MBC Group’s new CEO talks premium content, competing globally and going digital

The accelerated expansion of MBC GROUP that we witness through the phenomenal growth of the Shahid VIP platform will benefit the production industry of the Kingdom, says Marc Antoine d’Halluin, the new CEO of MBC GROUP. (Supplied)
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Updated 24 September 2020
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MBC Group’s new CEO talks premium content, competing globally and going digital

  • Marc Antoine: ‘We are content innovators showing openness and tolerance’

LONDON: For Marc Antoine d’Halluin, the new chief executive officer of the Middle East Broadcasting Center (MBC GROUP), premium content is king — especially when it came to the group’s upgraded streaming platform Shahid VIP.

“The volume of what we’re able to put on Shahid VIP is unique and I think the market discovered this at the same time that we were able to push some extremely strong content across our various channels,” the French native told Arab News in an exclusive interview.

Having taken over the reins of the company in January 2020, d’Halluin’s nine-month tenure has coincided with one of the most tumultuous times in history — but one of the most promising ones for media platforms.

The group’s huge growth has a lot to with d’Halluin’s strategy of taking advantage of the unprecedented position of having millions of consumers stranded at home due to the coronavirus with little to do but binge-watch television.

The lockdown, which was enforced months before the region’s highest media-consuming month of Ramadan, provided an opportunity to roll out the refurbished Video-On-Demand (AVOD & SVOD) streaming platform — a fine-tuned and state-of-the-art version of its predecessors Shahid and Shahid Plus — in a carefully coordinated marketing effort.

This position catapulted the platform’s paid customer base from a mere 100,000 subscribers in January 2020 to 1.4 million in April/May 2020 — that’s in less than three months.

“We were able to add other dimensions such as, for example, the availability to access our channels in the OTT (over-the-top) space that is part of the SVOD subscription, which of course provides our subscribers with the convenience of being able to watch our channels wherever they want, the ability to catch up as well as to access all our exclusive original content” d’Halluin said. OTT refers to media that is offered directly to viewers via the internet.

While lockdown restrictions have eased in most areas of the world and people are opting to stay out instead of cooped up indoors, the CEO explained that this is just the beginning of the journey.

“We have a multi-year business plan and we are expecting to reach 2 million subscribers by mid-2022, 5 million in four years from now, and to go beyond this target inside the region. We will also be aggressively pursuing growth of Shahid VIP subscribers outside the region,” he said. One of the key points of the plan is the recently launched English interface that allows MBC GROUP to tap into the US, Canadian and European markets.

Not only is pre-existing premium content crucial to retain subscribers and add new ones, d’Halluin explained, but so is producing new and exciting shows that resonate across the region.

“We like to believe that we are content innovators showing openness and tolerance, and I think television, and media in general, play a key role in showing important, positive aspects and society evolutions in the MENA region, so we have the intention of keeping that editorial line,” he said.




Marc Antoine d’Halluin. (Supplied)

“We are on our way to deliver such shows as our own ‘House of Cards,’ and there is going to be maybe three or four of them delivered next year and most of them are essentially high end dramas produced in-house by MBC STUDIOS but some outside producers also contribute some incredible quality,” he said. He added: “We’re proud to work with the very best producers in the region, upping their game to deliver more quality and more diverse storylines that you can expect to see inside Shahid VIP and on our TV channels.”

Without being able to divulge too much information about these shows, d’Halluin teased that one of them would be a Narcos-esque one — referring to the Netflix hit that chronicles the rise of the cocaine trade in Colombia and the gripping real-life stories of drug kingpins of the late 1980s, most notably Pablo Escobar. “We’ll soon be revealing a fiction series, inspired by a real Saudi story, at par with international crime series. It is a story that relates to the region with key roots in the Kingdom and it’s going to be very interesting to see how our subscribers react to it.”

“It will be the biggest premium series ever-produced regionally, the first series of its kind. And we know that our MBC channels and Shahid VIP will soon bring many more of such high-end series of international standard to our audiences.”

A Frenchman in the Mideast

The MBC GROUP CEO relishes the big opportunities and challenges that all countries face within the media sphere.

Coming from a background of working with Sony Pictures Entertainment and other reputed firms, in regions ranging from the UK, Scandinavia and the Middle East, d’Halluin believes this taught him about respecting local dimensions and cultures.

“I’m just glad that the various experiences I’ve had in my life come and bring me the right experience and expertise that I can put in the service of the collective effort at MBC,” he said.

“It’s a very interesting time in the history of the local regional media, which are becoming global at the same time that they are facing formidable global competitors. It’s a very exciting adventure that I’m proud to be a part of as the MBC Group has all it takes to compete very well globally leveraging its 30 years of content excellence and leadership. Working with Sheikh Waleed, our Chairman and with our Board members on our strategy is very inspiring and keeps us very focused.”

Among the changes being witnessed in the region is the February announcement of MBC GROUP opening a new headquarters in Riyadh in parallel to gradually producing more shows in Saudi Arabia.

“The accelerated expansion of MBC GROUP that we witness through the phenomenal growth of the Shahid VIP platform will benefit the production industry of the Kingdom,” he said. “We’re glad to be a local actor in the Kingdom where we are investing a lot in the local talent.”

Among these investments is the MBC ACADEMY, which is an initiative aimed at training, skill-sharpening and fast-tracking young Saudi talent in the content industry, focusing on scriptwriters, directors, producers and actors. 

“We want to find new scripts and we see some very promising material coming our way, and MBC ACADEMY is doing a great job at positioning MBC as a part of the young and vibrant Saudi community. And we will soon announce a new initiative in that space.”

Another big move was the announcement of MBC GROUP’s shift to MBC Media Services, an in-house advertising and sales organization, through its partnership with Engineer Holding Group (EHG). EHG will own a minority stake in MBC Media Services. This marks the end of its nearly 17-year relationship with Choueiri Group.

“It was a natural time for us, even though it wasn’t a simple decision to make, but we thought it was important to not only make that decision to bring our advertising sales in-house but, also to connect it deeper with our own market in Saudi, and the way we executed on that dimension was with the partnership with EHG that has, over the years, developed an extremely successful business with Al Arabia Outdoor.”

While MBC GROUP also decided to take a minority stake in Al Arabia Outdoor, d’Halluin explained that the two groups will keep operating separately, with dedicated ad sales teams that will be leveraging each other’s expertise only when relevant.

“Ultimately, what it does is that it will bring us closer to working with the local advertising community in the Kingdom without any intention to change our overall business model which is a pan-regional one with local executions.”

In the meantime, MBC’s focus on production promises exciting times that are yet to come in an ever-changing period. The Frenchman believes that the media giant’s push in original exclusive shows will surprise the region within the next 18 months.

“It’s a very big effort to make sure that the Kingdom keeps a ‘national, pan-regional and global champion’ in terms of a media group that can compete on a global basis with the very large streamers that are now coming into the region, and I think it’s for the benefit of the region, its culture, its production community but also to the benefit of our audiences,” he said.

“MBC has pivoted toward the digital space in a very coordinated way, a powerful way, and I’m glad that we’re on our way but the journey is still very long in front of us.”


Lawsuit against Meta asks if Facebook users have right to control their feeds using external tools

Updated 06 May 2024
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Lawsuit against Meta asks if Facebook users have right to control their feeds using external tools

  • The tool, called Unfollow Everything 2.0, is a browser extension that would let Facebook users unfollow friends, groups and pages and empty their newsfeed — the stream of posts, photos and videos that can keep them scrolling endlessly

Do social media users have the right to control what they see — or don’t see — on their feeds?
A lawsuit filed against Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. is arguing that a federal law often used to shield Internet companies from liability also allows people to use external tools to take control of their feed — even if that means shutting it off entirely.
The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University filed a lawsuit Wednesday against Meta Platforms on behalf of an Amherst professor who wants to release a tool that enables users to unfollow all the content fed to them by Facebook’s algorithm.
The tool, called Unfollow Everything 2.0, is a browser extension that would let Facebook users unfollow friends, groups and pages and empty their newsfeed — the stream of posts, photos and videos that can keep them scrolling endlessly. The idea is that without this constant, addicting stream of content, people might use it less. If the past is any indication, Meta will not be keen on the idea.
A UK developer, Louis Barclay, released a similar tool, called Unfollow Everything, but he took it down in 2021, fearing a lawsuit after receiving a cease-and-desist letter and a lifetime Facebook ban from Meta, then called Facebook Inc.
With Wednesday’s lawsuit, Ethan Zuckerman, a professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is trying to beat Meta to the legal punch to avoid getting sued by the social media giant over the browser extension.
“The reason it’s worth challenging Facebook on this is that right now we have very little control as users over how we use these networks,” Zuckerman said in an interview. “We basically get whatever controls Facebook wants. And that’s actually pretty different from how the Internet has worked historically.” Just think of email, which lets people use different email clients, or different web browsers, or anti-tracking software for people who don’t want to be tracked.
Meta declined to comment.
The lawsuit filed in federal court in California centers on a provision of Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which is often used to protect Internet companies from liability for things posted on their sites. A separate clause, though, provides immunity to software developers who create tools that “filter, screen, allow, or disallow content that the provider or user considers to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable.”
The lawsuit, in other words, asks the court to determine whether Facebook users’ news feed falls into the category of objectionable material that they should be able to filter out in order to enjoy the platform.
“Maybe CDA 230 provides us with this right to build tools to make your experience of Facebook or other social networks better and to give you more control over them,” said Zuckerman, who teaches public policy, communication and information at Amherst. “And you know what? If we’re able to establish that, that could really open up a new sphere of research and a new sphere of development. You might see people starting to build tools to make social networks work better for us.”
While Facebook does allow users to manually unfollow everything, the process can be cumbersome with hundreds or even thousands of friends, groups and businesses that people often follow.
Zuckerman also wants to study how turning off the news feed affects people’s experience on Facebook. Users would have to agree to take part in the study — using the browser tool does not automatically enroll participants.
“Social media companies can design their products as they want to, but users have the right to control their experience on social media platforms, including by blocking content they consider to be harmful,” said Ramya Krishnan, senior staff attorney at the Knight Institute. “Users don’t have to accept Facebook as it’s given to them. The same statute that immunizes Meta from liability for the speech of its users gives users the right to decide what they see on the platform.”


Netanyahu’s Cabinet votes to permanently close Al Jazeera offices in Israel

Updated 05 May 2024
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Netanyahu’s Cabinet votes to permanently close Al Jazeera offices in Israel

  • Vote comes amid deeply strained ties between Israel and the channel, which have worsened during the war against Hamas

TEL AVIV: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that his government has voted unanimously to shutter the offices of the Qatar-owned broadcaster Al Jazeera in Israel.
Netanyahu announced the decision on X, formerly Twitter. Details on when it would go into effect or whether it was permanent or temporary were not immediately clear.
The vote comes amid deeply strained ties between Israel and the channel, which have worsened during the war against Hamas.
It also comes as Qatar is helping to broker a cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas in the war in Gaza.


Warren Buffett says AI may be better for scammers than society. And he’s seen how

Updated 05 May 2024
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Warren Buffett says AI may be better for scammers than society. And he’s seen how

  • The billionaire investing guru predicted scammers will seize on the technology, and may do more harm with it than society can wring good

OMAHA, Nebraska: Warren Buffett cautioned the tens of thousands of shareholders who packed an arena for his annual meeting that artificial intelligence scams could become “the growth industry of all time.”
Doubling down on his cautionary words from last year, Buffett told the throngs he recently came face to face with the downside of AI. And it looked and sounded just like him. Someone made a fake video of Buffett, apparently convincing enough that the so-called Oracle of Omaha himself said he could imagine it tricking him into sending money overseas.
The billionaire investing guru predicted scammers will seize on the technology, and may do more harm with it than society can wring good.
“As someone who doesn’t understand a damn thing about it, it has enormous potential for good and enormous potential for harm and I just don’t know how that plays out,” he said.
EARNINGS BEFORE MUSINGS
The day started early Saturday with Berkshire Hathaway announcing a steep drop in earnings as the paper value of its investments plummeted and it pared its Apple holdings. The company reported a $12.7 billion profit, or $8.825 per Class A share, in first the quarter, down 64 percent from $35.5 billion, or $24,377 per A share a year ago.
But Buffett encourages investors to pay more attention to the conglomerate’s operating earnings from the companies it actually owns. Those jumped 39 percent to $11.222 billion, or $7,796.47 per Class A share, led by insurance companies’ performance.
None of it that got in the way of the fun.
Throngs flooded the arena to buy up Squishmallows of Buffett and former Vice Chairman Charlie Munger, who died last fall. The event attracts investors from all over the world and is unlike any other company meeting. Those attending for the first time are driven by an urgency to get here while the 93-year-old Buffett is still alive.
“This is one of the best events in the world to learn about investing. To learn from the gods of the industry,” said Akshay Bhansali, who spent the better part of two days traveling from India to Omaha.
A NOTABLE ABSENCE
Devotees come from all over the world to vacuum up tidbits of wisdom from Buffett, who famously dubbed the meeting ‘Woodstock for Capitalists.’
But a key ingredient was missing this year: It was the first meeting since Munger died.
The meeting opened with a video tribute highlighting some of his best known quotes, including classic lines like “If people weren’t so often wrong, we wouldn’t be so rich.” The video also featured skits the investors made with Hollywood stars over the years, including a “Desperate Housewives” spoof where one of the women introduced Munger as her boyfriend and another in which actress Jaimie Lee Curtis swooned over him.
As the video ended, the arena erupted in a prolonged standing ovation honoring Munger, whom Buffett called “the architect of Berkshire Hathaway.”
Buffett said Munger remained curious about the world up until the end of his life at 99, hosting dinner parties, meeting with people and holding regular Zoom calls.
“Like his hero Ben Franklin, Charlie wanted to understand everything,” Buffett said.
For decades, Munger and Buffett functioned as a classic comedy duo, with Buffett offering lengthy setups to Munger’s witty one-liners. He once referred to unproven Internet companies as “turds.”
Together, the pair transformed Berkshire from a floundering textile mill into a massive conglomerate made up of a variety of interests, from insurance companies such as Geico to BNSF railroad to several major utilities and an assortment of other companies.
Munger often summed up the key Berkshire’s success as “trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.” He and Buffett also were known for sticking to businesses they understood well.
“Warren always did at least 80 percent of the talking. But Charlie was a great foil,” said Stansberry Research analyst Whitney Tilson, who was looking forward to his 27th consecutive meeting.
NEXT GEN LEADERS

Munger’s absence, however, created space for shareholders to get to know better the two executives who directly oversee Berkshire’s companies: Ajit Jain, who manages the insurance units; and Abel, who handles everything else and has been named Buffett’s successor. The two shared the main stage with Buffett this year.
The first time Buffett kicked a question to Abel, he mistakenly said “Charlie?” Abel shrugged off the mistake and dove into the challenges utilities face from the increased risk of wildfires and some regulators’ reluctance to let them collect a reasonable profit.
Morningstar analyst Greggory Warren said he believes Abel spoke up more Saturday and let shareholders see some of the brilliance Berkshire executives talk about.
“Greg’s a rock star,” said Chris Bloomstran, president of Semper Augustus Investments Group. “The bench is deep. He won’t have the same humor at the meeting. But I think we all come here to get a reminder every year to be rational.”
A LOOK TO THE FUTURE
Buffett has made clear that Abel will be Berkshire’s next CEO, but he said Saturday that he had changed his opinion on how the company’s investment portfolio should be handled. He had previously said it would fall to two investment managers who handle small chunks of the portfolio now. On Saturday, Buffett endorsed Abel for the gig, as well as overseeing the operating businesses and any acquisitions.
“He understands businesses extremely well. and if you understand businesses, you understand common stocks,” Buffett said. Ultimately, it will be up to the board to decide, but the billionaire said he might come back and haunt them if they try to do it differently.
Overall, Buffett said Berkshire’s system of having all the noninsurance companies report to Abel and the insurers report to Jain is working well. He himself hardly gets any calls from managers anymore because they get more guidance from Abel and Jain.
“This place would work extremely well the next day if something happened to me,” Buffett said.
Nevertheless, the best applause line of the day was Buffett’s closing remark: “I not only hope that you come next year but I hope that I come next year.”


Lebanese security forces arrest ‘TikTok influencer’ using platform to lure, assault minors

Updated 03 May 2024
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Lebanese security forces arrest ‘TikTok influencer’ using platform to lure, assault minors

  • Lebanese police say they arrested six, including three minors, involved in sexual assaults against minors

LONDON: Lebanese authorities arrested on Wednesday six people for their alleged involvement in sexual assaults on children, sometimes using the video-sharing platform TikTok to lure minors.

The Internal Security Forces said in a statement that among those arrested was a “TikTok influencer,” who is also a hairdresser, according to local media.

The six suspects are reportedly part of a criminal network comprising around 30 individuals involved in assaults against at least 30 children.

The Lebanese police said in a statement that “based on information obtained by the Cybercrime Bureau of the Judicial Police, and following a complaint lodged by a number of minors with the Public Prosecutor’s Office concerning sexual assaults, compromising photos and incitement to take drugs by members of a gang, the bureau in question has been able to arrest, to date, six people in Beirut, Mount Lebanon and North Lebanon.”

The arrested suspects also include three minors of Lebanese, Turkish, and Syrian nationalities who were active on TikTok, according to the statement.

Highlighting that the case has been probed for about a month, the Lebanese police vowed that “the investigation is continuing with a view to arresting all members of the gang.”

The head of the network, a famous TikTok personality, purportedly abused his fame and invited children to shoot TikTok videos with him, the independent Lebanese TV channel Al-Jadeed reported.

The TikToker would cut the children’s hair to gain their trust before inviting them to a party, where his accomplices sexually assaulted the children.


Violence against environmental journalists rises: Report

Updated 03 May 2024
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Violence against environmental journalists rises: Report

  • State actors repsonsible for the attacks in most cases, says UNESCO

SANTIAGO: Journalists who report on environmental issues face increasing violence around the world from both state and private actors, UNESCO said on Thursday, highlighting that 44 of these journalists have been murdered between 2009 and 2023.
More than 70 percent of the 905 journalists the agency surveyed in 129 countries said they had been attacked, threatened or pressured, and that the violence against them had worsened — with 305 attacks reported in the last five years alone.
UNESCO, the UN cultural agency, listed in its report physical attacks such as injuries, arrests and harassment, as well as legal actions, including defamation lawsuits and criminal proceedings, among others.
At least 749 journalists, groups of journalists and media outlets have been attacked in 89 countries across all regions, its report said, with state actors being responsible for at least half and private for at least a quarter.
“State actors — police, military forces, government officials and employees, local authorities — are responsible for most of the attacks for which perpetrator information is available,” the report said.
These journalists were covering a wide range of topics, including protests, mining and land conflicts, logging and deforestation, extreme weather events, pollution and environmental damage, and the fossil fuel industry.
Men were more frequently attacked in general and women more frequently digitally, the report said.
Of the 44 journalists that were murdered in 15 countries while reporting on environmental issues, the report said only five cases resulted in convictions. Perpetrators remain unidentified in 19 of the 44 murders.
At least 24 journalists survived murder attempts.