US Business

Netflix on Thursday said a subscription option subsidized by ads will debut in November in a dozen countries as the streaming service strives to jumpstart growth.

Basic with Ads subscriptions will be priced at $6.99 in the United States, three dollars less than a basic option without ads, Netflix chief operating officer Greg Peters said in a briefing.

“The timing is great because we really are at this pivotal moment in the entertainment industry and evolution of that industry,” Peters said.

“Now streaming has surpassed both broadcast and cable for total TV time in the United States.”

The ad-discounted tier, a first for Netflix, will roll out in Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Spain and the United States.

Nearly all of the Netflix library will be available, with some offerings held back until licensing deals are renegotiated.

Video ads will be from 15 seconds to 30 seconds long.

“We are looking at a very light ad load with no more than four to five minutes of ads per hour, and including some very tight frequency caps so that members don’t see the same ad repeatedly,” Peters said.

After long shunning advertising, Netflix pushed ahead as competition in the streaming television market intensifies and as consumers recoil from soaring inflation.

With the launch of cheaper, ad-supported subscriptions, Netflix and Disney+ are expected to bite into the revenue of traditional television channels.

Netflix rival Disney+ is expected to launch its own ad-subsidized subscription soon.

“These launches are going to create the biggest premium advertising space in more than a generation,” said analytics company Samba TV senior vice president Dallas Lawrence.

“It’s going to be a major moment for advertisers.”

Russia agreed Thursday to help residents leave a region it has “annexed” in a new sign Kyiv’s counter-offensive is advancing, as a top EU official warned Moscow’s army would be “annihilated” by the West if the Kremlin uses nuclear weapons in the war.

Russia’s decision came a day after Kyiv said it had retaken five settlements in the southern Kherson region.

“The government took the decision to organise assistance for the departure of residents of the (Kherson) region,” Russian Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin said.

The Moscow-appointed head of the area in southern Ukraine — which Russia says it has annexed — had appealed for Russian intervention.

Vladimir Saldo suggested residents “leave to other regions to protect themselves from missile strikes”.

Kherson was being hit by an increasing amount of rockets causing “serious damage”, added Saldo, with civilian infrastructure being targeted.

Those departing would go to Crimea, a Ukrainian peninsula Moscow annexed in 2014, and southern Russian regions.

Kyiv, which announced its counter-offensive in the south in August, said it has already recaptured over 400 square kilometres (155 miles) in the Kherson region in under a week.

The city of Kherson, which lies near Crimea, was the first major Ukrainian city to fall to Russian forces after the February 24 invasion.

In Brussels, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell sent a strong message to the Kremlin after President Vladimir Putin’s veiled threats of resorting to nuclear weapons to stem growing battlefield losses.

“Putin is saying he is not bluffing. Well, he cannot afford bluffing, and it has to be clear that the people supporting Ukraine and the European Union and the Member States, and the United States and NATO are not bluffing neither,” Borrell said.

“Any nuclear attack against Ukraine will create an answer, not a nuclear answer but such a powerful answer from the military side that the Russian Army will be annihilated,” Borrell added.

The NATO alliance has stopped short of threatening to use its nuclear arsenal to respond as non-member Ukraine is not covered by its mutual self-defence clause.

The United States and NATO have steered clear of intervening militarily in the Ukraine conflict for fear of sparking a catastrophic nuclear conflict with Moscow.

– Booming trade –

In Ankara, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan defended Turkey’s booming trade ties with Moscow during an in-person meeting with Putin on the sidelines of a summit of regional leaders in Kazakhstan.

But Erdogan did not deliver an offer to mediate negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv — expected by the Kremlin.

Comments between the leaders made no mention of Ukraine and focussed instead on economic ties.

Putin proposed to create a “gas hub” in Turkey as Russia’s supplies to Europe have been disrupted by Ukraine-related sanctions.

NATO member Turkey has sought to retain dialogue with its Western allies as well as Moscow, and has not joined sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.

Erdogan also refrained from commenting on mass Russian strikes on Ukraine earlier this week that mostly targeted energy infrastructure and left at least 20 dead. 

The attacks caused power and hot water cuts across the country, but the head of Ukraine’s energy operator Ukrenergo said Thursday the power grid had “stabilised”, reassuring users emergency power cuts would be unneccessary.

– Rebels push to Bakhmut –

On the battlefield, Russian-backed separatist forces in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine said they had captured two villages near the industrial city of Bakhmut, posting small gains against Kyiv’s counter-offensive.

The villages lie just south of Bakhmut, a wine-making and salt-mining city that used to be populated by some 70,000 people and which Russian forces have been pummelling for weeks to capture.

The reported gains came after Ukrainian troops had for weeks been clawing back large swathes of territory in the south and east of Ukraine — including Donetsk — controlled by Russian forces for months.

The Ukrainian military countered in an update that it had repelled attacks near several frontline villages.

– Boy pulled from rubble –

Ukraine troops told AFP this week near the frontline south of Bakhmut that they were still outgunned by Russian artillery on their section of the frontline. 

Russian supply lines from the part of Donetsk occupied since 2014 are still intact. 

AFP reporters in Yampil just outside the recently liberated town of Lyman on Thursday heard heavy exchanges of artillery fire to the southeast. 

A Ukrainian soldier returning from the frontline said positions in Torske village were under fire from Russian guns guided by spotter drones.

Also in the south, the town of Mykolaiv was again rocked by Russian bombardments.

The head of the city Oleksandr Sienkevych said on social media a five-storey residential building was hit, with two upper floors destroyed completely.

“An 11-year-old boy was recovered from under the rubble and another seven people may still be there,” he said, adding a security guard was killed at a sea rescue station.

Bob Dylan fans on Thursday got a glimpse into the nobel laureate and folk-rock legend’s new book, “The Philosophy of Modern Song,” set for publication next month.

The collection of essays is his first book of new writing since 2004, when he released “Chronicles, Volume One.”

The book exploring songwriting’s power is set for release on November 8 with the publisher Simon and Schuster.

Excerpts published in The New York Times offer musings from the beloved American poet and musician on Frank Sinatra’s “Strangers in the Night” and The Who’s anthem “My Generation.”

Many of the essays include “riffs” that see Dylan expand on his words with a shorter, looser piece where the artist waxes poetic on the track in question.

“Something in your vital spirit, your pulse, something that runs in the blood, tells you that you must have this tender feeling of love now and forever, this essence of devoted love held tightly in your grip — that it’s essential and necessary for staying alive and cheating death,” Dylan riffs on Sinatra.

The book is also set to include musings on artists including Hank Williams and Nina Simone.

Dylan says “My Generation,” the 1960s smash that’s one of The Who’s most recognizable songs, “does no favors for anyone, and casts doubt on everything.”

He says “fear” — of getting old, namely — “is perhaps the most honest thing about the song.”

“We all rail at the previous generation but somehow know it’s only a matter of time until we will become them ourselves.”

Dylan, who burst onto the folk scene in New York in the early 1960s, has sold more than 125 million records around the world.

Rumors of a “Chronicles, Volume Two” have swirled for years but fans will now have “Philosophy” to tide them over until — or if — that sequel is published.

The 81-year-old has maintained a rigorous touring schedule, and is currently on a global itinerary set to continue into 2024.

In 2020 he released his 39th studio album, “Rough and Rowdy Ways,” to critical acclaim.

He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016 “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.”

The G20 held talks in Washington on Thursday, but Russia’s presence in the club made any consensus unlikely despite the multiple crises facing the world.

Finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 major economies are gathered in the US capital during annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank that have focused on Russia’s war in Ukraine, soaring inflation and a climate crisis.

But the G20 is unlikely to agree on many issues, with the group now facing tensions between Saudi Arabia and the United States over OPEC+ oil production cuts that Washington fears will further fuel inflation.

Despite the divisions, Western officials said the G20 remains a useful forum.

“Even if there are different opinions — including those that you don’t share, some even that you don’t understand — it’s still a good forum for a conversation,” said German Finance Minister Christian Lindner.

“It is better to have a forum to speak in than none,” he told reporters.

But the G20 is expected to close its meeting without a joint communique, as in its previous gatherings presided by Indonesia this year. A press conference is scheduled for later Thursday.

“We could do a communique that doesn’t mention the war in Ukraine, but we don’t want a communique that sweeps things under the rug,” a source close to the discussions told AFP.

– Saudi-US spat –

While Western nations have imposed unprecedented sanctions on Russia, other countries have maintained economic ties with Moscow, with India and China stepping up their purchases of Russian oil.

The Group of Seven wealthy democracies is now looking to cap the prices of Russian crude exports, a move aimed at stripping the country of a major source of funding for its war effort.

The G7 — which includes Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States — said Wednesday it had made “significant progress” in key parts of its proposal, noting that it had added Australia to its coalition.

Gaining broad global approval for a price cap is a key challenge for the proposal.

The Saudi-led OPEC group of oil exporters has angered the United States by agreeing on a drastic production cut with Russia and other allies, which could send energy prices soaring even higher.

Washington has accused OPEC+ of aligning itself with Moscow, and on Wednesday President Joe Biden threatened “consequences” for Saudi Arabia.

In a statement, the Saudi foreign ministry denied that the decision was “politically motivated against the United States” and expressed its “total rejection of these statements that are not based on facts.”

But US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby responded that Ryiadh knew the cut “would increase Russian revenues and blunt the effectiveness of sanctions. That is the wrong direction.”

The source close to the G20 discussions said Western nations explained at the meeting that they were “disappointed” and that it went against Saudi interests “because the risk for them is that they cause a recession.”

“It’s hard to understand,” the source said.

– ‘We’re cooked’ –

The G20 also discussed the state of the global economy and debt at a dinner on Wednesday. On Thursday they talked about the financial sector, regulating cryptocurrencies, a global minimum tax on corporations and how to follow through on pledges in climate financing, the source said.

Tensions within the G20 come as leaders are due to meet at a summit in Bali, Indonesia, next month that could see Biden share the same venue as Russian President Vladimir Putin and another rival, Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

The lack of consensus within the group also comes ahead of the United Nations’ COP27 climate summit in Egypt in November.

IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said Wednesday that the world has to invest up to $6 trillion per year if it is to meet the Paris agreement goal of reaching net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

“If we do not shift our trajectory this decade, we’re cooked. If we don’t want to be cooked, then we should speed up,” Georgieva said Wednesday in talks on climate change.

A US jury on Thursday rejected the death penalty for Nikolas Cruz, who shot and killed 17 people at his former Florida high school, opting instead for life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

Cruz, 24, wearing a striped sweater and large glasses, stared down expressionless at the defense table as the verdict was read while several relatives of the victims in the gallery shook their heads in disbelief.

The jury deliberated for a full day Wednesday and briefly Thursday before deciding that Cruz should receive life in prison for the February 2018 murders of 14 students and three staff members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

A death penalty recommendation needed to be unanimous and one or more of the 12 jurors found that it was not justified because of mitigating circumstances.

Several relatives of victims reacted angrily to the verdict.

“I could not be more disappointed in what happened today,” said Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter Jaime was one of the students killed in the Valentine’s Day attack.

“I’m stunned. I’m devastated,” Guttenberg said. “There are 17 victims that did not receive justice today. This jury failed our families today.”

Prosecutors and Cruz’s defense team gave their closing arguments on Tuesday after a three-month trial, during which the jury saw graphic footage of the attack and listened to harrowing testimony from survivors.

Michael Satz, the lead prosecutor, said Cruz, who pleaded guilty to the murders last year, planned and carried out a “systematic massacre” and the appropriate penalty was death.

The 80-year-old Satz, who came out of retirement to try the case, ended his closing arguments by reciting the names of the 17 people who died.

– ‘Brain-damaged, mentally-ill’ –

Melisa McNeill, a lawyer for Cruz, urged the jurors to show compassion.

McNeill said Cruz was a troubled young man born with fetal alcohol stress disorder to a mother who struggled with homelessness, alcoholism and drug addiction before putting him up for adoption.

“He was doomed from the womb and in a civilized, humane society, do we kill brain-damaged, mentally ill, broken people?” McNeill asked in her closing statement. “Do we? I hope not.”

Tony Montalto, whose 14-year-old daughter Gina was killed, dismissed those arguments.

“This shooter did not deserve compassion,” Montalto said. “Did he show compassion to Gina when he put the weapon against her chest and chose to pull that trigger?

“Do we want people who commit atrocious acts… to be punished to the fullest extent of the law?” he asked. “Or do we want to excuse them because they had a tough time growing up?”

– Gun control debate –

On February 14, 2018, the then-19-year-old Cruz walked into school carrying a high-powered semiautomatic rifle. He had been expelled a year earlier for disciplinary reasons.

In a matter of nine minutes, he killed 17 people and wounded over a dozen more.

Cruz fled by mixing in with people frantically escaping the gory scene, but was arrested by police shortly after as he walked along the street.

The shooting stunned the nation and reignited debate on gun control since Cruz had legally purchased the gun he used despite his mental health issues.

On March 24, 2018, nationwide marches inspired by school shooting survivors and parents of victims brought together 1.5 million people — the largest public turnout ever in defense of stricter gun control laws in America.

But the Parkland shooting prompted no significant reform by Congress and gun sales have continued to rise.

Thousands turned out for demonstrations organized following two other recent mass shootings: one at a Texas elementary school that killed 19 young children and two teachers, and another at a New York supermarket that left 10 Black people dead.

Those shootings helped galvanize support for the first significant federal bill on gun safety in decades.

President Joe Biden signed the bill into law in June. It included enhanced background checks for younger buyers and federal cash for states introducing “red flag” laws that allow courts to temporarily remove weapons from people who are considered a threat.

But the measure fell far short of steps Biden had called for, including an assault weapons ban.

The Justice Department reached a $127.5 million settlement in March with survivors and relatives of Parkland victims who had accused the FBI of negligence for failing to act on tips received prior to the attack that Cruz was dangerous.