the more pressing issues of accessibility and affordability, instead targeting normal human behaviour.
It appears copyright holders will be able to request that an Internet service provider (ISP) sends an educational notice to an alleged infringer, with no actual penalty attached. Copyright holders will also be able to seek an injunction that requires ISPs to block access to websites that allegedly infringe copyright or facilitate infringement. Groups including “wifi providers” and “libraries” are also unreasonably expected to act as “copyright cops” according to an FAQ on the Minister for Communication’s website.
“This proposal is effectively the beginning of an Australian version of the failed US Stop Online Piracy Act. Notification schemes, graduated response schemes and website blocking do not work. They are costly, ineffective and disproportioned, as evidenced by academia and decisions of foreign courts. Fighting the Internet itself as opposed to solving the lack of convenient and affordable access does not work, nor does propping up business models that rely upon the control of content consumption in the digital environment,” commented Brendan Molloy, President of the Pirate Party.
These points have been refuted strongly by the Pirate Party and others in their submissions on the Government’s Online Copyright Infringement discussion paper. The efficacy of blocking websites was examined in a Dutch Court of Appeals case earlier this year, where the Court found there was insufficient evidence that blocking the Pirate Bay was effective at reducing copyright infringement and ordered that the blockade could be lifted. The Pirate Party arranged a translation of the judgment, which is available from the Pirate Party’s website.
Proposals to allow copyright holders to seek injunctions that require Internet service providers (ISPs) to block subscribers’ access to allegedly infringing websites will allegedly be presented to the Federal Cabinet today. Coincidentally, the Pirate Party is pleased to publish its recently-commissioned translation of a Dutch Court of Appeals case (ECLI:NL:GHDHA:2014:88) that casts significant doubt on the efficacy of blocking websites.
The Pirate Party arranged and crowdfunded a certified translation of the case involving two ISPs, Ziggo and XS4All, and Dutch anti-piracy association BREIN. The translation was carried out by Sydney translation service Linguistico and the Pirate Party has published the translation under the Creative Commons Zero licence, allowing unrestricted use.
“Today the Pirate Party has demonstrated that it is willing to put its money where its mouth is and contribute to the commons. This translation is a significant piece of evidence that can be used to campaign against Internet censorship,” said Brendan Molloy, President of the Pirate Party.
“What this judgment makes exceedingly clear is that website blocking is ineffective and disproportionate for the many reasons we outlined in our submission on the Government’s Online Copyright Infringement discussion paper.”
Many submissions to the inquiry, including the Pirate Party’s, argued that the discussion paper attempted to solve a problem that does not exist, while acknowledging yet overlooking the major issue of access to content.
“What is known to solve the ‘piracy problem’ is providing consumers with convenient, timely and affordable access to the content they wish to acquire, and these alleged proposals will regress Australian copyright, not progress it,” commented Mr Molloy. “Another look at the recommendations of the ALRC ‘Copyright and the digital economy’ review certainly wouldn’t go astray.”
The Pirate Party thanks all of the supporters who contributed to the crowdfunding campaign that made this important translation possible.


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With the Detroit motor show in full swing, you can bet stories about green cars will be ten a penny this week. Well, alright, I doubt you can bet – William Hill wouldn’t be stupid enough to take your money.
And god knows, if you can bet on stories about green cars appearing this week, then Greenbang’s off to lay some serious money with the bookies that she can guess her own middle name.
In the meantime, Newsweek sums it all up nicely:
Detroit is anxious to show the world that it finally gets green and is working hard to engineer cars that sip instead of guzzle. They’ll roll out hydrogen-powered concept cars with names like ecoVoyager and fuel-friendly engines like the EcoBoost (eco, apparently, is the new i). There’s just one problem with this eco echo chamber: The most important new model introductions at the Detroit show are actually two hulking pickup trucks, the redesigned Ford F-150 (with a grill inspired by steel girders) and the Dodge Ram (with what its creators call “get-out-of-the-way” styling). That sure throws a monkey wrench into this garden party. […]
This old-school display of metal and muscle might mark the end of an era at the Detroit Auto Show. With Tata’s Nano taking the emerging world by storm and Toyota’s Prius hybrid selling more than 1 million units, massive models like the Ram and F-150 are looking like dinosaurs. Oh, sure, as long as there is work to be done–on ranches and construction sites–there will be a healthy market for pickups. But their days as the star of the show are waning. All those mileage misers cropping up at this year’s show demonstrate that the only way for Detroit to find itself in clover again is to head down the garden path.


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First vaccine delivery by drone in the USA
It has taken them a few months to get here, but the USA have decided to follow Africa’s example, and might have made its first ever COVID-19 vaccine delivery with a drone.
The delivery was made by package delivery company UPS, whose Flight Forward division made its first unmanned aerial vaccine delivery for Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, using new cold chain packaging developed specifically for drones.
For the delivery to happen, UPS’s drone airline had to satisfy a number of requirements, one of which was to get permission from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to carry alkaline and lithium batteries, which are needed to power temperature monitoring devices required by the CDC for COVID-19 vaccine transport.
The company also had to work with insulated packaging solutions provider, Cold Chain Technologies to design a custom, drone-sized solution to maintain temperature control at two to eight degrees Celsius. Like other COVID-19 vaccine shipments handled by UPS, these drone deliveries include a temperature monitoring device required by the CDC.
“This program paves the way for drones to become a meaningful link within highly-specialized cold chain logistics,” said Dan Gagnon, vice president of global marketing for UPS Healthcare.
“Not only are UPS Flight Forward and Cold Chain Technologies demonstrating a more sustainable way to open vaccine access to remote communities, but the implications extend far beyond COVID-19. This new cold chain drone capability is a proof point of opportunity for all our healthcare customers, including clinical trial shipments, cold chain pharmaceuticals and other temperature-sensitive biologics.”
UPS added that the autonomous, battery-powered drones produce zero operational emissions and are subjected to less vibration than packages moving by ground transport. They require less insulation and can utilise gel packs instead of dry ice since they spend less time in transit.
“For Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist, drones have been carrying specialty infusion medicines and lab specimens for over a year, said UPS in a statement. “Infusion medicines are patient-specific and high-cost, with a short shelf life — so delivery by drone within 10 minutes is an ideal solution. Using drones to shuttle vaccines and other pharmaceuticals from its main campus to its network of clinics can improve productivity in its pharmacy by as much as 30 percent.”
This program is the second COVID-19 vaccine drone delivery operation globally, following drone deliveries in Ghana in Africa supported by a public-private partnership between The UPS Foundation, UPS Flight Forward, Zipline and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.