title: The Challenge: All Stars

text: The series originally was pitched by Mark Long on social media for a season with "old-school" cast members. His pitch went viral in June 2020, and he started reaching out to former cast members and eventually to "The Challenge"s production company, Bunim/Murray Productions. In August 2020, Long and Bunim/Murray official announced a partnership to work together on the series. Along with being a cast member, Long was also an executive producer. Other executive producers include Julie Pizzi, Justin Booth, Dan Caster and Leanne Mucci, with Jack Reifert as co-executive producer.


title: The Challenge: All Stars

text: On February 24, 2021, the show was officially announced as "The Challenge: All Stars", and premiered on the streaming service on April 1, 2021. On October 13, 2021, the series was renewed for a second season, which premiered on November 11, 2021. The series was renewed for a third season, which premiered on May 11, 2022.


title: Jake Picking

text: Jake Picking (born March 2, 1991) is a German-born American actor. He is best known for portraying Rock Hudson in the Netflix series "Hollywood" (2020), created by Ryan Murphy. He is also known for playing the role of Sean Collier in "Patriots Day" (2016), and appearing in "" (2022). In 2022, he starred as young Gerald Ford in the Showtime series "The First Lady".


title: Jake Picking

text: Jake Picking was born in Germany, where his father, a member of the United States Army from West Point, was stationed (though some claim he was born in Massachusetts). He grew up in Wellesley, Massachusetts. At New York University, Picking was a winger on the New York ice hockey team. He dropped out of business school after a year because he was more interested in acting and student film projects. As an ice hockey player, Picking appeared in an NHL commercial before his acting career.


title: Jake Picking

text: Picking's high school math teacher encouraged him to try out acting, and he took lessons with Carolyn Pickman, a casting agent who also represented Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.


title: Jake Picking

text: Picking finally began attending auditions in Boston, in 2013 he made his feature film debut with a role in the youth film "The Way, Way Back" with Steve Carell. This was followed by guest appearances in the series Ironside (2013) and Chasing Life (2014). To start a professional acting career, he moved to Los Angeles, where he initially studied old Hollywood films with stars such as James Dean, Paul Newman, Marlon Brando or Montgomery Clift in his one-room apartment out of loneliness. He preferred moving to the West Coast to a possible acting course at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts, although he had no contacts whatsoever in Los Angeles.


title: Jake Picking

text: In the next years Picking was regularly in movie productions but mostly subscribed to support roles. In 2016, he was part of the ensemble of the drama "Goat", which deals with physical and psychological violence in the American college fraternity landscape. In the role of the sadistic oath master Dixon, Picking tormented Brett, played by Nick Jonas. In the same year he appeared in the thriller "Patriots Day", which dramatizes the attack on the Boston Marathon. Here he played the part of policeman Sean Collier, who is shot by the bombers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev (played by Alex Wolff and Themo Melikidze).


title: Absolution (album)

text: Absolution is the third studio album by English rock band Muse, first released on 15 September 2003 through Taste Media. The album followed up on "Origin of Symmetry" diverse musical tendencies and elaborate sound, while also having a more focused and consistent theme and aesthetic throughout. "Absolution" has a noticeably darker and heavier tone musically, with a lyrical focus on theological and apocalyptic concepts.


title: Absolution (album)

text: The album reached number one on the UK Albums Chart. It also yielded the band's first top-ten single, with "Time Is Running Out" peaking at number 8 on the UK Singles Chart. In 2009, it was voted by "Kerrang!" as the second-best album of the 21st century thus far. As of 2018, "Absolution" has sold over 3.5 million copies worldwide.


title: Absolution (album)

text: The band spent much of 2002 recording "Absolution" with producer Rich Costey. The album was recorded in studios in both Los Angeles and London. Bellamy said that the band made a "conscious decision" to "get together in a room and make music", setting aside time to record the album, as previous albums' recording sessions were 'hastily arranged' and rushed.


title: Absolution (album)

text: "Absolution" is an alternative rock, progressive rock, hard rock, and art rock album. It establishes some of the musical and lyrical themes which would later become Muse's trademarks, such as symphonic rock influences on "Butterflies and Hurricanes", orchestral music influences on "Blackout" and electronic music influences on "Endlessly". Lyrically, the album incorporates themes of fear, mistrust, personal achievement and joy, and a general theme of "things coming to an end". Bellamy said that the beginning of the Iraq War had an effect on their songwriting. These musical influences and lyrical themes were relatively new to Muse's sound and would be further explored on their following albums, in particular their fifth studio album "The Resistance".


title: Absolution (album)

text: The B-side and bonus track "Fury" and future "Black Holes and Revelations" track "Soldier's Poem" were among discarded material written during the "Absolution" sessions, with "Fury" being dropped in favour of "The Small Print" due to Chris Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard's preference to the latter song, despite frontman Matt Bellamy intending to include the former on the album's track listing.


title: Absolution (album)

text: In April 2004, Muse frontman Matt Bellamy stated "I think that absolution is not necessarily a religious word; it has meanings of purity, but it's not necessarily talking from a Christian or any particular religious point of view. I think it's just suggesting that the act of making music is a way of understanding things."


title: Absolution (album)

text: "Absolution" was one of two Muse albums (alongside "Black Holes and Revelations") to feature artwork by Storm Thorgerson. The ambiguous falling/floating image was inspired by the René Magritte painting "Golconda". According to Dominic Howard, "The artwork can either be seen as people coming down to Earth or leaving the Earth, it's open to interpretation". The special edition and vinyl pressing artworks slightly differ. The special edition features a different man in a different angle, while the vinyl pressing features a little girl, instead.


title: Absolution (album)

text: "Absolution" was released on 23 September 2003 on CD and double vinyl. It was their first album released on the A&E Records label. There were six singles, of which the first, "Stockholm Syndrome", was download only. Because of contractual obligations, the band could not allow the song to be downloaded for free, so the fee was set at $0.99 and it was downloaded more than 20,000 times.


title: Absolution (album)

text: There was also a limited edition release of Absolution that featured a bonus DVD. This DVD contained 40 minutes of 'The making of Absolution' footage, as well as pictures of the band.


title: Absolution (album)

text: The album and each of the singles except "Stockholm Syndrome" were distributed as promotional CDs housed in Anti-Static Bags.


title: Absolution (album)

text: The song "Blackout" features in the 2006 film, "Southland Tales" and its soundtrack, "Southland Tales: Music from the Motion Picture".


title: Absolution (album)

text: "Absolution" was met with positive reviews from critics, holding an average critic score of 72 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 16 reviews. "Alternative Press" wrote that the album's "chaotic choruses feel like the triumphant culmination of some earth-shattering undertaking", while Andrew Future of "Drowned in Sound" called it "a truly elemental opus". Tyler Fisher of Sputnikmusic hailed "Absolution" as Muse's most consistent album to date and felt that the album had perfected the sound of the band's previous releases, writing that it "expands on newer sounds and improves on others." Alexis Petridis of "The Guardian" wrote: "Muse sound like a band who are at the top of their game. Their confidence carries you through the album's excesses." Rob Kemp of "Rolling Stone" was less enthusiastic, drawing Radiohead comparisons but concluding that Matt Bellamy "doesn't bring as much ingenuity to his singing."


title: Absolution (album)

text: In 2005, "Absolution" was ranked number 345 in "Rock Hard" magazine's book "The 500 Greatest Rock & Metal Albums of All Time". The album was placed in at No. 23 after a public vote for "Q" in February 2008 for the Best British Albums of All Time.


title: Absolution (album)

text: "Absolution" was Muse's first album to chart in the US, and is credited with establishing the band a fan base in the country. It was technically the second Muse album to be released in the US, due to a creative dispute Muse had with Maverick Records, which prevented the release of "Origin of Symmetry" stateside. Absolution reached No. 1 on the "Billboard" Top Heatseekers chart and No. 107 on the "Billboard" 200. "Absolution" was certified gold by the RIAA in March 2007, becoming the group's first album to be certified in the US. The album also featured the band's first American hits – "Time Is Running Out" and "Hysteria", the former becoming their first UK Top 10 single and eventually went Gold in the US.


title: Len Lesser

text: Leonard King Lesser (December 3, 1922 – February 16, 2011) was an American character actor. He was known for his recurring role as Uncle Leo in a total of 15 episodes of "Seinfeld", starting during the show's second season in the episode "The Pony Remark". Lesser was also known for his role as Garvin on "Everybody Loves Raymond."


title: Len Lesser

text: Lesser was born in New York City in 1922. His father, a grocer, was a Jewish immigrant from Poland. Lesser received his bachelor's degree from the City College of New York in 1942 at the age of 19. Lesser enlisted in the United States Army the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and served in the China Burma India Theater during World War II. While there, he was promoted to sergeant.


title: Len Lesser

text: Lesser was a prolific character actor in film, TV and on stage. He appeared on American television steadily since 1955 on programs such as "That Girl", "The Untouchables", "Peter Gunn", "Mr. Lucky", "The Outer Limits", "Alfred Hitchcock Presents", "Gunsmoke", "Kentucky Jones", "Green Acres", "Get Smart", "Bat Masterson", "Family Affair", "The Monkees", "Quincy, M.E.", "The Rockford Files", "The Amazing Spider-Man", "Mad About You", "All in the Family", "Boy Meets World", "Smart Guy", "My Favorite Martian", "The Munsters", and "Castle". He appeared in a variety of films such as "Birdman of Alcatraz" (1962), "How to Stuff a Wild Bikini" (1965), "Kelly's Heroes" (1970), "Blood and Lace" (1971), "Dirty Little Billy" (1972), "Papillon" (1973), "Truck Stop Women" (1974), "The Outlaw Josey Wales" (1976), "Supervan" (1977), "Moonshine County Express" (1977), "Ruby" (1977), "Death Hunt" (1981), "Take This Job and Shove It" (1981), "Grandmother's House" (1988) and "Baadasssss!" (2003). He also guest starred on the "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" episode "Tick Tock Hilda's Clock."


title: Len Lesser

text: Lesser had a recurring role on "Everybody Loves Raymond" as Garvin, a friend of Frank Barone, who always lifted his arms in excitement whenever he saw Ray (just as Lesser did in his recurring role on "Seinfeld" as "Uncle Leo" whenever he saw his nephew Jerry). He also appeared in Jeff Seymour's stage production of "Cold Storage" at the University of Toronto's George Ignatieff Theatre.


title: Len Lesser

text: On February 16, 2011, Lesser died of cancer-related pneumonia in Burbank, California, at the age of 88.


title: Len Lesser

text: After learning of Lesser's death, Jerry Seinfeld said of him,Len was one of our favorites. We always loved having him on the show. I'll never forget when Uncle Leo was in prison and tattooed "Jerry Hello" on his knuckles. He was a very sweet guy. Another "Seinfeld" castmate, Jason Alexander, tweeted,Thanks to all of you for your kind remarks re: Len Lessor "[sic]". Tonight was the opening of "Gigi" at my beloved Reprise Theater Company and I've only returned at this late hour to hear the news. ... "Hellooo" Uncle Leo. And goodbye. Sleep well. Much love. Jason.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The Ziegfeld Follies was a series of elaborate theatrical revue productions on Broadway in New York City from 1907 to 1931, with renewals in 1934 and 1936. They became a radio program in 1932 and 1936 as "The Ziegfeld Follies of the Air".


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: Inspired by the Folies Bergère of Paris, the Ziegfeld Follies were conceived and mounted by Florenz Ziegfeld Jr., reportedly at the suggestion of his then-wife, the stage actress and singer Anna Held. The shows' producers were turn-of-the-twentieth-century producing titans Klaw and Erlanger.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The Follies were a series of lavish revues, something between later Broadway shows and the more elaborate high class vaudeville and variety show. The first follies, "The Follies of 1907", was produced that year at the "Jardin de Paris" roof theatre.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: During the Follies era, many of the top entertainers, including W. C. Fields, Eddie Cantor, Josephine Baker, Fanny Brice, Ann Pennington, Bert Williams, Eva Tanguay, Bob Hope, Will Rogers, Ruth Etting, Ray Bolger, Helen Morgan, Louise Brooks, Marilyn Miller, Ed Wynn, Gilda Gray, Nora Bayes and Sophie Tucker appeared in the shows.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The Ziegfeld Follies were also famous for their display of many beautiful chorus girls, commonly known as Ziegfeld Girls, who "paraded up and down flights of stairs as anything from birds to battleships." They usually wore elaborate costumes by designers such as Erté, Lady Duff-Gordon and Ben Ali Haggin.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The "tableaux vivants" were designed by Ben Ali Haggin from 1917 to 1925. Joseph Urban was the scenic designer for the Follies shows starting in 1915.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: After Ziegfeld's death his widow, actress Billie Burke, authorized use of his name for Ziegfeld Follies in 1934 and 1936 to Jake Shubert, who then produced the Follies. The name was later used by other promoters in New York City, Philadelphia, and again on Broadway, with less connection to the original Follies. These later efforts failed miserably. When the show toured, the 1934 edition was recorded in its entirety, from the overture to play-out music, on a series of 78 rpm discs, which were edited by the record producer David Cunard to form an album of the highlights of the production and which was released as a CD in 1997.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: In 1937, at the 9th Academy Awards, the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film, "The Great Ziegfeld" produced the previous year won the Best Picture (called "Outstanding Production"), starring William Powell as Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. and co-starring Myrna Loy (as Ziegfeld's second wife Billie Burke), Luise Rainer (as Anna Held, which won her an Academy Award for Best Actress), and Frank Morgan as Jack Billings. Featuring numbers by Ray Bolger, Dennis Morgan, Virginia Bruce, and Harriet Hoctor, the film gave a glimpse into what the Follies were really like. The show-stopper was the Irving Berlin-composed "A Pretty Girl Is Like a Melody", which, by itself, cost more to produce than one of Ziegfeld's entire stage shows.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: In 1941 MGM released "Ziegfeld Girl", starring Judy Garland, Lana Turner, Hedy Lamarr, James Stewart and Tony Martin. The film was set in the 1920s. Celebrated numbers from Ziegfeld Revues were recreated, including the famed "Wedding Cake" set which had been used for Metro's earlier film, "The Great Ziegfeld". Judy Garland was filmed on the top of the cake. Charles Winninger, who had performed in the Follies of 1920, appeared as "Ed Gallagher" with Gallagher's real-life partner, Al Shean to recreate the duo's famous song "Mister Gallagher and Mister Shean". According to modern sources, Turner's character was modeled after Ziegfeld Girl Lillian Lorraine, who suffered a drunken fall into the orchestra pit during an extravagant number.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: In 1946 MGM released a third feature film based on Ziegfeld's shows titled "Ziegfeld Follies" with Fred Astaire, Judy Garland, Lena Horne, William Powell (as Ziegfeld), Gene Kelly, Fanny Brice, Red Skelton, Esther Williams, Cyd Charisse, Lucille Ball, Kathryn Grayson, and others performing songs and sketches similar to those from the original Follies. "Ziegfeld Follies" was awarded the "Grand Prix de la Comedie Musicale" at the Cannes Film Festival in 1947, and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (black and white).


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The 1964 stage musical "Funny Girl", starring Barbra Streisand as Fanny Brice, depicts Fanny Brice's success with the Follies. The 1968 Columbia Pictures film of "Funny Girl" also starred Barbra Streisand as Brice and Walter Pidgeon as Florenz Ziegfeld.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The 1912 version of the Ziegfeld Follies included a song entitled "Row, Row, Row", which has been adapted by two football clubs in two different codes as its club song.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: In 1962, cabaret singer Jack Malcolmson, who was performing at the Richmond Football Club (Australian rules) Social Club in Richmond, Melbourne, adapted the song into the Tigers' new club song, "We're From Tigerland", at the request of Richmond committee member Alf Barnett. (Previously, Richmond's club song had been "Onward The Tigers", to the tune of "Waltzing Matilda".) In 2014, Melbourne's "Herald Sun" ranked "We're From Tigerland" as the best club song of any Australian Football League team. Official versions of the song include a 1972 recording by the Fable Singers, who recorded most AFL club songs, and a 2018 recording including Richmond legends Matthew Richardson and Kevin Bartlett.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: "Row, Row, Row" has also been adapted by America Football Club in Rio de Janeiro as its anthem, the "Hino do America", with America supporter and famous Brazilian composer Lamartine Babo helping adapt the song.


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The 1971 Stephen Sondheim musical "Follies" takes place at a reunion of showgirls from the "Weissman Follies", a fictional revue inspired by the "Ziegfeld Follies". In addition to featuring "ghosts" of statuesque showgirls from the heyday of the revues, the musical includes many songs and production numbers that are intended to evoke the types of entertainment typically featured in the "Ziegfeld Follies" and other revues of the period. Examples include parade of showgirls ("Beautiful Girls"); a torch song ("Losing My Mind"); a baggy pants comic song ("The God-Why-Don't-You-Love-Me Blues"); and a novelty song ("Rain on the Roof").


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: In "The Drowsy Chaperone" there is a character by the name of Victor Feldzieg, the producer of "Feldzieg's Follies", a parody of "Ziegfeld Follies".


title: Ziegfeld Follies

text: The TV show, "Boardwalk Empire", portraying crime and corruption in 1920s Atlantic City, New Jersey, features a character that is a former Follies dancer, Lucy Danziger. Lucy is one of Nucky Thompson's girlfriends in the first season of the show. Lucy is portrayed by actress Paz de la Huerta.


title: Jinx

text: A jinx (also jynx), in popular superstition and folklore, is a curse or the attribute of attracting bad or negative luck.


title: Jinx

text: The word ""jynx"" meaning the bird wryneck and sometimes a charm or spell has been in use in English since the seventeenth century. The modern spelling and connotations developed late in the nineteenth century. In the 21st-century press, the suggestion a ship might be "jinxed" was made in connection with two cruise liners after misfortunes, MS "Queen Victoria" and the "Emerald Princess". In the 20th century, the Australian aircraft carrier HMAS "Melbourne" was sometimes said to be jinxed, having twice struck a friendly ship, with considerable loss of life.


title: Jinx

text: The term "jinx" also arises when one does not want to say something positive about an incomplete or inconclusive situation out of fear of "jinxing it". The superstition goes that speaking positively about one's current situation will cause it to be "jinxed", and things will start to go wrong.


title: Jinx

text: Jinx is also the name given to a game between friends (especially children) when two people say the same word or phrase at the same time and they then call "jinx".


title: Jinx

text: The "Online Etymology Dictionary" states that "jynx", meaning a charm or spell, was in usage in English as early as the 1690s. The same source states that "jinx", with that specific spelling, is first attested in American English in 1911. Jynx/jinx is traced to the 17th-century word "jyng", meaning "a spell", and ultimately to the Latin word "iynx", also spelled "jynx", as 'j' and 'i' are the same letter in Latin. The Latin "iynx" came from the Greek name of the wryneck bird, "iunx", associated with sorcery; not only was the bird used in the casting of spells and in divination, but the Ancient Romans and Greeks traced the bird's mythological origins to a sorceress named Iynx, who was transformed into this bird to punish her for a spell cast on the god Zeus.


title: Jinx

text: Barry Popik of the American Dialect Society suggests that the word should be traced back to an American folksong called "Captain Jinks of the Horse Marines" written by William Lingard in 1868.


title: Jinx

text: In 1887, the character Jinks Hoodoo, described as ""a curse to everybody, including himself"" appeared in the musical comedy "Little Puck", and the name was quickly picked up by the press.


title: Jinx

text: One of the uses of the word "jinx" has been in the context of baseball; in the short story "The Jinx" (1910) – later collected in the book "The Jinx: Stories of the Diamond" (1911) – Allen Sangree wrote:


title: Jinx

text: By th' bones of Mike Kelly, I'll do it! Yes, sir, I'll hoodoo th' whole darned club, I will. I'll put a jinx on 'em or my name ain't Dasher, an' that goes!


title: Jinx

text: and later referenced in "Pitching at a Pinch" (1912), Christy Mathewson explained that "a jinx is something which brings bad luck to a ball player." Baseball's most common "jinx" belief is that talking about a pitcher's ongoing no-hitter will cause it to be ended. See also Curse of the Bambino.


title: Skrill

text: Skrill (formerly Moneybookers) is a digital wallet provider established in 2001 which offers a multiple online payment and money transfer services.


title: Skrill

text: Skrill operates in 131 countries with the digital wallet offered in 40 currencies. Customers can transfer money to their Skrill wallet using multiple payment options which include by card, bank transfer, and others. The funds can then be used to pay merchant and users that accepts payments via Skrill or turned into cryptocurrency.


title: Skrill

text: Skrill also has cross-border payments accessible to customers via its remittance service. The service enables customers to send money to a bank account overseas using their bank card.


title: Skrill

text: In 2015, Skrill was acquired by the Paysafe Group along with former competitor Neteller and prepaid payment provider paysafecard.


title: Skrill

text: Skrill is operated by Paysafe Payment Solutions Limited, a company incorporated in Ireland and regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland, for its European regulated activities. Skrill's activities outside the European Economic Area are operated by Skrill Limited – a company incorporated in the United Kingdom and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.


title: Skrill

text: Skrill was originally founded in 2001 in the United Kingdom as Moneybookers, a digital wallet provider. By 2007 it had become established as one of the top three e-payment solution providers in Europe. when it was purchased by Investcorp in March of that year In September 2011, Moneybookers announced that they would rebrand their service as Skrill, completing the rebrand in 2013. As Skrill, they completed the acquisition of Austrian-based prepaid payment method paysafecard in February 2013, before being acquired by CVC Capital Partners for €600 million in August 2013.


title: Skrill

text: In 2015, Skrill was acquired by Optimal Payments, the parent company of rival digital wallet Neteller, for €1.1 billion. During this period, Skrill Group announced in April 2015 that it had completed acquisition of Ukash, a UK-based competitor of paysafecard, which was merged during the same year. In November 2015, Optimal Payments rebranded as Paysafe.


title: Skrill

text: In 2018, Skrill began to extend the amount of services offered to its customers, launching an international money transfer service in February 2018, and a crypto service in July 2018 allowing users to buy and trade cryptocurrencies. This was followed by the launch of Skrill's customer loyalty programme, KNECT, in November 2019 and the extension of the international money transfer service to US customers in June 2020.


title: Skrill

text: In March 2021, Skrill announced a new partnership with the English Premier League football team Leeds United.


title: Skrill

text: In July 2013, English football's National League signed a one-year sponsorship deal with Skrill with the Conference's divisions being known as The Skrill Premier, The Skrill North and The Skrill South.


title: Skrill

text: In 2011, Skrill first sponsored the PokerStars owned European Poker Tour for its eighth season, sponsoring the event again in 2013 for its tenth season.


title: Skrill

text: Skrill is a digital multi-currency wallet provider for handling online payments, making transfers and storing money. It is available to any internet user over the age of 18 with a registered email address.


title: Skrill

text: Supporting over 40 currencies, the service is used to make payments and withdrawals Skrill customers can also use their account to transfer funds from their personal bank account to a bank account overseas, send money using an email address or phone number and the customers full name. Skrill can also be used to buy and trade cryptocurrency.


title: Skrill

text: Customers in certain locations can obtain a Skrill Card linked to their account. The card lets customers use their account balance to pay in stores or online where Skrill is not listed as a payment option. The Skrill Card can also be used to withdraw cash at ATMs.


title: Skrill

text: Customers who meet certain spending thresholds are offered Skrill VIP membership which includes lower fees, higher transaction limits and dedicated support, among others. Skrill offers a loyalty programme called Knect, enabling customers to earn loyalty points that can be exchanged for cash vouchers.


title: Skrill

text: Paysafe, Skrill's parent company, received the Payments Processor of the Year award at the 2019 American Gambling Awards for the Skrill digital wallet and sister product Paysafecard.


title: Skrill

text: In 2019 Paysafe won the ‘Best Online Payments Solution – Consumer’ at the Payments Awards. The accolade recognised Paysafe's suite of online consumer payment methods, including its digital wallets Skrill and Neteller.


title: Skrill

text: In August 2010, Skrill blocked the account operated by WikiLeaks as a donation collection account, citing the organisation's addition to Australian blacklists and American watchlists.


title: Korean idol

text: An idol () refers to a type of celebrity working in the field of K-pop in fandom culture in South Korea, either as a member of a group or as a solo act. K-pop idols are characterized by the highly manufactured star system that they are produced by and debuted under, as well as their tendency to represent a hybridized convergence of visuals, music, fashion, and dance. They usually work for a mainstream entertainment agency and have undergone extensive training in dance, vocals, and foreign language. Idols maintain a carefully curated public image and social media presence, and dedicate significant time and resources to building relationships with fans through concerts and meetups.


title: Korean idol

text: Inspired by the heyday of MTV in the United States, Lee Soo-man set his sights on laying the foundation for the modern Korean pop music industry. He witnessed New Kids on the Block became very popular in Korea in the 1990s.The K-pop trainee system was popularised by Lee Soo-man, the founder of SM Entertainment. Hundreds of candidates each day attend the global auditions held by Korean entertainment agencies to perform for the chance of becoming a trainee. This was part of a concept labelled cultural technology.


title: Korean idol

text: The trainee process lasts for an indefinite period of time, ranging from months to years, and usually involves vocal, dance, and language classes taken while living together with other trainees, who sometimes attend school at the same time, although some trainees drop out of school to focus on their careers.


title: Korean idol

text: Once a trainee enters the system, they are regulated in multiple aspects including personal life, physical condition, and visual appearance. The survival, and training and regulation take precedence over natural talent in the production of Korean idols. The system requires trainees to maintain a "wholesome image" while remaining "private about their lives and thoughts".


title: Korean idol

text: Former trainees have reported that they were required to go through plastic surgeries, such as a Blepharoplasty or a Rhinoplasty, in order to adhere to the acceptable Korean beauty standards. Further criticism towards the trainee system arose regarding the companies' harsh weight restrictions, which often caused trainees to pass out from exhaustion or dehydration in an attempt to reach the required weight for their desired program.


title: Korean idol

text: The investment on a potential trainee could be expensive. In 2012, "The Wall Street Journal" reported that the cost of training one member of Girls' Generation under SM Entertainment was US$3 million.


title: Korean idol

text: When trainees are finally chosen to debut in new groups, they will face a new setting of personalities created by the company to cater the entertainment market. Each member of an idol group has his or her own character to play and therefore an important part of their job duties is to maintain that temperament in any kind of exposure they may get. One way to build the personal image of idol groups is through social media services with content managed by the company to ensure the consistency of these personal characteristics.


title: Korean idol

text: The relationship between Korean idols and their fans can be characterized as "parasocial kin", which means for fans to create a familial connection with their idols rather than just being a "look-from-afar" fan. In some cases, within and outside of fandoms, fans also create familial connections with other fans through similar interests or just to make friends. These interactions can be initiated by the fans, the company, or the idols themselves, where they would most likely still have to go through their company to be approved. Some projects or activities, created by fans for the idols, must also be approved by the venue or the idols’ company to minimize any harm to the idols and fan-participants. Interactions and fan connections can be seen through events like fan meetings, also known as artist engagements, concerts or fansites, and artist cafés. An annual event known as KCon is also a place for fans and artists to interact. The nature of this "parasocial kin" relationship can also be seen in the proactive participation of Korean idol fans in production of idol groups. Even before debut, some trainees would already have their own fans. This leads to the "kinship" starting out early, and building that up is very important for the idol as an artist and the fan as a supporter. Once debuted, fans grow alongside their idols and idol-fan relationships become deeper. If anything happens, fans have their own unique ways to show their attitude and opinion on issues concerning "unfair" actions of management companies. Under this situation, fans often appear to be protecting idols from company mistreatment due to the familial connection built between both sides.


title: Korean idol

text: Several Korean idol groups and solo artists have resented the contracts issued to them by their management companies, claiming that the decade-long contracts are "too long, too restrictive, and gave them almost none of the profits from their success". A director of South Korean entertainment agency DSP Media stated that the company does share profit with the performers, but often little is left over after paying costs. Korean entertainment companies such as S.M Entertainment have been called "factories" for their unique method of mass-producing stars. Members of groups are frequently retired and replaced with fresh trainees when their age or musical inclinations begin to pose a problem. TVXQ charged S.M. Entertainment for unreasonable terms in their contracts with the company in 2009.


title: Korean idol

text: Entertainment companies in Korea use a boot-camp system in grooming their idols. In the case of S.M. Entertainment, the company receives 300,000 applicants in nine countries every year. They possess training facilities in the Gangnam district of Seoul, where recruits then train for years in anticipation of their debut. SM was called the first company to market "bands as brands", and commodify not just the artists' product, but the artists themselves. Such techniques have resulted in mass recognition abroad and helped to spark the Korean Wave, which benefits entertainment companies by broadening their audience. As domestic fandom is not generally enough to produce the profits that these corporations and their players require, branding and marketing of the artist/group has become central to industry profits and thus a defining feature of the genre today.


title: Korean idol

text: According to the South Korean National Tax Service, the average annual earnings for a Korean idol in 2013 were KR₩46.74 million (US$42,000). This was almost double the 2010 figure of KR₩26.97 million (US$25,275), a rise attributable to the global spread of "Hallyu" in recent years.


title: Korean idol

text: The Korean Wave has led to a global rise in interest in Korean idols, along with other aspects of Korean culture including Korean films and K-dramas being exported to other parts of the globe.


title: Korean idol

text: Nonetheless, some fanatical behaviors of K-pop idol fans have led to negative stereotypes of K-pop idols in the public, as well as caused criticism in society.


title: Korean idol

text: There have been criticisms on the sexual objectification of female and male idols across the industry. The problem is exacerbated due to the higher rigidity of gender norms in contemporary Korean society. Korean censorship practices regarding nudity and obscenity may have further reinforced this objectification.


title: Korean idol

text: Korean idols also frequently wear revealing clothes and dance provocatively in music videos as part of the companies' effort to market idols in multiple ways. In some cases, these efforts have resulted in censorship; for example, "Miniskirt" by AOA was deemed sexually inappropriate to public TV shows and programs and was unable to be aired until the group modified their outfits and choreography.


title: Korean idol

text: This sexualization has also led to a notion of conformity in idol acceptance. Idols that do not perform in a sexually appealing way to their targeted demographic have been harassed; for example, Amber Liu has received criticism for her androgynous appearance and disregard for gender norms.


title: Toriko

text: A short film was created by Ufotable for the Jump Super Anime Tour 2009, with another created for the 2010 tour. The manga has also been adapted into an anime television series produced by Toei Animation, which was broadcast in Japan from April 2011 to March 2014. Additionally, Toei developed a 2011 animated 3D short film and a 2013 feature film.


title: Toriko

text: The manga series has been licensed for English release by Viz Media in North America and Madman Entertainment in Australasia. Madman also licensed the anime series in Australasia, while Funimation licensed it in North America. Discotek Media licensed the 2013 film in North America.


title: Toriko

text: The planet of "Toriko" is separated into two parts; the and the . The Human World is where modern civilization exists and occupies just 30% of the planet, the rest is the Gourmet World, which is inhospitable to most humans due to the strength of the wildlife and extreme climate changes. In the , which began five centuries ago at the end of the hundred-year war, the taste and texture of food is extremely important. The (IGO), maintains order and defends civilians from dangerous animals and gourmet criminals. Originally set-up by the United Nations, the IGO is now independent from them and holds more influence as it is composed of 360 nations. They apply a numerical rating from 1 to 100, referred to as , to most ingredients based on the difficulty of acquiring it. The IGO has a group of seven individuals with highly sensitive taste, called the or G7, that are in charge of assigning the star ranking of restaurants and the ranking of chefs.


title: Toriko

text: Individuals known as , who have usually trained their abilities to that of superhuman, are regularly hired by restaurants and the rich to seek high-level ingredients and rare animals. One can also increase their strength by implanting into their bodies. are those who dedicate themselves to protecting ingredients from extinction or exhaustion, and who can also arrest people that partake in the transaction of illegal goods, violate poaching laws, or causes extinction of an entire species.


title: Toriko

text: Toriko is a Gourmet Hunter searching for the most precious foods in the world so he can create his full-course meal. A man with inhuman ability, he utilizes his incredible strength and knowledge of the animal kingdom to capture ferocious, evasive, and rare beasts to further his menu. He is accompanied by the weak and timid chef Komatsu, who, inspired by Toriko's ambition, travels with him to improve his culinary skills and to find rare ingredients. Toriko and his friends often fight against the , who seek to take control of the world's entire food supply and are looking for the highly sought-after ingredient , which the legendary Gourmet Hunter Acacia used to end the war that took place five-hundred years before the series began.


title: Toriko

text: Written and illustrated by Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro, "Toriko" was serialized in the manga anthology "Weekly Shōnen Jump" from May 19, 2008 to November 21, 2016. The 396 individual chapters were collected and published into 43 "tankōbon" volumes by Shueisha between November 4, 2008 and December 31, 2016. Readers and fans of the series were able to submit ideas and designs for monsters and ingredients that appear in the manga.


title: Toriko

text: At San Diego Comic-Con International 2009, Viz Media announced they had licensed "Toriko" for English release. The first collected volume of "Toriko" was released on June 1, 2010, and Viz has released forty-three volumes as of August 7, 2018. The manga premiered in the February 2010 edition of a digital supplement available only to subscribers of Viz's printed "Shonen Jump" magazine. When the printed magazine ended, "Toriko" was one of the launch titles of its digital successor "Weekly Shonen Jump" (originally named "Weekly Shonen Jump Alpha"), starting with chapter 171 in its debut issue on January 30, 2012. The "Toriko" and "One Piece" crossover was sent out free to annual subscribers of the magazine who signed up before April 30, 2012. Madman Entertainment released the first volume in Australasia on July 10, 2010, and have released twenty-six volumes as of April 10, 2015.


title: Toriko

text: Shimabukuro collaborated with Eiichiro Oda, author of "One Piece", for a crossover one-shot of their series titled , which ran in the April 4, 2011 issue of "Weekly Shōnen Jump". There is also a spin-off manga series titled , written by Toshinori Takayama and illustrated by Akitsugu Mizumoto. It was serialized in "Saikyō Jump" from December 3, 2010 to December 2, 2016, with the chapters collected into 9 "tankōbon" between April 4, 2012 and December 31, 2016.


title: Toriko

text: A short film simply titled "Toriko", directed by Mitsuru Obunai and produced by Ufotable, was shown on October 12, 2009 at the Jump Super Anime Tour 2009. It was streamed on "Weekly Shōnen Jump"'s English website one month later. A second short, titled , was shown at the following year's Jump Super Anime Tour on October 23, 2010.


title: Toriko

text: An animated 3D film short, , produced by Toei Animation, was released in Japanese theaters on March 19, 2011 as a double feature with the "One Piece" film "One Piece 3D: Mugiwara Chase".


title: Toriko

text: A feature-length film, , was released in theaters on July 27, 2013. It was licensed in North America by Discotek Media, who released the film on DVD and Blu-ray in 2018.


title: Toriko

text: In December 2010, it was announced that Toei Animation would be adapting "Toriko" into an anime television series in 2011. It is directed by Akifumi Zako and began broadcasting in Japan on Fuji Television on April 3, 2011. It took over "Dragon Ball Kai"'s 9:00 am slot on Sunday in the "Dream 9" time-slot, airing before "One Piece". A cross-over special between "Toriko" and "One Piece", considered episode 1 of "Toriko" and episode 492 of "One Piece", aired as the series' premiere, with another between the two series airing on April 10, 2012, episode 51 of "Toriko" and episode 542 of "One Piece". A two-part hour-long crossover special between "Toriko", "One Piece" and "Dragon Ball Z" aired on Fuji TV on April 7, 2013. Referred to as "Dream 9 Toriko & One Piece & Dragon Ball Z Super Collaboration Special!!", the parts are considered episode 590 of "One Piece" and episode 99 of "Toriko" respectively. The "Toriko" anime ended with episode 147 on March 30, 2014, being replaced by the return of "Dragon Ball Kai".


title: Toriko

text: In 2011, Funimation announced that it licensed "Toriko" for streaming in North America within four days after the Japanese broadcast. It premiered on Hulu and Funimation's official website on April 14. Eventually, the series was rescheduled to stream within three days after the Japanese broadcast. Funimation began releasing the series on DVD with an English dub from January 8, 2013, which abruptly stopped on May 7, 2013, for unknown reasons. Madman Entertainment announced they licensed the anime for Australasia on February 3, 2013.


title: Toriko

text: A book titled was published on October 2, 2009, consisting of an interview with Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro, the 2007 "Toriko" one-shot, and other unrelated one-shots by the author. The guidebook was released on November 4, 2011 and includes the original one-shot for "Toriko" from 2002 and the "One Piece" crossover chapter. A third companion book, listed as simply the 29.5 volume of "Toriko", was released on June 4, 2014.


title: Toriko

text: The television show "Sakiyomi Jum-Bang!" created a Vomic, a portmanteau of voice and comic, of the first couple chapters of "Toriko" in 2009. The segment has voice actors act over a manga series as the pages are shown on screen, Toriko was played by Takashi Kondō and Komatsu by Daisuke Kishio.


title: Toriko

text: There have been five video games created by Namco Bandai based on "Toriko". Two for the PlayStation Portable, "Toriko: Gourmet Survival!" (2011) and "Toriko: Gourmet Survival! 2" (2012), and three for the Nintendo 3DS, "Toriko: Gourmet Monsters!" (2012), "Toriko: Gourmet Battle!" (2013) and "Toriko: Ultimate Survival" (2013). Toriko and Zebra are also playable characters in the "Weekly Shōnen Jump" crossover PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita fighting game "J-Stars Victory VS".


title: Toriko

text: In 2009, "Toriko" was nominated for the second annual Manga Taishō award. The first and second collected "tankōbon" volumes, both released on November 4, 2008, were ranked 10th and 11th respectively on Oricon's manga chart for their first week, with nearly 70,000 and 67,000 copies sold. It was the 10th best-selling manga series during the first half of 2011, with over 1.8 million copies sold. "Toriko" was the eleventh best-selling manga series of 2012, with over 3 million copies sold, and the thirteenth best of 2013, selling 2.8 million. In 2011, Namco Bandai Games estimated "Toriko" would bring US$25.6 million in toys for the 2012 fiscal year. The series had 18 million volumes in circulation as of November 2013, and over 20 million volumes in circulation as of June 2014. As of November 2020, the manga had over 25 million copies in circulation.


title: Toriko

text: "Otaku USA"'s Joseph Luster called "Toriko" "an absolute feast for fans of beasts", not able to tell "whether Shimabukuro just comes up with everything on the spot or if it's all meticulously planned out", and said that the series' charm is "how it effortlessly applies classic shonen tropes to such an outlandish world." However, he commented that "The formula of "Toriko" is apparent right from the start in true shonen fashion[...] tougher and tougher creatures will quickly follow." Deb Aoki writing for About.com also praised the imaginative beasts and monsters of the series, as well as the occasional informational bits on the true science of foods, but called the art "grotesquely goofy."


title: Toriko

text: Lissa Pattillo of Anime News Network (ANN) called "Toriko" an "in-your-face action story riding on the back of a gastronomic fetch-quest." She compared Toriko's design to that of characters from "Dragon Ball" and "Fist of the North Star", and suggested this might deter some readers. ANN's Rebecca Silverman stated that "Shimabukuro has clearly devoted time and thought to crafting the story's world, as complex creatures, animal profiles, and distinctive landscapes attest.", and called his art an "odd mix of old school "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure"-style manly men and newer "One Piece"-style chibis." Carlo Santos, also for ANN, praised the action, saying "For over-the-top action, it's hard to beat the thrill of Toriko punching out a swarm of giant insects, or the creep factor of a villain who literally wears another human's skin.", and called the art one of the series' highlights. Reviewing the anime, Santos said "Fans will know what to expect in each adventure: ravenous strongmen flexing their superpowers, ferocious foes being slaughtered by said strongmen, and a rich, imaginative world full of impossibly delicious foods. But the simplicity of Toriko is also its downfall: there are no clever twists in store, the characters don't develop at all, either personally or interpersonally, and even the most calculating villains are just mindless targets waiting to be knocked down one by one. The on-again, off-again animation also does a disservice to the bright colors and creative designs of the series."


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Operation Car Wash () was a criminal investigation by the Federal Police of Brazil's Curitiba branch. It began in March 2014 and was initially headed by investigative judge Sérgio Moro, and in 2019 by Judge . It has resulted in more than a thousand warrants of various types. According to the Operation Car Wash task force, investigations implicate administrative members of the state-owned oil company Petrobras, politicians from Brazil's largest parties (including presidents of the Republic), presidents of the Chamber of Deputies and the Federal Senate, state governors, and businessmen from large Brazilian companies. The Federal Police consider it the largest corruption investigation in the country's history. The taskforce was officially disbanded on 1 February 2021.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Originally a money laundering investigation, it expanded to cover allegations of corruption at Petrobras, where executives allegedly accepted bribes in return for awarding contracts to construction firms at inflated prices. This criminal scheme was initially known as (Portuguese for "big oil") because of the Petrobras scandal. The investigation is called "Operation Car Wash" because it was first uncovered at a car wash in Brasília. The aim of the investigation was to ascertain the extent of a money laundering scheme, estimated by the Regional Superintendent of the Federal Police of Paraná State in 2015 at (US$– billion), largely through the embezzlement of Petrobras funds. It has included more than a thousand warrants for search and seizure, temporary and preventive detention, and plea bargaining, against business figures and politicians in numerous parties. At least eleven other countries were involved, mostly in Latin America, and the Brazilian company Odebrecht was deeply implicated.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Investigators indicted and jailed some well-known politicians, including former presidents Fernando Collor de Mello, Michel Temer and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The scandal seemed to challenge the impunity of politicians and business leaders and the structural corruption in the political and economic system that had prevailed until then. This was initially thought possible because of the independence of the judiciary. Documents leaked in June 2019 to Glenn Greenwald at "The Intercept" suggest that Moro may have been partial in his decisions, passing on "advice, investigative leads, and inside information to the prosecutors" to "prevent Lula's Workers' Party from winning" the 2018 Brazilian general election. Several top jurisprudence authorities and experts in the world have reacted to the leaks by describing former president Lula as a political prisoner and calling for his release. Lula was ultimately released on 8 November 2019, and Brazil's Supreme Court ruled Moro was biased against Lula in March 2021. Lula went on to win the 2022 Brazilian general election.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: The initial accusation came from businessman Hermes Magnus in 2008, who reported an attempt to launder money through his company, Dunel Indústria e Comércio, a manufacturer of electronic components. Ensuing investigations culminated in the identification of four large criminal rings, headed by: , Alberto Youssef, , and Raul Henrique Srour.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Investigation at first focused on the four black-market currency dealers and improper payments to Alberto Youssef by companies who had won contracts at Petrobras' Abreu and Lima refinery. After they discovered that "doleiro" (black-market dealer) Alberto Youssef had acquired a Range Rover Evoque for , a former director of Petrobras, the investigation expanded nationwide. Once he was charged, Costa agreed to provide evidence to the investigation. A newly adopted law introduced 'rewarded collaboration' () a type of plea bargaining involving sentence reductions for defendants who cooperate in investigations. Costa's deposition showed which political parties controlled Petrobras.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: It also led to a wave of arrests. Fernando Soares, also known as "Fernando Baiano," a businessman and lobbyist, was allegedly the connection between major Brazilian construction firms and the government formed by the Workers’ Party (PT) and Brazilian Democratic Movement (PMDB). After Costa and Soares, many others agreed to collaborate with the prosecution; between 2014 and February 2016, the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office () filed 37 criminal charges against 179 people, mostly politicians and businessmen. In December 2017, nearly three hundred people had been accused of crimes in the scandal. After Marcelo Odebrecht, grandson of the company founder, was sentenced to 19 years in prison, he and other Odebrecht executives were, due to the sentence reduction incentives of the 'rewarded collaboration' law, willing to act as witnesses and to give information about the broader corruption scheme. Odebrecht had a secret branch used to make illegal payments in several Latin American countries, from Hugo Chávez in Venezuela to Ricardo Martinelli in Panama. Odebrecht was given fines totalling $2.6 billion by authorities of Brazil, Switzerland, and the United States after the company admitted bribing officials in twelve countries with some $788 million.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Costa and Youssef entered into a plea bargain with prosecutors and the scope of the investigation widened to nine major Brazilian construction firms: Camargo Correa, , , Odebrecht, , , , , and ,


title: Operation Car Wash

text: as well as politicians involved with Petrobras. Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, who chaired the board of Petrobras from 2003 to 2010, denied knowledge of any wrongdoing. The Brazilian Supreme Court authorized the investigation of 48 current and former legislators, including former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, in March 2016. Eduardo Cunha, president of the Chamber of Deputies from 2015 to 2016, was convicted of taking approximately $40 million in bribes and hiding funds in secret bank accounts and sentenced to 15 years in prison.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 19 January 2017, a small plane carrying Supreme Court Justice Teori Zavascki crashed into the sea near the tourist city of Paraty in the state of Rio de Janeiro, killing the magistrate and four other people. Zavascki had been handling Operation Car Wash corruption trials.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: A "Miami Herald" report noted in September 2017 that when Operation Car Wash began in 2014, fewer than 10,000 electronic monitoring bracelets were in use to enforce home detention sentences; by September 2017 the number had ballooned to more than 24,000.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Petrobras delayed reporting its annual financial results for 2014, and in April 2015 released "audited financial statements" showing $2.1 billion in bribes and a total of almost $17 billion in write-downs due to graft and overvalued assets, which the company characterized as a "conservative" estimate. Had the report been delayed by another week, Petrobras bondholders would have had the right to demand early repayment. Petrobras also suspended dividend payments for 2015. Due in part to the impact of the scandal, as well as to its high debt burden and the low price of oil, Petrobras was also forced to cut capital expenditures and announced it would sell $13.7 billion in assets over the following two years.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: The conviction of Aldemir Bendine, Petrobras' former CEO, on corruption charges was annulled by the Supreme Federal Court in 2019 due to objections to the trial procedure.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 8 March 2016, Marcelo Odebrecht, CEO of Odebrecht and grandson of the company's founder, was sentenced to 19 years in prison after being convicted of paying more than $30 million in bribes to Petrobras executives.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In April 2018, former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva – after having been sentenced for passive corruption and money laundering in relation to a luxury apartment in Guarujá received from Grupo OAS – entered prison in Curitiba to serve his 12 year sentence. However, illegal communications between Car Wash prosecutors and its lead judge came to light in mid-2019, in which the parties suggested that their prosecutorial motive was to prevent Lula's re-election. There were calls to release the former president (see Leaked conversations below). As a result, he was released on 8 November 2019 after a supreme court ruling.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 3 July 2018, failed Brazilian billionaire Eike Batista was convicted of bribing former Rio de Janeiro governor Sérgio Cabral for state government contracts, having paid Cabral US$16.6 million, and was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Emílio Odebrecht said in a written report to the Attorney General of Brazil's Office (PGR) that he discussed donations to Worker's Party's (PT) campaigns with former PT president Lula. Financial support, according to the contractor, came even before Lula became president. Marcelo Odebrecht said that the "Amigo" account for former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, was created in 2010 with a balance of R$40 million. In his statement, he said he gave the money to Antonio Palocci, former Finance Minister and Rousseff's chief of staff, who had been the PT contact with Odebrecht since the prior administration, when and Pedro Novis had handled payments. He said that in the middle of 2010, at the end of the Lula administration, he knew that Dilma Rousseff was going to take over and that the balance of the account would be "managed by her at her request". Thus, he set apart a sum that would be destined exclusively for the former president. He said that Lula never asked directly for donations and that everything was done through Palocci, but it became clear that the donations were ultimately for the former president.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 4 March 2016, Lula was questioned for three hours as part of the fraud inquiry into the dealings of Petrobras, and his house raided by federal police agents. Lula, who left office in 2011, denied allegations of corruption. Police said they had evidence that Lula, 70, had received kickbacks. Lula's institute called actions against him "arbitrary, illegal and unjustifiable", since he had been cooperating with the investigations. Lula, convicted of accepting bribes worth 3.7 million reals (1.2 million dollars), was sentenced on 12 July to nine and a half years in prison. He appealed the sentence to the Federal Regional Court-4, which increased his sentence to twelve years and a month. On 5 April 2018, Moro ordered his imprisonment, and he surrendered two days later.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: The plea bargain testimony by Odebrecht Engenharia Industrial's former president Márcio Faria da Silva said that on 15 July 2010, President Michel Temer led a meeting about an agreement to pay approximately US$40 million in bribes to the Brazilian Democratic Movement in exchange for contracts with the international Board of Directors of Petrobras. According to Faria, Temer, who at the time was a candidate for vice-president on Dilma Rousseff's ticket, delegated to Eduardo Cunha and Henrique Eduardo Alves, then deputies and present at the meeting, the task of making the payments which represented 5% of the contract's value. The meeting took place in Temer's political office in São Paulo. He did not discuss any details about the financial agreement, limiting himself to trivial conversations about politics.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Marcelo Odebrecht said in his plea bargain testimony that the Social Democratic (PSDB) party, led by Senator Aécio Neves (PSDB-MG), received at least 50 million reals in exchange for favoring the business contractor in energy deals. He said that improper payments were made due to business deals with two state companies: Furnas and Cemig. The first federal investigation was under the leadership of , an ally of Neves, in the early years of the Lula administration (2003–2005). The second state-run investigation was influenced by Aécio during the period when the PSDB was in power in Minas Gerais (2003–2014).


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Odebrecht also discussed family involvement. In eleven cases under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Federal Court (STF), investigations implicate father and son, husband and wife, or siblings. The president of the Chamber, Rodrigo Maia (DEM-RJ), has the most family members implicated. Maia was charged in the same investigation as his father, councilor and former mayor Cesar Maia. According to the Odebrecht testimony, Rodrigo obtained cash resources both for his father's campaign and also for himself. The Brazilian Democratic Movement leader of the Senate, Renan Calheiros (AL), was charged along with his son, the governor of Alagoas Renan Filho (PMDB), in two inquiries. They allegedly participated in an agreement to divert resources from work on the Canal do Sertão and also received resources in the form of a slush fund they refer to as a "caixa 2". In the case of the father, two other inquiries are ongoing.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: The governor of Rio Grande do Norte, Robinson Faria (PSD), was charged along with his son, federal deputy Fábio Faria (PSD-RN). The two allegedly received contributions through a slush fund in return for defending Odebrecht Ambiental's interests in the area of basic sanitation in the state. The president of the PMDB, Senator Romero Jucá (RR), and his son Rodrigo Jucá both figured in one of the inquiries. The father helped Odebrecht negotiate a provisional measure and obtained an electoral donation of 150,000 reals for his son. Romero Jucá was also charged in four other inquiries. A father asking for a contribution for a son was also why former minister José Dirceu was investigated along with , federal deputy. The father was able to raise the money for Zeca in exchange for the acting for Odebrecht interests in the government.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In the Chamber of Deputies, the sons Antônio Britto (PSD-BA) and (PMDB-GO) were also investigated along with their parents, (PTB-BA) and Maguito Vilela (PMDB-GO). Senator Kátia Abreu (PMDB-TO) was accompanied by her husband Moisés Pinto Gomes, who brokered cash payments for her in 2014. Senator Vanessa Grazziotin (PCdoB-AM) is accompanied by her husband, , said to have asked for slush fund cash donations for her. Federal Deputy (PT-SC) also requested slush funds for the Blumenau municipal campaign in 2012 of his wife, state deputy Ana Paula Lima (PT-SC). The Viana brothers of Acre, Governor Tião Viana (PT) and Senator Jorge Viana (PT), were also charged together. Jorge asked for and Odebrecht paid R$1.5 million in cash two for Tião's campaign in 2010.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Marcelo Odebrecht detailed the payment of 100 million reals for the 2014 presidential campaign of Rousseff, requested by then-minister Guido Mantega. The payment was allegedly tied to the approval of Provisional Measure 613, which assisted Braskem, an arm of Odebrecht, and dealt with the Special Chemical Industry Regime (Reiq), and tax incentives to stimulate ethanol production. The former executive said that this was not a direct exchange of favors as was, he says, the negotiation of the 50 million reals passed on to the government for the creation of Crisis Refis to solve the crisis caused by zero ("Industrialized Products Tax"; IPI), but that the then-minister knew that he was talking to someone who had given money to . The former executive said he often met Mantega and they both brought their lawsuits to meetings. According to him, the former minister had already asked the executive to "resolve issues" pending with publicist João Santana and the then-treasurer of the PT, . The advertiser always feared political campaigns because of the risk of getting into debt at the end. That's why he made advance payment on the account, to make it quiet.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Former Odebrecht Institutional Relations Director stated that former minister , when he became treasurer of Dilma Rousseff's campaign in 2014, asked for two donations from five parties to support the Force of the People, at 7 million reals each. The PCdoB, PDT, PRB, PROS, and PP received the illegal donations, according to the former director of Odebrecht. Together, these parties gave three minutes and twenty seconds of television time to the presidential ticket. In return, said the former director, the contractor hoped to obtain "quid pro quos" from the elected government. The informant detailed meetings with the politicians in his office and cash deliveries, always made in kind by messengers to hotel rooms or flats. Marcelo Odebrecht said he met with Silva a few times to handle the money for the parties that would join the coalition in 2014. The former Dilma minister allegedly instructed Alencar to directly seek party leaders to pass on the values. He clarified that the interest of the PT was the increase of the time of electoral time in the television, being in a total of eleven minutes and twenty-four seconds, being a third of that time coming from the parties purchased.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: During the many years it has been going on, the Car Wash scandal has expanded from its original roots in money laundering, to encompass wider corruption in Brazil, and outside its borders in at least ten other countries, even beyond South America.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 5 November 2017, the Paradise Papers, a set of confidential electronic documents relating to offshore investment, revealed that Odebrecht used at least one offshore company as a vehicle for paying the bribes uncovered through the Operation Car Wash investigation. Marcelo Odebrecht, his father Emílio Odebrecht and his brother Maurício Odebrecht are all mentioned in the Paradise Papers.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: During the governments of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Néstor Kirchner, Odebrecht was awarded overvalued contracts worth at least US$9.6 billion.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In Mexico, the former director of the state-owned oil company Pemex, a close ally of President Peña Nieto, is suspected of receiving US$10 million in bribes from Odebrecht.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Ramón Fonseca Mora, president of Panama's Panameñista Party, was dismissed in March 2016 due to his involvement in the scandal. The Panama Papers resulted from a hack of his lawfirm's computer systems.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Fonseca and his business partner Jürgen Mossack were arrested and jailed in February 2017. They were released in April 2017 after a judge ruled they had cooperated with the investigation and ordered them each to pay $500,000 in bail.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: During the Peruvian presidential election in February 2016, a report by the Brazilian Federal Police implicated President Ollanta Humala in bribery by Odebrecht for public works contracts. President Humala denied the charge and has avoided questions from the media on this matter. In July 2017, Humala and his wife were arrested and held in pre-trial detention following investigations into his involvement in the Odebrecht scandal. Investigations revealed that Brazilian president Lula da Silva pressured Odebrecht to pay millions of dollars toward Humala's presidential campaign.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In December 2017 Peru's President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski appeared before Congress to defend himself against impeachment over allegations of covering up illegal payments of $782,000 from Odebrecht to Kuczynski's company Westfield Group Capital Ltd. Keiko Fujimori, who had lost the 2016 presidential elections to Kuczynski by a margin of fewer than 50,000 votes, was championing impeachment; her party had already forced out five government ministers. Fujimori herself was later implicated in the Odebrecht scandal over alleged campaign contributions and on 31 October 2018 a judge sent her to 36 months of pretrial detention. Kuczynski resigned the Presidency on 21 March 2018 and was sent to pretrial detention on 10 April 2019.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 17 April 2019, Alan García, a former President of Peru who was also implicated in the scandal, died by suicide from shooting himself in the head while police attempted to arrest him.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Former president Alejandro Toledo (2001–2006) was also implicated in the bribery scandal, and was arrested in Redwood City, California in July 2019 for allegedly taking bribes in connection with a highway construction contract.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In late 2017, Euzenando Prazeres de Azevedo, president of Constructora Odebrecht in Venezuela, told investigators that Odebrecht had made $35 million in campaign contributions to Nicolas Maduro's 2013 presidential campaign in return for Odebrecht projects receiving priority in Venezuela, that Americo Mata, Maduro's campaign manager, initially asked for $50 million for Maduro, settled in the end for $35 million. In May 2018, Transparency International showed that only 9 of 33 projects started by Odebrecht in Venezuela between 1999 and 2013 were completed.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: One of Singapore's prominent government linked company (Keppel Corp) is also implicated in the Petrobras' corruption scandals. Information of involvement is confirmed in the plea bargain Keppel Corporation reached with US DOJ. Keppel and US DOJ however failed to release the name of all people involved in this corruption scandal. Details is available on the US DOJ site here.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 9 June 2019, Greenwald and other journalists from investigative journalism magazine "The Intercept Brasil" started publishing several leaked chat messages exchanged via the Telegram app between members of the Brazilian judiciary system. Some, including then Car Wash judge and former Minister of Justice Sérgio Moro and lead prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol are accused of violating legal procedure during the investigation, trial and arrest of former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva allegedly for the sake of preventing him to run for a third term in the 2018 Brazilian general election, among other crimes. Other news agencies, such as "Folha de São Paulo" and "Veja" confirmed the authenticity of the messages and worked in partnership with "The Intercept Brasil" to sort the rest of the material in their possession before releasing it.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: On 23 July, Brazilian Federal Police made public that they had arrested and were investigating a hacker from Araraquara, Walter Delgatti Neto, for breaking into the authorities' Telegram accounts. Neto confessed to the hack and to having given the chat logs to Greenwald. Police said the attack had been perpetrated by abusing Telegram's phone number verification and exploiting vulnerabilities in voicemail technology in use in Brazil using a spoofed phone number. The Intercept neither confirmed nor denied that Neto was their source and cited provisions for freedom of the press in the 1988 Brazilian Constitution.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Greenwald has faced death threats and homophobic harassment from supporters of President Jair Bolsonaro due to his reporting on the Telegram messages. A "New York Times" profile of Greenwald and his husband David Miranda, a left-wing congressman, said the couple have become targets of homophobia from Bolsonaro supporters as a result of the reporting. "The Washington Post" reported that Greenwald had been targeted with tax investigations by the Bolsonaro government as retaliation for the reporting, while AP called Greenwald's reporting the first test case for a free press in the Bolsonaro era.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: "The Guardian," reporting on retaliation against Greenwald from the Bolsonaro government and its supporters, said the articles published by Greenwald and "The Intercept" "have had an explosive impact on Brazilian politics and dominated headlines for weeks," adding that the exposés "appeared to show prosecutors in the sweeping Operation Car Wash corruption inquiry colluding with Sérgio Moro, the judge who became a hero in Brazil for jailing powerful businessmen, middlemen and politicians."


title: Operation Car Wash

text: After Bolsonaro explicitly threatened to imprison Greenwald for this reporting, Supreme Court justice Gilmar Mendes ruled that any investigation of Greenwald in connection with the reporting would be illegal under Brazilian constitution, calling freedom of the press a "pillar of democracy".


title: Operation Car Wash

text: Glenn Greenwald reported that the leaked file is bigger than the one in the Snowden case. Fernando Haddad considered the leaks to have potential to become the "greatest institutional scandal in the history of the Brazilian republic".


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In response to the leaks, several top jurisprudence authorities and experts in Europe and the Americas, such as Susan Rose-Ackerman (praised by Car Wash prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol as the world's top corruption expert), Bruce Ackerman, and Luigi Ferrajoli, voiced their shock at the conduct of the Brazilian authorities and described former President Lula as a political prisoner, calling for his release.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: In March 2020, "the Intercept" reported that Brazilian prosecutors had secretly collaborated with the US Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation in a manner "that may have violated international legal treaties and Brazilian law". The Brazilian Ministry of Justice had not been informed; making this collaboration illegal. They also found that money paid by Brazilian companies in the US were funnelled back into Brazil; chief prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol said he would use part of this sum to set up an "independent fund to fight corruption". This attempt was then deemed unconstitutional by Brazil's Supreme Court. In February 2021, "the Wire" reported that Mr. Dallagnol had called Lula da Silva's arrest “a gift from the CIA”, and that Leslie Backschies, the head of the US FBI’s international corruption unit, had said that her agency had “toppled Presidents in Brazil”.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: As of September 2020, there were fears that political forces were about to bring an end to Operation Car Wash, according to prosecutors in Brazil. Chief prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol said, "Today there is a very strong alignment of political forces against the Lava Jato operation. Much more than [just] an operation, the Brazilian effort against corruption itself is at risk." One of the reasons Jair Bolsonaro was elected president in 2018, was because of his promises to attack corruption, but since he and his family members became embroiled, he has cooled on it. Bolsonaro's attorney general Augusto Aras complained that the investigations went too far, and were biased politically, and campaigned against it, gaining support from Bolsonaro family members such as son Flavio who was caught up in it. Dallagnol claimed that the slow down and efforts to stop the investigations were because the investigations were getting close to revealing corruption at the highest levels. Other branches of government also oppose the investigations, including Congress and the Supreme Court, which have been targets, as well as political parties. Analysts see a concerted effort to back down from aggressive anti-corruption efforts in Brazil.


title: Operation Car Wash

text: There are two dramatizations of Operation Car Wash. One is the 2017 film "" ("Federal Police: The Law Is for Everyone"), directed by Marcelo Antunez (2017), and the other is the Netflix series "The Mechanism". The Netflix documentary and Academy Award nominee "The Edge of Democracy", by Petra Costa (2019), about the political crisis between 2016 and the election of Jair Bolsonaro, in 2018, has Operation Car Wash as an important element as well.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: The Molossus (; also known as the Molossian hound, Epirus mastiff) was a breed of dog from Ancient Greece.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: The Molossus were dogs that were kept by the ancient Greek tribe and kingdom of the Molossians, who inhabited the region of Epirus.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: The Molossus were famous throughout the ancient world for their size and ferocity and were frequently mentioned in ancient literature, including the writings of Aristophanes, Aristotle, Grattius, Horace, Lucan, Lucretius, Martial, Nemesianus, Oppian of Apamea, Plautus, Seneca, Statius, Ovid, and Virgil. The Molossians issued silver coinage with an image of a Molossus as their emblem.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: It is sometimes stated in books and magazines, particularly in Continental Europe and North America, that all mastiff-type dogs are descended from the Molossus. This theory states that the breed's progenitors arrived in Molossia from Asia and were eventually discovered by the Romans who employed large numbers as guards for the Roman Army; this theory speculates that the various mastiff breeds found throughout Europe descend from dogs left behind by the Romans. This theory has been questioned by many experts who state it relies on guesswork and lacks historical evidence, and that mastiffs likely developed elsewhere.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: Another story is that in the course of his military conquests Alexander the Great discovered some giant dogs in Asia that impressed him so much that he sent some home; as the son of a Molossi princess these dogs became associated with his mother's people and that it was from these dogs that all mastiffs descend.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: It seems most likely that Molossi kept two distinct types of dogs, one a hunting dog with a broad muzzle which resembled something in between a Great Dane and a heavily built Saluki, the other a large livestock guardian dog. Aristotle in his "History of Animals" wrote "In the Molossian race of dogs, those employed in hunting differ in no respect from other dogs; while those employed in following sheep are larger and more fierce in their attack on wild beasts." He also added that dogs that are born of a mixed breed between the Molossian and the Laconian dogs are remarkable for courage and endurance of hard labour.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: According to Greek mythology the goddess Artemis gave to Procris a dog, Laelaps, that never failed to catch its prey and from this dog derived the Molossian and Laconian hounds.


title: Molossus (dog)

text: A number of modern kennel clubs, including the Fédération Cynologique Internationale, group the distinct mastiffs with livestock guardian dogs as a single type they call "molossoid". It has been theorised that this confusion is due to mistranslations of ancient texts and assumptions based solely on size.


title: Stalag 17

text: Stalag 17 is a 1953 American war film which tells the story of a group of American airmen confined with 40,000 prisoners in a World War II German prisoner of war camp "somewhere on the Danube". Their compound holds 630 Sergeants representing many different air crew positions, but the film focuses on one particular barrack, where the men come to suspect that one of their number is an informant. The film was directed and produced by Billy Wilder who, with Edwin Blum, adapted the screenplay from the Broadway play of the same name. The play was written by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski, based on their experiences as prisoners in Stalag 17B in Austria.


title: Stalag 17

text: The film stars William Holden in an Oscar-winning performance, along with Don Taylor, Robert Strauss, Harvey Lembeck, Peter Graves, Neville Brand, Richard Erdman, Michael Moore, Sig Ruman, and Otto Preminger. Strauss and Lembeck appeared in the original Broadway production.


title: Stalag 17

text: In a German prisoner-of-war camp named "Stalag 17", one of its compounds holds 630 American airmen (all of whom are sergeants) and is overseen by camp warden Oberst von Scherbach.


title: Stalag 17

text: In December 1944, the men of Barracks 4—led by appointed barracks chief "Hoffy" Hoffman and security officer Frank Price—arrange for the escape of fellow airmen Manfredi and Johnson. The pair are shot dead in the attempt, and the men believe they were betrayed by an informant. Suspicion falls on J.J. Sefton, an enterprising cynic who barters openly with the German guards for various luxuries. He also creates profitable ventures that distract from the mundanity of camp life: from organizing rat races for gambling, to an improvised distillery for brewing alcohol, to a makeshift telescope to spy on the Russian women from a neighboring compound. Clarence "Cookie" Cook, who narrates the story, serves as Sefton's underling.


title: Stalag 17

text: The men of Barracks 4 do their best to keep sane, which includes enduring the antics of barracks clowns "Animal" Kuzawa and Harry Shapiro and smuggling in a radio to listen in on war news. Their jovial supervisor, Feldwebel Schulz, secretly retrieves hidden messages from a hollow black queen on the chessboard, and straightens the looped cord of a dangling light bulb, which serves as a signal between himself and the informant. Just before Christmas, a recently captured Lieutenant Dunbar is assigned to Barracks 4 until he can be sent to an officers' camp. Sgt. Bagradian, who accompanies Dunbar, reveals that Dunbar rigged a time bomb in transit and blew up a munitions train. Sefton recognizes Dunbar from officers school and believes that he only passed because of his rich family, creating tension between them.


title: Stalag 17

text: Schulz announces that an inspector from the Geneva Convention will arrive, and Sefton bribes the guards to let him spend the day with the Russian women. The radio is later confiscated by Schulz. Concluding that Sefton was rewarded for revealing the radio, the men confront him when he returns, but Sefton denies he was responsible. Von Scherbach interrupts to arrest Dunbar as a saboteur; the men blame Sefton again and brutally beat him.


title: Stalag 17

text: The next day, the inspector from Geneva arrives with Red Cross parcels—including 2,000 ping-pong balls, which the prisoners use to create smoke bombs. The inspector is then told about Dunbar, and he warns von Scherbach that Dunbar cannot be convicted without proof, lest there be war crime trials. Von Scherbach hands Schulz a black queen to be delivered to the informant. During the Christmas Eve celebrations, Price stealthily switches out the black queen, reads the hidden message, and then resets the signal. Sefton, recovering from his beating, notices the signal afterwards and becomes suspicious. Price gets Bagradian to reveal the recipe of Dunbar's time bomb: a lit cigarette tucked into a matchbook. That night, an air raid siren forces the men to evacuate. Sefton hides and witnesses Price speaking German to Schulz and demonstrating the time bomb as evidence against Dunbar.


title: Stalag 17

text: On Christmas Day, the SS arrive to take Dunbar to Berlin. While Hoffy has Price guard Sefton (who is still believed to be the informant), he gathers the men to rescue Dunbar. A riot and an ignited smoke bomb distract the guards, and Dunbar is taken to hide in a latrine's water tower until nightfall. After von Scherbach threatens to raze the camp, the men of Barracks 4 decide that one of them must help Dunbar escape. Price volunteers, and Sefton finally accuses him of being a German spy. Sefton interrogates Price and reveals the messaging system he used; the men are convinced and Price tries to flee, but he is quickly restrained.


title: Stalag 17

text: Anticipating a generous reward, Sefton decides to rescue Dunbar. He retrieves the Lieutenant, and the prisoners throw Price out of the barracks with cans tied to his leg. Price attracts the spotlights of every guard tower and is gunned down; Sefton and Dunbar escape amidst the chaos. The prisoners return to their bunks, and Cookie whistles "When Johnny Comes Marching Home".


title: Stalag 17

text: The film was adapted by Wilder and Edwin Blum from the Broadway play by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski, which was based on their experiences as prisoners in Stalag 17B in Austria. Trzcinski appears in the film as a prisoner.


title: Stalag 17

text: The play was directed by José Ferrer and was the Broadway debut of John Ericson, as Sefton. It was presented first at the Edwin Burke Memorial Theater of The Lambs, a theatrical club, on March 11, 1951 (staged by the authors). It began its Broadway run in May 1951 and continued for 472 performances. The Sefton character was loosely based on Joe Palazzo, a flier in Trzcinski's prisoner-of-war barracks. The script was rewritten extensively by Wilder and Blum.


title: Stalag 17

text: The prison camp set was built on the John Show Ranch in Woodland Hills, on the southwestern edge of the San Fernando Valley. The shoot began in February 1952, during the rainy season in California, providing plenty of mud for the camp compound. It is now the location of a meetinghouse of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.


title: Stalag 17

text: The film was shot in chronological order, an unusual practice because that method is usually much more expensive and time-consuming. In a featurette released later, members of the cast said that they themselves did not know the identity of the informant until the last three days of shooting.


title: Stalag 17

text: Peter Graves recalled that the film was held back from release for over a year because Paramount Pictures did not believe that anyone would be interested in seeing a film about prisoners of war. The 1953 release of American POWs from the Korean War led Paramount to release it on an exploitation angle.


title: Stalag 17

text: By January 1954, "Stalag 17" had earned $3.3 million in theatrical rentals in the United States and Canada.


title: Stalag 17

text: Bosley Crowther praised the film, calling it "cracker jack movie entertainment". He praised Wilder and Edwin Blum for having improved the play, and applauded William Holden's performance. "Harrison's Reports" wrote, "Thanks to the brilliant handling of the subject matter by producer-director Billy Wilder, and to the fine acting of the entire cast, the picture has been fashioned into a first-rate entertainment". William Brogdon of "Variety" felt "The raucous flavor will set well with male viewers and even the distaffers should find it acceptable entertainment most of the time. William Holden's name heads the good cast...although the lengthy two-hour running time makes for a booking awkwardness when it reaches the regular dual-bill situations in the general runs." Philip K. Scheuer of the "Los Angeles Times" wrote Wilder "preserved [the] essential humor and tragedy with no dulling of its corrosive edges, though he has cleaned it up in both language and situations. Lustiness has pretty much replaced bawdiness, and while the fun may not yet be all in the "good clean" class, it is at least expressed in the accepted and more palatable Hollywood medium of hard-boiled comedy."


title: Stalag 17

text: In 2006, film critic James Berardinelli stated that "among the 20th century directors, few were more versatile than Billy Wilder". On Rotten Tomatoes the film has a 91% rating based on 74 reviews, with an average rating of 8.40/10. The website's consensus states: ""Stalag 17" survives the jump from stage to screen with flying colors, thanks to Billy Wilder's typically sterling direction and a darkly funny script." On Metacritic it has a score of 84% based on reviews from 15 critics.


title: Stalag 17

text: William Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role. His acceptance speech is one of the shortest on record ("thank you, thank you"); the TV broadcast had a strict cutoff time which forced Holden's quick remarks. The frustrated Holden personally paid for advertisements in the Hollywood trade publications to thank everyone he wanted to on Oscar night. He also remarked that he felt that either Burt Lancaster or Montgomery Clift should have won the Best Actor Oscar for "From Here to Eternity" instead of him. It is said that he felt he was given the award as consolation for not having previously won it for "Sunset Boulevard".


title: Orbital (band)

text: Orbital are an English electronic music duo from Otford, Kent, England, consisting of brothers Phil and Paul Hartnoll. The band's name is taken from Greater London's orbital motorway, the M25, which was central to the early rave scene during the early days of acid house. Additionally, the cover art on three of their albums showcase stylised atomic orbitals. Orbital have been critically and commercially successful, known particularly for their live improvisation during shows. They were initially influenced by early electro and punk rock.


title: Orbital (band)

text: In 1989, Orbital recorded "Chime" on their father's 4 track tape deck, which they released on Oh Zone Records in December 1989 and re-released on FFRR Records a few months later. The track became a rave anthem, reaching number 17 in the UK charts and earning them an appearance on "Top of the Pops", during which they wore anti-Poll Tax T-shirts. According to Paul Hartnoll, the track was recorded "under the stairs" of their parents' house in "a knocked-through stair cupboard that my dad set up as a home office". The track received its first live airing at a club night hosted by the promoter Que Pasa (Mark, Andrew and Nick Maddox) in a local Sevenoaks venue called the Grasshopper on Boxing Day. Next was a gig at the Town and Country 2 in Islington, performing for the first time under the name Orbital. Several singles and EPs followed, and their first self-titled album, a collection of tracks recorded at various times, was released in late 1991.


title: Orbital (band)

text: In late 1992, the "Radiccio" EP barely reached the UK top 40, although it included one of their most popular songs, "Halcyon". The track featured a sample of Kirsty Hawkshaw from "It's a Fine Day" (a chart hit for Opus III earlier that year). The B-side "The Naked and the Dead" was similarly based on a line from Scott Walker's rendition of Jacques Brel's song "Next". "Halcyon" was dedicated to the Hartnolls' mother, who was addicted to the tranquiliser Halcion (Triazolam) for many years.


title: Orbital (band)

text: The duo's popularity grew rapidly with the release of their second self-titled album, in 1993. The album included complex arrangements and textures, opening with the two-minute track "Time Becomes". The track consisted of two slightly delayed, looped samples of a line from the "" episode "Time Squared" spoken by actor Michael Dorn as the character Lieutenant Worf: "... where time becomes a loop" being played simultaneously through the left and right channels, respectively (until one cycle of phase difference has happened). The same sample was used at the beginning of "the Moebius", the opening track in the previous album. This audio pun was intended to make listeners believe that they had bought a mis-pressed album ("Orbital 1" packaged as "Orbital 2"). The album reached #28 on the UK album charts, staying in the chart for 15 weeks. "Halcyon" was remixed for the album, as "Halcyon + On + On". Versions of this song played live by the band have incorporated diverse samples, including "You Give Love a Bad Name" by the band Bon Jovi, "Heaven Is a Place on Earth" by Belinda Carlisle, and in 2004 "I Believe in a Thing Called Love" by the band The Darkness.


title: Orbital (band)

text: The first two albums are commonly known as "The Green Album" and "The Brown Album", after the colours of their covers (although the first album's cover is yellow, one of the first printings had a misprint causing the cover to be yellow-green).


title: Orbital (band)

text: Orbital won an "NME" award for Vibes Best Dance Act early in 1994, but it was their headline appearance at the Glastonbury Festival on 25 June 1994 that brought them most attention. "Q" magazine classed it as one of the top 50 gigs of all time, and in 2002 included Orbital in their list of "50 Bands to See Before You Die".


title: Orbital (band)

text: Crucially, the expanded TV coverage of the 1994 Glastonbury Festival by Channel 4 meant that Orbital's set reached a huge audience, in what is regarded as a pivotal moment. Speaking to The Guardian in 2013 about the gig, Paul Hartnoll commented: "I didn't know how much of an impact it would have. Being young myself, I just thought, 'It's about time – of course we should have acid house at Glastonbury'. It used to annoy me. I just used to think it should be happening."


title: Orbital (band)

text: Orbital gave an improvisational element to live electronic music as the brothers mixed and sequenced their tracks on the fly, wearing their trademark head-mounted torches behind banks of equipment. Orbital were one of the few electronic acts invited to play at Woodstock '94.


title: Orbital (band)

text: The third album, "Snivilisation", was released in August 1994. Alison Goldfrapp provided vocals on a couple of the tracks, including the single "Are We Here?". This track also included a sample from "Man at C&A" by The Specials. Among the remixes of "Are We Here?" was "Criminal Justice Bill?" – four minutes of silence, a reference to the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, which was in part intended to clamp down on the rave scene which had given birth to Orbital. The other track with Goldfrapp vocals, "Sad But True", was remixed for the "Times Fly" EP, the band's only release in 1995.


title: Orbital (band)

text: The single "The Box" was released in April 1996, reaching number 11 in the UK, and its parent album "In Sides", released in May 1996, became their second Top Five album. "In Sides" has since come to be one of their most critically well-regarded works. As with the previous album, there was a vague theme of ecological disaster and dissatisfaction with society.


title: Orbital (band)

text: The following year, the duo contributed to film soundtracks ("The Saint", "Event Horizon", "Spawn") and enjoyed the biggest singles of their career, with a live version of "Satan" and their reworking of the aforementioned "The Saint" theme both reaching number three in the UK. The "In Sides" track "Out There Somewhere (Part 2)" was also included in the long-awaited game series relaunch of "Test Drive 4".


title: Orbital (band)

text: Orbital would go on to aid the "Mortal Kombat" film soundtrack in reaching Platinum selling status during 1995, with a remix of "Halcyon", which can be heard during the final scene of the film.


title: Orbital (band)

text: In 1998, they returned to the studio to work on their fifth album "The Middle of Nowhere". This was released in 1999, becoming their third top five album, and was a return to a more upbeat style; with Alison Goldfrapp returning on vocals and the single "Style" using the stylophone. In 2000 the single "Beached" was released from the soundtrack to the film "The Beach", mixing the brothers' musical style with a melody by Angelo Badalamenti and the words of Leonardo DiCaprio from the film.


title: Orbital (band)

text: "The Altogether", released in 2001, included guest vocals by the Hartnolls' brother-in-law David Gray, a sampled Ian Dury, and a version of the "Doctor Who" theme, and was mixed for 5.1 surround sound. It was to be their last album for FFRR, and had a mixed critical reception. The following year, "Work 1989-2002" collected various singles from "Chime" onwards. Orbital recorded the track "Technologique Park" for the 2002 film "XXX" and can be seen in film playing the track live in a club.


title: Orbital (band)

text: Orbital split up in 2004. They played a final series of gigs in June and July 2004 at the Glastonbury Festival, the T in the Park Festival in Scotland, the Oxegen festival in Ireland, Istanbul, Turkey and the in Japan, concluding with a live Peel Session gig at Maida Vale Studios in London on 28 July 2004. The release of their seventh and last original album, "Blue Album", coincided with this final wave of shows. The album included Sparks (on "Acid Pants") and Lisa Gerrard (on the final single, "One Perfect Sunrise").


title: Orbital (band)

text: Paul Hartnoll continued to record music under his own name, including tracks for the 2005 game "Wipeout Pure" for the "PSP". He released his first full length solo album, entitled "The Ideal Condition" on the ACP record label in June 2007. Alongside Flood, he also jointly produced "Strength in Numbers" by band The Music.


title: Orbital (band)

text: Phil Hartnoll formed a new electronica duo, Long Range, with Nick Smith. Their debut album, "Madness and Me", was released on their own label, Long Range Recordings, in August 2007.


title: Orbital (band)

text: Orbital released a two-CD/DVD compilation "" in June 2007, containing over two hours of music recorded at their various performances at the festival.


title: Orbital (band)

text: On 21 November 2008, Orbital announced they would be reforming to play a gig together called "20 years after Chime" at The Big Chill Festival 2009. They preceded this show with a headline performance at RockNess 2009 in June.


title: Orbital (band)

text: On 26 January 2009, their official website "Loopz" announced confirmed dates for their 20th anniversary tour. "The Orbital reformation gathers momentum with headline shows now confirmed for Manchester and London this September." The concerts met with positive reviews. The band's first performance after the breakup took place in June 2009 at Selector Festival in Cracow, Poland. On 17 April 2009, it was announced that Orbital would be playing at The Electric Picnic in September 2009.


title: Orbital (band)

text: On 16 June 2009, Orbital released a 2-CD collection of their favourite tracks. The collection, "Orbital 20" (stylised as "20rbital"), covered the 20 years since "Chime" and contained 20 tracks. A single, "Don't Stop Me" / "The Gun is Good" was issued in 2010 on 12" and digital download. At the Glastonbury Festival on 27 June 2010 to close their set, Matt Smith, who played the Eleventh Doctor, came on stage and performed with Orbital their cover of the "Doctor Who" theme tune.


title: Orbital (band)

text: On 16 February 2011, Orbital posted a video diary on YouTube, via Loopz. The video diary reported their progress on the recording of their new album, along with remixes of existing material for their DJ sets. Subsequent diary updates have been published. In October 2011, Orbital announced a six gig UK tour (including a date at the Royal Albert Hall) and new album in April 2012. "Never", a track from the forthcoming album, was offered as a free download. The album titled "Wonky" was released on 2 April 2012, and included collaborations with singer Zola Jesus and MC Lady Leshurr. The albums release was featured on US radio on PrototypeRadio, which also marked the bands debut radio appearance on American radio.