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Thursday, November 02 05:43 PM |
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Adam Kidron and Urban Bust Office: The Den Redux
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Urban Box Office is dead. All the promise that was held in the dream of the urban entertainment on the net will survive, just not with UBO. At the end, an unwillingness of Adam Kidron to step down from the CEO position cost UBO a desperately needed round of funding. Currently all the stores are closed on the UBO network, not that they were selling anything anyway. How did this company get into such dire straights as to need $1+ million dollars a week and have no cash reserves to continue operations?
While seeking a rounds of funding from potential investors for a fourth round that Joel Dreyfuss, so elegantly bragged about in his attempt to bully the media in Salon with a crybaby piece that served as a rebuttal to a article written by a previous employee. Mr. Dreyfuss remarked that, "It's a unique strategy and our investors have shown their confidence in the ultimate fashion." Yes Joel, they did. Ordinarily, people don't lament about their company's mistakes and shortcomings only to turn around and brag about how much money investors are giving them. Especially before anything is signed.
William Goins attempted an 11th hour coup d'état to replace Adam Kidron but it was too late. UBO's high burn rate and under whelming content platforms proved unpalatable for investors. After a year and a half of operation UBO has made approximately $150,000 dollars in revenue against nearly $50 million in spending.
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damn!!!!!!!!! |
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he looks like a blowfish. |
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SAVE DAVID WATKINS & UBO
Wednesday NOV 22, 2000
CIPRIANI
55 WALL STREET
7 p.m. - 3 a.m.
open bar sponsored by GODIVA.
catering by SYLVIA'S
makeup by MAC
This event is by invatation only and non transferable. Invitation must be presented at the door to gain entry.
No invite. No entry. No Shade.
THERE WILL BE NO GUEST LIST AT THE DOOR. |
I have a dream... I have seen the day... I have seen the day, when corporate soponsors and English wanne be reggae singers can hold hands... and together... drive the urban inter-net market into the grave.
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
*sniff* If MLK had only lived to see this day... *sniff*
I have a dream!
That one day urban websites will be community based... with brothers and sisters, Black and White... Jew and gentile... Asian, Latino and other... writing code for pages that have robust content and products available for sale that the urban heads can actually use...
yes...
I have a DREAM today!
No longer will we be treated to the pride and prejudice of long ass, useless flash animations and "fan sites" for athletes and other poeple that no one really gives a flying fuck about.
I have SEEN the mountain top... and it looks down on the graveyard in Silicon Alley where the tombstone of a once promising giant looms and collects the dust of time...
it reads...
R.I.P
U.B.O
Welcome back to the real world... makes you wonder sometime "Why couldn't I have taken the BLUE pill???"
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Well, everything that was predicted came to pass. UBO is dying just like former employees we dissed all said it would. If we would have been more interested in creating content and less in trying to be Head Dick Blower In Charge, maybe the company could have been saved. But everyone wanted to be the big shot so now you all have nothing. And I'm glad. You can't make money without doing some work. Even drug dealers have to work for theirs. Why should UBO be any different? I already have all of my stuff packed and I'm happy to be getting out of this asylum. I will miss some of my coworkers but others from record companies and magazines can go back being the unemployed has beens with no credibility that they were before their friends brought them in. |
To be honest before you magazine motherfuckers came in I was doing well. I had about eighteen channels and a huge staff. I was going to make my site a success. But then we had people team up with Sheryl Huggins and everything went to shit. I was told to fire people. I was told to redesign my sites because of Corey. My one shot at success was ruined. Because of all of you I have nothing. I hope none of you bitches finds jobs! |
This isn't fair! Sheryl you fucking bitch I will make sure you will never work again in online. I will also tell my friends at magazines about how you are a lowdown backstabbing Uncle Tom bitch who fucked up the entire company and Indieplanet. We tried to be nice to you and you stabbed us all in the back. You ruined everything just like you did with Shade. But since your daddy left you millions when he died you are not even worried about UBO closing down. But now everyone will see that you are the reason UBO failed. You and James Andrews and David Watkins and Adam Kidron. Adam, you should have stepped down. Why did we have all those meetings for? Your ego also fucked it all up. I feel bad for how I betrayed George. I should have never listened to any of you. But I did and Indieplanet became just another bullshit site. Fuck You All, UBO. I'm sorry to say that but fuck it. |
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Damn that I have a dream speech was funny!
Arzie, all UBO done for you was gave you the opportunity to now move into bigger and better places...you probably won't realize this until you cash that first phat check at your next gig..believe me, I been there....
one loser site down, now ue can get started doing real homework on these other so-called urban portals or they have to write about themselves soon...
I also understand it takes a right balance of business acumen, technology and multimedia design interface to be successful with an Internet operation, if I didn't I'll be talking out my ass.....
But I think saying the interior designer is more important than the architect is a bit far... |
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And also I remember that rebuttal article they wrote in Salon bragging about UBO....lesson of the day: when your management start to smell like BS, it's time to start looking.. |
I have a dream, that one day ms. hampton will write a decent story that doesn't include sleeping with a rapper.
I have a dream that one day on the gray housing developments of Detroit, the sons of former UBO executives and the sons of former UBO workforce will be able to sit down together at a table of Heavy D and have a big fucking sweaty dinner.
I have a dream that one day even the state of New York, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of lame articles written by dream hampton, will be transformed into an oasis of brilliant articles that inspire and make you laugh and grow as a person without sleeping with Kool Moe Dee.
I have a dream that my four children from various rappers will write for The Source.
I have a dream.. and her name is dream hampton. |
I never believed the hype about Dream. She came to UBO, ate all the food, and tried to pretend she was working on films. She is the Monica Lewinsky of UBO. She slept with Biggie and Tupac and writes about it. She also had everyone at Vibe insulting her because she turned in an R. Kelly story that didn't feature new information or more than one interview. Her day is over. She has no credibility whatsoever. What's sad is that one day her child, who was born with health problems because of he drug use, will be old enough to understand the truth about Dream being a very promiscuous groupie and a laughable writer who helped UBO close its doors. |
Sorry Dream but you should not have come on this site to insult us. |
look at all these roaches |
Hey u folks r all a bunch of losers. You take time out of your day and come to this board and bash companies. Folks get a life really, obviously ur all thrive off of negativity. So what UBO is dead, it was successful and the most popular site with in the urban culture! Let see how long Urban Expose lasts piece of SHIT site! Hope ur company folds too! It does'nt last long, and as soon as u guys crash i will be there to applaud! All of u are hopeless and do not know the truth about UBO! And to the ones who did work at UBO and took the time to post nothing but Shit! U r sour Fucks and I hope u don't get a check tomorrow! -------------------------------------------------
RAISES A HAND IN THE AIR AND EXPOSES THE MIDDLE FINGER AND SAYS "URBAN EXPOSE, NOT"! |
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Hey u folks r all a bunch of losers. You take time out of your day and come to this board and bash companies. Folks get a life really, obviously ur all thrive off of negativity. So what UBO is dead, it was successful and the most popular site with in the urban culture! Let see how long Urban Expose lasts piece of SHIT site! Hope ur company folds too! It does'nt last long, and as soon as u guys crash i will be there to applaud! All of u are hopeless and do not know the truth about UBO! And to the ones who did work at UBO and took the time to post nothing but Shit! U r sour Fucks and I hope u don't get a check tomorrow! -------------------------------------------------
RAISES A HAND IN THE AIR AND EXPOSES THE MIDDLE FINGER AND SAYS "URBAN EXPOSE, NOT"!
>>
This is a great example of why UBO failed.
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Sorry pitiful people! Again u take time to respond! Get a life! SATAN always find the time to do HARM! |
I'm glad to see UBO shut down. These losers got exactly what they deserve. They had real hitters on their team at one point but let the shook ones scare em off. I agree with the guy who said it was a half assed cult. The posts on this site are raw but the reality in the office was even worse. What's saddest is that some of the people at UBO who talked a lot of shit are gonna have to pay for that shit on the street now. Tables turn suckers burn and learn and now a few are going to be snuffed on sight. It will only get worse for you shit talking people at UBO who thought you were invincible. |
Wow... you wanna bring up the attribute of Ha Shatain huh???
Ahh-ight, as a Hebrew scholar and student of middle eastern religion, culture and theology I would like to give you a lesson.
The rest of the UE heads can pass this one by cuz it's going off topic...
The word Satan is based on the Hebrew Ha Shaitan which means "the adversary". In the Hebraic tradition, Ha Shatain is an attribute of the God head. Anytime the Most High tests you or puts an obstacle in your way it is said to be himworking through the attribute Ha Shaitan. Even in the mythical book of Job, Ha Shaitain is listed as a "bnai Elohim" that is to say "Son of God" or even "emanation of God" and is fully under the control of the most high. Believing anything else is spookism.
So, you wanna blame Shaitan for destroying UBO all you're saying is that it was done by the HAND OF GOD... and as for us here at UE... if we be your Ha Shatain then again all we are is the neck snappin' WORD and 'bitch slappin' HAND of the MOST HIGH GOD... and that dear UBOer is a compliment to us all if ever I heard one...
One Love
The Dreaded One |
if a internet company would market to internet users with sites that look better and have urban news updates like AKA.com. it also does not hurt to have ads in urban magazines such as source, xxl, and others. thats how i found about their sites in the first place. |
Wow.........I can't believe it! I mean...I can but I just didn't think that it would come this soon.
But I do want to share something with everyone. You see.......UBO failed like many other sites because of ego and not knowing how to really operate at business within a culture that I tries to cater to.
You see....that's the same shit that happened to 360.hiphop, except Russell got real smart and sun it off on BET. He came to realize that he didn't have the pull that was needed to make it happen. Even though he has peeps that were part of his former label including variuos artists, but he realized that it was much more deeper than that.
People get in the game and then think that they can regulate some shit by using the almighty dollar to run everything. But look what happened..............all those millions of dollars invested in UBO are straight gone and really their is nothing to show for.
Personally it's pretty sad, but when you think of it, this is how the powers of God work. God has allowed the internet to become a tool to allow anyone, especially those that never had nothing or even a pot to piss in to make a success story by creating a site that if done right could manifest millions if it uses creativity and a rational and intelligent marketing plan.
UBO wore the clothes, but in the long run, that is all it had and now it's gone. I really never saw anything of interests related to UBO, except SOHH which I was very concerned with when it became a property of UBO. I had strong feeling about it and wished that I could reach out and express my options for them to take, but I didn't know Felicia and Steve and didn't want to reach out to them simply because I didn't want to clown myself since they didn't know me and I didn't want to become the victim of a "who's this nigga" type situation.
Wow.....! This is a trip, but life goes on and I guess that AKA might be next since they were primarily being supported by UBO who purchased all their advertising inventory. This will be interesting when everything unfolds within the next week or so.
I do want to give props to UE for being a alternative voice of some sort that was able to crack open the real and express the realities. But for those that god dissed on this site, I must say that many of them really wanted to be seen as big shots and wannabe conglomerates of some sort....well.....you got your exposure, but not in the fashion that many of you may have expected. Theirs a price to pay when it comes to peeps wanting to be big shots....and the UE portal gave you just what you deserved..........feedback based on the real and on the truth about most of these cats and broads in the biz that think they're all that.
Practice what you preach and the truth will reveal. Keep it real with folks and maybe you will recieve the credit you deserve. Big ups to all the new sites and even the matured sites that seemed as if to have been in the background due to UBO although they may have been great sites such as Manhunt.com, SOHH.COM, hookt.com, hiphopsite.com, undergroundhiphop.com and even those new sites souvietunion.com and hiphopdirectory.com.
Those sites should be the ones to reap the rewards that UBO was trying to reach but never did because those are the real sites that are operated by real cats in the culture of hip-hop and it shows in their content and their direction. I am glad to see the dust has begun to settle...now we can move on.
My condolences go to the oringinal founder of UBO from what seems to have been a brotha with a good heart. It is always sad to see peeps ruin the legacy of a founder who has not voice because they are dead, that's fucked up.
I hope that the ones that kept it real with UBO recover and find jobs especially if they have children to feed. Keep it real and stay away from all the bling...bling wannabees and reamin humble.
Big ups to UE for all the insight and those that diss this site, must be the ones who are being spoken about that use alias names to diss UE. If you make your bed a certain way, eventually your gonna have to lay in it and that basically it.
Peace........
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yo Imageyenation - What the f*ck r u talkin' about - I myself am a Sammy Davis Jewnior and you r whack - take your chai and get to steppin |
I'M A NEW MEMBER JUST WONDERING WHERE THIS SITE IS GOING. SO FAR THESE PAST DISUSSIONS HAVE BEEN A WHOLE BUNCH OF NOTHING. |
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Im sorry to hear UBO is dead, like many of us who wish to see "urban"(damn i hate that word) site sucseed-but the signs were obovious from the middel of this year. I personally know several people that worked for the company and wish them the best in finding new positions-but I hope they decide to now deal with a company a one thats a little more solid in foundation.
Yeah,,,,its easy to get caught up in the hype and temporary glamour associated with these new "startups"..but I done been there and thru the music industry-which is essentially the same.........aint no love or loyatly or even commitment in certain industries.
The internet..as new as it is-is one of them.
Big up to those who saw the warning signs and bounced before shit got ugly..and I hope those who didnt?..learned a hell of a lot in the process..experince is a muthafucka..but it helps you grow.
For now...imma chill and rest easy knowing that the publishing/design biz aint goin nowhere.....if i want risk?...shit...then imma just freelance-knowin where my next dollar is gonna come from and that imma be on the guest list for that million dollar party that will and can be accounted for.. |
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...hmm..i wonder if Boo.com is hiring..? |
It's amazing how many of the UBO people still don't have a clue. They blame person X or Y, but don't see that no matter who did what the business model had a serious problem - it produced no profit. You can't run a biz without cash. |
I saw this coming when I first started working with this company back in June. This is what happens when you try to bring in a bunch of washed up ex-record label employees who don't have a clue about the tech sector. Hell, these are the same people who are still amazed by two-way pagers and think that AOL is a God-send. Puh-lease! Most of the people I encountered at UBO cannot even spell HTML, less alone know how to really market urban tageted websites strategically, in order to turn a profit. All I can say is, I hope this situation does not discourage the smaller-scaled webmaster out there who are designing sites that are trully focused on providing fresh content for the so-called "urban" demo and are trying to take their sites to the next level. Look at the big boys and learn. Keep doing what you do (i.e. Manhunt, EUR, etc) and remember, the bigger they are, the harder they try to "Ball"....uh, I mean "the harder they fall!" |
UBO has never been a leading urban site. Like 360HipHop.com, Hookt.com and other urban plays, it just had millions of dollars in financing and drew attention from the media. Indie sites are the future of the urban market. For instance, HOT 104.com has been run for $209.00 per month since 1999. It generates nearly 50 times that amount in revenue. Growth has been steady sine its launch in 1998 and it attracts nearly 100,000 unique visitors per month with no promotion or marketing. The company has a fifteen-year business plan that includes a print spin-off and the creation of an online radio station.
There are success stories in the urban internet arena. It's just a matter of looking past press releases and Silicon Alley. |
UBO=Dead
No kidding.
Lesson 1: You cannot burn a million a week and live.
Lesson 2: You cannot hire wack assed record executives and expect them to bring their quasicriminal methods to the web and succeed.
Lesson 3: You cannot bring the same hack writers now exiled by the Voice and Spin online and expect to have the same audience online.
Lesson 4:Hip-hop alone is not enough to keep a website up and running. You need a more expansive idea of the culture and a broader audience. Too many people fishing in the same small pond.
Lesson 5: This ain't the music industry, small, fast and lean wins the day. All that infrastructure, film deals and the rest is bullshit.
Lesson 6: The cult of George Jackson was just that. He didn't have any more of a clue on how to make the web work than anyone else . He may have been a good leader and he might have been able to get the company sold, but these problems were endemic. The fact that it fell apart after his death should have been a clue that he didn't have the right subordinates.
Lesson 7: Too many employees more interested in acting the fool and playing around like they were still in the record industry. They looked dumb as shit in the online context. Hating? Are you out of your fucking mind? This is business, not for children like you.
Oh yeah, Netslaves is running a column on not killing your boss. Take the time to read it. |
Arzie Hardin :
You are an idiot. You need to see what a sinking ship is. See Black people didn't stay on the Titanic falling in love and thinking that they where Kinng of the World. No the Black people got the fuck off the sinking ship and was chillin.
If UBO was spending 1 million a week on NOTHING then what do you expect. UBO hired that over payed Party Planner David Watkins because he was giving up that Pootang to anyone who wanted.
Then thye pay Marion Jones 1 Million for a site that used nothing but content feeds?
What was UBO thinking?
If UBO where smart they would have become a design house and acquired business by having people pay them to develop orgainal content. They should ahve been building software that can be used on the web. They should have been keeping records, and doing research on Black Internet habits on the web. They should have been trying to team up with DME and get computer in The First Generation Urban Homes. If you don't have a computer who is going to see your content? They should ahve been like Marc Ecko and sticking the whole universe with the UBO logo.
Building Brand awarness. They should have NOT been having so many Parties. They should have started a urban content aggrigation company. They should have started a in-house consulting firm and hired their TALENTED staff out to other companies.
What happens when TALENTED people get bored. They CHANGE JOBS. All the HeadHunters are waiting for the REAL TALENTS of UBO to come to them. I should have taken that recruiter job cause I would PIMP the hell out of UBO right now and be having PHAT commission checks.
So children...Sister Fate has arrived and Urban Blunder Office is no more.
SAD! |
Today UBO. Tomorrow Vanguarde NeoMedia. They both have had the same fucked up formula. Management teams consisting of ex-magazine and music industry cats that don't know shit about the internet. Pud gave me my 200 points for UBO being an urban hall of fame fuck. I wonder how much I'll get for Bo Kemp's same lame attempts.
BTW - Neither Satan nor God have anything to do with wack people running lame businesses that fail. They both have better things to work on - like the battle between the Palestinians and Israelis in the Middle East; the fight between the Muslims and the Christians in Ivory Coast; or, whether or not you will vote for the Frat Boy or the Egg Head in the next presidential election. |
Uralla Bunchoflosers :
If you was a dude I tell you "SUCK MY DICK!" You ain't shit stop actin like a Bitch.
Get OVER it. Your just mad cause UE is probably the MOST popular urban site other then Blackplanet.com. We come here for the DRAMA and if you can't HANG
I got 2 word for ya...
SUCK IT! |
We the PEOPLE of UE DEMAND that UE PUBLISH THE David Watkins Story TODAY! All those in favor POST a MESSAGE!
It's Time for David Watkins to go! |
Good news for the urban web sites that can survive the killing fields.
1.) Internet stocks are up. The market correction is almost complete and the hard times are almost over.
Financing will definately be available for "good" web sites with profits and respectable growth.
No more free rides for half-baked business plans.
2.) African-Americans still represent the largest untapped viewership for the Internet.
Computers are getting cheaper and broadband will become a reality for the masses in the next few years.
Just hold on, budget properly and be patient.
This thing is just getting interesting.
My picks for the "urban" web plays with the best chances to survive and flourish.
EURWeb
Manhunt.com
HOT 104.com
Blackplanet.com
Blackvoices.com
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Steve,
here is the my lessons:
1. The most important rule: Always keep relationships with recruiters and references (taking them out to eat, calling to see what's up) so you can bounce in a minute if you have too
2. Never work for a company/position that you cannot brag about for a future job position...
3. If you see favoritism and politics, get out immediately that is a sure sign that the company or department will not last long.
4. Get the stupid certification, the recruiter can usually up your starting salary up 20-30%....
5. Last but most important. If you leave the office the end of the day mad or with a grudge and feel unfulfilled...quit the job on the spot...and spend positive energy looking for something to make you happy..even if you have to live off peanut butter and macaroni&cheese |
For all the haters:
http://hatebot.com
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Adam Kidron you balding piece of shit. Look what you did to UBO. You ruined everything with your ego. You sold us all out. But now you have nothing. Your reputation is ruined and not just in this small industry. The white newspapers are reporting you a fucking bum who couldn't do anything with UBO. Fuck you you white piece of shit. Now let's see if those Latinflava bitches you were chasing after will be there for you. Let's see Sheryl Huggins lend you some of the money her father left her when he croaked. And Sheryl, you Uncle Tom bitch. You had no interest in providing content for people of color. But now you ain't shit. You will never work in the "urban" industry again. You will be another dogface bitch with straight hair trying to fit in at the white country club. And a lonely dyke.
The lesson you should all learn from UBO is that Black people count. We spend money. We support web sites and have disposable income. If you come in to get millions by saying youre gonna help white companies reach us and turn your back on us we WILL SHUT YOUR TOM ASS DOWN BITCH! |
Straight outta compton
Urban Box Office is out of business. Musta spent too much money ho's and 40's...
Thanks, http://fuckedcompany.com/archives/
While we hate they hate.
When all the "Urban" sites are gone what will UE do?
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Teckie Geek...I am down brother, but I am first a Tennessee Titan Fan. That means two things:
1) I can't give Corey Dillon too much props. He does play for the Cincinnati Bengals, you know.
2) I can't admit he plays for a horrible team. That would be counterproductive to creating the competitive spirit.
Urbanetikz_thetan_2...You broke it down. Thank you. I am a philosophy/theology student who has been struggling with the satan issue for awhile now. I firmly believed satan was under the power of God, but could find no evidence of it in my readings. Thank you. |
It's fucked up.... a lot of well meaning brothers and sisters are going to be out of work.
This goes to show you.... you don't need $50 million to run a fucking website.
UBO also screwed themselves by leaving George Jackson (RIP) out of recent press releases as the founder of UBO... Adam Kidron and his cohorts took all of the credit. KARMA IS A MUTHA!
This is proof positive that, on the internet it's not about money.... it's about creativity, intelligence, and first hand knowledge of the market...
FUCK UBO....
By the way i need some computer equiptment.... i know y'all are boosting shit up there now.... i need a G4... wassup?!
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i guess AKA is going to be the next web scam to go bust... since ALL of their ad revenue comes from UBO....
in the last 60 days...
Pseudo.com (BUST)
Artist Direct (BUST)
360Hiphop (BUST)
UBO (BUST)
next stop...
HOOKT.COM
AKA.COM |
I'm certain I'll catch mad flack for this post, but fuck it, here goes nothing.
I am SO FUCKING SICK of the double standard. I don't know Dream Hampton personally, but I have to give her props for being a female journalist in this shit - I know how hard it is. I am tired of hearing people talk shit about her, and other women, because of who it is rumoured that they may have slept with. Why is a woman a hoe if she sleeps with X amount of men, while if a man sleeps with X amount of women, he's given props and accolades? Fuck that, I know 'nuff male hoes.
Furthermore, you don't see Foxy Brown getting reamed in the media for fucking Ron Isley, R. Kelly, Allen Iverson, AZ, Kurupt, and other assorted industry/music/sports figures.
And finally, the only reason you don't hear about male journalists sleeping with female artists is that the majority of the boy writers are fat and/or ugly and/or old and/or white, and very few of them have any semblance of game about themselves. However, if as an example Elliot Wilson slept with Lil Kim, he would be given props, pats on the back, kudos, big ups, etc. - UNLESS IT WAS DISCOVERED THAT HE ALSO ATE HER PUSSY.
I'm done. The real, thinking people here know that this shit is a double standard and is mad tired.
No more whispering in the hallways please.
Keep it real.
MJ |
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IT'S OFFICIAL VIACOM BUYS BET!!!
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UBO probably would have been able to last another couple of weeks if they hadn't thrown that "Victory" party on Ellis Island!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
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For real, Bootney. Put me on to trhe UBO fire sale...
Hey, where's the Viacom/BET article? |
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Front page of MSNBC..
2.5 Billion...mr johnson will stay on and have a new boss....moesha to host teen summit and shake her booty |
Viacom pays $2.3B for BET
Media giant buys Black Entertainment TV, ending a week of speculation
November 3, 2000: 11:09 a.m. ET
NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Media conglomerate Viacom Inc. agreed Friday to acquire privately held BET Holdings II Inc., the parent company of Black Entertainment Television, for $2.3 billion in stock, gaining access to the fast-growing African-American media market.
New York-based Viacom will assume about $570 million in debt, $130 in working capital and will swap roughly $2.3 billion in stock, or about 40 million shares. The final exchange ratio will be determined immediately before the purchase closes, a Viacom spokesman said.
The $2.3 billion purchase includes nearly all of BET except for the company's movie productions and restaurants that are not included in the acquisition.
BET Chairman and majority owner Robert L. Johnson will remain chairman and chief executive of the first and largest national cable network targeted to African-Americans. He will report to Viacom President and Chief Operating Officer Mel Karmazin while BET COO and President Debra Lee will also continue in her roles.
The purchase, which is expected to close in early 2001, is expected to add to Viacom earnings per share, the spokesman said.
A growing market
Talk of a deal between the two media companies has been circulating for about a week. Viacom currently owns a number of prominent cable-TV networks, including the MTV and VH1 music video channels. While it owns the United Paramount Network, which targets primarily to an African-American and young male audience, it lacks a cable service aimed at that audience.
The BET purchase will give Viacom the coveted cable holdings, as well as access to publishing and online units targeting African-Americans. BET Holdings owns and operates the popular Black Entertainment Television, which is the only cable TV network aimed at African-Americans and reaches 62.4 million households. BET also owns a jazz network, which has about 11 million subscribers and Action PPV, which has 8.5 million subscribers.
African-Americans are growing faster than the general population and consume more media than the general population, said Viacom COO Mel Karmazin in a conference call open to the public.
"This market is terrific for Viacom to participate in," Karmazin said.
BET's publishing reach includes owning BET books, which is a leading publisher of African-American themed romance novels, as well as stakes in four magazines. Viacom will also gain BET.com, one of the busiest Web sites for African-Americans, a spokesman said.
Privately held BET Holdings is also profitable and produced $270 million in revenue over the past 12 months, Viacom executives said. They expect BET revenue to grow at a double-digit rate while earnings before tax, debt and charges, will climb by about 20 percent in the first calendar year, Viacom said.
"BET is one of the last stand-alone networks with significant cash flow, nearly full distribution and significant room for improvement," said analyst Jessica Reif Cohen, of Merrill Lynch in a research note.
Instead of price, negotiations focused more on plans that BET's Johnson and Lee had for the company. "The only way to do this deal were if Bob Johnson and Debra Lee entered into long-term contracts," Karmazin said.
Currently, BET is distributed in areas with large African-American populations and Viacom will look to expand that reach, Karmazin said.
"We think BET should be distributed everywhere," he said. "There are African-Americans all over the country. We don't understand why a cable system anywhere in the U.S. wouldn't want to carry BET."
Viacom also has no plans to sell or spin-off the fast-growing BET.com.
BET and MTV
For BET, the purchase gives them access to Viacom's ample resources. BET's Johnson owned 63 percent of the firm before the purchase while Liberty Media held 35 percent. Both Johnson and Liberty Media will receive Viacom shares.
"Artists that participate in BET will have an opportunity to have relationships with MTV, VHI and an international reach that BET didn't have," said analyst Edward Hatch of SG Cowen. "Talent that has a strong affinity for BET will be able to develop and grow projects under the Viacom umbrellas."
Hatch pointed to the film "Kings of Comedy" a Paramount film that could now run on BET. Such a successful film would generate significant ratings for BET, Hatch said.
The transaction will also produce cross-promotional opportunities between BET and the UPN Network, which caters to an urban African-American audience, said Merrill's Cohen.
Liberty Media will benefit from the deal, as they will now have a piece of media conglomerate Viacom, Cohen said.
BET will remain headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and the United Kingdom.
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Urban Expose,
You should already be wondering where is Scott Mills going to fit in all this with MTV.com and other better Viacom dotcoms out there?
He is going to be as legimitate as a black executive at soft sheen after being bought out by Loreal |
Bet comes back to ANANDA! |
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I'm surprised no one said they was launching turkey drive for UBO employees this thanksgiving or say happy holidays trying to find a job during fourth quarter (when no one is hiring)
Where's the funny negativity???? |
Dunn- the lessons are on point. Soon, hopefully, if things go well, I'll be in the running and UE will be hating on my company.
MJ-I feel you. I'm tired of hearing who fucked who on UE period. The woman hating and homophobic rants have got to stop though. Sad thing though, it's not just the fellas talking trash. We evidently have one woman who wouldn't know anything about female solidarity.
Getting on my soapbox again, I want to address the real issue here.
With the sale of BET to Viacom and the death of several Urban sites, we have very little if any black-owned media outlets. That should make us pause, abandon this silliness and get to working. If you control the media, you control the minds. I, for one, am concerned about what these companies that have no clue about the "urban" consumer will be pumping into our minds. Something to think about. Talk amongst yourselves. |
I just got back from the message board at HOT 104.com and it seems as though AKA.com has already begun to rotate non-UBO ads.
Books and some other stuff.
Maybe the UBO deal gave them enough time to get their sales staff in place? |
In a nutshell, the problem with UBO from the start was the inclination of management to hire friends that they though were 'cool', instead of competent people. Case in piont, a former assistant who overnight became a Senior Director.
There is nothing wrong with helping people out, but at the end of the day, someone has to pay the price for incompetence. |
Miaranda, you are truly unschooled in journalistic ethics. Dream is not a victim of double standards. Dream is a disgrace because she has no objectivity when writing her articles, and no credibility. For you to champion her cause only shoiws why this ho must be stopped even sooner. Dream meets rappers, fucks them, then delivers glowing pieces about her lovers. For Dream and you obviously there's nothing wrong with lying to readers. But readers are cheated and battles that should be fought in print simply aren't. For you to come out of your face with your wannabe feminist bullshit is wrong. If you care so much about womens' rights why aren't you devoting your life to a battered womens' shelter or other agency of that nature? Why are you always on this site popping shit about how large you are (when I've heard you're nothing but a dyke version of Dream, closer to Jessica Green at Stress)? |
MJ, I'm sorry for the insults. But when you reply, try to focus on the issue of Why should we defend Dream? She is a groupie and a "writer" with no credibility. She is drug user who cares about no one but herself. She even got high when she was pregnant and hurt her own child for life. Should we defend Dream Hampton simply because she is black? but lying to black readers who can benefit from the information she willingly conceals after sleeping with and getting high her subject? She's not down for black people. She gets into a job and tries to get them fired. Like she did at Rappages. I don't think we should see Dream as anything but the has been she has become. Let's put this bickering aside and focus on embracing the many other talented black women who write for the media (there are more than one you know). |
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like Common said, "I ain't a hater, I just don't like it."
anyway...............
i'm not as old as some of you cats so I haven't experienced the whole "i need to go find a job or i'm assed out with no food" stuff.
good luck to all you job hunters.
finally ..............
<< Internet stocks are up. The market correction is almost complete and the hard times are almost over. >>
What stocks are you looking at? I have a few that are doing ok, but my only superstar is VeriSign (VRSN). While we're on VeriSign -- they are a pretty good company. They own Network Solutions, VeriSign Payment Services (formerly Signio), and they control 90% of the SSL certificate market. We use all three of their main services (actually we got a combo deal on the last 2) and I'm sure other e-business are doing the same.
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Miranda I am sorry for the insult because I sometimes agree with your posts. But you were just as misguided when you rush to defend this "reporter" by claiming this is a "conspiracy" against Dream. I worked near her at UBO and saw her every day. I think I know enough about her character to speak on her. You were not in the office.
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and fyi: the product from VeriSign Payment that we use is called Pay Flow Pro.
If you need to accept credit cards (especially if it's B2B transactions) I would recommend them.
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Miranda Jane--
Thank you for saying that.
I saw Bamboozled last night and although it was a great film, Jada's character was totally not justified. She just looked like she was a hoar and it just let my boyfriend feel like any day now, I too, may do something like that to get ahead...Maybe those are his issues, but I struggle in having meaningful relationships because someone thinks that I too, may do something like that to get ahead, just because I am an assistant. Never mind that I have a college degree and a weatlh of intelligence.
It has totally made me re-evaluate my place in the industry. I could care less what people think, but I rather put my efforts forth towards programs that help, not hinder our people.
Where do you even begin? |
WORD OF WARNING:
If you worked for UBO be forewarned that UBO burned some of the TOP IT recuriting firms in NYC. So make sure that resume is ON POINT cause soem of the recruiters won't deal with you because of the mess with UBO.
Hotjobs.com |
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Miranda,
Don't even put your hair back in one and waste
your vaseline, let me handle this for you ma'
Lisa (cleaning lady),
It's now blatantly obviously that you suffer from
not just latent lesbanism which you disguise with
homophobic rants, but you're also in dire need of
acceptance by your peers that continue to outclass
you. I have never seen a person so obsessive with
another woman's (dream) sex life. I don't care if
she fucked the entire rap industry, you are crossing
the line with the baby remarks psycho. Now if I'm
checking you on some shit you know you've clearly
crossed the line. Once again, I like dream, so if
you're bringing it her it's going to get grimy and
gritty in the city Ms. Unpretty. They have writing
classes at the Learning Annex and I don't think they're
that expensive, so now that you've been relieved of
cleaning the UBO toilets take your ass back to school
and maybe you can fuck your favorite rappers and write
about it.
Oh, I'm waiting for you to respond and then I'm going to
launch a logi at your ass that will set this bitch ablaze.
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Viacom is the #1 platform in the world for advertisers, with preeminent positions in broadcast and cable television, radio, outdoor advertising, and online. With programming that appeals to audiences in every demographic category across virtually all media, Viacom is a leader in the creation, promotion, and distribution of entertainment, news, sports, and music. Viacom's well-known brands include CBS, MTV, Nickelodeon, VH1, Paramount Pictures, Infinity Broadcasting, UPN, TNN, CMT, Showtime, Blockbuster, and Simon & Schuster.
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Lisa Warren is just another pseudonym, just another pseudonym kid! |
Well, damn...if y'all are giving Dream hell for sleepin' round with her subjects just imagine the hell I'm gonna catch when folks find out I compromised my supervisory integrity and fucked that tall drink of water of an intern of mine. And on the job no less! Oh heavens ta betsy! So, is I a ho now too? Whoop Whoop!! HEY NOW! Watch out! |
"Lisa Warren"
Another motha fucka giving away for free what they used to make money off of.
When you writing the book, nigga? |
Darqbrown---Aight! I take full advantage of any interns, entertainers, secretaries, nubile Catholic schoolgirls and "urban" culture journalists within arm's length. dream gets nothing but dap from me for coming strong with her mack game. |
Lisa/Sonya/who ever you are,
If Dream Hampton is really all you say she is, ma, the truth will come out. You don't have to play the role of Josiah, the prophet of doom for the word to get out. It just makes you look petty and ignorant which I'm sure isn't your intention. We all know that corruption reigns supreme in some cases and we all know where it lives, you don't have to call it out like you do. From my experiences, where there's smoke, there's fire...if you have issues from working with her, take it up with her since you've dealt with her on a close level. Tell her how much you hate her and her ethics to her face. That way you can get it off your chest and not let your ill feelings cloud your better judgement and cosmic progression. Think about the karma payback you're doling out ,kid. Even if Dream deserves all the smack you're dishing, your "it comes around" is going to be a whammy for not letting the universe handle it. Take two deep breaths and move on. Work through that pain. |
Corey P. and David C. k-i-s-s-i-n-g...
First Cumma Mark
Than Cumma Ronin
Than Cumma Satan
Than Cumma Some bitch called Lisa Warren
Bullshit by anyother name is still the same bullshit |
Seems like this whole UBO info thing is really going to be revealed at:
www.hiphopdirectory.com
some time later today in a written statement from the company itself. I can't wait! If anyone else has the actual info before then post it here. |
1) Lisa has crossed the line several times in her rants about Dream Hampton.
2) Dream should not sleep with the subjects of her articles; it compromises her journalistic integrity.
3) Miranda Jane is sexy. She is confident, well spoken, always well versed and...oh, that name......
4) Shann is a suprisingly well versed, misguided soul who has risen from the ashes of Ghetto Life to revel in mainstream social position, all the while emitting vitrulent diatribes espousing violence, hate, and holier-than-thou attitudes.
5) Outkast's new CD is cut open.
6) This practice of reading and posting, reading and posting, takes up too much time, but is suprisingly fun and exciting.
7) This is my weakest post ever. |
Thats what you get when you hire 300 employees do to nothing!. You could do nothing with your own damn self. So much for the Ping Pong tournaments that went on in the office.I hope there was some wagering. |
while you are all bickering about this and naming names...
Here's what they THINK about you...
http://www.fuckedcompany.com/comments/index.cfm?newsID=%25%2D%5EG%2FE8IA%0A
no time to open the URL?
Here's some highlights:
-"Urban Box Office is out of business. Musta spent too much money ho's and 40's...
Update: The guy from urbanexpose.com just called me and said that I'm "insensitive""
- "11/3/2000 10:18 AM
Too bad there isn't affirmative action for New Economy Co's. Maybe Gore can fix that."
-"They threw a Good Party! - 11/3/2000 09:35 AM
And I got laid at BOTH the one on Ellis Island and Tuesdays Latin Flava Holloween Jam. Crazy PR freaks at UBO. Its a shame their out of Biz. The business model sucked but so did some of there female employees."
Thanks. As if Motown wasn't embarassing enough.
Where did you all think the racist people who were in traditional media WENT? The more we show our ASS, the more this attitude continues.
Thanks to all who say stupid shit like "fuck George Jackson"..way to fucking GO. Every "urban" attempt at ANYTHING we do lacks focus. UBO obviously had issues from the day George died. Now BET is swallowed up. That site was weak, but it was our last hope at proving we could DO something.
No. There is another... |
Well. First let me say this - it is not that we should defend Dream. I am simply using her as an example. Just like the Elliot Wilson/Lil Kim aside is not factual, just juxtaposing that possibility against the female journalist/male MC, DJ, Producer, etc. thing.
Now "Lisa" I have never seen you apologize, and I accept your apology. However, I am heterosexual, and if I weren't so what? How would that skew my integrity or my standpoint at all? It would not. And if I were a lesbian, and I chose to have lesbian love with Lyte, or Latifah, or Missy, or any number of the rumoured-to-be-gay female artists out there - again I would be labeled a "hoe".
The problem is not Dream Hampton. The problem is the treatment of women within the industry. I can't tell which came first - the chicken or the egg - did women become "groupies and whores" to get ahead in the industry, or did "groupies and hoes" push their way into jobs without the resumes to back them up? The point is it doesn't matter as long as there is this incredibly obvious lack of social equality.
Men and women are not the same, I would be the last person to define equality as the two being identical. I'm just saying, CAN MYSELF AND MY SISTAS GET SOME MOTHAFUCKEN RESPECT UP IN THIS BITCH!?!
Peace y'all.
MJ |
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Maxamilian
hahah...you really UBO'd that last Post
(see yesterdays article)
TONIGHT: NY SERVICE CENTER
9finger's birthday bash!
be there
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It has come to my attention that there are those who seek to discredit me by claiming that I, a celebrated writer of books and magazine articles on the hip hop nation would be posting scandalous lies and slander about my former co-workers using various assumed names. I would never do that. It would be silly. It would be a wrong. It would be a waste of my talents.
I am a simple man, husband and father. I stick by everything I write and my good named attached.
Let me finish by saying that Arzie Hardin is the OJ Simpson of the dot com world. Time for my medication. Pass the Ballantine.
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Anyone that loves Mens' clothing and talks as much shit as Miranda Jane has to be fat and ugly. |
A couple of things:
The Geek factory is looking for ex-UBO PR people and Silicon Alley Reporter is looking for ex-UBO sales people.
As far as banging your interview subjects goes, wait until the piece is over. That's what guys do. Hell, when Angelina Jolie seduced two female writers in her last go round of interviews before her marriage, no one cared.
The only issue is when people see you screwing subjects to get ahead. Margaret Bourke-White was infamous for this and it caused her untold problems.
You cannot fuck around on the job and keep your reputation. And if you get a reputation for it, you're gonna be fucked for sure. Once the musicians see you as a groupie, you're done. Groupies are little better than scum. |
Groupies are little better than scum, however there are ten times more male groupies riding the dick of male MCs then there are female groupies fucking or sucking them. And of course, NONE of the male groupies are gay. Oh no of course not, they're just HUGE fans.
Pure fuckery. |
David Watkins
SVP of Marketing
Mr. Watkins brings a wealth of (non)experience in the entertainment industry to Urban Box Office. A graduate of Syracuse University( wher he spent most of his time sucking dick and getting gang banged by the football team) , Mr. Watkins has held several management positions throughout the music and entertainment industries. In 1990, after working for a time in the financial industry ( but they kick him out after he showed up in Drag for a business meeting), Mr. Watkins began a career at The Source, ( where he tried to have voguing put into the magazine but had to leave because all the boys had got tired of him bring his boyfriends into the office.) the preeminent hip-hop music and culture magazine. As General Manager, Mr. Watkins oversaw the magazine’s production (by wacking off in the men's room most of the time), human resources and circulation departments and was instrumental in establishing the marketing and fashion departments (just like a real gurl would do). In 1992, Mr. Watkins joined Da Streetz, Inc. as V.P./General Partner. He created Da Streetz’ corporate identity(by back stabbing everyone in the industry), established their New York offices, hired all staff members ( stright from his 550-6666 sex party) and developed the company’s overall strategic plan. Three years later, Mr. Watkins established ICON Lifestyle Marketing ( which failed). As President and Founder (and cry-baby) of ICON, Mr. Watkins developed the entire agency and grew it from a 3-person operation to a major force in the Urban market place (which went bankrupt but stupid UBO picket him up. How many dick do you hav to suck until you get to the center, Corey Darnell knows). At UBO, Mr. Watkins will lead the entire Marketing ( and make sure it goes down the toilet) effort for the network and all of its affiliate brands.
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Miranda you're right and I was wrong. I type this because you are a strong sista trying to champion the rights of women in this industry. I should not have gone where I went. As for you UBO suckers posting as MarFlo? You niggas onlky show how on the dick of Ronin Ro you suckers all were. In fact, since Urban Expose has come into existence all we've seen is unskilled hacks like you and UBO ride this man's dick. For the record: the nigga don't drink. Second of all thanks for bigging up his books. (I love his work too and always asked him why he even bothered to work at UBO). Third, yall are some broke ass niggaz while he's relaxing with another book deal. Finally, when he was here everyone from James to Arzie to Dee Tee to Adam and George were riding on his dick. When he left, after his boy George died, I saw all you bitches and shook ones crying. But fuck UBO. I gotta get back to packing my shit and getting ready for my new job on Monday, unlike you. I also want to see the pained expressions when you bitches see that you're wrong about who I am.
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ubo gives the boot to 200 employees
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/is/20001102/bs/urban_box_office_gives_the_boot_to_over_200_1.html
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Good for UBO. Now they can all group up at the welfare and talk about former employees and all the other people they wish they could be. |
David Watkins, Urban Box Office's senior vice president in charge of marketing, called word of impending layoffs "hysteria based on the fact that we are in the middle of a very hard round of financing. People in this environment are very nervous," Watkins said, referring to an avalanche of downsizing announcements that have cut Silicon Alley down to size. "We are optimistic that the funding will come through."
optimistic--- yea right!!!!!!!!!!!! |
CODE, November, 2000
Wired for Cash: For Michael Jenkinson, bucking the system has yielded big bucks.
Ever since Bill Gates replaced Donald Trump as the billionaire-businessman archetype, the world at large has been inundated by media hype proclaiming the Internet as the easiest way to attain the American dream. The Gates-inspired techie fairy tale posits that anyone with one megabyte of vision can harvest vast amounts of fame and fortune.
This is obviously not entirely true. But with every urban legend, there is always one very enviable guy out there perpetuating the entrepreneurial ideal that keeps regular folks scheming in all their off-hours. In the ever-expanding entertainment Web world, that success story belongs to Urban Entertainment founder and CEO Michael Jenkinson.
Jenkinson launched UrbanEntertainment.com last February to little fanfare, even though it was one of the first online destination sites targeting black audiences. But it didn't take long before his fledgling business venture became a standard-bearer for the nascent industry. When Urban Entertainment launched an original animated series, Undercover Brother, it sparked a bidding war the ended with a major studio forking over seven figures to purchase the cyberseries' film rights. Jenkinson scored a victory rarely accomplished in Hollywood. He had complete creative freedom funded by a fat studio paycheck.
But Jenkinson is no stranger to working for the Man. The 39-year-old executive spent six year at 20th Century Fox as vice president of feature film production before moving his talent online. During his studio stunt, he shepherded indie favorites such as The Brother McMullen. On the surface, life was sweet at Fox, Jenkinson sipped Moet with A-list stars and jetted to film festivals around the globe. The downside was that he often had to pass on projects that interested him because of the studio system's limitations.
"Studio people are most likely to take a chance on ideas they understand for a market they understand," says Jenkinson. "The culture within the studios is that you don't have many African-Americans at high decision-making levels. And the people making the decisions don't understand enough about this market to put themselves on the line when the opportunity arises."
Realizing that he wasn't about to change an entrenched system, Jenkinson decided to step outside the establishment and create his own opportunities. He made use of his pre-Hollywood years working as an investment banker on Wall Street to fund his bid for financial freedom. While in his office at Fox, Jenkinson bought and sold big-name Internet stocks-eBay, AOL, and RealNetworks-at just the right time. And once he made enough loot to leave his studio job in late 1998, Jenkinson took the cash and hung his own shingle in the form of Urban Media, now Urban Entertainment. "It was a risk," he says "but one I was excited about and quite willing to take."
Jenkinson's initial plan was to buy the movies he tried unsuccessfully to develop at Fox and resell them to other distributors. As a marketing gimmick, he started a Web site called UrbanMedia.com and put films online for potential distributors to view. But he decided to shift his focus and business plan, when he noticed that people were logging on to watch the flicks for pleasure, not business.
"We found that 95 percent of traffic was from nondistributors," says Jenkinson. "It was just people surfing the Web. " Jenkinson then decided to change his business model, making UrbanMedia.com a destination site for original film and animation content.
To help with his new strategy, Jenkinson hired friend and associate Damon Lee to help run his company. Lee, who came out of the highly regarded Peter Stark producing program at the University of Southern California and worked with director John Singleton, rose to vice president of production at MGM. The two friends would joke that they were the only black studio executives in Hollywood.
With Lee on board helping to run the business end of things, Jenkinson dedicated himself to finding artists to create content for the site. "I went through my Rolodex and looked for the most talented people I had worked with," he says. And that's when he remembered John Ridley, the writer behind the Gulf War film Three Kings, which starred Ice Cube. Jenkinson asked Ridley if he wanted to be involved. He explained that Urban Entertainment would act as production house and distributor and that no one could censor them. Jenkinson encouraged Ridley to develop any ideas he wanted, even those that seemed too edgy for mainstream audiences.
Ridley came back to him with Undercover Brother, a sketch-comedy act that riffs off the 1970's blaxploitation icons. Jenkinson and Ridley decided then to make the concept into an animated series in which the Afro-sporting, bell-bottom wearing agent works for the Brotherhood, a secret organization that settles the score for African-Americans. His undercover ego is the mild-mannered Anton Jackson, whom the establishment considers trustworthy.
Undercover Brother's subversive nature was exactly what gave the program credibility and urban appeal, offering audiences a show with ideas rarely seen in theaters or on television. In one episode, Undercover Brother seeks revenge on the white-boy groups that are biting the style of their black counterparts. In another episode, Undercover Brother decides that the speeches made by former presidential aspirant Alan Keyes cannot be for real and determines that the Republican Party must be holding Keyes hostage. He sets out on a mission to free him.
After only three episodes appeared on the Web, they knew they had scored a career-defining success when studio executives came calling with open checkbooks. And Jenkinson even made a bit of online history. His deal with Universal Pictures marks the first time an online program crossed over to be made into a feature film. "It's groundbreaking that they sold Undercover Brother to a major studio," says Ann Donahue, technology reporter for Daily Variety. "Selling online properties off-line is the revenue model behind a lot of Netcasters, and so far, very few have made it a success. Even fewer have sold anything for that amount of money."
And Jenkinson insists that his auspicious launch was no fluke. He recently added director Reginald Hudlin, of House Party and Boomerang fame, and writer Tina Andrews to the sire's roster of A-list black talent. Hudlin, who directed Paramount's The Ladies Man, which hits theaters this month, is writing and producing Mackin', an animated interactive show about a young man attempting to get lucky with the ladies. Andrews (who penned Why Do Fools Fall in Love) is writing and producing Sistas 'N the City, a series described as Sex in the City with black sensibilities.
With the Universal deal and UrbanEntertainment.com receiving more than 3.5 million hits and 300,000 unique users per month, Jenkinson has established himself as one of the most successful players in the new media world - a world, he says, in which the power is still up for grabs. "With new media, we've eliminated the gatekeepers," says Jenkinson. "No one has to give you permission to be on the Internet. You can simply decide to be there and then create content. Anyone can be a mogul."
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UBO put me on the top of No Buzz List? I love it. They must have did it on the way out or from those computers they have at the unemployment office where they'll be forced to find work. You suckers can blame people all you want but you all are the bum ass bitches and suckers who won't find work next week. Ha ha. I'm laughing at each and every one of you sad faced bitches shuffling quietly out of the office and hugging each other and promising to stay in touch. Fuck you all. Ha ha. |
UBO everybody hates each and everyone of you fucking losers. While you bitches hate, I celebrate! I'm happy to see you bitches keep riding people's dick even when you're leaving the office for the final time. |
is UBO having a "garage sale" to liquidate their assets? I could sure use some hardware......and some software... |
Movieline, August 2000
Cyberline - Site Specifics
UrbanEntertainment
(www.urbanentertainment.com)
This site means to target the African-American audience, but since it's top-notch and has a terrific selection of animation, shorts and feature films, don't let that deter you if you happen to not be African-American. Writer John Ridley (U-Turn) just sold the animated series he created for this site, "Undercover Brother" (a blaxploitation satire), to Imagine/Universal for feature film development for $2 million, if that gives you a sense of the quality here. Screenwriter Ben Ramsey (The Big Hit) has also created an animated show for Urban called "The Contract," which follows the adventures of a professional assassin as he navigates his way around the world's seedy underside. The weekly animated series "Cisco and Ripple", which features two guys "straight from the 'hood" who review new movie releases, is pretty funny (see for yourself what they have to say about Any Given Sunday's nude locker room scene). If you're looking for live action, check out True, the original short that inspired those "Wassup?!" commercials (True's filmmaker and stars also appear in the Bud spots). This is one of the rare sites that lets you watch full-length indie features continuously (as opposed to watching in segments), so you'll actually be able to get into the drama Love Beat the Hell Out of Me (with The Best Man scene-stealer Terrence Haward) and the action/sci-fi Welcome II the Terrordome(pictured top) which stars Gladiator's Saffron Burrows.
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TO RSVP FOR THE PARTY AT CIPRIANI call
2 1 2 . 3 7 8 - 7 3 27 |
Daily Variety,
Imagine goes 'Undercover' - Ridley to pen live-action adaptation of Web series
NEW YORK - In what marks the first major studio deal to turn an Internet-generated creation into a feature, author and screenwriter John Ridley will be paid $1 million against $2 million by Universal and Imagine to draft a live-action adaptation of "Undercover Brother," the animated series Ridley hatched on the Web site UrbanEntertainment.com.
"Undercover Brother" is an afro-sporting bellbottom-wearing dude cooler than Shaft who is a covert agent for the Brotherhood, an entity that levels the playing field for African Americans. His undercover alter ego is Anton Jackson, a guy who is considered harmless and trustworthy by the establishment, which he uses to gain information. In several episodes of the spoof, Undercover Brother has gone against white-teen singing groups thought to be ripping off the stylings of black counterparts, who are being stuck in minimum wage jobs at places like McDonald’s. In another, Undercover Brother decides from the conservative political speeches of African American presidential aspirant Alan Keyes that the real Keyes is being held hostage by the Republicans, and he sets out to rescue the man.
The property was chased by several studios, and brought in by U exec Scott Stuber and Imagine exec Kim Roth before Imagine topper Brian Grazer and U prexy Kevin Misher made the deal. Grazer, who developed a relationship with Urban Media and its founder Michael Jenkinson, said the property has a great title and a hip, smart premise that lends itself to a fun film drafted by a proven screenwriter. Grazer and Jenkinson will produce, and Ridley will exec produce.
"It’s the first Internet property to be headed for film treatment, and he’s a character who has two personalities: the regular guy and this cat who gets into all this fun secret agent stuff," said Grazer.
Urban Media, formed two years ago by former Fox film exec Jenkinson, has emerged as a leading streaming video entertainment site targeting African-Americans. Aside from a library of more than 60 films, the site features the recurring serial by Ridley, plus three other episodic creations being done by screenwriters like Ben Ramsey ("The Big Hit"), who hatched "The Contract," and comedian A.J. Jamal, whose serial "Pookie Poo" will be shopped as a possible TV series.
"This is a major step forward for the Internet, and the first step in our plan to take our product into the offline world," said Jenkinson. "We have direct access to a substantial targeted audience, which gives us immediate feedback on storylines and characters. This is a lot less expensive than doing a pilot or a feature treatment. We’ve done all the NRG research before a dime is spent on production."
It’s the latest big deal for Ridley, the former standup comic who has become a triple threat writer in films, TV and books. This deal was a total surprise. "This is a huge deal and I didn’t expect anything like this when Mike got me to do this project," said Ridley. "This was something I wrote six years ago that I found on some discs I was about to throw away."
A supervising producer on NBC’s "Third Watch," Ridley has an overall deal with Greenblatt-Janollari to develop comedies and dramas, and his film credits include "Three Kings" and "Cold Around the Heart," which he wrote and directed. Ridley is also a busy author of such fiction as "Stray Dogs," which was turned into the Oliver Stone-directed "U-Turn." He has completed a novel called "Conversations With the Mann," which director Carl Franklin is circling, about a black Harlem-born comic in the ’50s determined to become the first standup comic of color to appear on Ed Sullivan. While he ignores the civil rights movement going on around him in pursuit of his career, events happen as he gets close to realizing his dream that imperil his professional future. The book’s yet to be published. Ridley is repped by Endeavor and managed by Stephanie Davis of AMG.
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The Standard, 2000
Undercover Brother Is First Online Series to Get Film Deal - The animated blaxploitation show was picked up by Imagine Entertainment for $1 million.
Undercover Brother, an animated blaxploitation series featured on UrbanEntertainment.com, was picked up today by Imagine Entertainment for at least $1 million to be turned into a movie possibly starring Chris Tucker.
The deal was brokered by Endeavor, the talent agency that represents Undercover writer John Ridley, who penned the screenplays Three Kings and U-Turn, as well as the novels Stray Dogs and Love Is a Racket.
Ridley's deal marks the first of its kind in online entertainment. Web entertainment companies like Icebox and Shockwave.com have expressed hope that the shows and characters they create will see bigger-dollar futures by getting optioned to TV and movie producers. However, that business model remains untested. Icebox has stated explicitly that it intends to earn revenues from off-line creations based on Icebox shows, and it has signed star names like Seinfeld creator Larry David to this end. UrbanEntertainment today proved that the concept of parlaying Web content into feature films at least has potential.
Although Hollywood agents have been surfing the Web for years in search of characters and shows to represent and leverage into other media, UrbanEntertainment's deal is the largest and swiftest to date.
Ridley signed on with UrbanEntertainment parent Urban Media earlier this year and debuted the first of a 10-episode series on March 21. He will write Undercover Brother and be its executive producer. Urban Media, run by CEO Michael Jenkinson, a former film-production VP at Fox, will coproduce the movie with Imagine Entertainment, allowing Urban to retain significant ownership of the film along with its proceeds.
Undercover Brother follows the adventures of a present-day action hero whose style and attitude are rooted in the 1970s blaxploitation genre. UrbanEntertainment focuses on black films and animated series, and the company recently signed Ben Ramsay, who wrote the screenplay for The Big Hit. Ramsay's series, Pookie Poo, will debut soon on UrbanEntertainment.com.
Imagine Entertainment is part-owner of Web-entertainment venture Pop.com, which has yet to launch. So far, Pop has announced that it will accept films from the public in a "film festival," and the company is said to be seeking writers and stars for an online comedy series.
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Ro, Ro, Ronin Ro
Chillin' with book deal
Motherfucker gonna wake one day
And realize that shit ain't real.
NEXT ON THE UE TRUE HOLLYWOOD STORY
From street kid
To Acclaimed Author
To Full Out Psycho bum!
I love you Urban Expose! G'Nite
|
Hey UBO why don't you all say John Ridley "needs medication," too. Anyone who's doing better than you, you hate on. We know it hurts to see people living better than you. We feel your pain. It must be hard being an unemployed loser with enemies. Why don't you go take your medications (for everything from mental illness to HIV)? You broke ass motherfuckers are making me laugh while you're leaving and trying to rally support to "start something else on our own." Yall are as shitty as Sheryl was the other day! |
VIBE,2000
REEL TO REAL - News from the Hollyweird
...Former comedian-turned-writer/producer John Ridley(Three Kings, U Turn) is packaging a few red-hot projects. He could get as much as $2 million from Universal and Imagine Entertainment to write and produce a live-action version of Undercover Brother, the Internet-animated series he created for UrbanEntertainment.com. As the project comes together, industry watchers are trying to figure out who'll play the zero-cool hero with the 'fro and mack threads who takes on missions such as busting 'N Sync-like boy groups who try to sound like black guys. Will it be Will Smith or Taye Diggs? Omar Epps or Mekhi Phifer? Those names and other (including Chris Rock, Chris Tucker, and Jamie Foxx) have been mentioned as possible leads for another Ridley project, Conversaions With the Mann, about a Harlem stand-up comic during the '50's who wnats to break the race barrier and appear on The Ed Sullivan Show. Carl Franklin (One False Move) may direct...
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Still riding that nigga's nuts? Go ahead. Fuck him and fuck you! and fuck UBO too. Hey, I can rhyme. Maybe now that we got tossed I can sign with Urban Music Matrix. Oops I forgot the shit went out of business. Oh well. Goodbye you peasants. See you when I walk by the welfare on the way to my new job, bitches! and that goes for you, too, Arzie's retarded brother who moves his lips when he reads a menu. Wow. We really had "professionals" up in this piece. |
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HEAR COMES THE PAIN...
I got a few UBO resumes (no names or specifics)
since I am doing an urban service here, but I have
only found one viable candidate among 7 of them.
NOTE - Don't scan your damn business cards and e-mail
them as attachments and sign up for a free e-mail account
since those UBO addresses will be deaded by EOB. Duh!
List your company first and position (emphasis the latter)
and keep it down to four bulleted job descriptions. Might
I suggest you give a summary of your position in the first
line, breakdown your duties (concisely) in the second line and
list your achievements in the last two. Keep it consistent.
Punctuation and grammar are important so get someone other
than your co-worker that can't spell or write in coherent English
to read it. Proof it. Now proof it again. Education - this
doesn't mean I want to hear about what damn elementary (primary)
school you went to simpleton. If you haven't graduated from
College then don't list education first. Why? Because I will
immediately chuck the shit in the garbage if the position clearly
calls for a degree. Practice your phone voice. Don't call me
with, "Yeah, can I speak to Shaan. Yeah, whaddup dunn? This
is (fill in your name) from over at UBO, I heard y'all might be
hiring and I was wondering if you could put me on." If you found
that dial tone a little unpleasant or haven't heard from me in 5
business days...DON'T CALL ME, CAUSE I WON'T CALL YOU.
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Despite the dire warnings that have induced investors to
abandon dot-com companies, many other high-tech
businesses are expanding exponentially--and they can't find
enough people to hire. Even as some high-profile areas such
as e-tailing undergo difficult consolidation, less glamorous
fields like Internet infrastructure are creating jobs faster than
failing Web companies can eliminate them.
Complicating matters further, this unique labor market is the
first for many young workers whose values regarding time,
money and life in general differ vastly from those of their
predecessors. This Generation Y work force is also learning
what rights they have--and do not have--when faced with
sudden unemployment, and the resulting brick-and-mortar
education is not always a happy one.
The unprecedented labor landscape is forcing major changes among both companies and
candidates. And the resulting new job model will undoubtedly influence other industries, perhaps
redefining the American work ethic in the 21st century. |
I have been looking at the boards for a minute and I have noticed that there have been a couple of references of the BET deal but I wonder if anyone has noticed that Robert Knowling, CEO of Covad resigned from his post this week.
I think that we need to do some serious reflection about the state of Black folks in the hi-tech/new media industry.
I would like to see UE get outside of NYC and look at some of the websites that focus on the African-American internet audience. Have yet to see any real discussion on such sites as Africana.com, urbanentertainment.com, black voices. I would like to see that because now that UBO is no more we really need to look at some of these other sites and what they have going on.
Just a couple of thoughts |
nstead of panicking, the 28-year-old marketing director returned the countless calls and emails
he had been ignoring from recruiters for months. As he was wheeled
into the operating room, he took comfort in knowing that he would
awaken with more than a dozen companies clamoring for him even if
only 60 percent of his skills matched their needs.
"I had a lot of confidence that I was going to find something soon,"
Fellows said after moving here from Boston, where he worked for
consulting company Zefer. "I interviewed with as many people as
possible, and the very next day they were throwing job offers my way."
The story is a familiar one, from Manhattan's Silicon Alley to San
Francisco's Media Gulch: While the demise of dot-com companies
makes the headlines, employment continues to boom across the board for positions as diverse
as accountants, lawyers, engineers and producers.
The unemployment rate in some technology niches is less than 1 percent, mocking the national
rate of 4.1 percent in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Government studies also
project that the top five of the 10 fastest-growing occupations between 1998 and 2008 will be
related to technology. Computer engineers, support specialists, systems analysts, database
administrators and desktop publishers are expected to see the largest salary growth.
To be sure, the consolidation of the new economy this year has not been free of pain. More than
22,000 technology workers have been told to pack their bags since December, according to one
study, and the pace of cuts has only increased since technology stocks began their steep
decline in April. More than 60 companies--including AltaVista,
Qwest Communications International and Drkoop.com--have
slashed their work forces.
Content companies and online retailers, such as Oxygen Media,
Amazon.com and AllAdvantage.com, constitute the bulk of the
layoffs, climbing to a sector record of 5,677 in October, according
to a report by outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
The cuts are also beginning to seep into the wider tech world,
affecting such stalwarts as Xerox and Lexmark International
Group.
Yet unlike the dark days of the early '90s when large corporations
like AT&T and IBM announced massive layoffs on the order of
40,000 jobs, today's cutbacks are hardly making a dent in the
overall economy or in the psyche of those who are let go. In fact,
many of those receiving pink slips exude optimism.
"The market is pretty good and there are a lot of opportunities out there. I am in no rush to get
something," said 23-year-old Carlos Famadas, who was laid off at the end of September from
consulting company Gen3 Partners. Confident that he would find work, he took the opportunity to
stay home with his dog and take care of personal business for a month.
Such is life in this revolving-door job market. For all the recent pummeling the industry has
endured on Wall Street, most technology companies continue to have a difficult time filling all
their job openings. The steady closure of dot-coms and other companies does not mean that
people have lost all viable employment options; they're just being shifted to other parts of the
industry.
"Yes, the markets are jittery and you see individual companies that do better than others on
some days," said Michaela Platzer, vice president of research at AeA, an industry group
representing computer and technology companies. "But the bottom line is that companies are
wrestling with not having enough skilled workers to meet their demand."
And as the industry creates new jobs at a
breakneck pace, companies find themselves in a
perpetual game of catch-up.
Even as the dot-com meltdown continues, other
parts of the industry are still benefiting from the
original enthusiasm the Internet generated for all
technology stocks. Investor interest has shifted
from consumer Web companies to other sectors,
including optical networking, wireless, Internet
infrastructure and business-to-business companies.
People who lost their jobs in content, e-tailing and
other areas that have fallen out of favor are still hot
commodities.
Rich Hampton, who last month lost his job as the
lead technical designer at teen site Kibu.com, said
prospective employers are "desperate." After
posting his resume on Kibupeople.com, a site set up by the defunct company to help employees
find work, he said, "I got tons of calls; I've talked to about 30 HR people."
"One man is calling from Los Angeles at night to get me to visit his company. Another person is
calling from Chicago," said Hampton, who has become so confident that he is restricting his job
search to the narrow confines of Fremont, Calif., a suburb of San Francisco and an extension of
Silicon Valley.
Content sites like Kibu may come back into vogue as other sectors come to rely more on the
Internet. For example, wireless companies are racing to bring content, financial services and
shopping to their devices.
"There's going to be some interdependence between the different tech areas," AeA's Platzer
said. "Already, we see that people had to come up with ways to send the information that is
already there to wireless devices, creating a whole
new set of demands for wireless and Internet
infrastructure companies."
According to staffing and consulting company
Management Decisions Inc., the tech industry will
produce an estimated 1.5 million new positions
next year alone. Moreover, because of the severe
shortage of qualified workers, roughly half of those
spots will go unfilled.
With those numbers, salaries are not likely to dive anytime soon.
"Generally speaking, there is still an immense shortage of the best talent, and compensation
packages are staying the same," said Jeff Christian, chief executive of recruiting company
Christian & Timbers. "They may not be escalating as fast as they were; they may have taken a
breather."
The Internet's legendary lure of stock options, however, may not carry the same weight as in
previous years.
"People are still looking for stock options, but they are not willing to take as many risks to get
more options," said chief executive John Bongiorno of Myrecruiter.com, a staffing company
based here that specializes in Net jobs.
Accordingly, those who have been laid off are giving more scrutiny to companies that come
courting.
That's what Fellows did before signing on with another Net consultancy after his knee operation.
And even though he was laid off by that company as well just this week, he's as upbeat as ever.
"I am still optimistic about finding work quickly," said Fellows, though he admits that he was a
little unnerved by his second pink slip. "There is still a possibility of layoffs in any company, but
there is a little bit more volatility in the Internet economy. I still think it is somewhat of a
crapshoot." |
Maggie Pace was nearly seven months pregnant when the start-up where she worked,
Vox.com, lost its venture capital and shut its doors.
But Pace was relatively lucky. Cybergold, which had funded Vox and operated out of the same
building in Oakland, Calif., agreed to hire Pace and pay for her maternity leave. Furthermore, Vox
was able to pay the final paychecks of all its employees, including accrued vacation pay.
"Nobody got stiffed," she said.
Pace's tale ended on a positive note, but her initial anxiety is being experienced by thousands of
dot-com workers as the go-go days of the late 1990s are supplanted by a new sense of fiscal
sobriety. Although they represent only a small fraction of the overall tech work force, layoffs are
becoming more common as new companies cut costs or close altogether.
Laid-off employees in many other industries--from autoworkers to bank tellers--have long faced
questions about medical coverage and 401(k) plans. But the issues facing laid-off dot-commers
are often unique, as many are working their first jobs at small start-ups with
no union protection and unclear rights under the law.
In many cases, the company has filed for bankruptcy protection or has simply
locked its doors. That could leave former employees among a long list
creditors--but instead of being owed money for chairs or desks, they would be
owed a final paycheck, unused vacation time or overtime payments.
So just what rights do fired employees have, and where can they go for help?
The basic benefit, unemployment insurance, is available to all employees who have worked for a
certain amount of time depending upon the state. To be eligible, the employee must have been
laid off through no fault of his or her own.
Still, though the checks can help buy groceries and pay rent, unemployment insurance offers
little to those making more than $30,000 a year, as most in the high-tech industry do.
The payments are based on a percentage of earnings during the past 52 weeks, up to a
maximum set by the state. In California, this maximum tops out at $230 a week, or about $920
per month. This applies to people who earn more than $7,634 in their highest-grossing quarter, or
the equivalent of $30,536 annually. Anyone earning more, regardless of the amount, will receive
this same top-level compensation.
As for health benefits, a federal law dubbed COBRA (The Consolidated Omnibus Budget
Reconciliation Act) allows most people to continue the medical coverage they had at their
company if they make the full payments.
But COBRA generally covers companies that have insured at least 20 employees in the past
year. If a company has insured fewer than 20 workers, it may not fall under the law's protection.
In this scenario, an individual's only options would be to pay for an expensive individual health
plan or apply for government-funded health coverage.
"If the policy had been an insured policy, they may have some rights. If it was uninsured, they
may not," said John Jacobsen, an employee benefits attorney and partner with the Illinois-based
firm Vedder Price. Employees are advised to check with the employer on the type of
coverage--insured or uninsured--before any signs of fiscal stress.
Collecting unpaid wages--a possibility when companies file for bankruptcy protection or shut
down--is even trickier.
In the case of a company that files for bankruptcy, unpaid employees must contact the court and
ask to be added to a list of creditors. Unfortunately, employees are considered unsecured
creditors and can be paid only after a potentially long list of secured creditors receive their
money.
The odds of collecting owed wages depend on the amount of assets the company lists in the
bankruptcy filing and the amount of its debts. In most situations, the debts exceed the
assets--leaving little left for employees after the secured creditors have been paid.
If the company essentially disappears, "then the employee would have to hire an attorney and
sue," said attorney Nina Stillman, another partner at Vetter Price. However, it may not be easy
to find a lawyer willing to track down a few hundred or thousand dollars in lost pay.
Many employees sign up for their companies' 401(k) plans, which take pretax money out of each
paycheck and set it aside in a retirement account that a trustee invests.
Some companies will match part or all of their employees' contributions. These matching funds
are federally protected under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). Even if a
company declares bankruptcy and has no assets, this money should be safe and in a protected
trust, handled by either a bank or an individual. The terminated employee must contact the
trustee and have the account either rolled over to a new company or placed in an Individual
Retirement Account (IRA).
"You have rights against the trustee if they have terribly invested the money or stolen the
money," Jacobsen noted.
Many women continue their jobs until their ninth month of pregnancy and then take paid leave.
States pay a portion of the woman's salary during leave under temporary disability laws, and
many companies make up the difference, resulting in a full paycheck for new mothers.
But if the woman is laid off, not only is the company unlikely to subsidize her leave, but the state
will not make disability payments because she is no longer employed. Then, Stillman said, the
woman's only option is to file for unemployment benefits, which would usually amount to
considerably less than her subsidized maternity leave |
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Okay these damn cut & paste articles are irritating
what I'm sure is Carpal Tunnel Syndrome in its infancy.
Post the damn link if it's longer than 3 paragraphs, make
your comments (don't forget the venom) and keep it moving.
Even UE has some damn etitiquette.
STOP SPAMMING ME TO GET GRIMY PEOPLE...IT'S COMING!
I DO HAVE CLIENTS TO CONVINCE THAT NOT ALL 'URBANITES'
DON'T KNOW HOW TO HANDLE THEIR BUSINESS. (Post to that
for a minute).
COMMERCIAL: DMX's "Y'all gon' make me lose my mind" is the
perfect soundtrack while stealing hardware/software and
packing your desk UBOers's. |
Shaan, hi it's me Arzie. I was wondering if you can hit a brother off with a job. Everyone else up here is as usual not thinking ahead. They all want to spend their final moments in the office choking on another cake that Adam bought. Or blaming others for situations they caused. Or trying to hook up dates with the fags up in this office. Look, even now Dee Tee and Scott are heading into a store room with my brother Joe and Jessica Green and her strap on dildo. But I want to be smart and ask if there's anything in online that I can do. I really need a job. Please help a "black brother" out. |
lisa warren, you talk about "professionals" up at your old place up at UBO. yet, you keep on hating and really, venting your mouth into disgrace. have some class, leave with some diginity. you have no reason to bitch, for you are part of one of the biggest failures this history has ever seen. yet you seem to think you had nothing to do with it's downfall. as far as i'm concerned, you're as ever bit as accountable. |
Playahata you leave Dream, I mean Lisa, out of this. She's been on this site all day writing bullshit. Dream you wont get your severance if you keep it up. You too Jessica. I'm on to both of you man hating women. |
And to Urban Expose UBO failed but I am still HEAD NIGGA IN CHARGE! Me and Tyrone are already thinking of starting another company. An online radio station. Anyone who wants to work for us, e mail me at this address. One |
Richard Kong works for a hot Internet start-up in Silicon Valley, happy with his salary,
options, job duties and co-workers.
But what pleases the 22-year-old software engineer more than anything is the prospect of
sleeping in, then working until midnight--or whenever the urge strikes--and telecommuting when
he can't bear the traffic.
"The No. 1 thing I look for is flexibility," said Kong, a 1999 graduate of the California Polytechnic
State University in San Luis Obispo now working for a networking company. "If the company is
not flexible and requires 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, then forget
it."
Kong's dismissal of the traditional workweek isn't merely rebellious
bravado or a byproduct of America's full-employment economy.
Labor experts and sociologists say he reflects the priorities of
Generation Y.
The nation's youngest demographic group, born from roughly 1975
to 1988, is just entering the work force en masse. While not
necessarily rejecting behemoths like IBM or General Motors where
their parents and grandparents spent decades, they're shunning
traditional work schedules. Moreover, because the corporate world
doesn't hold as much sway over its modern values, the Generation
Y work force isn't burdened with the intense fear of job loss that
paralyzed its predecessors.
"They don't want to work all day, all night, in an office," said
Amanda Freeman, director of research and trends for New
York-based Youth Intelligence. "They want to be able to work on the go, from the train or plane,
or at a coffee shop. They're trying to find ways they can make their jobs integrate into other parts
of their lives."
According to numerous studies and focus groups, Generation Y places more value on flexibility
than on any other quality when weighing job offers or determining their career paths. And given
the size and impending influence of this group, 9 to 5 may soon get the deep six as a general
business rule.
"Employers can ignore them at their own peril," said Leslie Cintron, a research associate at
Harvard University's Radcliffe Public Policy Center in Cambridge, Mass., which recently
completed a detailed study of generational work habits called "Life's Work." "They won't be able
to attract and retain the kind of employees they say they need if they don't offer flexible
schedules that these people want."
Although world immigration trends and domestic birth rates will continue to shape the size of the
group for the next decade, most demographers agree that Generation Y is poised to become the
largest group in U.S. history, representing roughly 80 million people.
By contrast, baby boomers are the largest generation to date, totaling about 76 million.
Generation Xers, sandwiched between the boomers and the Y's, number only 41 million.
Also known as "millennials" for coming of age at the turn of the millennium, Generation Y
workers are already starting to infiltrate corporate America.
Sun Microsystems chief executive Scott McNealy said recently that by the end of the year,
about half of his company's employees will be young workers with seniority of two years or less.
Sun has a boot camp program called "Best of the Best," or BOB, to indoctrinate 500 to 1,000
college students each year in a 12-month program.
Why is corporate America making such a fuss over a group of people who just a few years ago
were learning how to drive?
For one, they're poised to become the largest consumer group in history. American teenagers
spent about $150 billion in 1998 and influenced more than $300 billion in U.S. purchases.
More important to employers is that the career aspirations of Generation Y can provide a sketch
of the American workplace in 2010 and beyond, yielding tips about what it will take to lure the
most talented young workers.
In addition to flexibility, some Generation Y members say money alone is not as important as
working in a fun or interesting situation. Others are planning to spend five or eight years in a
given career, then switch jobs or go back to
school. And a surprising number are hoping
to drop out of the working world altogether
when they start raising families.
Young men already view themselves as
fathers first and workers second, according
to a survey conducted in January and
February by Harris Interactive.
Unlike older men who perceived themselves
primarily as breadwinners, at least 80
percent of more than 1,000 men aged 20 to
39 interviewed said that having a work schedule that allows them to spend time with their family
takes a higher priority than doing challenging work or earning a high salary. Only about a quarter
said that having a prestigious job was very important.
According to the study, 82 percent of men aged 21 to 29 say it's "very important" to have a job
that leaves time to spend with family. By contrast, only 67 percent of men aged 40 to 49 rate
family time as "very important." The gap is even larger for women.
Many believe that the quickest way to flexibility is to be their own boss. That's a stark change
from the baby boomers, who tended to work for larger companies before becoming disgruntled
and striking out on their own.
Two decades ago, most new entrepreneurs were 35 to 45, according to the Young Entrepreneurs'
Organization in Alexandria, Va. Today, people 34 and younger account for more than 40 percent
of all business starts. The Collegiate Entrepreneurship Organization, a 2-year-old association
that helps college students learn about business ownership--with the appropriate initials
CEO--already has 57 chapters.
Jawed Karim isn't his own boss, but he did divert from his corporate path to work at a Silicon
Valley start-up. The 21-year-old Palo Alto, Calif., resident dropped out of college after summer
internships at IBM, Silicon Graphics and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications.
Stock options and a high salary were obvious attractions, but Karim said his real motivation had
little to do with money.
"What is most important to me about a job is that it is cutting-edge," said Karim, who still has
senior standing at the University of Illinois. "Whoever I work for must be a worldwide leader in the
field they specialize in." |
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212.378.7327 |
FUCK ALL YOU BITCHES AT UBO!
I STILL HAVE A JOB!!!
SVP of Marketing and if you HATE ME then FUCK YOU!
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Who is POSTING MY WORK NUMBER ON THIS SITE! |
opps I ment to say who is posting David Watkins work number on this site!!!!! Hummmmmmmm...Call him and ask him how is he doing.
212.378.7327 |
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Arzie,
I can't tell if you're serious or full of shit
since your post includes 'fags up in this office'
which might pose a problem. See, alot of people in
the space (hell in all spaces) are same sex indulgers
and I don't think it's PC to call them fags. At least
with your clothes on and not establishing an intimate
relationship with them first. Quite of few of my peers
here bite pillows (the guys) and help their significant
others remove that string when they pee pee (the girls)
so they may find you just a tad bit offensive. Imagine
that. |
To: TheTruth.com
Who the FUCK are YOU? How did you get my work number?
I'm going to fuck you up!!!! |
The bravery of some of these cats who hide behind the computer screen. Would love to meet up wit em in a dark alley. One Time! |
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Davey,
Don't you mean, "I'm going to fuck you up,
down, sideways, doggy-style, in the shower,
in my loft"? But take your medication first,
use a humifidier for that coughing (phlegm anyone?)
and for put a wrapper on that Rapper next time
before you blow him.
xoxoxo,
smooooches |
dotdeeznutz@hotmail.com, Interesting e-mail address Shaan |
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Thanks....I think. |
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Cory (uhurucom.com),
I would go with a different URL cat, since most
folks can't Uhuru. Holler if you need some ideas.
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yeah that name is kinda hard. the com.com always kills me. same thing when companies have a net.net
call it uhurumedia or something. |
Ayyo, all yall can stop your snivveling and backbiting... for I HAVE THE ANSWER!!!!
RICE KRISPY SQUARES!
Word, I just ate a whole pan of those muthafuckas and I feel better allready.
Forget about your pecan spins...
Rice Krispy Sqaures are where the urban market is going. And I'm not talking about those pre-packaged joints either... you need to make them shits yourself from scratch!
Kellog, you racist, theosophist, thieving bastard, you've done it again! |
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Rice Krispie Squares? Oh shit I think I just
did a Sheryl (and shit my pants on that one).
Damn, y'all UBOin' fo' real up in here today.
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This post is true. One of my editors at UBO told me the employees have left the office. The company is over. It is sad but I told them they wouldn't be able to mess with 360. We're paid and they're without jobs. As long as they don't come here looking for work everything's peace. Its bad enough they were breaking into out office to steal our laptops and site plans. Look what good it did them. |
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Of course DAVEY u still have a job because it was your duty to FIRE everyone... but id be careful coming out of 395 5th Ave (btwn 36/37) ... doesnt your loft space face the street? ...
We will all see you at CIPRIANI on the 22nd...
COREY SUSPECT will be doing the door, so come prepared to battle or kiss and make up |
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If urbanentertainment.com (URL makes me wanna
hurl) doesn't have some of the funniest cartoons
since Fat Albert I am definitely slipping. Sista's
in the City was so damn amusing. Note to Cita's
animator - it may be time to take one of those 3-D
animation courses advertised in the Village Voice you
are severely slipping and may be looking for a new job
soon. But you didn't hear that from me.
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Shaan James
fuck you bitch! you are the one thats gay |
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DAVEY how dare you call someone GAY... did you forget about COREY SUSPECT? |
Honey, none of you are worth shit anymore. The dot-com market in NY is dead. Can I have fries with that? |
thuglite
who are you and how do you know Corey? |
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know dont u worry about that DAVEY... i dont swing that way... i know all your dirt...including the people you shitted on that ICON owes $$$$$$$$ still. By the way your assistant (DIANA) gave up your direct dial number.. |
does corey know anything about technology? or just "media"
by the way online radio stations are a bad idea, at this point you would be an also ran in the game. I don't know if you are in the know but there is free music thing thats been getting alot of press lately. |
dotc om marlket is not dead, it's just this little thing called accountability has made an impressive comeback. see just like drug dealers who front you product, investors like to see a return on their investment. I know, shocking isn't it. |
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DAVEY,
Let me ask you a few personal questions...
1. Do you spit or swallow?
2. Input or output?
3. What dressing do you use when you toss salad?
4. Ever been with a woman?
5. Do you dress in drag?
6. Regular or scented tampoons?
7. Sit or stand when you tinkle?
8. Pre-op or satisfied the way you are?
9. Do you march in the parade?
And the million dollar question...
10. Are you aware that you're one of the worst dressed
gay men in America?
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"Kellog, you racist, theosophist, thieving bastard, you've done it again!"
I wish this site had one of those cheesy-ass signature functions so I could read this shit evry time I post. Diabolical comedy... |
Thats HARSH, WOW..I love it though. |
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thuglite,
Congrats playboy you are the player with the
most clout (300). Keep rippin' them down dunn.
Don't you just love how some brothers know how to
flip that corporate b-boy shit? Don't hate...emulate.
UBOer's - never let 'em see you sweat. If you've got
the goods cream will rise to the top. Stay up.
JAY-Z...JAY-Z...JAY-Z...Who knew! Bruknun it don't stop!
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a garage sale would be nice |
No wonder UBO TANKED...99.9 % of this board is UBO staff. If they put an ounce of the effort that they put into this board. UBO would be on it's way to be the first TRLLION dollar company. I am dumbfounded that this is what cats do when they are at there office on someone else's dime. NO JOKE. So my scrappy ass has a suggestion. Put that effort in creating and strategizing on how to make money and build an EMPIRE as opposed to Mother Fuck everyone cause they failed. They failed because they were two busy bashing the hand that fed them. So I gotta tell you theres a lot of wasted and counter productive energy here and I'm just laughing my ass off because it is funny as fuck. To see everyone else actually doing it and to see everyone else take time away from building there EMPIRE...BOB Johnson(BET) sure as hell didnt spend time in message boards and look at him now. Laughing his ass all the way to the bank. 3 Billion times worth. So before you bash someone else people, put that energy into creating a team and run your business like the MAFIA!
One Time! |
What I meant to say was. That if they put an ounce of that effort into work and the company. They would all at this point be deciding the color Big Bodies they wanted with there company jet and logo painted on it. Sipping on Coladas in the caribean 2 months outta the year |
UBO is dead...Viacom is now selling urban culture back to black folks...what a great time to be "URBAN".
I am Tyler's baby's daddy. |
Illegal XXX:
From the November 13 issue of Red Herring:
Undercover Brother was written by Three Kings screenwriter John Ridley, who developed the character for Urban Entertainment as a 50/50 partnership, taking no financial risk and sharing in whatever revenue the show generates online. Universal bought the rights to the film with a promise to pay Mr. Ridley $2 Million upon delivery of the script and a production fee of less than $1 million to Urban Entertainment. But should the movie get made, Urban Entertainment is merely a net profit participant in the film; not a very promising deal."
If this is true, Jenkinson and Lee should know better than to cut such a shitty deal. They will see no cash from this deal as net profit participants....
Also check out Icebox.com, run by Steve Stanford, a brother (I think, I hope).
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<<but lying to black readers who can benefit from the information she willingly conceals after sleeping with and getting high her subject? >>
Lisa,
What information is this? That some of these celebs may have doody tractor drawers? C'mon hon. Celebrity journalism is about puff pieces. Whether you lay down with those knuckleheads or not, they're all guarded, rehearsed and stupid. Ain't really that much to tell. If truth be told about most celebs, there would be a head, deck and a byline and no story. These muthafuckas ain't deep. They ain't got no real shit to say. So what's Dream withholding? And does it really matter to the average Tanisha? Nope. Black folk in West Bubble Fuck, Louisiana could give two shits. |
The most important thing to get out of the fall of UBO:
Yes it's true - they had no content, no business plan, no revenue building model,
opportunistic employees with skewed values, non-existent management, etc, etc, etc,
But they still were able to get the money.
They didn't have a business plan from the get -
But they got mad funding. What we need to learn from this is that there
is money to be had out there. So UBO did it wrong - for everyone who can point
to why and say how they could have made it successful, I hope you are doing your
business plans and I hope you get funding. Because after all is said and done,
I want to see Black people with ownership and benjamins:) |
Black people get it together!! |
UBO was white-run and controlled by white people like Corey Podolsky and Robin Comstock. Most of the employees were also white. Hey, if anyone wants to see Dream's big screen debut, go to Lukeworld and press "Baby Got Back." That's Dream walking across the screen, big belly and all. |
Bankrupt UBO, New Money in Hand, Plans to Rehire 50
GREG LINDSAY on MEDIA: Eco Associates, just weeks after bailing on a $20 million investment in the urban-culture portal, returns as part of VC rescue squad. |
Today on Netslaves
UBO: The Chapter 11
"UBO also filed a petition to pay their 330 employees. In a sleazy bid for sympathy, UBO says that most of their employees are "mostly young minorities who have grown up in the inner city". The total, was 1.8m total for their last series of paychecks, covering October 16 to November 3, 2000. After all, what dotcom's employees don't deserve their paychecks
Both numbers jump up. The number of staff, 330, is very large for an Alley company, as well as monthly payroll of 3m a month. The extra 500K is settling up expenses and vacation time. But the company was paying out around 2.6m a month in payroll. That's a serious drain in resources. "
www.netslaves.com |
Inside.com says UBO may "rehire" 50 people with "new money." This makes me think that all of this "UBO failing" stuff was a big elaborate and illegal plan that UBO had. UBO wanted to get rid of most of their employees but did not want to pay severance pay. So UBO pretended to go out of business and filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. Now they are going to re-open with all of the employees gone, most of that $1-mil a week burn rate stuffed in overseas accounts and not having to pay severance. If Urban Box Office returns, I urge all ex-UBO employees to get together and file a class action suit against UBO for unpaid severance and for firing them without cause. UBO employees deserve their severance and healthcare and if it reopens it will be the same company that owes you this. What does everyone think about this idea? |
http://www.inside.com/story/Story_Cached/0,2770,13900_7_25_3,00.html
So, Crispus, I'm looking for the urban expose on this matter.
:::tapping fingers:::
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Folks,
This is how the gsme is played. How else to legally fire 300 folks. BTW in New York you are an employee at will, that is until you "run out of funding". UBO will be back leaner and meaner. The folks on the board are not idiots. They know what they were doing. Enough of UBO -- I'm wondering how come people aren't worried about the Viacom/BET merger. Any record executive should be worried. In order to get airplay you HAVE to go through Viacom. Maybe it's because MTV has become so hip in our hop that's why this merger is just ho-hum. But I would be worried, then again maybe it takes white management to finally get a black network to have good content. i'm done |
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We think it is great," Mr. Karmazin said in a telephone interview. "Bob Johnson will own a lot of Viacom stock. He will be a large influence at Viacom." And, he added: "BET will be a better channel that will serve the market better. Other than that, they will stand headquartered in Washington. Bob will have total control. From a community point of view, it is really good news."
In a conference call yesterday, Mr. Johnson concurred, saying that the sale is "an opportunity for the black community to receive more information, entertainment and relevant news because of our partnership and relationship." BET executives added that the sale would not change the programming mandate of BET.
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$2.34 billion in viacom stock is pretty damn good. |
Come on, who at UBO thought this was not gonna happen???
I got fired from Pseudo before they went bust...
I did KoolOut.com - Urban Music and Culture......
i went and met with the heads at UBO when i got fired and they were like "we are very interested, we want to bring you all to UBO, youre great, you got more traffic that most of our properties, great content, good vision, etc. etc..."
next week it was like:
"we dont know where to put you, we got no room"
next week was like:
"want to do sound design for othervision?"
....gotta be kidding me....the halls of ubo rang with usless buisness plans from heads that never even produced a homepage, or a buisness plan! and had no experience online at all...
seriously tho, UBO had potential....i think that all that money is a curse for these startups...ESPECIALLY when the heads that run the company got no vision/experience/etc...
Big up to BREEZ, DREA, LOU, and the rest of y'all...
So what is urbanexpose gonna expose now???
you gonna start shitting on regular websites like ughh.com and hiphopsite?Ue might as well start doin content...y'all should do the next level of blackplanet.com for jobless indursty heads...thats a good idea...call it wackplanet.com
shit is ill now...here comes the technological depression, time to start hustlin on my block...
Dan
Broke Executive Producer
http://www.RapNetwork.com
dan@rapnetwork.com
(please dont start shitting on our site YET, we got no FUNDING, just launched, and are about to redesign etc. etc. those are my excuses)
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Question: Who pays worse, MTV or BET? I just hope they still allow BET to play music videos - I've had enough reality programming for a lifetime.... |
Look at the filing closely.
All of the prime lenders got paid off some of their final investment. Stands out to me.
They're not paying severence because they don't have to unless it was in your employment contract.
The company also had outstanding debts to the taxman and a new company will not help that dodge. Chapter 11 allows for reorganization, which means they can legally seek new funding and try again while settling debts.
You should be covered under CORBA, which should allow you to float your health insurance, but the company is doing a lot better than others, in trying to pay off expenses as well as salary. Be glad you don't have to go to the AG's office for legal help.
I wouldn't count on a new UBO lasting for long. They were consultant addicted for their tech needs and iXL needs their money.
They don't have the tech talent to do the job, forget the editorial talent. |
WHAT! No severance pay? I hope people at UBO had good saving plans for that they can pay their rent. Today is sunday...get the sunday paper and start looking.
I'd be sacred to death living in NY with no severance pay. I feel truely sorry to those UBo heads that got fired. But I think it's awful and just bad business not to give severance pay. That's just totally shitty. I peeps that got fired from UBO need to band together and demand their money.
May God be with you all.
PS.
Call MacAruther Consulting they are on the 3rd floor of 5th Ave and 42st. They are really good. |
A "new UBO" would stink just as bad as the old UBO. For a "new UBO" to succeed you must not re-hire James Andrews, William Goins, Sheryl Huggins, Corey Podolsky, Frank Cooper, Myra Stark, Joel Dreyfuss, John Pasmore, Arzie Hardin, Tyrone Thomas, the e-commers, David Watkins and his Icon staff, the Lukeworld people, Latinflava, Womanhood, Reverend Run, Othervision, and anyone connected to Urban Newswire. If Sheryl Huggins is brought onboard the company is over. |
UBO was about as dope as the shake at the bottom of a nickel bag. I was glad to hear their shit went under. Right now, getting new investment will not help their company. Who would want to be a part of a company who filed for Chapter 11 in 2 years of existence? And who would want to be a part of a company that produced garbage then tries to sue their investors, when the investors saw the writing on the wall and ran like a bunch of screaming Mexicans for the American border? If they do reorganize and start again, you know they will be wack. They'll rehire Sheryl "I Gotta Take a Dump" Huggins, James "I'm not gay, really!" Andrews, Frank "Russell Simmons would be nothing without me" Cooper, Joel "Where are my bi-focals?" Dreyfuss, Arzie "Where could I get that Michael Jackson skin lightener" Harden, Corey "No really, I'm not racist" Podolsky.
Plus, what do they have that people care about? SOHH? A site run by 2 nerds who wouldn't know hip hop if it was fucking them in the ass. Latinflava, a site dedicated to spanish guys who jerk off to nude pictures of Charo? Indieplanet, a site dedicated to shit people don't care about?
Hmmm...hmmmm...hmmm..sounds like UBO will be on fast track to success. Tattoo that one on your ass papi. |
Look out for the newest 'urban-culture' site coming out of Toronto, Canada: www.rushmag.com.
It's set to launch in 2001, and will teach so-called urban sites a la UBO a thing or two.... |
Ouch. OK it's a bitch that this hit the fan -- but no one ever got anywhere successfully for blaming someone else. Accept it, use it productively -- wasn't it the Clash who said "the theory of the hour, anger can be power, you know that you can use it"? Who knows when y'all will be working/sleeping together again on this small island... |
Well met!!! let me tell you something lads, UBO.net had some potential, and I can understand why Eco pulled out in the end then jumped back on the UBO's bandwagon in the very end.
You see, the bloody gits knew that UBO had potential as well, and they know what you and I know what the stupid bahstards in upper management does not, and that 90% of their content were full of shite(excuse my foreign tongue)
From what the young lads at UBO had informed me since day one was that it was mainly othervision who the potential investors looked at. It was all of those Heather Hunter and BattleSeed and IndiePlanet trailers they showed that made investors watered their mouths. I mean, c'mon the bloody fools never looked at the rest of the place, even if they did, what were people doing? I was at the studio one day observing the place so I can pick a place for Michael Bay to Shoot a hot scene for "The Rock" sequal, where me and nick cage once again attempts prevention VX missiles from launching off the 31st. building, anyway as I observed this space, I noticed many things.
Employees were constantly on that piss poor service American Online chatting with the royal Majesty in london
Another thing, I've never seen this much ass in the office since my old Bond days, where I had my way with the ladies behind the sets I must say those were the days when Ladies were Ladies. Now ladies are labeled as "ho's" for all that I'm concerned, a ho is a garden tool back in my day.
Back to my point with UBO, I just hope that my fellow englishman decides to keep othervision, because that is about the only reason why I visit UBO.net in the first place, I must say though, Bruce Flea is truly an abomination. This is a disgrace to the man, whom I've been a student of at one point, ohh I use to be so agile back in my day, but now I have to worry about my hair, my teeth, the discoloration of my hair, viagra...
Bruce Lee should be immortalized by constantly replaying Enter the Dragon on UPN.
Ok, that is enough for today, I shall return when my day has come!
Sean Connery
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No severance pay sounds like employees will get stiffed like at ICON... remember it is the holiday season and gift have to be bought... RETAIL is always hiring.... until you get your next gig... |
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Um, just wondering if the gay-bashing on this site is a prerequisite of some sort. Is there a handbook I didn't get in the mail? What does being gay have to do with business decision-making (even if it's horrendous decision-making)? I'm not PC all the time, but damn, it's hard to take folks' posts seriously with all the racial slurs, etc. Take a deep breath people, and if you can get one, a Valium would help too. |
Ever wonder where such hatred can come from? Wonder why a one site is so hell bent on bringing down only a small handful of people? Wonder why UE shits on people of color? Who could be this bitter? Who has this resentment? Why is UE so mad? Why is UE's shoulder chip so big? Who is Marc Flores? Who is Crispus? Who is Ronin Ro? Why do some people point their finger at him?
Q:WHEN WILL URBAN EXPOSE BE DEAD?
A: IN APRIL, WHEN SUGE KNIGHT GETS OUT.
Q:WANT TO COME FROM UNDER RONIN RO'S VENOMOUS RADAR?
SUGGESTION: SIMPLY TELL SUGE KNIGHT THAT RONIN RO'S STILL IN NYC.
SHORTLY THEREAFTER, SUGE KNIGHT WILL 187 RONIN RO. ITS SO EASY. IF ONLY LIFE WERE THAT EASY.
THE TRUTH IS THAT RONIN RO IS ONE OF A FEW LEADERS BEHIND URBAN EXPOSE. NO QUESTION ABOUT IT.
EVERYONE HE HATES GETS SHITTED ON IN URBAN EXPOSE, EVER NOTICE THAT? THEN HE TRIES TO PLAY BOTH SIDES OF THE FENCE BY POSTING AS OTHER PEOPLE THEN TAKING MORE SWIPES AT HIS ENEMIES.
HIS LUCK CAN ONLY LAST SO LONG BEFORE SOMETHING HAPPENS TO HIM THAT HE FICTIONALIZES IN HIS OWN BOOKS.
HE KEEPS TALKING AND WRITING ABOUT IT. HE MUST WANT IT TO HAPPEN TO HIM.
LIGHTS OUT! NITEY NITE, RONIN RO! VOTE FOR SWEET SUGE TO PLOW RONIN RO'S BACK OUT...WITH NO VASELINE
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MARC FLORES IS MAD IS RONIN RO IS URBAN EXPOSE IS BITTER IS HURTING IS WANTING TO BRING YOU DOWN IS MISERABLE IS WANTING COMPANY IS SHITTING ON PEOPLE SO THEY FULFILL HIS PROPHECY IS THINKING THAT WHAT'S A HERO WITHOUT AN ENEMY IS RONIN IS RO IS MARC IS FLORES IS UGLY IS ANGRY IS BITTER IS ANGRY IS BITTER IS URBA EXPOSE IS SICK IN THE HEAD IS A WALKING TIME BOMB IS ABOUT TO GO POSTAL IS RONIN IS RO IS CRISPUS IS URBAN EXPOSE IS LOVING THE ATTENTION IS WAITING TO SHIT ON YOU IS ANGRY IS RONIN IS BITTER IS RO IS URBAN IS EXPOSE IS IGNORANT |
1, 2 suge's coming fo you
3,4 suge's tapping that jaw
5,6 you're riding it
7,8 your book's out too late
9,10 suge lays you again.
A magazine should show a picture of suge and his soon-to-be new boyfriend, ruin ro
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RUIN RO'S RADAR IS UGLY.
SUGE KNIGHT'S RADAR IS LETHAL.
RUIN RO JUST GETS MAD AND WRITES ABOUT YOU.
SUGE KNIGHT JUST GETS YOU AND THEN OTHERS WRITE ABOUT IT.
RUIN RO STUCK HIS NOSE IN SUGE'S BEES WAX. 'JUDGES, CAN WE ACCEPT THAT ANSWER? I'M SORRY, RO, THAT'S NOT GOOD. YOU'LL HAVE TO PAY. JUDGES, WHAT IS RUIN RO'S PUNISHMENT?? OOOOOH, THAT'S A STIFF ONE, YES. RUIN, THE JUDGES SAY YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO NOT LIE TO PEOPLE ANYMORE AND SMILE AT THEIR AND BEHIND THEIR BACKS, TALK TRASH.'
SUGE'S COMING FOR YOU, RUIN RO.
READ HIS BOOK, "HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL." THE SEQUEL WILL BE "AM DONE, NO GAVEL."
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love death row
ronin ro
enormous foe
gonna go
say no mo'
black fo' fo'
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James and the UBO crew,
These last "Suge Knight" posts are exactly why your asses aint got no jobs and are now feeling worse than stupid hoping that people don't remeber how DAVID WATKINS and the ICON crew, (who was already bankrupt when they came to UBO and dumbassed UBO assumed ICON debt) spent a million plus on Ellis Island to get people no body cared about to act like they were celebrites and party about sites no one ever heard of.
That money could have went to save your company, morons. Think about that when your on the unemployment line. If you spent half the time you spent on Urban Expose posting bullshit because your BITTER, you might have still have jobs right now.
Go back into the stories and look back as you spamed the boards with sorry assed sites no one ever heard of, how you were coming up and gonna make everyone look like idiots.......
Did you have tears in your eyes when you found out the people you played yourselves to defend are even now planning to re-start the company without your asses? Dumb muthafuckers. LEARN FROM YOUR MISTATKES FOR A CHANGE. |
Ronin Ro is "leader" behind this site? Simply because the people Ronin "hates" get bashed on here? Have you ever wondered if it isn't something as simple as Ronin being a wise businessman and getting out of companies he sees are headed for the dotcom graveyard on fuckedcompany.com? Suge Knight ain't gonna do shit when he gets out. All he's gonna do is get himself killed by all the gangsters who have hits out on him (including Harry-O). Damn, I read all these posts on here and thought Lisa Warren was just writing a bunch of crap. But now I see she was right. UBO is forever riding on this guy Ronin' s dick. It seems that as soon as he left the company, it went downhill. You UBO people are so on his Dick you have to spend your Sunday evening writing about him! He's probably home watching X Files or something and you losers are sweating him behind his back. |
UBO, you people continue to try to bring it to me on message boards. People inside of the company have already told me who you are, too. But let me explain a few things to you men and women who want to attack me. When I went to your company, all you had was Sheryl Huggins talking about a "cultural DMZ." Sheryl had good intentions but our approaches were very different. I wanted to appeal to the streets and the suburbs; she didn't; she had the position; they did it her way. I continued to try to affect positive change (helping to introduce the concept of the "urban mindset") but UBO refused the help and ran the company into the ground. After George Jackson died, I bounced to 360 and was able to work with people who understood more about the Internet and who were in it for more than an IPO dream.Since then, I've had to deal with James Andrews putting me in his Soulpurpose newsletter; UBO suckers throwing my name around on this site; UBO suckers calling me to say "What's up" and try to get connects when their job is in danger then trying to "scare me" by saying "Suge is gonna get you." You suckers at UBO don't know me at all. You suckers are from the industry. When someone comes at you, you run to call the cops. I've never called the cops in my life. And I never will, either. I'm a peaceful guy, I love to help younger writers come up, and if you're having problems, I'll try to give helpful advice (and most of you in that company had problems and needed advice). I tried to show you at UBO the nice side. But if anyone wants to try to bring it to me and mine, I will have a big surprise waiting for them. I don't give a f--k who you are. Anyone can die. We might even have to die together but that will be fine if the battle is worth it (and my loved ones are). UBO: the best thing you can all do is tell these jealous hacks (you know who they are, some of you even told me on the phone) to stop trying to blame the companywide failure on me. UBO gave it a shot; it didn't go as planned; leave with dignity. There's no shame in falling on your face. The shame is in staying there. |
I have to write as "Mister Ro" because someone at UBO took the name "Ronin Ro" when this site went up. But for the fifteenth or twentieth time, I am not Crispus Attucks. I'm just a guy who writes about hip-hop and writes books and tries to be a helpful and sane presence in this industry-gone-amok. |
To Lisa Warren:
Thanks for having my back when these (as you put it) "UBO suckers" and "hacks" (had to steal those from you) were trying to post shit about me under different names. |
I do hope that UBO is making provisions for the talented victims the company made. To throw out 300 plus employees on the street with no severance and no anything at all...well that's absolutely illegal. Then again, UBO for the most part, didn't act or operate like a company above board.
As for the Ellis Island party, well I was there, and boy what a lot of money thrown around to accomplish nothing at all. NO CELEBS turned out at all (unless you consider Heather Hunter a celeb...to me, she's just a washed out stringy looking pornochick-please Othervision...you couldn't have found someone else to model a "bulletproof diva" after?) The Ellis Island party was like going to your very rich uncle's backyard wedding, cept he's a crackhead and plans it on the water in chilly early autumn, so that no one can enjoy displaying their fine fettles without the aid of a ski jacket. You had to walk miles to get to the bars, and excuse me...if this party was supposed to be an all out gala affair....THEN HIRE A WAITSTAFF!!! Buffet style dining and plastic silverware, ain't my idea of high class. And to think, thousands of dollars were spent on this weak ass buffet.
Even funnier, was the lack of MARKETING!!! Instead of Adam Kidron getting up in front of huge video screens and giving his 15th "wanna be down" speech, couldn't they have shown the sites on the screens, or at the very least project the UBO logo onto them? Where was reading materials about the UBO sites? Where was anything having to do with UBO at all? This was nothing more than David Watkins...being a heffer caterer to the wanna be urban elite. There was no marketing to drive traffic to the sites, which is what I would have thought such a lavish ordeal would have been for.
And you wonder why UBO tanked only a month and a half later? |
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Do you guys really not know who runs this site? I don't work in an internet 'space', I'm strictly brick and mortar, but doesn't word kind of travel fast? Or is everyone just feigning ignorance? I dig the site so I have no axes to grind and don't need to spill anyone's business but again, you guys are grasping at straws with the whole Crispus thing. Just let it go and enjoy the site (in your own, individual, sometimes warped ways). :-) |
Expect to see more posts from ex-UBO losers. They don't have jobs anymore and need more to entertain them then episodes of Jerry Springer and phone calls to the unemployment number to see if their check is on the way. |
The people from UBO who have been attacking people with their posts are James Andrews, our intern (RZ's brother) Joseph Bolding, Dee Tee, Kenyatta Bell, Scott Poulson Bryant, Jessica Green, Dream Hampton, Sheryl Huggins, and Arzie Hardin. There was also some chick in the legal department who was always talking bad about people. These are the people no company will ever want to hire and no one will ever want to trust. Every day I was at UBO I saw them standing around calling everyone names and never doing any work. |
"Suge Knight" or should I say Dream Hampton? You should really take a few months off and consider how your career has fallen. Dream, Lisa Warren may have got a little harsh with her posts but that's her style. That's why she was thrown out of 360. But you were the person who behaved your way into the rumors about you. You slept with rappers and tried to get people fired. You handed in bullshit articles to magazines and got yourself blacklisted from The Voice and Vibe and The Source. Dream, we all know it was you who attacked Ronin after he kept telling us to hire you. We know because you were the one who worked at Rap Pages and still use played out slang like "187." You really used to be a good writer but now you're a penniless "hack" who has to work for disreputable Internet companies. And after attacking people, everyone knows you are not to be trusted. You might never work again in this industry. You have officially played yourself in public. |
Next to close....
1. AKA... since most of their revenue is from UBO ad banners they won't be around long!
2. 360 is most definitely gone.... MTV is going to ice the wack dot-com real soon.
Make room for the REALEST NIGGA ON THE NET! |
Low level rock pushers could flip 1 million dollars into a profit...fuck, they could flip 10 grand into a profit...why couldn't UBO? Why were they allergic to money, and profitable business models? All those parties...ahaha didn't they charge at the door?
I only feel bad for the young kids fired trying to make something of themselves. I'm tired of these rich jew ass ma fuckas in the urban market raping the hiphop culture and making it look lousy, when they fuck it all up. What "urban" portal is actually ran by an urban/hiphop culture cat??? |
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UE, please post a new article, even if you're out of ideas. There are like 4,000 posts on this article and folks are getting out of hand. You know everyone can go on talking about UBO FOREVER. It stopped being interesting for me a coupla days ago. Ok, people are out of jobs, lots of peeps are mad. I get it. Can we move on? |
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They're only doing what silly negroes that need their approval allow them to do.
jews aren't raping anybody. They are having consensual sex. |
Yo Ronin WTF
why you siting up on yo soap box like you got fucking conviction give it up money
when your the main scab thay helped fuck up the Source
truth is truth
writing strories for mags that bend over for personal intrest while people lost their job over politics has nothing to do with loving hip hop you love that fuckin dollar |
UBO employees: The company spends $1 million a week, generates $150,000 a year, and you act surprised that you're finished?
Keep blaming others and play the victim but what did you expect? Accept some responsiblity. You can't work for anyone and not ask questions (like "how do we make money?"). And then act shocked when you go out of business when your business makes no money.
Business is about producing business...not looking like you're in business. |
URBANENTERTAINMENT.COM ANNOUNCES FIVE NEW ANIMATED SERIES -- HELMERS JOHN SINGLETON, GEORGE TILLMAN JR., MALCOLM D. LEE AND WRITERS CHEO HODARI COKER AND CHRIS MACK CREATE FIVE NEW ANIMATED SERIES FOR URBANENTERTAINMENT.COM
(11/3/2000) With the addition of John Singleton, George Tillman Jr. and Malcolm D. Lee to the roster of talent creating shows for UrbanEntertainment.com, the Web site has emerged as the home of Hollywood’s A-list African American directors and writers. In his first foray into the world of Internet entertainment, John Singleton (Boyz 'N The Hood, Shaft) and co-creator comedian Freddy Ricks capture the true essence of New York street life with "Hustlin’ Hank." The animated series redefines what it means to be street smart through the escapades of Hank and his subway dweller friends. "I think Freddy Ricks is one of the funniest comedians to come along in a decade. The internet is the quickest way to expose him to as many people as possible," says Singleton.
Director George Tillman Jr. (Soul Food, Men of Honor) and producer Robert Teitel (Soul Food, Men of Honor) have signed on to create an original series, the concept of which is being kept under wraps for now. "We’re looking forward to working with UrbanEntertainment.com. This is a great opportunity to expand the horizons of our company," says Teitel.
In Malcolm D. Lee's (The Best Man) animated series tentatively titled, "Baby Mama Drama," he examines the varied philosophies of a pseudo-black nationalist barber who must constantly juggle his two very different babies’ mamas. "I am very glad to have the opportunity to present my work on the internet and to contribute to the great work that Urban Entertainment has thus put forth," says Lee.
UrbanEntertainment.com has also announced the start of production on "There Goes the Nation" created by Chris Mack and "The Devil’s Music" created by Cheo Hodari Coker. Mack, a former staff writer on "ER" and "The Practice" introduces a multi-cultural, multi-dysfunctional first family of the new millennium. "There Goes the Nation" deals with what happens when a contestant’s popularity on a "Survivor"-like reality show propels him into the White House, as the first black President of the United States. Mack says, "creating an Internet series is a great way for writers to develop ideas in their purest form without being over developed by committee." Coker is a screenwriter, currently working on the Marion Barry and Tupac Shakur biopics for HBO and MTV, respectively. He is also a respected entertainment journalist and former LA Times staff writer who’s written for Premiere, VIBE, Rolling Stone, Spin, and Source to name a few. His animated series, "The Devil’s Music," takes us deep inside the music world, where after a near brush with death, a hot out of control gangsta rapper attempts to clean uphis ac, but the powers that be want things just the way they were. "Creating episodic content for the Internet means no rules. You can create from a huge palette and take thematic chances – opportunities which are hard to come by in the current network model," says Coker.
"There Goes the Nation" will launch in December along with two previously announced series: Reggie Hudlin’s (The Ladies Man, Boomerang and House Party) "Game" and John Ridley’s ("Three Kings" and "Third Watch") "Those Who Walk In Darkness." "Hustlin’ Hank", the Tillman/Teitel series, "Baby Mama Drama" and "The Devil’s Music" will be available in early 2001.
Says Damon Lee, President of Production and Development at Urban Entertainment, "It is really exciting to see that directors and writers of this caliber are seizing the opportunity that Urban Entertainment.com provides to speak directly to their audience." Adds founder and CEO Michael Jenkinson, "The recent failures of high profile Internet content companies spells opportunity to us rather than doom. The business model in this space may not support massive infrastructure and bloated staffing but I think a lean operation focused on creating productive assets rather than overhead can be very profitable."
Urban Entertainment was formed in early 1999 by former Fox film exec Michael Jenkinson. The site features the award winning John Ridley series "Undercover Brother," that is being developed by Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment as a live-action feature film. The Web site also currently features four other episodic creations: "Sistas ‘N the City" written by Tina Andrews (CBS’ "Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis" and "Sally Hemings: An American Scandal"; "Why Do Fools Fall In Love"), "The Contract" written by Ben Ramsey ("The Big Hit"), "Pookie Poo" written by A.J. Jamal and Gary Anthony Williams, and "Cisco & Ripple" written by comedians Spencer and A.J. Jamal. UrbanEntertainment.com also streams a large selection of live-action short films.
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11/6/00
BLACKMUSIC.COM is looking for a buyer.
If you think that you or your company have a great concept for developing the website BLACKMUSIC.COM, this may be your opportunity.
The site has been semi-inactive for several months, while new investors were sought. However, when it was active it generated very respectable traffic numbers and had a sizeable mailing list for a company with no marketing dollars and an under-developed business plan.
The right team could make this site blow up!
If you seriously are interested in developing this site, please email brian@blackmusic.com |
HEY, HERE'S A POTENTIAL dream JOB FOR YA 9courtesy of mediabistro.com):
Publication or Company Groopeez Weekly Magazine (Teen Hip Hop Magazine)
Job Title Writers
Industry magazine publishing
Salary
Benefits flexible hours
Job Duration freelance
Job Location New York, NY
Job Requirements Writers must be updated on all of the industry happenings/events and any pertinent information. No professional experience necessary; students/interns also welcome.
About Our Company Groopeez Weekly will be launching in Jan 01.
Contact Frank Holder
Email Address
Frank@Groopeez.com
Address
P.O. Box 990304
Boston, MA 02199
USA
Phone
617-623-0451
Fax
617-628-5091
Special Instructions Please include resume in text of email, cover letters not necessary. |
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== UPDATE: UBO Snags $1.8 Million in Emergency Funding ==
http://www.atnewyork.com/news/article/0,1471,8471_504181,00.html
Read this
Too late for some of y'all right???
When does the next Urban Expose update happen??? |
hahahah UBO was mostly white, now that shit is funny, what are you fucking color blind? I was up in there on occasion and I can tell you, there were not too many of my cracker brethern in there, I would have been hard pressed to field a sports team of any nature.
Lady Jazz: no severce is not illegal, and moreoever is rather common in the high stakes gamble of the online world.
Suge: is it really you? say it's so, say it's so! |
Marcos Flores aka Ronin Ro aka Satan aka Arzie Hardin aka 360 Eye aka Lisa Warren aka Sheryl Dykeley (Dayumm, you got more skitzo goin' on den de whole entire Wu-Tang Clan, boy!):
If 'n ya gon' to continue plopping muchos kaka and pissing all o' deez people off wit ya postings -- 'specially when it's soooo obvious as ta who ya iz (check da patterns way back ta when Ro and 360 first parted ways if'n ya care to see da truth fo yaself peoples) -- then you should send Susan and Rachel away for a while. If unniceties should happen to happen o'side of ya nice suburban home, ya don't want dem dere ta see it, do ya? And ya can't think ya can keep on shittin' on ze world before some poor soul does ya in John Lennon-style, do ya?
Leave Dream alone. Ya hatred (jealousy?) is just downright uglee, muchacho. Leave Arzie, Sheryl, David and the rest of UBO family alone. They've got enuff to deal with w/o ya negativity. Leave Corey alone.Leave Adam alone. And definitely leave James Andrews alone -- he's freakin' harmless.
Stop putting their names up on de no buzz list.
Step 'way from da computer. Write sumpin' menaingfull. For all our sakes. Pleeze.
Ya truly were great once. Truly. But ya'z a shadow of ya former self due to hate, bro. Da 4 sins -- hatred, greed, envy, and lust -- have taken you down. We mourn your loss. It is a shame. It is. It is. It is. Truly.
Put de bottle down!
God bless us, everyone. You may now resume to your regularly scheduled hating.
P.S. : DC, stop giving RR inside info. We'll catch you right in QU -- ya know we get hectic. (Do you know how much Ro snaked you while pretending to be ya friend during his short-lived UBO days? If not, ask around. You know where to start.) |
hey
if you are an aka affiliate, you probably got that email from them about not getting paid by ubo, and, therefore, that aka and their attorneys are working through how to get the ad dollars ubo owes aka and affiliates. 2 truths:
1) aka is a creditor of ubo, affiliates are not. ubo owes the money to aka.
2) afflilates are creditors of aka and aka owes us dough on 11/15 whether or not ubo pays them. |
Lucky Luciano, if you want to insult me, that's fine. You want to accuse me of being other people? That's your right as an American citizen. All I can do is tell the truth and say I'm none of those people you listed. You want to claim I drink? Go right ahead. It's not true, but nothing else in your post was true, either. But leave my family out of it. |
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and icon still owes $ to past employees and creditors and freelancers etc... |
Mista Double R:
Pleeze lay down like tha dogg ya are, or you will be put down post haste. Ya don't drink? Pleeze. What will it take for ya ta admit the troof? Signed affadavits phrum mo'fo's who have shared brews wit ya n da past 6 months? Not a problem.
Ya not those other posters? It ain't but a chicken wang to have ya rest run up on, ya hard drive confiscated, and da evidence lef' fah da world ta see. This can and be very ugly an' painfull for you. Trust in those words right dere.
Phukk that fake gangsta bravado ya lifted from a Steven Segal flick (or your corny ass 'novel'), cuz ya know Suge got bigga fish to fry. But some otha niggas will see yo' ass wit' no delay. Trust. Don't make it happen.
Dis here iz da last poste and tha las' wurdz: Ya come back, under any name, sayin' anythang, insulting people's intelligence and/or rep and ya skirt will be pulled up. Trust.
f.a.l.a. |
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UBO Gets Final-Hour Reprieve
next
by Dakota Smith
Just hours after informing its employees that the site would close, Urban Box Office received a stay
of execution in the form of at least $1.8 million in interim financing late Friday.
The cash, received from past investors Chase Capitol Partners, Flatiron Partners, Quetzel/Chase
Capital Partners, and Eco Opportunity, is being used to pay UBO's 325 departing employees, and
retain a skeleton crew.
So, UBO isn't over?
"I sure hope not," said Fred Wilson, managing partner of Flatiron Partners, a major investor in UBO.
"We've got a lot of money in this company."
Wilson said he and fellow investors were heading to UBO's office this afternoon to discuss the urban
portal's future. Options included "selling of UBO as an entity, selling it off in pieces, in piecemeal
parts, or to continue to operate the whole thing," he said.
One ex-UBO employee, who asked not to be identified, told the Daily that UBO executives had
been whispering among themselves last week that the company's three most popular
sites--SOHH.com, Othervision, and Hairweb.com--would be kept, while the other UBO sites would be
pulled.
Reached in Texas, Joe Allen, a spokesman for Eco, said that Eco was considering whittling down UBO
by outsourcing the portal's technology department. "It takes the burden off the technology
development side," Allen said.
Flatiron's Wilson said some of the new cash is earmarked for UBO to employ 50 people essential to
the company.
"I don't want to imply that they've been hired back," Wilson said. "We would hope those 50 people
would want to work for the company."
Unprompted, Wilson addressed the rumors that CEO Adam Kidron should have stepped aside from
the struggling company months ago.
"That rumor is absolutely incorrect," Wilson said. "No one ever asked Adam to step aside. We
couldn't turn this company around and reorganize without his support. No has asked him to resign
and I hope he doesn't do this voluntarily."
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damn damn damn.......... |
This UBO stuff is PLAYED OUT. |
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I think we ex uboer's need to get together and firebomb the office. These bitches running ubo bascally ran the shit into the ground and fucked all of us during the worst possible time of the year. What the fuck! And the assholes responsible are still there! What the fuck! This shit was a straight up jack. Alot of people knew we was getting fucked and they just laughed in our faces like wasn't shit happening. I hope I'm not the only one that wants to see these assholes called out publicly. |
Luciano, you crossed the line. |
If in fact, any of the former posting about the last minute $1.8 million is true...then I have gone beyond aghast and disgusted.
I hope that the ugly karma which has created that horny toad Adam Kidron comes back to haunt him thrice over..that is disgusting, you send all your employees out on the street, then recall them?
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Lady Jazz,
I'm afraid it's true which is why I posted it. It came from Silicon Alley Daily and I'm sure you can find it on their website if you want to confirm it. I know you UBO'ers must be really angry. To think you guys got fired with no severence packages and then to have them hire some back. That's shitty. I was reading an article yesterday about employees of dot coms that went under and how they were spending their enormous severance packages. But it in your case (as well as my own) it seems like we were stiffed. But if I ever decide to work for another dot com again, I will make sure that this is in my contract. Take note!!! |
Magazine Publishers of America Job Fair 11/7/00
http://www.magazine.org/jobfair/ |
David Watkin is on the lose again. Whose company will he ruin next? |
Hey LL you're a big gangster. Maybe we'll see you around Rego Park, Queens. In the old neighborhood. |
Don't people have loved ones who live out there? |
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