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    African American Film Critics to honor Quincy Jones, Jason Blum

    By SHOOTUpdated:No Comments2239 Views
    Jason Blum (photo by Kurt Iswarienko/courtesy of Israel Film Festival)
    LOS ANGELES --

    The African American Film Critics Association (AAFCA) announced that music icon Quincy Jones and prolific filmmaker Jason Blum are among its 2019 Special Achievement honorees. The awards, celebrating career excellence in and around the cinematic arts, are given out annually by the association which represents the largest body of Black film critics in the world. Along with Jones and Blum, who produced Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman this year, director Aneesh Chaganty, AAFCA Breakthrough Film Award recipient for his film Searching, and early jazz innovator Buddy Bolden, the posthumous recipient of the AAFCA Pioneer Award and subject of Daniel Pritzker long-awaited biopic, Bolden, join the impressive list of previously announced recipients, including Netflix’s Tengo Nagenda and HBO’s Kelly Edwards.

    “Quincy Jones is a cultural icon,” AAFCA co-founder Shawn Edwards shared. “For nearly 70 years, he has helped shape pop culture as a music composer and producer as well as a film/TV composer and producer. His creative influence is unparalleled. He has molded the arts, film and music with a force that we may never witness again in our lifetime and given back all along the way.”

    AAFCA co-founder and CEO Gil Robertson shared that “Jason Blum is a visionary creatively and in business. Through Blumhouse, he has rebirthed the horror genre, favoring both horror and specialty films like BlacKkKlansman that inclusively reflect or make us think about the world today. I am thrilled that AAFCA is honoring Jason, the legendary Quincy Jones, jazz pioneer Bolden and the other great creatives, in front of and behind the camera, that continue to make our industry and our world great.”
     
    AAFCA Special Achievement Awards will be distributed over two signature ceremonies. Six awards to honorees, including Buddy Bolden and the film Crazy Rich Asians, will be presented on February 2 at the California Yacht Club in Marina Del Rey. Jones and Blum will be honored at the 10th Annual AAFCA Awards, alongside AAFCA Best Picture winner Black Panther and more, on February 6 at the Taglyan Complex in the heart of Hollywood.

    Tags:African American Film Critics AssociationJason BlumQuincy Jones



    Ex-OpenAI engineer who raised legal concerns about the technology he helped build has died

    Saturday, December 21, 2024
    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

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