There’s more than one fashion plate in this famous family.
While appearing on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” music and style icon Madonna revealed her son David Banda, 16, is already out-dressing her, The NY Post reported.
“He can put on any outfit and look swag as you know what,” she told Fallon on Wednesday night.
“It’s really irritating. He wears my clothes and looks better in them. He can even wear a dress and look butch.”
The “Material Girl” wasn’t joking. Back in May, the mother-son duo matched in Adidas outfits at the WBA World Lightweight Championship at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
Banda, who’s known for his gender-fluid fashion choices, stole the show in a bright red three-stripe dress from Adidas’ collaboration with Gucci. The teen paired the eye-catching look with a pair of yellow sunglasses, layered silver jewelery and black sneakers.
But David inherited more from his mother than just her fashion sense.
The “Like a Virgin” singer went on to tell Fallon that her son, whom she adopted in 2006, is working on music of his own.
“He’s going to end up being one of your guests,” the 63-year-old gushed about Banda, saying he has “everything” needed to be a star.
Fallon agreed with the Queen of Pop, saying, “He’s got ‘it.’ He’s got magic. He’s funny, he’s charming, he’s athletic, he’s a good-looking dude.” During the same interview, the hit maker revealed the moment she believed her career was “over with” after accidentally flashing the crowd during her performance of “Like a Virgin” at the first-ever MTV Video Music Awards in 1984.
According to Madge, after her stiletto slipped off onstage, she dived to grab it — accidentally flipping up her dress and exposing her backside to the audience.
“Those were the days when you shouldn’t show your butt to have a career,” the singer joked. “Now it’s the opposite.”
Although her reps thought her career would crash after the incident, the superstar went on to become one of the best-selling female artists of all time.
This article was originally published by The NY Post and was reproduced here with permission.
Lisa Kudrow has weighed in on the lack of diversity in Friends and claimed the show’s creators had “no business writing stories about people of colour”.
The actress, who played Phoebe Buffay for 10 seasons, said David Crane and Marta Kauffman likely wrote the series about their own lives and therefore did not have the experiences of being a person of color.
Lisa has previously admitted the series lacked representation, stating that if the hit show was made today, it would include a more diverse cast.
“I feel like it was a show created by two people who went to Brandeis and wrote about their lives after college. And for shows especially, when it’s going to be a comedy that’s character-driven, you write what you know,” Kudrow, 59, told the Daily Beast.
“They have no business writing stories about the experiences of being a person of colour. I think at that time, the big problem that I was seeing was, ‘Where’s the apprenticeship?””
Show creator Marta Kauffman has also publicly expressed the “embarrassment” of how she “didn’t know better” about diversity 25 years ago.
“I’ve learned a lot in the last 20 years,” Kauffman said in an interview with The Los Angeles Times.
“Admitting and accepting guilt is not easy. It’s painful looking at yourself in the mirror. I’m embarrassed that I didn’t know better 25 years ago.”
“It took me a long time to begin to understand how I internalized systemic racism.
“I’ve been working really hard to become an ally, an anti-racist. And this seemed to me to be a way that I could participate in the conversation from a white woman’s perspective.”
Kauffman has since pledged $4 million to support African American students in the US.
The Marta F. Kauffman ’78 Professorship in African and African American Studies “will support a distinguished scholar with a concentration in the study of the peoples and cultures of Africa and the African diaspora” and “assist the department to recruit more expert scholars and teachers , map long-term academic and research priorities and provide new opportunities for students to engage in interdisciplinary scholarship,” the Waltham, Massachusetts-based university announced.
“It took me a long time to begin to understand how I internalized systemic racism,” Kauffman, who is reportedly worth nearly $600 million, told Brandeis.
“I’ve been working really hard to become an ally, an anti-racist. And this seemed to me to be a way that I could participate in the conversation from a white woman’s perspective.”
Kauffman told the LA Times that she has received “nothing but love” since announcing the pledge along with “people acknowledging it was long overdue.”
“In this case, I’m finally, literally putting my money where my mouth is,” Kauffman said. “I feel I was finally able to make some difference in the conversation.”
“I have to say, after agreeing to this and when I stopped sweating, it didn’t unburden me, but it lifted me up. But until in my next production, I can do it right, it isn’t over.
“I want to make sure from now on in every production I do that I am conscious in hiring people of color and actively pursue young writers of colour. I want to know I will act differently from now on. And then I will feel unburdened.”
Disney has overtaken Netflix in the global race for streaming customers. But there’s a catch. Actually, there are many catches.
The headline numbers are that Disney as an entertainment megalith now has 221.1 million subscriptions to Netflix’s 220.6 million accounts.
While that looks like Disney has surpassed Netflix in the streaming wars, that 221.1 million number is a combined figure of Disney+ customers as well as US services Hulu and ESPN. Netflix only has the one brand so it’s not a like-for-like comparison.
Of that total figure, Disney+, which launched in late-2019, has amassed 152.1 million subscribers worldwide. It increased its membership by 14.4 million subscribers, more than the 10 million that was forecast.
That’s catch number one in the Disney versus Netflix narrative.
The more revealing asterisk comes when you drill down into the numbers around average revenue per user (ARPU), as industry publication Variety you have donated
ARPU is an important measure for finance types because it reflects how much each customer is worth to a business. The higher the ARPU, the more money each customer is spending with the business.
According to Variety, Disney’s ARPU in the US and Canada was $US6.27 per customer per month compared to Netflix’s $US15.95 for the same region. Disney’s subscription price in the US and Canada is significantly lower than Netflix’s.
The difference in ARPU is even more glaring in India and Southeast Asia where Disney is only making $US1.20 per month to Netflix’s $US8.83 in APAC.
While it may seem like ARPU is something that investors and money people care about, ultimately it will affect audiences.
In a bid to increase that ARPU, there’s currently a lot of movement around pricing.
Disney has announced US prices for Disney+ will increase by 38 per cent in December, from $US7.99 to $US10.99 per month, at the same time as the introduction of an ad-supported membership tier which will be priced at $US7 .99.
Disney+ will roll out the ad-supported option globally in 2023.
In Australia, Disney+ is priced at $11.99 a month. It launched at $8.99 a month but increased the cost in February 2021 when it added the Star sub-brand to its platform.
Locally, Star houses Disney’s more adult-oriented programming and includes many of the exclusive movies and shows that are made for Hulu in the US. This has included series such as dopesick, WeCrashed and the upcoming critical sensation Bear.
Netflix will also introduce an ad-supported membership tier from 2023.
Netflix had previously eschewed introducing advertising on its platform with co-chief executive and co-founder Reed Hastings rejecting the idea.
The company did an about-face in April when it revealed it had for the first time in a decade gone backwards in its subscription numbers.
An ad-supported tier is one of two main tactics Netflix is deploying to arrest its declining membership. A cheaper subscription option could be attractive to existing and potential customers feeling the pinch of global economic and inflationary pressures.
And advertising revenue from brands may increase Netflix and Disney’s ARPU.
Netflix’s other plank in boosting its subscriber numbers is to crackdown on password, a common practice which is a violation of its terms and conditions but is done by 100 million of its customers.
Netflix is trialling two forms of a crackdown in smaller territories in Latin America, both of which means charging customers an extra fee for sharing their login details beyond their residence.
The American streaming market is going through a tumultuous period due to increased competition and economic conditions.
Earlier this month, Warner Bros Discovery announced it will combine its two streaming services, HBO Max and Discovery+ following its merger. The Warner Bros Discovery move could signal the long-awaited consolidation many in the industry have flagged for some time.
In Australia, there are more than a dozen paid streaming platforms, ranging from broad appeal brands such as Binge*, Netflix, Stan and Amazon Prime Video to niche products such as Shudder, Hayu and Shelter.
According to Roy Morgan data published in February, 74.5 per cent of Australians accessed a subscription video-on-demand platform across an average of four weeks in the three months to December 2021, an increase of 2.5 per cent.
The most popular service remains Netflix, followed by Foxtel Group*, which owns Foxtel, Binge, Kayo and Flash.
Roy Morgan estimated Australians use on average 2.7 subscription video-on-demand services, up from 1.8 a year earlier.
*Foxtel Group is majority owned by News Corp, publisher of this website
Matty Johns believes that South Sydney can “come from nowhere” to win the NRL premiership this season, but only if they address a potentially decisive part of their game.
South Sydney can move up to fifth on the ladder if they beat Parramatta in a crunch clash at CommBank Stadium on Friday night.
Both teams will be looking to keep their top four hopes alive with a win in the blockbuster, while the loser could risk dropping down the ladder.
Stream every game of every round of the 2022 NRL Telstra Premiership Season Live & Ad-Break Free During Play on Kayo. New to Kayo? Start your free trial now >
PAUL GREEN NEWS
OBITUARY: 167cm great who became a giant and the gamble that set him up for glory
‘FUNNY, CARING’: Legends’ emotional tribute to ‘wonderful friend’ Green
‘HAD TOO MUCH TO OFFER’: Bennett reveals Dolphins’ talks with Green in tribute
The Rabbitohs began their impressive run of form against Parramatta early last month, recording the first of four consecutive wins.
After wins over the struggling Newcastle Knights and Bulldogs, Souths made a statement with a 12-point win over the Melbourne Storm.
While they lost in golden point the week after against the Sharks, they bounced back with an emphatic win over the Warriors on the Sunshine Coast.
But not everyone is sold on their recent successes, with Matty Johns comparing the team to a “nice Sunday drive.”
“South Sydney, their recent performances remind me of someone taking a nice Sunday drive, and I mean that both in praise and criticism,” Johns said on SEN’s Morning Glory.
“Watching South Sydney, and I think it’s a bad practice, it’s something they’ve got to be really careful of, they’re lifting the intensity only when they think they need to.
“That’s a concern because intensity and focus and poise under pressure is not something you just reach for out of the kit bag and say ‘alright we’re gonna do it now’.
“Last week I was expecting a real statement game against the Warriors, and they delivered in the first-half. Their intent and their blueprint (on) how they played their best football was the evidence.
Rabbitohs star Latrell Mitchell has been in some sensational form for the Rabbitohs since returning from injury. (Photo by Ashley Feder/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
“But the second-half there was just no intensity in the contest… and I’m probably knit-picking a little bit because I do like to see coaches showing a range of emotions, but in that second-half when they were really wiping the floor with the Warriors, whenever they cut up to the coaches box the whole coaching staff were really pissing themselves laughing.
“That’s almost a little bit symbolic of where Souths are. It’s got to start tonight, they’ve got to start to lift and they’ve got to start to play with finals intensity football.”
Latrell Mitchell has been in sensational form for the Rabbitohs, after returning from an almost three month absence against the Eels.
Mitchell has had nine try assists since returning just over one month ago, as well as 33 tackle breaks and four tries.
While the Rabbitohs have largely reaped the rewards since he returned, although Johns issued the team with a warning.
“Latrell plays his best football when he’s relaxed. He’s come back from the States really relaxed, and his touch from him, the way he’s playing is just superb, but it does n’t mean that the rest of the side play their best relaxed, ”he added.
“At the moment there’s a reliance on ‘Trell will get it done’. When you’ve got players like Latrell Mitchell in your football side, they are the icing on the cake. They’re the one who can actually get it done for you.
“But you can’t rely on them. Even with Andrew Johns in our side, our forwards were tearing heads off, hitting the line that hard… If suddenly we went out there and say ‘Joey will get us home’, it just doesn’t happen.”
Storm sizzle poor Panthers | 02:01
Despite a tough run home, in which they play the Eels, Panthers, Cowboys and Roosters, Johns believes they can go all the way.
“The way they’re playing, that relaxed style, and the fact they’re playing within themselves and winning, well done to you boys. But they’re in a position, in my opinion, they can win this competition.
“They can come from nowhere and win this competition but they will not win it with the way they’re playing at the moment.
“It’s nothing about talent or anything like that, they’ve just got to develop, in the next few weeks, a really hard edge, and tonight’s a perfect opportunity.”
Eight months after scoffing at the ATP world rankings, Nick Kyrgios has moved up 100 places — and he might not be done yet.
It was back in January, Kyrgios, 27, started the year in the 93rd spot. Soon after he dropped outside the top 100 and slid as far down as 137th in March.
All along though the outspoken Australian never feared about his slide down the rankings.
“Honestly, if I’m ranked 1000 or 10 in the world I know what I’m capable of and everyone knows what I’m capable of on Tour,” he said in January.
“I’m not a player that hasn’t come from themselves – I talk a lot but I also have beaten a lot of players and I’ve won a lot of tournaments so that’s not something I’m focusing on,” he said.
“I just want to go out there have fun and I want to put on a good performance.
“It’s the Australian summer and people expect me to put on a good show and I think that I’m still capable of doing that.
“I won Acapulco unseeded and I beat four top-10 players … I think the level of tennis has never been this deep, everyone can play, everyone’s capable of doing very, very well.”
Despite his runner-up finish at the All England Courts not counting towards his ATP ranking because of Wimbledon’s decision to exclude Russian and Belarusian players because of the war in Ukraine, Kyrgios has now moved inside the top 30 with his round of 16 win over Alex by Minaur on Friday.
Watch Tennis Live with beIN SPORTS on Kayo. Live Coverage of ATP + WTA Tour Tournaments including Every Finals Match. New to Kayo? Start your free trial now >
Demon no match for King Kyrgios | 02:16
After starting the tournament ranked 37, Kyrgios has moved to No.27 in the world after his two-set clinical showing at the ATP Montreal Masters
He will climb as high as No.21 should he prevail over eighth-seeded Hubert Hurkacz in the quarter-finals on Saturday and could move inside the top 15 should he win the tournament. He has now won 15 of his past 16 single matches, including his past nine straight.
Nick Kyrgios was in sublime form against Alex de Minaur during Day 6 of the National Bank Open on August 11, 2022 in Montreal, Canada. Photo: Getty ImagesSource: Getty Images
In a boost to his US Open hopes, Kyrgios’ victory over de Minaur means the volatile Australian will be seeded at the grand slam event.
“It was a goal, more so that I don’t get one of the big titans or gods the first-round, I can actually work my way through the draw, if the draw is kind,” he said.
“I always feel as if my game is right there. I feel like no matter who I play, today I felt amazing, and let’s keep it going.”
The Tennis world was blown away by Kyrgios’ clinical showing in Canada.
De Minaur had few answers against his Davis Cup teammate, who came to the net early and reeled off 22 winners and just nine unforced errors in the 62 minute demolition.
It was the type of tennis that saw Kyrgios progress through his maiden Slam final, where he ultimately went down to Novak Djokovic in a five-set epic.
Victorian Premier Dan Andrews has made an awkward gaffe while posting a tweet announcing a state memorial service for Olivia Newton-John that missed her name.
The iconic Australian singer, who starred in the hit musical Grease, died aged 73 at her home in southern California on Monday, after a long battle with breast cancer.
Ms Newton-John’s death triggered an outpouring of heartfelt condolences from celebrities and fans all over the world and prompted Mr Andrews to offer her family a state memorial service for the star.
“I’m so pleased that Olivia Newton-John’s family have accepted our offer of a State Memorial Service,” Mr Andrews’ official account tweeted.
The spelling error, in which an extra “w” was added to “Newton”, was quickly pointed out by followers who accused the premier of making the service about himself instead of honoring Ms Newton-John.
“It’s Newton NOT Newtown. With the amount we pay for your PR team they could get the spelling right,” one person wrote.
“Her name was Olivia NEWTON John. You’re absolutely embarrassing,” another posted.
Several Twitter users claimed that the error was disrespectful because it allegedly showed a lack of attention to detail.
“At least have the respect to spell her name correctly,” one wrote.
Olivia Newton-John. With respect Premier, please be mindful of the correct spelling,” another advised.
And: “You can’t even get her name right. So much for respect.”
Earlier, Mr Andrews said he spoke to Ms Newton-John’s niece, former Neighbors star, Tottie Goldsmith to discuss plans.
“I can update that I’ve spoken with Tottie Goldsmith this morning and she, on behalf of the family, have accepted my offer of a state service,” he said.
“This will be much more of a concert than a funeral, I think it will be a celebration of such a rich and generous life.
“As I said the other day, Olivia Newton-John was a very special person and to take her cancer journey and to turn that into more research, better treatment, better care and this focus on wellness, is such an amazing legacy and that’s why I think we all feel the pain of her passing.”
Mr Andrews said the family was touched by the Australian public’s outpouring of grief following Ms Newton-John’s death.
“There will be further discussions, those discussions have started today, but there will be further discussions in my department and the family about what’s appropriate,” he said.
“I think giving Melburnians and Victorians and indeed people who travel from other parts of the country and maybe even the world to be here to celebrate such an important, rich and generous life — that was the right thing to do.”
“And I must say, it’s very clear to me the family were quite touched by the prospect of Victorians being able to come together and celebrate Olivia’s life.”
The British-born actor and singer, who moved to Melbourne aged six, identified as Australian and became a devoted advocate for cancer research.
Her family will hold a private funeral for Ms Newton-John in the US – where she has lived for decades.
She is survived by husband John Easterling and daughter Chloe Lattanzi.
Things got ugly for Ben Simmons in Philadelphia and if Kevin Durant is not careful, he could be heading down a similar path in Brooklyn — if he is not already.
But could that be all part of the Nets superstar’s master plan?
Well, Durant certainly got the NBA world talking earlier in the week then he issued an ultimatum that left Nets owner Joseph Tsai in a tricky situation.
Durant, who requested a trade in June, reportedly told Tsai he needs to choose between the 12-time All-Star and the pairing of head coach Steve Nash and GM Sean Marks.
Watch The Biggest Sports from The US with ESPN on Kayo. NBA, NHL, MLB & NFL. Live Coverage Every Week in Season. New to Kayo? Start your free trial now >
Green dominates Bulls with career high | 02:03
A subsequent report from The New York Post laid out Durant’s specific grievances with the team, including a lack of consultation over the Nets’ firing of assistant coach and director of player development Adam Harrington.
But not everyone in the NBA world seems to think that Durant actually wants Nash or Marks fired from the organization.
That is certainly the opinion of Fox Sports’ Nick Wright, who said on ‘The Herd’ with Colin Cowherd that Durant’s ultimatum is all about achieving one “single goal”.
“I don’t think Kevin Durant actually wants those guys fired,” Wright said.
“I think he just wants to be traded. I think if he wanted Sean Marks and Steve Nash fired, he would have gone to Joe Tsai a month ago when he did the trade demand and quietly and privately said: ‘Listen, if you don’t fire these guys, I’m going to demand a trade’.
“I read this differently than most. I read this as Kevin Durant asking for something he knew he would not get in order to make it untenable for them to bring him back because he was starting to get concerned they were actually going to bring him back.
“This was him upping the ante to a level that is pretty unprecedented. It’s why I think Durant understood Joe Tsai is not going to do it and they also, I don’t believe, can ask Steve Nash to now coach Kevin Durant. I think it was a really smart move if his single goal is to be traded and I think that is his single goal.
Could Kevin Durant be heading down a similar path to Ben Simmons? (Photo by Adam Hunger/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
You see, it is not like Durant has much leverage in this situation, as NBA front office insider John Hollinger explained in a recent article for The Athletic.
Hollinger pointed towards two numbers in particular to prove that point — 34 and four — Durant’s age and how many years he has left on his contract.
“Throwing both his coach and GM under the bus — in many cases for moves that came with a wink and nod from Durant’s camp — certainly makes it less likely the Nets will find it tenable to reunite everyone in the fall,” Hollinger wrote.
“Of course, this gambit offers no guarantees. The trade offers in front of the Nets today aren’t any different from the ones they rejected yesterday, and it’s not clear how or if Durant’s latest demand will compel action.”
What it could do though is lead to a similar situation to the one Simmons found himself in Philadelphia last year, although there are a few key differences as Hollinger also pointed out.
“Seemingly the sharpest arrow left in Durant’s quiver is pure hardball: a holdout, one that would cost him a chunk of his $44 million 2022-23 salary for every day he sat out,” he wrote.
“It would, ironically, be a near carbon-copy of the situation a year ago in Philadelphia with Durant’s occasional teammate Ben Simmons.
“Here’s the thing: The Nets are working on a different timeline than the Sixers were.”
Dad UP for Bronny James alley-oop! | 00:21
Hollinger is right. Philadelphia had to move relatively fast to capitalize on Joel Embiid’s prime and as such was more inclined to reach a swift resolution in the Simmons drama.
The same cannot be said for the Nets though, as Hollinger argued.
“If anything, they would seem to have the opposite motivation,” he wrote.
“Yes, Brooklyn’s first choice would be to run it back with Durant, Simmons and Kyrie Irving (or a suitable replacement). But in the absence of Durant, wouldn’t the Nets’ second choice be to tank the season and try again in 2024? And wouldn’t a Durant holdout do anything more than accelerate the Nets toward that endgame?
“Brooklyn’s best-case scenario may be waiting until midseason, when this summer’s free agents are eligible to be dealt with. It seems less likely they’d let a year of Durant’s contract wither on the vine at his age and wait until next offseason… but it ca n’t totally be ruled out either given the tanking incentive.
Durant has told Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai that he must choose between keeping Durant or head coach Steve Nash and general manager Sean Marks, The Athletic reported on August 8, 2022. (Photo by ELSA / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / AFP)Source: AFP
What was consistent among a host of voices in the NBA media landscape was a sense of uncertainty, not knowing what exactly was coming next, again similar to the Simmons saga.
“The whole situation is a mess, but the kind of mess Brooklyn might happily sweep under a rug and ignore, if only it could,” The Ringers Rob Mahoney wrote.
“It’s impossible to replace Kevin Durant. Hell, it’s hard enough just to set a fair return for Durant in a trade, much less one suitors can realistically meet. Every ask sounds ridiculous because Durant is a genuinely ridiculous player.
“That might be the only reason he’s still a Net some six weeks after requesting a trade—and maybe the real reason KD is stirring the pot with this ultimatum in the first place. Does he really want Marks and Nash gone? Or is he just looking to send a shock through the Nets’ system?”
Dellavedova to make NBA return! | 00:32
The Athletic’s Alex Schiffer, meanwhile, pointed towards Durant’s strong endorsement of Marks after the Brooklyn’s four-game sweep at the hands of Boston as proof of just how confusing it all is.
“If Durant wanted Nash out but didn’t feel like putting him on blast to the media 10 minutes after the season ended, he could have discussed Nash’s future with an ‘I don’t know’ or ‘Now’s not the time for that’ . But he didn’t,” Schiffer wrote.
Schiffer agreed one “plausible explanation” is that this is Durant trying to force Brooklyn’s hand, to make the situation so untenable that the Nets back down.
Durant wants out of Brooklyn. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images
The Heat have been heavily linked to Durant since he first requested the trade but are unlikely to have the assets to make it work, at least in a traditional two-team deal.
The Miami Herald’s Anthony Chiang though Durant’s ultimatum was an important point in the drama, even if it still left “plenty of questions unanswered”.
“But in the wake of The Athletic’s report that Durant doesn’t want to work with Nash or Marks, the question is: Will this force the Nets to trade Durant prior to the start of training camp in late September to avoid any awkward tension and drama between the two parties? he wrote.
“That sort of deadline could take away some of the Nets’ leverage as the window to trade Durant before training camp shrinks as each day passes.
“The Nets could also decide to take Durant into training camp if a good enough offer doesn’t present itself, which would force Durant to decide whether to skip practices as he waits to be dealt or play through it.”
Bogut breaks down the Aussies in the NBA | 08:35
NBA insider Brian Windhorst though was not so sure it would pay off, should Durant’s ultimatum have been a ploy to try speed up a trade out of Brooklyn.
“Doing it now is a manoeuvre, a manoeuvre that I don’t think worked because as I talk to teams out there, they don’t think this increased his trade demand. They think this hurt his trade value,” Windhorst said on ‘NBA Today’.
Windhorst brought up Tsai’s tweet earlier in the week as proof of it, in which the Nets owner claimed: “Our front office and coaching staff have my support. We will make decisions in the best interest of the Brooklyn Nets.”
“I want to point to the second half of the Joe Tsai tweet,” Windhorst said.
“I think it’s obviously important to look at the first sentence which is that he’s not going to fire Sean Marks and Steve Nash. But the second sentence is really the sentence that the league paid attention to it. And it seems benign when he says ‘We make decisions for the best interest of the Brooklyn Nets.’
“But I’m going to decode that for you. What he’s basically saying is despite what Kevin Durant is trying to do here, we’re not going to change what our expectations are for a trade and if you are not traded, we expect you to be reporting to camp to continue the four years you have left on your contract.”
At this stage though, we are no closer to either party getting what they want, with Schiffer putting it best in his summation of the drama.
“During’s ultimatum,” he wrote, “opened a chest’s worth of questions while the clock to training camp continues to tick more loudly”.
Aussies are keener than ever to hop on a plane and escape what has been a pretty rough past few years.
Almost 57 per cent of Aussies are planning a getaway in the next 12 months which is up 49 per cent from December, according to Finder’s Consumer Sentiment Tracker.
However, travel at the moment comes with a heftier than usual price tag.
KAYAK’s data shows the average return economy international flight price in Australia based on flight searches in July (between July 1-18) was approximately $1761 – an increase of about 14 per cent compared to the same period in May (between May 1-18) .
Meanwhile, the consumer price index (CPI) July report shows plane tickets have soared 27.7 per cent on a year-over-year (YoY) basis.
And sadly it is a tendency likely to stick around for a bit longer, according to Angus Kidman, travel expert at Finder.
“Sale fares are definitely higher than they were pre-pandemic. Tiger used to regularly offer $9 domestic fares,” Mr Kidman said.
“We won’t see that again. Jetstar has offered a handful of $22 fares this year, but only outside of peak periods and for a tiny number of seats.”
He said Virgin’s floor in sales is now generally $49, and for Qantas it’s rare to see any sub-$100 flights.
“I don’t expect we’ll see much change to that in 2022. The arrival of new competitor Bonza may create a little price pressure, but many of its routes are regional and I’m expecting that it will be charging well over $100 for a seat most of the time.”
‘On the rise’
Trivago (TRVG) CEO Axel Hefer believes “costs will continue to go up”, attributing it to staffing shortages and labor costs.
“You see a fundamental shortage of people in travel and hospitality, and the reason is that a lot of companies have actually reduced their staffing during the pandemic,” Mr Hefer told Yahoo Finance.
“[Companies] are now struggling in very tight labor markets to staff up again. So they will have to pay up, and that cost will be passed on.”
Flight cancellations
The Bureau of Transportation Statistics quantified that 88,161 flights have been canceled so far this year, with many being attributed to staffing issues.
Virgin Australia, Qantas, and Air New Zealand were all named among the global airlines with the current highest cancellation rates, while Singapore Airlines was noted as the carrier with the lowest cancellation figure.
The new data, compiled by aviation analytics company Cirium, looked at flight data from 19 major airlines in the three months to July 26 which revealed Virgin Australia to have one of the highest cancellation rates at 5.9 per cent.
Air New Zealand and Qantas were also named in the top five airlines with high cancellation rates, at 3.7 and 3.3 per cent respectively.
Singapore Airlines, which remains the top international carrier in Australia, was dubbed the most reliable airline, with a 0.8 per cent cancellation rate.
Notably, of all 19 studied carriers, Virgin boasts the smallest international network, possibly skewing the data, according to Australian Aviation.
Australia’s worst month for flying
Australian airlines recorded their “worst ever” month in June for flight delays and cancellations with a total of 5.8 per cent of all flights canceled – nearly three times more than the long-term cancellation average.
There were 63 per cent of all flights arriving on time in June, with 61.9 per cent departing on schedule, the Bureau of Infrastructure and Transport Research Economics (BITRE) report found.
BITRE said these figures mark “the worst” the industry has seen since records began in November 2003.
The report looked at delays and cancellations across all major Australian airports in the month of June.
The severe disruption was fueled by staffing shortages, staff sicknesses, mid-year school holiday travel surges and severe weather events, including flash flooding throughout NSW.
Qantas recorded the highest percentage of cancellations at 8.1 per cent during the month, followed by QantasLink, Virgin Australia, Jetstar, Virgin Australia Regional Airlines and Rex Airlines.
Qantas recorded just over half of their airlines arrived on time in June, at 59 per cent, while Virgin achieved the highest level of on time departures among the major domestic airlines at 60 per cent.
A Qantas spokesperson told NCA NewsWire the flight delays and cancellations were not the kind of performance that they were delivering pre-Covid.
“A rise in Covid and other illnesses among airline crew as well as the tight labor market led to flight disruptions for all domestic airlines in June,” they said.
“We had rostered additional crew on standby which helped lessen the impact of Covid-related crew absences and meant 85 per cent of our domestic flights for the month departed within an hour of schedule.”
“Flight cancellations in July were lower than they were in June, call center wait times are now better than they were pre-Covid and our mishandled bag rates are close to what they were before the pandemic.”
Anne Heche’s family have released a statement following her horror car crash last week, saying she’s “not expected to survive.”
The 53-year-old US actress has been in a coma since the accident in Los Angeles last Friday.
“Unfortunately, due to her accident, Anne suffered a severe anoxic brain injury and remains in a coma in critical condition,” a representative said in a statement on behalf of Heche’s family, obtained by People. “She is not expected to survive.”
Heche’s rep added that the actress was being kept on life support to “determine if her organs are viable”.
“It has long been her choice to donate her organs,” Heche’s rep said.
Heche’s family went on to thank wellwishers for their support over the last few days, before talking about the star’s legacy.
“We want to thank everyone for their kind wishes and prayers for Anne’s recovery and thank the dedicated staff and wonderful nurses that cared for Anne at the Grossman Burn Center at West Hills hospital,” the statement said.
“Anne had a huge heart and touched everyone she met with her generous spirit. More than her extraordinary talent, she saw spreading kindness and joy as her life’s work — especially moving the needle for acceptance of who you love.
“She will be remembered for her courageous honesty and dearly missed for her light.”
It comes after police confirmed earlier today that Heche tested positive for cocaine and possibly fentanyl at the time of her crash.
Los Angeles Police Department sources told TMZ that the actress’ blood test results came up positive for both substances.
However, the law enforcement insiders cautioned that fentanyl may have been administered to Heche at the hospital to help manage her pain after the accident, so they will do more testing to determine whether the fentanyl was in her system at the time of the crash, Page Six reports.
the Six Days Seven Nights actress, who dated Ellen DeGeneres in the ’90s, has been in an “extreme critical condition” at the medical center following the collision in Mar Vista, which also destroyed a house and displaced a woman and her dogs.
“She has a significant pulmonary injury requiring mechanical ventilation and burns that require surgical intervention,” Heche’s rep said earlier this week.
“She is in a coma and has not regained consciousness since shortly after the accident.”
Meanwhile, DeGeneres gave a surprisingly curt response yesterday when asked by a photographer about her former girlfriend.
When asked on Thursday if she’d checked in on Heche since the crash, DeGeneres said simply: “No, have not. We’re not in touch with each other, so I wouldn’t know.”
When asked if she wanted to send Heche any well-wishes, DeGeneres again kept it brief. “Sure… I don’t want anyone to be hurt,” she said.
DeGeneres and Heche were arguably Hollywood’s most visible same-sex couple for the three years they were together, from 1997 to 2000.
While definitely not as common as they used to be, movie tie-in video games are generally viewed as the absolute bottom of the barrel in terms of video game entertainment.
These are video games created often in short time frames, with limited development cycles, budgets, and anything else that you need in order to make a decent video game.
But, as with anything, some are worse than others.
So here, we have compiled the top 10 (in no particular order) worst of the worst, the rock bottom, the absolute dredge of them all for you to enjoy.
10. E. T. The Extra Terrestrial (1982, Atari)
While older than most people reading this, this game is often credited as having caused the video game market of 1983 to crash. The game itself was boring and bland, featuring awful graphics (even for its time) and repetitive tasks.
Rumor has it that Atari only gave developers five weeks to develop the game for the Christmas season, which would explain the lack of… well, gameplay in the video game. A huge number of these games were returned, Atari fell into bankruptcy, and, as the legend goes, the remainder of the stock was buried in a New Mexico landfill somewhere.
9. Tomorrow Never Dies (1999)
Remember golden eye 64? Remember how much fun it was to stay up late into the night with three of your best friends, getting mad at each other over picking Oddjob, or someone who grabbed the Golden Gun first? Those were good times. What if the next game released in the 007 franchise was worse in every conceivable way?
Tomorrow Never Dies did away with the first-person view, instead choosing a third-person view. The game only featured a story mode, lacking any multiplayer whatsoever. If they had named this game anything else, it probably would have been fine, but coming hot off the heels of the success that golden eye 64 was, it led many to see this as a downgrade in every way.
8. Marvel’s Avengers (2020)
Crystal Dynamics has done some good work in gaming, don’t get me wrong, but avengers fails in a lot of ways that don’t make sense. The launch of avengers had some serious game-breaking bugs tethered to it, and while most of them have been ironed out over its lifespan, one of the game’s core problems hasn’t been – how content dry and unrewarding it is to play.
The game has a decent story mode, but once you complete it, the only way to progress is to complete multiplayer missions, which are the same boring, repetitive missions that every other games-as-a-service game has. The multiplayer is not fun, and that’s the biggest advertising point of the game. Please just make another Legacy of Kain game, Crystal Dynamics.
7. Saw 2: Flesh and Blood (2010)
“Hey, what if we took a movie that was relatively unique in the horror genre for its interesting puzzles and turned it into a boring action video game?” said the developers of Saw 2: Flesh and Blood. I may be paraphrasing.
The puzzles are boring, the dialogue is boring, you’re having to repeat puzzles often because they do not explain how the puzzles work, and the majority of downtime in between puzzles are filled with quick-timed events. Low amounts of checkpoints means that you’re often having to redo several rooms multiple times.
6. Cat Woman (2004)
Not unlike the movie of the same name, cat woman did extremely poorly with critics and players alike.
Genuinely awful voice acting combined with seemingly malfunctioning camera controls and a mash-one-button-until-you-win combat style made this game an easy one to pass up.
5. Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game (1995)
In the games industry, there’s an unfortunate expectation that a video game made to tie in with a movie is gonna suck. So what happens when a movie is made based on a video game – that is then turned into a video game itself? It’s like an inception of bad video games.
This soulless shell of a game lacks even the most basic things that Street Fighter II had, namely its charm. Seeing Dhalsim stretch-punch or Ryu throw Hadoukens is timeless, but seeing digitized versions of the actors playing these characters doing the same is just painful.
4. James Cameron’s Avatar: The Game (2009)
Picture this: you’ve just seen Avatar in theaters, and it was a wondrous journey through what cinematic effects can look like in 2009. You can’t get over how cool the fight scenes were, how beautiful the landscapes were, or how intricate the sex-hair thing was. So you rush to your local store and immediately spy a copy of Avatar: The Game. Surely it must look just as good, right?
While the game does tackle events prior to the movie, expanding the lore of the world a bit, the graphics looked awful – I can think of a few late-gen PS2 games that looked nicer – the gameplay was bland and repetitive, made worse by the linear paths you have to walk in the game.
3. Evil Dead: Hail to the King
I cannot imagine watching Evil Dead 2having a wonderful time, and then picking this game up and trying to play through it. Hail to the King lacks pretty much everything that made Evil Dead 2 or Army of Darkness work, instead attempting to emulate some action-horror games that had come out before it.
Fixed camera angles are fine in some games, but the game has to be built around them for it to work. This game has problems with enemies swarming you, and you are unable to deal with them due to the camera perspectives.
2. Every Shrek Game That Isn’t Shrek SuperSlam
I don’t really have the energy to go into why all but one of the Shrek games are bad. In short, they’re poorly paced, have game-breaking bugs, are boring and feature repetitive gameplay. Instead, I want to focus on why SuperSlam is a great game.
SuperSlam is technically a bad game, in terms of gameplay and execution. It’s a broken platform/arena fighter, with several characters able to commit to ‘infinite’ combos that generally just make it unfun – in theory.
What makes it fun is that an entire competitive esports community has formed around the broken game, figuring out how the game works within how broken it is. To this day, tournaments are held online, with new players joining in to try to win.
1. Aliens: Colonial Marines (2013)
This one is a pain for me, personally. Alien is such a cool series, with a lot of lore and a lot of good horror sequences – Alien: Isolation is arguably my favorite movie tie-in game because of how oppressive and well-done the horror in that game is. Enter Colonial Marines: a game with broken AI, to the point where Aliens will crab-walk right past you while they try to figure out their pathing, or get caught in level geometry because the developers couldn’t figure out hitbox collision. The graphics were extremely bland for their time, especially when you compare it to the alpha footage that leaked before release, which looked incredible.
What’s worse, however, is the vast number of promises that the developers gave prerelease that were simply not true. It was a giant mess from beginning to end, and Alien fans the world over were truly disappointed.
