title: Lady with an Ermine

text: Gallerani was a member of a large family that was neither wealthy nor noble. Her father served for a time at the Duke's court. At the time of the portrait, she was about sixteen years old and was renowned for her beauty, scholarship and poetry. She was married at approximately age six to a young nobleman of the house of Visconti, but sued to annul the marriage in 1487 for undisclosed reasons and the request was granted. She became the Duke's mistress and bore him a son, even after his marriage to Beatrice d'Este eleven years previously. Beatrice was promised to the Duke when she was only five, and married him when she was sixteen in 1491. After a few months, she discovered the Duke was still seeing Gallerani, and forced the Duke to end the relationship by having her married to Count Ludovico Carminati di Brambilla, also known as Il Bergamino. The newly-wed couple was moved to Palazzo Carmagnola in Milan.


title: Lady with an Ermine

text: It has always been known that Leonardo painted a portrait of Ludovico Sforza's mistress, Cecilia Gallerani, but the "Lady with an Ermine" remained largely unknown to scholars until nearly the 20th century. The painting was acquired in Italy in 1798 by Prince Adam George Czartoryski, the son of Izabela Czartoryska Flemming and Prince Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski, and incorporated into the Czartoryski family collections at Puławy in 1800. The inscription on the top-left corner of the painting, , was probably added by a restorer shortly after its arrival in Poland, and before the background was overpainted. Czartoryski was clearly aware it was a Leonardo, although the painting had never been discussed in print; no record exists of any previous owner. The "Belle Ferronière" is the Leonardo portrait in the Louvre, whose sitter bears such a close resemblance; the Czartoryskis considered this sitter to be the same.


title: Lady with an Ermine

text: The painting travelled widely during the 19th century. During the November Uprising in 1830, the 84-year-old Princess Czartoryska rescued it in advance of the invading Russian army, hid it, and sent it 150 km south to the Czartoryski palace at Sieniawa. Soon after, it was transferred to the Czartoryski place of exile in Paris, the Hôtel Lambert. The family returned to Poland in 1869, settling in Kraków. In the tumultuous aftermath of the German occupation of Paris in 1871 and the Commune, the family brought the painting to Kraków in 1876 and the museum opened in 1878. During World War I, the painting was moved to the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden for safe-keeping, returning to Kraków in 1920.


title: Lady with an Ermine

text: In 1939, anticipating the German occupation of Poland, it was again moved to Sieniawa, but it was discovered and seized by the Nazis and sent to the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin. In 1940, Hans Frank, the Governor General of Poland, saw the painting there and requested it be returned to Kraków, where it hung in his suite of offices in the Wawel Castle. In 1941, it was transferred to a warehouse of other plundered art in Breslau. In 1943 it was brought back to Kraków and exhibited at the Wawel Castle. At the end of the Second World War it was discovered by Allied troops in Frank's country home in Schliersee, Bavaria, and was returned to Poland in 1946. It was again placed on exhibit at the Czartoryski Museum in Kraków. Throughout the mid–late 20th century the work traveled the world more extensively than any other Leonardo painting, being exhibited in Warsaw (1952), Moscow (1972), Washington, D.C. (1991/92), Malmö (1993/94), Rome/Milan (1998), Florence (1999).


title: Lady with an Ermine

text: The work remained displayed at the Czartoryski Museum until it closed for renovations in 2010. From May 2017 to 2019, it was exhibited in the National Museum, Kraków, just outside the Old Town. It returned to the Czartoryski Museum for the museum's reopening on December 19, 2019.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: Batman: Hush is a 2019 American animated superhero film featuring the DC Comics superhero Batman and loosely based on the 2002 . It is the thirteenth installment of the DC Animated Movie Universe and the 35th overall film of the DC Universe Animated Original Movies. In the film, Batman forms an alliance with Catwoman to defeat a new villain named Hush, who knows all of Batman's secrets and targets the key figures in his life.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: After Batman rescues an abducted child from Bane for a ransom, Lady Shiva approaches Batman to inform him of an unknown Lazarus Pit intruder and requests his help in identifying the intruder. Batman agrees to do so as Catwoman steals the ransom. While pursuing her, a masked vigilante shoots through Batman's grapple line, causing him to fall onto the sidewalk and crack his skull. Catwoman rescues him from a gang of criminals who tried to unmask him, but Batgirl chases her away. Batgirl takes Batman back to the Batcave where Alfred and Dick Grayson create an alibi for how Bruce Wayne suffered the injury. Alfred contacts Bruce's childhood friend Thomas Elliot, a renowned brain surgeon, to aid his skull. When Bruce declares himself ready to be Batman again two weeks earlier than Thomas advised him to be up and around, Alfred gives him a new bulletproof batsuit with a padded cowl for better skull protection. Meanwhile, Catwoman delivers the ransom to Poison Ivy, who has been controlling her with a hypnotic kiss. The masked vigilante who shot Batman then arrives to confront Ivy about the ransom and gives her Kryptonite.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: Batman helps Amanda Waller retrieve Bane from police custody in return for information. Waller uses the special tranquilizers supplied by him to stop Bane from escaping police custody and capture him herself. Batman later reluctantly works with Catwoman to find Ivy, following a lead given by her to Metropolis. There, Batman confronts Lex Luthor, now a probationary member of the Justice League after helping them defeat Cyborg Superman, about delivery list of an ethylene compound utilized by Ivy. Ivy uses Kryptonite lipstick to take control of Superman and orders him to kill Catwoman and Batman. Catwoman pushes Lois Lane off a building to free Superman from the mind control. After Ivy is defeated, she reveals she was acting on the orders of a vigilante known only as "Hush".


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: Hush later kidnaps the Joker to persuade Harley Quinn into attacking an opera Bruce, Selina, and Thomas are attending. During the commotion, Hush lures Thomas outside and kills him, framing the Joker for the murder, much to Batman's anger. The Joker attempts to claim his innocence before Batman brutally beats him and nearly kills him. Following the Joker's arrest and Thomas' funeral, Bruce deduces that Hush knows he is Batman. While on patrol, Hush catches Batman's attention and confronts him, although Hush tricks him by using mirrors. He then threatens to hurt everyone close to him, prompting Batman to reveal his identity to Catwoman. Bruce takes Selina to the Batcave, where she meets Dick and Alfred and learns of Bruce's son Damian. The two become a crime-fighting couple, but Hush later lures Dick and Selina to Thomas’ grave, where they are attacked by Scarecrow. Dick is incapacitated by Scarecrow's fear toxin while Hush kidnaps Selina.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: Shortly after, Commissioner James Gordon informs Bruce of a break-in at Thomas’ office. While investigating, Batman learns that one of Thomas' patients was someone using the alias of crossword puzzle inventor Arthur Wynne, leading him to suspect the Riddler was behind the break-in. At Arkham Asylum, Batman interrogates Riddler, who reveals that he had deduced his secret identity while using the Lazarus Pit to cure his untreatable brain tumor, and took on the identity of Hush due to his lack of respect among other villains. However, Batman deduces that this "Riddler" is actually Clayface in disguise and, after defeating him, learns where the real Riddler has taken Selina: a factory whose name is an anagram of Arthur Wynne.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: At the factory, Batman rescues Selina and defeats Riddler, who is growing weaker as the healing effects of the Lazarus Pit are wearing off. With the building about to explode, Batman risks his own life to try and save Riddler from falling into a vat of molten metal. Realizing this, Selina cuts the grapple line holding Riddler and lets him fall to his death to give Batman enough time to escape. Once they reach safety, Batman and Selina argue over the latter's actions and decide to call off their relationship due to Selina being unable to cope with Bruce's moral code.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: Penguin, Two-Face, and Mr. Freeze appear in unvoiced cameos in a montage scene of Batman and Catwoman fighting crime together.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: "" alumni Kevin Conroy (Batman) and Mark Hamill (the Joker) teased producing an animated adaptation of "Hush" during a panel at Canada's Fan Expo in 2016. In July 2018, an animated adaptation of "" was announced.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: Jason O'Mara, Jerry O'Connell, Rebecca Romijn, Rainn Wilson, Sean Maher, Bruce Thomas, Vanessa Williams, and Stuart Allan reprise their roles from previous DCAMU films, while the new additions include Jennifer Morrison, Peyton R. List, Maury Sterling, Geoffrey Arend, Jason Spisak, Adam Gifford, Peyton List, and Dachie Alessio. Peyton List reprises her role as Poison Ivy, after previously appearing in the role in a live action form in "Gotham". Notably, this is a rare instance in which the two actresses named Peyton List appear in the same production.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: The film had its world premiere at the San Diego Comic-Con on July 19, 2019. The film was made available through digital streaming outlets one day later. It was released on 4K UHD Blu-ray, Blu-ray, and DVD on August 6.


title: Batman: Hush (film)

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, it has an approval rating of based on reviews from critics with an average rating of .


title: Jim Carroll

text: James Dennis Carroll (August 1, 1949 – September 11, 2009) was an American author, poet, autobiographer, and punk musician. Carroll was best known for his 1978 autobiographical work "The Basketball Diaries", which inspired a 1995 film of the same title that starred Leonardo DiCaprio as Carroll, and his 1980 song "People Who Died" with the Jim Carroll Band.


title: Jim Carroll

text: Carroll was born to a working-class family of Irish descent, and grew up in New York City's Lower East Side. When he was about 11 (in the sixth grade) his family moved north to Inwood in Upper Manhattan. He was taught by the LaSalle Christian Brothers. In fall 1963, he entered Rice High School in Harlem, but was soon awarded a scholarship to the elite Trinity School. He attended Trinity from 1964 to 1968.


title: Jim Carroll

text: Carroll was a basketball star in high school, but also developed an addiction to heroin. He financed his drug habit by engaging in prostitution in the vicinity of 53rd Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan. Carroll briefly attended Wagner College and Columbia University. He dated Patti Smith.


title: Jim Carroll

text: Carroll identified Rainer Maria Rilke, Frank O'Hara, John Ashbery, James Schuyler, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs as influences on his artistic career.


title: Jim Carroll

text: While still in high school, Carroll published his first collection of poems, "Organic Trains." Already attracting the attention of the local literati, his work began appearing in the Poetry Project's magazine "The World" in 1967. Soon his work was being published in elite literary magazines like "Paris Review" in 1968, and "Poetry" the following year. In 1970, his second collection of poems, "4 Ups and 1 Down" was published, and he started working for Andy Warhol. At first, he was writing film dialogue and inventing character names; later on, Carroll worked as the co-manager of Warhol's Theater. Carroll's first publication by a mainstream publisher (Grossman Publishers), the poetry collection "Living at the Movies", was published in 1973.


title: Jim Carroll

text: In 1978, Carroll published "The Basketball Diaries," an autobiographical book concerning his life as a teenager in New York City's hard drug culture. "Diaries" is an edited collection of the diaries he kept during his high school years; it details his sexual experiences, his high school basketball career, and his addiction to heroin.


title: Jim Carroll

text: In 1987, Carroll wrote a second memoir, "Forced Entries: The Downtown Diaries 1971–1973," continuing his autobiography into his early adulthood in the New York City music and art scene as well as his struggle to kick his drug habit.


title: Jim Carroll

text: After working as a musician, Carroll returned to writing full-time in the mid-1980s and began to appear regularly on the spoken-word circuit. Starting in 1991, Carroll performed readings from his then-in-progress first novel, "The Petting Zoo".


title: Jim Carroll

text: In 1995, Canadian filmmaker John L'Ecuyer adapted "Curtis's Charm", a short story from Carroll's 1993 book "Fear of Dreaming", into the film "Curtis's Charm".


title: Jim Carroll

text: In 1978, after he moved to California to get a fresh start since overcoming his heroin addiction, Carroll formed Amsterdam, a new wave/punk rock group, with encouragement from Patti Smith, with whom he once shared an apartment in New York City, along with Robert Mapplethorpe. The musicians were Steve Linsley (bass), Wayne Woods (drums - he had previously been in hard rock band, Estus), Brian Linsley and Terrell Winn (guitars). He performed a spoken word piece with the Patti Smith Group in San Diego when the support band dropped out at the last moment.


title: Jim Carroll

text: They changed their name to The Jim Carroll Band and were able to secure a recording contract with Atlantic Records with the support of the Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards. They released a single, "People Who Died", taken from their 1980 debut album "Catholic Boy", originally intended to be released on Rolling Stones Records. The single would make it to No. 103 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart. The album featured contributions from Allen Lanier and Bobby Keys. The first known use of "People Who Died" in film was in Steven Spielberg's 1982 film "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" opening the first scene with dialogue while the boys play "Dungeons & Dragons". It was also used in the 1985 Kim Richards film "Tuff Turf" starring James Spader and Robert Downey Jr., which also featured a cameo appearance by the band. It was also used in 2004's "Dawn of the Dead", and in the 2015 episode "eps1.9_zer0-day.avi" in Season 1 of "Mr. Robot". It was featured in the 1995 film "The Basketball Diaries" (based on Carroll's autobiography), and was covered by John Cale on his "Antártida" soundtrack. The song also was covered by the super group Hollywood Vampires on their album "Rise" with vocals by Johnny Depp. The song's title was based on a poem by Ted Berrigan. Later albums were "Dry Dreams" (1982) and "I Write Your Name" (1983), both with contributions from Lenny Kaye and Paul Sanchez (guitar). Carroll also collaborated with musicians Lou Reed, Blue Öyster Cult, Boz Scaggs, Ray Manzarek of The Doors, Pearl Jam, Electric Light Orchestra and Rancid.


title: Jim Carroll

text: "People Who Died" was most recently used in the 2021 film "The Suicide Squad", directed by James Gunn, and the end credits of the Season 4 "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" episode "Everything Is Bellmore", paying tribute to late cast member Brian Tarantina.


title: Jim Carroll

text: Carroll became sober in the 1970s. After moving to California, he met Rosemary Klemfuss; the couple married in 1978. The marriage ended in divorce, but the two remained friends.


title: Jim Carroll

text: Carroll died of a heart attack at his Manhattan home on September 11, 2009, at the age of 60. At the time of his death, he was in ill health due to pneumonia and hepatitis C. He was working at his desk when he died. His funeral mass was held at Our Lady of Pompeii Catholic Church on Carmine Street in Greenwich Village.


title: Mallrats

text: Mallrats is a 1995 American buddy comedy film written and directed by Kevin Smith and starring Jason Lee, Jeremy London, Shannen Doherty, Claire Forlani, Ben Affleck, Jason Mewes, Joey Lauren Adams, Michael Rooker, and Smith as Silent Bob. It is the second film in the View Askewniverse and a prequel to 1994's "Clerks".


title: Mallrats

text: As in the other Askewniverse films, the characters Jay and Silent Bob feature prominently, and characters and events from other films are discussed. Several cast members, including Jason Lee, Ben Affleck and Joey Lauren Adams, have gone on to work in several other Smith films. Comic-book icon Stan Lee appeared, as did Brian O'Halloran, the star of Smith's breakout feature "Clerks".


title: Mallrats

text: Despite failing at the box office and receiving a lukewarm critical reception, "Mallrats" has since become a cult classic. Plans for a sequel film titled "MallBrats" were announced in March 2015. By the following year, the project was proposed to be a television miniseries, but by February 2017, Smith announced that he had not been able to sell the series to any network. In January 2020, Smith revealed that development on a sequel film has started again, this time under the title "Twilight of the Mallrats".


title: Mallrats

text: "Mallrats" has had three versions released, with the main version being released amongst an extended version and a theatrical version. The theatrical release has a total of 100 differences between the extended and original version.


title: Mallrats

text: College student T.S. Quint is preparing for a trip to Universal Studios Florida in Orlando with Brandi Svenning, during which he plans to propose to her; however, Brandi tells him she cannot go due to having volunteered to fill in as a contestant on "Truth or Date", her father's dating game show, because the original contestant had died from an embolism bursting in her brain while swimming 700 laps at the local Y.M.C.A following T.S.'s comment regarding her weight. T.S. dismisses the blame, and they argue over this and break up. T.S. turns to his best friend Brodie Bruce, who has been dumped by his girlfriend Rene, and Brodie suggests the two might find comfort at the local mall.


title: Mallrats

text: In the extended version, T.S. is dressed up for a play recital and is holding a prop musket when speaking to Brandi, subsequently his musket gets caught in her hair before accidentally firing, T.S. is misinterpreted as a sniper attempting to assassinate the governor, whom Brandi's father Jared, works for.


title: Mallrats

text: T.S. finds himself surrounded by news reporters before finding refuge in Brodie's mother's basement where Brodie eventually suggests they go to the mall and hide in plain sight.


title: Mallrats

text: The "Truth or Date" show, which was to be hosted by Jared, was referenced within the first scene of the extended version.


title: Mallrats

text: Brodie and T.S. discover "Truth or Date" is being filmed at the same mall, through their friend Willam, who throughout the film tries to see a sailboat in a Magic Eye poster (which ironically, has no sailboat in it but just some rows of random geometric shapes). The two ask local slackers Jay and Silent Bob to destroy the show's stage, a task for which they devise elaborate, but ultimately unsuccessful plans. Brodie and T.S. run into Tricia Jones, a 15-year-old senior who is writing a book on the sex drive of men ages 14–30, for which she has sex with various men as research and films every encounter. She then reveals that the previous night she had sex with Shannon Hamilton, a 25-year-old clothing-store manager who hates Brodie because of his "lack of a shopping agenda."


title: Mallrats

text: Brodie then learns that Rene has begun a relationship with Shannon. Brodie confronts Rene to find out more about the relationship, and the two have sex in an elevator. Brodie is later abducted and attacked by Shannon, who intends to have sex with Rene in a "very uncomfortable place". As a result of this incident, Jay and Silent Bob assault the mall's Easter Bunny, under the incorrect assumption that he attacked Brodie.


title: Mallrats

text: Brandi's father Jared has Brodie and T.S. arrested on false charges of drug possession at the mall. Jay and Silent Bob are able to rescue Brodie and T.S., and they hide out at a local flea market, where they meet topless fortune teller Ivannah, who gives them both advice on their relationship problems. T.S. decides to win Brandi back and the two return to the mall.


title: Mallrats

text: Before the show begins, Brodie meets famed Marvel legend Stan Lee, who gives him advice on romance, this was revealed immediately after to be a request by T.S. who somehow knows Stan Lee. After this, Brodie requests that his friend Tricia Jones retrieve footage of her having sex with Shannon. Meanwhile, T.S. also persuades Jay to get two of the game show contestants stoned, which allows him and Brodie to replace them on "Truth or Date".


title: Mallrats

text: During the show, Brandi recognizes the voices of Brodie and T.S., and an on-air argument between them ensues. Brodie ultimately gets the two to stop arguing, explaining that T.S. has been pining for Brandi all day. Then T.S. proposes to Brandi, and she accepts. As the police arrive to arrest T.S. and Brodie after the show is over, Silent Bob plays a sex tape of Shannon and Tricia, resulting in his arrest for statutory rape. Brodie and Rene renew their relationship as a result.


title: Mallrats

text: The conclusion reveals that T.S. marries Brandi at Universal Studios while on a Jaws attraction, Tricia's book is a bestseller, Shannon is imprisoned (and subsequently raped), Willam eventually does see the sailboat, Brodie becomes the host of "The Tonight Show" (with Rene as his bandleader), and that Jay and Silent Bob get an orangutan named Susanne.


title: Mallrats

text: After the success of the independent hit "Clerks", writer/director Kevin Smith and his best friend/producer Scott Mosier began to make their second film. After a screening of "Clerks", producer James Jacks approached them to do another film for Universal Studios. Smith soon finished the script for this new film, and casting began.


title: Mallrats

text: Jeremy London, an actor with a TV series and a few films to his credit, was cast as T.S.; Henry Thomas was the finalist of the role. Shannen Doherty was the most famous cast member after her appearances in several films and the hit TV show "Beverly Hills, 90210". Jason Lee was cast with no prior acting experience; before the film, Lee was a professional skateboarder, and Adam Sandler and Steve Zahn were the finalists for the role of Brodie Bruce. Ben Affleck, who was a relative unknown at the time, was cast as Shannon Hamilton. Joey Lauren Adams was cast as Gwen Turner; she later dated Smith, and during that time, he wrote the main character in "Chasing Amy" for her. Ethan Suplee was cast as Willam Black. Scott Mosier was supposed to reprise the role, but Smith and the film's producers were so impressed with Suplee that they cast him, instead. The most troublesome role to cast was Jay, as Universal did not want Jason Mewes to have the role, despite the fact that he played it in "Clerks" and the character of Jay is based on him. Mewes had to audition for the part against actors such as Seth Green and Breckin Meyer.


title: Mallrats

text: The film grossed $400,000 on its Friday gross on 800 screens. The film made $1.2 million its opening weekend. The film grossed $2,122,561 at the box office.


title: Mallrats

text: "Mallrats" was the subject of much critical derision when it was released, with many critics comparing it unfavorably to Smith's first film, "Clerks". In his negative review of the film, critic Roger Ebert gave the film 1 1/2 stars out of 4 and said "Before "Mallrats" was released, I chaired a panel that Smith participated in and Kevin Smith cheerfully said he'd be happy to do whatever the studios wanted, if they'd pay for his films. At the time, I thought he was joking." Kevin Smith responded by apologizing for "Mallrats" at the 1996 Independent Spirit Awards, though he later stated that the apology was made in jest. Despite all that, the film developed a cult following after it was released on video.


title: Mallrats

text: On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 57% based on 47 reviews, with an average rating of 5.6/10. The website's critical consensus reads, ""Mallrats" colorfully expands the View Askewniverse, even if its snootchie has lost a few of the bootchies boasted by its beloved predecessor." On Metacritic, the film received a score of 41 based on 18 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".


title: Mallrats

text: In 1996 MCA/Universal Home Video released the movie on VHS and Laserdisc (the latter in widescreen format).


title: Mallrats

text: A DVD was released in 1999 including 1.85:1 Anamorphic widescreen picture & 5.1 Dolby surround sound (both of which the movie was in for the Laserdisc release). Bonus features include:


title: Mallrats

text: The film was released on Blu-ray in 2014 and it used digital noise reduction and edge enhancement (as part of Universal's 1990's Best of the Decade collection); the menus were replaced with Universal-mandated menus, the Focus Features logo replaced the Universal logo at the start of the film, and some copies also included a code for a digital streaming version to be redeemed at Universal's online UltraViolet service, and iTunes.


title: Mallrats

text: In 2005, a 10th anniversary double-sided DVD was released, containing the original version of the film, features from the previous DVD release, and an all new extended cut of the movie.


title: Mallrats

text: In 2020, Arrow Video released a 25th anniversary Blu-Ray that contains a third "television cut" of the film, with many scenes altered and re-dubbed to remove profanity.


title: Mallrats

text: As explained by Kevin Smith in the introduction, most of the scenes were reworked because of the test audience's negative reaction. Some of the dialogue had been re-dubbed in the theatrical release, but is restored in this version. (For example, the man who runs up to and is subsequently punched by T.S. outside the mall near the end originally asked if he had seen T.S. on CNN, whereas in the theatrical cut, he asks T.S. if he was the one who broke up with Brandi Svenning.) Other extended scenes have notable jump cuts.


title: Mallrats

text: The original DVD's deleted scenes reel also featured the first draft opening sequence (in script form); here, T.S. is competing on a collegiate game show produced by Mr. Svenning; he accidentally mispronounces an answer ("Bay of Bisquake" instead of Bay of Biscay); his team loses, and in the confusion, T.S. accidentally damages a camera, and he must now pay Mr. Svenning for the damages. Brandi then breaks up with him, and a man on a bus mistakenly thinks that T.S. will kill him after seeing him in a news report. Several alternate openings, with different voiceover spiels from Brodie (including one which has him recounting the events up to him nearly getting assaulted by Hamilton on the "Truth or Date" stage) were also seen in that reel.


title: Mallrats

text: The soundtrack album was released in October 1995. It features mainly alternative rock from the 90s along with dialogue from the film. The ordering of the songs on the soundtrack album is not the order they appear as in the film. For example, Squirtgun's "Social" opens the film, while Weezer's "Susanne" ends the film, with Wax's "Mallrats" playing over the end credits. The song "Boogie Shoes" by KC and the Sunshine Band makes an appearance, when Brodie and T.S. drive to the flea market. However, it was excluded from the soundtrack album. A music video for The Goops' version of "Build Me Up Buttercup" was directed by Smith and featured both Smith and Mewes.


title: Mallrats

text: On March 13, 2015, Kevin Smith confirmed that "Mallrats 2" was being written and was slated to begin shooting in summer 2016. In April 2015, Smith announced that "Mallrats 2" would be his next film, instead of "Clerks III" as originally intended, and would begin filming in 2015. From April 2015 to July 2016, Smith made a series of announcements regarding the proposed sequel, some regarding casting and some announcing delays in production. During this time, the planned film became a planned 10-episode television miniseries.


title: Mallrats

text: In February 2017, Smith announced that pitches to six different networks resulted in no one willing to produce the TV series, but expressed his hope that interest in the series would spike after the release of the film "Jay and Silent Bob Reboot".


title: Mallrats

text: In January 2020, Smith announced that development on a "Mallrats" sequel film has started up again, under a new title "Twilight of the Mallrats". On April 24, Smith stated that he has officially completed the first draft of the script and that the original cast will return. On May 12, 2020, Smith revealed that Aparna Brielle, who played Jihad in "Jay and Silent Bob Reboot", has been set to lead the film as Banner, the daughter of Brodie, and that Shannen Doherty would return to reprise her role of Rene Mosier.


title: Brightline

text: Brightline (reporting mark BLFX) is an inter-city rail route between Miami and West Palm Beach, Florida that runs on track owned by Florida East Coast Railway.


title: Brightline

text: Brightline is the only privately owned and operated intercity passenger railroad in the United States. Its development started in March 2012 as All Aboard Florida by Florida East Coast Industries, a Florida real estate developer owned by Fortress Investment Group. Construction began in November 2014 and the route opened in January 2018. An extension from West Palm Beach to Orlando International Airport is expected to open in 2023, with additional spots being planned.


title: Brightline

text: In 2012, All Aboard Florida, a wholly owned subsidiary of Florida East Coast Industries (FECI), announced plans to operate passenger rail service between Miami and Orlando. The construction was projected at the time to be $1.5 billion. In March 2013, All Aboard Florida applied for a $1.6 billion Railroad Rehabilitation & Improvement Financing (RRIF) loan, which was administered by the Federal Railroad Administration, and in late 2014, the company applied for a $1.75 billion private activity bond allocation, with proceeds from the bond sale substantially reducing or replacing entirely the amount of the RRIF loan request.


title: Brightline

text: The company received a Finding of No Significant Impact from the Federal Railroad Administration in January 2013, effectively clearing way for work to begin between Miami and West Palm Beach. The Final Environmental Impact Statement was released on August 4, 2015. By the beginning of 2015, the company had started site work at the Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach stations, plus right of way improvements along stretches of the corridor. On November 10, 2015, All Aboard Florida announced that the service would operate under the name Brightline.


title: Brightline

text: In September 2018, Brightline acquired XpressWest, a private company that intends to connect Las Vegas with Southern California via Victorville, California. Brightline announced the intent of purchasing 38 acres of land near the Las Vegas Strip for a station and following the Interstate 15 corridor from Las Vegas to Southern California.


title: Brightline

text: Two key counties on the coastal route north of the West Palm Beach station have, for various reasons, been fighting the extension of the rail line through Martin and Indian River Counties in court. One of their objections is that Brightline is owned by a private corporation, so they should not be allowed to issue tax-exempt bonds as if they were a municipality. On December 24, 2018, after four years of legal battles, a Federal District Judge threw out a suit by Indian River County that claimed the U.S. Department of Transportation improperly approved the bond allocation, clearing the way for construction of the new rail corridor through the Treasure Coast and Space Coast. On October 5, 2020, the US Supreme Court declined to hear the appeal of that decision, ending Indian River County's efforts to stymie development. The county's efforts at a Supreme Court hearing were financed with over $200,000 in private donations in addition to over $4 million in County funds.


title: Brightline

text: In April 2019, the company secured $1.75 billion in funding for the Orlando extension and said construction would begin right away.


title: Brightline

text: In November 2018, it was announced that Virgin Group would become a minority investor in the railroad and would provide rights to rebrand the service as Virgin Trains USA. However, in August 2020, railroad managers announced that Virgin had not provided the agreed investment money and the company would be ending its branding deal, returning to the previous Brightline brand. In March 2021, Virgin sued Brightline for $251.3 million because of the broken contract.


title: Brightline

text: Construction began on the Miami–West Palm Beach section with the laying of new tracks and closure of the temporary surface lots in Government Center, Downtown Miami, in mid 2014. Preliminary work on the Miami station, such as site preparation and demolition, began later in the year. Suffolk Construction was the general contractor for the Miami station. Piles were being set on the four lots of MiamiCentral in early 2015.


title: Brightline

text: On October 29, 2014, work on the Fort Lauderdale station began with the demolition of existing buildings on the site. A groundbreaking ceremony for the West Palm Beach station was held in November 2014. Moss & Associates, of Fort Lauderdale, was the general contractor for the West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale stations.


title: Brightline

text: In January 2015, crews started replacing track throughout the corridor. All Aboard Florida secured leasing of easement rights alongside the Beachline from the Central Florida Expressway Authority for $1.4 million in December 2015.


title: Brightline

text: Construction work on Phase 2, between West Palm Beach and Orlando, officially began in June 2019, with a groundbreaking ceremony at Orlando International Airport. Preliminary work on the corridor began in September 2019, in the area of Jensen Beach and Sebastian, and began path clearing for construction of the Orlando–Cocoa portion in October of that year.


title: Brightline

text: , the contractors on the project were the Hubbard Construction Company, Wharton-Smith Inc., The Middlesex Corporation, Granite, and HSR Constructors. These five contractors are responsible for the development of 170 miles of new track into the completed state-of-the-art intermodal facility located in the new South Terminal at the Orlando International Airport (MCO).


title: Brightline

text: In 2019, Brightline operations sent a letter to the city of Boca Raton about the possibility of adding their city as an infill station along the Florida route. Brightline proposed constructing the station and rail infrastructure while the city would cover access and zoning requirements and costs. In December 2019, the former community garden next to the Boca Raton Public Library was officially chosen as a station site for the station.


title: Brightline

text: In October 2019, Miami-Dade County allocated $76 million to build a Brightline Aventura station by the Aventura Mall in Ojus, Florida, between Miami and Fort Lauderdale. At the time of the announcement, the projected opening date was October 2020. Groundbreaking on the station occurred in September 2020.


title: Brightline

text: Public operations between West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale began Saturday, January 13, 2018. Service between West Palm Beach and Miami began on May 19, 2018. Aventura and Boca Raton begin service on December 21, 2022.


title: Brightline

text: Brightline suspended operations on March 25, 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. All train services were completely closed, and the company cut 250 jobs. Construction north to Orlando continued, as well as plans for the upcoming station in Boca Raton.


title: Brightline

text: In January 2021, the company stated that service would begin again in "late 2021," contrary to their earlier estimate of the third quarter of 2021. The company says that most station and operations staff will be brought back approximately 30–60 days before service resumes. Throughout January 2021 and May 2021, the trains ran with no passengers occasionally in order to test an upgraded corridor between the West Palm Beach and Miami train stations. Service resumed on November 8, 2021, between West Palm Beach and Miami, with the Orlando line approximately 70% complete.


title: Brightline

text: While Brightline does stop at all five of the stations, they also have an express service that excludes the stops at Aventura and Boca Raton, allowing for faster travel times between stations.


title: Brightline

text: , between Miami and West Palm Beach, there are 17 round trips Monday through Friday, ten on Saturdays, and nine on Sundays.


title: Brightline

text: During the first two and a half months of introductory service between West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale, ridership totaled 74,780, increasing from 17,800 in January to 32,900 in March 2018. The company itself announced that the ridership has been triple to what had been expected. The forecast provided to bond investors calls for 240,000 passengers per month by 2020, which includes service to Miami, and analyst Fitch Ratings has said that the company could break even at 56% of their ridership forecast.


title: Brightline

text: By the end of 2018 almost 600,000 passengers had ridden the train, and the line welcomed its 1 millionth rider in August 2019.


title: Brightline

text: The five South Florida stations were designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in association with Zyscovich Architects. Rockwell Group designed the interiors. All five have adjacent parking at the rate of $5–6 per day.


title: Brightline

text: The downtown Miami station, known as (not to be confused with Miami Central Station, now known as Miami Intermodal Center, near Miami International Airport), spans located just east of Miami-Dade County Hall and includes of mixed-use development with residential, office and commercial, and a retail concourse. The station connects Brightline with the Metrorail, Metromover, County bus and City of Miami trolley systems. The new Brightline station connects the following transit modes: 2 Metrorail stations, 2 Metromover stations, Metrobus, and the future Tri-Rail station. This increases connections to activities and tourist destinations, including the Performing Arts Center, Bayside Market and Bayfront Park. Service to Miami began on May 19, 2018.


title: Brightline

text: The Aventura station is located on West Dixie Highway west of the Aventura Mall in Ojus, Florida. The station is on a 3 acre site. There are 240 parking spaces at the Aventura station, as well as a Miami-Dade Transit bus drop-off. Complimentary shuttle service is available to and from the mall. In the future, it will include another bridge that will connect the platform to Aventura Mall, and it will serve as the terminus of planned commuter rail service.


title: Brightline

text: The Fort Lauderdale station is located at NW 2nd Avenue between Broward Boulevard and NW 4th Street. The four-acre station site has a station and platform. The Brightline train service in Ft. Lauderdale connects to the Sun Trolley and Broward County Transit system. Brightline also owns about three acres of land to the east of the Florida East Coast Railway corridor, where there are plans to build a transit-oriented development.


title: Brightline

text: The Boca Raton station is located next to the Boca Raton Public Library. The station is on a 1.8-acre site across from Mizner Park. The station has access to a 455-space parking garage that will also provide dedicated free parking for library patrons.


title: Brightline

text: The West Palm Beach station is located between Datura and Evernia Streets and to the west of Quadrille. The two-acre station site has a station and platform that connect with the neighborhood's existing vehicular, trolley and pedestrian networks and establish links to the Tri-Rail, Palm Tran Downtown Trolley and Amtrak West Palm Beach station.


title: Brightline

text: In 2017, the new Orlando International Airport Intermodal Terminal at Orlando International Airport was opened. Brightline will terminate at this station once the Orlando Extension track is built. Trains will run up to with a travel time of approximately three hours from Orlando's airport to Miami. The first test run of the Brightline train into Orlando station happened on May 17, 2022.


title: Brightline

text: , Brightline is in negotiations with the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) to lease right-of-way along the Interstate 4 corridor. Brightline was the only bidder to submit a proposal to construct an intercity rail line along Interstate 4, which has been designated for federally funded high-speed rail. This would be utilized for an extension of the line from Orlando International Airport to Tampa. Potential stops along this route are the SunRail Meadow Woods station and Lakeland. The deadline for the negotiations between Central Florida Expressway Authority, FDOT, and Brightline was March 31, 2020. In September 2020, the railroad entered into a memorandum of understanding with a local developer to potentially construct the terminal station in Ybor City.


title: Brightline

text: In November 2020, Brightline and Walt Disney World Resort announced an agreement to build a station in Disney Springs as a part of its Tampa extension. The high-speed rail corridor between Disney Springs and Orlando International Airport was projected to cost $1 billion and travel alongside Florida State Road 417. While the project has yet to secure needed funding, passenger service was planned to start by 2026. Then, on May 5, 2022, Universal Orlando offered 13 acres of land near the site where Universal's Epic Universe is being built for a commuter station, as well as bond guarantees. This was claimed to promote construction of an extension of Brightline that would include a brief confluence with SunRail between SunRail's Meadow Woods and Pine Castle stations, and lead through Disney eventually to Tampa. They did not mention the existing proposal to run Brightline down SR 417 to Disney Springs. But it did suggest a future SunRail service to Epic Universe, the Orange County Convention Center, and Disney Springs. On June 28, 2022, Disney announced that Brightline would not run on their Walt Disney World park property; however Brightline said it would still build a station near Disney World to get riders as close as possible.


title: Brightline

text: As part of the initial construction for Brightline, All Aboard Florida said it was considering an extension to Jacksonville, Florida.


title: Brightline

text: In October 2019, Brightline announced plans to start building a station in PortMiami in 2020. However, as of 2022, the plans for the station have been removed from Brightline's website.


title: Brightline

text: Brightline has expressed interest in serving at the Miami Intermodal Center, at the facility where Amtrak plans to relocate its service, but no negotiations are currently underway, according to FDOT.


title: Brightline

text: Brightline has also expressed interest in adding a station on Florida's Treasure Coast and another on the Space Coast between West Palm Beach and Orlando. In August 2018, the company asked cities in the area to submit proposals for station locations. Fort Pierce, which last had passenger train service on July 31, 1968, has expressed interest. The city of Stuart has also indicated that it will be negotiating for a potential station. Brightline has indicated that Stuart is the most likely location for a Treasure Coast station, and that Cocoa would make the most sense for a Space Coast station, both because of proximity to Port Canaveral's cruise lines as well as for positioning for future expansion to Jacksonville. Neither station has been committed in writing, and both are pending market studies, as completion of the line to Orlando is the top priority for Brightline.


title: Brightline

text: In 2020, it was revealed that Brightline was planning a commuter rail service to complement their existing service. Referred to as the Northeast Corridor, trains would run between Miami Central and Aventura with five stations between. The railroad and the Miami-Dade County Commission agreed to access fees in November 2020. The estimated cost for full buildout of the line is $325 million. Operations are expected to start as early as 2024.


title: Brightline

text: The following year, the Florida Department of Transportation and Broward County executed a memorandum of understanding to implement a passenger transportation system along the FEC corridor. Plans call for a commuter rail route starting at Aventura station in the south and running as far north as Deerfield Beach. Service could start in 2028.


title: Brightline

text: On September 18, 2018, Fortress Investment Group announced that it would acquire XpressWest, a venture capital proposal to build a privately funded high-speed rail passenger train from Apple Valley, California to Las Vegas, Nevada from hotel developer Marnell Corrao Associates. When Fortress subsequently entered into its partnership with Virgin Group in 2019, it was announced that the newly formed consortium will build and operate XpressWest when it opens. In September 2020, Fortress Investment Group renamed the project Brightline West.


title: Brightline

text: Despite funding difficulties, Brightline currently plans on constructing the long Brightline West track starting in 2023. They plan on carrying passengers at speeds of up to for an 85-minute trip. Trains on this line will be fully electric and run alongside Interstate 15. Fortress' Wes Edens has stated that Brightline's service is modeled off of Eurostar's Paris-to-London commute. Its coach design includes white-and-blue interiors, roomy seating, and free Wi-Fi.


title: Brightline

text: Upon full buildout of the Miami–Orlando route, trains will operate at up to between Miami and West Palm Beach, up to between West Palm Beach and Cocoa, and up to between Cocoa and the Orlando International Airport. A future extension to Tampa from Orlando would, if constructed, also allow trains to operate at up to . It will be one of the few rail services in the United States to approach the lowest high-speed rail standard set by the International Union of Railways, for existing lines, although newly built railways are typically expected to meet the higher standard of to be considered high speed.


title: Brightline

text: The planned travel time between Miami and Orlando is 3 hours. Driving between the two takes hours using the Florida's Turnpike, and hours using the I-95/SR 528 freeways along the planned train route via Cocoa. The flight time between MIA and MCO is one hour, not including check-in, security, and last mile transportation.


title: Brightline

text: To meet the 3 hour schedule, trains will have to operate with an overall average speed of , which is similar to the overall average speed of the "Amtrak" "Acela Express" operating on the Northeast Corridor between New York City and Washington, D.C.


title: Brightline

text: The project calls for more than $1.5 billion in upgrades to the rail corridor between Miami and Cocoa. The company is double tracking the corridor, improving signaling systems, and upgrading every grade crossing to meet the highest applicable safety standards set by FDOT and Federal Railroad Administration. In January 2013, the Federal Railroad Administration issued a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) for the Miami–Cocoa phase of the project, effectively clearing the way for work to begin. Part of the corridor safety upgrades includes installing positive train control (PTC), which will enhance Brightline's ability to monitor and control train movements safely.


title: Brightline

text: Responding to citizen concerns about increased noise from additional horns, the company stated that it will work with local communities to implement quiet zones where possible. Federal law requires quiet zone requests to originate from the local authority that has jurisdiction over the roadway, not the railroad company.


title: Brightline

text: In August 2014, the company announced a partnership with the Broward and Palm Beach Metropolitan Planning Organizations to implement quiet zones between the city of Hallandale Beach and 15th Street in West Palm Beach. In December 2014, the Miami-Dade Metropolitan Planning Organization approved funding to construct quiet zones between PortMiami and the northern Miami-Dade County line. The quiet zones were originally planned to be in place when Brightline becomes operational between Miami and West Palm Beach by the end of 2017. Brightline started service on January 11, 2018, but various delays in constructing the quiet zones have stretched their in-service date to sometime in March.


title: Brightline

text: On May 14, 2018, quiet zones went into effect in West Palm Beach, in Lake Worth on May 21 and in Boca Raton on May 30. The "no train horn" areas apply to all trains, freight and passenger. Quiet Zones remove the legal duty of a train engineer to sound the horn. Train engineers do still use the horn in quiet zones for emergency situations (such as a trespasser fouling the tracks).


title: Brightline

text: The FEC rail corridor includes a number of fixed-span bridges that will be replaced as part of the project. Most do not require United States Coast Guard (USCG) permitting as they do not span significant navigable waterways and clearances will not change. Twelve other bridges—St. Johns River, Eau Gallie River, St. Sebastian River, Crane Creek, Turkey Creek, West Palm Beach Canal, Boynton Canal, Middle River (both the North and South Fork), Oleta River, Arch Creek and Hillsboro Canal—will require permitting by the USCG. In addition, the project calls for significant investment and upgrades to three movable bridges: St. Lucie, Loxahatchee, and New River. These improvements will ensure that bridge mechanical systems for raising and lowering the bridge spans are either fully upgraded or replaced. The company has stated that, prior to it becoming operational, it will start to regularly notify mariners of scheduled bridge closings via the internet, smart phone application and countdown signage on the bridges to enable mariners to have real-time information to decrease wait times at each bridge. Also, the company will station a bridge tender at the New River bridge.


title: Brightline

text: There have been 60 deaths since Brightline began test runs in 2017, giving it the worst per-mile fatality rate in the nation, according to an ongoing Associated Press analysis that began in 2019. In December 2019, the AP produced a story based on FRA data that Brightline had the worst per-mile death rate of the nation's 821 railroads.


title: Brightline

text: None of Brightline's deaths were caused by crew error or faulty equipment, but were all related to suicides or pedestrians and drivers trying to cross and beat the trains, according to law enforcement and federal reports.


title: Brightline

text: The proposed line between Cocoa and Orlando is the only segment that does not have existing track or right-of-way owned by FEC. Originally, the Central Florida Expressway Authority (CFX) believed it could accommodate building new tracks for the project within the BeachLine Expressway's wide right-of-way. This segment of the proposed line will operate at speeds of up to .


title: Brightline

text: CFX began negotiations with Deseret Ranch, which owns the land just south of the BeachLine, to purchase additional land in order to widen the right-of-way. According to a pact made on July 16, 2013, CFX tentatively agreed to pay $12 million for an extra along the BeachLine corridor between Cocoa and Orlando International Airport. In early October 2013, CFX and All Aboard Florida reached a formal purchase agreement for the land required for the right-of-way. Although construction was slated to originally begin in early 2015, construction of the segment started on May 22, 2019.


title: Brightline

text: Also in October 2013, the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority (GOAA) board approved development of a station and maintenance facility on Orlando International Airport property, as well as an easement to build track between the station and the mainline to the coast.


title: Brightline

text: For the initial opening of the line it will be single track for most of the route, however all the bridges and infrastructure is designed for double track thus saving effort when upgrading.


title: Brightline

text: Brightline is constructing two maintenance facilities. One is a Running Repair Facility, located north of the West Palm Beach station at 601 15th Street, designed for maintenance and minor repair work that does not require the train to be removed from service. The 12-acre site has been under construction since at least January 2016. The land includes vintage industrial buildings that will be renovated for the workshop. The facility, named "workshop b", will include a maintenance pit for access to the underside of the trains and will be able to handle four 10-car train sets.


title: Brightline

text: More extensive maintenance/repair will be accomplished at a second site near the Orlando International Airport Intermodal Terminal.


title: Brightline

text: All Aboard Florida ordered five Siemens trainsets in 2014. Each Brightline trainset initially consisted of four passenger coaches, with a Siemens Charger SCB-40 diesel-electric locomotive on each end. The coaches, with interiors designed by the LAB at Rockwell Group, feature ergonomic seating, Wi-Fi, and level boarding, and meet ADA standards. Each trainset holds 248 passengers. Working with All Aboard Florida, the LAB also conceived the Brightline name, brand platform, and visual identity. The entire trainset, including passenger cars, were manufactured by Siemens in its solar-powered plant in Florin, California. Once the route to Orlando is in operation, the trainsets will be expanded to seven coaches, and five more complete trainsets will be purchased. The first of five trainsets departed the Siemens factory on December 8, 2016, and arrived in West Palm Beach on December 14. The fifth trainset arrived in South Florida in October 2017.


title: Brightline

text: The trains offers two classes of service, with one "Premium" coach and three "Smart" coaches on each trainset. "Premium" offers 2x1 and four-to-a-table seating with 50 -wide seats per car and complimentary snacks and beverages, while the slightly less expensive "Smart" fare coaches seat 66 with narrower -wide seats, with snacks and beverages available for purchase. Each trainset is able to hold 248 passengers.


title: Human condition

text: The human condition is all of the characteristics and key events of human life, including birth, learning, emotion, aspiration, morality, conflict, and death. This is a very broad topic that has been and continues to be pondered and analyzed from many perspectives, including those of anthropology, art, biology, history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and religion.


title: Human condition

text: As a literary term, "the human condition" is typically used in the context of ambiguous subjects, such as the meaning of life or moral concerns.


title: Human condition

text: Each major religion has definitive beliefs regarding the human condition. For example, Buddhism teaches that existence is a perpetual cycle of suffering, death, and rebirth from which humans can be liberated via the Noble Eightfold Path. Meanwhile, many Christians believe that humans are born in a sinful condition and are doomed in the afterlife unless they receive salvation through Jesus Christ.


title: Human condition

text: Philosophers have provided many perspectives. An influential ancient view was that of the "Republic" in which Plato explored the question "what is justice?" and postulated that it is not primarily a matter among individuals but of society as a whole, prompting him to devise a utopia. Two thousand years later René Descartes declared "I think, therefore I am" because he believed the human mind, particularly its faculty of reason, to be the primary determiner of truth; for this he is often credited as the father of modern philosophy. One such modern school, existentialism, attempts to reconcile an individual's sense of disorientation and confusion in a universe believed to be absurd.


title: Human condition

text: Many works of literature provide perspective on the human condition. One famous example is Shakespeare's monologue "All the world's a stage" that pensively summarizes seven phases of human life.


title: Human condition

text: Psychology has many theories, such as Maslow's hierarchy of needs and the notion of identity crisis. It also has various methods, e.g. the logotherapy developed by Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl to discover and affirm a sense of meaning. Another method, cognitive behavioral therapy, has become a widespread treatment for clinical depression.


title: Human condition

text: Ever since 1859, when Charles Darwin published "On the Origin of Species", the biological theory of evolution has been significant. The theory posits that the human species is related to all others, living and extinct, and that natural selection is the primary survival factor. This has provided a basis for new beliefs, such as social Darwinism and theistic evolution.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Kattassery Joseph Yesudas (born 10 January 1940) is an Indian playback singer and musician who sings Indian classical, devotional and film songs. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest singers in the history of Indian Music and also as a cultural icon of Kerala. Yesudas is estimated to have recorded more than 50,000 songs in various Indian languages, including Malayalam, Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, Hindi, Odia, Bengali, Marathi as well as Arabic, English, Latin, and Russian, in a career spanning six decades. He is often referred to as "Gaanagandharvan" ( The Celestial Singer). He is one of the highly acclaimed singers in India. Yesudas holds the record for singing 11 songs in different languages in a single day. He has also composed a number of Malayalam film songs during the 1970s and 1980s.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Yesudas won the National Award for the Best Male Playback Singer record eight times, the Filmfare Awards South five times, and the State Award for the Best Playback Singer forty-three times, including awards given by the state governments of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, and West Bengal. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1975, the Padma Bhushan in 2002, and the Padma Vibhushan (second-highest civilian award) in 2017 by the Government of India for his contributions towards the arts. In 2005, he was honoured with the J. C. Daniel Award, Kerala government's highest honour for contributions to Malayalam cinema. In 2011 Yesudas was honoured with the CNN-IBN outstanding achievement award for his contributions in the music field. In 2006, he sang 16 film songs in four South Indian languages on the same day at AVM Studio, Chennai.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: K. J. Yesudas was born in Kochi, in Kerala, in a Latin Catholic Christian family to Augustine Joseph and Elizabeth Joseph. His father was a well-known Malayalam classical musician and stage actor. Yesudas was the second of seven children, preceded by an elder sister named Pushpa, and followed by four younger brothers - Antony (Antappan), Babu, Mani, Justin and a younger sister, Jayamma. Among these siblings, Pushpa and Babu died of fever at a young age, and Justin, the youngest brother, died under mysterious circumstances in February 2020, aged 62.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Augustine Joseph's dearest friend, Musician Kunjan Velu Bhagavathar was the first guru of him. Kunjan Velu was the disciple of Nadaswara Chakravarthi T N Raja Ratnam Pillai. Yesudas started his academic music training at R. L. V. Music Academy, Thrippunithura and completed the "Ganabooshanam" course. Later he studied at Swathi Thirunal College of Music, Thiruvananthapuram under the tutelage of the carnatic music maestro K. R. Kumaraswamy Iyer and Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer but could not complete his studies due to financial constraints. For a brief period, he also studied music under Vechoor Harihara Subramania Iyer, after which he took advanced training from Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Yesudas recorded his first popular song "Jaathi Bhedam Matha Dwesham" (music: M. B. Sreenivasan) on 14 November 1961. The singer considers those four lines he got to sing to start his career in films as a huge blessing as it was written by none other than Sree Narayana Guru, the most respected saint-poet-social reformer of Kerala. The film was Kalpadukal (1962), based on social reform during the life and times of Sree Narayana Guru. He associated with popular singers of those times like P. Leela, Santha P. Nair, K. P. Udayabhanu, S. Janaki etc. and lyricists like P. Bhaskaran and Nambiyath. He sang the lines of poet Kumaran Asan for this film.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: After the initial years he became the most sought after by established music directors of that time, M. B. Sreenivasan, G. Devarajan, V. Dakshinamoorthy, Br Lakshmanan, M. S. Baburaj and many others. Thus began his career in playback singing which included the Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada movies thereafter.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: He got the first major break with the hit Malayalam film named "Bharya" ( music by G. Devarajan and lyrics by Vayalar Ramavarma). In 1967, he sang hit songs in the composition of M.S.Baburaj for the film "Udhyogastha" directed by P.Venu. He also sang in Tamil for "Bommai" first (music: S. Balachander), but the first released movie was "Konjum Kumari" (music: Veda). In 1965, he was invited by the Soviet Union government to perform at music concerts in various cities in the USSR and also sang a Russian song over Radio Kazakhstan. The trio of Salil, Yesudas and Prem Nazir entered the Malayalam Cinema Industry of the 1970s.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: In 1970 he was nominated to head the Kerala Sangeetha Nataka Academy and was the youngest person ever to occupy the post.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: After a decade of singing in South Indian movies, Yesudas got a break in Bollywood in the early 1970s. The first Hindi song he sang was for the movie "Jai Jawan Jai Kissan" (1971), but the first released movie was "Chhoti Si Baat", which resulted in his becoming popular for singings songs like "Jaaneman Jaaneman". He has sung Hindi songs for many leading actors in Hindi cinema including Amitabh Bachchan, Amol Palekar and Jeetendra. He has sung many evergreen Hindi film songs for music directors including Ravindra Jain, Bappi Lahiri, Khayyam, Rajkamal and Salil Chowdhury.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Yesudas' most popular Hindi songs are in the 1976 movie "Chitchor", with music given by Ravindra Jain.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: On 14 November 1999, Yesudas was presented with an honorary award by UNESCO for "Outstanding Achievements in Music and Peace" at the "Music for Peace" event in Paris, a concert held to mark the dawn of the new millennium and whose attendees included artistes such as Lionel Richie, Ray Charles, Montserrat Caballé, and Zubin Mehta.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: In 2001 he sang for album "Ahimsa" in Sanskrit, Latin and English and in a mix of styles including new-age and Carnatic. In his music concerts in the Middle East he sings Arabic songs in the Carnatic style. He frequently serves as a cultural ambassador for India through his performances abroad, promoting Indian music.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: In 2009 Yesudas began a cross-country musical campaign against terrorism in Thiruvananthapuram, with the motto 'Music For Peace'. Kavita Karkare, wife of Hemant Karkare, handed over the torch to Yesudas to mark the launch of the 'Shanthi Sangeetha Yatra'. Yesudas has performed for 36 times in the 36-year-old Soorya Music festival organised by Soorya Krishnamoorthy.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Yesudas is married to Prabha. Their marriage was on 1 February 1970. They have three sons, Vinod (b. 1977), Vijay (b. 1979) and Vishal (b. 1981). Their second son Vijay Yesudas is a musician who won the Kerala State Film Award for Best Male Playback Singer in 2007, 2012 and 2018.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Sree Narayana Guru's message, "One religion and One God for all humanity", influenced young Yesudas in his dealings with his fellow men. He had his own heroes among the musicians too. Mohammed Rafi, Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar and Balamurali Krishna are the ones he admires the most.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Yesudas has been visiting Kollur Mookambika temple, Kollur, Karnataka on his birthday to sing keerthans of Saraswati devi, the Goddess of knowledge, music and the arts. The music festival started on his 60th birthday in 2000. The nine-day music festival begins every January at Kollur Mookambika Temple.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: On Sunday, 10 January 2010, he celebrated his 70th birthday (Sapthathi) at Kollur Sri Mookambika Temple with 'Sangeetharchana' (classical devotional songs), along with 70 singers before goddess Mookambika. The Sangeetharchana included "Pancharatna Gayana" of Thyagaraja's poems. He also took part in the Vidyarambha function. All India Radio broadcast the special Sangeetharchana all over Kerala. Yesudas also has many songs devoted to Lord Ayyappa including the hit song "Harivarasanam". In 2002, during Marad massacre, he visited the place along with the veteran poet Sugathakumari, and conducted classes against violence. Harivarasanam, a devotional song musical version composed by G. Devarajan, recited before closing the temple at Sabarimala was sung by Yesudas. Though there have been many different renditions of this song by many different renowned singers, Sabarimala officially uses Yesudas' voice for Harivarasanam every day.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: In 1980 Yesudas established the Tharangani Studio at Trivandrum. In 1992 the office and studio were moved to Chennai, Tamil Nadu and the company was incorporated in the US in 1998. Tharangni Studio and Tharangni Records became a recording center in Kerala which, for the first time, brought out audio cassettes of Malayalam film songs in stereo. The record company also had a voice mixing studio in Studio27, Chennai. The studio continues to produce and present events of Yesudas, both for film and Indian classical music concerts throughout the world.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Yesudas has recorded over 50,000 songs and has won scores of accolades including the coveted Padma Shri (1975), Padma Bhushan (2002), Padma Vibhushan (2017) and eight National Awards for Best Playback Singer.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: In his acceptance speech of winning the Swaralaya Kairali Yesudas Award (2006), AR Rahman said "I'm greatly honoured by Swaralaya's gesture, and getting this award from my most favourite singer Mr Yesudas. He is one of my most favourite voices' ever in the world." On another occasion during an interview he said of Yesudas, "his voice is unmatched, his voice is god given and I've been hearing his songs since I was 3 years old"


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Ravindra Jain, in an interview wherein the blind music director confessed that if ever he happened to regain vision, the first person he would like to see would be Yesudas.


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: In 2003, billionaire and businessman B. R. Shetty gifted him his 1992 model Rolls-Royce Silver Spirit after listening his concert held at The Indian High School, Dubai. Shetty said: "I was not only touched by his concert but by the man himself who talked about God's kindness to mankind".


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: Bappi Lahiri said in an interview with Filmfare in 2012: "'Yesudas' voice is touched by God. After Kishore Da(Kishore Kumar), he was another singer who brought out the best in me. He is a yogi, a mystic who lives for music. He takes your tunes to another level. And his note is perfect, you can rely on him to deliver it right the first time. Working with him made me touch base with my melodious side. He is vastly under-utilised in Hindi films. I wish Hindi film composers of today realise his genius and offer him assignments."


title: K. J. Yesudas

text: On 2 October 2014, Yesudas sparked a row while speaking at a public function on the occasion of Gandhi Jayanti, where he stated that "Women should not wear dress that trouble others. You should dress modestly and do not behave like men". This resulted in a number of protests from Women's Rights and Political organizations, who asked him to withdraw the comment.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr ( ; ) is an American image hosting and video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was a popular way for amateur and professional photographers to host high-resolution photos. It has changed ownership several times and has been owned by SmugMug since April 20, 2018.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr was launched on February 10, 2004 by Ludicorp, a Vancouver-based company founded by Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake. The service emerged from tools originally created for Ludicorp's "Game Neverending", a web-based massively multiplayer online game. Flickr proved a more feasible project, and ultimately "Game Neverending" was shelved, Butterfield later launched a similar online game, Glitch, which was shut down on November 14, 2012.


title: Flickr

text: Early versions of Flickr focused on a chat room called FlickrLive, with real-time photo exchange capabilities. The successive evolutions focused more on the uploading and filing back-end for individual users and the chat room was buried in the site map. It was eventually dropped as Flickr's back-end systems evolved away from "Game Neverending"s codebase. Key features of Flickr not initially present are tags, marking photos as favorites, group photo pools and interestingness, for which a patent was granted.


title: Flickr

text: In addition to being a popular website for users to share and embed personal photographs and an online community, in 2004, the service was widely used by photo researchers and by bloggers to host images that they embed in blogs and social media.


title: Flickr

text: Yahoo! acquired Ludicorp and Flickr on March 20, 2005. The acquisition reportedly cost $22 million to $25 million. During the week of June 26, 2005 to July 2, 2005, all content was migrated from servers in Canada to servers in the United States, and all resulting data became subject to United States federal law. On May 3, 2007, Yahoo! announced that Yahoo! Photos would close down on September 20, 2007, after which all photos would be deleted; users were encouraged to migrate to Flickr. On January 31, 2007, Flickr announced that "Old Skool" members (those who had joined before the Yahoo! acquisition) would be required to associate their account with a Yahoo! identity by March 15, 2007 to continue using the service. This move was criticized by some users.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr upgraded its services from "beta" to "gamma" status on May 16, 2006, the changes attracted positive attention from Lifehacker. On December 13, 2006, upload limits on free accounts were increased to 100 MB a month (from 20 MB) and were removed from Flickr Pro accounts, which originally had a 2 GB per month limit. On April 9, 2008, Flickr began allowing paid subscribers to upload videos, limited to 90 seconds in length and 150 MB in size. On March 2, 2009, Flickr added the facility to upload and view HD videos, and began allowing free users to upload normal-resolution video. At the same time, the set limit for free accounts was lifted. In 2009, Flickr announced a partnership with Getty Images in which selected users could submit photographs for stock photography usage and receive payment. On June 16, 2010, this was changed so that users could label images as suitable for stock use themselves.


title: Flickr

text: On May 20, 2013, Flickr launched the first stage of a major site redesign, introducing a "Justified View" close-spaced photo layout browsed via "infinite scrolling" and adding new features, including one terabyte of free storage for all users, a scrolling home page (mainly of contacts photos and comments) and updated Android app. The Justified View is paginated between 72 and 360 photos per page but unpaginated in search result presentation. "Tech Radar" described the new style Flickr as representing a "sea change" in its purpose. Many users criticized the changes, and the site's help forum received thousands of negative comments. On March 25, 2014, Flickr's New Photo Experience, a user interface redesign, left beta.


title: Flickr

text: On May 7, 2015, Yahoo! overhauled the site, adding a revamped Camera Roll, a new way to upload photos and upgraded the site's apps. The new Uploadr application was made available for Macs, Windows and mobile devices.


title: Flickr

text: In early May 2019, SmugMug announced the migration of Flickr data - 100+ million accounts and billions of photos and videos - from former owner Yahoo's servers to Amazon Web Services (AWS) in a planned 12-hour transition on May 22, 2019.


title: Flickr

text: On June 13, 2008, Flickr co-founder Stewart Butterfield announced his resignation on July 12, 2008, which followed that of his wife and co-founder Caterina Fake, who left the company on the same day. Butterfield wrote a humorous resignation letter to Brad Garlinghouse.


title: Flickr

text: On December 14, 2008, "The Guardian" reported that three employees had been laid off as Yahoo! continued to reduce its workforce, and on November 30, 2010, "CNET" reported Yahoo! was on the verge of a major layoff affecting 10% to 20% of its workforce. Flickr was specifically named as a target for these layoffs.


title: Flickr

text: On June 13, 2017, Verizon Communications acquired Yahoo!, including Flickr. Verizon reorganized Yahoo!, along with AOL, into a new umbrella company, Oath, which was renamed as Verizon Media on January 8, 2019.


title: Flickr

text: On April 20, 2018, SmugMug acquired Flickr from Verizon's Oath and put an end to Flickr 1 TB storage plan for free users, these users had until February 5, 2019 to convert to 'Pro' accounts or their photo streams would be reduced to a maximum of 1,000 pictures. The deadline was later extended to March 12, 2019. The reasons cited were that the existing model was unsustainable by a medium-sized company which could not get revenues by selling profiles of the users. The sentiment was generally agreed on among the professionals. This policy, however, was never implemented and was abandoned in March, 2022 in favor of a policy that restricted content unless the user upgraded and paid for a Pro account.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr has always offered two types of accounts: Free and Pro. Until January 7, 2019, free accounts had up to 1 TB of storage. On January 8, 2019, the account offerings changed. The free option is limited to 1,000 photos or videos stored, with videos limited to 3 minutes. After January 8, 2019, members over the limit could no longer upload new photos to Flickr. On February 5, 2019, a free account's older content would be deleted automatically if it contains more than 1,000 photos and they do not subscribe to Pro, with the exception of content that was already uploaded with a Creative Commons license before November 1, 2018.


title: Flickr

text: The Pro option features "unlimited" storage, advanced statistics, advertising-free browsing, videos up to 10 minutes in length, "premier" customer service, and promotional offers with other partners.


title: Flickr

text: In May 2011, Flickr added an option to easily reverse an account termination, motivated by the accidental deletion of a Flickr user's account, and public reporting of its protracted restoration. Flickr may delete accounts without giving any reason or warning to the account's owner.


title: Flickr

text: As a result of the SmugMug buyout, Flickr added the ability for users to download all of their account data, such as photo albums, contacts, and comments.


title: Flickr

text: The images a photographer uploads to Flickr go into their sequential "photostream", the basis of a Flickr account. All photostreams can be displayed as a justified view, a slide show, a "detail" view or a datestamped archive. Clicking on a photostream image opens it in the interactive "photopage" alongside data, comments and facilities for embedding images on external sites.


title: Flickr

text: Users may label their uploaded images with titles and descriptions, and images may be tagged, either by the uploader or by other users, if the uploader permits it. These text components enable computer searching of Flickr. Flickr was an early website to implement tag clouds, which were used until 2013, providing access to images tagged with the most popular keywords. Tagging was further revised in the photopage redesign of March 2014. Flickr has been cited as a prime example of effective use of folksonomy.


title: Flickr

text: Users can organize their Flickr photos into "albums" (formerly "sets") which are more flexible than the traditional folder-based method of organizing files, as one photo can belong to one album, many albums, or none at all. Flickr provides code to embed albums into blogs, websites and forums. Flickr albums represent a form of categorical metadata rather than a physical hierarchy. Geotagging can be applied to photos in albums, and any albums with geotagging can be related to a map using imapflickr. The resulting map can be embedded in a website. Flickr albums may be organized into "collections", which can themselves be further organized into higher-order collections.


title: Flickr

text: Organizr is a Web application for organizing photos within a Flickr account that can be accessed through the Flickr interface. It allows users to modify tags, descriptions and set groupings, and to place photos on a world map (a feature provided in conjunction with Yahoo! Maps). It uses Ajax to emulate the look, feel and quick functionality of desktop-based photo-management applications, such as Google's Picasa and F-Spot. Users can select and apply changes to multiple photos at a time, as an alternative to the standard Flickr interface for editing.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr provides both private and public image storage. A user uploading an image can set privacy controls that determine who can view the image. A photo can be flagged as either public or private. Private images are visible by default only to the uploader, but they can also be marked as viewable by friends and/or family. Privacy settings also can be decided by adding photographs from a user's photostream to a "group pool". If a group is private all the members of that group can see the photo. If a group is public the photo becomes public as well. Flickr also provides a "contact list" which can be used to control image access for a specific set of users in a way similar to that of LiveJournal. In November 2006, Flickr created a "guest pass" system that allows private photos to be shared with non-Flickr members. This setting allows sets or all photos under a certain privacy category (friends or family) to be shared. Many members allow their photos to be viewed by anyone, forming a large collaborative database of categorized photos. By default, other members can leave comments about any image they have permission to view and, in many cases, can add to the list of tags associated with an image.


title: Flickr

text: The core functionality of the site relies on standard HTML and HTTP features, allowing for wide compatibility among platforms and browsers; Flickr's functionality includes RSS and Atom feeds and an API that enables independent programmers to expand its services. This includes a large number of third-party Greasemonkey scripts that enhance and extend the functionality of Flickr. In 2006, Flickr was the second most extended site on userscripts.org. Organizr and most of Flickr's other text-editing and tagging interfaces use Ajax, with which most modern browsers are compliant. Images can be posted to the user's photostream via email attachments, which enables direct uploads from many cameraphones and applications. Flickr uses the Geo microformat on over 3 million geotagged images.


title: Flickr

text: According to the company, Flickr is hosted on 62 databases across 124 servers, with about 800,000 user accounts per pair of servers. Based on information compiled by highscalability.com, the MySQL databases are hosted on servers that are Linux-based (from Red Hat), with a software platform that includes Apache, PHP (with PEAR and Smarty), shards, Memcached, Squid, Perl, ImageMagick and Java; the system administration tools include Ganglia, SystemImager, Subcon and CVSup.


title: Flickr

text: Signed-in Flickr users can "Follow" the Photostreams of other Flickr photographers. Reciprocating this process is optional. A user's homepage contains a stream of their Contacts' photos at 2/3 screensize.


title: Flickr

text: Groups are another major means of interaction with fellow members of Flickr around common photography interests. A Flickr Group can be started by any Flickr user, who becomes its administrator and can appoint moderators. Groups may either be open access or invitation-only, and most have an associated pool of photos. The administrator of the Flickr group can monitor and set restrictions for the group, assign awards to members, and may curate and organize the photo content. Recent uploads to a group will sometimes appear on its members' homepages. Group photo pools may be displayed in the "Justified View" or as a slideshow.


title: Flickr

text: "Galleries" of photos from other photostreams may be curated by any signed-up Flickr user, provided the feature is not disabled by the photo's uploader, these are then publicly viewable.


title: Flickr

text: Any Flickr user can post comments to a Flickr photo on its photopage, unless this has been disabled by the uploader, and users can "favorite" a photo. A user's favorites can be viewed in a justified or slideshow display.


title: Flickr

text: Users of Windows Photo Gallery, Apple's iPhoto (version 8), Adobe's Lightroom 3.2, Apple's Aperture (version 3.0), darktable, and digiKam have the ability to upload their photos directly to Flickr. They can also automatically update their status on other social networking services when they upload their images to Flickr. Flickr provides a desktop client for Mac OS X and Windows that allows users to upload photos without using the web interface. Uploadr allows drag-and-drop batch uploading of photos, the setting of tags and descriptions for each batch, and the editing of privacy settings.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr has entered into partnerships with many third parties. Flickr had a partnership with the Picnik online photo-editing application that included a reduced-feature version of Picnik built into Flickr as a default photo editor. On April 5, 2012, Flickr replaced Picnik with Aviary as its default photo editor. In addition to using commercial mapping data, Flickr now uses OpenStreetMap mapping for various cities; this began with Beijing during the run-up to the 2008 Olympic games. , this is used for Baghdad, Beijing, Kabul, Sydney and Tokyo. OpenStreetMap data is collected by volunteers and is available under the Open Database License. Flickr offers printing of various forms of merchandise, including business cards, photo books, stationery, personalized credit cards and large-size prints from companies such as Moo, Blurb, Tiny Prints, Capital One, Imagekind, and QOOP. The Flickr partnership with Getty Images to sell stock photos from users is under review as of early 2014.


title: Flickr

text: In March 2007, Flickr added new content filtering controls that let members specify by default what types of images they generally upload (photo, art/illustration, or screenshot) and how "safe" (i.e., unlikely to offend others) their images are, as well as specify that information for specific images individually. Individual images are assigned to one of three categories: "safe", "moderate" and "restricted". Users can specify the same criteria when searching for images. There are some restrictions on searches for certain types of users: non-members must always use SafeSearch, which omits images noted as potentially offensive, while members whose Yahoo! accounts indicate that they are underage may use SafeSearch or moderate SafeSearch, but cannot turn SafeSearch off completely. The system achieves a fairly good separation of family-friendly photos and adult content; generic image searches normally produce no pornographic results, with the visibility of adult content restricted to users and dedicated Flickr communities who have opted into viewing it.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr has used this filtering system to change the level of accessibility to "unsafe" content for entire nations, including South Korea, Hong Kong and Germany. In summer 2007, German users staged a "revolt" over being assigned the user rights of a minor. See Censorship below.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr offers users the ability to either release their images under certain common usage licenses or label them as "all rights reserved". The licensing options primarily include the Creative Commons 2.0 attribution-based and minor content-control licenses – although jurisdiction and version-specific licenses cannot be selected. As with "tags", the site allows easy searching of only those images that fall under a specific license.


title: Flickr

text: On January 16, 2008, Flickr launched a program called "The Commons on Flickr." Several international cultural institutions share images using a "no known copyright restrictions" through the program. According to Flickr, the goal of the program is to "firstly show you hidden treasures in the world's public photography archives, and secondly to show how your input and knowledge can help make these collections even richer." Participants include the National Museum of Denmark, Powerhouse Museum, George Eastman Museum, Library of Congress, Nationaal Archief, National Archives and Records Administration, National Library of Scotland, State Library of New South Wales, and Smithsonian Institution.


title: Flickr

text: In May 2009, White House official photographer Pete Souza began using Flickr as a conduit for releasing White House photos. The photos were initially posted with a Creative Commons Attribution license requiring that the original photographers be credited. Flickr later created a new license which identified them as "United States Government Work", which does not carry any copyright restrictions.


title: Flickr

text: In March 2015, Flickr added the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark and Creative Commons Zero (CC0) to its licensing options. The Public Domain Mark is meant for images that are no longer protected by copyright. CC0 is used for works that are still protected by copyright or neighbouring rights, but where the rightsholders choose to waive all those rights.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr became an immediate success and is seen as a successful example of "Web 2.0", and a year later was purchased by Yahoo!. Initially the site was most popular with professional photographers and graphic designers as well as bloggers who used it as an image repository. In 2007, Flickr was the 19th most popular website on the Internet according to its Alexa Rank. However, since then, its popularity has declined relative to social media platforms with photo sharing capabilities (such as Facebook and Instagram), as well as cloud file storage services (such as Dropbox). By 2021, Flickr's Alexa Rank declined significantly, yet indicated that the website was still among the top 500 most popular websites globally.


title: Flickr

text: On June 12, 2007, in the wake of the rollout of localized language versions of the site, Flickr implemented a user-side rating system for filtering out potentially controversial photos. Simultaneously, users with accounts registered with Yahoo! subsidiaries in Germany, Singapore, Hong Kong and Korea were prevented from viewing photos rated "moderate" or "restricted" on the three-part scale used. Many Flickr users, particularly in Germany, protested against the new restrictions, claiming unwanted censorship from Flickr and Yahoo.


title: Flickr

text: Flickr management, unwilling to go into legal details, implied that the reason for the stringent filtering was some unusually strict age-verification laws in Germany. The issue received attention in the German national media, especially in online publications. Initial reports indicated that Flickr's action was a sensible, if unattractive, precaution against prosecution, although later coverage implied that Flickr's action may have been unnecessarily strict. On June 20, 2007, Flickr reacted by granting German users access to "moderate" (but not "restricted") images, and hinted at a future solution for Germany, involving advanced age-verification procedures.


title: Flickr

text: Since June 1, 2009, Flickr has been blocked in China in advance of the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.


title: Flickr

text: Michael Arrington of TechCrunch and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have criticised Flickr for its heavy-handed implementation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA). Under OCILLA, a service provider such as Flickr is obliged to delete or disable access to content as soon as they receive an official notice of infringement, to maintain protection from liability. After having one of his own pictures taken down following an incorrect DMCA claim, British comedian Dave Gorman researched the issue and concluded that if the Flickr user was not based in the United States or they were, but the person filing the notice of infringement was not, Flickr deleted the disputed content immediately. Even if the user could successfully demonstrate that the content did not infringe upon any copyright, Flickr did not, according to Gorman, replace the deleted content. He argued that this was contrary to its obligations in responding to a counter-notice. Shortly afterward, Flickr changed its policy.


title: Flickr

text: In 2019, Flickr added new theft detection tool options to certain users. Some subscribers will be provided "copy-protection tools that can detect if their images have been used without permission," the BBC reported in 2019, noting "Flickr Pro subscribers will be able to monitor up to 1,000 images and send automated copyright claims to people or companies that use their photos."


title: Flickr

text: In November 2014, Flickr announced that it would sell wall-sized prints of photos from the service that are licensed under Creative Commons licenses allowing commercial use. Although its use of the photos in this manner is legal and allowed under the licenses, Flickr was criticized by users for what they perceived to be unfair exploitation of artists' works, as all the profits from these offerings go to Yahoo! and are not shared with their respective photographers, and users were not given a means of opting-out from the program without placing their photos under a more restrictive non-commercial license. By contrast, a similar opt-in program for "licensed" photos does give photographers a 51% share of sales. On December 19, 2014, Flickr General Manager Bernardo Hernandez announced they would pull all Creative Commons-licensed images from the program and issue refunds, stating that "Subsequently, we'll work closely with Creative Commons to come back with programs that align better with our community values."


title: Flickr

text: On March 17, 2022, Flickr revealed that it had not in fact deleted any photos for exceeding storage limits. However, it announced that it would soon implement a policy limiting the sharing of "moderate" or "restricted" content to Pro users, and limiting free users to 50 "non-public" images. Images beyond these limits would be at risk for deletion.


title: Patrick Kane

text: Patrick Timothy Kane II (born November 19, 1988) is an American professional ice hockey right winger and alternate captain for the Chicago Blackhawks of the National Hockey League (NHL). The Blackhawks selected him with the first overall pick in the 2007 NHL Entry Draft. Kane also represented the United States at the 2010 and 2014 Winter Olympics.


title: Patrick Kane

text: Kane has won three Stanley Cups as a member of the Blackhawks, in 2010, 2013 and 2015, winning the Conn Smythe Trophy as the most valuable player of the playoffs in 2013. Kane won the Hart Memorial Trophy as Most Valuable Player and Art Ross Trophy as scoring champion in the 2015–16 NHL season. Kane, who led the NHL with 106 points (46 goals, 60 assists), is the first American-born player to win the Art Ross Trophy as the NHL's scoring leader. He was also the first American-born player to win the Hart Trophy. In 2017, he was named one of the 100 Greatest NHL Players. On January 19, 2020, Kane became the youngest U.S. player to reach 1,000 career regular-season points.


title: Patrick Kane

text: At age 14, Kane played junior hockey for the USA Bobcats, scoring many goals and earning the title of MVP. Kane relocated to Michigan, where he lived with former NHL player Pat Verbeek, having been convinced to play for the Honeybaked AAA hockey club in Detroit. The club is a part of the Midwest Elite Hockey League. Kane's career with Honeybaked lasted for three years.


title: Patrick Kane

text: The London Knights drafted Kane in the fifth round, 88th overall, in the 2004 Ontario Hockey League Midget Draft, but he chose not to play for the Knights until the 2006–07 season. Instead, he played for the United States U-18 National Team Development Program (NTDP), where he led the team in scoring with 102 points during the 2005–06 season, surpassing the previous record holder, Phil Kessel. Playing on a line with Sergei Kostitsyn and Sam Gagner the following season with London, he scored 145 points for the OHL scoring title and combined with Gagner and Kostitsyn for 394 points.


title: Patrick Kane

text: Kane and the Knights finished the playoffs by losing in the OHL's Western Conference final to the Plymouth Whalers in a 4–1 best-of-seven series. He finished his playoff campaign with 10 goals and 21 assists for 31 points in 16 games.


title: Patrick Kane

text: On April 27, 2007, Kane was announced as the winner of the Emms Family Award for the OHL rookie of the year. He was also named runner-up to John Tavares for the Red Tilson Trophy as league MVP.


title: Patrick Kane

text: Heading into the 2007 NHL Entry Draft, Kane was ranked first among North American prospects by the NHL Central Scouting Bureau and was chosen first overall by the Chicago Blackhawks. The St. Louis Blues offered to trade the Blackhawks their 9th, 24th and 26th overall picks in the 2007 Draft in order to acquire Chicago's first overall selection and draft Kane. On July 25, 2007, Blackhawks' general manager Dale Tallon announced that they had signed Kane to a three-year contract. Kane threw the ceremonial first pitch at a Chicago Cubs game on June 25, 2007, at Wrigley Field. Kane later joined Denis Savard, the Blackhawks' coach, in singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game". Kane also threw the first pitch at a Buffalo Bisons (AAA) game in August.


title: Patrick Kane

text: Kane made his NHL debut on October 4, 2007, against the Minnesota Wild. He recorded his first assist and first shootout goal (a game-winner) two days later against Dominik Hašek of the Detroit Red Wings. He scored his first NHL goal on October 19, beating José Théodore of the Colorado Avalanche. With a quick start to his rookie campaign, on November 2, Kane was named the NHL Rookie of the Month for October after scoring 5 goals and 11 assists in 12 games. On December 15, Kane and the Blackhawks visited the Buffalo Sabres to mark Kane's first return to Buffalo as a professional hockey player. Kane received a special cheer from his hometown and a special ceremony was held before the game. The Blackhawks lost the game 3–1, with Kane scoring their lone goal. Kane finished his first NHL campaign atop the rookie scoring race with 72 points. On June 12, 2008, he received the Calder Memorial Trophy, awarded to the NHL's rookie of the year, finishing ahead of teammate Jonathan Toews and Washington Capitals forward Nicklas Bäckström.


title: Patrick Kane

text: The following season, Kane and Toews helped lead a rejuvenated Blackhawks team back to the Stanley Cup playoffs. After recording 70 points in the regular season, Kane scored his first career hat-trick in the 2009 playoffs against the Vancouver Canucks in the second round on May 11, 2009. The Blackhawks won the game 7–5, clinching their spot in the Western Conference Finals for the first time since 1995. After the game, Kane told the "Chicago Sun-Times" that he was "fired up" after Canucks defenseman Willie Mitchell claimed that Kane "couldn't play five-on-five". He finished his first NHL playoffs with 14 points in 16 games as the Blackhawks were eliminated in the Western Conference Finals by the Detroit Red Wings.


title: Patrick Kane

text: In May 2009, the "Chicago Tribune" reported that Kane would be the cover athlete for EA Sports' "NHL 10". In the final season of his initial rookie contract, on December 3, 2009, Kane signed a reported five-year, $31.5 million contract extension with Chicago. The deal was announced simultaneously with contract extensions to both Toews and defenseman Duncan Keith.