This photo released by Paramount Pictures shows, David Oyelowo, center, as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Carmen Ejogo, right, as Coretta Scott King in the film, "Selma," from Paramount Pictures and Pathe. (AP Photo/Paramount Pictures, Atsushi Nishijima)
LOS ANGELES (AP) --
Paramount Pictures says business leaders across the country have joined the effort to allow students to see Ava DuVernay's civil rights drama "Selma" for free.
The studio said Monday that cities including Boston, Nashville, Philadelphia and San Francisco will follow the lead of New York, where a group of 27 African-American business leaders created a fund to provide 75,000 tickets to seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade students to see the film.
DuVernay's film chronicles events leading to the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
To obtain a free pass, students must show their ID or report card at the box office of participating theaters, which can be found at the website www.SelmaMovie.com/studenttickets .
More cities are expected to be announced this week.
Suchir Balaji poses for a photo in Hawaii in 2018. Balaji was a former OpenAI engineer and whistleblower who died in November 2024. (Balaji Ramamurthy via AP)
Suchir Balaji, a former OpenAI engineer and whistleblower who helped train the artificial intelligence systems behind ChatGPT and later said he believed those practices violated copyright law, has died, according to his parents and San Francisco officials. He was 26.
Balaji worked at OpenAI for nearly four years before quitting in August. He was well-regarded by colleagues at the San Francisco company, where a co-founder this week called him one of OpenAI's strongest contributors who was essential to developing some of its products.
"We are devastated to learn of this incredibly sad news and our hearts go out to Suchir's loved ones during this difficult time," said a statement from OpenAI.
Balaji was found dead in his San Francisco apartment on Nov. 26 in what police said "appeared to be a suicide. No evidence of foul play was found during the initial investigation." The city's chief medical examiner's office confirmed the manner of death to be suicide.
His parents Poornima Ramarao and Balaji Ramamurthy said they are still seeking answers, describing their son as a "happy, smart and brave young man" who loved to hike and recently returned from a trip with friends.
Balaji grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and first arrived at the fledgling AI research lab for a 2018 summer internship while studying computer science at the University of California, Berkeley. He returned a few years later to work at OpenAI, where one of his first projects, called WebGPT, helped pave the way for ChatGPT.
"Suchir's contributions to this project were essential, and it wouldn't have succeeded without him," said OpenAI co-founder John Schulman in a social media post memorializing Balaji. Schulman, who recruited Balaji to his team, said what... Read More
