- ‘Great British Bake Off’ Scraps National-Themed Weeks For New Series After Fans Slam “Casual Racism” Deadline
- Hit British baking show ditches national-themed weeks after people call them ‘racist and tacky’ Fox News
- ‘The Great British Bake Off’ nixes nationality-themed weeks in Season 13 after racism accusations New York Post
- Great British Bake Off promises no “Mexican Week” debacles this year The A.V. Club
- Great British Bake Off Season 13 Scraps Controversial Themed Weeks ComicBook.com
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Tag Archives: scraps
‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Scraps Limited Release, Will Roll Out Globally in Theaters Oct. 20 – Variety
- ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Scraps Limited Release, Will Roll Out Globally in Theaters Oct. 20 Variety
- ‘Killers Of The Flower Moon’ Now Going With Worldwide Theatrical Release October 20; Martin Scorsese’s Crime Epic Teams De Niro & DiCaprio Deadline
- Apple Shifts ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Theatrical Release to Worldwide Hollywood Reporter
- ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Official Posters Released — World of Reel Jordan Ruimy
- Killers of the Flower Moon Gets New Global Release Date and Poster IGN
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Dungeons & Dragons Scraps Plans to Update Its Open Game License
Wizards of the Coast, publisher of Dungeons & Dragons, announced today that they will no longer be pursuing deauthorization of the Open Gaming License 1.0a, abandoning plans previously stated in the drafted OGL 1.2. This statement comes after relentless fan backlash against the decision to deauthorize that was revealed after io9 reported on a leaked OGL 1.1. After three weeks of near constant pressure, it appears as if Wizards of the Coast is fully paying attention to the fanbase.
The deauthorization of the OGL 1.0a was a huge sticking point for fans and third party publishers who made a living using the license that was granted nearly two decades ago. Opinions varied on whether or not Wizards of the Coast could even legally deauthorize, with many people, including Ryan Dancey, vocally arguing that it was never intended to be deauthorized and the very act of doing so was not built into the legal wording of the license.
Brink said in the statement that “these live survey results are clear. You want OGL 1.0a. You want irrevocability. You like Creative Commons.” This sentiment was expressed so overwhelmingly in the playtest OGL 1.2 that Wizards of the Coast had to pay attention. Originally they were going to keep the playtest open for two weeks, however Brink writes, “the feedback is in such high volume and its direction is so plain that we’re acting now.”
The concessions D&D makes in this announcement are huge: they will not attempt to deauthorize the OGL 1.0a, they are putting the entirety of the Systems Reference Document for D&D 5.1 into the Creative Commons, and they are abandoning its previously-stated intentions for Virtual Tabletops.
One thing to note is that Brink states that putting the entire 400-page SRD into the Creative Commons means that fans don’t need to “take [Dungeons & Dragons’] word for it.” That Brink would explicitly acknowledge the lack of trust between fans and publishers and Wizards of the Coast is incredible.
G/O Media may get a commission
Finally, the company finished the statment with an olive branch, publishing the SRD immediately, and stating, “Here’s a PDF of SRD 5.1 with the Creative Commons license. By simply publishing it, we place it under an irrevocable Creative Commons license. We’ll get it hosted in a more convenient place next week. It was important that we take this step now, so there’s no question.”
[Editor’s Note: This article is part of the developing story. The information cited on this page may change as the breaking story unfolds.]
Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
Hong Kong scraps most COVID rules, though masks still mandated
HONG KONG, Dec 28 (Reuters) – Hong Kong will cancel its stringent COVID-19 rules from Thursday, city leader John Lee said, meaning that arrivals will no longer need to do mandatory PCR tests while the city’s vaccine pass would also be scrapped.
All measures would be cancelled on Thursday, apart from the wearing of masks which still remains compulsory, Lee told a media briefing on Wednesday.
“The city has reached a relatively high vaccination rate which builds an anti-epidemic barrier,” Lee said.
“Hong Kong has a sufficient amount of medicine to fight COVID, and healthcare workers have gained rich experience in facing the pandemic,” he added.
Lee said his government is aiming to reopen the borders with mainland China by Jan. 15 and was working with authorities over the border to ensure an orderly re-opening.
He said the authorities have been preparing for the scrapping of all restrictions.
“The time is appropriate for us to do this, having prepared for six months to do this,” said Lee. “The whole society is preparing for this. We are doing all this according to our local epidemic situation.”
Hong Kong’s vaccine pass requirement, which was imposed in February and was a must for people to access most venues in Hong Kong, will end from Thursday. Social distancing rules such as a cap on gatherings of more than 12 people in public will also be scrapped from Thursday.
The city has for nearly three years largely followed China’s lead in tackling the novel coronavirus, with both places being the last strongholds in adopting a zero-COVID policy.
The removal of the curbs are likely to result in an increase of travellers to the former British colony who have previously shunned it due to strict restrictions.
In an abrupt change of policy, China this month began dismantling the world’s strictest COVID regime of lockdowns and extensive testing. The country will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8, authorities said this week.
Restrictions on travel between Hong Kong and the mainland were imposed in early 2020. The reopening was postponed several times due to outbreaks in Hong Kong or the mainland.
International passengers arriving in Hong Kong since mid-month are no longer subject to COVID-related movement controls or barred from certain venues, the government announced in December.
Business groups, diplomats and many residents had slammed Hong Kong’s COVID-19 rules, saying they threatened its competitiveness and standing as an international financial centre.
The rules have weighed on Hong Kong’s economy since early 2020, speeding up an exodus of businesses, expatriates and local families that have left amid a drive by Beijing to more closely control the former British colony.
Additional reporting by Jessie Pang and Angel Woo; Editing by Tom Hogue, Lincoln Feast and Muralikumar Anantharaman
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
China scraps inbound quarantine rules in decisive break with zero-Covid regime
China will remove quarantine requirements for inbound travellers from January 8 as the country dismantles the remnants of a zero-Covid regime that closed it off from the rest of the world for almost three years.
The National Health Commission on Monday unveiled the move as part of a wider announcement that downgraded the country’s management of Covid-19 and definitively abandoned a host of other preventive measures.
The NHC said that more than 90 per cent of cases of the Omicron variant were “mild or asymptomatic”, part of a shift in tone towards coronavirus as it rages across a country where until recently very few of the 1.4bn population had contracted it.
The government, which this month also scrapped the requirement for positive cases to quarantine at central facilities, is now battling a severe winter outbreak with estimated cases spiralling into the hundreds of millions and health services under pressure.
Models have estimated the virus could lead to close to 1mn deaths, though China’s public data has ceased to reflect the situation on the ground and other zero-Covid rules such as mass testing have largely ended.
Chinese equities led rises across the Asia-Pacific region on Tuesday following the announcement, with the CSI 300 of Shanghai- and Shenzhen-listed stocks climbing 1.2 per cent. Hong Kong’s exchange was closed.
China pursued a strict zero-Covid policy shortly after the pandemic first emerged, locking down many of its largest cities and imposing quarantine requirements on foreign arrivals as part of an attempt to eliminate the virus within its borders.
Late this year, the policy began to unravel as authorities struggled to contain outbreaks in numerous cities, including the capital Beijing. Protesters took to the streets in November in a rare display of defiance against the central government’s approach, which was dramatically relaxed shortly afterwards.
Monday’s announcement signalled the end of the zero-Covid system that transformed China’s relationship with the outside world, and which for long periods successfully limited the transmission of a virus that had swept through every other advanced economy.
At one point this year, the quarantine rule required travellers to spend three weeks in a hotel room. The current policy of five days at a hotel followed by three days at home will end on January 8. Arrivals will still be required to have a negative Covid test result within 48 hours of departure and to wear masks on flights.
The sudden removal of restrictions has already put immense pressure on China’s healthcare system, especially in Beijing, which was one of the centres of the outbreak prior to the policy’s abandonment and was thought to be one of the best-prepared cities.
Recent economic data has highlighted the costs of the policy. Retail sales, a gauge of consumer spending, fell 5.9 per cent year on year in November, worse than analyst expectations, while the economy is set to miss an annual 5.5 per cent growth target that was already its lowest in decades.
But analysts have also warned over the economic and corporate costs of the virus itself as it sweeps the country, with Apple among those vulnerable to further supply chain issues.
Under zero-Covid, citizens in China were required to test every few days at booths across major cities and scan a code on their phones to enter buildings. Such practices have largely disappeared as cases multiplied rapidly, though as recently as late November individuals in Shanghai were still being taken to central quarantine because they were close contacts of positive cases at bars.
Camilla scraps position of lady-in-waiting at Buckingham Palace
The position of lady-in-waiting has been scrapped at Buckingham Palace, bringing to an end a centuries-old tradition.
Combining the roles of companion, adviser and secretary, ladies-in-waiting played a key part in Royal life, accompanying the late Queen and her sister Princess Margaret on official duties and foreign tours.
But in a sign of the new Queen Consort Camilla’s unfussy approach, they will be replaced by six aides styled ‘Queen’s Companions’.
Last night the Palace named them as Sarah Troughton, Jane von Westenholz, Fiona the Marchioness of Lansdowne, an interior designer, Lady Katharine Brooke and Baroness Carlyn Chisholm, a Conservative peer. The sixth is Camilla’s close friend Lady Sarah Keswick, whose husband, Sir Chips Keswick, retired as chairman of Arsenal football club in 2020. All have been loyal to Camilla.
A Palace source said they will receive a nominal fee to cover their expenses in much the same way as ladies-in-waiting.
Meanwhile. a senior royal source told The Sunday Times: ‘The Queen Consort did not want or need ladies-in-waiting and the Queen’s companions will have a different role. They are there to provide Her Majesty with support and company. At the end of a very busy day, it is nice to have a longstanding friend beside you.’
The position of lady-in-waiting has been scrapped at Buckingham Palace, bringing to an end a centuries-old tradition – in a sign of the new Queen Consort Camilla’s unfussy approach
Last night the Palace named Sarah Troughton (pictured) as one of the ‘Queen’s Companions’
Lady Sarah Keswick (pictured) was also named. Her husband, Sir Chips Keswick, retired as chairman of Arsenal football club in 2020
Baroness Carlyn Chisholm, a Conservative peer, will be another of the ‘Queen’s Companion’
Fiona the Marchioness of Lansdowne (right), an interior designer, is another appointed to the role
All the women are among the inner circle of the King and Queen and believed to be some of the monarchs’ oldest and most loyal friends.
Lady Lansdowne, 68, is an interior designer with an eye for fashion. She is known professionally as ‘Fiona Shelburne’. Her husband Charles, the Marquess of Lansdowne, is one of the King’s closest friends.
Lady Lansdowne is the chatelaine of Bowood House in Wiltshire – close to Camilla’s private country estate. Known as ‘Lofty’ to her friends, Jane von Westenholz is married to former Olympic alpine skier Baron von Westenholz.
While Lady Brooke – daughter of Lady Susan Hussey, who is a former lady-in-waiting of the late Queen – is a leading figure in horse racing.
Sarah Troughton, 69, is the Lord-Lieutenant of Wiltshire – the first woman to hold the post since its creation almost 500 years ago. She is also the late Queen’s cousin and appeared in the ITV documentary Camillia’s Country Life to mark the Queen Consort’s 75th birthday earlier this year.
And Lady Sarah is the Queen Consort’s oldest friend and is married to Sir Chips Keswick, the former chairman of Hambros bank and ex-director of Arsenal Football Club. Having a wicked sense of humour, she is described as ‘very funny’ and a ‘great draw at dinner time’ by friends close to her.
Former nurse Baroness Chisholm is a life peer, having previously represented the Conservatives in the House of Lords. A fan of horse racing, she has previously attended Royal Ascot with the Charles and Camilia and, before the royal couple quit, used to go fox hunting with them too.
Lady Katherine Brooke, right, pictured with Sir Francis. She is among the closest and most loyal friends of the King and Queen Consort
Jane von Westenholz is the Queen Consort’s sixth companion
Combining the roles of companion, adviser and secretary, ladies-in-waiting played a key part in Royal life, accompanying the late Queen and her sister Princess Margaret on official duties and foreign tours.
The shift in royal tradition has also seen the Queen Consort hire her first dedicated equerry, a male adviser playing the same role. He was last night named as Major Ollie Plunkett, of The Rifles, of which the Queen Consort is Colonel-in-Chief.
He will work alongside her private secretary. Some of the Queen’s Companions will appear publicly with her for the first time on Tuesday, at a Palace reception to highlight violence against women and girls.
Ladies-in-waiting answered correspondence, helped host events and accompanied female Royals on their travels.
The new role, a Palace source said, was to take into account the changing needs of the 75-year-old Queen Consort who won’t be required ‘to be in attendance as regularly’.
A Palace spokesman said: ‘The role of the Queen’s Companion will be to support the Queen Consort in some of her key official and state duties.’
The late Queen’s ladies-in-waiting have been kept on but will now be known as ladies of the household. They are Lady Susan Hussey, Dame Mary Morrison and Dame Annabel Whitehead.
A Palace spokesman added that the former ladies-in-waiting would ‘continue to assist His Majesty the King in hosting formal occasions at Buckingham Palace’.
Paramount scraps $2.2bn sale of Simon & Schuster publishing to Penguin | Publishing
Penguin Random House, the world’s largest book publisher, and rival Simon & Schuster have scrapped a $2.2bn deal to merge, Penguin’s owner said in a statement on Monday.
Bertelsmann, a German media group which owns Penguin, initially said it would appeal a US judge’s decision that said its purchase of Simon & Schuster would be illegal because it would hit authors’ pay.
But Bertelsmann said in a statement on Monday that it “will advance the growth of its global book publishing business without the previously planned merger of Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster”.
Reuters reported on Sunday that the German company was unable to convince Paramount Global, Simon & Schuster’s owner, to extend their deal agreement and appeal the judge’s decision.
Judge Florence Pan of the US district court for the District of Columbia ruled on 31 October that the justice department had shown the deal could substantially lessen competition “in the market for the US publishing rights to anticipated top-selling books”.
With the deal’s dissolution, Penguin will pay a $200m termination fee to Paramount.
Paramount said on Monday that Simon & Schuster was a “non-core asset” to Paramount. “It is not video-based and therefore does not fit strategically within Paramount’s broader portfolio,” the company said in a filing on the deal’s termination.
The justice department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Unlike most merger fights, which focus on what consumers pay, the Biden administration argued the deal should be stopped because it would lead to less competition for blockbuster books and lower advances for authors who earn $250,000 or more.
The decision comes as the Biden administration has made clear it intends to tackle what it sees as monopoly positions, blaming them, among other things, for rising meat prices and soaring concert ticket prices.
The book industry has gone through a series of consolidations in recent years and critics feared another big merger would reduce competition while making life harder for smaller publishers.
Penguin is by far the US’s largest publisher already. Its writers include the cookbook author Ina Garten and novelists Zadie Smith and Danielle Steel, while Simon & Schuster publishes Stephen King, Jennifer Weiner and Hillary Rodham Clinton, among others.
The US justice department filed a lawsuit aimed at stopping the deal in November 2021.
In hearings held in August, the government argued that the largest five publishers control 90% of the market, and a combined Penguin and Simon & Schuster would control nearly half of the market for publishing rights to blockbuster books, while its nearest competitors would be less than half its size.
King, author of bestsellers including The Stand and The Shining, was among the authors and agents who testified during the trial, arguing it would reduce competition.
“You might as well say you’re going to have a husband and wife bidding against each other for the same house. It’s kind of ridiculous,” King told the court. “Consolidation is bad for competition.”
Reuters contributed to this story
U.K. Scraps Plan to Cut Income-Tax Rate for Top Earners
LONDON—The U.K. government backtracked on a key part of its broad tax-cut plan after facing a backlash from financial markets and a rebellion in its own ranks, sending the pound higher on Monday but marking a major setback for new Prime Minister Liz Truss and her economic agenda.
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer
Kwasi Kwarteng
shelved an initiative to cut the top rate of income tax from 45% to 40%, more than a week after a broader fiscal plan to stoke growth through tax cuts and new spending forced an emergency intervention by the Bank of England to prevent a financial crisis.
Ms. Truss, who based her nascent leadership on a sweeping revamp of the British economy, defended the measure as recently as Sunday but eventually buckled under the pressure of international investors who balked at the scale of unfunded tax cuts and Conservative Party lawmakers shocked by polls showing they faced a near total wipeout at the next general election.
The pound rallied 1.3% against the dollar and bought $1.13 in late Monday trading—a higher rate than before the tax plans were unveiled last week. U.K. borrowing costs mostly fell, with the yield on the 10-year gilt slipping 0.21 percentage point to 3.93%, although yields were still far higher than before the plans.
“I know the plan put forward only 10 days ago has caused a little turbulence. I get it,” Mr. Kwarteng, the U.K.’s Treasury chief, told party members gathered at an annual conference on Monday. He said he hoped getting rid of the planned cut to the 45% rate would allow people to focus on the rest of the government’s pro-growth agenda.
He also sought to reassure financial markets: “There is no path to higher sustainable growth without fiscal responsibility.”
U.K. Prime Minister Liz Truss, at the annual Conservative Party conference on Sunday. She defended the package in a BBC interview that day.
Photo:
oli scarff/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Under pressure from lawmakers, Mr. Kwarteng late Monday decided to bring forward the Office for Budget Responsibility analysis of public finances to October from Nov. 23. The report is seen as key to providing transparency to the market about whether and when the government program will generate growth.
Still, political analysts said the chaos of the past week marked a rocky start to Ms. Truss’s tenure and raised questions over whether she can hold her party together as she seeks to implement spending cuts to help fund the plan’s remaining tax cuts and reassure markets about the scale of government debts.
U.K. bookmakers Oddschecker on Monday placed the odds of Ms. Truss being forced out of leadership at 4-1, compared with 66-1 last week. “One of the most incompetent, catastrophic debuts in political leadership I’ve seen,” wrote Brian Klaas, an associate professor of global politics at University College London, on Twitter.
The move to slash the top income-tax rate was a small part of a much bigger stimulus announced on Sept. 23 that paired large subsidies to help homeowners and businesses cope with rising energy costs along with the biggest tax cuts in a generation, a package funded by borrowing that raised alarm among investors.
The most controversial part of the plan was the move to cut the highest rate of income tax on the wealthy at a time when high inflation is cutting into real wages and a recession looms.
Conservative Party lawmakers had lined up to criticize the abolition of the tax. On Sunday,
Michael Gove,
a former senior cabinet minister, said it was morally wrong. The growing list of rebels meant the government would likely have struggled to get the top-rate tax cut voted through Parliament.
Despite the change, questions remain about the plan’s economic viability. The change will affect only £2 billion, the equivalent of $2.23 billion, out of an initial package of tax cuts that totaled £45 billion in foregone revenue for the government, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, an independent think tank. It estimated the British government would still require an additional £72.4 billion in debt issuance this financial year.
This is “a rounding error in the context of the public finances,” said Paul Johnson, director of the IFS. “The chancellor still has a lot of work to do if he is to display a credible commitment to fiscal sustainability.”
Still, the move to roll back the tax cut was welcomed by some investors as an important signal that the government was responding to market concerns about the plan’s impact on inflation and debt at a time of rising interest rates and financial uncertainty.
“It’s a first step in restoring credibility that was lost after the fiscal statement,” said
Cathal Kennedy,
U.K. economist at RBC Capital Markets.
Government officials on Monday said they intended to press ahead with other measures announced in the mini-budget, including a reduction in the lowest rate of income tax that economists estimated was set to cost much more than the removal of the highest rate in lost revenues. Other controversial measures remain, including scrapping a cap on banker bonuses imposed after the 2008 financial crisis.
The International Monetary Fund gave a rare rebuke of the initial plan, saying it risked further fueling inflation that the BOE sees hitting 11% later this year. On Friday, ratings agency S&P lowered its outlook on U.K. sovereign debt to negative, citing risks to the country’s economy.
Political analysts said the Truss government was likely bowing to political reality as much as economic reality.
“This move is rather symbolic, being less about the amount of money it will save and more about the poor signal it had delivered of ideological tax cuts,” said
Chris Turner,
an analyst at ING Bank. “The move looks driven by a backlash from her own party and perhaps the threat of a sovereign rating downgrade.”
The top-rate tax cut had threatened to completely overshadow the annual Conservative Party conference that is currently under way in Birmingham. The conference, normally a three-day show of devotion to the party leader, is instead turning into a more somber event as the Tories brace for a difficult few years ahead of an election in 2024.
A series of opinion polls after the plan pointed to a big loss of support for the Conservative Party among voters as it approached the gathering.
At the conference,
Chris Philp,
a senior Treasury minister, said he expected the party to support the rest of the tax-cutting package and argued that the U.K. government had a strong balance sheet. “We think they are the right plans because ultimately those plans are what make our economy competitive,” he said.
Turmoil in the U.K. Economy
Monday’s announcement is the latest step to stem the fallout from the fiscal plan. Last week, after coming under pressure from the BOE, the government announced the Office for Budget Fiscal Responsibility, an independent public finances watchdog, will in November lay out the full cost of the package and whether it will generate the 2.5% a year of economic growth the government promises. The government had resisted having the watchdog score the plan.
Mr. Kwarteng also promised on Monday that no new tax cuts would be coming. Both steps were also welcomed by investors.
“That’s quite a shift,” said Chris Jeffery, head of interest rates and inflation at Legal & General Investment Management.
The government said it would outline other steps to pay for the tax cuts in November, including likely spending restrictions such as making below-inflation increases to unemployment benefits. In the meantime, the government is hoping to win over doubters with a drumbeat of new announcements of regulatory reforms to make everything from agriculture to child-care provision more competitive.
Worries about the impact of tax cuts on government borrowing helped push yields on government bonds sharply higher early last week. On Wednesday, the BOE stepped in to halt the surge and the threat of significant harm to some pension funds, announcing that it would buy up to £65 billion of government bonds in a series of daily auctions.
When the bank intervention ends in mid-October, yields could rise again, but not as quickly as in recent days, said Orla Garvey, a fixed-income portfolio manager at
Federated Hermes.
The top-rate tax cut had threatened to overshadow the annual Conservative Party conference that is currently under way in Birmingham.
Photo:
oli scarff/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Write to Paul Hannon at paul.hannon@wsj.com, Max Colchester at max.colchester@wsj.com and Anna Hirtenstein at anna.hirtenstein@wsj.com
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AP Exclusive: Philippines scraps Russian chopper deal
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The Philippine government has scrapped a deal to purchase 16 Russian military transport helicopters due to fears of possible U.S. sanctions, Philippine officials said.
Former Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said Tuesday night he canceled the 12.7-billion-peso ($227 million) deal to acquire the Mi-17 helicopters in a decision last month that was approved by then-President Rodrigo Duterte before their terms in office ended on June 30.
“We could face sanctions,” Lorenzana told The Associated Press, describing ways Washington could express its displeasure if the Philippines proceeded with the deal due to America’s worsening conflict with Russia.
American security officials were aware of Manila’s decision and could offer similar heavy-lift helicopters for Philippine military use, he said.
After serving as defense chief under Duterte, Lorenzana has been appointed by new President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to head a government agency in charge of transforming former military bases into business hubs.
Philippine Ambassador to Washington Jose Manuel Romualdez told The AP that the deal was canceled because Manila could face possible sanctions under a U.S. federal law called the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act if the helicopter deal went through.
A Philippine military official said the helicopter deal would undergo a “termination process” after the decision to cancel it was made since a contract has already been signed. The Russians can appeal but there is little room for the Philippine government to reconsider, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of a lack of authority to publicly discuss the issue.
Under the helicopter purchase agreement, which was signed in November, the first batch of the multi-purpose helicopters would have been scheduled for delivery by Russia’s Sovtechnoexport in about two years.
Asked in March if Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would affect the purchase, Lorenzana told reporters: “We do not see any likelihood of it being scrapped as of this moment” and added that “only time can tell.”
Lorenzana at the time said an initial payment had been made by the Philippines in January. It was not immediately clear what would happen to the payment after the Philippines’ decision to back out of the deal.
The Russian-made helicopters could have been used for combat, search and rescue operations, and medical evacuations in the Southeast Asian archipelago, which is often lashed by typhoons and other natural disasters, Philippine officials said.
In March, the Philippines voted “yes” on a U.N. General Assembly resolution that demanded an immediate halt to Moscow’s attack on Ukraine and the withdrawal of all Russian troops. It condemned the invasion and echoed U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s appeal for respect of humanitarian principles to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine.
Duterte has expressed concern over the global impact of the Russian invasion but has not personally condemned it. When he was in office, he nurtured close ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom he once called his “idol,” and Chinese leader Xi Jinping while frequently criticizing U.S. security policies.
The Philippines is a treaty ally of Washington, which has imposed heavy sanctions aimed at pressuring Moscow to pull back from Ukraine.
The deal to acquire the Russian helicopters was among several weapons purchase agreements signed during Duterte’s final months in office.
Last February, Lorenzana signed a 32-billion-peso ($571 million) deal to acquire 32 S-70i Black Hawk helicopters from Poland-based aerospace manufacturer PZL Mielec. It was the largest military aircraft acquisition contract signed under Duterte, Philippine defense officials said..
Due to financial constraints, the Philippines has struggled for years to modernize its military, one of the most underfunded in Asia, to deal with decades-long Muslim and communist insurgencies and to defend its territories in the disputed South China Sea.
Meta Scraps App for Couples
Hey all you sexy young couples, I have bad news. Meta’s relationship-focused communication app Tuned is officially being shut down on September 19. Or, if you’re like me and 1) are single and/or 2) have never heard of this app, September 19 will just be another Monday.
Tuned is a Meta product that was released during the very beginning of the covid-19 pandemic in April 2020, when staying in touch with someone you love was either really easy if you were quarantined with them, or really difficult if you were quarantined without them. While the app’s release towards the beginning of the pandemic is likely coincidence (apps take time to develop), its structure of getting couples to communicate over quirky prompts and a kitschy interface could not have come at a better time. But now, just over two years later, the app is shutting down on September 19.
Meta’s New Product Experimentation communication team told us in an email that, “Tuned is an experimental app from NPE. In the spirit of experimentation and similarly to previous apps, we try a lot of things, learn, and if our tests aren’t sticking, shut it down.”
I tried to experiment with Tuned to write this article, but upon entering my phone number to sign up, I was greeted with an error message. Perhaps Tuned is no longer accepting new users as it begins winding down its services, and Meta did not immediately address my request for clarification on that. According to Gadget360, the app is “a private space where you and your significant other can just be yourselves. With Tuned, you can be as mushy, quirky, and silly as you are together in person, even when you’re apart.”
Meta appears to be going through a bit of a tough time, and it’s possible that axing Tuned is a part of a wider effort for the company save money and pivot away from social media. Meta has endured recent chatter of a hiring slowdown and impending layoffs: Leaked documents from executives instructed managers to cut underperforming employees under the guise that “they are not who we need,” and Meta employees are now reportedly concerned about a rumored layoff of up to 10% the company’s workforce.
Meta is also making a clear effort to distance itself from its “Facebook” days of social media amidst regulatory pressure and public scrutiny with a hair-brained scheme to rebrand itself into a VR juggernaut. But we all know how the Metaverse is going.
Tuned shutting down is likely a bummer for the handful of couples that are still using the gimmicky app two years after it launched, but it could also be a symptom of a larger, internal company restructuring.
Update July 26, 3:40 p.m. ET: This article was updated to include additional comment from Meta’s New Product Experimentation team.