title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: As a consequence of this confrontation, the FLN lost its operational capacity. In the early 1980s, some of its militants decided to found a new organization. Thus, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) was founded on November 17, 1983, by non-indigenous members of the FLN from Mexico's urban north and by indigenous inhabitants of the remote Las Cañadas/Selva Lacandona regions in eastern Chiapas, by members of former rebel movements. Over the years, the group slowly grew, building on social relations among the indigenous base and making use of an organizational infrastructure created by peasant organizations and the Catholic Church (see Liberation theology). In the 1970s, through the efforts of the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, most indigenous communities in the Lacandon forest were already politically active and had practice in dealing with governmental agencies and local officials. Specifically in 1974 the indigenous conference brought indigenous peoples from across Chiapas together to discuss their conditions. Promoted and organized by the Catholic church, this event helped foster an indigenous political identity in the region. In the 1980s, they joined with the Rural Collective Interest Association--"Unión de Uniones," (ARIC-UU). However, disputes over strategy in the Chiapas would lead to the EZLN taking on over half of the ARIC-UU's membership in the early 1990s.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The Zapatista Army went public on January 1, 1994, releasing their declaration on the day the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) came into effect. On that day, they issued their First Declaration and Revolutionary Laws from the Lacandon Jungle. The declaration amounted to a declaration of war on the Mexican government, which they considered illegitimate. The EZLN stressed that it opted for armed struggle due to the lack of results that had been achieved through peaceful means of protest (such as sit-ins and marches).


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Their initial goal was to instigate a revolution against the rise of neoliberalism throughout Mexico, but since no such revolution occurred, they used their uprising as a platform to call attention to their movement to protest the signing of the NAFTA, which the EZLN believed would increase inequality in Chiapas. Prior to the signing of NAFTA, however, dissent amongst indigenous peasants was already on the rise in 1992 with the amendment of Article 27 of the Constitution. The amendment called for the end of land reform and the regularizing of all landholdings, which ended land redistribution in Mexico. The end of land distribution heralded the end of many communities that had been growing of the past decade, as they had been waiting for further distribution that was on an agrarian backlog according to the government.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The Zapatistas hosted the Intercontinental Encounter for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism to help initiate a united platform for other anti-neoliberal groups. The EZLN also called for greater democratization of the Mexican government, which had been controlled by the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (Institutional Revolutionary Party, also known as PRI) for 65 years, and for land reform mandated by the 1917 Constitution of Mexico, which had been repealed in 1991. The Zapatistas had mentioned “independence” among their initial demands;however, it received little systematic treatment from the EZLN until the extensive contact between the Zapatistas and other indigenous organizations during the San Andrés negotiations and use of natural resources normally extracted from Chiapas. It also advocated for protection from violence and political inclusion of Chiapas' indigenous communities.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: On January 1, 1994, an estimated 3,000 armed Zapatista insurgents seized six towns and cities in the Chiapas highlands. The Zapatistas soon retreated to the forest to avoid a federal military offensive.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: "The EZLN listed a series of other demands that were a compendium of long-standing grievances of the indigenous communities of Chiapas, but also found echo in broad sectors of Mexican society outside of Chiapas: work, land, housing, food, healthcare, education, independence, liberty, democracy, justice, and peace."


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Following a ceasefire on January 12, peace talks commenced later in the month between Catholic bishop Samuel Ruiz for the Zapatistas and former mayor of Mexico City, Manuel Camacho Solis, for the state.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Arrest-warrants were made for Marcos, Javier Elorriaga Berdegue, Silvia Fernández Hernández, Jorge Santiago, Fernando Yanez, German Vicente and other Zapatistas. At that point, in the Lacandon Jungle, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation was under military siege by the Mexican Army. Javier Elorriaga was captured on February 9, 1995, by forces from a military garrison at Gabina Velázquez in the town of Las Margaritas, and was later taken to the Cerro Hueco prison in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas. On February 11, 1995, the PGR informed the country that the government had implemented an operation in the State of México, where they had captured 14 people presumed to be involved with the Zapatistas, of which eight had already being turned over to the judicial authorities, they had also seized an important arsenal. The PGR threatened the San Cristóbal de Las Casas' Catholic Bishop, Samuel Ruiz García, with arrest. Claiming that they helped conceal the Zapatistas' guerrilla uprising, although their activities had been reported years before in "Proceso", a Mexican leftist magazine. It is likely however that the Mexican Government knew about the uprising but failed to act. This adversely impacted Holy See–Mexico relations.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In response to the siege of the EZLN, Esteban Moctezuma, the interior minister, submitted his resignation to President Zedillo, which Zedillo refused to accept. Influenced by Moctezuma's protest, President Zedillo abandoned the military offensive in favor of a diplomatic approach. The Mexican army eased its operation in Chiapas, allowing Marcos to escape the military perimeter in the Lacandon Jungle. Responding to the change of conditions, friends of the EZLN along with Subcomandante Marcos prepared a report for under-Secretary of the Interior Luis Maldonado Venegas; the Secretary of the Interior Esteban Moctezuma and then President Zedillo. The document stressed Marcos' natural pacifist inclination and an unwillingness to get caught in a bloody war. The document also said that the marginalized groups and the radical left that existed in Mexico supported the Zapatista movement. It also stressed that Marcos maintained an open negotiating track.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In April 2000, Vicente Fox, the presidential candidate for the opposition National Action Party (PAN), sent a new proposal for dialogue to Subcomandante Marcos, without obtaining a response. In May, a group of civilians attacked two indigenous people from the autonomous municipality of Polhó, Chiapas. Members of the Federal Police were sent to guarantee the security of the area. The Zapatista coordinators and several non-governmental organizations described it as "a clear provocation to the EZLN."


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Vicente Fox was elected president in 2001 (the first non-PRI president of Mexico in over 70 years) and, as one of his first actions, urged the EZLN to enter into dialogue with the federal government. However, the EZLN insisted that it would not return to peace negotiations with the government until seven military positions were closed. Fox subsequently made the decision to withdraw the army from the conflict zone, so all the military located in Chiapas began to leave the area. Following this gesture, Subcomandante Marcos agreed to initiate dialogue with the Vicente Fox government, but shortly thereafter demanded conditions for peace; especially, that the federal government disarm the PRI paramilitary groups in the area. The Zapatistas marched on Mexico City to pressure the Mexican Congress and formed the "Zapatista Information Center", through which information would be exchanged about the trip of the guerrilla delegation to Mexico City, and mobilizations would be articulated to demand compliance with the conditions of the EZLN for dialogue. Although Fox had stated earlier that he could end the conflict "in fifteen minutes", the EZLN rejected the agreement and created 32 new "autonomous municipalities" in Chiapas. They would then unilaterally implement their demands without government support, although they had some funding from international organizations.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: On June 28, 2005, the Zapatistas presented the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle declaring their principles and vision for Mexico and the world. This declaration reiterated the support for the indigenous peoples, who make up roughly one-third of the population of Chiapas, and extended the cause to include "all the exploited and dispossessed of Mexico". It also expressed the movement's sympathy to the international alter-globalization movement and supported leftists governments in Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador, and elsewhere, with whom they felt there was common cause.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: On May 3–4, 2006, a series of demonstrations protested the forcible removal of irregular flower vendors from a lot in Texcoco for the construction of a Walmart branch. The protests turned violent when state police and the Federal Preventive Police bused in some 5,000 agents to San Salvador Atenco and the surrounding communities. A local organization called the People's Front in Defense of the Land, which adheres to the Sixth Declaration, called in support from other regional and national adherent organizations. "Delegate Zero" and his "Other Campaign" were at the time in nearby Mexico City, having just organized May Day events there, and quickly arrived at the scene. The following days were marked by violence, with some 216 arrests, over 30 rape and sexual abuse accusations against the police, five deportations, and one casualty, a 14-year-old boy named Javier Cortes shot by a policeman. A 20-year-old UNAM economics student, Alexis Benhumea, died on the morning of June 7, 2006, after being in a coma caused by a blow to the head from a tear-gas grenade launched by police. Most of the resistance organizing was done by the EZLN and Sixth Declaration adherents, and Delegate Zero stated that the "Other Campaign" tour would be temporarily halted until all prisoners were released.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In late 2006 and early 2007, the Zapatistas (through Subcomandante Marcos), along with other indigenous peoples of the Americas, announced the Intercontinental Indigenous Encounter. They invited indigenous people from throughout the Americas and the rest of the world to gather on October 11–14, 2007, near Guaymas, Sonora. The declaration for the conference designated this date because of "515 years since the invasion of ancient Indigenous territories and the onslaught of the war of conquest, spoils and capitalist exploitation". Comandante David said in an interview, "The object of this meeting is to meet one another and to come to know one another's pains and sufferings. It is to share our experiences, because each tribe is different."


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The Third Encuentro of the Zapatistas People with the People of the World was held from December 28, 2007, through January 1, 2008.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In mid-January 2009, Marcos made a speech on behalf of the Zapatistas in which he supported the resistance of the Palestinians as "the Israeli government's heavily trained and armed military continues its march of death and destruction". He described the actions of the Israeli government as a "classic military war of conquest". He said, "The Palestinian people will also resist and survive and continue struggling and will continue to have sympathy from below for their cause."


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: On December 21, 2012, tens of thousands of EZLN supporters marched silently through five cities in the state of Chiapas: Ocosingo, Las Margaritas, Palenque, Altamirano and San Cristóbal. Hours after the march, a communiqué from the CCRI-CG was released in the form of a poem, signed by the Subcomandante Marcos. This mobilization, which included the participation of around 40 thousand Zapatistas, was the largest since the 1994 uprising. Of this number, "La Jornada" estimated that half would have marched through the streets of San Cristóbal de las Casas, 7,000 in Las Margaritas and 8,000 in Palenque; for its part "El País "calculated that San Cristóbal would have seen the concentration of some 10 thousand participants.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Beyond the number of people, the silence with which they marched and the lack of an opening or closing speech were the elements that marked this action. The poet and journalist , specialist in coverage of the movement, ended his chronicle in this way:


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The Zapatistas invited the world to a three-day fiesta to celebrate ten years of Zapatista autonomy in August 2013 in the five caracoles of Chiapas. They expected 1,500 international activists to attend the event, titled the Little School of Liberty.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In June 2015, the EZLN reported that there was aggression against indigenous people in El Rosario, Chiapas; The report, signed by Subcomandante Moisés, indicated that the attack occurred that same month and year. In addition, there was a complaint by the Las Abejas Civil Society Organization that stated that an indigenous Tzotzil person was assassinated on June 23 on 2015.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In 2016, at the National Indigenous Congress, the EZLN agreed to select a candidate to represent them in the 2018 Mexican general election. This decision broke the Zapatista's two-decade tradition of rejecting Mexican electoral politics. In May 2017, María de Jesús Patricio Martínez, a woman of Mexican and Nahua heritage, was selected to stand, but she was unable to gather the 866,000 signatures required to appear on the ballot.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: At the end of August 2019, Subcomandante Insurgente Galeano announced the expansion of EZLN into 11 more districts. In response, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador stated that this expansion was welcome, provided it was done without violence.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The EZLN has made opposition to mega-infrastructure projects in the region a major priority. In 2020, it announced the Journey for Life and in 2021, Zapatistas visited various activist groups in Europe.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The ideology of the Zapatista movement, Neozapatismo, synthesizes Mayan tradition with elements of libertarian socialism, anarchism,Catholic liberation theology and Marxism. The historical influence of Mexican anarchists and various Latin American socialists is apparent in Neozapatismo. The positions of Subcomandante Marcos add a Marxist element to the movement. A Zapatista slogan is in harmony with the concept of mutual aid: "For everyone, everything. For us, nothing" ("Para todos todo, para nosotros nada").


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The EZLN opposes economic globalization, arguing that it severely and negatively affects the peasant life of its indigenous support base and oppresses people worldwide. The signing of NAFTA also resulted in the removal of Article 27, Section VII, from the Mexican Constitution, which had guaranteed land reparations to indigenous groups throughout Mexico through collective land tenure.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Postcolonialism scholars have argued that the Zapatistas' response to the introduction of NAFTA in 1994 may have reflected a shift in perception taking place in societies that have experienced colonialism.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The Zapatistas have used organizations like the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) to raise awareness for their rebellion and indigenous rights, and what they claim is the Mexican government's lack of respect for the country's impoverished and marginalized populations. Appealing to the ECOSOC and other non-governmental bodies may have allowed the Zapatistas to establish a sense of autonomy by redefining their identities both as indigenous people and as citizens of Mexico.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The Zapatista movement is outwardly secular, and does not have an official religion. However, the overarching Zapatista movement has been influenced by liberation theology and its proponents. The organization established early on that it "has no ties with any Catholic religious authorities nor authorities of any other creed."


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: In the decades preceding the 1994 uprising, the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, guided by the Bishop Samuel Ruiz Garcia, developed a cadre of indigenous catechists. In practice, these liberationist Christian catechists promoted political awareness, established organizational structures, and helped raise progressive sentiment among indigenous communities in Chiapas. The organization of these catechists and events such as the 1974 Indigenous Congress laid much of the ideological and often organizational groundwork for the EZLN to unite many indigenous communities under a banner of liberation. Further, many of these indigenous catechists later joined and organized within the EZLN.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Anthropologists Duncan Earle and Jeanne Simonelli assert that the liberationist Catholicism spread by the aforementioned catechists which emphasized helping the poor and addressing material conditions in tandem with spiritual ones brought many indigenous Catholics into the Zapatista Movement. Beyond just the Zapatistas, the blossoming indigenous resistance and identity of the late 20th century saw a broader indigenous movement based in indigenous liberationist Christianity. One such group in the broader movement is Las Abejas, an ecumenical Christian organization. Supported, but not controlled by the Diocese of San Cristobal, Las Abejas is dedicated to nonviolence, but shares sympathies and solidarity for the aims of the Zapatistas. Due to their ties to the Zapatistas, 45 Las Abejas members were killed in the Acteal Massacre in 1997.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The EZLN has placed a high priority on forging communication with the rest of Mexico and the world. Marcos and the Zapatistas would issue hundreds of missives, hold "encuentros" (mass meetings), give numerous interviews, meet high-profile public and literary figures including Oliver Stone, Naomi Klein, Gael García Bernal, Danielle Mitterrand, Régis Debray, John Berger, Eduardo Galeano, Gabriel García Márquez, José Saramago and Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, participate in symposia and colloquia, deliver speeches, host visits by thousands of national and international activists, and participate in two marches that toured much of the country. Media organizations from North and South America, as well as from many European and several Asian nations, have granted press coverage to the movement and its spokesperson. The EZLN's writings have been translated into at least 14 different languages and Marcos, according to journalist Jorge Alonso, had by 2016 been the subject of ′over 10,000 citations...in the academic world′.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: Zapatista communities build and maintain their own health, education, and sustainable agro-ecological systems, promote equitable gender relations via Women's Revolutionary Law, and build international solidarity through humble outreach and non-imposing political communication, in addition to their focus on building "a world where many worlds fit". The Zapatista struggle re-gained international attention in May 2014 with the death of teacher and education promoter "Teacher Galeano" (a self chosen name honoring anti-capitalist author Eduardo Galeano), who was murdered in an attack on a Zapatista school and health clinic led by local paramilitaries. In the weeks that followed, thousands of Zapatistas and national and international sympathizers mobilized and gathered to honor Galeano. This event also saw the unofficial spokesperson of the Zapatistas, Subcomandante Marcos, announce that he would be stepping down.


title: Zapatista Army of National Liberation

text: The American rock band Rage Against the Machine released two songs in support of the EZLN, "People of the Sun" (1996) and "Zapata's Blood" (1997).


title: Pluto TV

text: Pluto TV is a free, ad-supported video streaming service owned and operated by the Paramount Streaming division of Paramount Global. Co-founded by Tom Ryan, Ilya Pozin and Nick Grouf in 2013 and based in Los Angeles, California, in the United States, and parts of the rest of the Americas, and Europe, Pluto is an advertiser-supported video-on-demand (AVOD) service that primarily offers a selection of programming content through digital linear channels designed to emulate the experience of traditional broadcast programming (sometimes known as a free ad-supported streaming television or "FAST" service). The service's revenue is generated from video advertisements seen during programming within ad breaks structured similarly to those found on conventional television.


title: Pluto TV

text: Pluto TV licenses its content directly from providers, and as of March 2020 had deals with 170 content partners providing more than 250 channels and 100,000 unique hours worth of programming. Its content is available via its website and mobile apps on Android and iOS operating systems. In January 2022, the service reached a total of 64 million monthly active users. In April 2022, Pluto TV reached 68 million monthly active users. In July 2022, Pluto TV reached 69.9 million monthly active users. As of October 2022, Pluto TV rose to around 72 million monthly active users.


title: Pluto TV

text: Pluto TV launched its beta website on March 31, 2014. Co-founded by Thomas V. Ryan (former Senior Vice President of Digital Strategy at EMI and co-founder of now-defunct digital music retailer CDuctive), Ilya Pozin (founder and former CEO of venture builder firm Coplex) and Nick Grouf (co-founder and managing director of venture capital firm Alpha Edison), it was originally developed to provide curated channels of existing online content, offering a slate of nearly 100 categorized channels featuring content aggregated from various video-sharing platforms (including YouTube, Vimeo, and Dailymotion) as well as additional content provided through partnerships with original web content services and television networks (including Funny or Die, QVC, Refinery29, RocketJump and TYT Network). The service was originally owned by Pluto Inc., which, during the second half of 2013 and early 2014, had raised $13 million in series A funding from investors that included Universal Music Group, Sky plc, UTA Ventures, and venture capital firms U.S. Venture Partners (USVP), QueensBridge Venture Partners, Pritzker Group Venture Capital, Luminari Capital, Great Oaks Venture Capital and Chicago Ventures. On May 14, 2014, Pluto unveiled a digital video recorder feature on its website known as "myPluto"; users could “record” content by clicking a “save show” button that would archive content from the channel as it played.


title: Pluto TV

text: On July 1, 2015, Pluto TV announced that it had signed a deal with Hulu to distribute the ad-supported video content, available for free on Hulu's website at the time, including current-season episodes of programs from ABC, NBC and Fox, recent and older classic television series, and domestic and foreign animated programs. Under the arrangement, Hulu handled advertising for content made available through the Pluto website. Separately, in the weeks preceding the Hulu deal, Pluto TV had reached content agreements with AOL, Endemol Beyond USA, Shout! Factory, Jukin Media and YouTube content channels Devin SuperTramp, Multicom, Around the World in 4K and Amazing Places on Our Planet to distribute their programming on the service. In October 2015, 20 additional channels (featuring content from AwesomenessTV, IGN, Cracked, DHX Media, Just For Laughs, Newsy, Legendary Digital Networks and The Onion) were brought onto the service's lineup, bringing the total number of curated channels offered by Pluto to around 120.


title: Pluto TV

text: On May 15, 2016, Pluto TV signed an agreement with Sony to make the Pluto TV app available on the PlayStation Store for download by users of the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4. In 2016, Pluto Inc. raised $30 million in series B venture capital funding from ProSiebenSat.1 Media, Scripps Networks Interactive, and venture capital firms Luminari Capital, Chicago Ventures and Third Wave Ventures, valuing the company at $140 million. The round was led by German television network ProSieben, with additional funding from telecommunications company Sky UK. On April 30, 2017, Pluto Inc. added a chief programming officer role, appointing Robert Magdlen—who formerly served as senior vice president of program strategy and acquisitions for E! and as a production executive for TNT—in the post, handling responsibilities for programming and channel development from the company's Los Angeles headquarters.


title: Pluto TV

text: On May 15, 2017, Pluto TV launched a traditional video-on-demand offering, composing a large library of movies and television shows licensed from such distributors as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Viacom, Sony Pictures, DHX Media, Nelvana, Fremantle, Monstercat and King Features Syndicate that are made available for individual viewing to Pluto users. "Variety" reported that , the service was averaging 6 million users per month, and, , it was rated one of the most-watched Roku Channels on Roku.


title: Pluto TV

text: By October 2017, Pluto TV reached over 15 million users. On October 17 of that year, Pluto TV announced that it received a $5-million investment from Samsung Venture Investment Corporation as part of an $8.3 million round of funding raised by various investors. On March 15, 2018, Pluto TV entered into a partnership with SpotX to provide advertising monetization services for Pluto, including engendering sales from media buyers breaking into over-the-top content services. On August 1, 2018, Vizio launched a new ad-supported streaming platform powered by Pluto TV, called WatchFree. This service is built into several models of Vizio's line of Internet-connected smart TVs, particularly those supporting its SmartCast operating system, and is advertised as having "an easy-to-navigate, cable-like interface".


title: Pluto TV

text: On October 1, 2018, Pluto TV expanded into parts of Europe, with the launch of a platform on Sky's Now TV service in the United Kingdom, offering an initial slate of more than 12 curated channels. Also in October 2018, Pluto TV picked Tru Optik to help with advertising inventory. On December 4, 2018, Pluto TV launched a regional service in Germany and Austria, also through a separate collaborative agreement with Sky, with the app's content made available initially via the Sky TV stick; the German/Austrian service initially incorporated a slate of 15 streaming channels (composed of both Pluto-exclusive services with German and English language content as well as channels compiled by third-party content providers).


title: Pluto TV

text: On January 22, 2019, Viacom announced its intention to acquire Pluto for $340 million. Viacom's plans for Pluto TV included using the service as a marketing tool for its portfolio of linear media brands (including incorporating more licensed content from Viacom-owned properties) and to serve as a distribution outlet for its in-house digital content brands (including CBS News Streaming, AwesomenessTV and CNET), expanding the service into Latin America and expanding its distribution on smart TVs. The company also planned to use the service to upsell its subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) properties (including Paramount+, Showtime, Noggin, and BET+) directly to consumers. The deal was completed on March 4, 2019. On March 18, 2019, Viacom—through its Viacom International Media Networks (VIMN) unit—announced plans to launch Pluto TV worldwide; VIMN President James Currell stated that the company believed the global SVOD sector was "becoming too crowded and capital intensive," choosing to focus on building scale through ad-supported streaming platforms.


title: Pluto TV

text: On May 1, 2019, Pluto introduced branded channels based on Viacom Media Networks-owned cable outlets and other Viacom properties, including content from Paramount Pictures, Nickelodeon, BET, Comedy Central, VH1, Logo, TV Land and MTV. Among those channels is a revival of Spike, which had been relaunched as Paramount Network in January 2018. The free channels are not simulcasts of their namesake networks, as contractual restrictions with traditional pay television providers prevent it from distributing the full linear feeds, but instead focus primarily on archival content and series that Pluto TV has acquired from other content providers. Some of these branded services are direct offshoots of their linear counterparts, while others (such as CMT , TV Land Sitcoms, TV Land Drama, MTV Teen, VH1 I Love Reality, and Nickelodeon offshoots Dora TV and Totally Turtles) maintain theme formats offering specialty programming owned by ViacomCBS and other program library partners.


title: Pluto TV

text: On June 13, 2019, Pluto TV was launched on Comcast's Xfinity X1 cable boxes. On July 1, 2019, the service launched a Spanish language programming tier, Pluto TV Latino, consisting initially of eleven Spanish and Portuguese-language channels (including two sports-focused channels, Lucha Libre and Combate World, that were previously assigned to the service's main sports tier) that incorporate programming originally produced natively in those languages and Spanish-dubbed versions of English and Portuguese programs.


title: Pluto TV

text: On August 13, 2019, National Amusements announced that Viacom and CBS Corporation—which had split into two separate companies in 2005, five years after the original Viacom first acquired CBS's assets—would recombine their assets into a singular entity to be named ViacomCBS in a deal valued at up to $15.4 billion. Following the announcement, "Deadline Hollywood", citing sources within the company, identified Pluto TV as a potential outlet for CBS streaming content. Pluto already carried CBS's free online news service, and technology and video-game-oriented CNET Video. Additional channels from CBS, including CBS News's New York and Los Angeles services and an "Entertainment Tonight"-branded entertainment news channel (ET Live), were added to the service on November 13, 2019, prior to the merger's closure.


title: Pluto TV

text: In September 2019, Pluto TV became available on mobile platforms in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the United Kingdom; the service first became available in those countries on iOS and Apple TV devices on September 6, and on Android devices on September 24. By November 2019, the service was estimated to have 20 million monthly active users.


title: Pluto TV

text: On February 3, 2020, ViacomCBS announced that Pluto TV would launch in Latin America at the end of March, offering 17 channels available in Spanish and Portuguese at launch; additional channels would be added on a monthly basis with more than 80 channels expected to be available by the end of 2020. Along with content carried by ViacomCBS Networks International-owned local versions of its corporate parent's U.S. media properties, co-owned Argentinian network Telefe and Porta dos Fundos would also provide content for the service. The service was expected to launch in Brazil in December 2020, but was anticipated and was launched on November 17, 2020.


title: Pluto TV

text: On February 20, 2020, ViacomCBS estimated that Pluto TV generated a monthly average of 22 million viewers in the fourth quarter of 2019, with expectations of its user base reaching 30 million monthly viewers by December 2020. The company also announced that Pluto content would be incorporated into a revamped version of CBS All Access, which would also add content from ViacomCBS Domestic Media Networks cable properties, Paramount Pictures and CBS Television Distribution. ViacomCBS CEO Bob Bakish stated that Pluto TV—which will remain a free, standalone offering—would be part of the company's refocusing on three core streaming services, alongside the subscription-based CBS All Access and Showtime's OTT service, which would act as its mid-level and premium offerings and which Pluto will also be used to upsell along with ViacomCBS's other niche streaming platforms.


title: Pluto TV

text: In January 2020, Pluto TV unveiled a new logo at CES 2020, and later unveiled a redesign of its Apple iOS apps, which included a new channel guide and on-demand menu interface. The redesigned interface—absent the new logo—was rolled out to the website and desktop app the following day on February 21, its Roku app on February 26, and Android devices and other platforms on March 2.


title: Pluto TV

text: On October 8, 2020, ViacomCBS announced Pluto TV's launch in Spain, Italy and France, with 40 channels and thousands of hours of on-demand content.


title: Pluto TV

text: On July 17, 2021, Pluto TV added several new channels including News 12 New York, Pluto TV Home, and Professional Bull Riders’ RidePass. A deal made between Pluto TV and PBR allowed for Pluto TV to be the exclusive home to RidePass content.


title: Pluto TV

text: On September 29, 2021, Pluto TV's parent ViacomCBS agreed to pay $3.5 million and enter into a consent decree with the FCC to provide clear and accessible closed captioning, which would often not be passed down to the consumer via Pluto TV apps or websites despite either being part of a program already or being captioned by the live programming provider. The FCC's determined the service had not implemented proper and visible settings to allow the passthrough of captions, removed captioning capabilities, and did not maintain email or telephone captioning support hotlines required by the FCC to address viewer complaints. Under FCC rules, all nonexempt full-length video programming delivered over the internet must present closed captions if originally aired over American television with captioning, if the programming had previously been shown on television in the U.S. with captions. This effectively applies to most television programming created after 1984, along with the 1990 Television Decoder Circuitry Act of 1990, which mandated a requirement for captions to be accessible on all but the smallest televisions.


title: Pluto TV

text: On November 29, 2021, ViacomCBS announced that Pluto TV would launch in Sweden, Norway and Denmark by 2022 as part of a joint venture with Nordic Entertainment Group, phasing out the company's existing AVOD service Viafree upon launch. On March 16, 2022, it was announced that the launch date of Pluto TV in the three countries will be on May 18, 2022.


title: Pluto TV

text: On February 16, 2022, Pluto TV's parent company, ViacomCBS Streaming, was renamed to Paramount Streaming, in-line with the rebranding of parent company ViacomCBS to Paramount Global.


title: Pluto TV

text: On May 18, 2022, Pluto TV was launched in the Nordics through a partnership with Viaplay Group (formerly called Nordic Entertainment Group).


title: Pluto TV

text: On June 8, 2022, Pluto TV announced a partnership with Corus Entertainment to launch Pluto TV in Canada and will launch in Fall 2022.


title: Pluto TV

text: On July 13, 2022, Pluto TV added five new channel categories: Game Shows, Daytime TV, Home, Food, and Lifestyle & Culture, and two new channels: "Let's Make a Deal" and The Judge Judy Channel. Additional channels devoted to "Jeopardy!" and "Wheel of Fortune" were added in August 2022.


title: Pluto TV

text: On September 1, 2022, Pluto TV launched 2 new channels: 00s Replay and The Ed Sullivan Show. More channels were added throughout the month: CSI: Miami and CSI: NY, launched on September 13, 60 Minutes launched on September 24, and Hallmark Movies & More and The Rachael Ray Show launched on September 26.


title: Pluto TV

text: On September 22, 2022, Paramount Global and Corus Entertainment announced that Pluto TV will be available in Canada beginning December 1. The Canadian launch will include titles from its own production house, Corus Studios, along with some of the favorite titles from the CBS including "NCIS", "Hawaii Five-O", and "The Love Boat".


title: Pluto TV

text: On October 31, 2022, Pluto TV announced the expansion of its on-demand content offering by adding 6,300 new classic episodes from CBS-owned hit series such as "Cheers", "Frasier", "Star Trek" and "Criminal Minds" by the end of 2022.


title: Pluto TV

text: On December 2, 2022, Pluto TV announced 12 new channels coming to the service. This includes nine holiday channels: Holiday Movie Favorites by Lifetime, Hallmark Movies & More, Pluto TV Christmas, Festive Fireplace, Crackling Fireplace, Holiday Lights, Home for the Holidays, Vevo Holiday, and Cine Navideño, and three channels for talk shows, Star Trek, and Spanish language content: More Star Trek, Confess by Nosey, and AMC en Español.


title: Pluto TV

text: Pluto TV is structured similarly to the traditional cable television model, offering its content as designated channels categorized by program content type into multiple channel categories:


title: Pluto TV

text: As of August 2022, Pluto TV carries over 200 channels, packaging content acquired through various content syndication deals, as well as programming from ViacomCBS's internal libraries. Traditional television channels whose feeds are carried directly on Pluto include WeatherNation TV, Newsmax TV, the Trinity Broadcasting Network (and sister network Hillsong Channel), Dabl, Bloomberg Television, Sky News, CNN, Professional Bull Riders’ RidePass, Eleven Sports (albeit with some events replaced with alternative programming due to streaming rights restrictions), Stadium and TheBlaze. AVOD services whose feeds are carried on Pluto include CBS News, CBS Sports HQ, Fox Sports, ET Live, Nosey, NBC News Now, Newsy (short-form "Newsy Briefs" are inserted into commercial breaks on other Pluto channels), Cheddar News, TYT Network, and People TV. In addition, Pluto also offers “pop-up channels," which maintain binge-viewing or specialty programming formats that operate on a temporary or open-ended basis.


title: Pluto TV

text: Pluto TV content can be streamed through a number of desktop, mobile and internet-connected TV platforms, including: Android and Apple iOS/iPadOS devices, Android TV, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Roku, Cox Contour Stream Player, Vizio SmartCast, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, webOS, Chromecast, Virgin Media and macOS and Windows computers. Pluto-operated channels are also offered through The Roku Channel's live TV section.


title: Pluto TV

text: In Canada, Pluto TV was available in a limited capacity due to existing program rights held by broadcasters. In June 2022, it was announced that Paramount would partner with Corus Entertainment to relaunch the service locally in late 2022, with Corus serving as ad-sale representative and providing library content to the service. Pluto TV was officially relaunched in Canada on December 1, 2022.


title: Pluto TV

text: During Canadian launch event on December 1, 2022, executive vp and international general manager, Olivier Jollet, told "The Hollywood Reporter" that they're already planned to launch Pluto TV in Australia by 2023 (which haven't described whether it would replaced 10Play) awhile they're also explored to have their platform available on other European territories.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The Midnight Sons is a fictional team of supernatural superheroes appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Including Ghost Riders Danny Ketch and Johnny Blaze, Blade, and Morbius, the original team first formed as part of the "Rise of the Midnight Sons" story arc, culminating in the first full team appearance in "Ghost Rider" (vol. 3) #31 (cover date November 1992). Following the success of the crossovers, Marvel branded all stories involving the group with a distinct family imprint and cover treatment, which lasted from December 1993 to August 1994. The team has been revived several times with different characters, but the most frequent members include Morbius, Blade, and at least one Spirit of Vengeance.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The original Midnight Sons appeared in several 1990s multi-issue crossovers of Marvel's supernatural titles. The first, "Rise of the Midnight Sons," launched several books in the Midnight Sons line, including "Morbius" (September 1992), "Darkhold: Pages from the Book of Sins" (October 1992), and "Nightstalkers" (November 1992). The team consisted of "the Nine": Blade, Morbius, Danny Ketch (as a Ghost Rider), John Blaze (as a human), Frank Drake, Hannibal King, Vicki Montesi, Louise Hastings, and Sam Buchanan.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The group appeared in the nine-issue anthology comic book "Midnight Sons Unlimited", which ran from April 1993 to May 1995 and tied into the crossover events.


title: Midnight Sons

text: Their final crossover was the seventeen-part "Siege of Darkness" which ran from December 1993 to January 1994. It was featured in two consecutive issues of each Midnight Sons title as well as four issues of "Marvel Comics Presents" (#143-146), and two issues of "Doctor Strange", a title that was newly included in the line. It was advertised with an eight-page insert in several comics in October, November, and December 1993. According to the text of the advertisement, written by Jeffrey Lee Simmons.


title: Midnight Sons

text: "Siege of Darkness," however, marked the cancellation of "Darkhold: Pages from the Book of Sins", and the Midnight Sons brand did not last much longer. "Nightstalkers" only lasted three more issues. A "Blade" and "Blaze" series failed to catch interest. The Midnight Sons logo was eventually dropped from the remaining titles, cover-dated September 1994, although "Morbius", "Blade", "Blaze", "Doctor Strange", "Ghost Rider" (vol. 3), "Marvel Comics Presents" and the final three issues of "Midnight Sons Unlimited" continued on under the normal Marvel logo.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The Marvel Edge imprint debuted in 1995, incorporating some of the same ongoing titles as Midnight Sons, including "Doctor Strange: Sorcerer Supreme" and "Ghost Rider".


title: Midnight Sons

text: In 2009, a different incarnation of the team was featured in "Marvel Zombies 4" after being teased in "Marvel Zombies 3". More like the Legion of Monsters than a traditional Midnight Sons line-up, this team included Morbius, Daimon Hellstrom, Jennifer Kale, Werewolf by Night, and Man-Thing. The Hood briefly assisted. The story was loosely continued in "Punisher: Frankencastle" and "Legion of Monsters".


title: Midnight Sons

text: An unnamed team similar to the Midnight Sons appeared in the 5-issue "Spirits of Vengeance" series in 2017 by Victor Gischler and David Baldeón. This series featured Johnny Blaze, Daimon Hellstrom, Blade, and Satana.


title: Midnight Sons

text: In February 2017, Moon Knight artist Greg Smallwood expressed interest in a revamped version of the Midnight Sons, featuring a team composed of Moon Knight, Blade, Ghost Rider, Doctor Strange, Punisher, Daimon Hellstrom, Jennifer Kale and Hannibal King. Although this never came to pass, Smallwood did contribute variant covers for "Doctor Strange: Damnation" by Donny Cates, Nick Spencer, and Rod Reis, which featured another modern Midnight Sons team: Wong, Blade, Doctor Voodoo, Elsa Bloodstone, Johnny Blaze, Moon Knight, Iron Fist, Scarlet Spider, and Man-Thing.


title: Midnight Sons

text: In June 2022 a new limited series was announced for a September 2022 release entitled Midnight Suns. The 5-issue miniseries will be written by Ethan Sacks with art by Luigi Zagaria. The roster will be made up of Blade, Kushala the Spirit Rider, Magik, Wolverine, Nico Minoru and Zoe Laveau.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The team was formed by Ghost Riders, Danny Ketch and Johnny Blaze after Ghost Rider received a vision in which he learned that Lilith, Mother of All Demons ("not" Dracula's daughter, another Marvel character of the same name) was being resurrected and posed a great threat. She planned to use her demon children, the Lilin, to take over Earth. Though Lilith had many children, she had four children who were very loyal to her. Their names were Pilgrim, Nakota, Meatmarket, and the most powerful of the four, Blackout, Ghost Rider's old enemy (Blackout was not an actual child of Lilith originally, but rather a grandchild. He was later killed and Lilith gave birth to Blackout along with her other children, thus indeed making him one of her actual children). Though she would have a lot more of her children to help her, the rest had forsaken Lilith. After she was imprisoned, many of the Lilin were either scattered or killed. Those who were scattered forgot the ways of Lilith and moved on with their lives, except Lilith's most faithful servants.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The team consisted of the Nightstalkers (Eric Brooks / Blade, Frank Drake and Hannibal King), Morbius, the Living Vampire, the Spirits of Vengeance (Danny Ketch / Ghost Rider, Johnny Blaze / Ghost Rider, and later Michael Badilino / Vengeance), and the guardians of the Darkhold, the Darkhold Redeemers (Sam Buchanan, Victoria Montesi, Louise Hastings, and later Modred the Mystic and Jinx). While secretly assembling the team and the sub-teams within, from behind the scenes, Doctor Strange didn't officially join the team until the Siege of Darkness storyline.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The second major meeting between the Midnight Sons occurred when Blade, with a page from the Darkhold, became the demonic creature Switchblade. He killed most of the Midnight Sons, subsequently taking on the power and weapons of each. He was finally stopped when Louise Hastings used a counter spell from the Darkhold.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The "Siege of Darkness" consisted of two subsequent stories in which the Midnight Sons fought groups connected with the two major villains, Lilith and Zarathos. In the first story arc, covers were black with vague outlines, and the Midnight Sons fought the Lilin who were invading the earth in a mysterious smoke emanating from Cypress Hills Cemetery. Lilin included in this arc include Bad Timing, Martine Bancroft, Blackout, Dark Legion, Meatmarket, Nakota, Outcast, Pilgrim, Sister Nil, Stonecold, and Bloodthirst, who was possessing Morbius. In the second story arc, covers featured a dripping blood design, and the Midnight Sons fought The Fallen, a group loyal to Zarathos. The Fallen include Atrocity, Embyrre, Metarchus, Patriarch, and Salomé.


title: Midnight Sons

text: At the beginning of the story, Ghost Rider and Blaze tell The Nightstalkers, The Darkhold Redeemers, and Morbius that they have killed Lilith and Zarathos. The Nightstalkers, who are skeptical, investigate but find mist containing Lilin now emanating from Cypress Hills Cemetery. As the other Midnight Sons join the fight, they discover that, instead of killing Lilith and Zarathos, Ghost Rider and Blaze have opened a portal to Shadowside where the Lilin had been exiled. They split into two groups, one led by Ghost Rider and one led by Morbius. Caretaker, Doctor Strange and Vengeance also join the fight. Caretaker claims Zarathos is more powerful and they must protect the Medallion of Power. Doctor Strange teleports Ghost Rider's group to his Sanctum Sanctorum. They find out from some Lilin that Morbius' team has a traitor. The team following Morbius, which includes Louise Hastings, hide out in one of Morbius' old labs. Louise Hastings finds out Morbius has been infected by Lilin blood, and Morbius secretly kills her. Morbius has been taken over by the Lilin Bloodthirst. He then requests entry into Doctor Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum. Unaware that Morbius has been possessed, Doctor Strange allows him to enter which allows other Lilin to follow. Doctor Strange convinces Morbius to fight the control of Bloodthirst. Doctor Strange then casts a spell that causes the Sanctum Sanctorum to explode. The Spirits of Vengeance then confront Lilith and Zarathos in Cypress Hills Cemetery and use the Medallion of Power to send Lilith and the Lilin back to Shadowside. The Medallion of Power disappears.


title: Midnight Sons

text: After Lilith is exiled, it appears as if a group called The Fallen, loyal to Zarathos, has returned from exile. The Fallen are an offshoot of The Blood, the group to which Caretaker belongs. The Fallen left The Blood to follow the wizard Zarathos. The Fallen quickly beat the Midnight Sons and take Caretaker captive. The Midnight Sons regroup at The Nightclub, and Caretaker sends a message that The Fallen plan to recruit or kill surviving members of The Blood. The Midnight Sons then find James Raydar, Patriarch and Truthsayer with varying degrees of success; Patriarch joins Zarathos, Truthsayer is killed by Modred, and James Raydar joins the Midnight Sons along with Embyrre, Raydar's daughter and one of The Fallen who turns against Zarathos when she sees Morbius' nobility. Meanwhile, Victoria Montesi finds out that she has been impregnated with Chthon. Doctor Strange helps her just as he is being attacked by Salomé, one of The Fallen, who claims she is the rightful Sorceress Supreme. Doctor Strange disappears into another dimension and places Victoria Montesi in a mystical stasis. In his place appears Strange, a mystical construct Doctor Strange based loosely on himself. Strange joins the rest of the Midnight Sons in the fight against The Fallen. Ghost Rider confronts Zarathos one on one, and Ghost Rider is apparently destroyed and his power absorbed into Zarathos. The Midnight Sons then fight Patriarch, Metarchus, and Atrocity to a standstill, and the Fallen retreat. Caretaker reveals that there is one more member of The Blood they have not contacted, Foundry. The Midnight Sons track down Foundry who gives them a sword called Justiciar. She claims it must be tempered in her own blood and sacrifices herself. Blade then uses Justiciar to kill Patriarch, Metarchus, and Atrocity with the help of the other Midnight Sons. They believe the destruction of The Fallen will weaken Zarathos. They attack Zarathos directly. Embyrre and James Raydar also attack and are killed. Ghost Rider, whose spirit was absorbed by Zarathos, now apparently attacks him from within and Blade stabs Zarathos with Justiciar. Zarathos, with the sword through his chest, turns to stone. Johnny Blaze, Vengeance, Morbius, Blade, Hannibal King, Strange, and Caretaker then go through a ceremony in which they are branded with the symbol of the flaming dagger. Caretaker says they have become the successors to the original 'Order of the Midnight Sons'. This brand is placed on the arms of all the members of the new team aside from Frank Drake, a member of the Nightstalkers and a human descendant of Dracula and the Ghost Rider who had apparently been destroyed. Drake was disallowed from taking the brand due to his relative normalcy compared to the other members who were supernaturally afflicted and destined to be outsiders. He was allowed, however, to be an associate member.


title: Midnight Sons

text: A new Midnight Sons team is sanctioned by A.R.M.O.R., a government agency that monitors and polices alternate realities from Earth-616. The team is chosen by Morbius, who enlists Daimon Hellstrom, Jennifer Kale, and Werewolf by Night to contain the zombie virus outbreak from further spreading into the 616 universe. The team makes a brief appearance at the end of "Marvel Zombies 3" and fully appears in "Marvel Zombies 4". Man-Thing and the Hood join the team later in the series.


title: Midnight Sons

text: During the "Damnation" storyline, Wong and the ghost of Doctor Strange's dog Bats assembled Blade, Doctor Voodoo, Elsa Bloodstone, Ghost Rider, Moon Knight, Iron Fist, Scarlet Spider and Man-Thing to form the third incarnation of the Midnight Sons so that they could help Doctor Strange fight Mephisto's forces in Las Vegas.


title: Midnight Sons

text: In 2022, the current team was brought together when Strange Academy student Zoe Laveau accidentally projected a vision to supernatural characters across the Marvel Universe. Featuring Blade, Kushala, Magik, Wolverine, Nico Minoru and Zoe Laveau, the series also includes prominent appearances by characters such as Agatha Harkness, Clea Strange, and Doctor Doom.


title: Midnight Sons

text: The Midnight Sons, renamed Midnight Suns, appear in "Marvel's Midnight Suns". This version of the team has existed since the 17th century, with Ghost Riders as prominent members throughout the various iterations of the team and the Scarlet Witch as a former member. In the present, the Caretaker enlists the Hunter, Nico Minoru, Blade, Magik and Robbie Reyes to join forces with the Avengers and stop Lilith.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic, a trading name of Virgin Atlantic Airways Limited and Virgin Atlantic International Limited, is a British airline with its head office in Crawley, England. The airline was established in 1984 as British Atlantic Airways, and was originally planned by its co-founders Randolph Fields and Alan Hellary to fly between London and the Falkland Islands. Soon after changing the name to Virgin Atlantic Airways, Fields sold his shares in the company after disagreements with Richard Branson over the management of the company. The maiden flight from Gatwick Airport to Newark International Airport took place on 22 June 1984.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: The airline along with Virgin Holidays is controlled by a holding company, Virgin Atlantic Limited, which is 51% owned by the Virgin Group and 49% by Delta Air Lines. It is administratively separate from other Virgin-branded airlines. Virgin Atlantic Airways Limited and Virgin Atlantic International Limited both hold Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) Type A Operating Licences (AOC numbers 534 and 2435 respectively), both of which permit these airlines, operating as Virgin Atlantic Airways, to carry passengers, cargo and mail on aircraft with 20 or more seats.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic uses a mixed fleet of Airbus and Boeing wide-body aircraft and operates to destinations in North America, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East and Asia from its main hub at London–Heathrow, and its secondary hub at Manchester. The airline also operates a seasonal service from Edinburgh Virgin Atlantic aircraft consist of three cabins: Economy, Premium (formerly Premium economy) and Upper Class (business).


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In July 2017, Virgin Atlantic announced its intention to form a joint venture with Air France–KLM, but in December 2019, it was announced that the joint venture would not include a stake in the company.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 5 May 2020, it was announced that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the airline would lay off 3,000 staff, reduce the fleet size to 35 by the summer of 2022, retire the Boeing 747-400s and would not resume operations from Gatwick following the pandemic.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic filed for Chapter 15 Bankruptcy Protection in New York on 4 August 2020 as part of a £1.2 billion private refinancing package. The airline announced that it is to join the SkyTeam airline alliance in 2023.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic has its origins in a joint endeavour by Randolph Fields, an American-born lawyer, and Alan Hellary, a former chief pilot for British private airline Laker Airways. Following the collapse of Laker Airways in 1982, Field and Hellary decided to establish a new company, initially named "British Atlantic Airways", as a successor. Reportedly, Fields had formed a concept for an airline that would operate between London and the Falkland Islands during June 1982, when the Falklands War had just finished. Seeking out expertise in the field, Fields made contact with Hellary, who had already been considering options for establishing a regular commercial service to the Falklands. In turn, Hellary was in contact with several out-of-work colleagues from the collapse of Laker Airways; as such, the pair decided to refine their ambitions.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: However, it was soon determined that the short runway at Port Stanley Airport, and the time it would take to improve it, would render a route to the Falklands commercially unviable, thus the idea of such a service was dropped. In its place, Hellary and Fields commenced efforts to secure a licence to operate a route between Gatwick Airport, London and John F. Kennedy International Airport, New York City. During May 1983, a three-day inquiry was conducted, which chose to reject the application following objections from British Airways, British Caledonian and BAA.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Hellary and Fields then applied for a licence between Gatwick and Newark, New Jersey, using a 380-seat McDonnell Douglas DC-10. However, faced with the prospect of direct competition from rival operator PEOPLExpress, a post-deregulation "no frills" discount airline based at Newark, they decided to secure more funding before proceeding. Fields met British entrepreneur Richard Branson at a party in London during which he proposed a business partnership. After protracted and testy negotiations, Fields agreed to a reduced stake of 25% in the airline (which was renamed "Virgin Atlantic") and became its first chairman. Following disagreements over operations, Fields agreed to be bought out for an initial sum of £1 million with further payment on Virgin Atlantic's first dividend. As a result of a High Court action, this additional payment was received shortly before Fields' death in 1997.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 22 June 1984, Virgin Atlantic operated its inaugural scheduled service, flown between Gatwick and Newark using a leased Boeing 747-200 (registration ), christened "Maiden Voyager", which had been formerly operated by Aerolíneas Argentinas. From the onset, its activities were augmented by leveraging existing Virgin Group resources, such as tickets being sold at Virgin Megastores record shops.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Part of Richard Branson's declared approach to business is to either succeed within the first year or exit the market; this ethos includes a one-year limit being expressed upon everything associated with starting up operations. Virgin Atlantic became profitable within the first 12 months, aided by sister company Virgin Records' ability to finance the lease of a secondhand Boeing 747. The firm had timed its operations to take advantage of a full summer, from June to September, which was typically the most profitable period of the year.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In November 1984 the airline launched a service between Gatwick Airport and Maastricht Aachen Airport in the Netherlands using a chartered BAC One-Eleven.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In 1986 the airline added another Boeing 747 to its fleet and started a scheduled route from Gatwick to Miami. Additional aircraft were quickly acquired and new routes launched from Gatwick, such as to New York JFK in 1988, Tokyo Narita in 1989, Los Angeles in 1990, Boston in 1991, and Orlando in 1992. In 1987, Virgin Atlantic launched a service between Luton and Dublin using secondhand Vickers Viscount turboprop aircraft, but this route was withdrawn around 1990. The airline also operated a Viscount service between Maastricht and London Luton Airport in 1989. During 1988, Club Air operated two Boeing 727 jet aircraft on behalf of Virgin Atlantic; these served the Luton to Dublin route until about 1990.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In 1991, Virgin Atlantic was given permission to operate from Heathrow following the abolition of the London Air Traffic Distribution Rules (TDRs), which had governed the distribution of traffic between Heathrow and Gatwick airports since 1978, primarily to bolster the profitability of Gatwick. Airlines without an international scheduled service from Heathrow prior to 1 April 1977 were obliged to operate from Gatwick. However, airlines that did not already operate at Heathrow were still able to begin domestic scheduled services there provided BAA, which then ran both Heathrow and Gatwick on behalf of the UK government, and the Secretary of State for Transport, granted permission.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: The Civil Aviation Authority also transferred two pairs of unused landing slots that British Airways held at Tokyo's Narita Airport to Virgin Atlantic; allowing it to increase frequency between Heathrow and Tokyo from four to six weekly round trips, making it easier to compete against British Airways. The then-chairman of BA Lord King called the CAA's decision, which the government had endorsed, "a confiscation of his company's property".


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In the year to October 1993, Virgin Atlantic declared a loss of £9.3m. The decision to abolish the London TDRs and to let Virgin Atlantic operate at Heathrow, in competition with British Airways, became the trigger for BA's so-called "dirty tricks" campaign against the company. During 1993, BA's public relations director, David Burnside, published an article in "BA News", British Airways' internal magazine, which argued that Branson's protests against British Airways were a publicity stunt. Branson sued British Airways for libel, using the services of George Carman QC. BA settled out of court when its lawyers discovered the lengths to which the company had gone in trying to kill off Virgin Atlantic. British Airways had to pay a legal bill of up to £3 million, damages to Branson of £500,000, and a further £110,000 to his airline. Branson reportedly donated the proceeds from the case to Virgin Atlantic staff.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: During the 1990s, Virgin Atlantic jets were painted with "No Way BA/AA" as a declaration of its opposition to the attempted merger between British Airways and American Airlines. In 1997, following British Airways' announcement that it was to remove the Union Flag from its tailfins in favour of world images, Virgin Atlantic introduced a Union Flag design on the winglets of its aircraft and changed the red dress on the "Scarlet Lady" on the nose of aircraft to the union flag with the tag line "Britain's Flag Carrier". This was a tongue-in-cheek challenge to BA's traditional role as the UK's flag carrier.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In June 2006, US and UK competition authorities investigated alleged price fixing between Virgin Atlantic and British Airways over passenger fuel surcharges. In August 2007, BA was fined £271 million by the UK Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and the US Department of Justice. However, the Chief Executive of Virgin Atlantic, Steve Ridgway, was forced to admit that the company had been a party to the agreement, had been aware of the price-fixing and had taken no steps whatsoever to stop the price-fixing. The company escaped a similar fine to that levied on British Airways only by virtue of the immunity it had earlier negotiated with the regulators.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In April 2010, a tip-off from Cathay Pacific led to an Office of Fair Trading (OFT) investigation of alleged price-fixing between Virgin Atlantic and Cathay Pacific on flights to Hong Kong between 2002 and 2006. Cathay Pacific received immunity from prosecution for reporting the alleged offence. A maximum fine, if found guilty, was 10% of turnover, which, based on the £2.5 billion in sales for the year to February 2009, would have been £250 million. At the time, the OFT stressed that it should not be assumed that the parties involved had broken the law. The OFT cleared both airlines in December 2012, concluding there were "no grounds for action".


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In May 2014 Virgin Atlantic ended flights to Sydney. In September 2014 Virgin Atlantic announced plans to scrap flights to Tokyo, Mumbai, Vancouver, and Cape Town, and to codeshare transatlantic flights with Delta Air Lines; the company was also reported to be considering axing its new Little Red domestic airline after suffering heavy losses.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 6 October 2014, Virgin Atlantic confirmed that Little Red services between London and Manchester would end in March 2015, and that the Scottish routes would be terminated in September 2015. Passengers used the routes from point to point as opposed to using it as a connection for longer haul Virgin Atlantic flights. The former BMI routes continued with rival airline British Airways.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In June 2015, Richard Branson stated that Virgin Atlantic had needed the aforementioned deal with Delta to survive, after losses of £233 million between 2010 and 2013. In the same month, the airline announced it would cut 500 jobs to establish a more efficient management structure.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In July 2017, Air France-KLM nearly acquired a 31% stake in Virgin Atlantic for £220 million. This deal however never went through.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In 2019, Virgin Atlantic began to allow its female flight attendants to not wear makeup and have a choice to wear trousers rather than a skirt. In September 2019, it was announced Virgin Atlantic had outlined plans to expand. A key part of these plans would have been acquiring Flybe, with a plan to rebrand it as "Virgin Connect" from early 2020; however, the plans fell through when Flybe filed for administration and ceased operations in March 2020. In December 2019, Branson announced that he would be scrapping the sale of a 31% stake in the airline to Air France-KLM and that Virgin Group would retain its 51% shareholding.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In March 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Richard Branson and Virgin Atlantic attracted criticism by asking employees to take eight weeks' unpaid leave. However, this was before the UK Government announced the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, and employees were subsequently furloughed instead. Whilst furloughed, many staff volunteered with the NHS, answering 999 calls, and at NHS Trusts in London and the South East. On 27 March, it was reported that Virgin Atlantic was expected to seek a government bailout, which was on 1 April reportedly backed by Rolls Royce, Airbus and Heathrow.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In May 2020, Virgin Atlantic announced over 3,000 jobs losses in the UK and an imminent end to operations at Gatwick Airport. On June 7, Virgin Atlantic commenced cargo-only flights between Brussels Airport and London Heathrow, feeding the high demand for European cargo into its network via LHR. As of 2022 the flights still continue on a daily basis, using all aircraft types within the fleet. On 4 August, Virgin Atlantic filed for bankruptcy protection from creditors in the US as part of a recapitalisation and debt restructuring plan. On August 25, 2020, creditors approved the £1.2bn (€1.3bn) rescue package and debt restructuring. On September 4, 2020, Virgin Atlantic announced a second round of job cuts, totalling 1,150 across all departments. Since the start of 2020, the company halved its workforce due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Chief executive Shai Weiss said that "further reducing the number of people we employ is heartbreaking but essential."


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: As of February 2022, during Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Virgin Atlantic, along with the other UK carriers, observed a ban from travelling in Russian airspace that was a retaliatory measure for the UK's ban on Russia's main carrier, Aeroflot and all other Russian private jets and carriers from using UK airspace. Virgin Atlantic said that avoiding Russia would add between 15 minutes and an hour to flight journeys between the UK and India and Pakistan.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 27 September 2022, Virgin Atlantic announced that the airline will join SkyTeam airline alliance in 2023. According to SkyTeam CEO Kristin Colville and Virgin Atlantic CEO Shai Weiss, the airline's membership will commence at the beginning of the year. It will be the first time that a British airline will join an Airline Alliance since British Midland International joined Star Alliance in 2002 and British Airways of OneWorld in 1999.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic's head office, known as "The VHQ", is located on a business park in Crawley, England, near Gatwick Airport and also houses the corporate offices of Virgin Holidays. The company operates several offices and call centres around the United Kingdom, including a large office in Swansea, Wales, which is a base for reservations, sales, baggage claims and tracing, 'live chat' web support and a customer relations department.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: International offices are located at Atlanta, Barbados, Greater Delhi, Hong Kong, Johannesburg, Lagos and Shanghai.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Group sold a 49% stake in the airline to Singapore Airlines in 1999 for £600 million. On 14 May 2008, Singapore Airlines formally announced an invitation for offers for its Virgin Atlantic stake, and publicly acknowledged that its stake in the airline had "underperformed".


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In November 2010, it was reported that Virgin Atlantic had appointed Deutsche Bank to begin a strategic review of options for the airline following the tie-up between British Airways and American Airlines. By February 2011, it was confirmed that SkyTeam members Air France–KLM and Delta Air Lines had appointed Goldman Sachs to advise them on a joint potential approach for Virgin Atlantic. Etihad Airways was also reported to be considering a deal, and Willie Walsh, chief executive of International Airlines Group, stated that they would be interested in the airline, but only for the lucrative take-off and landing slots it holds at Heathrow Airport.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 11 December 2012, Delta Air Lines confirmed the purchase of Singapore Airlines' 49% stake in Virgin Atlantic for £224 million, with plans to develop a transatlantic joint venture. Regulatory approval from the United States and European Union was granted on 20 June 2013, and the purchase was completed on 24 June. In December 2012, International Airlines Group CEO, Willie Walsh, suggested that the loss-making company would be history within five years. "I can't see Delta wanting to operate the Virgin brand because if they do what does that say about the Delta brand? I just don't see that the guy [Branson] has anything that stands out in terms of what he has achieved in the industry."


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In July 2017, Virgin Group agreed to sell a 31% stake in the airline to Air France-KLM for £220 million, leaving it with a 20% holding. The deal fell through in late 2019.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: The key trends for Virgin Atlantic are shown below (from 2014 onwards, figures are for year ending December; earlier figures are for year ending February, and exclude Virgin Nigeria operations 2005–2008):


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic aircraft operate with a three-class cabin configuration: Economy, Premium (formerly Premium Economy), and Upper Class - the business class product. Premium has a separate check-in area, priority boarding and a wider seat with more legroom. Upper Class features a seat that converts into a fully flat bed and access to chauffeur drive (in a private check in area called the Upper Class Wing at London Heathrow). Virgin Atlantic was the first airline to offer personal entertainment for all passengers in all classes.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic operates 6 lounges worldwide called 'Clubhouse' at London Heathrow, New York-JFK, Boston, Washington D.C.-Dulles, San Francisco and Johannesburg. It also operates a 'Revivals' arrival lounge in London Heathrow. They are accessible for passengers travelling in Upper Class and Flying Club Gold tier members. Where applicable, Upper Class passengers are also welcome to use Delta Sky Clubs prior to departure.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: British Midland International provided domestic and European feeder traffic into Heathrow Airport in partnership with Virgin until it was purchased by British Airways' parent company International Airlines Group in 2011. The Lufthansa-owned airline had faced heavy annual losses of more than £100 million. Under the terms of the takeover, IAG had to relinquish some former BMI domestic slots at Heathrow. Virgin Atlantic purchased enough slots in 2012 to enable it to launch a domestic service on 31 March 2013, under the Little Red brand, operating a total of 12 daily services from London to Aberdeen (three), Edinburgh (six), and Manchester (three). The airline wet-leased four Airbus Airbus A320-200s from Aer Lingus, operating with Virgin Atlantic livery, under a three-year contract.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In September 2014, it was reported that Virgin Atlantic was considering closing its domestic brand after suffering heavy losses, with Civil Aviation Authority figures confirming an average seat occupancy level of just 37.6% in 2013. The 12 daily pairs of take-off and landing slots at Heathrow cannot be sold to be used for long-haul routes.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 6 October 2014, Virgin Atlantic confirmed that the Little Red service would cease; flights to Manchester ended on 28 March 2015 and flights to Edinburgh and Aberdeen ended on 26 September 2015.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 13 April 2015, Virgin Atlantic incorporated a new subsidiary – Virgin Atlantic International Limited (VAIL). In November 2015, VAIL obtained its own Air Operators Certificate and Operating Licence, and commenced operations with two former Virgin Atlantic Airways Limited operated Airbus A330-300 aircraft taking over routes previously operated by Virgin Atlantic Limited between London Gatwick and Barbados, St Lucia, Antigua, Grenada and Tobago. These flights are operated on behalf of Virgin Atlantic.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Upon incorporation as an AOC holder, the majority of Virgin Atlantic's landing slots at London Heathrow Airport were transferred to VAIL, allowing Virgin Atlantic to access the value of the carriers' slots by 'mortgaging' them through open investment from capital markets.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: On 11 January 2019, Virgin Atlantic formed the Connect Airways consortium with Stobart Aviation and Cyrus Capital, to make a takeover bid for Flybe. The deal would see the consortium combine Flybe and Stobart Air with Virgin Atlantic to create an integrated carrier operating under the Virgin Atlantic brand. Flybe and Stobart Air would however retain their own Air Operator Certificates. On 15 January 2019, Connect Airways announced an increased offer, which Flybe's board accepted. On 21 February 2019, the Flybe Group confirmed that its operating assets, including the airline and the website, had indeed been transferred to Connect Airways, despite a last-minute rival bid. However, despite the investment of £135 million from Connect Airways into Flybe, the airline filed for administration and ceased operations with immediate effect in March 2020, following reduced demand that Virgin Atlantic attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic and the UK government failing to grant a £100 million loan.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In September 2022, Virgin Atlantic announced the introduction of two new sets of uniforms, designed by Vivienne Westwood, as well as a new policy to embrace the concept of gender neutrality. One uniform comprises a bright red skirt suit and high-heeled shoes, and the other a burgundy-coloured trouser suit with a grey waistcoat, red tie and flat black shoes. Men and women will be allowed to choose either uniform, and may also choose to wear a badge indicating their preferred pronoun of address. The new uniforms are for crew, pilots and ground staff.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: At the same time, the company is making changes to its ticketing systems to allow those holding passports which indicate gender-neutrality to be entered as “U” or “X”, as well as offering a new title of address, “Mx”, on their reservations. At this time, not all countries offer this option on passports; those that do include the United States, India, Pakistan, Nepal, Australia, Canada, Argentina, Colombia, Germany, Ireland, and Iceland.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic operates a fleet consisting entirely of widebody aircraft from both Airbus and Boeing.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic's first aircraft were painted with a "Eurowhite" design with a red stripe through the centre of the main deck windows. The engines were metallic silver and the tail red with the logo in white. In the 1990s, the refreshed design was introduced, removing the centre red stripe through the windows, engines were painted red, the Virgin Atlantic titles in grey were added along the main fuselage, and the 'Flying Lady' was introduced to the nose area.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In October 2006, with the delivery of G-VRED, Virgin Atlantic introduced a new design, with the fuselage painted in metallic silver and a revised tail fin, with red and purple features and the logo. Near the nose of each aircraft is a pin-up girl, the "Scarlet Lady", carrying a Union flag, which was designed by British artist Ken White, who modelled the motif on the World War II pin-ups of Alberto Vargas – hence the naming one of the fleet "Varga Girl" (in this case, an A340-600 registered G-VGAS).


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Each aircraft has a name, usually feminine, such as "Ladybird", "Island Lady", and "Ruby Tuesday", but some are linked to registrations (e.g. G-VFIZ became "Bubbles"). A couple are commemorative names (e.g. G-VEIL—"Queen of the Skies"—which was named by Queen Elizabeth II on 7 April 2004, marking the centenary of the Entente Cordiale; this frame exited the fleet in April 2016). An exception is "Spirit of Sir Freddie". An early Boeing 747, it was named in honour of Freddie Laker of Laker Airways, who helped Virgin Atlantic following the demise of his own airline. G-VFAB—"Lady Penelope"—gained a special livery to celebrate Virgin Atlantic's 21st birthday. G-VFAB, "Lady Penelope", exited the fleet in September 2015 after 21 years of service and was subsequently parted out. In 2006, the airline ran an eBay auction to name an Airbus A340-600, registered G-VYOU. The winner named it "Emmeline Heaney" after his newborn daughter, and the name adorned the aircraft for the remainder of its operating service until the aircraft was retired in October 2019. In 2018, a previously stored Airbus A340-600 registered G-VNAP was returned to active use by Virgin Atlantic, and was renamed from "Sleeping Beauty" to "Sleeping Beauty Rejuvenated". It additionally received a special "thank you" livery dedicated to its 9,000 employees. In 2019, one of the airline's Boeing 747-400 aircraft (Registration G-VROS) was renamed from "English Rose" to "Forever Young" in honour of lost colleagues


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: The current livery dates from 2010 and returns to the "Eurowhite" design featuring purple billboard titles on the fuselage, slight changes to the Scarlet Lady, and new red metallic paint for the aircraft's tail and engines. On aircraft that have winglets, the wingtips are red, with the logo on the inside facing passengers on board. The Virgin Atlantic logo was also added in purple billboard titles to the underside of the aircraft.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: In anticipation of the Airbus A350-1000's introduction to the airline's fleet, Virgin Atlantic announced in April 2019 that its Flying Lady mascot to be adorned on the A350's nose would be replaced by illustrations referred to as "Flying Icons", consisting of a range of five individual characters in an effort to represent modern Britain. Each of the characters, separately named Daley, Meera, Oscar, Ray, and Zadie, were styled and posed with Union flags similarly to the Flying Lady. Originally portraying the characters in leotards, the illustrations were later revised by designer Toby Tinsley to instead portray the characters wearing more clothing and revealing less skin, prior to their application on Virgin Atlantic's first A350. Meera, one of the first five characters, was also at some point changed to or replaced by Mei, a new character portraying a Chinese woman. Reasons for the changes or revisions were not provided by Virgin Atlantic or anyone involved in the branding. At least one additional Flying Icon was unveiled to complement the initial five, including an icon portraying an Indian woman, named Aria.


title: Virgin Atlantic

text: Virgin Atlantic is considered to have a strong safety reputation. Since the airline's founding in 1984, it has never suffered a complete hull-loss incident or a passenger fatality.


title: Williams sisters

text: The Williams sisters are two professional American tennis players: Venus Williams (b. 1980), a seven-time Grand Slam title winner (singles), and Serena Williams (b. 1981), twenty-three-time Grand Slam title winner (singles), both of whom were coached from an early age by their parents Richard Williams and Oracene Price.


title: Williams sisters

text: Both sisters have been ranked by the Women's Tennis Association at the world No. 1 position in both singles and doubles. In 2002, after the French Open, Venus and Serena Williams were ranked world No. 1 and No. 2 on singles, respectively, marking the first time in history that sisters occupied the top two positions. On 21 June 2010, Serena and Venus again held the No. 1 and No. 2 rankings spots in singles, respectively, some eight years after first accomplishing this feat. At the time, Serena was three months shy of her 29th birthday and Venus had just celebrated her 30th birthday.


title: Williams sisters

text: There is a noted professional rivalry between the sisters in singles — between the 2001 US Open and the 2017 Australian Open, they contested nine major finals. They became the first two players, female or male, to contest four consecutive major singles finals, from the 2002 French Open to the 2003 Australian Open; Serena famously won all four to complete the first of two "Serena Slams" (non-calendar year Grand Slams). Between 2000 and 2016, they collectively won 12 Wimbledon singles titles (Venus five, and Serena seven). Nonetheless, they remain very close, often watching each other's matches in support, even after one of them had been knocked out of a tournament.


title: Williams sisters

text: By winning the 2001 Australian Open doubles title, they became the fifth pair of women to complete the career Grand Slam in doubles, and the only pair to complete the career Golden Slam in doubles. At the time, Venus and Serena were only 20 and 19 years old, respectively. Since then, they have gone on to add another two Olympic gold medals at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the 2012 London Olympics. Moreover, the duo would go on to win a non-calendar year Grand Slam in doubles between 2009 Wimbledon and 2010 Roland Garros, which made them the co-No. 1 doubles players on 7 June 2010. Their most recent major doubles title came at the 2016 Wimbledon Championships.


title: Williams sisters

text: Both players have won four gold medals at the Olympics, one each in singles and three in doubles— all won together— the most of any tennis players. Venus has also won a silver in mixed doubles at the 2016 Rio Olympics. As a duo, they have also completed the double career Golden Slam in doubles. Between the two of them, they have completed the Boxed Set, winning all four grand slams in singles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles. They split all four mixed doubles titles in 1998.


title: Williams sisters

text: Note: Serena Williams did not play at the 2004 Olympics because of injury. Venus partnered with American Chanda Rubin and lost in the first round to eventual gold-medalists Sun Tiantian and Li Ting.


title: Williams sisters

text: During the 2001 Indian Wells Masters tournament in Indian Wells, California, controversy erupted when Venus Williams withdrew four minutes prior to her semifinal match with her sister Serena.


title: Williams sisters

text: The following day, Serena played Kim Clijsters in the final. Venus and her father, (coach to her and Serena) Richard Williams were booed as they made their way to their seats. Serena was booed intermittently during the final, in which she defeated Clijsters, 4–6, 6–4, 6–2, and even during the presentation ceremony.


title: Williams sisters

text: Richard accused the crowds at Indian Wells of overt racism, saying, "The white people at Indian Wells, what they've been wanting to say all along to us finally came out: 'Nigger, stay away from here, we don't want you here'". However, no other reports of verbal racism were reported to tournament officials, although Venus has stated without elaboration, "I heard what he heard." Oracene Price (mother and coach of Venus and Serena) accused the crowd of "taking off their hoods".


title: Williams sisters

text: After the initial controversy, neither Williams sister played the tournament in Indian Wells for 14 years. The Women's Tennis Association currently classifies the Indian Wells tournament as a Premier Mandatory event for all eligible players. Exceptions are made when players engage in tournament promotions, but Venus and Serena both declined to promote the tournament; WTA Tour CEO Larry Scott agreed he would not, promotionally, "put them in a position that is going to be awkward," and tournament director Charlie Pasarell has stated he would accept the WTA tour's ruling.


title: Williams sisters

text: Allegations had been made before Venus's withdrawal that Richard Williams decided who won the matches between his daughters. Those allegations continued and increased as a result of her withdrawal.


title: Williams sisters

text: Richard has said that racial epithets were used against him and Venus as they sat in the stands during the final, but no official complaints were recorded by the tournament. Venus and Serena have been criticized for refusing to discuss the controversy, as some believe that their silence perpetuates racism.


title: Williams sisters

text: Serena discusses what happened in her view at Indian Wells in detail in an entire chapter titled "The Fiery Darts of Indian Wells" in her 2009 autobiography, "On the Line". She says that on the morning of the semifinal, Venus told the tour trainer that she had injured her knee and didn't think she could play and tried for hours to get approval from the trainer to withdraw, but the tournament officials kept stalling.


title: Williams sisters

text: What got me most of all was that it wasn't just a scattered bunch of boos. It wasn't coming from just one section. It was like the whole crowd got together and decided to boo all at once. The ugliness was just raining down on me, hard. I didn't know what to do. Nothing like this had ever happened to me. What was most surprising about this uproar was the fact that tennis fans are typically a well-mannered bunch. They're respectful. They sit still. And in Palm Springs, especially, they tended to be pretty well-heeled, too. But I looked up and all I could see was a sea of rich people—mostly older, mostly white—standing and booing lustily, like some kind of genteel lynch mob. I don't mean to use such inflammatory language to describe the scene, but that's really how it seemed from where I was down on the court. Like these people were gonna come looking for me after the match. ... There was no mistaking that all of this was meant for me. I heard the word "nigger" a couple times, and I knew. I couldn't believe it. That's just not something you hear in polite society on that stadium court ... Just before the start of play, my dad and Venus started walking down the aisle to the players' box by the side of the court, and everybody turned and started to point and boo at them ... It was mostly just a chorus of boos, but I could still hear shouts of 'Nigger!' here and there. I even heard one angry voice telling us to go back to Compton. It was unbelievable ... We refused to return to Indian Wells. Even now, all these years later, we continue to boycott the event. It's become a mandatory tournament on the tour, meaning that the WTA can fine a player if she doesn't attend. But I don't care if they fine me a million dollars, I will not play there again.


title: Williams sisters

text: However, on February 3, 2015, Serena Williams wrote an exclusive column for "Time" magazine stating her intentions to return to Indian Wells for a tournament on March 9, 2015. She did indeed return and won her opening match. Williams withdrew before her semi-final match with Simona Halep because of a knee injury.


title: Williams sisters

text: The WTA announced on January 27, 2016, that Venus would return to Indian Wells for the first time in 15 years.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The Irish Wolfhound is a historic sighthound dog breed from Ireland that has, by its presence and substantial size, inspired literature, poetry and mythology. Like all sighthounds, it was used to pursue game by speed; it was also famed as a guard dog, specializing in protection against and for the hunting of wolves.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The modern breed classified by recent genetic research into the "Sighthound United Kingdom Rural Clade" (Fig. S2), is used by coursing hunters who have prized it for its ability to dispatch game caught by other, swifter sighthounds.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: In 391, there is a reference to large dogs by Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, a Roman Consul who got seven ""canes Scotici"" as a gift to be used for fighting lions and bears, and who wrote "all Rome viewed (them) with wonder". Scoti is a Latin name for the Gaels (ancient Irish). Dansey, the early 19th century translator of the first complete version of Arrian's work in English, "On Coursing", suggested the Irish and Scottish "greyhounds" were derived from the same ancestor, the "vertragus", and had expanded with the Scoti from Ireland across the Western Isles and into what is today Scotland.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The dog-type is imagined by some to be very old. Wolfhounds were used as hunting dogs by the Gaels, who called them "Cú Faoil" ( , "hound" of "wolf" or wolfhound). Dogs are mentioned as "cú" in Irish laws and literature dating from the sixth century or, in the case of the Sagas, from the old Irish period, AD 600–900. The word "cú" was often used as an epithet for warriors as well as kings, denoting that they were worthy of the respect and loyalty of a hound. Cú Chulainn, a mythical warrior whose name means "hound of Culann", is supposed to have gained this name as a child when he slew the ferocious guard dog of Culann. As recompense he offered himself as a replacement.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: In discussing the systematic evidence of historic dog sizes in Ireland, the Irish zooarchaeologist Finbar McCormick stressed that no dogs of Irish Wolfhound size are known from sites of the Iron Age period of 1000 BC through to the early Christian period to 1200 AD, and on the basis of the historic dog bones available, dogs of current Irish Wolfhound size seem to be a relatively modern development: "it must be concluded that the dog of CúChulainn was no larger than an Alsatian and not the calf-sized beast of the popular imagination".


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Hunting dogs were coveted and were frequently given as gifts to important personages and foreign nobles. King John of England, in about 1210, presented an Irish hound named Gelert to Llywelyn, the Prince of Wales. The poet The Hon William Robert Spencer immortalized this hound in a poem.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: In his Historie of Ireland completed 1571, Edmund Campion gives a description of the hounds used for hunting wolves in the Dublin and Wicklow mountains. He says: "They (the Irish) are not without wolves and greyhounds to hunt them, bigger of bone and limb than a colt". Due to their popularity overseas many were exported to European royal houses leaving numbers in Ireland depleted. This led to a declaration by Oliver Cromwell being published in Kilkenny on 27 April 1652 to ensure that sufficient numbers remained to control the wolf population.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: References to the Irish Wolfhound in the 18th century tell of its great size, strength and greyhound shape as well as its scarcity. Writing in 1790, Bewick described it as the largest and most beautiful of the dog kind; about 36 inches high, generally of a white or cinnamon colour, somewhat like the Greyhound but more robust. He said that their aspect was mild, disposition peaceful, and strength so great that in combat the Mastiff or Bulldog was far from being an equal to them.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The last wolf in Ireland was killed in Co. Carlow in 1786. It is thought to have been killed at Myshall, on the slopes of Mount Leinster, by a pack of wolfdogs kept by a Mr Watson of Ballydarton. The wolfhounds that remained in the hands of a few families, who were mainly descendants of the old Irish chieftains, were now symbols of status rather than used as hunters, and these were said to be the last of their race.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Thomas Pennant (1726–1798) reported that he could find no more than three wolfdogs when he visited Ireland. During the 1836 meeting of the Geological Society of Dublin, Dr. Scouler presented the ""Notices of Animals which have disappeared from Ireland"", with the wolfdog mentioned.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Captain George Augustus Graham (1833–1909) of Rednock House, Dursley, Gloucestershire was responsible for creating the modern Irish wolfhound breed – a resuscitation of the old wolfhounds. He stated that he could not find the breed "in its original integrity" to work with:


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Based on the writings of others, Graham had formed the opinion that Irish Wolfhounds could be standardised by gathering the few remaining wolfhounds of Ireland, and cross-breeding them with similar, large dogs.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: “Faust” of Kilfane was believed to be descended from the last wolfhounds of Ireland and with “Old Donagh” was the progenitor of Graham's breeding program. However, with a gene-pool that was too small to be ‘pure-bred’, Graham crossed the biggest and best examples of the Scottish Deerhound (Glengarry strain) with the Great Dane, two breeds which he believed were derived earlier from the wolfhound. Graham then outbred with the Duchess of Newcastle's Borzoi "Korotai", who had proved his wolf hunting ability in his native Russia, and for a ‘huge shaggy dog’ a Tibetan Mastiff “Wolf” entered into the wolfhound pedigree.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Garnier's "Lion" was bred to the Deerhound "Lufra", and their offspring "Marquis" entered wolfhound pedigrees through his granddaughter "Young Donagh". In 1885 Captain Graham with other breeders founded the Irish Wolfhound Club, and the Breed Standard of Points to establish and agree the ideal to which breeders should aspire.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The Wolfhound has been adopted as a symbol by both rugby codes. The national rugby league team is nicknamed the Wolfhounds, and the Irish Rugby Football Union, which governs rugby union, changed the name of the country's A (second-level) national team in that code to the Ireland Wolfhounds in 2010. One of the symbols that the tax authorities in both Ireland and Northern Ireland have on their revenue stamps has been the Irish wolfhound. In the video game , the Irish Wolfhound is the breed of dog for all dogs in the base game.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Genomic analysis indicates that although there has been some DNA sharing between the Irish wolfhound with the Deerhound, Whippet, and Greyhound, there has been significant sharing of DNA between the Irish Wolfhound and the Great Dane. One writer has stated that for the Irish Wolfhound, "the Great Dane appearance is strongly marked too prominently before the 20th Century". George Augustus Graham created the modern Irish wolfhound breed by retaining the appearance of the original form, but not its genetic ancestry.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The Irish Wolfhound is characterised by its large size. According to the FCI standard, the expected range of heights at the withers is ; minimum heights and weights are / and / for dogs and bitches respectively. It is more massively built than the Scottish Deerhound, but less so than the Great Dane.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The coat is hard and rough on the head, body and legs, with the beard and the hair over the eyes particularly wiry. It may be black, brindle, fawn, grey, red, pure white, or any colour seen in the Deerhound.


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: The Irish Wolfhound is a sighthound, and hunts by visual perception alone. The neck is muscular and fairly long, and the head is carried high. It should appear to be longer than it is tall,


title: Irish Wolfhound

text: Irish Wolfhounds have a varied range of personalities and are most often noted for their personal quirks and individualism. An Irish Wolfhound, however, is rarely mindless, and, despite its large size, is rarely found to be destructive in the house or boisterous. This is because the breed is generally introverted, intelligent, and reserved in character. An easygoing animal, the Irish Wolfhound is quiet by nature. Wolfhounds often create a strong bond with their family and can become quite destructive or morose if left alone for long periods of time.