Director Chris Hooper, best known for his work in comedy, has joined bicoastal Über Content for exclusive U.S. spot representation. He comes over from Santa Monica-based Bob Industries and is currently shooting his first project with Über, for McDonald’s via Moroch Partners, Dallas.
Hooper brings agency creative sensibilities to the director’s chair, having first established himself as a creative at TBWA/Chiat/Day in Los Angeles and Toronto, and Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco. His first directorial roost was bicoastal Tool of North America, after which he landed at Bob Industries.
Hooper’s spot helming credits include notable work for Volkswagen, DirecTV and Budweiser, and honors from competitions that include the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, The One Show and the AICP Show.
Headed by partners/exec producers Phyllis Koenig and Preston Lee, Über has a directors’ roster comprised of Hooper, Jordan Brady, Jeffrey Fleisig, Luis Gerard, Jason Kohn, Dave Laden, Marc Schölermann, and Steven Tsuchida.
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