Voicemail Hack Scandal Leads To Closure of UK Tabloid 268
Some Bitch writes "Britain's biggest selling Sunday tabloid will close after this Sunday's issue. The tabloid has been embroiled in a voicemail hacking controversy for some time now and the news that they compromised the voicemail of a murdered schoolgirl and paid bribes to Metropolitan police officers for stories kicked off a renewed assault on the paper. The News Corp daily counterpart to Sunday's News of the World is the Sun; the domain sunonsunday.co.uk was registered two days ago."
Fuck Rupert Murdoch (Score:5, Insightful)
Send that fuck a bill for Iraq while you're at it.
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Except, like a hydra, cut off one head and two more will take it's place.
The first, The Sun on Sunday, a Sunday edition of that whacky fun time daily tabloid everyone in Liverpool loves to hate [wikipedia.org], that rants on about paedophiles on page 2 and shows a barely 16 girl baring her breasts on page 3. With the second head likely coming with the full buying out of BSKYB. They'll control the News, Sports, Movies and general Entertainment the majority of people in the UK watch.
I'll stick with Blogs, BBC News, Film4 and
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Indeed, there's already some impetus to prevent Murdoch buying BSkyB [38degrees.org.uk] ; that would seem to be a likely reason that he's engaging in this symbolic gesture - to draw attention from this campaign.
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US law is not 18--it varies from state to state, and is 16 in most states [wikipedia.org]. The reason most people think it's 18 in the US is because it's 18 in California, where Hollywood is located. People from Hollywood have no idea about anything in the rest of the country [tvtropes.org], and the rest of the world gets its ideas of the US from Hollywood.
(Warning, TVTropes links may rot your brain. You have been warned.)
You can blame Tony's actions on Hollywood, but don't blame it on the US.
Re:Fuck Rupert Murdoch (Score:4, Informative)
Rupert Murdoch argued strongly for a war with Iraq in an interview this week. Which might explain why his 175 editors around the world are backing it too, writes Roy Greenslade [guardian.co.uk]
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But lest you think I'm a complete monster, I do agree anyone who was part of this phone hacking thing is pretty awful, and deserve whatever they get.
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Hahahahahaha!
You had me going for a minute.
Oh, wait. You were serious?
Perhaps you're referring to the bit of Iraq inside the "green zone"/reality-suspension-bubble.
Can we close Fox News yet? (Score:3, Insightful)
If the intolerable hyping and biasing of the Casey Anthony trial in complete disregard of the defendant's right to due process isn't enough, there's that whole ordering people to tell lies about science to bias legislation [mediamatters.org] thing.
Re:Can we close Fox News yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're singling out Fox News for that, you're nuts. Every single news outlet was doing exactly the same thing. It was disgusting.
Re:Can we close Fox News yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah. Isn't Nancy Grace on MSNBC?
By all that's holy, I cannot stand that woman!
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No; in her house at CNN, dead Nancy Grace waits dreaming.
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When asked for comment on the Slashdot death-threat case, Mrs. Grace replied "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Nancy Grace CNN wgah'nagl fhtagn!"
Re:Can we close Fox News yet? (Score:4, Informative)
She's on CNN [cnn.com].
(My wife is unfortunately an addict of that damnable show).
Personally, I have zero respect for someone whose very paycheck apparently requires rhetorically feeding from the literal corpses of children, but that aside and to be fair, it wasn't just her, it was the whole damned channel's prime-time lineup: Dr. Drew, "Issues", and the rest of that particularly incestuous bucket of shows.
To be fair to Fox, they really didn't invest nearly as much time in the whole affair. I don't think MSNBC did all that much on it either, but in their case I don't know offhand. CNN on the other hand seemed like they should have named themselves the Casey News Network and been done with it. :/
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If you're singling out Fox News for that, you're nuts. Every single news outlet was doing exactly the same thing. It was disgusting.
Just because everyone else is doing it doesn't make it right.
I'm glad here in Oz I've got the ABC (public broadcaster) and SBS (hybrid public/private broadcaster) who have to maintain standards of impartiality as well as the BBC from the UK.
I'd hate to think what life would be like if the likes of Murdoch and Packer had a news monopoly.
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Re:Can we close Fox News yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing is without bias.
Yes, but honest news outfits do everything in their power to minimize their bias, rather than reveling in it like Fox and the other NewsCorp properties do.
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Yes, but honest news outfits do everything in their power to minimize their bias...
Replace the word "bias" with "drama" and I'd call you a damned liar. :)
That said, where is this honest news outfit on US television* these days? They all seem rather wrapped up in their own particular slants, each catering to a clearly definable ideology.
* (the Beeb I actually have some respect for in this aspect)
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That said, where is this honest news outfit on US television* these days? They all seem rather wrapped up in their own particular slants, each catering to a clearly definable ideology.
Not that I live in the US, but surely there's some respectability still left at the news divisions of the broadcast networks, NBC/ABC/CBS? Or are those marginalised too?
That said, I think you'd be hard-pressed to suggest that CNN is catering to a clearly definable ideology.
Re:Can we close Fox News yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
Bias is human and as long as humans are involved in some way, news will have bias.
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False equivalency bullshit, as usually from Fox apologists. There's a difference of scale. Fox, and right-wing pundits in generally, are far more likely to demagogue than their left-wing counterparts. These are the people who actively pushed the idea that the Democrats were trying to set up "death panels" to kill off the elderly. Find me something on Rachel Maddow that is even remotely on par with that.
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In the past, pretty much every government in the UK has complained that the BBC is anti-government, regardless of which party it was. What you do get is that on "Newsnight", Jeremy Paxman will grill anyone about anything. There's been some spectacular youtube moments over the years from that. Hmm.. from the UK version of the 'politics' page (we get a different layout to the internationa
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There is always going to be some bias, but at least good news sources are discreate or on slight in their bias. The problem with Fox it's not really bias, but whatever view point that will get the blood flowing. News is meant to be informational, not some action movie.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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"As for TFA? When you are hacking into and deleting a murder victim's voice mails, thus hindering an investigation, and bribing the cops for evidence? Then you've gone way past reporting the news into making it. Personally i hope that just because they close the doors won't stop the investigation and every single one who bribed or hacked gets a nice long jail term."
It's worse than that, the person in charge of The News of the World at the time this happened was Rebekah Brooks, she's now a director of News I
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On that subject, Murdoch's daily UK tabloid "The Sun" is also in the dock over almost exactly the same thing:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/sun-and-mirror-in-the-dock-over-coverage-of-joanna-yeates-murder-2307524.html [independent.co.uk]
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I think she did it. I respect the jurors and their conclusion that there was not sufficient proof.
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Of course not! Due process is a laugh, the court of public opinion is the only thing that matters anymore.
And for the life of me, even I can't tell if that's supposed to be sarcastic or not. Makes me a sad monkey.
shell game...? (Score:4, Insightful)
so they close down one tabloid and move all the employees to another?
Hugh Grant knows the score (Score:2)
I'm not sure why exactly they're quoting him (as opposed to any other famous Brit), but the BBC reports actor Hugh Grant saying "I think this is a cynical management manoeuvre".
Bingo.
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Secondly, saying "they more or less got away with [it]" is a little disingenuous. Firstly, it's not over. Secondly, there's been an ongoing investigation into the phone-hacking charges and these things take time. Now, barring a criminal conviction, you're right, I suspect
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Re:shell game...? (Score:5, Insightful)
so they close down one tabloid and move all the employees to another?
No, it's cleverer than that. The close a Sunday tabloid and move a small number of staff to the daily stablemate, just enough additional hands for it to operate effectively over seven days rather than six. The rest are fired, giving massive savings. The News Corp accountants are now punching the air, and the senior management making wry jokes about silver linings.
Hell, that may have been a long-term plan for a while. The scandal had just given them an excuse to bring the plans forward.
Re:shell game...? (Score:4, Informative)
From the FT story
The second obstacle is that Mr Murdoch and Ms Wade had made known their plan to cut costs and overlap by bringing the News of the World close into line with The Sun as a seven-day operation. It seems likely that News International will resurrect the Sunday title as The Sun on Sunday.
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Sorry.
Re:shell game...? (Score:5, Interesting)
As an aside, The Guardian has a rather interesting piece [guardian.co.uk] on the use of private investigators by UK media from back in 2007 when things first kicked off. The NoTW only came in fifth behind those other stalwarts of quality UK journalism; The People, The Daily Mirror, The Mail on Sunday and, the run-away leader, The Daily Mail.
Re:shell game...? (Score:5, Interesting)
Rebekah Brooks, née Wade, who was in charge at the time is already chief exec of News International. The current rumour mill is that the NOTW staff are being sacrificed in order to keep her safe. As to why Murdoch would go to such lengths to protect her, the thinking is that if she went then James Murdoch would also have to go. James Murdoch has admitted to paying settlements to silence people involved in the hacking affair; he claims that the information given to him at the time was incomplete and he didn't know the full extent.
Just so everyone is clear what's going on here, Members of Parliament have started talking openly about how they've been threatened by News International. A murder investigation into a private detective where the prime suspects were two other PIs with close ties to News International was interfered with by the NOTW. The former deputy features editor of the NOTW has openly admitted to bribing police to the tune of £5-10,000 for stories - something he doesn't believe should be illegal. Rebekah Brooks accidentally admitted to Parliament a few years ago that they regularly paid the police for stories, although in a clarification 6 months later that claim was retracted.
There's always been rumours around how Murdoch runs his empire, but now it's being blown wide open. News International runs more like a criminal conspiracy than a legitimate media organisation; they're basically gangsters.
Re:shell game...? (Score:4, Interesting)
Closing down NOTW is being done for no more reason than to keep Murdoch's purchase of the remaining 60% of BSkyB on track. The government has announced a delay, and with David Cameron's close associations to key players (including Andy Coulson who was tossed from Downing Street in shame and now faces arrest), there is a push among many Tories and close supporters in papers like the Daily Telegraph to basically toss News Corp out of Britain. The general sentiment is that Murdoch has had an unholy influence on British politics and it's time for it to go.
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Closing the NOTW also means they have a superficially legitimate reason to start destroying documents. The police really need to get in there now and start seizing paperwork.
It makes you wonder why the police have essentially given Coulson 24hrs notice that they're going to arrest him. It makes one wonder if they're giving him a fighting chance to get rid of much stuff as possible in exchange for not revealing the names of officers he could count on to bribe.
I'm not normally one for conspiracy theories but
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Considering that police have been implicated in taking money for scoops and in basically burying the evidence of illegal hacking, your conspiracy theory may not be far off.
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It was reported on Channel 4 News last night that a senior News International figure had tried to get their data centre in India to delete documents. The call was logged as suspicious and the request was denied, but it does seem like NI are trying to cover their tracks.
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Can we please get a +1 "knows how to use a semicolon correctly"mod option?
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Brooks is in a difficult position.
(1) If she didn't know about the phone hacking, then she was printing stuff in her paper without knowing the sources, and she was incompetent. (Didn't Ben Bradley, the editor of the Washington Post, know the identity of Deep Throat?)
(2) If she did know about the phone hacking then she was committing a crime.
I hope she'll be testifying under oath soon. Wonder what she'll say.
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Actually, the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act allows for neglect on the part of directors of a body corporate to be just as guilty as connivance or consent. The fact is that the directors of News International should, from the information released, have known about what was going on when it was happening and if they didn't, were neglectful and still guilty. The RIP act is clearly designed to catch and prosecute all unauthorised wiretaps of this form.
Here's an excellent analysis: http://www.independen [independent.co.uk]
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Nixon only kept his job long enough to resign when he was about to be impeached. Time for you to watch All the President's Men again.
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I believe the GP was posting an alternative scenario to compare with the current situation, not a description of what actually happened after Watergate. He is saying that the current situation is as though Nixon fired the innocent members of the secret service and somehow saved himself and the plumbers.
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You should read your history. Nixon was playing the shell game super-big time. Listen to his speech where he announces the resignations of Haldeman and Ehrlichman--it is a classic.
And your "President's Men" tip is BS. The movie ends before the DRAWN-OUT Nixon endgame played out. If you were alive then, you remember how long it to get that vile crook out of office.
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I was alive then, and I remember. And the movie is faithful to the facts, albeit compressed into a filmable timeline and without the latter stages more than mentioned at the end.
Nixon was on a pole the moment he started inveigling himself in the coverup, and came down the moment they got the axes out.
And he did fire a number of underlings to keep from having to admit his involvement.
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Really? I'd heard it was two days ago. Sure it was word of mouth, but still more reliable than anything that was ever in that squalid little rag.
Seems that Inquisitus [slashdot.org] beat me to it.
It's just a re-branding (Score:3)
not a closure
the brand got torpedoed (in terms of goodwill)
so keep calm and carry on under a new name.
There's nothing new under the Sun.
Aaaaand... (Score:4, Informative)
sunday.co.uk (Score:3)
Why bother making people type another 8 characters when News International already own sunday.co.uk, which currently redirects to
the News of the World anyway.
And Nothing Of Value Was Lost (Score:2)
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Re:And Nothing Of Value Was Lost (Score:5, Insightful)
As a brand new organization, the new tabloid won't be tainted with the bad name of the old one. Nor, presumably, will it be subject to their lawsuits.
The fact that it'll be the exact same people doing the exact same thing is mostly meaningless from a business standpoint.
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All that counts is that NewsCorp can still gain control of Britain's satellite TV services. David Cameron and the other little servants of Rupert the Vile have their marching orders.
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I for one cheered when I heard this. A horrid, awful, sensationalist piece of crap 'news'paper. Excellent! Good riddance to bad rubbish!
Most news papers are to some degree or other, this one was just more than most. But also one of the largest news papers in the world. http://www.newspapers24.com/largest-newspapers.html [newspapers24.com]
Nothing but PR (Score:3, Interesting)
This is the press equivalent of amputating a gangrenous limb to try and stop the spread of the infection, without even acknowledging that the rest of the body is already riddled with disease...
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Not even close. Most of the editors, journalists, and other staff will either be moved to other Murdoch publications, or else will have a six month sabbatical while the launch of "News Of The World 2: Paper without Honour or Humility" is carefully prepared.
This process is actually best compared to cutting out a festering tumour, and them transplanting pieces of it back into the rest of the body.
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It's more like removing the festering tumor, lifting it a half inch above the body, then dropping back in.
Not just a schoolgirl (Score:2)
Re:Not just a schoolgirl (Score:5, Informative)
Small beer (Score:2)
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Voicemail Hack Scandal Leads To Closure of UK Tabl (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Voicemail Hack Scandal Leads To Closure of UK T (Score:4, Informative)
Hugh Grant just called the Murdoch Empire a protection racket live on Question Time.
Strangely enough Hugh Grant, someone I previously disliked for his films has actually shown considerable stones in this whole debacle.
Re:Voicemail Hack Scandal Leads To Closure of UK T (Score:4, Interesting)
He has the advantage that we already know his private life isn't whiter than white and has in any case semi-retired from acting. There isn't much you could really threaten him with.
Re:Voicemail Hack Scandal Leads To Closure of UK T (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah. That does sound rather funny:
call to Hugh: We will threaten you with exposing your private life if you reveal anything on us.
-some muttering can be heard in background-
Call to Hugh: sorry, seems like we already did that. Is there anything else you would like us to threaten you with?
Hugh: not really
-more muttering in background-
Call to Hugh: turns out you are retired and we kinda draw the line at death threats at the moment (new company policy and all), and we're pretty much fucked anyhow. Continue as you were.
News of the Screws (Score:4, Interesting)
oh well (Score:2)
Coincidentally, he just announced he is soon launching a brand new paper: Wews of the Norld. Appearances are everything.
Phone Hacking? (Score:5, Funny)
I must say that I'm quite surprised that no-one technically minded has yet managed to raid Mr Murdoch and Mrs Brooks voicemails and publish them on YouTube. I'm sure there must have been some juicy irate messages left and would be a most apt thing to do.
Hang on, didn't them crafty LulzSec buggers have a request-line...?! Anyone got the number?
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The way it should be (Score:2)
A company commits a crime, they should be gone, and anyone directly responsible have their professional reputation smeared for life.
No different than if a person commits a crime, the go to jail.
It's not what you think it is (Score:2)
What we are seeing instead of any sort of justice is a shrewd move by that evil old bastard Rupert who gets to clear his name by sacrificing a tiny piece of his huge media empire that barely brings in any money. He'll fill the gap with another part of Newscorp before any competition gets a chance to move in, and he'll do it with less staff than News of the World had.
Hopefully som
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It isn't, except for the influence of the people involved.
Actually, makes me wonder what has become of Conrad Black?
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I'm happy to report that the recalcitrant crook has been sent back to prison [canada.com]. I confess I particularly enjoyed the reports of the fragrant Barbara fainting in the court room. That Connie submitted his letters of reference written by fellow inmates was also a delightfully humbling detail.
Re:The way it should be (Score:5, Insightful)
The company isn't gone. This is the equivalent of The Coca Cola Company selling cans of Fanta Orange intentionally laced with arsenic, being caught out, and then agreeing to discontinue the brand "Fanta Orange" (but immediately announcing the launch of new "Sprite Orange"). Oh, and firing some factory workers who weren't even on the pay roll at the time of the arsenic-lacing for good measure.
Where are the charges? (Score:2)
This case perfectly showcases the difference between regular people and those at the top. Let's be honest, here is what would happen if some random Joe broke into that girl's voicemail and deleted messages:
The real issue (Score:3)
The real issue is not the lack of morals in the tabloid press... We've always known that they never had any.
No, the real issue is how easy it was for some low-life private investigator to 'hack' voicemails all over the place. Most systems appear to use just 4-digit PINs and have no limits to how many times you can try your luck, as well as no logs (or nobody looking at the logs), so it's not surprising it is possible, but why haven't anything been done?! - This have been going on for 5 years or more, as we know from the early scandals involving this newspaper, and thus despite public knowledge nothing has been done?
Now that's the real scandal!
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Brute forcing and social engineering all fall within the realm of hacking techniques. There's no reason this shouldn't count.
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Re:James Murdoch alleged to off broke the law (Score:4, Interesting)
He almost certainly broke the law. The regulation of investigatory powers act makes it an offence for a corporate body to engage in this kind of behaviour and holds directors personally responsible for connivance and neglect.
If James Murdoch let things happen on a nod and a wink he's guilty of connivance. Even if he didn't have that level of knowledge, failing to do a full internal investigation based on the allegations from five years ago is a clear sign of neglect.
How so? (Score:2)
If big corporations want hacking systems and circumventing security to be a crime for us then it ought to be a crime for them as well, regardless of how hard or easy it was to circumve
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Given what Kevin Mitnick was charged with, and he was pretty much using social engineering, surely they should be charged with the same?
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You mean the press is doing *investigative* journalism? Viva la revolucion!
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The broadsheets are fairly happy to attack other papers. Its the tabloids which generally avoid attacking each other.
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The Guardian, however, IS a great newspaper and online presence if a little left-leaning for me, but with Charlie Brooker and David
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Do you honestly believe they aren't? Murdoch is single handily responsible for the division of American society, and yes I believe he's doing it intentionally.
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You broke it, he bought it, and he's busy making as mu
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heya,
Lol, Elliot Carver was hinted at being a caricature on Rupert Murdoch...
Another one is the Teddy K. character from In Good Company:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Good_Company_(2004_film) [wikipedia.org]
Reputedly another caricature of Rupert Murdoch.
Don't worry, Murdoch isn't too well loved down under either.
Cheers,
Victor
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The Sunday Sun is a Newcastle Upon Tyne based newspaper that has nothing to do with The Sun or News International.
http://webwhois.nic.uk/cgi-bin/whois.cgi?query=sundaysun.co.uk
I agree that boycotting the Sun and the Sun on Sunday is a good idea though.