WHEN A LOVELY BEACH, OR VIEW, IS NOT ENOUGH
By Erwin M. Mascariñas
BUTUAN CITY—In a bid to meet faltering targets, the Department of Tourism (DOT) in Caraga Region is beefing up its service-related training with added emphasis on first aid and life support services, as most of the tourism areas in the region are those that are island destinations, beach and coastal areas, lakes, waterfalls and riverways.
The focus makes eminent sense, since many a visitor in an island paradise has come to grief with the belated realization that awe-inspiring beaches are not enough for tourist offerings if the host cannot guarantee their safety in case of accidents or medical emergencies.
“We’ve stepped up our training, giving more focus on it since other tourist areas in Caraga Region, not considering Siargao, are still an emerging destination. The training we’ve provided will help prepare local guides and tourism personnel in our tourism destinations so that when we go full blast with our promotions, we are ready by capacitating our tourism frontline workers,” said Ivonnie B. Dumadag, Regional Director, DOT Caraga Regional Office 13.
Dumadag explained that the training will mostly cover seven days, touching different topics of interest tailored to fit the tourism experience offered in the area.
“The tour-guiding training that we are giving will be specific to that area, as each tourist destination that we have differs from one to another, they need to fit the needs of that area,” said Dumadag.
Jessie Mae Tolentino, Tourism Operations Officer 1 of the Training Unit of DOT Caraga Region, explained that the scope of the weeklong training covers a broader topic specifically tailored depending on the area.
“The trainings cover different topics; we have community tour guiding, cave guides training, eco-tourism guides, and even river guides. These trainings will en-
hance our local guides to facilitate better our tourists visiting their areas,” said Tolentino.
Tolentino cited as an example the recent training they had in the town of Del Carmen which offers guests a different tourism experience, such as exploring the town’s vast mangrove forest through their boardwalk tour.
“For example, we will give them the confidence to guide their guests and properly talk about the experience of walking through the mangrove forest using the walk pathway along the area. It is also best if the guide has more information and knowledge as to the topic and area they will talk about,” said Tolentino.
Tolentino explained that aside from giving the participants enough knowledge and skills, the goal is to prepare them for their work as tour guides and to be able to represent their respective destinations.
Basic life support training for tour guides
DUMADAG revealed that a big part of the community tour guiding training is the incorporation of basic life support and first aid.
“We have emphasized teaching our community tour guides the basics on how to rescue as they are the ones guiding their visitors in their area, and before help can arrive, at least they will be able to do something towards helping their guests,” said Dumadag, pointing out that the trainings are essential since most of the attractions across Caraga Region are coastal areas whether it is by sea, river systems, and lakes.
certifying training, we have also integrated our accreditation drive, including orientations on how to secure DOT accreditations all the way to navigating the process of application. That way, we don’t just train to capacitate, but also ensure that these enterprises conform to standards by getting themselves accredited.”
For the entire 2023, DOT Caraga has conducted 143 training sessions.
As of July 5, 2024, DOT Caraga has conducted 54 trainings, catering to 2,437 individuals with several more in the pipeline.
Tolentino, for her part, added that an example of fitting the training to their respective areas is the one they had last August in the towns of Del Carmen and Pilar, in Siargao Island where the basic life support was more inclined to water safety.
“The one we did in Del Carmen, part of the weeklong training on the 29 participants was teach-
ing the participants the basics of water survival, saving and rescuing drowning victims,” said Tolentino.
“With our island destinations, we have a separate training on Water Search and Rescue ( WASAR), but this has to be in coordination with the local disaster risk reduction and management office because they already have trained personnel in their municipality or their province on the skill set,” said Dumadag.
She added that, “we can’t completely cover all the towns in the region that has a coastal area catering to tourists as much as we want to, since the training cost is very expensive. That’s why we do this with the local government units since they will help counterpart in the cost.”
The DOT regional office is also advocating for boat operators to have their training on WASAR, as it will be essential in ferrying guests and tourists to the different islandhopping sites and destinations.
TOURIST guides from the town of Del Carmen on Siargao Island get trained in basic life support and first aid in water safety from personnel of the Department of Tourism (DOT) in Caraga Region. ERWIN M. MASCARIÑAS
AI can only do 5% of jobs, says MIT economist who fears crash
DBy Jeran Wittenstein | Bloomberg
ARON ACEMOGLU wants to make clear right away that he has nothing against artificial intelligence. He gets the potential. “I’m not an AI pessimist,” he declares seconds into an interview.
What makes Acemoglu, a renowned professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, come off as a doomsayer locked in on the mounting economic and financial perils ahead, is the unrelenting hype around the technology and the way it’s fueling an investment boom and furious tech stock rally.
As promising as AI may be, there’s little chance it will live up to that hype, Acemoglu says. By his calculation, only a small percent of all jobs—a mere 5%—is ripe to be taken over, or at least heavily aided, by AI over the next decade. Good news for workers, true, but very bad for the companies sinking billions into the technology expecting it to drive a surge in productivity.
“A lot of money is going to get wasted,” says Acemoglu. “You’re not going to get an economic revolution out of that 5%.”
Acemoglu has become one of the louder, and more high profile, voices warning that the AI frenzy on Wall Street and in C-suites across America has gone too far. An Institute Professor, the highest title for faculty at MIT, Acemoglu first made a name for himself beyond academic circles a decade ago when he co-authored Why Nations Fail, a New York Times bestselling book. AI, and the advent of new technologies, more broadly, have figured prominently in his economics work for years.
ACEMOGLU: “A lot of money is going to get wasted.”
The bulls argue that AI will allow businesses to automate a big chunk of work tasks and spark a new era of medical and scientific breakthroughs as the technology keeps improving. Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, a company whose very name has become synonymous with the AI boom, has projected that rising demand for the technology’s services from a broader range of companies and governments will require as much $1 trillion in spending to upgrade data center equipment in coming years. Skepticism about these sorts of claims has started to mount—in part because investments in AI have driven up costs much faster than revenue at companies like Microsoft and Amazon—but most investors remain willing to pay lofty premiums for stocks poised to ride the AI wave.
Acemoglu envisions three ways the AI story could play out in coming years.
• The first—and by far most benign—scenario calls for the hype to slowly cool and investments in “modest” uses of the technology to take hold.
• In the second scenario, the frenzy builds for another year or so, leading to a tech stock crash that leaves investors, executives and students disillusioned with the technology. “AI spring followed by AI winter,” he calls this one.
• The third—and scariest— scenario is that the mania goes unchecked for years, leading companies to cut scores of jobs and pump hundreds of billions of dollars into AI “without understanding what they’re going to do with it,” only to be left scrambling to try to rehire workers when the technology doesn’t pan out. “Now there are widespread negative outcomes for the whole economy.”
The most likely? He figures it’s some combination of the second and third scenarios. Inside C-suites, there’s just too much fear of missing out on the AI boom to envision the hype machine slowing down any time soon, he says, and “when the hype gets intensified, the fall is unlikely to be soft.”
Second-quarter figures illustrate the magnitude of the spending frenzy. Four companies alone—Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon and Meta Platforms—invested more than $50 billion into capital spending in the quarter, with much of that going toward AI.
Today’s large language models like OpenAI’s ChatGPT are impressive in many respects, Acemoglu says. So why can’t they replace humans, or at least help them a lot, at many jobs? He points to reliability issues and a lack of human-level wisdom or judgment, which will make people unlikely to outsource many white-collar jobs to AI anytime soon. Nor is AI going to be able to automate physical jobs like construction or janitorial, he says.
“You need highly reliable information or the ability of these models to faithfully implement certain steps that previously workers were doing,” he said. “They can do that in a few places with some human supervisory oversight”— like coding—“but in most places they cannot.”
“That’s a reality check for where we are right now,” he said.
Editor: Angel R. Calso
The shadow players: How private warehouses squeeze the $15 trillion global metals market
By Mark Burton, Alfred Cang, Archie Hunter & Jack Farchy
IN 2002, the metals industry was jolted into uproar, after a US warehouse owner announced it would start charging a fee to safely buckle up each cargo being trucked from its depots in the London Metal Exchange’s storage network.
Overnight, traders trying to access metal backing the LME’s futures contracts were hit with tens of thousands of dollars in extra costs for work that took a matter of minutes. If any refused to pay, their metal stayed put, meaning the warehouse could keep charging rent. After furious complaints, Metro International Trade Services was reprimanded by the LME for charging to discourage withdrawals from its sheds.
A decade later, Metro was catapulted into the public consciousness at the center of a far bigger firestorm—blamed for orchestrating aluminum delivery backlogs that roiled the LME and at their peak stretched for longer than two years as rivals followed suit. Executives from Metro and then-owner Goldman Sachs Group Inc. were among those dragged to a US Senate inquiry and accused of predatory behavior that distorted rawmaterial prices for everyone from carmakers to beer companies.
Now, as the metals world converges on London for its annual LME Week gathering, the industry is again fighting over a contentious warehouse fee. And at the heart of the latest controversy lie some of the very same people.
It’s a story that highlights how a small handful of largely private warehouse companies play a critical role in the LME— and how one group of warehouse operators in particular have spent decades finding ways to push the exchange’s rules to the limit in order to maximize their own profits.
Now working at Istim Metals LLC (named for the initials of Metro, backwards) they have introduced a charge that some say is contributing to a squeeze in the aluminum market that is threatening to come to a head in the next two weeks. The situation has drawn in global players including Citigroup Inc. and Squarepoint Capital LLP, and the LME is fielding complaints of unfair practices from some members. At least one party has complained to the UK’s financial regulator.
Metro itself has new owners and managers and a far lower profile today. Michael Whelan, whose father William founded Metro, now runs Istim. Much as Metro once dominated LME warehousing, today Istim is so important to the LME ecosystem that it stores roughly half the metal in the exchange’s global network.
Over more than two decades, the Whelan family have become crucial players in metals markets thanks in part to a knack for finding wriggle room in the LME system to attract metal into their sheds and keep it there. The tactics pioneered
by first Metro and then Istim shaped the way the market has evolved, leaving rivals following behind and forcing the LME to adjust the rules to keep up.
This story is based on interviews with more than two dozen current and former metals insiders, most of whom asked not to be identified discussing private dealings. Whelan and Istim are described in terms ranging from anger to admiration— and often both. Depending on who you talk to, they are either the bad boys of metals warehousing, or its creative geniuses.
“The sad truth is everyone has learnt to love it, because they’ve realized that these inefficiencies of the market can be traded very profitably,” says a veteran metals trader who lodged a complaint about Metro’s handling fees in 2002 but is contractually restricted from publicly discussing his work at the time. “I shake my head, but in the end, what else would you expect traders to do?”
Istim, Citigroup, Squarepoint and the LME all declined to comment for this story.
The network of privately run warehouses licensed by the LME is designed to ensure that prices on the exchange don’t swing too far from conditions in real-world metal markets, and it serves as a backstop for consumers who need metal at short notice, or producers who want to offload it.
Yet despite its significance as the marketplace where global benchmarks for aluminum, copper and nickel are set—the total notional value of contracts traded in a year is $15 trillion— the LME and its warehouse system regularly turn into a playground for traders.
The games have heated up over the past year, as oversupplied markets meant stockpiles got bigger and a wide discount between spot and futures prices across the key markets creates opportunities to profit by holding onto metal. The more metal that traders have to work with, the more effective their chess moves can be— and the more lucrative they become for rent-hungry warehouses.
In May, Trafigura Group dumped a huge stash of aluminum on to the LME at Port Klang, Malaysia. The move sent the market lurching and was a huge windfall for Istim, but rival players including Squarepoint and Citigroup quickly lined up to withdraw the stockpile, creating a queue that stood at more than nine months by the end of August. For buyers, queues are inconvenient if they need the metal urgently. But LME rules also say that anyone waiting for more than 80 days can stop paying rent, which means that
extra-long backlogs can actually be profitable plays.
If prices shot up, the traders assumed they would re-deliver their metal to the LME. That’s just what happened over the past couple of months, as a spurt of buying sent prices for the main October contract jumping to a premium over the following month.
But Istim raised the cost of reregistering metal to $50 a ton, making the maneuver significantly costlier. (The industry norm is $5 to $10. While the LME sets a cap on the rent warehouses in its system can charge, it does not for fees to reregister metal.)
Critics have suggested the charge is intended as a deterrent against removing stock from Istim sheds, and that it is distorting prices on the LME by slowing re-registrations. In its defense, people close to Istim say it’s working within the rules to protect its profits in a low-margin business, and that it’s told customers the charge is negotiable. They argue it’s the traders who are abusing LME rules for free rent.
The company has since halved the fee after receiving an inquiry from the LME, but it’s still roughly three times higher than the norm.
The clash has also revived questions about the potential for conflicts of interest between storage companies and their biggest customers. It’s common practice for warehouses to offer a large slice of their rent— often about half— to the trader that originally delivered the metal, for as long as it remains in the warehouse. That means both parties stand to benefit the longer the metal stays put.
Long position
TRAFIGURA is also a key actor in the current aluminum market, after taking out a large long position in the LME’s key monthly aluminum contract for delivery in mid-October, according to people familiar with the matter.
LME data shows a single long position with more than 30% of the main contract due for delivery in the middle of the month, meaning it would be entitled to scoop up at least 550,000 tons of aluminum if it holds the contracts to expiry. That’s more than the amount currently available in the LME’s global warehousing system, and prices for those October contracts have continued jumping—further squeezing the traders in the queue.
Trafigura declined to comment.
For the LME, the shenanigans are an ongoing headache, as it is forced to adjudicate disputes and keep a wary eye on any threats to the orderliness of its market. Yet the exchange’s executives are also keenly aware of the importance of the small handful of companies like Istim that can handle the large mounds of metal flowing through the warehouse system.
At least one party has filed a complaint with the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, according to people familiar with the matter. The FCA declined to comment.
Merry-go-round trades FOR warehousing companies,
business is a constant grind to attract stocks into their sheds and keep it there as long as possible.
When aluminum demand plunged after the global financial crisis, Metro struck deals with traders and producers to stash more than a million tons of unwanted metal in warehouses in Detroit. Rental income started pouring in, and the windfall was so large that it attracted the attention of Goldman Sachs, which bought Metro for $451 million in 2010. (Michael Whelan and Metro CEO Chris Wibbelman stayed on after the sale.)
But it was the plan to keep the metal where it was that catapulted Metro and Goldman into the global spotlight.
The company spotted a nowinfamous clause in LME regulations: the minimum daily load-out rate to fulfill metal withdrawals could also be read as a maximum.
The discovery, combined with incentives that encouraged “merry-go-round” trades—simply moving metal between sheds—served to kickstart a queue for metal that
quickly multiplied across the industry as other traders and warehouses followed.
“It affected not just the North American market but the global market,” said Nick Madden, who at the time was the largest individual buyer of aluminum in the world, as head of purchasing at Novelis Inc. “It was a stark reminder that whatever happens on the LME impacts everyone in the aluminum industry.”
In the wake of the fallout, Goldman sold Metro, which eventually agreed to pay $10 million in a settlement with the LME over the saga.
Michael Whelan, who is now 50, had resigned from Metro by the time the scandal reached fever pitch. He founded the Pilgrimage Music Festival, which is also backed by Justin Timberlake, and has also since invested in a chain of taco stands and a boutique hotel, as well as a copper recycling plant in Spain.
By 2014 Whelan was back in the warehouse business and running Istim. Ex-Metro CEO Wibbelman is also still working closely with the family,
but has become less active in the LME warehousing industry. Back then, the hot game in warehousing was rent sharing. Istim soon muscled in on the action, using the incentives to strike deals for new mountains of metal.
Rent sharing is now widely practiced by warehouse firms across the industry and is a key factor in the calculations for traders trying to make money out of the warehousing system. It’s also a regular annoyance for the LME, which rolled out rules in 2019 restricting how the incentives can be used. At times, however, such as during a 2019 run-in with Glencore Plc, the LME has also sided with Istim during disputes.
“The LME always do what they can to respond to the challenges, but it’s like squeezing a balloon—the air is just going to move somewhere and another problem will appear,” said Madden, the former Novelis executive. “At the end of the day, they can’t change the mindset of the people involved in the market.
Bloomberg News
IronNet’s billion-dollar bubble bursts: Cybersecurity firm founded by ex-NSA chief collapses amid financial scandal
By Alan Suderman The Associated Press
WASHINGTON—The future was once dazzling for IronNet. Founded by a former director of the National Security Agency and stacked with elite members of the US intelligence establishment, IronNet promised it was going to revolutionize the way governments and corporations combat cyberattacks.
Its pitch—combining the prowess of ex-government hackers with cutting-edge software—was initially a hit. Shortly after going public in 2021, the company’s value shot past $3 billion.
Yet, as blazing as IronNet started, it burned out.
Last September the neverprofitable company announced it was shutting down and firing its employees after running out of money, providing yet another example of a tech firm that faltered after failing to deliver on overhyped promises.
The firm’s crash has left behind a trail of bitter investors and former employees who remain angry at the company and believe it misled them about its financial health.
IronNet’s rise and fall also raises questions about the judgment of its wellcredentialed leaders, a who’s who of the national security establishment. National security experts, former employees and analysts told The Associated Press that the firm collapsed, in part, because it engaged in questionable business practices, produced subpar products and services, and entered into associations that could have left the firm vulnerable to meddling by the Kremlin.
“I’m honestly ashamed that I was ever an executive at that company,” said Mark Berly, a former IronNet vice president. He said the company’s top leaders cultivated a culture of deceit “just like Theranos,” the once highly touted blood-testing firm that became a symbol of corporate fraud.
IronNet’s collapse ranks as one of the most high-profile flameouts in the history of cybersecurity, said Richard Stiennon, a longtime industry analyst. The main reason for its fall, he said: “hubris.”
“The company got what was coming to” it, Stiennon said.
IronNet and top former company officials either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment.
The general IRONNET’S founder and former CEO Keith Alexander is a West Point graduate who retired as a four-star Army general and was once one of the most powerful figures in US intelligence. He oversaw an unprecedented expansion of the NSA’s digital spying around the world when he led the US’s largest intelligence agency for nearly a decade.
Alexander, who retired from the government in 2014, remains a prominent voice on cybersecurity and intelligence
matters and sits on the board of the tech giant Amazon. Alexander did not respond to requests for comment.
IronNet’s board has included Mike McConnell, a former director of both the NSA and national intelligence; Jack Keane, a retired four-star general and Army vice chief of staff, and Mike Rogers, the former Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee who is running for the US Senate in Michigan. One of IronNet’s first presidents and co-founders was Matt Olsen, who left the company in 2018 and leads the Justice Department’s National Security Division.
Alexander’s reputation and the company’s all-star lineup ensured IronNet stood out in a competitive market as it sought contracts in the finance and energy sectors, as well as with the US government and others in Asia and the Middle East.
IronNet marketed itself as a kind of private version of the NSA. By scanning the networks of multiple customers, the company claimed, IronNet’s advanced software and skilled staff could spot signals and patterns of sophisticated hackers that a single company couldn’t do alone. The company dubbed the approach the “Collective Defense Platform.”
The South African VENTURE capital firms were eager to invest. Among IronNet’s biggest early boosters was C5 Capital, an investment firm started and run by Andre Pienaar, a South African who had spent years serving the needs of the ultrarich while cultivating business relationships with former top national security officials.
C5’s operating partners— essentially expert advisers— include former Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen and Sir Iain Lobban, who used to lead the UK’s signals intelligence agency equivalent to the NSA. Former C5 operating partners include National Cyber Director Harry Coker Jr. and Ronald Moultrie, who resigned earlier this year as undersecretary of defense for intelligence and security.
Prior to going into venture capital, Pienaar was a private investigator and started a firm called G3 Good Governance Group whose clients included blue chip companies, wealthy individuals and the British royal family. Pienaar also worked at the time to help Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg cement relationships with London’s rich and famous, according to William Lofgren, a former CIA
officer and G3 co-founder.
“The relationship was steady and frequent because both Andre and Vekselberg saw merit in it,” said Lofgren.
Pienaar also helped Vekselberg win a share of a South African manganese mine in 2005 and then later served as one of the oligarch’s representatives on the mine’s board of directors until early 2018, internal G3 records and South African business records show.
Vekselberg has been sanctioned twice by the US government, first in April 2018 and again in March 2022. The US Treasury Department has accused him of taking part in “soft power activities on behalf of the Kremlin.”
In 2014, the FBI publicly warned in an op-ed that a Vekselberg-led foundation may be “a means for the Russian government to access our nation’s sensitive or classified research.”
Pienaar’s long association with Vekselberg should have disqualified him from investing in IronNet, which was seeking highly sensitive US defense contracts, former intelligence officials said.
The company’s leaders “absolutely should have known better,” said Bob Baer, a former CIA officer.
He added that Russian intelligence services would have had a strong interest in a company like IronNet and have a history of using oligarchs like Vekselberg to do their bidding, either directly or through witting or unwitting proxies.
Pienaar also sponsored a swanky Russian music festival that Vekselberg and a close associate, Vladimir Kuznetsov, put on in Switzerland.
Kuznetsov, who served as a key investment adviser to Vekselberg, was also an investor in Pienaar’s investment firm.
Alexander and others at IronNet either did not know the details of Pienaar’s relationships with Vekselberg or did not find them troubling: A month after Vekselberg was first sanctioned in 2018, Pienaar joined IronNet’s board and C5 announced it was putting in a $35 million investment.
C5’s investment would grow to $60 million by the time IronNet went public, giving the investment firm around a 7 percent stake in the company.
Vekselberg did not respond to requests for comment.
Kuznetsov told the AP he stopped speaking to Pienaar about five years ago but did not say why.
“I’m not commenting on that,” Kuznetsov said.
Pienaar’s attorneys said he has never had a relationship with Vekselberg. The lawyers said the mine’s filings with the South African government’s regulatory agency that listed Pienaar as a director were incorrect and should be “viewed
as suspect” because news reports indicated the agency has been hacked.
Pienaar filed a defamation lawsuit last year against an Associated Press reporter who sought interviews with Pienaar’s former associates. The AP said the suit, which remains pending, was meritless and an attempt to stifle legitimate reporting.
The fall NOT long after Alexander rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange in September 2021, IronNet’s stock price soared, making its founders and early investors extremely wealthy on paper.
Top officials were prohibited from unloading their stock for several months, but Alexander was allowed to sell a small amount of his shares. He made about $5 million in early stock sales and bought a Florida mansion worth the same amount.
IronNet was projecting exponential growth that required the company to land a handful of major contracts, according to confidential board documents obtained by the AP.
Those prospective deals included one valued at up to $10 million to provide cybersecurity for the US Navy’s contractors and a more than $22 million deal with the government of Kuwait.
It did not take long for IronNet’s promises to slam into a tough reality as it failed to land large deals and meet revenue projections. Its products simply didn’t live up to the hype, according to former employees, experts and analysts.
Stiennon, the cybersecurity investing expert, said IronNet’s ideas about gathering threat data from multiple clients were not unique and the company’s biggest draw was Alexander’s “aura” as a former NSA director.
The AP interviewed several former IronNet employees who said the company hired wellqualified technicians to design products that showed promise, but executives did not invest the time or resources to fully develop the technology.
When IronNet tried to land contracts with the NSA, officials dismissed the company’s offerings as unserious, according to a former member of US Cyber Command who was at the meeting but not authorized to discuss government procurement proceedings publicly.
The failure to win large contracts quickly derailed IronNet’s growth plans. In December 2021, just a few months after going public, IronNet downgraded its annual recurring revenue projections by 60 percent.
Another sign that things were not well: IronNet and C5 were engaging in a questionable business practice in an apparent effort to juice the cybersecurity firm’s revenues, according to C5 records and interviews with
former employees at both firms.
In addition to being a major investor, C5 was also one of IronNet’s biggest customers, accounting for a significant part of the cybersecurity firm’s revenue when it went public.
C5 had signed two multi-year customer contracts with IronNet for $5.2 million, according to internal C5 records.
Contracts of that size were typical for large clients with thousands of employees, not a small investment firm like C5 that had a couple dozen employees and partners, former IronNet employees said.
“That’s an inflated number,” said Eddie Potter, a former top sales executive at IronNet, when told by the AP of the size of C5’s contracts with IronNet. He added there was “no way” that C5 required services “worth $5 million.”
Indeed, one C5 internal record obtained by the AP shows it budgeted only about $50,000 a year for IronNet’s services.
Pienaar’s attorneys said C5’s contracts with IronNet were to help protect the UK government’s hospitals and other entities against “escalating cyberattacks during the Covid-19 pandemic.” His attorneys said the work was coordinated through a charity Pienaar and C5 created in 2020. Securities and Exchange Commission filings and C5 records show C5’s contracts with IronNet were signed in the summer and fall of 2019—several months before the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. Pienaar’s attorneys said Alexander and Pienaar were “briefed on the shocking scale of hostile nation-state cyberattacks on hospitals” in 2019, which created the “foundation” for IronNet’s work with C5.
Pienaar’s charity never registered with the IRS, as one of Pienaar’s companies claimed in UK business filings, and former C5 and IronNet officials said they did not see it do any substantive work.
“It was marketing, fluffy crap,” said Rob Mathieson, a former IronNet vice president.
Pienaar’s attorneys said his charity was successful but there was “insufficient time” for it to register with the IRS.
After reporting millions in revenue from C5 from 2020 to 2023, IronNet wrote off $1.3 million from C5 in what the cybersecurity firm claimed was “bad debt,” IronNet’s filings with the SEC show. Pienaar’s attorneys said the write-off represented a reduction in the cost of providing services to his charity and denied that C5 had not fulfilled its financial obligations to IronNet.
IronNet was not alone in having trouble getting money from Pienaar and his firms.
A group of nuns sued C5 in 2022, court records show, alleging it failed to return their $2.5 million investment in a tech incubator that Pienaar had promoted as a way to boost socially conscious start-ups. C5 agreed to refund the nuns’ investment, plus attorney fees and expenses, to settle the lawsuit, records show. The nuns’ financial adviser, Carolyn LaRocco, told the AP that Pienaar used the nuns’ investment to pay expenses she believed were unwarranted.
An affiliate of the United States Institute of Peace, a nonprofit established by
Congress, sued Pienaar in 2020 after he failed to pay a promised $1.5 million personal donation, federal court records show. The nonprofit’s affiliate then took Pienaar back to court after he failed to make payments on time as part of a settlement. Pienaar used $500,000 from a C5 bank account to meet a court-ordered deadline for payment, court records show. C5 staff were concerned about Pienaar’s use of the firm’s funds to cover his personal debt, according to C5 records.
In the last year, Pienaarcontrolled entities have been sued by a top former CIA executive who alleged C5 owed him back wages and a Washington landlord who accused Pienaar’s firms of failing to pay more than $140,000 in rent and associated costs. The suits were dismissed soon after they were filed, indicating the parties likely settled, court records show. A lawsuit recently filed by a financial services firm alleges C5 owes it more than $1 million in unpaid debts.
The crash After slashing revenue projections in December 2021, Alexander tried to project confidence and said IronNet was still on track to see its revenue rise. It didn’t work. IronNet’s stock went into a prolonged skid and the company underwent multiple rounds of layoffs.
In April 2022, the company was hit with a class-action lawsuit from investors who alleged IronNet had fraudulently inflated its revenue projections to boost its stock price. The company has denied any wrongdoing but recently agreed to pay $6.6 million to settle the lawsuit, according to a proposed settlement filed in federal court. Alexander told Bloomberg News this past January that IronNet’s troubles stemmed in part from his naivety about how the business world worked. C5 began loaning money to IronNet to keep it afloat starting at the end of 2022 while Pienaar continued to try and boost the company’s brand.
In September of last year, IronNet announced it had run out of money and was closing its doors.
A Pienaar-controlled entity stepped in shortly afterwards with $10 million in loans to allow the company to restructure via bankruptcy.
A dramatically scaleddown version of IronNet led by Pienaar’s allies went private in February and announced Alexander had stepped down as chairman of the board.
Pienaar remains bullish on the company, which he said continues to successfully protect clients in the US and Europe from cyber threats. IronNet’s more recent activities have included looking to partner with the government of Ukraine.
“Any accusation that IronNet has been anything other than successful is categorically false,” his attorneys told the AP.
Many of C5’s investors and former employees are baffled by Pienaar’s continued heavy bets on IronNet after it has been soundly rejected by the market. During bankruptcy proceedings earlier this year, an investment bank approached 114 prospective buyers for IronNet, federal court records show. None of them made an offer.
‘Metrology
can be a career path for students’
AT the beginning of the tech forum organized by the Department of Science and Technology-Industrial Technology Development Institute (DOSTITDI) titled “Beyond Measure: The Basics of Metrology,” the host, Science Research Specialist II Janesky O. Esplana, asked the participants if they were familiar with the term “metrology.”
Only a few participants raised their hands.
Esplana noted that some might even confuse metrology with meteorology, which is a different branch of science.
To raise awareness among the youth on metrology, DOST-ITDI recently held a forum at the Philippine International Convention Center Forum Tent in Pasay City. The forum was part of the second National Youth Science, Technology, and Innovation Festival (NYSTIF).
DOST-ITDI Director Annabelle V. Briones in her remarks emphasized that accurate measurements are crucial for achieving reliable results and successful outcomes, whether in developing new technologies, conducting innovative research, or addressing real-world challenges, the DOST-ITDI said in a news release.
Aligned with NYSTIF’s goal of promoting science and technology (S&T) among the youth, Briones envisioned the forum as an opportunity for students to view metrology as a potential pathway toward pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).
Dr. Maryness I. Salazar, Supervising Science Research Specialist at the DOSTITDI National Metrology Division, in her discussion during the forum, described metrology as “the foundation for scientific accuracy and technological advancement, playing a pivotal role in everyday life through measurements.”
Salazar also provided an overview of metrology through its history, key categories, essential concepts, including the measures and International System of Units.
She also discussed the practical applications of metrology in various sectors, including healthcare, automotive industries, supermarkets, and power plants.
She allowed the students to experience the field in a vibrant, innovative, brilliant, and engaging (VIBE) way through metrological demonstrations and interactive games and activities.
Dr. Janet F. Quizon, OIC of the Office of the Deputy Director for Administrative and Technical Services, explained how metrology is not just about numbers and measuring instruments as it is fundamentally tied to every field of science and engineering.
“I hope you have been inspired by the expertise shared today by our speaker, [Salazar], and have gained a new perspective on how metrology intersects with your studies and future careers,” she said.
Themed “STEM VIBE: Engaging the Youth in Providing Solutions and Opening Opportunities,” NYSTIF aims to enhance youth appreciation and awareness of science, technology, and innovation.
It also allowed the youth to experience STEM in a VIBE way to inspire them to pursue careers in these fields.
National metrology lab HIGHLIGHTING metrology’s role in S&Trelated activities in the country, the National Metrology Laboratory is a Philippine government agency operating under the DOST-ITDI. It is mandated to establish, maintain, and disseminate national measurement standards for various physical standards, such as mass, temperature, pressure, voltage, frequency, length, and luminous intensity.
NML also serves as a bridge to the global metrology system through the country’s participation in the Metre Convention as an Associate State of the General Conference on Weights and Measures. Rudy P. Parel Jr./S&T Media Service
By Manuel T. Cayon
CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY—The newest science laboratory at the Xavier University in this city has ignited a flint of promise for a greener environment for the Northern Mindanao region, addressing the critical question on optimizing the use of municipal and industrial wastes while generating energy in the process.
The laboratory at the university’s Department of Chemical Engineering is refining the waste-to-energy technology. Unlike the conventional technology, it will skip the incineration process, focusing instead on deriving hydrogen from waste water generated by factories and plantations.
The Green Biohydrogen to Energy (Green Bio-H2E) Research and Development Laboratory (R&D Lab) would then use the biohydrogen as the main resource for energy, mainly in the form of electricity, offering a promise for the Philippines to derive an alternative source of power that is clean and renewable “right from our backyard.”
High hopes
THE Green Bio-H2E laboratory developed from the urgent concerns and needs not only of the highly urbanized Cagayan de Oro City but also for the entire Northern MIndanao, whose 5.02 million population either have to brace the risk of the environment impact of the solid and liquid wastes generated by the factories and plantations.
Or, whose wastes are themselves generated by the households, which are a major source of waste water that have been always dumped back into the environment.
“It has to be addressed in a cleaner and sustainable way because domestic waste water alone is mostly coming from the households.” said Dr. Shierlyn S. Paclijan, the project leader of the Green Bio-H2E R&D Lab. Treating waste water, Paclijan added, “would cost a lot of energy, and that finding or sourcing it is a need that has become as pressing as ever.”
As cities struggle with mounting solid waste turning their sanitary landfills into mountains of trash, Paclijan said the laboratory would help reduce the accumulation of toxic liquid waste, like leachate, from the landfills before they percolate underground, and from the waterways before draining out to the seas or oceans.
Because of the extraction of the liquid waste, it would turn out most likely that the trash may be sent further to the next useful form, like raw materials for fertilizer or waste-catching dry bed for animal manure.
Rather than the trash thrown directly to the landfill, extracting the garbage for their green hydrogen content may be the next best thing for Northern Mindanao to slow down the accumulation of solid waste.
Paclijan said the trash collection would concentrate on extracting their liquid content to be subjected to microbial electrolysis, the emerging technology to derive the green hydrogen, the cleaner version of hydrogen used in power plants.
Electrolysis will break down the molecules into their basic atomic elements to extract hydrogen, to derive the resource for energy storage, and to break down further the erstwhile unusable garbage to other uses.
“We are returning the resources back to
Will ‘kawayarn’ be the next big thing in home goods biz in PHL?
By Geraldine Bulaon-Ducusin
THE Philippine bamboo textile, known as “kawayarn,” is a government innovation that can potentially impact the home furniture and interior design markets.
This is based on data and researches conducted by the Department of Science and Technology-Philippine Textile Research Institute (DOST-PTRI).
According to DOST-PTRI Director Julius L. Leaño Jr., bamboo is strong, sustainable, and perfectly suited for durable goods like furnitures.
Bamboo has the properties of yarn. It works better in thicker yarn assembly, resulting in thicker fabric construction, which is suitable for home textiles.
Kawayarn—short for kawayan (bamboo) and yarn—is not just another textile. It is a solution that offers a balance between sustainability, function, and aesthetics.
Bamboo textile fibers are naturally tenacious and breathable, which makes them ideal for fashion and home applications.
Environmentally, kawayarn has a significantly lower carbon footprint than many synthetic alternatives or even other natural textile fibers.
Bamboo is a very efficient carbon sequestrant, or agent that binds. It also has a higher textile fiber yield per kilogram input.
Economically, by choosing
the environment in a clean slate to enhance the circular economy, a principle given due recognition by the United Nations Development Programme [UNDP] Philippines for ensuring a sustainable environment.
“We will see in the immediate future how many factories or plantations may tap this clean and renewable technology to address their mounting waste generated from their specific production activities,” said Engr. Hercules R. Gascon, dean of Xavier University College of Engineering.
The Lab
THE Green Bio-H2E R&D Lab has already acquired the basic chemistry equipment like the dark fermentation gadget and the microbial electrolysis cells and microscopes.
It was given a space in the engineering building and a funding of P6.332 million, withP1.32 million coming from the university, and P4.99 million from the Philippine Council for Industry, Energy, and Emerging
kawayarn, businesses are supporting the local farmers and contributing to the gradual, yet sustainable shift to a circular textile economy, which operates on the responsible production, consumption and inclusive mode of revitalizing the industry.
The Bamboo Textile PH Program was conceptualized as part of the government’s initiative to explore sustainable and locally available raw materials that can revitalize and spur innovation for the Philippine textile industry.
It was chosen for its promising and robust natural textile fiber source because it is abundant and versatile.
The brand Kawayarn gained momentum only in 2023, when DOSTPTRI needed to focus on local resources. But the research process began even before the pandemic.
Eventually, DOST-PTRI launched and developed the technology in partnership with various popular brands to test its performance and viability as a product.
Initially, the cost of producing kawayarn is higher compared to more established materials because it is just being introduced in the market. It relies on the existing and tested supply chains, including transport and machinery, and the current scale of production.
The good news is that as more entrepreneurs adopt the kawayarn technology and partake in the supply
chain, the production gains speed. From bamboo textile fiber production, yarn manufacturing, weaving and knitting, non-wovens and its onward conversion to wearables, accessories, construction and structural applications, the DOST-PTRI expects that as scale sets in, costs will stabilize and production will be sustained.
The Institute developed, scaled and deployed the technology to the regions.
Currently, there are four Bamboo Textile Fiber Innovation Hubs (BTFIHs) in Naguilian, La Union; Cauayan, Isabela; Maragondon, Cavite; and Lagangilagan, Abra.
Three more BTFIHs will be launched in Lingayen, Pangasinan; Maramag, Bukidnon; and Buenavista, Agusan del Norte, where bamboo is naturally abundant, allowing local communities to tap into this resource and create products that are both sustainable and profitable.
DOST-PTRI is ready to assist Filipino entrepreneurs, whether in fashion or furniture, who want to venture into using kawayarn.
The established kawayarn innovation ecosystem is flexible, offering small batches for those just starting out or exploring, and larger quantities of up to 100 kg/day to 130 kg/day yarn production for more established manufacturers.
“We’re here to support entrepre -
Technology Research and Development of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST-PCIEERD).
Caroline Jacot, a sophomore Chemical Engineering student and Deux Konstantin V. Echavez, a graduating Chemical Engineering, looked at the laboratory as significant addition to the common laboratories of many schools for their engineering, physics, biology and chemistry courses.
“This helps us understand better the concepts of renewable energy [RE], sustainability and innovation which are all theoretical. Now we understand why there must be a sustainble environment or innovation in the way we operate the machines and gadgets,”
they said.
However, there are still challenges to hurdle, Paclijan added, whose graduate studies on waste-to-energy is expected to be the crucial talent behind the technology.
“We have to find ways to generate adequate supply of the microbes that would break down the substrates into hydrogen,” she said.
The laboratory would also need more talents and researchers to meet the needs of corporations, factories and plantations, saying each of them have specific designs and processes because of the differences in the raw materials they use and the waste they generate.
neurs at every stage of their journey with kawayarn,” Leaño told the BusinessMirror.
Typical in a technology development, kawayarn requires refining the process to ensure consistent quality of fibers, and marketing it, which meant educating the public and industries about its unique and strategic propositions.
The DOST-PTRI was able to overcome these challenges through sustained research, improving the production process, and in creating strategic partnerships with key actors in the textile, fashion and home furnishing fields.
The Institute is collaborating with industry associations and is organizing seminars and fora to demonstrate kawayarn’s potential for furniture design/
It is also continuously undertaking product development, validating financial projections and gaining insights to market needs and trends to facilitate smooth transfer and commercialization of the technology. DOST-PTRI is one of the progressive government agencies which believes that “real innovation happens when science touches lives, communities are engaged and empowered, not just ‘served’ or ‘helped.’” DOST-PTRI’s goal is to ensure that science, technology and innovation benefit society with a “managed” impact to the environment.
She cited for example the cassava processor whose waste from the root crop has its own liquid waste water as compared to a pineapple plantation, whose wastes are from pulp and pineapple skin.
The challenge would also come from livestock farms which have odorous and objectionable smelling-liquid waste water.
Northern Mindanao has 47 manufacturing plants alone, many in agricultural industry like poultry and piggery, Paclijan said.
“We will be generating 8,000 cubic meters per day by 2025 and treating them would cost a lot in terns of energy to be used,” she added.
“We always have a problem in sourcing energy to power our electricity, and this time, we have a potentially good alternative,” she noted.
Prospects JESUIT Father Mars P. Tan, university president, said it would be up to the project team and the DOST to chart the path of the laboratory and the technology.
He said he was open to the possibility of allowing the facility to be the center of mentoring or fellowship for other academicians who would be trained in the application of the technology.
He also promised organizers and the project team that the laboratory has a priority space in the
DOST-PTRI Director Julius L. Leaño Jr. (left) leads the “Kawayarn: The Bamboo Textiles PH Exhibition” at the recent Tela Gallery of DOST-PTRI in Bicutan, Taguig City. With Leaño at the event are vlogger Kyle “Kulas” Jennerman, Catherine Diquit-Jennerman, owner of Likhang Maragondon, and Doreen Odvina, owner of Shoepatos. DOST PTRI PHOTOS
THE clothes made with “kawayarn,” or bamboo yarn, are on exhibit at the recent “Kawayarn: The Bamboo Textiles PH Exhibition” at the Tela Gallery of DOST-PTRI in Bicutan, Taguig City.
STUDENTS participate in an interactive game held during DOST-ITDI’s tech forum titled “Beyond Measure: The Basics of Metrology.” PHOTO FROM HENRY A. DE LEON, DOST-STII
A6 Sunday, October 6, 2024
Faith Sunday
Carmelites launch Congress on Prayer II
MBy Edith T. Burgos, OCDS
ORE than 400 Secular Carmelites from more than 40 OCDS Communities from all over the Philippines—from as far as Laoag in the North and Jolo in the South—gathered at the Minor Basilica of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in New Manila, Quezon City, last October 1, to witness the launching of the Congress on Prayer II (COP II).
The COP II will be held at Smart Araneta Coliseum, Quezon City, on April 9, 2025, to celebrate the 100th year of the canonization of St. Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face.
The COP II launch was opened with the celebration of the Holy Mass, presided by Rev. Fr. Dan Lim, OCD, Provincial Vicar and Superior of the Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Shrine Community, and concelebrated by Fr. Dionysius Balute, OCD; Fr. Emmanuel Angeli -
tud, OCD; and Fr. Rogelio Regner. Fr. Lim, in his homily, identified the “poor” as those who have no resources, no education, the social outcasts, and those, because of circumstances in their lives, have no choice but to remain poor without the opportunity to pray, exhorted all to help them by taking on the yoke of prayer for them.
Engaging with the “poor,” he pointed out, is to become like little children, which is “to be natural and spontaneous, to be
ST. THERESE IN MY LIFE
By Edith of the Merciful Love
ONE of the fondest memories my sister and I love to share was how we would set up an altar on top of a big stone in our yard, composed of a hibiscus flower, a cross from a broken rosary, a half burnt-unlighted candle. We would kneel on the grass in front of the stone altar, praying the Hail Mary at the top of our voices, hoping that the Blessed Mother would appear before us as she did at Fatima. I was probably 5 and she, 3 years old. Our neighbor, an old retired teacher, we fondly call “Lola Cion” (Grandma Cion) would be amused no end as she observed us through a small window in their kitchen which was just a meter away from us. She would tell our Mom how she enjoyed watching us pray.
Childish wishes then, but now on hindsight, they were stirrings, not understood by this human heart.
Accompanying an aunt to the Carmelite monastery in Naga City, when I was 4 years old, stirred the heart once again. The memory of the nuns’ voices singing behind a black curtain behind iron bars sounded angelic and mysterious and this has stayed with me. The clearer and more distinct memory was during my teen years, 13 to 15.
When there was trouble at home and my parents did not agree on some things, it was always unpleasant for us kids to understand.
I would skip lunch, cross the highway from our school and spend lunch break in an empty old parish church. My favorite place was the pew in front of a statue of a saint I wasn’t introduced to yet at that time. There was no name and what probably attracted me were the roses and a cross held close to her heart.
I preferred her gentle look over the more eye-catching statue of the parish’s patron, the one who appeared more fascinating, clothed in animal skin and enshrined at the “retablo” at the right side of the church.
I just sat there, unanswered questions in my mind, quiet and staring at the statue, tears would just fall. I cannot remember what my prayers were, but I remember somehow, there would always be relief after the quiet time.
When I heard the bell calling students back, which meant that lunch break was over, a brief glance
transparent and without malice in one’s dealings.”
October 1, being St. Therese’s
at her would be my prayer of thanks.
After graduating from high school, and on three occasions, the slightest expression I made to make my desire to become a Carmelite nun known would elicit an adverse, bordering on a violent, reaction from my father. His possessive love was evident even as I was growing up. Wanting to keep peace at home eclipsed the stirrings.
When I had to leave home to study in the city, vacations would mean I would have the chance to visit my still unnamed saint. Somehow I was hopeful that the quiet peace I felt in her presence would be recaptured but the grace was not granted.
Ten years after confiding to this unknown saint, I fell in love with the man I wanted to marry. This time with a name, St. Therese of Lisieux was reintroduced to me by my mother.
In her desire to convince me not to get married yet, she asked me to pray the novena to St. Therese to find out if marrying was the right thing to do at a young age. Her advice was to ask St. Therese for a sign.
Not knowing any better, I naively asked for the sign to be any flower except a rose for an answer. Since I was already a teacher and often got roses from my students, receiving a rose could mean anything but the answer to my novena.
On the ninth day of the novena, as I walked to the parish church for an early Mass, a bunch of yellow golden shower flowers from a neighbor’s tree fell on my head, with dew spattering all over me.
To my neighbor’s surprise instead of getting annoyed over getting wet, I was overjoyed. It was a
feast day made the celebration doubly significant for those who came for the launch. The presence
“yes” from St. Therese!
Gifted with her book, The Story of a Soul, by the husband, slowly and unaware I adopted total confidence as a way to deal with day to day challenges of a young mother, a wife, a teacher and a student all at the same time.
In many instances, some call God’s providence, trying to live the way of confidence came as normal and natural as the sun rising in the morning and setting at night.
Whether it was lack of food on the table, bringing the kids to school, coping with bills, staying up late for the laundry, unfulfilled deep desire to attend novenas, falling asleep in the midst of prayer, asking for safety for the husband’s work related hazards, imposing rosary time for the family, and even patience in cleaning one tile after another, all were made easy for love of Him, confident that whatever I lacked He would supply.
Was placing every small snag in family life, this thing called confidence in Him? Amidst the normal family and career life, a yellow rose from someone reminded me that behind ordinary incidents, my saint said holiness was possible.
I didn’t even think of the word “confidence” as applied to a spiritual journey. What kept me going was the advise the former Mother Superior of the Carmelite monastery I applied to and desired to join.
When I apologized to her that I was getting married instead of joining the Order, she just smiled and said “Go child, your new mission is to bring your family to heaven. God will be pleased with that.”
Fast forward, after 35 years of a happy family life, I accidentally
of young seculars, the youngest was 23 years, stoked the hopes of survival among the elderly—with the eldest being 93 years.
Rekindling old friendships characterized by tight hugs and peals of laughter simply revealed the truism that friendships bonded by prayer never fade nor diminish.
Time and distance are immaterial for hearts that love. St. Therese, the little flower declared “My vocation is love. I will be love in the heart of the Church.”
Fr. Reynaldo Sotelo, the Superior of the OCD Province of St. Teresa of Avila, Philippines, in a video message, invited all to attend the Congress, which he said, quoting Pope Francis, was in honor of the “the greatest saint of modern times.”
With the theme “Confidence in Love,” the Congress with a twopronged goal, hopes to share the true essence of St. Therese’s “spiritual childhood, the way of trust and absolute surrender,” and to open opportunities for vocations in the Order, for the two other branches, the friars and the nuns.
Imelda “Meg” Ramos, OCDS, president of the Provincial Council of the OCDS, explained the rationale of the COP II, which was in answer to the clamor for more
stumbled on the Carmelite House of Prayer in Quezon City. I was then looking for the convent of the nuns where I was supposed to meet a friend but I was directed to the House of Prayer.
A priest was giving a lecture on St. Therese. I stayed, mesmerized. I applied, went through the sixyear secular Carmelite formation program and became a definitive promised member.
Uncharacteristic of the husband and family, whose way was to keep everyone together doing things together, he supported my journey even bringing me to meetings.
A year before I learned about secular Carmelites, I had a dream— my husband was going away, up a mountain and I could not move my feet to run after him. Then I heard a voice: “Do not worry soon you will be Edith of the Merciful Love.”
A little over three years after discovering Carmel, He had a heart attack. Confined in the ICU, he persuaded me to leave him and attend my temporary promise ceremonials.
After the ceremony, my youngest son surprised me with a big bouquet of yellow-orange roses, saying: “Padala po ni Dads [Dad sent these].”
The flowers, somehow assuaged the sadness because no one among my family members was able to witness my promise.
Three months after, my husband passed away, God’s provision became apparent when I became a secular with the name “Edith of the Merciful love”.
after the first Congress on Prayer I in March, 2015, an expression of desire to know more about Carmelite prayer.
Calling St. Therese of Lisieux, “the greatest cheer leader of Carmel,” Ramos said that “she [Therese] is the one who can bring people to God in an easy way.” St. Therese being already popular and the seculars being Carmelites in the world, and the world being what it is today, it is a grace to bring the Carmelite prayer to where it is needed—the world.
As “frontliners” of the Order, Ramos said that much like marines during war, the task of the seculars is to provide the opportunities to explore the two other branches of the Order, who, by the nature of their life, do not have physical access to the world as seculars have. With 190 days to COP II, Ramos encouraged all the secular Carmelites present to prepare daily by praying the Prayer for the Centenary of the Canonization of St. Therese, and be aware of the countdown as the date nears. Emma Choa, chairperson of the COP II, acknowledged all who helped in the preparations, all who participated, those who shared their resources, and those who were not present but prayed for the success of the launch.
Oct. 1, 2013, 10 years after my husband’s death, I found myself attending Mass on the feast day of St. Therese in a cathedral where a wedding was ongoing.
Seated at the last pew, thinking of how we had a happy married life, I was overcome with melancholy, I wondered if he was praying for us in heaven. Offering the sadness as a gift to Therese, I stayed on. Then a member of the wedding crew approached me and offered a bouquet of yellow roses which was supposed to be for a wedding sponsor who didn’t come. Was St. Therese consoling me or telling me he was indeed praying for me?
The M as in mystical experience is not sought for in Carmel, for indeed on our own, we have no way of knowing the source of the experience, instead fidelity to the six Ms: Mass, meditation (mental prayer), morning and evening prayer, Mary, meetings, and mission guide our daily living. In whatever circumstance we find ourselves in, always it is “allegiance to Jesus Christ through friendship with the One who we know loves us and in service to the Church” that calls us.
But the human in me confronted with the loss of a son, wished for a mystical experience that would bring back my son, yet, learning that “all is grace” allowed the development of a better perspective progressing into a lifestyle—St. Therese’s complete confidence in our Father.
The holocaust became flying embers. My little sister Therese says: “Jesus points out to me the only way which leads to Love’s furnace—the way is self-surrender—it is the confidence of the little child who sleeps without fear in its father’s arms.” This article was
FR . Danilo Lim, OCD, (center) Provincial Vicar and Superior of the Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Shrine Community, delivers the homily during the Mass on the Feast Day of St. Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face at the Minor Basilica aof the National Shrine of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Quezon City
MEG RAMOS, OCDS, president of the e Provincial Council of the OCDS.
EMMA CHOA , OCDS, chairperson of Congress on Prayer II PHOTOS BY NORMAN FAMILIARA AND LYN RESURRECCION
FR . Danilo Lim, OCD, incenses the image of St. Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, also known as St. Therese of Lisieux.
ST. Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face
Editor: Lyn Resurreccion
UP chemists develop temperature sensitive polymers for medical use
By Bless Aubrey Ogerio
ESEARCHERS from the Univer -
Rsity of the Philippines Diliman (UP Diliman) have successfully developed temperature-sensitive materials that could revolutionize drug delivery systems and other biomedical applications.
Thermoresponsive polymers respond to changes in temperature and offer potential uses in the safe and targeted delivery of medications such as insulin and calcitonin.
They remain stable at lower temperatures but break down and release medication when they reach the warmer environment of the human body.
Led by Ludhovik Luiz Madrid and Dr. Susan Arco from the Institute of Chemistry, along with Ser John Lynon Perez of the Natural Sciences Research Institute, the team created the polymers using an eco-friendly method that “minimizes environmental risks.”
Traditionally, producing polymers involved using harmful chemicals known as volatile organic solvents. These chemicals, typically used in industrial processes, contribute to pollution and health risks for workers.
To address this, the scientists turned to a type of solvent called hexylpyridinium
How
Sionic liquid, which significantly reduces toxicity and allows for better control over the production process. This means they can create materials with specific characteristics more effectively.
“RAFT polymerization helps control the growth of polymer chains by mitigating the formation of chains that can no longer grow (a.k.a. ‘dead’ polymers), thereby creating a narrower molecular weight distribution which can allow more tailored polymer designs or properties,” Madrid explained.
The process called Reversible Addition Fragmentation Chain Transfer (RAFT) polymerization ensures that the growth of the polymer chains is more controlled, reducing the occurrence of ‘dead’ polymers, or chains that can no longer grow.
The polymers developed by the team are also biocompatible, or they can interact with living tissues without causing harmful reactions.
Besides their current achievement, the researchers see even more possibilities for future development.
“The results open up the potential for using other hexylpyridinium ionic liquids to create dual-responsive polymers (e.g. responsive to both temperature and pH), which are valuable for biomedical applications such as drug delivery,” Madrid added.
do ordinary people ‘sense’ water quality?
EEING —and tasting—is believing:
a qualitative study of communities living along the Philippines’ bustling Marikina River underscores the importance of taking into account local peoples’ everyday experiences, practices, and perceptions in establishing water quality.
Anthropologists Gideon Lasco of the Ateneo de Manila University’s Development Studies Program and Anita Hardon of Wageningen University’s Knowledge, Technology, and Innovation Group undertook a four-month exploration of human-water relations in communities along the Marikina River.
They followed the river upstream, interviewing water drinkers, distributors, and regulators from low- and middleincome groups.
The researchers found that people rely primarily on their own sensory experiences of the water—such as its color, taste, and smell—to evaluate its quality.
For instance, while clear water is considered safer than muddy water, clear but rusty-tasting water is inferior to sweettasting water.
But more importantly, according to the researchers, people saw water quality as dynamic and changeable, depending on current and future circumstances: a recent typhoon might make the water muddy for
a few days, but it is seen to gradually clear up and improve.
Access to clean water is also influenced by social and economic factors: the urban communities downstream of the Marikina River can afford to rely on water-refilling stations and bottled water despite the significant financial cost, whereas upstream communities tap into natural sources like springs despite the risks of contamination.
Furthermore, while privatization of the water distribution system has expanded water access, many low-income and upstream communities still lack consistent access to piped water.
Lasco and Hardon recommend that policies on water purification and distribution take into account local experiential knowledge of water quality, with the understanding that peoples’ sensory experiences are the main way they define “good” water.
This is particularly critical when tackling issues, such as contamination from microplastics, which are otherwise colorless, tasteless, and odorless.
For further inquiries and interview requests, please email media.research@ ateneo.edu. Visit archaeum.ateneo.edu for more information about our latest research and innovations.
Coca-Cola, Naga City link to boost PET bottle collection, recycling
I
N line with its mission to support local communities’ sustainable waste management efforts, Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines, Inc. (CCBPI), the bottling arm of Coca-Cola in the Philippines, has signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) to formalize its partnership with the City of Naga and its community partners.
As part of this collaboration, CCBPI provided a baling machine to support the city’s PET bottle collection and recycling initiatives.
“CCBPI is proud to support the City of Naga in promoting its waste management initiatives and empowering its community members to actively participate in the city’s collection and recycling efforts. We thank all our partners—Mayor Nelson S. Legacion, the CamSur Multipurpose Cooperative, and the Regional Agricultural and Fishery Council of Region 5—for working with us towards our goal of fostering cleaner and greener communities,” said Atty. Juan Lorenzo Tañada, CCBPI VP for Corporate and Regulatory Affairs.
The partnership underscores the shared commitment of Coca-Cola, the local government, and partner communities to fostering a collective effort toward
creating a circular economy for recyclable plastic packaging in Naga. Central to the effort is the CamSur Multipurpose Cooperative, which leverages its network of over 7,000 members to execute the collection initiatives for post-consumer clear PET plastic bottles within the city.
The Regional Agricultural and Fishery Council Region 5 will help oversee the project implementation to ensure that the collection efforts are seamlessly integrated into the community’s needs.
The goal is to ensure that all collected clear PET plastic bottles, regardless of brand, are diverted to PETValue Philippines, the country’s first facility dedicated to bottle-to-bottle recycling. PETValue employs advanced technologies to transform fully recyclable post-consumer plastic packaging into new food-grade recycled PET (rPET) bottles.
This facility is a joint venture between CCBPI and Indorama Ventures, a global sustainable chemical company.
Through strong multi-sectoral partnership, the initiative aims to promote a circular economy that is geared towards protecting the environment, supporting local livelihoods, and creating a better future for the residents of Naga City.
Swiss-Filipino artist with autism shines in biodiversity art exhibit
By Jonathan L. Mayuga
ARECENT art exhibit featured vibrant colors of birds, fish, corals, and plants, with intricate details, as well as landscapes.
What makes the beautiful works of art more astonishing is the artist behind the paintings.
Titled “Biodiversity in Full Court” it showcased the work of 27-year-old Filipino-Swiss artist, Samantha Kaspar.
She was diagnosed with autism at a very young age and had difficulty expressing herself.
But not when she is holding a brush in front of the canvas to express herself with great detail—often painting lush landscapes and various flora and fauna.
The art exhibit
THE exhibit was organized by the Asean Centre for Biodiversity (ACB) in partnership with Enderun Colleges, the Center for Possibilities Foundation Inc., and A Child’s Dream Foundation as part of the effort to promote appreciation for biodiversity.
In her opening message at the event, ACB Executive Director Theresa Mundita Lim said the art exhibit is a recognition of the deep connection between art and nature, a testament to a fruitful collaboration, demonstrating how nature inspires art and how art can promote conservation of nature and encourage humanity to become better stewards of the environment.
ACB’s 19th Anniversary
ACB’S support to the art exhibit was part of its 19th anniversary celebration.
Lim explained that while at first, the ACB did not realize the relationship between nature and these other fields, it has become clear now that they have a valuable connection that is key to sustaining the benefits that people enjoy.
Benefits such as clean air, clean water, natural defense against extreme climatic events, and inspiration for creativity and invention, are all essential in ensuring our meaningful existence on this planet, the ACB director said.
Since 2005, the ACB has been working with various partners and like-minded organizations to mainstream biodiversity across sectors and disciplines such as tourism, agriculture, arts and education, business, and health.
“As we continue to raise aware -
ness on the value and beauty of biodiversity, we invite everyone - nature lovers, art enthusiasts, or both - biodiversity and neurodiversity advocates, to join our efforts in safeguarding our region’s unique natural wealth, reflected here in all of Samantha’s incredible work”, Lim said in her speech
Mother and daughter
LIM gave credit to Samantha’s mother, Mitzi Kaspar, who has nurtured her daughter’s talent to paint and to sing, and encourage her daughter to express her appreciation for nature through art.
Kaspar communicates for her daughter, as she knows fully well, which makes the mother and daughter an awesome team.
“Our special recognition goes to the mother of Samantha, Ms. Mitzi Kaspar, who has nurtured Samantha’s talent to paint and to sing, and encouraged her daughter to express her appreciation for nature through art, in a way that she could not be able to express in words,” Lim told the BusinessMirror said via Messenger on October 1. She added that ACB has always harnessed artists to interpret nature and biodiversity as a part of its advocacy.
New dimension for art and biodiversity
“FOR Samantha, being neurodivergent and nonverbal has added a new dimension to our appreciation for art and biodiversity. Biodiversity is also healing and therapeutic as a universal inspiration for creating art, giving a voice to those who have the difficulty to articulate their complex feelings through words and actions,” Lim explained.
“Through Samantha’s art, we have not only been able to raise awareness on biodiversity, but on neurodiversity, as well. And the incredible work of Samantha demonstrates that nature and art indeed transcend language.
The BusinessMirror interviewed Mrs. Kaspar via email about her daughter journey through art. Knowing her daughter fully well, Kaspar answered the questions confidently, saying Samantha would have communicated it in the same light.
When Samantha’s interest in painting started
SAMANTHA’S journey in painting began during her early childhood when she discovered it as a helpful way to process her emotions and experiences.
Her favorite subjects
AS her style has evolved, she has diversified her paintings from playful Disney characters to creating colorful portrayals of the natural environment around her.
Natural subjects she paints often
S HE frequently paints butterflies, birds, and fish, captivated by their stunning colors and the joy they bring to her artistic vision.
Time allotted to finish a painting
THE time to complete a painting varies widely, ranging from a few hours for simpler pieces to several weeks or even months for more complex works.
Favorite medium
SAMANTHA enjoys using watercolor on paper and acrylic on canvas as her preferred mediums.
Inspiration in painting
PAINTING started as a therapeutic outlet for Samantha in her youth, and she was motivated by the joy and pride she felt from the art she created.
Painting teachers
SHE credits three exceptional mentors with shaping Samantha’s artistic skills: Gloria Teng, Ken Sioson, and Jen Consumido.
People with autism can also inspire like Samantha ABSOLUTELY! Because art is a universal language that enables
anyone, regardless of their challenges, to express themselves and inspire others.
How a biodiversity communicator and champion feels IT’S incredibly an honor for her to play a role in inspiring others and fostering awareness about biodiversity. It gives hope and purpose to a lot of individuals like Samantha.
Message for people who are aspiring to become an artist JUST follow your passion wholeheartedly, as it will guide you in developing your unique artistic path and fulfilling your creative dreams.
A celebrated event THE exhibit gathered not only art enthusiasts but also diplomats, government officials, celebrities, entrepreneurs, and mental health advocates. Some of the VIPs included Ambassador of Switzerland to the Philippines H.E. Dr. Nicolas Brühl, H.E. Ambassador of Lao People’s Democratic Republic Sonexay Vannaxay, Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates Mohamed Obaid Alzaabi, former senator Atty. Leila de Lima, Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity Sec. Carlito Galvez Jr., President and CEO of Magsaysay Group of Companies Doris Magsaysay-Ho, honorable officials and representatives from Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, and Myanmar, and representatives from ACB’s sectoral dialogue partners from Brazil and Morocco. A portion of the proceeds from the sales of the paintings will go to the Centre for Possibilities Foundation Inc. and A Child’s Dream Foundation.
SWISS-FILIPINO
Simone brings guys on board US tour
PITTSBURGH— Simone Biles simply wanted to mix it up when the gymnastics superstar invited some of the top American men to join her post-Olympic Tour
“Bringing the guys on board was designed to show what men’s gymnastics has to offer,” Biles said. “And I just think that over the years, we kind of know the guys, but we don’t really know them, know them.” That may be starting to change.
A8 | SundAy, OctOber 6, 2024
mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph
Editor: Jun Lomibao
The US men’s bronze-medal breakthrough at the Paris Games— with pommel horse specialist Stephen Nedorscik’s clinching routine serving as the exclamation point—has pushed into the spotlight a side of the sport that typically operates in the shadows.
While Nedoroscik, who went viral in the aftermath, parlayed his newfound fame into a gig on “Dancing With The Stars,” Olympic teammates Frederick Richard Brody Malone and Paul Juda as well as NCAA champion-
turned-influencer Ian Gunther are spending most of the fall traveling across the country with Biles and fellow gold medalists Jordan Chiles Jade Carey and Hezly Rivera in a show that is part exhibition, part celebration.
The co-ed nature of the second iteration of the Gold Over America Tour —a not-so-subtle nod to Biles’s status as the greatest gymnast of all time—has given the show a different energy than the first, which was entirely female-centric.
Journalism ethics on sanctity of media pass
REUTERS has withdrawn two doping-related news stories after learning that one of the news organization’s employees helped arrange for an official to get a media credential to see the Masters golf tournament this past spring.
The news organization said that it stands by its reporting on the stories, but said they violated standards “as they pertain to avoiding the appearance of bias in our sourcing.”
The Times of London, which first reported the story, said a Reuters journalist helped arrange for James Fitzgerald, media representative for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), to attend the Masters on a media credential. Reuters said the journalist who admitted to helping Fitzgerald had left the company before it was made aware of the situation when contacted by the newspaper.
“We have no evidence that the tickets were rewards for tips and remain confident of the accuracy of our stories,” Reuters said.
The appearance is damaging enough, said Kathleen Bartzen Culver, a media ethics expert and director of the journalism school at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
“You’ve given the source a really strong incentive to give you not just information but whatever kind of information you want,” she said. “There is a very good reason we don’t pay sources for information. The reason is the source would feel they have to please us in some way.”
The stories, one that originally moved on the Reuters wire on August 8 and the other on September 13, touched upon a rivalry between WADA and one of its fiercest critics, the US Anti-Doping Agency. USADA said it was thankful that Reuters had withdrawn its August story, and said it had complained to the news outlet of inaccuracies in the story about the US anti-doping agency’s use of informants before it had been published.
Responding to an e-mail The Associated Press sent to Fitzgerald,
FIFA defers suspension of Israel, digs into claims of discrimination
ZURICH—FIFA stopped short of suspending the Israeli soccer federation, but asked for a disciplinary investigation of possible discrimination alleged by Palestinian soccer officials.
A senior FIFA panel overseeing governance will separately investigate “the participation in Israeli competitions of Israeli football teams allegedly based in the territory of Palestine,” soccer’s governing body said after a meeting of its ruling Council. The Palestinian soccer federation has consistently asked FIFA for more than a decade to take action against the Israeli soccer body for incorporating teams from West Bank settlements in its leagues. The compromise decisions came more than four months after Palestinian officials had urged FIFA to suspend Israel’s membership at a meeting in May. The request to FIFA’s congress in May also cited “international law violations” in Gaza during the IsraelHamas conflict and directed the soccer body to its statutory commitments on human rights and against discrimination.
FIFA delayed making a decision in May until after a legal review scheduled
for July, then pushed back the issue two more times until a meeting of its 37-member Council on Thursday. “The FIFA Council has implemented due diligence on this very sensitive matter and, based on a thorough assessment, we have followed the advice of the independent experts,” FIFA president Gianni Infantino said in a statement. Ahead of the meeting, Palestinian soccer federation leader Jibril Rajoub
the general WADA media relations department and WADA director general Olivier Niggli, Fitzgerald said WADA had no “quid pro quo” arrangement with Reuters to provide story tips in exchange for favors, like the Masters tickets.
He said that although the Reuters stories were withdrawn, it was noteworthy that the news outlet stands by its reporting.
“My attendance at that event in April was unconnected to my role at WADA and was a personal matter,” Fitzgerald said. “All related costs were paid for entirely by me and I was there on my own time.”
Reached by the AP, Augusta National—which runs the Masters— said it had no comment on the matter.
Tickets to attend the Masters as a spectator generally cost around $140 a day, but they’re among the toughest in sports to get. Many are allotted through a lottery where odds are roughly 200-1 against getting chosen. Some “select badge patrons” are able to purchase tickets for life. AP
and its vice president Susan Shalabi came to Zurich to lobby FIFA officials.
“I trust and I expect that FIFA will take the right decision,” Rajoub told The Associated Press. “I am asking for the Council to follow their statutes.”
The latest process follows a pattern—under Infantino and his predecessor Sepp Blatter—of Palestinian requests for FIFA to uphold its legal rules and the question then being steered toward ad hoc panels and other committees.
FIFA gave no timetable Thursday for the investigations it has now requested.
Supporters of the Palestinian soccer campaign have criticized FIFA for not following its decision in 2022 to suspend Russian national teams
Biles praised Richard and company for getting out of their comfort zone and leaning into the performative aspect of the show, which required a lengthy string of 12-hour practice days to prepare.
“We took a risk by bringing the guys on board,” Biles said. “But the outcome has been absolutely amazing. And you have the kids in the crowd chanting ‘Ian! Ian!’ ‘Fredrick! Fredrick!’ and that’s just so cool.”
The 20-year-old Richard’s longterm goal has always been to make men’s gymnastics matter, a daunting proposition in an era when support at the NCAA Division I level—the prime feeder into the US Olympic program— has never been more tenuous.
There is an urgency to turn the splash of notoriety the men earned in Paris into something more sustainable. There have been early signs of progress, most notably an influx of young boys across the country rushing to join their local gym.
It’s a start. So is spending two months barnstorming from coast to coast—the show hits Philadelphia on Friday and New York on Saturday— with newly minted bronze medals on their resume and a tacit endorsement from the face of the US Olympic movement, particularly because their inclusion feels earned.
“It doesn’t really feel like we are ‘the pity case,’” Richard said.
“It feels like [we] are on the same standard [as the women].”
That’s by design, and also a nod to Biles’s considerable influence. The 27-year-old has reached the level of stardom where everything she does— from watching her husband
Jonathan Owens play for the Chicago Bears to what she shares on social media—can become news, whether
that’s her intention or not.
“I know if we do something, the attention will be there,” she said. “But I kind of just ignore it and just go day by day. But I am aware that the attention that it does bring.”
The 11-time Olympic medalist and first two-time all-around champion in more than five decades is taking her time before making any firm decisions about her athletic future. For now, she is focused on letting herself relax and enjoy this chapter of her life before moving on to the next one.
“I got to go to the US Open [tennis tournament],” she said. “I got to go to my first WNBA [Women’s National Basketball Association] game. It’s like supporting people who have supported me, which has been really exciting because usually we don’t have that time. And now that I have more
Irving and his ‘The Art of Movement’
from its competitions within days of the military invasion of Ukraine. European soccer body UEFA also removed Russian teams. Several European federations had already refused to play scheduled games against Russia, including Poland and its captain Robert Lewandowski. They said they would not go to Moscow for a World Cup qualifying playoff in March 2022. FIFA later successfully argued at the Court of Arbitration for Sport that keeping Russian teams in its competitions would cause chaos and be a security risk. Russian teams have not played in World Cups, European Championships or the Champions League
for more than two-and-a-half years. In the case of Israel, which has been a member of UEFA for 30 years, no European federation has refused to play its national or clubs teams. Israeli teams have played home games in neutral countries such as Hungary and Cyprus for security reasons since the Hamas attacks one year ago. The Palestinian men’s national team is currently playing in the Asian qualifying program for the 2026 World Cup, hosting Jordan three weeks ago in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The team next plays at Iraq on October 10 and hosts Kuwait five days later in Doha, Qatar. AP
NATIONAL Basketball Association (NBA) superstar Kyrie Irving embarked on his 2024 China and Southeast Asia Tour as he assumed dual roles as Anta’s Chief Creative Officer and Creative Director for the “The Art of Movement” fashion show.
The event marked the debut of the Anta Hélà lifestyle collection, a fusion of art, movement, basketball and fashion that creates a unique athletic look that Irving can bring to life.
“The Art of Movement” showcased outfits co-designed with Irving’s sister, Asia Irving.
same energy drives the Irving Hélà lifestyle collection in collaboration with Anta, breaking boundaries and offering a modern, versatile aesthetic that echoes his distinctive presence both on and off the court. Irving recently visited key landmarks in Thailand, including the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, to admire Thai art, architecture and culture.
THE US men’s gymnastics team—(from left) Brody Malone, Asher Hong, Fred Richard, Paul Juda and Stephen Nedoroscik are spending most of the fall traveling across the country with Biles and fellow gold medalists Jordan Chiles, Jade Carey and Hezly Rivera in a show that is part exhibition, part celebration. AP
ANTA athlete Kyrie Irving visits Southeast Asia for the first time.
How cultural dancing helped me reclaim my life after the Marawi siege
“Performing has become my lifeline,” writes Plan International Pilipinas youth advocate Sanira, who was only 13 when the crisis erupted and displaced her family. “Dancing helped me cope with the trauma.”
NEW FACES, SAME FIRE Linkin Park embarks on a new chapter with ‘From Zero’ album
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“I only wanted to be part of something I only wanted to be part of, part of…”
LINKIN Park is back, and for many, this feels like reconnecting with an old friend. The band’s new album promises to reignite the raw energy and charisma that brought them to global stardom.
With new members Emily Armstrong and Colin Brittain bringing freshperspectives, Linkin Park is set to introduce an evolved sound while staying true to the essence that made them iconic.
In a recent interview with SoundStrip and other media, Mike Shinoda assured fans that their new album From Zero will remain relatable despite the changes within the band.
“It sounds like a Linkin Park album even though it’s different. It doesn’t sound like a one era of Linkin Park, it’s just Linkin Park in general… There’s a lot of variety. You’ll see overtime,” the 47 year-old vocalist said.
The band—originally consisting of Mike, Chester Bennington, Brad Delson, Rob Bourdon, Dave “Phoenix” Farrell, and Joe Hahn—first skyrocketed to fame in the early 2000s with their breakthrough debut album Hybrid Theory which featured their signature blend of nu metal, rap, and alternative rock.
Its first album sold around 32 million copies worldwide, making it the best selling debut album since Guns N’ Roses’ Appetite for Destruction was released in 1987.
Linkin Park’s chart-topping albums like Meteora and Minutes to Midnight further cemented their place as one of the most influential rock bands of the 21st century.
Unfortunately, the band went on hiatus in 2017 after the tragic death of its lead vocalist Chester. This had left the future of Linkin Park uncertain.
Now, the release of From Zero in November will mark their first major project since that
heartbreaking chapter, signaling a new beginning for the band.
Phoenix shared that the band took a gradual approach in creating From Zero to make sure that they will stay true to their roots while, at the same time, moving forward into new avenues.
“Little steps get made and like start writing some stuff that you like and then you start working with some people that you love working with… and then it just all comes together,” the Linkin Park bassist said.
Onto a new era
KEEPING their new project and lineup under wraps was no easy feat for the band. Mike shared that they had to balance their excitement of working on something big with the challenge of maintaining it a secret to not spoil the fun.
“There are certain things that we had to keep very quiet. We had so much up our sleeve, we had so much planned for the launch date that it was almost a miracle that it all stayed a secret,” Mike said.
For Emily and Colin, joining a band as iconic as Linkin Park was both a dream and a challenge. They were very much aware of the legacy they were stepping into.
“I truly believe that this is a very important band for the world. I love to be part of something big and to inspire as much as I can, and they have already kind of been doing this for a long time,” Emily shared.
Prior to joining Linkin Park, Emily first frontlined for Dead Sara, a three-piece American rock band. It received accolades from Dav Grohl
and Courtney Love.
Colin, on the other hand, first played the drums for Oh No Fiasco. He also wrote and produced for bands like 5 Seconds of Summer and One Ok Rock.
“These people have been hugely influential in my life, both creatively and personally. To support these guys in their vision, which obviously they stand on such a huge legacy, really give this important message to the world and so I’m really grateful to just be a small part of that,” Colin said.
Stronger connection
AS they embark on this new journey together, Joe shared that the band will still continue to perform for the same reason—to make music together.
“I think our main focus was just making great music and enjoying it. We did a lot of experimenting but I think the combination became complete with Colin and Emily, things just started fitting and we were able to draw back into some old things and some new things,” Joe said.
To build on the theme of their stronger connection and the secret to their long-lasting career, you can highlight the band’s collaborative spirit, mutual respect, and the joy they find in creating music together. Here’s what you can add:
It’s this foundation of creative collaboration and genuine love for the craft that has been key to Linkin Park’s longevity.
The band have always emphasized the importance of enjoying the process, something that hasn’t changed even with the addition of new faces.
“A lot of younger people think of music more as a commodity sometimes, like a hamburger or a pair of pants... but for me, that’s not what the core of being an artist and in a band is like,” Mike said.
“It’s really much more about taking just something, a spark of an idea that isn’t anything. It’s fuzzy and can fall apart. It’s fragile and then you chase that thing down and turn it into something,” he added.
From Zero will be available for streaming on November 25. Aside from the album, fans can also look forward to the band’s ongoing tour, where Linkin Park showcases their new yet very familiar sound.
LINKIN Park.
MEMBERS of Linkin Park during their recent virtual press conference via Zoom.
Photo Credit: James Minchin III
Why it pays to be a songwriter
IN the past two weekends we looked back on how musicians like Yano made money from album royalties and live performances, and Pepe Smith from corporate sponsorship and product endorsements.
Today let’s see how a music artist can achieve financial success through songwriting.
A timely example is Kris Kristofferson. The American country music star and Hollywood actor, who died September 28 at age 88, struggled for years before making a name as a songwriter in Nashville.
At first, he wanted to be a novelist. He graduated summa cum laude in literature in college, went on a scholarship to Oxford in England and finished philosophy, joined the US Army as a pilot, and was assigned to teach English literature at West Point when he decided to drop everything to pursue a burning passion for music, inspired by Bob Dylan and confident of his writing skills.
Kristofferson didn’t mind working as a janitor at a Columbia Records studio in Nashville to achieve his goal. But he also had to do something outrageous — flying a helicopter and landing on the yard of Johnny Cash’s house — to get attention. Cash eventually recorded Kristofferson’s song, “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down,” which won Song of the Year at the 1970 Country Music Association Awards.
From then on, more artists would record Kristofferson’s other songs. These were a lot, and I’ll cite just two, “For the Good Times” and “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” to prove how lucrative songwriting can be.
“For the Good Times,” whose version by Ray Price which went to No. 1 in the US country chart in 1970, has likewise been recorded by “250 other artists,” according to David Hinckley in an article in medium.com.
“Help Me Make It Through the Night,” another top country hit and first recorded by Sammi Smith in 1970, has been covered by the likes of Gladys Knight, Joan Baez, and Elvis Presley, to name a few.
Which meant Kristofferson received substantial royalty checks as a songwriter of these two singles alone.
Which brings us to the news that the members of the long-disbanded British band Pink Floyd stand to earn $400 million from the sale of its music catalogue to music label Sony.
“The deal includes Pink Floyd’s recorded music, according to two people familiar with the matter, resolving the fate of one of the most valuable assets during a boom time for sales of vintage rock music,” the Financial Times online reported on October 2.
“The terms also include the band name and the artists’ “likeness,” one person added, which means that the label will have the rights to merchandise and spin-offs such as movies and TV series,” said the report.
But what makes the deal sweeter for Pink Floyd is this detail: “Songs have two sets of copyrights — one for the songwriting and one for the recording, or master copy. Pink Floyd has agreed to sell their recorded rights, but not the songwriting, said people familiar with the matter.”
It means band members credited as writers in Pink Floyd songs can still earn royalties directly from sales and other revenue streams.
“Companies invest in music and buy music catalogs primarily becausethey generate stable and predictable revenue streams. With the rise of streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music, music consumption has surged, especially in the years following the pandemic, leading to increased royalty payments. These revenue streams are diverse, coming from streaming, physical sales, synchronization in media, and public performances, making music catalogs a reliable source of income,” said online site xposuremusic.com.
The growing list of legacy/heritage artists who have sold their music catalogue includes Bruce Springsteen ($550M), Bob Dylan ($300M), Phil Collins and Genesis ($300M), Tina Turner ($300M), David Bowie (P250M), Sting and the Police ($250M)
But the biggest deal so far is that of Queen, whose songs Sony has bought for a staggering $1.27B.
BAYANG BARRIOS STAGES MAJOR CONCERT THIS YEAR
B-CREATIVE Multimedia
Production presents Bagong Umaga, a major concert featuring OPM icon and Katutubong Diva Ms. Bayang Barrios on October 26, 2024 at the Music Museum. Playing with Bayang are the Naliyagan Band and guest performers Poppert Bernadas, Dong Abay and Bituin Escalante.
On this concert, Bayang will experiment on new sound and repertoire giving her fans a richer Pinoy folk music flavor.
Tickets are availbe through Ticket2Me.
ROGER Waters of Pink Floyd
FREDDIE Mercury of Queen
KRIS Kristofferson
Photo credits: AP
How cultural dancing helped me reclaim my life after the Marawi siege
“Performing has become my lifeline,” writes Plan International Pilipinas youth advocate Sanira, who was only 13 when the crisis erupted and displaced her family. “Dancing helped me cope with the trauma.”
by Sanira, 21, Lanao del Sur Plan International Pilipinas youth advocate
(Editor’s note: The last of a two-part series, this essay is written by a young internally displaced person (IDP) who found solace in performance art amid the chaos of the Marawi siege. Sanira is a youth advocate of Plan International Pilipinas, an independent development and humanitarian organization that advances children’s rights and promotes equality for girls.)
ASSALAmuALAikum, mapiya gawii. i am Sanira, and this is my story as a young girl at the time of the marawi siege.
I was thirteen when the battle erupted in the summer of 2017. Our community, once a sanctuary, was turned into a battlefield. I still remember that day. The sky was filled with smoke, the air thick with the smell of gunpowder. My mother clutched my hand tightly as we ran, and the sound of cries echoed in the deserted streets. I looked back, and all I saw was destruction.
It was a nightmare I couldn’t shake. We fled, a huddled mass of terrified souls, seeking refuge in the nearby municipality of DitsaanRamain.
Life as an internally displaced person (IDP) was a constant struggle. We lived in a cramped makeshift shelter, sharing limited resources with countless others. The fear was palpable, the uncertainty overwhelming. I missed my school, my friends, and the carefree days of childhood. In the days that followed, my parents struggled to make ends meet, and I couldn’t continue my education. I felt as if I needed to carry the burden of our family. It was a harsh reality that taught me the true meaning of hardship.
It was in this tumultuous time that I discovered dance. They told me they were forming a local cultural group and inviting new members. At first, I was hesitant. I was shy and unsure of myself. But something
about the rhythm, the movement, the camaraderie drew me in.
Dancing became my escape. It allowed me to express the emotions I couldn’t put into words. It gave me a sense of purpose, a way to channel my pain and worries. I found solace in the music, in our shared experience of loss and resilience. With each step, I felt a little stronger, a little more hopeful.
The Kalombayan sa Ramain Meranaw Cultural Troupe, as we’re now called, has become more than just a dance group. It’s a family, made up of students, out-of-school youth, farmers’ children, and IDPs. We’ve faced countless challenges together, but we’ve also celebrated countless victories.
Our performances have brought joy to our community. They’ve helped preserve our Maranao heritage and remind people of who we are and where we come from. They’ve given us a platform to share our stories and raise awareness about the
struggles we’ve faced.
I’m grateful for the support we’ve received from organizations like Plan International. Their assistance and support have enabled us to continue our work and keep our culture alive.
As I look back on my journey, I
self, for the support of my family and friends, and for the opportunities that have come my way. Because of all these, I’ve grown into a young woman capable of overcoming anything, using my voice to advocate for the rights of IDPs and marginalized communities.
I am also grateful to the Kalombayan sa Ramain for giving me the chance to connect with other survivors and share our stories. Thank you for helping me heal and find my place in the world.
This International Day of the Girl, my dream is for all young women, especially those who have faced adversity like I have, to find their own voice, be heard, and be respected. Together, we can build a future where our voices are acknowledged, our cultures are celebrated, and our contributions are valued.
n Plan International Pilipinas celebrates the International Day of the Girl Child annually on October 11 to bring the world’s attention to the realities and lived experiences of girls and young women. This year, the organization’s campaign in the Philippines centers on the theme “Girls in Conflict and Crisis,” shedding light on the unique vulnerabilities of girls affected by conflicts and disasters. Sanira’s story is part of an initiative to launch the Girls in Conflict campaign in Mindanao. Last week, we published an essay from Analyn, a young Indigenous woman promoting disaster preparedness in her Alangan Mangyan community, introduced the Girls in Crisis campaign in Luzon and Visayas.
“At first, I was hesitant [about accepting an invitation to join a local cultural group]. I was shy and unsure of myself. But something about the rhythm, the movement, the camaraderie drew me in.”
see my younger self with empathy. I was just a child. I didn’t know how to cope with the change in environment or the loneliness of having no friends.
Today, I am filled with gratitude— for the strength I found within my -
n Sanira’s last name is withheld for security and privacy matters. She wrote this essay with Pauline Gutierrez, a contributor to BusinessMirror and a Campaigns and Youth Engagement Specialist for Plan International Pilipinas.
Sanira found in dancing a sense of purpose amid 2017’s Marawi siege that displaced her family. The artform gave her an escape, a new identity, while helping preserve that of their proud Maranao heritage. Dancing allows them to remind people of who they are and where they come from. a s Plan international Pilipinas prepares to celebrate the annual international Day of the Girl next Sunday, October 11, Sanira hopes that young women like her, especially those who face adversity, find the strength to carry on. Cover and inside photos from plan international pilipinas