Ad agency vets Colin Costello and Susanna Matukas have teamed with executive music consultant Surita Mansukhani to form FranMar Entertainment, a Chicago-based branded entertainment company. The new venture’s main focus will be on scripted and reality-based series for television, Web TV and mobile outlets. Costello has served in such capacities as VP/group creative director at FCB Chicago and associate creative director at DDB Chicago. Matukas spent 20 years at DDB, working primarily on Budweiser and McDonald’s. Mansukhani is an executive music consultant and producer for Chicago’s What The Hale Music and Omnicom entertainment media marketing firm AWE……Director David Wild has come aboard Directorz, Dallas, for national representation. He joins a company roster that includes directors Jeff Bednarz, Tom Ryan and Stewart Cohen……Director Larry Shiu has joined Instant Karma Films, Santa Monica….Cut + Run, New York, has launched its sound and mixing division with a short film by director Wim Wenders. The new Nokia-sponsored promotional documentary features David Bowie as a guide to innovative music stores around the globe, with sound design and mix by Cut + Run’s Jun Mizumachi….Editor Nicholas Erasmus of bicoastal 89 Editorial is again available for commercials after a nine-month hiatus during which he worked on the feature film Chaos Theory, directed by Marcos Siega…..The industry is mourning the passing of Terry Clairmont on Oct. 28 after a courageous battle against lung cancer. Clairmont, CEO of Clairmont Camera, cofounded the North Hollywood-headquartered camera rental house with his brother Denny; the company went on to open facilities in Vancouver, B.C., and Toronto….
Supreme Court Seems Likely To Uphold A Law That Could Force TikTok To Shut Down On Jan. 19
The Supreme Court on Friday seemed likely to uphold a law that would ban TikTok in the United States beginning Jan. 19 unless the popular social media program is sold by its China-based parent company.
Hearing arguments in a momentous clash of free speech and national security concerns, the justices seemed persuaded by arguments that the national security threat posed by the company's connections to China override concerns about restricting the speech either of TikTok or its 170 million users in the United States.
Early in arguments that lasted more than two and a half hours, Chief Justice John Roberts identified his main concern: TikTok's ownership by China-based ByteDance and the parent company's requirement to cooperate with the Chinese government's intelligence operations.
If left in place, the law passed by bipartisan majorities in Congress and signed by President Joe Biden in April will require TikTok to "go dark" on Jan. 19, lawyer Noel Francisco told the justices on behalf of TikTok.
At the very least, Francisco urged, the justices should enter a temporary pause that would allow TikTok to keep operating. "We might be in a different world again" after President-elect Donald Trump takes office on Jan. 20. Trump, who has 14.7 million followers on TikTok, also has called for the deadline to be pushed back to give him time to negotiate a "political resolution." Francisco served as Trump's solicitor general in his first presidential term.
But it was not clear whether any justices would choose such a course. And only Justice Neil Gorsuch sounded like he would side with TikTok to find that the ban violates the Constitution.
Gorsuch labeled arguments advanced by the Biden administration' in defense of the law a... Read More