Acting for the common good has often been a tortuous process but there is hope the change of owner could help make every team happy, not just the wealthy

Change is in the air for Formula One. The sale of the sport to Liberty Media has dominated discussion since the Italian Grand Prix and understandably given that it has potentially huge ramifications for the future. About which there is optimism, so much so that there are now ideas being floated that might be considered positively revolutionary.

Pleasing as it might be to consider Lewis Hamilton noting post-race that he wanted to thank the team for working so hard on his car, making the right strategy calls and helping him deal mercilessly with a group of revisionist collaborators, the drivers will not be manning barricades. Indeed, although Mercedes suffered here under the lights of Singapore last year, unable to make the super-soft tyres work, with Sebastian Vettel taking what was Ferraris last race win, the Briton is confident that his team has identified and dealt with the issues and expect no repeat of the difficulties. On track, with resources now shifted to building the 2017 cars, radical transformation will have to wait until Australia next year at best.

Off track however, what is to be done? Outside the sport, the reaction to Libertys purchase and its subsequent announcements of plans to expand it around social media, promotion and marketing has been better than one imagines they expected. The companys stock price rose by 15% on Tuesday as the volume of shares traded increased dramatically. The money men like it, as well they might given that CVC had made $8.2bn in 2014 since its initial investment of $2bn in 2006. But it is also this economic engine that could be the force for real change.

One of the most pressing issues of recent years has been the very survival of the smaller teams and central to that is the distribution of prize money between competitors. Sauber and Force India have lodged an official complaint with the EU over the current system of dividing revenues that favours the big five Mercedes, Ferrari, Red Bull, McLaren and Williams over the rest.

The issue is raised with positively Stakhanovite zeal at the Friday conferences attended by team principals and always provokes the same responses. The smaller teams think it is unfair and the big boys are in principle in favour of them receiving more, as long as it does not come out of their share. The vested interests involved created an impasse that has shown no sign of being broken and by which the previous owners were entirely unconcerned as long as it did not affect their bottom line.

While Liberty have said they have no plan for the time being to review the current payment structure, there is still a sense that change is in the air. They have proposed that teams will have the opportunity to participate in the investment in F1, which, although short on detail, has been cautiously welcomed. Might the teams go further though, might they use this as a chance to effect real change, for the long-term benefit of F1?

The sport has been crying out for a very long time for something like this to happen, Anthony Indaimo tells me.

Very few will recognise Indaimos name, but his opinion is worth bearing out. He is head of corporate at Withers, a law firm with an international sports practice across 18 offices globally involving F1 teams and drivers. It has been part of the sport since 1986, when it arranged the sale of Tyrrell to Benetton, and has been involved in negotiating F1 TV deals and also worked with BMW Sauber, the original Renault F1, Lotus, Marussia, Caterham and now represents two of the current top drivers as well as the modern Renault Sport Racing. They reviewed the current bilateral agreements that cover the teams payments and are in place until 2020 and, crucially, were involved with the Formula One Teams Association (Fota) the last time they acted collectively and successfully, when in dispute with the FIA over regulation changes in 2009.

The dynamics of the different relationship [with Liberty] might force the teams to act together in a way that they wouldnt be able to do but for this change, Indaimo explains. I say this because nobody thought that Fota would be formed or that it would be successful. We were intimately involved with that so we know what happened. This acquisition might prove to be a similar catalyst.

The redistribution of wealth in F1 centrally concerns three facets. Cost-cutting which has never worked redividing the current revenues and increasing the overall revenues so each team receives more. Liberty clearly has plans to achieve the latter but a redivision might also be possible.

Indaimo says: What you might see is a couple of the top teams sitting in a room and thinking: The financial agreement expires in 2020, thats set in stone but what should we be doing now to really leverage our position and make our voice heard.

This is a collective muscle-flexing that is more than possible, he believes. In 2014, F1 revenues were 1.8bn approximately and 50% is taken by the owners. There are only a couple of variables you need to discuss and negotiate so that everybody gets more. Prize money to the teams should be 55% as opposed to 50%. A 5% differential of 1.8bn is a lot. Then you also look at the revenue pie increasing and there is more for everybody.

These are the discussions that need to be had and will be had in the not-too-distant future.

Against all this is the hard fact that acting in concert in recent years has been painfully hard, as the protracted and often fruitless strategy group meetings on regulation changes have proved. However, the vested interests involved then were less easily solved. Since in this case the idea of fairer payments has already been agreed as long as no one is worse off, acting together would have no direct impact on the racing but would be of benefit to the sport as a whole.

This might be the time when the teams put their differences aside and come together for a common purpose, Indaimo says.

Its an idea at least. And that is where all good revolutions begin.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2016/sep/15/takeover-f1-liberty-change-for-the-masses

Ungava apologises to the Inuit people for offensive video showing cartoon characters paddling a canoe past igloos and a mans voice chanting

A Canadian gin company has apologised after its advertising campaigns and branding involving cartoon Inuit characters and young women wearing parka costumes sparked complaints about cultural appropriation

Ungava, founded in Quebec in 2010, makes a gin infused with botanicals harvested from Canadas north, and was recently sold to a Toronto-based company for C$12m.

A marketing video from 2013, titled Discovering the Inuit, showed cartoon Inuit characters paddling a First Nations canoe past igloos and polar bears while a mans voice mimics the style of Inuit throat singers and chants Ungava.

Earlier this month, the video came to the attention of Ossie Michelin, an Inuk freelance journalist, who was rankled by the use of Inuit imagery, and some glaring inaccuracies. If you know the slightest thing about Inuit its that we use kayaks, he said. And throat singing is a womans thing. The video has since been removed from the companys YouTube page.

Michelin joined a growing chorus of voices online taking aim at the companys use of Inuit culture to sell its product. Its like the marketing department for this company was like, you know what, we need a shorthand to say north and cold and nature and we cant be bothered to come up with our own recognisable symbols, so were just going to rip off somebody else, he said.

There have also been complaints that attempts to market the drink in bars by employing women in parka costumes equated to sexualising Inuit to sell alcohol.

Writing on Twitter, throat-singer Tanya Tagaq said the company was mocking us and profiting off of us.

Franco Buscemi, who lives in Iqaluit, the capital of Canadas Nunavut territory, criticised the companys Inuit Survival Guide, saying: Heres a tip Dont use Inuit as mascots to sell your product.

In a statement, Ungava founder and president Charles Crawford, said: We are truly sorry that weve offended the Inuit community, as this was never our intent, nor does it align with our corporate values and beliefs. We are deeply sorry and we will do better.

The aim, he said, had been to pay tribute to northern tip of Quebec where the gin is made. Ungava is proud of our ties to the Canadian Arctic, and our brand identity is intended to celebrate the individuality of the region. He added that in the future the company will seek to gather feedback on its use of Inuit symbols.

Some of the problem lies in the seemingly one-way relationship between the company and Nunavik, the Quebec Inuit territory where the botanicals, from cloudberries to juniper, are harvested, said Stephen Puskas, an Inuk visual artist based in Montreal. How do Nunavimmiut [Nunavik residents] benefit from the plants harvested on their land and their identity and language used to sell this alcohol? Puskas recently asked on Facebook.

Puskas pointed to a 2013 interview in which Crawford said that each year the company hires the same two people in the region to handpick its botanicals. The interview noted Crawford wasnt sure of the two mens names.

When approached by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation for comment, Crawford said it was the first criticism he had heard of the companys use of Inuit imagery. He called Puskass comments a one-off.

Days later, the company offered its full apology, which Michelin described as a nice first step, though he questioned whether it would lead to any concrete change. I think it would be so amazing if companies actually came to indigenous communities and established real and meaningful partnerships and used that as part of their branding.

Until that happens, he remained sceptical. This kind of stuff just keeps happening again and again, he said. We get portrayed as these mythical creatures of the north as opposed to real human beings that have a real culture and would like to have some sort of say in how we are portrayed.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/15/canadian-gin-company-ungava-offends-inuit-people

The film caused some audience members to faint at the Toronto film festival, due to highly realistic depictions of bite marks and lacerated extremities

Paramedics were called to a Toronto film screening on Tuesday, after some cinemagoers fainted during a cannibal horror film.

The swoonings occurred during the movie Raw, a blood and guts offering that has been described as a huge, satisfying surprise, but also has prompted one critic to warn that viewers may need to reach for the barf bag.

An ambulance had to be called to the scene as the film became too much for a couple patrons, Ryan Werner, who is handling the films marketing, said in a statement.

Raw, written and directed by Julia Ducournau, tells the all-too-common tale of a vegetarian woman becoming a cannibal after being forced to eat raw rabbit liver during a veterinarian school initiation.

This relatively innocent tasting quickly develops into a lust for man-flesh as the lead protagonist, Justine, turns from a naive freshman into blood-thirsty cannibal.

Often so realistic that they are hard to look at, scenes that viewers of a sensitive nature may find disturbing see lacerated extremities, bite marks and gaping wounds perfectly walk the line between the visceral fun of practical effects and overt attention-grabbing, Variety wrote of the film.
Screen Daily noted that feminist and youth culture angles, plus distinctive visual flamboyance, give Raw a fresh flavor.

It is far from the first time that cinemagoers have bitten off more than they can chew.

In 2012 a number of people fainted during screenings of the horror film V/H/S. Others reported becoming unconscious during the film Prometheus specifically during a scene where a woman performs surgery on herself to remove a space alien from her gut.

Going further back, in 1974 the New York Times reported that during The Exorcist a number of moviegoers vomited at the very graphic goings on on the screen. Others fainted, or left the theater, nauseous and trembling, before the film was half over. Several people had heart attacks.

Raw is a French language film. Its initial release date was 14 May, at the Cannes film festival. The movie currently has a 100% fresh rating on review website Rotten Tomatoes.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/sep/14/cannibal-horror-film-raw-toronto-film-festival