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'Spider-Man: Brand New Day' Skyrockets Sony Pictures Entertainment's Quarterly Profit, Revenue
Spider-Man: Brand New Day, the top-grossing theatrical release in 2026, helped Sony Pictures Entertainment hit a fiscal grandslam in the second quarter ended Sept. 30. The fourth installment starring Tom Holland in the title role along with Zendaya as his female interest, skyrocketed Sony’s theatrical revenue almost 1,020% to $1.276 billion from $114 million in … Continue reading "‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Skyrockets Sony Pictures Entertainment’s Quarterly Profit, Revenue"
Susan Bullman, Ph.D.
Susan Bullman, Ph.D., receives TAMEST Mary Beth Maddox Award for breakthrough tumor microbiome research
Rhode Island voters approve higher education bond, providing funds for new URI integrated health building
KINGSTON, R.I. – Nov. 5, 2026 – Rhode Island voters overwhelmingly approved Question 1 on Election Day, Nov. 3, authorizing a $275 million bond investment in the state’s public colleges and universities, including $165 million for a new integrated health building at the University of Rhode Island’s Kingston Campus. The bond approval represents a significant […]
Danish comedian unwittingly stars in elaborate TV prank
Danish comedian Rasmus Wallbridge spent four months thinking he was making a feature film with his creative partner. It turned out to be an elaborate TV prank filmed with hidden
Cigna profit tops estimates on insurance, care services
Cigna said profits reflected growth in its insurance business and specialty pharmacy services.
In brief: 'A Proud Family Wizmas' trailer and more
Zoo wee mama, indeed. There's a brand-new trailer for the upcoming Disney+ animated holiday comedy film Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: The Getaway. Readers of Jeff Kinney’s bestselling book series can see the Heffley family come to life in this festive film that premieres on Dec. 4 ...Speaking of trailers for holiday specials, fans of The Proud Family can watch a brand-new look at the upcoming stop-motion holiday special A Proud Family Wizmas. It arrives on Disney+ Nov. 14. The special is filled with songs and follows Penny Proud as she accidentally destroys Christmas and sets out to make things right. Kyla Pratt returns to voice Penny while guest stars Anderson .Paak, Lil Rel Howery, JB Smoove and Gabrielle Union come along for the ride ... TNCMS.AdManager.render({region: 'fixed-big-ad-top-asset', slot: 1, fold: "above"}); Camila Mendes is back in character as Ana Santos. The actress once again stars as the character in the new sequel film Upgraded 2. Prime Video has announced cameras are up and rolling on the movie in Venice, Italy ...Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved. Thank you for reading kmaland.comAt KMA, we attempt to be accurate in our reporting. If you see a typo or mistake in a story, please contact us by emailing kmaradio@kmaland.com.
Six-Story Medical Office Building Tops Out At Broward Health North In Deerfield Beach
Florida YIMBY says "Yes In My Backyard" to positive new development in Florida.
Democrats’ blue wave beat Texas’ GOP gerrymanders. Did California even need Prop. 50?
California Democrats went all in on redistricting to fight GOP gerrymanders in Texas and Florida. But in light of the blue wave, was Prop. 50 even necessary?
Heichal HaTorah Talmidim Experiment in the Science Lab
This past week, Heichal HaTorah’s ninth-grade biology students learned how to use indicators to test the pH levels of common household solutions. Students observed a wide range of colors as natural plant-based pigments (anthocyanins) in red cabbage juice reacted with acids and bases in everyday substances. Students made predictions and determined whether a substance was […]
First time buying health insurance during open enrollment? Here’s what to know
Not many 22-year-olds share DJ Mikunda’s enthusiasm for health insurance coverage. “You know what sounds like a good Friday night? It’s looking at he
1K views · 26 reactions | Many female politicians say open hostility...
Many female politicians say open hostility towards them is growing. Researchers say democracy could pay the price. #dwgermanpolitics
South Korean director Yeon Sang-ho revisits AI themes in latest thriller 'Paradise Lost'
South Korean director Yeon Sang-ho explores artificial intelligence in his films, including his latest, “Paradise Lost.”
South Korean director Yeon Sang-ho revisits AI themes in latest thriller 'Paradise Lost'
South Korean director Yeon Sang-ho explores artificial intelligence in his films, including his latest, “Paradise Lost.” | 830 WCCO
Almost 5.2 million Texans lack health insurance. Advocates say problem is bigger than new data shows
New Census data shows more than 16% of Texans didn’t have health insurance in 2025. Advocates warn the number could already be worse.
Scientists discover that a clogged filter could revolutionize oil refining
Scientists have developed a remarkable new membrane that separates crude oil at room temperature, using the oil itself to create microscopic filtration channels. The breakthrough could cut refining energy consumption by nearly 32%, carbon emissions by almost 38%, and operating costs by 36%, potentially transforming one of the world's most energy-intensive industries.
'I Play Rocky,' 'The Cat in the Hat,' 'Ramayana' top list of new films
'Jimmy,' 'Once Upon a Time in Harlem,' 'Godzilla Minus Zero,' 'Possible Love' and 'Wild Horse Nine' are also opening
Cristiano Ronaldo confirms retirement from international soccer
After years of spending time and elevating the Portuguese national team, Cristiano Ronaldo is done with international soccer . Ronaldo was a part of the Portuguese team for almost 23 years and represented the squad in 6 FIFA World Cups (2006, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022, and 2026). Amid his ongoing suspension and miscommunication with manager Jorge […] The post Cristiano Ronaldo confirms retirement from international soccer appeared first on ClutchPoints.
Unfinished business for Cantero as Pearson chases a Chilean double
Last Sunday in San Pedro de la Paz, five men came off the bike together and only 44 seconds separated them at the line. Seven days later, almost all of them…
Fresh wave of bomb threats hit Europe flights, days after first hoaxes
Since Tuesday as many as 20 flights in Europe have faced bomb hoaxes. "Threats are almost always unfounded," one airline told Business Insider.
Palm Beach County 'Best of Season' arts and culture preview
From Broadway hits to classical concerts, here are the top arts and entertainment events coming to Palm Beach.
LA film students are eager to pick up Hollywood's pieces
Mergers, layoffs, AI and runaway production have shaken Hollywood. Film students at USC, UCLA and LMU explain why they're pursuing the industry anyway.
'Passing Strange' premieres in L.A. at Pasadena Playhouse
'Passing Strange,' a 20-year-old rock musical about a striving musician in downtown L.A. has gone to Broadway and been filmed by Spike Lee — but it has never been produced in SoCal. A highly anticipated revival at Pasadena Playhouse is changing that.
A ‘STEM wave’: Democratic doctors, scientists win a record number of seats in the midterms
New members of Congress are expected to help shape the health agenda next year.
How the blue wave almost tilted Louisiana’s Senate race — but Julia Letlow narrowly won
Jamie Davis almost pulled up a shocking upset in a red state. Here’s how Julia Letlow eked out a win.
When papers become currency: a Chinese debate about trust in science
Last Saturday, 31 October, I went to the University of Hong Kong’s Beijing Centre for its Talent Forum. It was the fourth stop in the series this year, following events in Shanghai’s Zhangjiang, Shenzhen’s Qianhai, and on HKU’s main campus. The programme covered a remarkable distance in one afternoon. HKU’s Xiao-Jing Wang discussed computational neuroscience, intelligence, and the prefrontal cortex—before even delivering his inaugural public lecture to students back in Hong Kong. His colleague Bing Zhang took us from the Big Bang to artificial intelligence. Tsinghua’s Xue Lan asked how AI might reshape the institutional infrastructure underpinning higher education. There were lively panels featuring industry leaders from JD.com, Xiaomi, Haier—and Kaiser Y Kuo on the closing panel discussing innovation and international connections. I cannot pretend to have followed every detail of the brain models or the astrophysics. The talk that stayed with me was closer to something we have covered before: Zhou Zhonghe 周忠和 on papers, evaluation, and scientific trust. Zhou is a palaeontologist, an Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and an international member of the US National Academy of Sciences. He is also editor-in-chief of The Intellectual (知识分子), China’s leading science commentary platform. His subject was uncomfortable enough for a room full of successful academics: what happens when the system for recognising good science starts rewarding something else? Part of my interest came from our sister newsletter, The East is Read, which covered the controversy around “Geng Tongxue” in May. A PhD dropout from Beihang University, Geng has publicly challenged papers by prominent researchers through detailed online allegations of manipulated images and fabricated data. At Tongji University, an investigation into a challenged Nature paper found academic misconduct, and the dean of its life sciences school was removed. The affair brought doubts about academic integrity well beyond laboratories and university committees. How could someone outside the established hierarchy spot problems in papers that had passed through prestigious journals and institutions? And what, exactly, had all that prestige guaranteed? Zhou approached these questions through two essays published in July by The Intellectual: one by Wang Xiaodong, director of the National Institute of Biological Sciences, Beijing, and a response by Wang Liming, of Shanghai’s Shangsi Institute of Natural Sciences. Both began with the controversy over Geng. Their arguments deserve a wider audience, so I want to put parts of them alongside what Zhou said on Saturday. Wang Xiaodong’s starting point is evolution. A research system selects for the behaviour it rewards. Grants, jobs, journals, talent programmes, and prizes collectively determine which scientists prosper and which practices get passed down from advisors to students. “Whatever the system rewards is what it will evolve to produce,” he writes, citing the ancient Chinese saying: The King of Chu loved slender waists, and many in the palace starved to death. That is a more demanding diagnosis than saying there are dishonest people in science. Punishing a fraudster does not change the selective environment that made a particular kind of research profitable. His account also gives scientific success an awkward role in the story. As Zhou put it on Saturday, science became a victim of its own success. Once research became central to industry, national power, and economic growth, universities and laboratories expanded, and public money followed. That created an administrative need for rapid decisions: who should get the next grant, the next laboratory, the next appointment? The difficulty is that the true value of a discovery may take years or decades of testing and building to become clear. Resource allocation cannot wait that long. Publication counts, journal prestige, impact factors, and citations therefore become convenient ways to make an instant judgement. “The real problem is not that these indicators have no value,” Wang Xiaodong writes, “but that they are trying to answer a question that only time can answer.” Telling administrators simply to stop counting papers will never be enough. They still have budgets to distribute and appointments to make. Something has to replace the shortcut. Zhou described the consequences inside publishing. Papers acquire ever more requirements: a complete story, polished presentation, extensive datasets, and accessibility to readers beyond the immediate field. Individually, those demands sound reasonable. Together, he warned, they produce formulaic “eight-legged” papers 八股文 and rigid reviewing, while genuinely original or non-consensus work struggles to get past journal editors—some of whom wield immense gatekeeping power despite having limited laboratory experience themselves. Meanwhile, the demands for sprawling, “complete” narratives have fuelled a wider replication crisis. Wang Xiaodong uses a mahjong metaphor to describe the result: put the complex papers published by the exact same lab over several years side by side, and they often look like “Thirteen Orphans” (十三不靠)—every tile completely unrelated to the next, and none of them reproducible by outsiders. Zhou also spoke frankly as an editor who has trouble finding reviewers. Everyone wants someone else to review their work; qualified senior researchers have little time to return the favour. The labour is anonymous, unpaid, and brings almost no institutional recognition, so it increasingly gets passed down to postdocs and graduate students. And while anonymity protects reviewers from rank and personal favours, hyper-specialisation means an author’s most qualified reviewer is often a direct competitor, shielded from accountability. The protection and the problem coexist. Wang Liming takes the argument a step further. The decisive change, in his essay, is the instant conversion of academic honour into material resources. Once a paper can be cashed in for funding, a job, students, commercial investment, or even a company valuation, scientists are alienated from their work: they must keep minting this “research currency” to keep their teams alive. He is careful not to romanticise the past. The old world of gentleman scientists—financially independent figures like Boyle and Darwin who needed nothing from external funders—was also a closed club that excluded people without inherited wealth, women, and much of humanity outside the West. Professional science allowed ordinary people, himself included, to become researchers. Nobody should want to undo that. The problem, in his account, is an exchange system that becomes too uniform and too difficult to correct. His most pointed Chinese example is the “hat” (帽子): the prestigious talent designation that brings continuing access to money, laboratory space, students, and institutional influence. “If papers are the circulating currency of the research system, then a ‘hat’ is a bond that pays interest over the long term,” he writes. A paper at least requires another round of peer review. A title in the Chinese context can lock in a judgement made years ago and turn it into permanent status rent, regardless of whether its holder is still doing good science. Here, official institutions hire, organise, and evaluate scientists. Unlike honours awarded by autonomous academic communities in the West, a Chinese “hat” blends non-scientist administrative power with state authority. Once granted, it turns a past judgement into permanent status rent that is nearly impossible to revoke—because taking a hat off would imply that official authority erred in putting it on. Both Wangs see China as experiencing, at compressed speed, pressures present across global science. Research expansion, rising investment, publication growth, and elaborate evaluation metrics arrived in China within two or three decades rather than two or three centuries. Zhou agreed with that international framing—noting that recent US White House science policy documents and the new president of the US National Academy of Sciences, a fellow palaeontologist who recently visited Zhou’s institute in Beijing, have raised strikingly similar warnings about consensus-bound peer review, short-term project grants, and the replication crisis. Still, Zhou emphasised that China’s traditional hierarchy, personal networks (guanxi), and the ethos that “a good scholar becomes an official” (学而优则仕) amplify those pressures at home. So what would change things? Here Zhou’s tone differed from the call for a revolution in scientific trust in Wang Xiaodong’s essay. As an evolutionary biologist, Zhou favoured patchwork repair (修修补补). Living systems survive through accumulated adjustments; dramatic mutations are usually fatal. Science cannot return to a small, slow-moving pastoral era, especially after the successive accelerations of professionalisation after the Second World War, the internet, and now artificial intelligence. But it can alter the local environment in which researchers work. He pointed to domestic experiments designed to support unconventional research and diversify funding, including Tencent’s New Cornerstone Investigator Program, the Xplorer Prize, and the Future Science Prize. He also mentioned participating in reviews for “major non-consensus projects” under the National Natural Science Foundation of China. One guiding principle he recalled was wonderfully direct: “Failure is allowed; corruption is not” (允许失败，不允许腐败). That distinction would mean quite a lot if taken seriously. An honest attempt that fails should not have to disguise itself as a success to survive an assessment. Wang Liming’s essay adds a sharp caveat to the optimism about new domestic funders. Multiple organisations do not automatically produce multiple ways of judging science. If the same pool of senior domestic scientists makes the decisions through the same two-round review procedures, it is still “fake diversity.” He argues for three distinct kinds of money: broad baseline funding governed by fair procedures; patient funding for questions that take ten years; and non-consensus funding based on individual taste, deliberately empowering a few genuine experts to make biased, contrarian bets on eccentric ideas that would inevitably be averaged out by a committee. Replacing one monopoly with another achieves little; a healthy ecosystem needs variance. Zhou’s proposals for publishing were similarly concrete: strip papers of their resource-allocation burden and return them to recording discoveries and establishing priority; separate dissemination from evaluation, as eLife and Peer Community In do; adopt more modular “micro-publications” and real-name endorsements; recognize the labour of editors and reviewers; and give replication work proper credit rather than treating it as an unpublishable dead end. AI makes every part of this debate more urgent—and Zhou wove it throughout his talk. In his own preparation, he used AI to survey the declining influence of academic monographs, noting how tools are already changing how scholars gather information. More fundamentally, he placed AI as the latest great acceleration in scientific history: just as the internet sped up the pace of research and tightened external resource pressures, AI is compressing the cycle again. In the essays Zhou cited, AI cuts both ways. Wang Xiaodong expects large language models to erase much of the English-writing disadvantage long faced by Chinese scientists, further swelling the flood of papers coming out of Chinese labs. Wang Liming sees AI accelerating both ends of the trust crisis: it lowers the cost of paper mills and fabricated images just as quickly as it lowers the cost of automated image forensics, data auditing, and code reproduction. “Whoever builds the verification layer wins,” Wang Liming writes. His proposed alternative to the static, packaged “story paper” is a continuously versioned “unit of discovery” containing a falsifiable claim, raw data, analysis code, experimental parameters, and an ongoing log of independent checks—where negative results and failed replications are recorded rather than buried. Zhou ended his keynote by bringing AI back to the question of scientific honour and credit. Citing a recent Intellectual discussion on “What AI Means for Mathematics” featuring Fields Medalist Deng Yu 邓煜—at a moment when AI is already batch-solving mathematical conjectures, as HKU Vice-President Lin Chen noted in his opening remarks—Zhou agreed that human researchers must remain the principal agents: AI is a tool that frees scientists from tedious calculation to think about deeper, messier real-world problems. Yet that partnership creates a thorny new evaluation problem. When a breakthrough is made with AI, what is the human contribution and what is the machine’s? And since AI models distil centuries of accumulated human scholarship, is it right that the credit and value flow so heavily to the private AI companies building the tools? The old struggle over how to assign scientific honour is acquiring a whole new layer. What I took away was a serious discussion of how science can remain trustworthy as its scale, incentives, and tools change. These were scientists with real standing inside China’s system questioning how that standing is produced, and proposing changes that would affect their own institutions and peers. That made the afternoon at HKU’s Beijing Centre worthwhile. At the close, Wang Feng, Director of Communications and Public Affairs at HKU, said the value of the forum series—which heads to Hangzhou in December and cities like Chengdu early next year—would lie in the real cooperation it helped bring about. The university has plenty to celebrate: this week it topped the QS Asia rankings for a second consecutive year, alongside its 11th-place position in the QS World University Rankings 2027. For me, bringing this debate to an audience beyond the people who review papers and allocate grants was a useful contribution. Share [ The East is Read PhD dropout’s exposé forces an academic fraud reckoning in China A former doctoral student turned blogger has shaken China’s academic establishment by publicly accusing prominent university scholars of fabricating data and manipulating papers, triggering investigations at several leading institutions and drawing rare attention from state media… Read more 5 months ago · 43 likes · 8 comments · Yuxuan JIA ](https://www.eastisread.com/p/phd-dropouts-expose-forces-an-academic?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=47580)
European Enterprises Face Growing Pressure to Turn AI Investment into Business Value, ISG Says
PARIS, November 05, 2026--The ISG AI Impact Summit will explore operating models and data and governance frameworks to scale AI, November 9–10 at the Pullman Paris Tour Eiffel.
Imaging Science Thesis Defense: A Step Towards Developing Digital Twins of Forest Environments with Terrestrial Laser Scanning | Events
Imaging Science MS Thesis Defense A Step Towards Developing Digital Twins of Forest Environments with Terrestrial Laser Scanning Zoom Link here Aisha Co Imaging Science MS Candidate Rochester Institute of Technology Abstract: Digital twins have become an increasingly relevant topic as we pursue accurate representations of the real world for planning, research, and even design purposes. This study focuses on the steps for creating digital twins of forest environments using sparse points from terrestrial light detection and ranging (LiDAR). Specifically, we developed geometric models of structural digital twins (SDTs) from leaf-off terrestrial laser scanning of real-world forests. Three algorithms were used to develop an approach to handle individual tree reconstructions for sparse point clouds, and they were tested and validated with a two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic against an existing inventory of the RIT Nature Trail to evaluate the reconstruction’s fidelity. The key evaluation metrics included diameter at breast height (DBH) and height. The limited nature of available ground truth necessitated the use of an additional validation method using a PANGAEA open dataset, based on comparing DBH, height, and crown diameter against the dataset’s calculated measurements. Reconstructions were compared against per-tree reference values at two-point spacings for sixteen trees from the open BR07 dataset (PANGAEA); these specifications matched the collected RIT Nature Trail data and the scanner’s nominal spacing. On BR07, the proposed method had the lowest median DBH error among the methods that modeled every tree (1.28cm, 4.1%), and this error was nearly unchanged at the coarser spacing, while TreeQSM’s rose from 4.2% to 6.5% and AdTree overestimated DBH by 30% to 40%. Results show the proposed method understates the tree heights by 0.2m to 1.4m but contains the least error when estimating DBH. The proposed method was able to produce all 69 trees, while SimpleTree produced 49 and none at the 4.35 cm BR07 spacing. We concluded that the developed geometric model (digital) twins have significant potential to serve as both simulation and prediction tools. We recommend that future efforts focus on collecting per-tree ground truth measurements within the scanned plot and incorporating leaf-on scans. Leaf-on scans include representative foliage, which would add realism to the model and ecological function of the trees. Intended Audience: Beginners, undergraduates, graduates. Those with interest in the topic. To request an interpreter, please visit myaccess.rit.edu
OpenAI AI Pipeline Generates 948 Linux Root Escalation Exploits in 30-Hour Run
OpenAI's AI pipeline reproduced 1,724 Linux vulnerabilities and generated 948 working local privilege escalation exploits for $1.2 million.
Across Southwest Ohio, voters pushed back against data centers — and politicians who support them
The backlash against data centers can be seen in the election results in Urbana, Piqua and Wilmington.
Buffalo Council OK’s Counter-Offer for Business Park Real Estate Sale
Buffalo’s City Council considered the approval of an offer in Block 1, Lot 2 in the Buffalo Business Park. Councilman Scott Madsen made a motion to make a counter-offer on the sale of the property. City Attorney Zane Hengel said if the council wanted to reject the offer and make a counter-offer, he suggested some […]
Becerra prepares to take helm as governor with few political debts. But there's questions about his agenda
California is about to enter the 'Becerra era,' though the governor-elect who coined that phrase has dropped few hints about what will define it.
📋 São Paulo and Corinthians line-ups for decisive Majestoso
São Paulo and Corinthians have confirmed their lineups for this Wednesday's (4th) Majestoso derby in the Brasileirão.The derby is part of the championship's 33rd round and takes place at Vila Belmir...
Illumina selected to help bring precision medicine into everyday healthcare in Singapore
Illumina, Inc. (Nasdaq: ILMN) announced it has been selected to provide whole-genome sequencing services for the SG-INSIGHT study, a cohort under Phase III of Singapore's National Precision Medicine (NPM) programme. Expected to include approximately one in 10 Singapore residents, or around 450,000 individuals, the study is designed to generate evidence from genomic and health data to help inform preventive approaches to healthcare.
Springfield longstanding business to close this November after nearly 80 years
After nearly eight decades serving the Springfield community, Glo Dry Cleaning Specialists is closing its doors for good on Nov. 16, leaving devoted customers and neighbors stunned by the sudden departure.
Palmetto Sports Daily: Are Clemson's high standards slipping?
PSD returns with a deep dive on what to expect as Clemson heads to Syracuse, South Carolina entering Saturday as a ranked team and Coastal Carolina looking to get bowl-eligible.
Mob Entertainment Lays Off 'Almost Entire' Escape From Playtime Team
A former member of Mob Entertainment’s Escape from Playtime Team claims “almost all” staff working on the project have been laid off.
Economic Report: Rancho Mirage Invests in Business, Housing, and Tourism
Rancho Mirage strengthens its economy through healthcare, tourism, new residential communities, and investments in infrastructure and sustainability.
‘It Changed Science Fiction’: Hunter Schafer on Her Fave Sci-Fi Film
OK, we’ll give you three guesses as to what “Blade Runner 2099” star Hunter Schafer’s favorite sci-fi film is. Schafer plays Cora, a human pretending to be a replicant in order to survive, in the upcoming miniseries. Speaking at WIRED World Fair in Miami, Schafer said the action scenes were “really physically demanding.”
I’m an Entertainment Editor, and These Are the New Christmas Movies on My Watchlist This Year
If you're looking for the best new Christmas movies in 2026, we've gathered holiday films for you to watch on Netflix, Prime Video, Hallmark, and other streamers.
Montana Votes Overwhelmingly to Ban Corporate Cash From Political Campaigns
Supporters have billed the initiative as a way to strike a blow against the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling.
'VisionQuest': Who is the Client?
The MCU's newest villain reveal leaves us with more questions than answers.
Councilmembers demand DA drop charges against Queens man shot by police during mental health crisis
Over a dozen city councilmembers this week called on Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz to drop the felony charges her office has brought against Jabez Chakraborty, the 22-year-old who was shot by police in his family’s home while experiencing a mental health crisis in January.
CVS plans to break up $117B healthcare conglomerate
A CVS split would follow a decade-long trend of consolidation, with health insurers combining with pharmacy benefits firms and medical providers.
Square Enix Producer Yoshinori Kitase Teases Life After Final Fantasy VII, Future Movies, and Why He Wants to Create New IP Over Remakes
Final Fantasy producer Yoshinori Kitase reveals Square Enix will prioritize new games over remakes, discussing future film adaptations and what he wants to make next.
'Primetime' film, Arts Market and Great Pumpkin Dash: 3 things to do this weekend in Baton Rouge
You can't go wrong with these three events this weekend in Baton Rouge.
Pancho Claus to give his final performance, citing health and financial challenges
Reyes created Pancho Claus in 1981, drawing on the film "Zoot Suit" and the lowrider culture popular at the time for the character's look.
Lawsuit filed against 'Money out of Politics' proposal after Michigan voters pass initiative
Almost immediately after Prop 2 passed in Michigan, a lawsuit challenging its legality was filed in federal court.
Colman Domingo recalls being ‘the nerd’ to Will Smith’s ‘cool kid’ in high school
“The last interaction I had with him was when I was working at El Torito restaurant,” the Emmy winner revealed.
Colman Domingo attended high school with cool kid’ Will Smith: ‘I was the nerd’
Colman Domingo has only crossed paths with Will Smith once since they attended high school together, where Smith was a ‘cool kid’ and Domingo was ‘the nerd.’
The best new Christmas movies to watch on Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video and more
From festive rom-coms to action flicks, this year's holiday lineup has something for everyone — with the Hallmark Channel alone unveiling 34 new movies.
Stand Up for Science Reacts to Midterm Election Results, Turns Its Focus Towards Accountability
In response to yesterday’s midterm elections, in which voters overwhelmingly chose pro-democracy, pro-science, pro-public health candidates, Stand Up for
Prop. 40's failure points to the tax California already pays for its wealth: Politics overrun by money
The playbook for defeating the the billionaire tax was simple: Stoke economic fears and confuse Californians.
'Spider-Man: Brand New Day' Remains Atop Weekly U.K. Home Entertainment Sales Chart
Sony’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day remained atop of the Official Film Chart, the weekly U.K. home entertainment sales chart through Nov. 4, in its fourth week in the Top 10. Warner’s sci-fi thriller The End of Oak Street, starring Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor, leapfrogged 10 spots to No. 2 in its seventh week, followed … Continue reading "‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Remains Atop Weekly U.K. Home Entertainment Sales Chart"
New Research Tests Whether AI Models Know Their Own Thoughts
By injecting “thoughts” directly into large language models, researchers are trying to map out AI’s capacity for introspection.
Science for Public Service: How One Entomologist Found Her Calling in Extension
Meet Sara Salgado MacDonald, Ph.D., entomologist and extension agent at the University of Florida, expert in public science communication, and subject of the next installment of our "Standout Early Career Professionals" series.
Palm Beach County students help scientists track where trash drifts in local waterways
Shining A Light on Palm Beach and the Treasure Coast
Health survey of local students shows encouraging trend
Hopkinton’s middle and high school students are feeling less anxious and depressed, but there still are areas of concern, particularly for students with
ENTERTAINMENT: Three Days Grace brings Alienation Tour to Huntsville
ENTERTAINMENT: Three Days Grace brings Alienation Tour to Huntsville - The Cullman Tribune - Featured
GTA 6 Has Sold Almost 8 Million Copies So Far, And PS5 Is Dominating The Split (Of Course)
The PS5 edition of GTA 6 is massively outselling the Xbox version.
This Week's Health IT Jobs
It can be very overwhelming scrolling through job board after job board in search of a position that fits your wants and needs. Let us take that stress away by
New nurses find family and fulfillment in long-term care
The group found support in each other during nursing school and at Good Samaritan - Comforcare, where all four RNs work today.
5 Dietitian-Recommended Recipes to Help Boost Brain Health All Day Long
TODAY contributor and dietitian Joy Bauer shares five easy recipes packed with brain-boosting ingredients.
Analysis-AI shopping agents could threaten Amazon and Walmart’s ad business
By Juveria Tabassum, Nicholas P. Brown and Arriana McLymore Nov 4 (Reuters) - The rise of AI-led shopping is posing a conundrum for retailers like Walmart and Amazon: how to enable AI agents to shop on their websites, without threatening their lucrativ...
Analysis-AI shopping agents could threaten Amazon and Walmart’s ad business
By Juveria Tabassum, Nicholas P. Brown and Arriana McLymore Nov 4 (Reuters) - The rise of AI-led shopping is posing a conundrum for retailers like Walmart and Amazon: how to enable AI agents to shop on their websites, without threatening their lucrativ...
Bills trade deadline candidate: Colts receiver Josh Downs
The ninth installment in the series examining possible Bills trade targets before the deadline
Hidden planet emerges from the glare
Stars are so bright that their glare overwhelms faint nearby planets. Scientists combined detailed physics from telescope observations with modern computational techniques to precisely remove this glare. After applying the tool to existing JWST images, they found a previously hidden giant exoplanet. Technique could improve planet-detection sensitivity without requiring changes to telescope hardware.
Search committee formed to find new Vice President for Research
The committee begins its work immediately and invites members of the Northwestern community to share feedback
How Anthony Ippolito talked his way into playing Sylvester Stallone in 'I Play Rocky'
Anthony Ippolito took a bold step to land the starring role in “I Play Rocky.” | WBBM Newsradio 780 AM & 105.9 FM
How Anthony Ippolito Talked His Way Into Playing Sylvester Stallone in 'I Play Rocky'
Anthony Ippolito saw the opportunity of a lifetime when he learned that Oscar-winning director Peter Farrelly was developing a film about Sylvester Stallone’s determination to write and star in the original “Rocky.” There was just one problem: Nobody had asked him to audition for “I Play Rocky.”
Cava CEO Brett Schulman discusses his daily routine
Brett Schulman, the CEO of Cava, describes a day in his life, from early workouts to balancing work and family with efficient time management.
Why a Four-Hour Elon Musk Doc Sold Out the Ojai Film Festival
“It is a movie of its time in a topic that is really happening.”
Missouri sets 2027 health rates as plan networks change
Missouri finalized 2027 health insurance rates as consumers face increases, changing provider networks and key enrollment deadlines.
New Children’s Entertainment Releases: What Families Can Watch Together in November 2026
Plan family movie nights with November 2026 kids' releases, featuring animated films, holiday stories and familiar characters.
How a Ms. Frizzle-esque librarian helped Flagship’s Louisa Helms find biotech
BioSpace 40 Under 40 honoree Louisa Helms is a lot of things—athlete, scientist, entrepreneur and likely future biotech executive. Just don’t ask her to pick up any pipettes.
National Navy SEAL Museum honors courage and commitment
Just north of Palm Beach County, along Florida’s scenic Treasure Coast, the National Navy SEAL Museum brings to life the remarkable stories of courage, sacrifice and service that have shaped
Yankees news: Skubal linked to Yanks
Yankees among several teams in on top FA; Murphy walks back taunt; Chisholm likely to walk
AFGHS co-signatory countries ask health care users to help fill the financing gap
Hundreds of thousands of Ugandans living with HIV on antiretrovirals could be targeted for user fees or community health insurance schemes requiring modest premium payments, according to the April 2026 version of the country’s America First Global Health Strategy implementation narrative.1 As part of the “sustainable financing for the private not for profit sector” strategy, 491 facilities will be targeted for a phased introduction of user fees and scale up of community health insurance programs.2 In the Ugandan context, PNFP facilities include faith-based hospitals and other health facilities, US missionary organizations and centers of excellence—services that are often co-located at government facilities but run with additional financial and technical resources. 402,000 people—or about 28 percent of the total Ugandan adult PLHIV population on treatment—get ART from the private not for profit sector. The selected facilities provide the majority of ART and prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT) services. The plan doesn’t give the total number of clients served by the 491 facilities, so it is not possible to give a precise number. But the majority of 402,000 is a figure in the hundreds of thousands—hence the estimate I’m using.3 The April draft of the Ugandan implementation plan narrative is the only one I’ve been able to review. But the government of Uganda is not alone in turning to health care users to help fill the financing gaps caused by the abrupt withdrawal of US funds. In July 2025, the Government of Liberia introduced user fees for previously free services including “registration, accommodation, patient feeding, hospitalization, and a wide range of surgical and diagnostic procedures.”4 Earlier that year, Liberia rolled out a revolving drug fund designed to stabilize drug supplies by “allowing patients to pay a small fee for standardized, quality medications,” according to a Ministry of Health press release.5 (Both of these approaches had been proposed in the National Health Policy 2022-2031; media coverage explicitly connects the launch with the US foreign aid cuts.) The health financing strategies proposed by Uganda and established in Liberia are qualitatively different from user fees officially adopted by specific health facilities to cover funding shortfalls caused by the new US approach.6 The latter is a stopgap, adhoc change. The former is a national governmental adoption of policies that pass costs on to health care users, despite evidence that such approaches can exacerbate inequities and leave deficits unfilled. Two countries does not make a pattern, but they do point to urgent questions: Have other countries, including Liberia, included user fees or community health insurance schemes in their implementation plans? If so, do any of these narratives have what Uganda’s lacks: a fall-back plan in place in case these strategies for sustainable health systems fail to deliver—as they have before? I wonder if you think about it Subscribe Predictable pitfalls Both community-based health insurance and user fees are as old as the hills. And after decades of people climbing up these hills, duking it out, climbing back down—neither strategy has shown the results the Ugandan implementation plan is counting on. This is, in fact, a hill some folks are willing to die on. (You knew I’d get there, right?) In November 2025, an African-led team of health system experts published a paper directed at low- and middle income country governments trying to figure out how to create self-sustaining health systems. The money wasn’t coming back. It had been more than nine months since the season of freezing, waivering and wood-chippering; two months since AFGHS tumbled into the world touting co-financing requirements and reductions in future US government health aid. Governments were looking for strategies for sustainable, self-financed health systems, the authors wrote. For countries considering user fees and community health insurance to fill the financing gaps, they had a simple message: Don’t. On user fees, the paper states: “Reliance on user fees is ultimately a regressive and inequitable approach. It places a disproportionate burden on the poor and undermines health system goals of equity and financial protection. […] There is overwhelming evidence that user fees mobilise very limited resources for the public health sector, making it an inefficient mechanism for revenue mobilisation.” On community health insurance: “Attempting to shift the burden of funding previously donor-funded services, such as HIV care and management, and TB treatment, onto contributory schemes would exacerbate their fragility and fail to protect the population.”7 The WHO says that community-based health insurance “cannot be expected to provide a major source of funding or coverage,” and noted that most schemes offer only moderate benefit to individuals paying into them, and exclude the poorest segment of the population.8 And yet, the US-Ugandan implementation plan says that community health insurance is “the central pillar of this [PNFP] sustainability strategy” and that this approach that will generate “pre-paid pooled funding at facility and community level [that] improves financial risk protection for households, reduces catastrophic out-of-pocket expenditure, and generates structured, transparent revenue streams that can progressively absorb recurrent costs including health worker salaries.” Unfortunately, Uganda’s own history suggests the pillar might not be able to bear this weight. Ugandans Have Been to this Rodeo Before—and Some Want Their Money Back Uganda introduced its first community health insurance scheme in 1996 with support from international donors.9 Thirty years later, somewhere between 0.2 and 0.3 percent of the population is covered by CHI; just over 1 percent has any kind of health insurance.10 User fees were universally introduced in 1993 as a condition of a World Bank loan.11 They were abandoned in 2001, and in 2004—the year I moved to Uganda to watch the free HIV program get underway—a definitive study found that the fees did not improve health systems and outcomes.12 In 2004, most clinics and hospitals had ‘free’ and ‘fee for service’ options for getting care.13 The fee for service, or “cash and carry” programs had often been established in the years prior to PEPFAR and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. People who could afford to paid for the drugs, often at facilities in the private-not-for-profit (PNFP) sector. When free drugs arrived, some people who’d been paying kept on doing so, perhaps because of shorter wait times, greater confidentiality, convenience or other factors. But in the year that I spent visiting the same clinics around the country week after week—including a “center of excellence” that maintained separate days for cash and carry clients and those accessing free ARVs—lots of people who had been paying tried to switch to the free option. They’d paid because they had no other choice. They’d sold pieces of family land, begged family members for loans, bought pills by the week, and sometimes by the day. Or they were just cash-strapped, like most of us, and wanted the funds for other things. 14 Twenty-two years later, this hasn’t changed. Ugandans pay out of pocket for 30-40 percent of their health care costs, leading one paper to declare that “falling ill is more than a health crisis. It is a financial emergency.”15 One recent study found that up to 48.5 percent of households dealing with tuberculosis sold something, took out a loan or dug into savings to defray the costs of TB care—which is supposed to be universally free.16 The Ugandan implementation plan does anticipate challenges. It proposes a phased approach, with 187 facilities introducing user contribution systems in Year 1, 152 in Year 2, and 153 in Year 3. Willingness to pay and feasibility studies will precede roll out; fees will be tiered by region, and a waiver system is proposed to ensure that no one has to pay who is unable to. Moreover, the plan provides for quarterly reviews of epidemiological data to “ensure that user contributions do not compromise epidemic control gains, ART continuity for the client cohort, TB case management, or PMTCT services.” Alt text: A screenshot of a table included in the implementation plan narrative that is the subject of this stack. It’s got a fetching pink bar at the top. It uses the abbreviation “CHI” which is Community Health Insurance, and FBO which is Faith Based Organizations, and it details the number of facilities that will implement user fees with waivers and community health insurance schemes over the five years of the agreement. As I said in the footnote, this is a super interesting document with a lot of other rich material. Tell me what you see—and what you would have focused on. And if you’ve seen something like this, or anything else that strikes you, in another implementation plan, tell me that too. You can use the Substack message platform or try me on Signal at @endaplague_again.25 (because @mercoonfan was, weirdly, taken). But the plan doesn’t fully explain what will happen if this approach doesn’t work out. Yes, progress will be monitored, and corrective action triggered. However, there is no specified funding replacement if premium and fee revenue prove inadequate. Instead, the authors write, “Currently, COEs serve a total client cohort of over 180,000 across 28 facilities. In the initial years, the U.S. Government (USG) will provide financial support for clients; over time, user fees generated by COEs will become the primary source of funding for sustaining their services.” Failure does not really seem to be an option. Health insurance schemes are more acceptable to the Ugandan population than user fees. Members of Parliament and civil society traveled to Ethiopia to see how that country’s scheme worked. In a follow up report, a veteran civil society group recommended allowing the “health insurance ecosystem to grow organically and [to] keep reviewing the law and regulations as this growth takes root.”17 One study found that more than three-quarters of Ugandans were willing to join a health insurance program.18 However, coverage of community-based health insurance is minimal, as is coverage of any kind of insurance—including private plans.19 A national health insurance scheme bill has been stalled for several years and presently sits with President Yoweri Museveni.20 Community-based health insurance scheme that do exist are expanding in number, but losing enrollees. Between 2022 and 2026, the number of community-based health financing schemes across the country increased by 42 percent, while the number of people enrolled decreased by nearly 11 percent.21 None of this means that community-based health insurance should not happen in Uganda—or that people do not want insurance. It doesn’t even mean that user fees and waivers won’t ever work. But there is highly relevant evidence from Uganda and the surrounding region that it is quite optimistic to describe community health insurance and user fees as central supports for sustainable financing in any sector of the health system. And now for the best-case scenario In the best-case scenario22, the Ugandan approach does exactly what it sets out to do, and so does the Liberian fee structure and revolving pharmacy fund—though I’ve not confirmed that these are in the MoU. In one best-case scenario, Uganda is an outlier, and user fees and community health insurance are not recurrent pillars of self-sustaining financing in other countries’ implementation plans. In another best-case scenario, all countries that include these strategies enjoy success beyond anyone’s evidence-informed wildest dreams: reliable funding generated by health care users fees, great health care outcomes for everyone, no exacerbation of inequities, no crippling household debt. No sold land, repurposed school tuition or high-interest loans. In the best-case scenario, not one of the hundreds of thousands of Ugandans living with HIV receiving antiretrovirals from 491 PNFP facilities misses a refill or leaves care because of user fees or community health insurance premiums. This is the best-case scenario for these people for their own health, and for their families. It is also the best-case scenario if Uganda wants to stay on the path to eliminating HIV as a public health threat. According to the country’s most recent data, 96.5 percent of people living with HIV on antiretrovirals are virologically suppressed. Epidemic control depends ensuring that 95% of people living with HIV know their status, 95 percent of those individuals are on ART, and 95% of those individuals are virologically suppressed. Uganda is still struggling with the first “95"—a frankly abysmal 85.3 percent. If HIV epidemic control and the attendant prevention of new infections, avoidable suffering and premature death matter, the country cannot afford to lose any clients who are currently in care.23 As I write this a couple hours before the polls close for the US elections in the city I live in, I say with soul-deep sincerity: I am rooting for the best-case scenario. I think it’s safe to say that we all are.24 I think it’s also safe to say that if the US and co-signatory governments have inked plans that lead to successful expansion of community health insurance and strategic use of user fees, we all would like to know, now, so that we don’t miss the opportunity to celebrate when success happens. The implementation plan narratives have to enter the public domain. They are the fullest expression of a strategy co-created by two governments. There are assumptions and details that people living in the US and co-signatory countries need to understand that are not available in the MoUs or, to date, in the Congressional Notifications. Some of these details can help other countries that are, as I write this, still working on implementation plans. Others, like a solid count of how many other countries have plans for expanding user fees or health insurance, are important for regional and global health architecture reform initiatives. No matter how this election night turns out, there will be a slew of new Congressional member orientations, briefings and talking points papers in the next few months. Release of implementation narratives should be a bullet point in every context that AFGHS is discussed. These documents can be redacted so that procurement sensitive information isn’t disclosed. There is much more historical precedent for sharing such documents than there is for relying on user fees to fill health financing gaps. Let’s look at the information together so we can hope for the best and prepare for, you know, the other thing. Alt text: A substack first: a bicep selfie! It’s my arm - peachy-white skin, black shirt (flannel, notch neck, too hot for this appallingly balmy November weather, if you’re wondering) and a sticker that says I VOTED 2026. Beige letters on red for I voted. Beige on blue for 2026. You bet I did.25 In your wildest dreams. Subscribe 1 This is a really, really rich 95 page document. There are fascinating ideas and detailed plans in it. It is all worth reading AND I have, in this post, highlighted an instance of content that could pose challenges and certainly posits success of strategies that haven’t worked before. I would love to hear what readers’ see that’s interesting and should be lifted up as something to check for in other implementation plans. I will also shortly be adding a static page to the substack site where implementation plan documents will live. I will put the url into this footnote and it will also be there on emilybass.substack.com by the end of the week. Uganda Implementation Narrative Section 4 April 22 2026 Draft 1.51MB ∙ PDF file Download Download 2 User fees are costs charged for visits, labs, medicines or other health services, usually at the time they are provided. Community health insurance, or community-based health insurance, is what the World Health Organization calls “micro insurance,” which is health insurance targeted at low-income people. 3 As usual (by which I mean always), please prove me wrong. 4 https://smartnewsliberia.com/liberias-ministry-of-health-announces-2025-hospital-service-fees-for-public-facilities/?utm 5 https://moh.gov.lr/news/2025/grand-cape-mount-leaders-residents-embrace-new-community-pharmacy-program/?utm 6 https://www.christianitytoday.com/2026/09/hiv-usaid-pepfar-africa-foreign-aid-cuts-mission-hospitals/?utm 7 https://gh.bmj.com/content/10/11/e021270 8 https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/community-based-health-insurance-CBHI 9 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2827475/ 10 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10861328/#b3-jpmph-23-110 11 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC527704/ 12 Same citation as the footnote 2 - the article is called “Learning from failed health care reform in Uganda.” To which I say: If only. If. Only. 13 There is a whole taxonomy of user fees to be aware of, if not commit to memory. Out of pocket costs are everything that someone pays for themselves. In this Stack, user fees are planned and policy-supported out of pocket costs. There are also out of pocket costs that people pay to buy drugs or receive tests or health care assessments that would be free if the drugs were on the shelves, or the machines or kits were available, or the staff were on site. A user fee is usually designed to be modest, pegged to willingness to pay, and may be waiveable at the point of care for anyone who is unable to do so. The costs for things that would otherwise be free are whatever the market will bear and people either have to pay them or go without. Out of pocket costs for services and stuff that aren’t available in public facilities are different again from bribes or unofficial fees that some health workers may impose, even though most are indefatigable, tireless and tired, and devoted to their clients. 14 For the record—which really is these footnotes—I would give a whole stack of fridge magnets for a systematic analysis of the economic and social impact of the Mass Unemployment Event in AFGHS countries among the very people who used to be able to afford and cover user fees, both for themselves and vast family networks. Locally employed USAID technical staff, house cleaners, caregivers, drivers and technicians were financial anchors for cousins, friends, friends’ children, friends’ childrens’ cousins, teachers, pastors, neighbors and so many other kinds of kin. Aid recipients lost direct funding; many other people who had not been aid recipients, but parts of the elaborate care webs that function as safety nets for so many people, lost crucial support too. And that’s even before we get to the people who worked at the hotels and restaurants and bars where people employed by the US and its implementing partners used to spend disposable income. Those businesses have lost revenue; those folks have lost jobs. It will be some time coming—and someone will have to fund this work—but I do hope it happens. And I hope, as usual, to be proven wrong. 15 https://eprcug.org/blog/how-out-of-pocket-healthcare-costs-keep-driving-ugandans-into-poverty/ 16 Another straight-to-the-point journal article title. Households experiencing catastrophic costs due to tuberculosis in Uganda: magnitude and cost drivers. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32938411 17 https://www.cehurd.org/download/technical-policy-brief-on-community-health-insurance-scheme/?wpdmdl=13661&refresh=6ae9122f5d4ed1793659439 18 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10125197/ 19 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10861328/#b3-jpmph-23-110 20 https://ugandapost.news/uganda-to-make-health-insurance-mandatory-by-2026/ 21 https://shu.org.ug/download/235 22 With a nod, tip of the stack hat, and wag of the Mercoon tail to a deeply valued reader who told me that I have a tendency to speculate about the worst-case scenarios a little too much of the time. 23 https://news.mak.ac.ug/2026/10/uphia-2025-shows-ugandas-hiv-status-awareness-gap-despite-strong-treatment-outcomes/ As you’ll see in the next footnote, I’ve already written a subSubstack on another topic, so I will be brief with regard to the study referenced in this article. The Uganda Population-Based HIV Impact Assessment, or UPHIA, will never happen in this way again. For more than a decade, PHIAs have been supported by the US government as a way to generate accurate estimates of country progress on key HIV indicators. They are a holdover from the PEPFAR program that was laser focused on ensuring US taxpayer dollars subsidized progress in pandemic control. There may be other population-level surveys and the data may even be publicly released, as the entire set of FY2026 MER data have not. But PHIAs will never happen again. If you’re wondering whether the estimates of HIV progress at country level might get less reliable….you’re not alone. 24 Ooh baby, I hate “we” in almost all forms. But sometimes I go there, when I am looking for company, which I am. Because this Stack moves into the somewhat-uncharted territory of assessing what the implementation plan narratives may suggest about co-signatory countries’ roles and responsibilities to the people living within their borders. The MoUs, specimen and data sharing agreements were templates. Countries’ answers fit into pre-specified questions that did not include, “how are you going to fill financing gaps and stabilize your health system as this plan unfolds?” In contrast, the implementation narratives are open form—the product of co-creation between the two governments. Co-creation can mean lots of things, but nothing leads me to believe that implementation plans are ghost-written by the US government, or that contents were imposed by the US counterparts. Instead, I think the parts of the plans that read like country government initiatives are endorsed, if not initiated by, those governments. For instance, the Ugandan implementation plan narrative describes plans for revenue-generation through fees charged for equipment calibration, repair and maintenance provided through Uganda’s National Equipment Calibration Laboratory, and laboratory accreditation through the Uganda National Accreditation Service (UGANAS), targeting private sector, PNFP, research and academic clients. That’s super specific and also quite ambitious. It doesn’t read like an American idea. There’s also a provision for solar panels, and other stuff that feels country owned and driven. This is where it gets interesting. If co-creation is the case, then both the US and co-signatory governments are accountable for the contents and the outcomes. Most discourse about AFGHS to date has focused on the decisions that America has made, or demanded that other countries make. The AFGHS architects have monopolized the hot seat. As they should, in so many ways. America absolutely created the conditions under which countries needed to come up with health financing strategies to fill unanticipated, catastrophic funding gaps. And with not-too-long a lens, we can look back and see that America is also on the hook for its role in the Bretton Woods institutions that made user fees and health system fiscal austerity conditions of loans during the era of structural adjustment. But in the here and now, it is not at all clear to me that the US is requiring Uganda or any other country to implement specific approaches to sustainable financing. Instead, it is as the authors of that paper up in footnote 6 suggest: African governments have agency. As implementation plans roll out—whether or not the narratives are shared—it will be important to understand what this agency looks like and what it means for people, including the poorest of the poor. And it will be important to figure out how to talk about it safely, respectfully and critically in places other than the literal and metaphorical footnotes. 25 This week’s song is “Once upon a time” by the Moody Blues. (I know, this is gonna be a weird, largely banger-free end of 2026 playlist. HMU with requests.) AND please do watch the video and appreciate the truly amazing opening sequence—a drum kit wasteland, a coupla plastic bags, a bit of sand. Sort of like the hill where fiscal austerity policies that put costs on health care users might go to perish. But then there’s a lady with amazing hair. It’s worth it.
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The Last Disney+ Original?
(Welcome to my weekly streaming ratings report, the single best guide to what’s popular in streaming TV and what isn’t. I’m the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a former streaming executive who now analyzes business strategy in the entertainment industry. If you were forwarded this email, please subscribe to get these insights each week.) Before we get going, I wanted to remind readers about how I plan to keep your trust while I add advertising to this newsletter. As you’ve no doubt noticed, I’m running ads now, but the danger is that it could impact my analysis and writing. I have a list of sponsors on my About Page, so if you think I’m biased, you can check out who’s sponsored this newsletter! This is something that I’m not sure anyone else in digital media does (if you’re a writer or media outlet and you do this, let me know and I’ll shout you out!) but it’s something I’d love to see embraced by the entire industry. Sunlight, i.e. transparency, is often the best disinfectant. Okay, on to this week’s issue. We (finally) have another major Disney+ TV show to talk about, so that’s my main focus for today. Plus, we had a lot of new shows come out, including the fourth seasons of The Diplomat and Tulsa King! And Love is Blind! The Lowdown! Also, four (four!) straight-to-streaming films came out this week, featuring a lot of big names and celebrities, so I’m going to look at those. All that, mixed news for the WNBA, Reacher ends its run on the charts, Skydance does well in September viewership, NYU’s Sundance dominance, all the flops, bombs and misses, and a whole lot more. Let’s dive right in! (Reminder: The streaming ratings report focuses on the U.S. market and compiles data from Nielsen’s weekly top ten viewership ranks, Luminate’s Top Ten Data, JustWatch and Reelgood interest data, Samba TV household viewership, company datecdotes, Netflix hours viewed data, Google Trends, and IMDb to determine the most popular content. While most data points are current, Nielsen’s data covers the weeks of October 12th to October 18th, 2026. You can find a link to my terminology here.) Subscribe Television - Disney+’s Porridge Problem Listen, per my headline, VisionQuest isn’t the last Disney+ Original. At least, I’m pretty sure it’s not. They have other MCU shows in development. Well, maybe one: But it sure feels like the end of an era. I’d call it their “porridge too hot” era, to quote myself from The Ringer. I told Ben Lindbergh that Disney+ seemingly couldn’t figure out the right amount of content. In the heights of the Streaming Bubble Era (circa 2019 to 2022), they started releasing an insane amount of TV shows. After their growth slowed, they’re down to two or three shows a year, and that might be down to 1 by 2027. Here’s my TV shows by year chart: Even at the time, I thought Disney was making too many shows (that cost too much). Today? They’re definitely making too few shows (though the budgets are more in check, at least according to the reporting). Porridge too hot, porridge too cold; too many shows, now not enough. Which makes evaluating VisionQuest so interesting. This show didn’t have a great lead-in, whether it be a Marvel Cinematic Universe film (the last non-Sony-produced-Spider-Man flick came out The Fantastic Four from July of 2025) or Marvel Cinematic Universe TV show (the two this year were Wonder Man back in January and _Daredevil: Born Again_in May, both of which underwhelmed). And so far, VisionQuest hasn’t quite recaptured the MCU Originals glory, but it has some signs of sparks. First, it made Samba TV, though at a lowly ninth place. At least it made it, a feat some other Marvel shows didn’t accomplish. (Ironheart landed on the Samba TV charts one week at tenth place, but Wonder Man and Daredevil: Born Again both missed.) VisionQuest also made Luminate, though with only 3.0 and 7.6 million hours. But it missed Nielsen in its first week. The best news might be its 7.8 on IMDb, on 12K reviews so far, great numbers, even for a superhero show. Looking at those numbers, this show will really need to pick up in future weeks—and it may since it’s coming out weekly—or Disney will have another disappointment on its hands. Disney+ binge-released their last few shows to try to boost numbers, but that meant shows like Iron Heart and Wonder Man didn’t last long on the charts. _Daredevil: Born Again’s_last season missed entirely (though it came out weekly). Here’s the Disney+ Originals by totals: And for a fun new look, here are those same shows, rearranged by the years they came out: That really shows that, in addition to Disney+ releasing fewer shows, those shows just don’t hit like they once did. If I had to offer one main explanation, it’s that Marvel Studios moved away from characters who starred in the Avengersmovies (The Scarlett Witch, Vision, Hawkeye, Loki, Falcon, Winter Soldier) to characters who didn’t (Moon Knight, She-Hulk, Iron Heart, Wonder Man, Daredevil). It sounds trite, but more popular IP tends to do better than less popular IP. In Marvel’s case, beloved, decades-old characters trump newer ones. And yes, I think this is a problem for Disney. The failure of Marvel TV shows to linger for weeks on the charts, unlike in 2021 and 2022, explains why Disney’s share of the charts has plummeted: That’s a strategic issue. Yes, these shows are really expensive, but without them, Disney+ will struggle, especially if Disney+ keeps raising prices AND licenses out its shows non-exclusively. My recommendation? Return to the core value proposition, which is Disney+ as “genre HBO”. The goal is six shows a year, coming out weekly, spaced out throughout the year. When a show hits, keep it coming back. Make three to four of those shows Marvel or Star Wars, and fill out the rest with IP swings like Percy Jackson, Goosebumps or something like National Treasure. And make YA-skewing shows like Coven Academy to fill out the schedule. Disney, you can get this porridge just right, er, make the right number of shows. Quick Notes on TV Netflix’s sophomore, er, junior, er, senior season slump abated very, very slightly this week. I speak of The Diplomat, which returned for its fourth season on 15-Oct. Credit where credit is due, this show debuted in April of 2023, and has put out new seasons every year since. Has that helped the viewership? Not really. This season opened to 16.4 million hours, which is down significantly from the first season (21.7 million hours) and down somewhat from the second season (18.0 million hours), but it is up from last year’s 14.2 million hours opening. On Samba TV, it opened to third place; that’s also very good. On Luminate, it opened to 25.0 million hours, which is good, but over thirty million hours is a hit on that platform. Netflix wisely renewed it, since it’s steady and, frankly, Netflix needs hits.1 Paramount+ put out Tulsa King’s fourth season on a Friday. After putting out most of their big, usually-Taylor Sheridan-scripted shows out on Sundays last year, they’ve clearly moved to Fridays going forward. Was this a thought-out strategic change, Netflix mimicry, or a data-inspired move? Tough to say. Fridays are crowded with new movies, but so are Sundays with new shows. Anyways, this one is coming out weekly, and we haven’t seen it hit the Nielsen or Luminate charts yet. But it did make Samba TV at fifth place, which is a good opening. Still, if this doesn’t make Luminate or Nielsen next week, I’d call it a disappointment. Netflix had two unscripted shows hit the charts this week, one a docu-series and one a reality competition show. Tyson is a four-episode docu-series about one of boxing’s most popular fighters, and it made both the Samba TV and Luminate charts, but not Nielsen. That’s a solid run for only four episodes (assuming it didn’t cost an arm and a leg to produce). Netflix’s latest season of Love Is Blind also returned for its eleventh season, which opened to 10.0 million hours, down from previous seasons. It also had 11.0 million hours according to Luminate, roughly in line with the Nielsen numbers. Last issue, I analyzed the triple successes of Below, Carrie and Crystal Lake, noting that all three have done well. I mostly used Nielsen, but all three shows also made Samba TV (see above). Crystal Lake in particular did very well on Luminate, getting 35.0 million hours, top for Peacock among first seasons: The top “show” of the week would have been Thursday Night Football again, at 41.7 million hours. This is still above last year’s game, but it continues the season’s overall downward trend, which happens every year. (Though a big week is coming, based on the news stories I’ve seen.) As I said before, I’ll do a deeper dive on all the October games later this month, with comparisons to previous years. One company is quietly on a roll, when you consider the shows it makes and streams. I speak of Skydance—a point Variety made—noting that it produces Neagley and Reacher for Amazon, along with Paramount+’s Lioness, which means it produced three of the top four shows of September according to Nielsen. By the way, Neagley fell off the Nielsen charts after four weeks, which is a pinch short for how well it started, but it’s still a huge success. (Interestingly, it finished just 7.3 million hours ahead of the cancelled Ride or Die.) The point, though, which I’ve made before, is that Prime Video still has a problem with how many co-productions it buys, most notably _The Boys_from Sony and Reacher/Jack Ryan from Skydance. It’s not a critical flaw—everyone licenses shows—but Amazon still struggles to make its own hits. Reacher finally fell off the Nielsen charts, so here’s its final rank for season four: We’re just getting started with this issue, but the rest is for paid subscribers of the Entertainment Strategy Guy, so if you’d like to find out… ...An example of the algorithm NOT picking a film… …whether or not Netflix buys shows simply for the movie poster… ...if East of Eden is above the Obliterated Line... ...what four star-studded straight-to-streaming films didn’t chart... ...and a whole lot more... ...please subscribe! We can only keep doing this great work with your support. If you want an idea of just how much content you’d get in a full issue, check out this older issue.
Disney’s “Suite Life” star Phill Lewis claims show filmed extra episodes without having to pay cast
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Duly’s private equity backer looks for an exit: report
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