What is it about the end of the month?! Last week got away from us and so this edition is the “The Fortnight That Was”.
In Aotearoa, 1 in 8 Kiwi kids feel excluded from sport because they don’t have the gear. To help rally the generosity of Kiwis and give more children the chance to experience the benefits of sport, Cadbury created Donate Your Kit. Supported by NZ Olympics Committee and Paralympics New Zealand ambassadors, we put out the call for people donate their pre-loved sports gear via purple lockers in communities. In collaboration with charity partner KidsCan, the Donate Your Kit initiative has distributed over 60,000 pieces of sports gear to kids that need it the most and funded 480 school sports initiatives.
We’re incredibly proud to have taken home the top prize in the consumer/customer relations category for this campaign last Friday night. Go team!
Sadly, Melbourne went back into lockdown with the travel bubble being paused and then extended.
Maybe an outbreak so close to home will help arrest the low number of daily scans being recorded in New Zealand. We wholeheartedly endorse this quote from the Ministry spokesperson.
“Currently at alert level 1, we strongly encourage New Zealanders and visitors to NZ not to be complacent and continue to keep a record of your movements.”
The past two weeks were difficult for journalists around the world.
Last week the Guardian reported on Roman Protasevich, a former editor of the influential Telegram channels Nexta and Nexta Live, being detained by police after his flight was diverted to Minsk national airport. Minsk confirmed that Lukashenko ordered his military to scramble a Mig-29 fighter to escort the plane.
This resulted in Belarus becoming a no-fly zone for commercial aircraft after the EU took action.
And then just today the BBCis reporting that, "Belarusian journalist Roman Protasevich, who was arrested in Minsk after being taken off a diverted flight last month, has appeared in a tearful interview on state television. In the interview, he confessed to organising anti-government protests and praised President Alexander Lukashenko."
In Myanmar a US journalist was detained while boarding a flight home.
More than 70 journalists have been detained by the military in Myanmar over recent months, as it attempts to crush independent coverage of anti-coup protests, and of the reign of terror the security forces have inflicted on communities.
It’s a dangerous job.
The BBC report on Amazon’s purchase of the MGM studios for $8.45bn (£5.97bn) says is it known for having produced classic films such as Some Like It Hot and Singin' In The Rain. Younger readers will be more familiar with the Bond franchise and the Handmaid’s Tale.
The acquisition is Amazon's second biggest after it bought upmarket grocery chain Whole Foods Market for $13.7bn in 2017.
Danish bacon company, Danish Crown, took the unusual step of using the pre-roll ad on Youtube to find out how long to cook bacon. Seems about 11 minutes is the answer. We have to say we’ve never let a pre-roll run for 11 seconds let alone 11 minutes.
A couple of weeks ago we reported on the GameStop short squeeze driven, we were told by Reddit users. Little did we know that the Mormon Church was also involved racking up a 900% gain.
The church fund also boosted its Tesla stake by 39% after growing it 3,500% last year.
From our sedentary desks and computers we leave you with the winners of the World Sports Photography Awards.
