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Why Netflix is getting into games

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Netflix started out shipping DVDs to customers through the mail. Then it started streaming other people’s movies and TV shows. Then it started making its own movies and TV shows. Next up: Video games.
On Tuesday, Netflix formally told <a href="https://s22.q4cdn.com/959853165/files/doc_financials/2021/q2/FINAL-Q2-21-Shareholder-Letter.pdf">investors</a> that is in the “early stages of further expanding into games,” saying that it’s an extension of experiments the company has done with a handful of choose-your-own-adventure style interactive programs, like 2018’s <a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/80988062">Bandersnatch</a>.
It’s a move that is both obvious and surprising, and we can discuss why in a minute. First, here’s how Netflix says it will work:
<ul>
<li>The games will be bundled for free into Netflix’s main app, and for the time being will be primarily meant to be played on mobile devices, though they may eventually migrate to TVs.</li>
<li>The company thinks some of its games will connect in some way to Netflix-owned franchises — you can definitely imagine a Stranger Things game, though probably not a Sex/Life one — but it may also license existing games and brands from other developers.</li>
<li>Netflix is describing its move into games as an initial foray — “We think the time is right to learn more about how our members value games,” the company said in its quarterly earnings release — but also says it expects to be in gaming for the long haul. “This is a core part of our subscription offering,” Greg Peters, the company’s chief operating officer said during the company’s earnings call.</li>
<li>The company thinks the main value of its games will be keeping existing subscribers more engaged in the Netflix app, and thus less likely to unsubscribe. The games could also, in theory, help drive new subscriptions.</li>
</ul>
If you have paid attention to Netflix over the years, you have seen this move coming: Netflix executives, starting with CEO Reed Hastings, have mused for years about the fact that games are a major source of competition for Netflix users’ time and money. More concretely, <a href="https://www.theinformation.com/articles/netflix-seeks-executive-to-expand-game-efforts">The Information</a> reported earlier this spring that the company was considering offering a bundle of games to subscribers, similar to the ones Apple offers via its Apple Arcade service. And last week <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-14/netflix-plans-to-offer-video-games-in-expansion-beyond-films-tv">Bloomberg</a> reported that Netflix had hired an executive to run its upcoming games service.
On the other hand: If you’ve paid attention to Netflix over the years, you may also view this a real departure from the company’s strategy — namely, its insistence on focusing on doing one thing well.
For years, Netflix executives have been asked when they will get into live sports, or live news, or when they will add advertising to the service. The response is always the same: Netflix thinks a single-minded focus is the best way to win, and branching out beyond on-demand movies and TV shows would be a distraction.
Now, the company says, it’s willing to try something new, while arguing that free games are reasonable extension of what it’s already doing. The company’s subscription model means “We don’t have to think about ads [in games]. We don’t have to think about in-game purchases or other monetization; we don’t have to think about per title purchases,” Peters said during the earnings call.
Yes, Netflix allows, it doesn’t really know anything about making and hosting video games. But it says it didn’t know anything about making its own content when it agreed to make House of Cards in 2011, and that has worked out fine since.
But that seems like a stretch. When Netflix tells the story about its first move into original content, it said that it thought its customers would like House of Cards because it knew its customers like other dark political soap operas. And while Netflix didn’t know anything about making shows when it started 10 years ago, it didn’t really have to know that: It simply paid David Fincher, Kevin Spacey, and production company Media Rights Capital to make the show — and then it streamed it to customers the same way it already streamed the other shows and movies it already had.
But figuring out how to make games is a very different skill set than making TV shows and movies — which is why most big entertainment companies have failed whenever they’ve tried to get into games themselves (big tech companies like Amazon, Apple, and Google have all swung and missed to varying degrees, as well.) So it’s entirely possible that Netflix’s move into games could flop, too.
On the other hand: As even the most hidebound Hollywood executive knows by now, <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/videogames-are-a-bigger-industry-than-sports-and-movies-combined-thanks-to-the-pandemic-11608654990#:~:text=Global%20videogame%20revenue%20is%20expected,North%20American%20sports%20industries%20combined.&text=The%20videogame%20industry%20has%20boomed,of%20ways%20to%20play%20games.">games are bigger than Hollywood</a>, and they’re not going away. If it’s going to take a long time to figure out, it’s better to get started sooner than later.
 
 
source <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/7/20/22586084/netflix-gaming-strategy-earnings-explained">https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/7/20/22586084/netflix-gaming-strategy-earnings-explained</a>

vox Why Netflix is getting into games

Netflix started out shipping DVDs to customers through the mail. Then it started streaming other people’s movies and TV shows. Then it star...

Biden stacks his administration with yet another tech foe

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Big Tech has yet another reason to be worried about the threat of US government regulation.
President Biden announced Tuesday he is <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/07/20/president-biden-announces-jonathan-kanter-for-assistant-attorney-general-for-antitrust/">nominating Jonathan Kanter</a>, a known legal foe of Google and other major tech companies, to head the Department of Justice’s antitrust division. If confirmed to his post by the Senate, Kanter will have the power to take on cases to break up Big Tech companies or otherwise limit the size of their businesses. And as head of the DOJ antitrust division, Kanter would also decide how to proceed with the Trump administration’s landmark case against Google for engaging in allegedly anti-competitive business practices.
Kanter has <a href="https://twitter.com/b_fung/status/1417555682946125825">long argued</a> that regulators have failed to enforce anti-monopoly antitrust laws against the tech sector and that this lack of regulation is hurting small businesses and American consumers. If he is confirmed, Kanter will join two other recent Biden appointees: Lina Khan, who heads the FTC; and Tim Wu, a top White House adviser on economic policy. Like Kanter, both built their careers making the case that the government needs to more aggressively regulate tech companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple.
These three powerful government figures are a worrisome trifecta for Google and other major tech firms. And their ascension to power is welcome news to advocates of breaking up Big Tech (so much so that some key political supporters have been touting <a href="https://twitter.com/RepBowman/status/1391844418282475523?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1391844418282475523%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Ftechnology%2F2021%2F07%2F20%2Fdoj-kanter-antitrust%2F">“Wu & Khan & Kanter” mugs</a> on social media).
“With Lina Khan at the Federal Trade Commission, Tim Wu on the National Economic Council, and dozens of other strong leaders in departments and agencies throughout the Biden administration, Jonathan Kanter’s nomination to lead the Antitrust Division spells the end of the era of unaccountable monopoly power in America,” Barry Lynn, executive director of the policy group Open Markets Institute, wrote in a statement.
Other anti-monopoly policy groups like the American Economic Liberties Project put out similarly positive statements.
“President Biden has made an excellent choice to lead the DOJ’s antitrust division,” wrote Sarah Miller, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project, in a statement to Recode. “Jonathan Kanter has the experience, values, and intellectual foresight to ensure that antitrust enforcement under the Biden administration delivers for working people, small businesses, and communities. … He has crafted many of the most successful legal arguments driving the major antitrust investigations into Big Tech.”
Kanter is an antitrust lawyer who has previously represented Google competitors like Yelp and Microsoft.
The Senate will need to confirm Kanter to secure his position. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-M), who is sponsoring bills regulating tech, and Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) immediately released statements in support.
“I look forward to working together to ensure that the Antitrust Division will fulfill its mission to vigorously enforce the antitrust laws, protect consumers, and promote competition throughout our economy, and I will continue to push to secure additional resources to support this critical effort,” wrote Sen. Klobuchar, in part, in a statement.
Kanter’s experience representing Google’s competitors in the past may be something that Google tries to use against him, <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/20/biden-to-nominate-jonathan-kanter-to-lead-doj-antitrust-division.html">according to CNBC</a>. The company could push for him to be recused from cases involving Google by arguing that these create a conflict of interest for him.
That’s already started happening with Khan: Amazon and Facebook have <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-seeks-recusal-of-ftc-chairwoman-lina-khan-in-antitrust-investigations-of-company-11625067962">both</a> <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/14/facebeook-antitrust-ftc-lina-khan-recusal-499608">petitioned</a> Khan to recuse herself from cases involving their companies because of her past criticism of their business practices. Khan has the advantage of broad bipartisan support in Congress, so it’s unclear if these petitions will succeed.
Considering that Trump’s nominee to head the antitrust division, Makan Delrahim, had to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/justice-departments-antitrust-chief-removes-himself-from-google-probe-11580822369">recuse himself</a> for the opposite reason — he advised Google earlier in his career — these new appointees’ histories of being critical of the tech sector says a lot about current attitudes in Washington toward the industry.
Kanter’s appointment is also a reflection of Biden’s larger policy agenda of reining in Silicon Valley’s power. Earlier this month, Biden <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/07/09/fact-sheet-executive-order-on-promoting-competition-in-the-american-economy/">issued an executive order</a> on competition, directing government agencies like the FTC to more closely scrutinize the tech sector. And recently, he has been increasingly <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/16/politics/biden-facebook-covid-19/index.html">critical of social media companies like Facebook</a> for allowing the proliferation of misinformation about topics like Covid-19 on their platforms.
It’s true that lawmakers and regulators have been urging more antitrust scrutiny of Big Tech for a while. But these efforts and appointments signal a shift: Rather than just talking about antitrust enforcement, the government may finally be ready to take some action.
 
 
source <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/22585851/jonathen-kanter-biden-google-facebook-tech-antitrust-department-justice-tim-wu-lina-khan-apple">https://www.vox.com/recode/22585851/jonathen-kanter-biden-google-facebook-tech-antitrust-department-justice-tim-wu-lina-khan-apple</a>

vox Biden stacks his administration with yet another tech foe

Big Tech has yet another reason to be worried about the threat of US government regulation. President Biden announced Tuesday he is nomina...

Don’t be fooled by that viral Hannity clip. Fox News’s Covid-19 coverage is a mess.

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Fox News host Sean Hannity received a <a href="https://twitter.com/neeratanden/status/1417310179624951809">round</a> of <a href="https://twitter.com/steveschale/status/1417303089372143625">applause</a> on Tuesday for comments he made Monday night urging his viewers to “please take Covid seriously” and telling them, “I believe in the science of vaccination” — remarks seemingly standing in contrast to the kind of vaccine skepticism Fox has been <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/162971/fox-news-vaccine-hesitancy-tucker-carlson-ingraham">trafficking in</a> for months now.
A clip of Hannity’s comments has been viewed more than 5.4 million times on Twitter as this is written, and was described as the “<a href="https://twitter.com/EggerDC/status/1417434027955572752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1417434027955572752%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mediamatters.org%2Fcoronavirus-covid-19%2Ffox-news-anti-vaccine-campaign-isnt-over">monologue of the night</a>” by Politico.
Some observers interpreted that clip and <a href="https://twitter.com/justinbaragona/status/1417178420950220811">others from Monday of Fox News personalities endorsing Covid-19 vaccines</a> as evidence <a href="https://twitter.com/JuddLegum/status/1417314250587090948">a change of tone</a> is afoot at America’s most-watched cable news network. But don’t be fooled — Fox’s Covid-19 coverage is still a mess.
<div>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
SEAN HANNITY: "Please take Covid seriously. I can't say it enough. Enough people have died. We don't need any more death. Research like crazy. Talk to your doctor... I believe in science. I believe in the science of vaccination." <a href="https://t.co/tOi5ebpqSf">pic.twitter.com/tOi5ebpqSf</a>
— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) <a href="https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1417301374245687296?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 20, 2021</a></blockquote>
</div>
Consider, for instance, that the viral clip of Hannity talking about vaccines came <a href="https://twitter.com/JanNWolfe/status/1417303864546635776">immediately before he pivoted</a> to a story about a college athlete who was temporarily paralyzed after she took a different sort of vaccine in 2019 — the subtext being that inoculations are more dangerous than the experts would have you believe and that mandates are ill-advised. (Hannity has previously tried to discredit Covid-19 vaccines by <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sean-hannity-science-vaccine_n_60892949e4b0ccb91c2c0023">saying stuff like</a>, “the great Dr. Fauci has been wrong so often” and proclaiming he was “beginning to have doubts” about getting the shot.)
Or consider, as Matt Gertz <a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/coronavirus-covid-19/fox-news-anti-vaccine-campaign-isnt-over">detailed</a> for Media Matters, that Hannity’s comments were sandwiched between shows anchored by Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham that both pushed vaccine misinformation:
<blockquote>
On Monday, Carlson <a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/tucker-carlson/tucker-carlson-lies-about-vaccinated-people-having-same-covid-risks-unvaccinated">revived</a> his <a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/anti-vax-persuasion-problem-about-right-wing-sabotage">lie</a> about a government database purportedly showing thousands of deaths from the vaccines and <a href="https://www.mediaite.com/tv/after-fox-colleagues-encourage-vaccines-tucker-carlson-tells-viewers-they-should-ignore-people-giving-you-medical-advice-on-television/">urged viewers</a> to ignore journalists who are encouraging vaccination because they want to “make you comply,” over on-screen graphics reading “MANY VACCINATED PEOPLE ARE HOSPITALIZED” and “OUR LEADERS WANT US TO SHUT UP & NOT ASK QUESTIONS.” Ingraham’s broadcast likewise <a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-says-theres-reason-question-efficacy-vaccine-itself-among-adults">stressed</a> reasons to question “the efficacy of the vaccine itself among adults.”
</blockquote>
It’s true that Hannity was not the only Fox News personality to speak out on behalf of vaccines on Monday. While Hannity stopped sort of explicitly asking his viewers to get vaccinated, Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy went further and said, “If you have the chance, get the shot. It will save your life.”
But Doocy was undermined by Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade, who claimed in response that it’s not the government’s job “to protect anybody” and said of those who choose not to get vaccinated, “if you feel as though this is not something for you, don’t do it, but don’t affect my life.” (A person’s choice to not get vaccinated does in fact affect other people by making it more possible for <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/the-effects-of-virus-variants-on-covid-19-vaccines">deadlier mutations</a> of the virus to develop.)
<div>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Doocy: 99% of people who are dying are unvaccinated
Kilmeade: That's their choice!
Doocy: They don't want to die. The admin and gov't says mask mandates are to protect the unvaccinated
Kilmeade: That's not their job, it's not their job to protect anybody! <a href="https://t.co/NsP2IcMnCX">pic.twitter.com/NsP2IcMnCX</a>
— Lis Power (@LisPower1) <a href="https://twitter.com/LisPower1/status/1417109335818256387?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 19, 2021</a></blockquote>
</div>
Later Monday, Kilmeade hosted an hour-long <a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/brian-kilmeade/foxs-brian-kilmeade-why-does-it-matter-how-many-covid-cases-we-have-country">show</a> in which he said things like, “Why does it matter how many Covid cases we have in this country?” and, “Since when do we count on the president of the United States for health care advice? Let me answer that, we do not.”
So while Doocy was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2021/07/20/steve-doocy-vaccines-fox/">praised by the Washington Post</a> for his comments encouraging people to get vaccinated, Kilmeade’s vaccine skepticism was actually a more prominent theme of the network’s programming on Monday.
Fox News didn’t immediately respond to a Vox request for comment about what guidelines, if any, hosts are provided about how to talk about Covid-19 and Covid-19 vaccines on their shows. (The disease continues to kill an average 268 Americans per day this week, and if <a href="https://twitter.com/profshanecrotty/status/1416072636300283904">trends from May</a> hold, over 99 percent of those individuals are likely unvaccinated.)
But incoherency has been the hallmark of the network’s coverage since the beginning.
For instance, in March of last year, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/3/20/21186727/hannity-coronavirus-coverage-fox-news">I wrote</a> about how Hannity insisted he had “never called the virus a hoax” just nine days after he decried it as “this new hoax” that Democrats were using to “bludgeon Trump.”
<div>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
HANNITY, March 9: "This scaring the living hell out of people -- I see it, again, as like, let's bludgeon Trump with this new hoax."
HANNITY, March 18: "By the way, this program has always taken the coronavirus seriously. We've never called the virus a hoax." <a href="https://t.co/yLKpojA7BI">pic.twitter.com/yLKpojA7BI</a>
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) <a href="https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1240640020714848257?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 19, 2020</a></blockquote>
</div>
Carlson, meanwhile, <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/tucker-carlson-says-masks-have-no-basis-in-science-he-sang-a-different-tune-in-march">flip-flopped</a> from saying “of course” masks work in March 2020 to proclaiming they “have no basis in science” just four months later. Though he <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/tucker-carlson-says-he-felt-an-obligation-to-meet-with-trump-on-seriousness-of-coronavirus-2020-03-18">reportedly</a> directly urged then-President Donald Trump to take the coronavirus seriously in the early days of the pandemic, in recent weeks Carlson has repeatedly hyped <a href="https://twitter.com/TBPInvictus/status/1417500637055623177">unconfirmed and dubious</a> self-reported accounts of vaccine side-effects to insist that getting inoculated is riskier than experts lead people to believe.
And as I <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/12/8/22163226/fox-news-coronavirus-coverage-lockdowns">detailed</a> last December, a major theme of Fox’s Covid-19 coverage in the winter months was trying to reframe the pandemic not as a humanitarian disaster that at the time was killing more than 2,000 Americans daily, but as an economic problem created by Democrats that predominately hurt business owners and workers.
More recently, Fox’s approach has been to highlight rare negative reactions to the Covid-19 vaccine, ignoring the broader context that getting vaccinated is far safer than actually contracting the disease. The Food and Drug Administration, for example, recently reiterated that even after a new rare side effect of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was found, “the known and potential benefits clearly outweigh the known and potential risks.” Fox has also misleadingly <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/07/20/sean-hannitys-limited-vaccine-endorsement-is-small-drop-fox-newss-ocean-doubt/">suggested</a> those who have had Covid-19 don’t need to get vaccinated.
Sprinkled amid all this vaccine skepticism and hostility have been <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/profound-benefits-tucker-carlson-says-vaccine-lowers-covid-severity-hospitalizations-1611279">out-of-context soundbites</a> here and there from hosts (even including Carlson) that can be interpreted as endorsements of vaccines. These bites aren’t reflective of the network’s broader coverage of the pandemic but at least provide a pretext for Fox spokespeople to try and push back on claims its coverage has been irresponsible, and are good enough to convince casual observers of Fox that the network is pivoting.
Carlson’s top-rated show is viewed by nearly 3 million viewers each night, and Hannity draws over 2.6 million. Furthermore, in 2019, the average age of a Fox News viewer was 65 — an age at which people are particularly at risk from the coronavirus, especially if unvaccinated.
Questioning the vaccine has consequences. As Philip Bump recently <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/07/16/fox-newss-dismissive-vaccine-coverage-is-particularly-dangerous-its-relatively-old-audience/">detailed</a> for the Washington Post, there’s a correlation between Fox News viewership and vaccine hesitancy. So not only are the Carlsons and Kilmeades of the world putting the lives of their own viewers at risk by discouraging them from getting vaccinated, they’re jeopardizing everyone’s health and well-being by making it more difficult to reach herd immunity.
As my colleague German Lopez <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/7/6/22554198/political-polarization-vaccine-covid-19-coronavirus">explained</a>, cues like this from elites (like former President Donald Trump or cable news hosts) have had real consequences in polarizing how Americans responded to the pandemic — including, now, vaccines:
<blockquote>
[T]he share of Republicans who reject the vaccine hasn’t significantly budged all year, remaining in the range of 41 to 46 percent.
Measuring the correlation between a state’s vaccination rate and 2020 election results, Masket found a coefficient of 0.85, with 1 meaning a one-to-one correlation and 0 representing no correlation. As Masket <a href="https://www.denverpost.com/2021/06/25/covid-19-vaccine-rates-donald-trump-joe-biden/">noted</a>, “We almost never see this high a correlation between variables in the social sciences.” In fact, he added, “vaccination rates are a better predictor of the 2020 election than the 2000 election is. That is, if you want to know how a state voted in 2020, you can get more information from knowing its current vaccination rate than from knowing how it voted 20 years ago.”
</blockquote>
Meanwhile, Ryan Grim of the Intercept <a href="https://twitter.com/samstein/status/1417139099736096769">reported</a> on Monday that Fox News has implemented a Covid-19 vaccination passport program for its own workforce, suggesting it recognizes the value of vaccinations internally even while it pushes skepticism publicly.
Unsurprisingly, even as Hannity’s Monday comments were being applauded, Kilmeade on Tuesday’s edition of Fox & Friends continued to push vaccine skepticism.
“The vaccine is not nearly as effective against this delta variant as they say,” Kilmeade falsely <a href="https://twitter.com/LisPower1/status/1417464434897924096">claimed</a>.
In reality, the CDC <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/07/16/pandemic-of-the-unvaccinated-cdc-says-delta-variant-may-warrant-local-mask-mandates/?sh=1dc240617de2">says</a> the Covid-19 vaccines approved for emergency use in the US protect against severe hospitalization and death caused by all known variants. As is the case with much of the discussion of vaccines on Fox News, Kilmeade’s comments on Tuesday misleadingly conflated a positive Covid-19 case with a severe Covid-19 case, ignoring that while it’s still possible to get Covid-19 after being vaccinated, it’s much less likely that a case will result in hospitalization or death.
 
 
source <a href="https://www.vox.com/22585354/hannity-fox-news-covid-19-coverage">https://www.vox.com/22585354/hannity-fox-news-covid-19-coverage</a>

vox Don’t be fooled by that viral Hannity clip. Fox News’s Covid-19 coverage is a mess.

Fox News host Sean Hannity received a round of applause on Tuesday for comments he made Monday night urging his viewers to “please take C...

Tokyo Olympics

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Japanese officials have decided to move forward with the <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021-olympics-tokyo-japan">Tokyo Olympic Games</a> this summer after the Games were <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/3/24/21185843/summer-olympics-postponed-coronavirus-tokyo-2020">postponed</a> in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.
But the pandemic still isn’t over. In May, the country experienced its worst outbreak since January, with over <a href="https://www.vox.com/22428596/olympics-tokyo-2021">6,000 daily cases</a>, spurring Japan’s government to announce an extended state of emergency in Tokyo. But while bars, restaurants, and other venues are either closed or operating under limited capacity, the Olympic Games are set to continue as planned.
Just <a href="https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/region/japan">over 22 percent</a> of Japan is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus as of July 20 — a stark difference from the athletes in Tokyo’s Olympic Village, where the International Olympic Committee (IOC) estimates that over <a href="https://www.vox.com/22537506/tokyo-2021-olympics-vaccinations">80 percent</a> of Olympians will be vaccinated.
Ensuring the safety of this year’s $25 billion-plus event — the most expensive Olympic Games on record — remains a major concern for the IOC. But with such a huge economic investment in the Games contrasting with a world still reeling from a disastrous health crisis, some critics question the need for them at all.
“I don’t know if the international prestige of holding the Olympics is worth it for a potential domestic public health event,” Timothy Mackey, an associate professor in the global health program at the University of California San Diego, told <a href="https://www.vox.com/22428596/olympics-tokyo-2021">Vox’s Jen Kirby</a>.
As it stands, the IOC and Japan remain committed to ensuring the Games continue, even if that means doing so without spectators. Just 10,000 fans — all of whom must adhere to Covid-19 protocols — will be allowed to watch in person.
The opening ceremony will be on Friday, July 23, with the Games lasting until Sunday, August 8. Follow this storystream for all of Vox’s news and updates across the entirety of the games.
 
 
source <a href="https://www.vox.com/22580164/tokyo-japan-olympics-2021-summer-covid">https://www.vox.com/22580164/tokyo-japan-olympics-2021-summer-covid</a>

vox Tokyo Olympics

Japanese officials have decided to move forward with the Tokyo Olympic Games this summer after the Games were postponed in 2020 due to th...

Passengers Trapped Inside Train Amid Severe Floods In China, 12 Killed

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<div class="ins_instory_dv_cont"><img alt="Passengers Trapped Inside Train Amid Severe Floods In China, 12 Killed" src="https://c.ndtvimg.com/2021-07/3ecj26c_china-floods_625x300_21_July_21.jpg" title="Passengers Trapped Inside Train Amid Severe Floods In China, 12 Killed" /></div>
Streets flooded following heavy rains in Zhengzhou in China's central Henan province.
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Beijing:
Twelve people died after torrential rains flooded the subway in the central Chinese city of Zhengzhou, authorities said Wednesday, as shocking images of passengers struggling against neck-high water inside a train carriage emerged on social media.
The city of more than 10 million people in Henan province "has experienced a series of rare and heavy rainstorms, causing water to accumulate in Zhengzhou metro", city officials said in a Weibo post, adding 12 people died and five were injured.
Authorities have issued the highest warning level for Henan province as record floods hammer the province.
Seasonal floods are common in China, but scientists say climate change is bringing increasingly extreme weather patterns.
Images poured across Chinese social media showing dramatic rescues of pedestrians in Zhengzhou from torrents gushing through the streets.
The Chinese army warned that a stricken dam in the centre of the country "could collapse at any time" after being severely damaged in torrential storms that killed at least three people and brought the region to a standstill.
On Tuesday evening, the regional unit of the People's Liberation Army warned that the relentless downpour had caused a 20-metre breach in the Yihetan dam in Luoyang -- a city of around seven million people -- with the risk that it "may collapse at any time".
The PLA's Central Theater Command said it had sent soldiers to carry out an emergency response including blasting and flood diversion.
"On July 20, a 20-metre breach occurred at the Yihetan dam.... the riverbank was severely damaged and the dam may collapse at any time," it said in the statement.
Annual floods during China's rainy season cause chaos and wash away roads, crops and houses.
But the threat has worsened over the decades, due in part to widespread construction of dams and levees that have cut connections between the river and adjacent lakes and disrupted floodplains that had helped absorb the summer surge.
According to the authorities, the rainfall was the heaviest since record-keeping began 60 years ago, with the city seeing the equivalent of a year's average rainfall in just three days.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
 
 
source <a href="https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/passengers-trapped-inside-train-amid-severe-floods-in-chinas-zhengzhou-12-killed-2491136">https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/passengers-trapped-inside-train-amid-severe-floods-in-chinas-zhengzhou-12-killed-2491136</a>

news world Passengers Trapped Inside Train Amid Severe Floods In China, 12 Killed

Streets flooded following heavy rains in Zhengzhou in China's central Henan province. Beijing: Twelve people died after torrential ...

Moroccan King On List Of Potential Pegasus Spyware Targets: Report

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<div class="ins_instory_dv_cont"><img alt="Moroccan King On List Of Potential Pegasus Spyware Targets: Report" src="https://i.ndtvimg.com/i/2015-08/king-mohammed-vi-afp_650x400_81440706727.jpg" title="Moroccan King On List Of Potential Pegasus Spyware Targets: Report" /></div>
Morocco on Monday denied the allegations (File)
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Paris:
Moroccan King Mohammed VI's phone is on a list of numbers of people identified as potential Pegasus spyware targets by Morocco's intelligence services, French radio reported on Tuesday.
Radio France made the claim two days after it and several other news outlets, including The Washington Post and The Guardian, reported that the Israeli software had been used by governments to spy on activists, journalists, lawyers and politicians around the world.
The bombshell claims were based on a leaked document containing 50,000 numbers of people identified as potential targets for Pegasus between 2016 and June 2021.
The list was dominated by numbers from 10 countries -- Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Hungary, India, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Morocco, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Morocco on Monday denied the allegations, saying it had "never acquired computer software to infiltrate communication devices".
On Tuesday, Radio France claimed the country's monarch was on the list as well as "a large number" of Moroccan royals.
It said they included the king's wife Lalla Salma Bennani, his cousin Prince Moulay Hicham Alaoui, nicknamed the "red prince" for his progressive views, a former son-in-law of the late King Hassan II, entrepreneur Fouad Filali, and Hassan II's former bodyguard, Mohamed Mediouri, who is the current king's stepfather.
"But what is most surprising, when you look closely at this list, is that the sovereign himself is among those whose numbers were selected as potential Pegasus targets," the report said.
Radio France said it and its partners in the Forbidden Stories media consortium had established "that one of the telephone numbers that figures on the listing of the Moroccan intelligence services is indeed that of Mohammed VI."
It added that "his entire entourage suffered the same fate", including the king's chamberlain, Sidi Mohammed Alaoui, his personal secretary and three members of the latter's family.
It said that the list also included the number of the head of Morocco's royal gendarmerie as well as the king's former top bodyguard, Hassan Charrat.
It was not possible to immediately verify the claims.
Pegasus is a highly invasive tool that can switch on a target's phone camera and microphone, as well as access data on the device, effectively turning a phone into a pocket spy. In some cases, it can be installed without the need to trick a user into initiating a download.
NSO has denied selling the software to authoritarian governments for the purposes of spying on dissenters, labelling the allegations "false."
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
 
 
source <a href="https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/moroccan-king-mohammed-vi-on-list-of-potential-pegasus-spyware-targets-report-2491035">https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/moroccan-king-mohammed-vi-on-list-of-potential-pegasus-spyware-targets-report-2491035</a>

news world Moroccan King On List Of Potential Pegasus Spyware Targets: Report

Morocco on Monday denied the allegations (File) Paris: Moroccan King Mohammed VI's phone is on a list of numbers of people identifi...