The current state
of technology available at high stake venues like the BCS National Championship
or the Olympics games can enhance and empower sports producers in their ability
to create a believable and dynamic narrative. Television sports journalists
using today’s contemporary audiovisual technology can produce multiple streams
of information, enabling each producer to construct, distribute, and exhibit a
cohesive and stimulating product for the sports audience. However, the cost of
this technologically advanced infrastructure is exorbitant and solely dependent
on symbiotic economic relationships with advertisers, corporate sponsors,
network executives, and governmental regulators. This synergistic relationship
can be viewed as tenuous since television might be able to survive without
sports, but professional and collegiate sports could not exist in their present
form without the revenues from televisual distribution (Bellamy, 120). But, in
fact, I’m not completely sure if network TV could survive without sports.
Football, for example, is the highest rated programming on TV. Additionally, without intense capital funding
of this creative environment, the sports spectacle, which is ever more
dependent on current technological advancements, would collapse in a tepid pool
of visual boredom in our commoditized society. It also may be assumed that both
entities, with their co-dependent relationship, may suffer an economic downturn
in revenue and popularity without constant textual reinforcement of the current
digital commoditized sports industrial complex.
There is nothing
accidental about this process. Sports
are about big money, and thus produce the mediated spectacle that is dependent
on technology, production, sponsors, government agencies, and distribution
outlets. Sut Jhally, professor of communication at the University of
Massachusetts Amherst, has represented it this way: “the mediated sport is the
outcome of a complex blend of technical, organizational, economic, cultural,
political, and social factors” (Jhally, 84).
A number of
factors came into play to accelerate the introduction of the sports/media
complex in the late 1950s and early 1960s. First, it was necessary for television
to be fully entrenched in American homes. By 1955, half of the U.S. homes had
at least one television set. After that tipping point, the technology began to
improve quickly for sports television and the first use of color television in
a national game was deployed by NBC for the 1955 “Subway Series” between the
Dodgers and the Yankees. The now-familiar sports replay was introduced in 1956
by the Ampex Corporation with the first videotape recorder that would allow 30
seconds of sports replays and the ability to do slow motion and video freeze
frames. In 1961, the Sports Broadcasting
Act was passed permitting professional sports teams in one league to negotiate
contracts with broadcasters. Finally, the networks and local television
stations began to purchase broadcast rights directly from the teams, and, in
turn, sold time to commercial advertisers (McChensney, 61). All of these
factors created a perfect storm of revenue streams for broadcasters and league
owners. This scenario created a textbook marketplace to attract the coveted
18-49-year-old male audience so companies like Gillette could sell razors to
them. Gillette signed a contract in 1960 worth $8.5 million for ABC Sports
(Sullivan, 132). Benjamin G. Radar, in his authoritative work, American
Sports, also sees two fundamental external forces that shaped the organized
sports growth in the post-1950s era: the rapid growth of new metropolises and
populations, especially in the Sunbelt, coupled with the new technological
marvels of television (Radar, 231).
Aggregating these
dynamics produced a capitalist environment that nourished the growth of the
sports/media complex. To attract new television spectators and meet the
ever-increasing requests from commercial sponsors, the television production teams
employed authoritative color and commentary announcers, upbeat music, multiple
cameras angles, slow motion playback, and electronic graphics to create a
television-mediated spectacle for the new and expanding sports audience. In
response to the new television coverage, the nouveau sports entrepreneurs, like
Branch Rickey and Walter O’Malley, altered the rules of the games by
introducing timeouts for television commercials and creating prolonged national
championship playoff games.
It appears that
sports coverage has been mediated from the very beginning of sports
broadcasting. Even as early as 1936, at the Berlin Olympics, Adolph Hitler and
Joseph Goebbels, Reich Minister of Propaganda, used the CCTV medium to enhance
the image of Aryan athletic superiority and Germany's sophisticated television
technology. The German Telephone
Organization placed 21 cameras at different Olympic venues and broadcasted
their signals to public television offices in Berlin. Twenty-eight viewing
rooms were set up, and 150,000 people are estimated to have seen the Olympics
in this manner. Under the direction of Germany’s television and telephones
companies, the ministries promised a cultural event of “unsuspected importance
to the progress of mankind” (Berlin, Olympics). Initially reluctant to host the
Games, the Nazi regime eventually saw television as a propaganda opportunity to
spread their political message to a wider audience (Short).
In the United
States, the modern-day Olympic telecasts were cast in the shadows of commodification
from its humble television genesis. For illustration, the Winter Olympics in
Squaw Valley, California, were essentially purchased by land developer,
Alexander Cushing, who outbid Innsbruck, Austria, St. Moritz, Switzerland, and
Chamonix, France with the help of California’s Governor Goodwin Knight and
then-president Dwight Eisenhower to win over the International Olympic
Committee. The entertainment and televisual spectacle of Squaw Valley
contributed to the mediazation by CBS, who paid $50,000 for the live broadcast
rights. The opening ceremonies broadcast live was orchestrated and produced by
Walt Disney, which featured the release of two thousand pigeons as a symbol of
peace, as the Olympic cauldron was set aflame.
CBS also benefited
by the IOC (International Olympic Committee) officials, who were unsure as to
whether a skier had missed a gate in the men's slalom, and asked CBS if they
could review a videotape of the race. This gave CBS the idea to invent the now
ubiquitous "instant replay” (Squaw Valley). CBS’s coverage set the tone of
future Olympics broadcasts by incorporating textual spectacle by Disney and
featuring commentary by esteemed news correspondences, Walter Cronkite and Bud
Palmer. Commercial sponsors included Renault Dauphine automobiles, which
boasted of getting 40 miles per gallon, which made driving fun again (Renault).
If we look at prior and current Olympic
coverage by NBC we can see how they have adapted the CBS model. NBC has
incorporated the ever-popular Today Show in their morning lineup, which has
featured Matt Lauer and Katie Couric. Tom Brokaw, NBC’s semi-retired news
anchor, regularly posts segments for the prime time show with Bob Costas; and
General Motors and Chevrolet have sponsored
“Chevy Moments” which highlight the greatest 30 NBC Olympic moments.
Initially, sports
television was constrained by its technology and limited to indoor events such
as wrestling, professional boxing, and roller derby. The multi-turreted lenses
of the broadcast black and white television cameras manufactured by RCA and GE
were not as nimble as today’s multi-focal length zoom lenses. These early
orthicon camera pick-up tubes required an astonishing amount of foot-candles
for the images to be visible on a small cathode ray television tube. The early
pioneers of television sports production also needed additional high wattage
lighting fixtures, and required an enormous amount of power to supply the
cameras and the large amounts of ancillary broadcast equipment. These technical
and aesthetic barriers also prevented the early pioneers of sports production
from branching out to outdoor events such as baseball or football. The camera
lenses were not able to pick up the movement of the fastball or scrimmages due
to awkward camera positions and the lack of the required light levels.
Despite these
limitations, broadcasters in sports television have always searched for new
technology to advance its spectacle. Slow motion video playback, innovative
audio reproduction, and sophisticated 3D graphics have provided cutting-edge
sports presentations since the first airing of ABC’s Wide World of Sports in
1961. The success of the Wide World of Sports was partially due to its
innovation in technology. Live satellite feeds from exotic locales; the introduction
of videotape playback, and multiple camera angles enhanced its image as a
technology leader in sports television.
Advanced
technology has helped illuminate and clarify the sports viewing experience by
precision processing of visual information. Multicore workstation technology
enhances the sports spectators’ experience by presenting the athletic dynamism
of sports competition, which is displayed on video monitor systems at 4,000
lines of resolution per second. This
type of visual experience is uniquely adapted to exploit sports acquisitions
with new technology and special effects that have been invented solely for the
broadcast sports industry.
There is no other
type of media that uses all the creative tools that television technology has
to offer on a daily basis, and to their fullest effect and benefit. Not only
are the images magnificent in high definition, but the overall benefit to the
production process of retrieving these high definition images can also be
outstanding, with the correct technology and established procedures for defined
and proven workflows. Imagery can be retrieved rapidly at its full resolution,
and presented and displayed in a number of creative and innovative ways.
Indeed, the
technical advancements in the televisual environment have been swift and
purposeful. Over a ten-year period, remarkable milestones have been achieved in
television production. During the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia,
NBC instituted the first all-digital editing and production environment, which
enhanced the visual and auditory quality of the sports images. However, this
digitized footage was not stored in a fashion that allowed content to be
searched and retrieved. This technical shortcoming became a significant hurdle
when late breaking events occurred in the fast paced environment of the
Olympics. Illustrating this, the closing ceremonies of the Summer Olympics in
Sydney Australia featured a RAAF F-111 military jet flyover that would
extinguish the Olympic flame and send the representation of the Olympic flame
to the next summer Olympics in Athens, Greece (F-111).
Unfortunately, the
live telecast director missed the dramatic flyover that needed to be included
in the final presentation. However, the
eight-hour time difference between the United States and Australia allowed
significant time for the dramatic sequence to be re-edited for final
distribution. Subsequently, the footage of the flyover was recorded on digital
videotape, but unfortunately misplaced. Without any metadata attached to the
physical tape, a manual and frantic search began for the physical tape and its
sequence. Tapes had to be searched manually, with precious minutes ticking
away, by fast forwarding and rewinding each tape for the specific camera angle
which captured the flyover; a time consuming process. Eventually, the tape was
found, and the dramatic sequence was inserted minutes before the United States
broadcast. Sadly, hours were wasted fast-forwarding and rewinding videotapes in
real time. As each moment passed, the producer and executive producer for the
closing ceremonies could have concentrated on other tasks. They strategized how
to textualize this important event without the flyover footage, instead of
concentrating on other creative avenues for the closing ceremonies.
From this example,
it's evident how workflow and database management can radically change the
outcome of a live event. When the Olympic luge trials begin in the upcoming
winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, NBC producers will keep in mind the tragic
event, which occurred in Vancouver in 2010 when the Georgian luger, Nodar David
Kumaritashvili, was killed in a training run. If a tragedy does occur,
production personnel can retrieve, edit, and display footage from the tragic
event in Vancouver in a matter of moments by entering a few keywords, i.e.,
Georgian luger, or the name Nodar David Kumaritashvili. In some respects, with
this ability for speed and accuracy, the televisual spectacle does not need a
detailed script. Indeed, the sports television presentations can be shaped and
re-reshaped in a short time using end-to-end file-based workflows systems, thus
creating a new textual reality with new emerging technical synergy.
Electronic tools
of the trade have reinforced and stirred the visual spectacle of sports
production. Intertwined in this high definition mesh are multi-branded
commercial sponsors playing a major economic role in sports presentation. Fall
weekends are saturated with college football games; some 78 games are
broadcast, cablecast, and streamed on 21 distribution outlets. Branded segments
and highlight packages are embedded in each game with the latest television
production techniques, which can camouflage commercial sponsorships as
well-crafted sports trailers. An example of this is a recent ABC/ESPN college
football telecast which attracted up to eight million viewers (Nielsen).
Commercial sponsors were introduced with flair, creativity, and authority,
adding to the collegiate visual spectacle. The Capital One Half Time Report was
introduced in bold 3D alphanumeric fashion with additional sound effects, which
emphasized the authority, grandeur, and financial stability that sustains the
sporting institution. “Windows presents ESPN's Saturday Night Football,"
closely knits the synergy of technology and institutions of higher learning
with the mobile communication devices manufactured by Microsoft Corporation.
The Pacific Life Game Summary adds further ammunition with the patriarchal
order of college investment and financial freedom for baby boomers. Each
presentation is crafted to blend perfectly with the sports aura, shaped with
fanfare music and glistening panoramas of college stadiums filled with
energetic fans who serve as the dramatic background for these commercial
entities.
Everything is
branded: the playing field and the 1920 x 1080 televisual screen crammed with
logos of ABC/ ESPN, USC, Fighting Trojans, and PAC 12. Superimposed images keep
track of the number of downs and yardage made, with a coliseum filled with
fans, dressed in a sea of red, cheering with painted faces and bodies,
intertwined with pop-culture musical rhythms as part of the largest
money-making machine for colleges and universities. The monetization continues
throughout the allotted two-and-a-half hours of the sports spectacle
continuously so as not to miss any opportunities to bring audiences closer and
invoke more personal feeling for these events.
As the robotic
aerial camera sweeps across the stadium high above the crowd, Sportsvision
graphics display the 1st and goal markers, the commentator draws circles around
the offending player on the Telestrator, five synchronized video playback
devices displaying the angles chosen to be aired, and color and commentary
announcers add to the drama with enthusiasm while using descriptive military
euphemisms which add spectacle and significance to the replayed event. The
spectacle created by today’s television technology in college football can be
repeated for the television audience with the replay. For example, after an
exciting interception, Hail Mary pass, or offensive return kickoff, the
commentators and production crew delve into their discursive mode and visually
retell the story of celebration or defeat. The replay articulates the past
event. This original occurrence, which was not scripted, represents a reality
program. In fact, broadcast sports are the original reality television program.
Few others broadcast genres amplify real-world events while bringing audiences
so intimately close to live action, and none does so with the regularity of
televised sports (Sullivan, 131). The replay is the cornerstone of the
sports-mediated spectacle. Editorial decisions can be made at a more selective
pace, which enables the production staff to tell a story rather than just show
one. This is the moment when the spectacle shines with technology and
personnel. Vision mixers, slow-motion devices, and multiple camera angles
re-tell the play, one frame at a time. Each replay can describe a different
narrative, with emphasis on offense or defense. The mediated replayed event can
also cause controversy, disagreeing with official rulings or play-calling
decisions.
Fox Sports, for instance, uses technology in a
somewhat subversive manner to supplement, enhance, and editorialize the sports
spectacle. Watching Fox Sports, a viewer is not able to tell when a “replay”
occurs. Usually, when a replay occurs in a sports presentation, the television
audience is aware that the action has taken place and that they are watching an
event which is being repeated, branded by a lower third or upper left corner of
the screen that identifies it as a replay. At Fox Sports, the production staff
purposely interjects the event that has just occurred and displays it as if it
was in “real time” so the viewer cannot distinguish real-time or live events
from events that are being replayed.
This could be
understood as controlling and manipulative to the television audience, without
regard to the viewer’s sense of reality in the context of the sports
presentation. This would not be possible without the advancement and
participation of four interested factions: broadcasters, league owners,
commercial sponsors, and equipment manufacturers. These symbiotic relationships
have increased the value of sports presentations since the first sports
broadcast in 1939 (First).
Synergy has
brought the spectacle to the sports industrial complex, as it is currently
represented in much-mediated events such as the Super Bowl. This premier event,
with its extravagant camera angles, dissolving pictures of players, flags,
fireworks, and the music of the “Star Spangled Banner”, symbolizes extreme
commodification. The spectacle has also influenced what Olympics events are to
be represented. In 2013, the Olympic Committee reinstated wrestling after the
rules of wrestling were amended to make matches more dynamic, rewarding
wrestlers who are more aggressive and punishing those who remain passive
(Longman). The spectacle is so sought-after that broadcasters seem willing to
pay any price to be part of the sports exhibition. NBC has won the rights to
four Olympic games through 2020, in a deal valued at nearly $4.4 billion
(Vascellaro).
The sports
spectacle can be planned and implemented, but its message may not be
predictable or easily controlled. Commodification of the sports message is
changing through audience power. Traditional avenues of measurement such as
ratings and polls are trustworthy mechanisms for commercial sponsors and
advertisers; but networks need greater media attention and exposure for their
financial supporters, future opportunities, and brand presence. Through interactive
media, chat boards and social networks, individuals guide and create their own
agendas and scenarios, which influence the sports-industrial complex. This new
force took some by surprise. For instance, Dick Ebersol, chairman of the NBC
Olympics, banned any social networking at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens,
Greece. Individuals who worked at the games as contractors or employees were
not allowed to create their own blogs or websites; pictures and blogs were all
strictly forbidden. All information out of Athens was to come from one source,
NBC Olympics.
A change occurred
by the winter of 2006. US athletes were given flip cameras by NBC and
encouraged to record everything they could, and post their material as soon as
possible for NBC in Torino, Italy. Ebersol knew NBC was maxing out interest
with their television audience and needed to expand their wireless and Internet
components; and Ebersol also believed he needed to be live for more than half
of the future Olympics, which was counter to his previous position in
re-creating the Roone Arledge’s approach of tape-delay by showing major Olympic
sports to get the highest ratings in primetime, which was the subject of some
of the most vocal criticism of Dick Edersol’s career as president of NBC
Olympics.
Large spectacles
in sports are also dependent on the synergy of technology, cultural
aspirations, sponsors and broadcasters as well. Opening ceremonies for the
Olympics are strategically and creatively planned for years in advance and are
one of the most lavish sports events in the world. Performers, athletes,
dignitaries, politicians, musicians, actors, and royalty all have been on
display during this grand exercise of television excessiveness.
The 1984 Summer
Olympics in Los Angeles is no exception. Bill Suitor, by means of a Bell Aero
rocket pack system, circled the middle of the Los Angeles Coliseum during the
opening ceremonies. John Williams, the celebrated composer of cinema, was
commissioned to write a new Olympic theme based on Leo Arnaud’s “Bugler's
Dream", which was introduced in the 1968 Olympic Games in Grenoble, and
Gina Hemphill of Chicago, granddaughter of Jesse Owens, and William Thorpe Jr.
of Texas, grandson of Jim Thorpe, carried the Olympic flag into the Los Angeles
Coliseum (Los Angeles). The representations of these three events exemplify the
City of Los Angeles in elation and celebration. The rocket pack system
demonstrates the maturing aerospace industry in Southern California, John
Williams’ “Olympic Fanfare and Theme” celebrate the genius of Hollywood’s film
industry, and relatives of Jesse Owens and Jim Thorpe commemorate the injustice
of American athletes. Los Angeles tried to shed its often-perceived
identification as a culturally-isolating city, with cloverleaf freeways and
concrete riverbeds, which separate the elite west-side population with its
inner city populace. This futuristic spectacle, which characterizes a utopian
Disneyland society of advanced technology, racial harmony, and cultural
openness seemingly summarizes the hopes of the Olympic planners in Los Angeles.
The television
spectator, alongside today’s current technology, is engulfed with a visual
manifestation, which can create an illusion of reality. Television’s 1125-lines
of resolutions and 5.1 audio can create a third dimension, placing the viewer
somewhere between the foreground and the background, sandwiched in the diegetic
digital domain of visual space. The Summer Olympics in Beijing may have
accomplished this goal. The human technology on display in 2008 reached a new
high-water mark in visual spectacle. Literally, with thousands of performers
and millions of dollars committed to this international event, an estimated 842
million viewers in China were able to view this auspicious night on 8-8-2008.
Beijing was the first all-digital Olympics, enabling the viewer to experience
the spectacle free on the Internet, either live or on-demand. Also, Beijing was
the first fully high-definition Olympics, competing technically as the most
advanced media spectacle of the 21st Century. The technical spectacle only
enhanced the pageantry, drama, and industrialism of this monumental exhibition.
With potential
four billion viewers worldwide, Beijing built an impressive Olympic park, which
included the Bird’s Nest (Beijing’s National Stadium) where Usain Bolt
masterfully set the world records for the 100m, 200m and 4x100m track and field
races and earned three gold medals doing so. Moreover, the Water Cube (Beijing
National Aquatics Center), with its honeycomb blue design, accentuated the
grandeur and tremendous scale of the Olympic park with its translucent blue
glow. There, Michael Phelps collected eight gold medals and surpassed Mark
Spitz's 36-year old aquatic record. It does appear, for all the success of the
event, the Chinese Olympic Committee may have crossed the ethical line in
search of the perfect media spectacle. Accusations of computer-generated
fireworks superimposed over Tiananmen Square resulted in a squabble over
Chinese artistic choices as “Cinematic Devices” intended to present a perfect
spectacle. Also, during a rehearsal of the opening ceremonies, a member of
China’s Politburo asked for a change to the seven-year-old singer Yang Peiyi,
who sang 'Ode to the Motherland'; the official felt Peiyi was not cute enough
and ordered another girl to lip-sync 'Ode to the Motherland’. At the end of the
day, the Politburo picked the best voice and the best performer, without any
apology (Chinese).
Indeed, the
Chinese Olympic Committee successfully presented a perfectly controlled and
well-orchestrated Olympics. The spectacle, pomp, and pageantry were all
tightly-controlled by the Chinese government; you could see it on the faces of
the guards who stood rigid for eight hours protecting the entrances to the
Birds Nest, and the construction workers who lived in shanties that surrounded
the Olympic Park during this celebrated media event. The media and sponsors
celebrated the number of commercials sold during the summer Olympics, and the
Beijing Olympic Committee demonstrated how China could show the world how much
it had emerged as an economic power (Riley), but the media could not hide the
orchestrated and forced responses of the muted Chinese people who have been
burdened by this repressive regime. The spontaneity surrounding this event was
all but extinguished.
Each Olympic event is unique for its
impression and representativeness. The 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City
was under the shadow of the 9/11 attacks in New York City, which resulted in
increased security and military presences, essentially changing the tenor of
all Olympic events that follow. In 2004, the government of Greece, at the
Summer Olympics in Athens, was under enormous pressure to succeed financially
with raising costs, which included major infrastructure and security projects
that essentially crippled the country economically for a number of years after
this prestigious event (Rose). In the 2000 reconciliation, race relations and
nationalism summarized the goals of the Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia.
The atmosphere of the Olympic spirit in Sydney was jubilant for journalists and
athletes the pre-9/11 days. Security was present but somewhat lax for SOCOG
(Sydney Organizing Committee for the Olympics). Athletes’ portraits were draped
on sides of multistory buildings, and Sydney Harbor celebrated with magnificent
fireworks displays every evening from Sydney’s Harbor Bridge, as it was adorned
with the symbol of the Olympic, the multi-colored five Olympic rings. Foreign
journalists could not ignore the sensationalism and excitement that wrapped
Sydney in this new millennium. In this new century, Australia was concluding
work on a 10-year reconciliation plan between indigenous and non-indigenous
people, which concluded during the Summer Olympics.
Australia’s
premier track-and-field athlete, Cathy Freeman, from Aboriginal and Chinese
ancestry, represented the indigenous athletes and served as a reconciliation
symbol and bridge to healing for race relations in Australia. Although some
academics and journalist believed Freeman was a pawn of the sports industrial
complex and was complicit with Nike as in their advertising campaign, “Change
the world 400 meters at a time” (McGuire 20), the semiotics of Freeman at
Sydney’s Opening Ceremonies were unique and original. The pageantry of
Freeman’s body surrounded by water and fire as she lit the Olympic cauldron was
mystical as well as dramatic. The television cameras with contrasting images of
fire and water emphasized Freeman’s solitary accentuated figure. Freeman, alone
in her representation of her indigenous ancestors, was hard to miss, with the
solo act of water extinguishing the fire of racial hatred in the territories of
Oceana. Although Freemans’s opening ceremony and solo performance was
predictable and orchestrated, Freeman’s own reality program in the 400-meter
race was about to begin. When Freeman entered the stadium in Sydney’s Olympic
Park to compete in the 400-meter race, an electrical charge raced through the
100,000 spectators. When the 400-meter race began, thousands of camera flashes
illuminated the stadium as the eight runners began to circle the Olympic
Stadium. A visceral reaction rippled through the crowd when Freeman began to
falter in her quest for the gold medal. Visually, it was a dramatic moment when
Freeman began to fade in the pack. As the crowd began to feel the Olympic
spectacle drain out of the race for Freeman, the unexpected happened; Freeman
rebounded and kicked and sprinted to win the gold medal. Afterward, in dramatic
fashion, Freeman collapsed in a pool of celebration and anguish. It was a
momentous occasion, which symbolized the individual spirit of a dominant
society, trying to shape a newfound social-political system.
The sports
spectacle can be planned but may not be predictable. The dominant culture can
chart and exercise boundaries to shape the exhibition to its desired political
agenda. In addition, current technology can aid in the production and
distribution of commoditized sports products. Individuals, as well as
corporations, can now influence the spectacle by digital confluence. By all
assessments, the conversation concerning sports is gossip, but chat boards,
twitter, and social events are sustained by ever expanding branding by
commercial sponsors who capitalize on the growing market for sports products in
college, amateur, and professional televisual venues. The relationships of each
member in the sports industrial complex are solely dependent on one another.
Broadcasters, sponsors, government agencies, and the academic sports community
are based on the principles of dependent variables of associations that have
been beneficial in a number of ways. Currently, for example, the NFL generates
nine billion dollars a year according to Forbes magazine; the NFL remains the
most lucrative league in the world (Burke). Without the glitz and glamour of
television or the web of commercialism, football would probably return to its
humble beginnings as a sport which people enjoy playing rather than watching.
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