Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI SCROLL: MrBeast situation gets worse + Sabrina Carpenter shares how Taylor Swift felt about Skims campaign

Transcript

MINI SCROLL: MrBeast situation gets worse + Sabrina Carpenter shares how Taylor Swift felt about Skims campaign · Mini Scroll

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  Hi everyone, welcome to Mini Scroll, the daily Internet
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  culture podcast bringing you the biggest stories from social
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  media, the creator economy and the digital space.
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  Every Monday through Thursday. I'm your host, Lauren Meisner,
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  the founder of the youth digital media brand Centennial World.
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  Whoa, I said that really high pitched.
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  Welcome to Mini scroll everyone. Thank you guys so much for all
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  your kind words about this vibe for the month of August.
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  It's definitely more YouTube than it is like podcaster, but I
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  appreciate you guys sticking with me.
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  But anyways, I have two stories for you guys today and the first
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  one is pretty big. So I need to talk about how the
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  Mr. Beast situation is getting worse.
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  So last week I covered the Mr. Beast situation, I think like
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  every day now. And now the New York Times has
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  released an investigation into the allegations that his game
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  show Beast Games with Amazon Prime is mistreating
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  contestants. So a lot has come out about Mr.
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  Beast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, and his business over
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  the last few weeks. For a quick recap on everything.
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  First, we saw Jimmy's best friend and former Channel Co
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  host Ava Tyson faced allegations that she sent inappropriate
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  tweets and messages to a Mr. Beast fan when that fan was a
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  minor. Jimmy issued a statement saying
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  he takes all of this really seriously and had terminated
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  Ava's role at the company. And the fan in question did
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  speak out and say that they didn't feel groomed by Ava
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  necessarily, But based on other stories that were coming out
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  about Ava off the back of that story, they felt like it was a
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  good decision that Ava had, you know, been removed from Mr.
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  Beast's company. Then Mr. Beast was exposed for
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  making racist and homophobic comments back in 2017, and a
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  spokesperson for Mr. Beast told The Associated Press that quote,
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  when Jimmy was a teenager, he acted like many kids and used
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  inappropriate language while trying to be funny.
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  We love that excuse of, oh, they were just young and dumb.
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  And then amid all of this, two creators made content exposing
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  Mr. Beast. Rosanna Pansino, who is a
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  YouTube that participated in one of Jimmy's Creator Games
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  competition shows. And she has been really vocal
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  about how it was rigged. And a former employee named
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  Dawson who made a video that is now super viral about how Mr.
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  Beast is a fraud and basically said that his business is based
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  off of promoting gambling to children.
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  So Rosanna has made several videos sharing alleged stories
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  from Beast game contestants. So she participated like years
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  ago and spoke out, I think it was last year.
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  Beast Games is the new competition show that is like
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  currently filming or has been filming over the last couple of
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  weeks. So contestants who were
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  competing meeting in Las Vegas as part of this show, we're
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  messaging Rosanna because she has spoken out in the past.
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  Rosanna and Dawson's content felt a bit like hearsay, maybe.
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  I mean, not to me because you know that I am like on the train
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  of Mr. Beast is, in my opinion, a narcissist who was power
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  hungry and he is not this good guy that he makes himself out to
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  be. I feel like did we not learn
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  from like David Dobrik and Shane Dawson?
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  Like we have seen this before. But anyways, some people felt
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  like, OK, well, this is just like hearsay.
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  However, now the New York Times has done an entire investigation
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  into these claims. So for context on like what
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  Beast Games is, it is billed as the biggest competition show
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  ever with the biggest winning prize ever, $5,000,000.
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  So 2000 people were competing in Las Vegas to get chosen for the
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  show. There will be 1000 contestants
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  who actually are on the Amazon Prime show, but 2000 people were
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  competing to get chosen for that and he was filming this
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  competition to get chosen for his YouTube channel.
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  So the New York Times spoke with over a dozen contestants of
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  Beast Games and basically verified what Rosanna was
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  saying. These contestants said that
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  during the shoot they were barely fed.
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  They did not receive clean underwear for long periods of
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  time. Some didn't even receive it for
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  days at a time. Including one girl who told the
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  staff that she was on her period and she needed to change her
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  underwear and they told her that is not a life threatening
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  emergency and they laughed at her.
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  So it seems like they lost some contestants underwear.
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  They were asked to put five days worth of underwear in a Ziploc
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  bag. This is according to a
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  contestant who spoke with Philip Defranco.
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  And, you know, some people went like a day and 1/2, this
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  contestant said, without getting their underwear.
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  That was like the average. That was like the majority of
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  people, It took them about a day and a half.
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  Other people, it took them more than that.
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  And, yeah, this contestant said that for some, they actually
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  just straight up lost their underwear.
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  So this is from the New York Times article, quote.
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  One contestant said she had initially been denied food.
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  She required to take her medication and had been told by
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  staff members that she didn't actually need to eat.
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  After asking repeatedly, she was given half a banana.
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  This is another direct quote. Several contestants said when
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  they had sought out production staff members for assistance
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  with medical care, food and hygiene issues, the staff
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  members were often not helpful and appeared disorganized.
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  Some staff members yelled and cursed at contestants. 1
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  participant said. So in responding to these
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  allegations, Mr. Beast's team, like a Rep for Mr. Beast,
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  actually did respond to the New York Times.
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  I mean, I don't know how you cannot respond to the New York
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  Times. You kind of need to get ahead of
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  this. So they sent a text message to
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  The New York Times blaming external factors like the crowd
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  strike outage for the mistreatment quote.
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  In a text message, a spokesperson for Mr. Beast said
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  the shoot was unfortunately complicated by the crowd strike
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  incident, extreme weather, and other unexpected logistical and
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  communications issues. The spokesperson said Mr. Beast
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  had started a formal review and had, quote, taken steps to
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  ensure that we learn from this experience.
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  So they're not denying these allegations, you know, and there
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  are also some rumors floating around, I'm not sure how
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  verified these are, that contestants were offered an
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  extra $1000 to basically not participate in any type of class
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  action lawsuit in the future about this.
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  So I mean, like I said last week, this is definitely I think
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  the beginning of Mr. Beast downfall.
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  I think this is the beginning of the mask starting to fall for a
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  lot of people if they weren't kind of already there with him.
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  I think the thing with Mr. Beast is he has so many followers and
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  he is so beloved and his following is young men
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  primarily. So they're not going to look at
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  things like this with a critical eye.
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  I think this whole situation, especially now that it's getting
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  so much mainstream press, I think it will impact his ability
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  to work with the streamers ever again.
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  I think a lot of like Hollywood and stuff like, I'm not sure if
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  touch him again after this, but I think in terms of his career,
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  he's just going to keep going. All right.
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  And the last story that I have for you guys is that Sabrina
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  Carpenter has spoken out about that SKIMS campaign.
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  So in April of this year, Sabrina Carpenter starred in a
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  SKIMS campaign that went totally viral.
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  It went viral partly because she looked so good and it was just
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  so on brand for her. It just felt so Sabrina
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  Carpenter. She was like this Bratz doll
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  pinup star. Like it was just like perfect.
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  It was like this bubble gum sexy, cute vibe.
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  It was just, it was so good. And partly because she had just
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  finished her run on the Eris Tour opening for Taylor Swift.
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  And as we know, Taylor and Kim Kardashian, who owns SKIMS, have
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  a very tumultuous history. So at the time, there were
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  rumors swirling around that Sabrina had asked Taylors
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  permission to do the SKIMS campaign.
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  And now in a new profile for Variety, Sabrina has debunked
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  this. She said, quote the post about
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  me having to ask her permission. No, she's one of my best
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  friends. And we grabbed dinner or text
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  and catch up like you would with your best friend.
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  So yeah, I guess she's just kind of implying that Taylor would
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  never expect that of her. And I mean, that was my opinion
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  at the time. I'm like, Taylor's not going to
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  get in the way of any of her friends getting their bag
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  because we know Taylor Swift is a capitalist queen.
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  And this was probably a huge payday for Sabrina.
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  And I think like starring in a Skims campaign is kind of like
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  this new badge of honor. It's like a new rite of passage
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  for Hollywood up and comers. So yes, I am not surprised that
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  she didn't ask Taylor and that Taylor would not have, you know,
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  cared either way. But anyways, guys, that is it
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  for mini scroll today. Thank you so much for listening.
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  Please remember to rate review and subscribe.
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  It helps me so much. It helps me grow.
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  I love you guys. And there will be a deep dive
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  tomorrow with my actual favorite podcasters ever.
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  I'm so excited. I could not believe that I
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  secured this interview. So that's going up tomorrow for
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  you guys and then I will be back with Mini Scroll on Monday.
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  OK, bye.