Piper Productions has named Thomas Robbins as its president, a new position at the bicoastal shop. He comes over from Foote, Cone & Belding on the West Coast where he served as senior VP, director of communications. Robbins will work out of Piper’s Santa Monica office, while managing director Sarah Jenks, who founded the company in 1996, remains based in New York…. Director Kevin Bourland and bicoastal Great Guns have amicably parted ways…..Heidi Gottlieb has been named executive producer at New York-based production company Zero 2 Sixty. She spent the past seven years as president/partner at now defunct rep firm Single Bid….Kevin Batten, formerly a staff producer at Deutsch LA, has taken the executive producer reins at Brand New School, a design/graphics/live-action shop that’s just gone bicoastal with the opening of a New York office. Batten replaces Matthew Marquis, who had been executive producer since the end of February (SHOOT, 2/23, p. 1). Marquis, who continues to maintain spot shop Milk Bar, has taken a temporary leave of absence from that company due to family reasons. In the interim, former freelancer Erin Tauscher is handling executive producer responsibilities at Milk Bar, which has relocated to Marina del Rey, Calif., and which continues to represent directors Jarl Olsen, Lara Shapiro and Brumby Boylston. Seth Epstein, who had been repped by Milk Bar, has left to pursue opportunities outside of directing….Northern Lights Post, New York, has added editor Patrick Burns, Jr. and producer Arthur Tremeau to its staff….
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More