By Brendan Farrington
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) --Rapper Pitbull released his $1 million contract with Florida's tourism marketing agency via Twitter on Thursday, two days after the House speaker sued to find out details of the agreement that included the production of a video for the song "Sexy Beaches."
Pitbull tweeted "*FULL DISCLOSURE – FLORIDA*" with a link to the 11-page agreement to produce the "Sexy Beaches" video for Visit Florida and to promote the hashtag #LOVEFL on his social media sites and during concerts.
House Speaker Richard Corcoran filed a lawsuit Tuesday in an attempt to have details of the contract disclosed. Visit Florida refused to say how much it paid the rapper, whose real name is Armando Christian Perez, or details of the arrangement, saying it was a trade secret.
Corcoran found that unacceptable, saying taxpayers should now how Visit Florida was spending its money.
"It is unfortunate that it took litigation to lift the veil of secrecy on this particular contract," Corcoran said in a statement released by his office. "This was a long unnecessary journey through claims of trade secrets, threats of prosecution, and corporate welfare paid for by taxpayers."
A lawyer for Pitbull let the tweet speak for itself.
"There will be no further comment from the Pitbull camp," Leslie Jose Zigel said in an email.
Visit Florida didn't immediately return an email and a phone call seeking comment.
The video features images of women frolicking in the surf and sand as well as pictures of iconic Florida hotels such as Miami Beach's Fontainebleau and the pink Don CeSar Hotel in St. Pete Beach. It ends with an image of #LOVEFL written in the sand.
The song includes lyrics like, "I want to go somewhere exotic/Let the sun massage my body/Meet a sexy stranger in the lobby."
The video has nearly 10.7 million views on YouTube.
Sony reports healthy profits on strong sales of sensors and games
Sony's profit rose 69% in July-September from a year earlier on the back of strong sales of its image sensors, games, music and network services, the Japanese electronics and entertainment company said on Friday.
Quarterly profit was 338.5 billion yen ($2.2 billion), up from 200 billion yen in the year-earlier period, while consolidated quarterly sales edged up 3% year-on-year to 2.9 trillion yen ($19 billion).
Tokyo-based Sony's latest quarterly results were boosted by healthy demand around the world for image sensors used in mobile products.
Sales also held up in its video games division. During the latest quarter, 3.8 million PlayStation 5 game consoles were sold globally, compared with 4.9 million units sold the same period a year ago.
Demand remained strong for PS5 game software, according to Sony.
The top-selling music releases from Sony for the quarter included "SOS" by SZA, David Gilmour's "Luck and Strange" and Kenshi Yonezu's "Lost Corner."
One area where Sony's business suffered was its pictures division, including TV shows and movies, which was impacted by production delays caused by the strikes in Hollywood.
Among the recent hit films from Sony was "It Ends With Us," a romantic drama based on a novel.
Sony, which also makes digital cameras and TVs, maintained its 980-billion yen ($6.4 billion) profit forecast for the fiscal year through March 2025, up 1% from the previous fiscal year.
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