DC/Warner Brother’s Announcements at Fandome 2021

On By Noah Furcht-HeafitzIn Brand, Gaming, TelevisionLeave a comment
When Is DC FanDome 2021? - Push Square

https://www.pushsquare.com/features/live-watch-the-dc-fandome-2021-livestream-right-here, Sammy Barker

Warner Brothers and DC Comics held their second annual “Fandome” event this past Saturday at which they revealed a number of trailers and sneak peeks of upcoming tv shows, movies, and games. The movie trailers shown include: The Batman, Black Adam and, The Flash. The movie sneak peeks included Aquaman 2 and Shazam 2. New tv shows that were announced include Peacemaker, Batman: Caped Crusader, Aquaman: King of Atlantis, and a yet to be named CW show about a girl who doesn’t know she has superpowers that stars Kaci Walfall. Shows that have been announced to have a new season coming include: Batwoman, The Flash, Superman & Lois, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Stargirl, Harley Quinn, Young Justice, Titans, and Doom Patrol. The games displayed at this event includes Suicide Squad: kill the Justice League and Gotham Knights.

The Batman trailer that was displayed is the second that has been put out for the upcoming film. This trailer notably showed off the inclusion of the characters Catwoman and The Riddler as well as Robert Pattinson’s take on the Caped Crusader. The Batman has been slated for a March 4th 2022 release. Dwayne Johnson was quoted as saying he was “born to play Black Adam,” before introducing that movie’s trailer. Said trailer also marks the on-screen debut of superhero group The Justice Society of America. Black Adam is set to hit theaters on July 29th 2022. The Flash movie trailer features a number of different versions of The Flash played by different actors as well as both Ben Affleck’s and Michael Keaton’s versions of Batman. The Flash is set to premiere on November 4th 2022. Only behind the scenes looks at Aquaman 2 and Shazam 2 were shown as the films aren’t far enough into production to warrant having trailers. John Cena’s Peacemaker character who debuted in last Summer’s Suicide Squad film’s HBO Max series was announced to be debuting on January 13th 2022. lastly, in video game news, Both Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and Gotham Nights are AAA titles in the vein of the preexisting Batman series of video games. 

This article interests me for four key reasons. One, because I am a fan of a lot of the intellectual properties that are being represented in upcoming films and shows. Two, due in large part to the delays necessitated by the pandemic a part of me had long since accepted that DC up and stopped trying to compete with Marvel before seeing these announcements. Three, I’m particularly fond of Batman The Animated Series and this article notes that the upcoming Batman: Caped Crusader series is very reminiscent of it. And four, there seems to be a wide variety of different types of films and tv shows being produced. This is notable because my main issue with the DC films and tv shows of a few years ago is that most of them were sold on being “gritty” and “realistic” takes on the characters they were representing.

Barker, Sammy. “Live: Watch the DC Fandome 2021 Livestream Right Here.” Push Square, Push Square, 16 Oct. 2021, https://www.pushsquare.com/features/live-watch-the-dc-fandome-2021-livestream-right-here.

Lyons, Kim, and Chaim Gartenberg. “The Biggest Announcements from DC FanDome.” The Verge, The Verge, 16 Oct. 2021, https://www.theverge.com/2021/10/16/22729057/biggest-announcements-dc-fandome-batman-black-adam-hbo-warner.

Hollywood’s Behind-The-Scenes Staff reach Tentative Deal with Studios, adverting strike scheduled for Monday

On By alanapotIn Cable, Media Covergence, Movie, Netflix, Regulation, TelevisionLeave a comment
IATSE President Matthew D. Loeb, Image via AdWeek/IASTE

IATSE, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, recently came to a tentative agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), adverting a scheduled strike for this upcoming October 18th. IATSE is a union representing about 60,000 crew members including hairstylists, costumers, gaffers, propmakers, cameraworkers and other behind-the-scenes jobs on set. The union had been negotiating pay, work schedules and more with AMPTP, an organization that represents companies such as Netflix, Warner Bros, Universal Pictures and Paramount Pictures, since May.

Prior to the tentative agreement, IATSE President Matthew Loeb said in a statement posted on Twitter: “We will continue bargaining with the producers this week in the hopes of reaching an agreement that addresses core issues, such as reasonable rest periods, meal breaks and a living wage for those on the bottom of the wage scale” 

If the strike had occurred it would’ve been the first time Hollywood’s Behind-The-Scenes workers had held a strike since World War II and would represent the largest cease Hollywood’s workforce since a 14-week writers’ strike in 2007.

According to IATSE, the 3-Year contractual agreement with AMPTP includes living wages for the lowest paid workers, higher wages, daily 10 hour rest periods and weekend 54 hour long rest periods along with other basic benefits. Prior to this, streaming TV and film productions featured lower pay scales for workers which reflected budgets at the beginning of the medium and platforms. However, streaming is now a very large chunk of the market and worker’s felt their wages should reflect that. The increased production and volume of streaming entertainment had also made for grueling, “around-the-clock” and “around-the-calendar” (Sutton, 2021) working conditions.

Overall, this situation between IATSE and AMPTP reflect the truth behind what is going on behind the scenes of the public’s favorite shows and streaming platforms. It also reflects streaming as medium that is here to stay and in need of regulation for it’s workers.

Del Barco, Mandalit. “Hollywood crew members reach a tentative deal with major studios, averting a strike” NPR, 16, October, 2021. https://www.npr.org/2021/10/16/1045711954/hollywood-crew-members-iatse-reach-deal-no-strike

Sutton, Kelsey. “TV, Film Workers Set Oct. 18 Strike Date as Negotiations With Studios Stall” AdWeek, 14, October, 2021. https://www.adweek.com/convergent-tv/tv-film-workers-set-oct-18-strike-date-as-negotiations-with-studios-stall/

Netflix CEO, Ted Sarandos, stands firm on the decision to stream Dave Chappelle’s new standup special.

On By aliceherrickIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Famous comedian, Dave Chappelle, is no stranger to controversy. In fact, it’s to be expected, at this point, for any new stand up special of his to be met with a certain amount of blowback. It has been nearly been two weeks since the release of his new Netflix special, The Closer, and it has already climbed in viewership, currently making it Netflix’s most popular release just below Squid Game.

In the special, Chappelle talks about a variety of controversial issues, but primarily talks about his experience and perspective on the LGBTQ community. To report that his entire rhetoric was an offensive attack would be inaccurate as well as subjective. It is true that he makes a variety of jokes that would be considered taboo in our Western society’s vision of political correctness compliance. However, every joke is accompanied by a message of empathy; in his special, Chappelle stresses the importance of having compassion for your fellow human, and how as a black man, can relate to the struggle of minority groups including the trans community that he pokes fun at. At the end of the special he addresses the LGBTQ community: “I am not telling another joke about you until I am sure that we are both laughing together.”

(Pictured left: Ted Sarandos/ Left: Dave Chappelle) Image courtesy of variety.com/

Whether or not you agree with his message, or consider his comedy valid is completely up to you as the viewer. Comedy, like all forms of art, is subjective. However, many viewers, media outlets, and employees within Netflix found The Closer to not only be of poor taste, but harmful to the progress of the LGBTQ community. As a result, Netflix CEO, Ted Sarandos, put out a memo to his staff, acquired by Variety that read, “you should be aware that some talent may join third parties in asking us to remove the show in the coming days, which we are not going to do.” The memo continued, “As with our other talent, we work hard to support their creative freedom—even though this means there will always be content on Netflix some people believe is harmful.”

While the notion of creative freedom, as well as first amendment rights are typically supported by the general public, the blowback from people who found the Closer offensive, site Netflix allowing Chappelle such a large reaching platform to express these ideologies as the main problem. In a Wired article, Angela Watercutter, stated “The reason a show like The Closer can grab as much attention as a show like Squid Game is simple: People sometimes like content that is harmful to others. Thousands, if not millions, will vote for anti-LGBTQ candidates, and the same amount of them will watch content with similar viewpoints.”

The comparison of The Closer to Squid Game is interesting; sure, they’re both surging in popularity on Netflix, but does that really mean that we’re only watching them to fulfil a desire to see harm come to others? If this was the case, why is there no call to pull the South Korean TV show from the platform? Many would argue that, with Squid Game, there is so much more to flesh out from the narrative and characters; a variety of social political commentary that shines a light on corporate corruption that lives between the lines of these characters’ partaking in gory children’s games. The same could be argued about Dave Chappelle’s special: That within the jokes regarding the LGBTQ community, people of color, women, white people, law enforcement, and all the other people he joked about (including himself in the acknowledgement of his own privilege) there is an accompanying message of unity, humility, harmony, and humanity.

Facebook announces plans for how to ‘nudge’ teens away from harmful content

On By Marlene TurreyIn facebook, Instagram, Social MediaLeave a comment
Image via The Verge

Facebook is planning to introduce new features to protect teenagers’ mental health, including measures prompting teens to take a break from Instagram, as well as features to nudge young people away from harmful content. In CNN’s State of the Union show on Sunday, Facebook vice president of global affairs Nick Clegg commented: “We’re going to introduce something which I think will make a considerable difference, which is where our systems see that a teenager is looking at the same content over and over again, and it’s content which may not be conducive to their well being, we will nudge them to look at other content”. Moreover, he added Facebook is pausing its plans for an Instagram Kids platform, which was also strongly criticized.

“We cannot, with a wave of the wand, make everyone’s life perfect. What we can do is improve our products, so that our products are as safe and as enjoyable to use.”

Nick Clegg, Facebook vice president of global affairs

The announcement comes less than a week after whistleblower Frances Haugen accused the company of failing to improve Instagram after internal research confirmed that the social media app negatively affects the mental health of young people. Clegg explained that Facebook has invested $13 billion in the last years to keep the platform safe. However, he also noted: “We need greater transparency,” and that Facebook’s algorithms “should be held to account, if necessary, by regulation so that people can match what our systems say they’re supposed to do from what actually happens.”

It is very interesting to observe how Facebook is defending its strategy in this ongoing debate. The social media company is one of the most powerful forces in our times and therefore influences people’s daily life worldwide. Therefore, this debate is not only about Facebook’s repetition, but also determines how people, and in particular teenagers, are going to consume and use social media in the future.

NBA Star Kyrie Irving is Anti-Vaccine?

On By troypittman13In UncategorizedLeave a comment

The seven-time All Star and Brooklyn Net’s player, Kyrie Irving recently announced views about hesitancy toward COVID-19 vaccinations. Irving serves as the Vice President of the players union and has blocked efforts made to impose a vaccine mandate.

Irving was born in Melbourne, Australia on March 23, 1992. He started his NBA career becoming a basketball star at St. Patrick High School in Elizabeth, New Jersey. After gaining attention for his athletic ability he committed to Duke University in 2009 working towards the opportunity to play professionally. He played for Duke University as a Blue Devil, and was drafted by the NBA to play for the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2011. Since then, Irving played for various teams in the NBA also playing alongside Hall of Famer’s. What wasn’t praised so much, was his recent announcement to remain unvaccinated. This decision sparked public backlash due to opposing efforts encouraging the public to get vaccinated. As confirmed this past week, the NBA will be withholding salaries from players who are currently unable to play because of their unvaccinated status. Meaning, Kyrie Irving could potentially miss out on half of his $34 million contract for the Brooklyn Nets home games.

We’ve entered the conversation of personal choice, COVID-19 culture, and “cancel culture“. As everyday people grew to adjust the new normal: wearing masks, using extra hand-sanitizer, or staying 6-feet a part, vaccine’s grew more probable. Private and public institutions began to mandate requirements for vaccine cards or proof of negative COVID-19 test results. Similar to the reaction of other pandemics such as the Swine flu and Ebola, people were hesitant about receiving the vaccine. Culturally, religiously, and politically there are many reasons people oppose to receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. With the trust that “everyday” citizens have for high profile people, like basketball stars, Kyrie Irving is in the hot seat.

” I would just appeal to him, get vaccinated. Your fans want to see you. We all want you back. Your teammates want you back”

– De Blasio

Recently, YouTube made an effort to remove “anti-vaccine” content from their platform, as many people were mislead or misinformed by some channels. This was an effort to encourage Americans to receive both doses of the vaccines, to lower the casualty rates resulted from this virus. Because Irving has been an active figure for social justice in the NBA, fans were outraged by his punishment to bench Brooklyn Nets games for exercising his personal choice. Is Irving’s decision to remain unvaccinated sending the “wrong messages” to fans? Should the NBA be able to withhold pay from players who refuse to get vaccinated? Does Irving’s example of exercising his personal choice encourage others to do more research on vaccines? How will this impact the NBA? How will this impact American citizens in the workplace? Is this an invasion of the First Amendment?

YouTube to End Rewind After 11 Years

On By Kendra FranklinIn Social Media, YouTubeLeave a comment

YouTube announced that they will be ending their annual Rewind videos after years of criticism and backlash.

YouTube Rewind, started in 2010, is a yearly recap video of all of the site’s trends, popular, and music, featuring top creators on the site. The videos have become some of the most viewed (and disliked) videos on the platform. They are a yearly tradition and a staple within the YouTube community.

The company decided not to release a Rewind for 2020, stating that “But 2020 has been different. And it doesn’t feel right to carry on as if it weren’t.”

YouTube’s 2020 Rewind cancellation tweet.

Pandemic concerns, as valid as they are, seem to be an excuse to cancel the series, as the Rewind videos have consistently received some of the harshest criticism on the site.

2018’s Rewind became the most disliked video on the platform and holds that title today. Many felt as if the video was pandering towards advertisers rather than featuring the community of users and top creators.

Anxious to avoid the same hate from the previous year, YouTube made 2019’s Rewind as simple and non-controversial as possible by simply making a compilation of the top videos of the year, throwing out all the bells and whistles of the normal Rewind. The change still managed to bring on heavy criticism from users.

Though this is the end of the Rewind series, the site still plans to release yearly recaps in a different format. The stated on Twitter that they plan to “refocus our energies on celebrating you and the trends that make YouTube [fire emoji] with a different and updated kind of experience – stay tuned.”

There are no further details on what this new Rewind experience will be just yet, but YouTube plans to turn to creators to fill in the blanks. Whatever the company decides to do, it would be in their best interest to try and avoid controversy.

Next Big Sound Will Be Shutting In November

On By emmaspaethIn Data, Media CovergenceLeave a comment
Photo Via medium.com

Next Big Sound, a New York-based company which provides analytics for online music, will shutting down effective November 1st. Next Big Sound allowed users to track mentions of bands and musical artists across several music social media platforms including Facebook and Twitter. NBS tracked music data across hundreds of thousands of artists and hundreds of billions of streams.

After being acquired by Pandora in 2015, its team will now work on Pandora’s Artist Marketing Platform. In a blog post NBS stated, “This is just the final step of a multi-year transition, and our team is excited to focus on improving and expanding the awesome marketing tools and data-driven insights available in Pandora’s Artist Marketing Platform. Pandora’s AMP tools have been the primary focus of our development and growth for two years already, and we’re really excited about the opportunities we can create for artists and creators across the industry on the AMP platform.”

Pandora’s AMP was launched in May of 2020 as a service for artists to find, engage, and market to their target listeners. Pandora’s AMP “allows creators to promote their music to more Pandora listeners and engage with fans more deeply through a free suite of powerful self-serve artist marketing tools.” Some of these tools include, artist audio messages, featured tracks, Pandora stories, and audience maps.

Connecticut Attorney General Requests Meeting with TikTok over ‘Slap A Teacher’ Challenge

On By alanapotIn Online Safety, Regulation, TikTokLeave a comment
(Image from Solen Feyissa on Flickr || https://www.flickr.com/photos/solen-feyissa/50179261657)

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong (D) has requested to meet with Tiktok CEO Shou Zi Chew over concerns of potential safety issues of a rising ‘Slap a Teacher’ Challenge trend and other impacts of Tiktok on Connecticut students.

In the letter that was addressed to Tiktok’s CEO, Attorney General Tong notes that a high school in New Britain, Connecticut recently had to shut down because of the “Devious Lick” trend on Tiktok. Educators in the school gave reports of “stolen school property, clogged toilets, and excessive vandalism” due to the challenge that was viral on the app in September. Tiktok has since removed “Devious Lick” content from its platform and Tong commends the company for that in his letter.

However, Attorney General Tong is calling upon Tiktok again because of the threat to educators with the rising “Slap a Teacher” Tiktok challenge. According to an article by The Hill, this dangerous challenge was set to begin in October, but does not seem to have caught on significantly. The challenge “involves a student calmly approaching a teacher and slapping them”. While attempts of this challenge have not yet been reported in Connecticut, parents in Lancaster County, South Carolina, were warned of an incident where an elementary student allegedly participated in the challenge, striking a teacher in the back of the head.

The Connecticut Attorney General ends the letter with a request for a detailed outline of the platform’s policies and procedures against misuse and abuse of content by Tiktok users and to “thoroughly analyze” why these measures are currently inadequate. He finally asks the CEO to meet with himself, educators and parents to hear first hand the effects the content on their app has on the youth of Connecticut. You can read the full letter below:

Overall, we see the real life effects social media has on today’s youth and how it can be harmful or dangerous to themselves or others. While being able to proceed without large consequences in the past, many social media companies are now having to create new regulations for their user base in order to protect children and other groups.

Choi, Joseph. “State AG seeks meeting with TikTok CEO over ‘Slap a Teacher’ challenge” The Hill, 04 October, 2021. https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/575273-state-ag-seeks-meeting-with-tiktok-ceo-over-slap-a-teacher-challenge?rl=1

The Digital News Report 2021 raises questions about the future of news organizations

On By Marlene TurreyIn News Media, Social MediaLeave a comment
Image via Reuters Institute

The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism published their 2021 Digital News Report. The report is based on a YouGov survey of over 92000 online news consumers in 46 countries and the whole report can be downloaded here.

A summary of the most important findings in the 2021 Digital News Report:

  • After recent periods of decline, the overall trust in the news has increased in the last year, with 44% of the total sample saying they trust most news most of the time. However, the U.S. has the lowest level of overall trust in the survey (26%) and Black and Hispanic audiences and younger women in the U.S. feel that news coverage is unfair to them.
  • Familiar and trusted new brands continue to attract more attention, especially in those countries with strong and independent public service media. However, particularly young people have weaker ties to traditional news media. There are less likely to visit a news website or app directly but are more likely to find news via social media.
  • The pandemic has also heightened awareness about misleading or false information. In the survey, 54% of news consumers say they have seen misinformation about COVID-19 in the previous week. Those who use social media are more likely to say they have been exposed to misinformation about the pandemic than non-users.
  • Although reliable and trustworthy news media is very important these days, the industry has been hard hit by the pandemic, leading to job cuts in news organizations worldwide. There has been a significant increase in payment for online news in a smaller number of richer Western countries, while the overall percentage of people paying for online news remains low.

This survey is very important, as it draws attention to some of the biggest problems in media and news organizations. It gives added urgency for a more diverse and inclusive newsroom, as well as showing how important it is to spread awareness for misinformation, in social media in particular. Furthermore, the survey raises the question about the future financing of news organizations.

Facebook Outage On Top of Current Backlash

On By Kendra FranklinIn facebook, Social Media, TechnologyLeave a comment
Zuckerberg Loses $5.9 Billion In A Day As Facebook Faces Rare Outage, Whisteblower Testimony
Image: Forbes

Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp were a few of the Facebook family apps rendered inaccessible on Monday for over five hours. This completely shifted the social media sphere for the day, as billions use Facebook and its apps. This is the largest outage the platform has had since 2008.

Facebook’s apps first started to display error messages around 11:40am Eastern time, according to the New York Times. The apps struggled to load content, some not displaying anything at all. It wasn’t until after 6:00pm Eastern time when the apps’ features slowly started to work, one by one.

This outage affected more than just Facebook and its apps, as many use Facebook as a sign-in feature on many websites and devices. Many rushed to other apps, like Twitter and Snapchat, who then experienced some issues from overloaded servers.

Facebook issued an apology using its competitor’s platform, Twitter.

Many on social media noted the interesting timing of this outage. It happened only a day after whistleblower, Frances Haugen exposed how the company consistently chooses its own interests over the public good. Haugen appeared on “60 Minutes” on Sunday to discuss her knowledge on Facebook’s effect on young users.

As usual, social media users rushed to Twitter to voice their feelings about the inconvenience throughout the entirety of the 5-hour outage.

Even Twitter itself decided to join on the fun.

https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1445078208190291973

Facebook has had its fair share of issues this past few weeks due to legal troubles, Haugen’s statement, and now the massive server outage. More is to come as Haugen is set to testify before Congress sometime this week.