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Kraft Heinz announced on Tuesday their brands will no longer release new products with synthetic or artificial food dyes, and will completely phase them out of their current products by 2027. The major food conglomerate, which owns brands like Kraft, Kool-Aid, and Jell-O, said in a statement that nearly 90% of their U.S. products are already free of FD&C colors. They say their signature ketchup has never used artificial colors and has always relied solely on tomatoes for the products bright red hue. The nearly 10% of Heinz products that use some of the 36 color additives and nine petroleum-based synthetic dyes currently approved by the FDA, include drink products such as Kool-Aid and Crystal Light, and food products such as Jell-O and Jet-Puffed. Why now? Heinzs statement comes just months after the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced plans to phase out all petroleum-based synthetic dyes by the end of 2026, and encouraged major food companies to do so voluntarily. The Trump Administration and RFK Jr.s Make America Healthy Again campaign has long advocated against artificial dyes, linking them to potential cancer risks and ADHD symptoms, like hyperactivity. Red dyes have especially been put on the chopping block, with Red No. 3 being singled out as needing to be eliminated no later than January 2027, with calls for companies to reformulate their food products. The vast majority of our products use natural or no colors, and weve been on a journey to reduce our use of FD&C colors across the remainder of our portfolio, Pedro Navio, North America President of Kraft Heinz, said in a statement. In fact, we removed artificial colors, preservatives, and flavors from our beloved Kraft Mac & Cheese back in 2016. Who else has eliminated synthetic additives? States and companies alike are suffering pushback from the current administration and consumer market to rid their products of artificial additives and theyre seemingly obliging. Companies such as Tyson, and PepsiCo owned brands like Lays and Tostitos, have already pledged to stop using synthetic and petroleum-based dyes by the end of this year. Other wide-reaching bans have come from states on both sides of the political aisle including California, Virginia, and West Virginia, with 23 other states actively pursuing bans. For consumers interested in the federal rules governing color additives and dyes in foods, cosmetics, and drugs, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services maintains a searchable online database with up-to-date information.
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Indie streamer Mubi raised a staggering $100 million from Sequoia Capital. Then, fans started boycotting. Mubi built a loyal audience of cinephiles through breakout hits like The Substance and Decision to Leave. But after subscribers examined investor Sequoia Capitals portfolio, many took to X to denounce the streamer. They pointed to Sequoias ties to Israels military campaign in Gaza, highlighting its investments in the Israeli defense tech startup Kela. Even after Mubi issued a public statement, its social media remains flooded with Palestinian flags and posts about canceled subscriptions. Even after Mubi issued a public statement, its social media remains flooded with Palestinian flags and posts about canceled subscriptions. The crisis raises broader questions about the financial forces shaping the indie film world. Mubis money crisis Founded in 2007, Mubi coasted for a decade on a loyal base of cinephiles. Then, the distributors films began breaking out, most notably with The Substance, the $80-million-grossing body horror starring Demi Moore. Between 2016 and 2025, Mubi jumped from 100,000 to 20 million subscribers. That growth enabled the company to invest in more films. At the 2025 Cannes festival, Mubi was a top buyer, acquiring titles like The Sound of Falling and the Jennifer Lawrence-led Die My Love. Its success also helped Mubi secure significant funding. After closing a $100 million fundraising round, the company was reportedly valued at $1 billion. The round was led by Sequoia Capital, the investment firm known for backing companies like Nvidia, Reddit, and PayPal. Sequoia also led a $10 million seed round for Kela, an AI-powered defense tech firm founded by four former Israeli intelligence officials, one of whom also worked as the general manager of Palantir Israel. That connection sparked outrage among some Mubi fans. On X, users organized a boycott of the streamer after learning about its ties to Sequoia. One protest flyer claimed that Sequoia is deeply invested in Israels genocide of the Palestinian people. As posts gained traction, Mubi issued a statement on Instagram that many fans considered inadequate. The company’s social media postseven unrelated onescontinue to attract comments from upset subscribers. When reached for comment, Mubi sent Fast Company the same statement shared on its Instagram: Over the last several days, some members of our community have commented on the decision to work with Sequoia given their investment in Israeli companies and the personal opinions expressed by one of their partners. The beliefs of individual investors do not reflect the views of MUBI. How big money invaded independent filmmaking Mubi is far from alone in facing investment controversies. A24, known for films like Civil War and Moonlight, is valued at $3.5 billion. In 2024, A24 accepted $75 million from Thrive Capital, an investment firm that has also put more than $1 billion into OpenAI. Some fans were dismayed that A24, ostensibly a bastion for human-made art, would align itself with investors helping to accelerate generative video. Other independent film studios dont just take money from large firmstheyre owned by them. Annapurna Pictures, the company behind Her and Hustlers, is owned by Megan Ellison. Megan is the daughter of Larry Ellison, cofounder of Oracle, and sister of David Ellison, CEO of SkyDance. Neon, distributor of Anora, is owned by The Friedkin Group, which invests heavily in automotive companies like Toyota. Focus Features is owned by Comcast. Sony Pictures Classics belongs to Sony. IFC Films is under AMC. Some holdouts still maintain a more independent path. Blumhouse Productions focuses on low-budget, scalable horror films, which allows it to operate without major outside investment. Briarcliff Entertainment uses its lack of financial stakeholders to support riskier projects, including The Apprentice and the Jonathan Majors-led Magazine Dreams. But most independent filmmakers cannot avoid the pull of Wall Street, Big Tech, or other powerful investors entering the entertainment world. These financial ties often leave fans in an ethical bindan issue many Mubi subscribers are currently trying to navigate.
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From a distance they look almost like ordinary sailboats, their sails emblazoned with the red-and-white flag of Denmark.But these 10-meter (30-foot) -long vessels carry no crew and are designed for surveillance.Four uncrewed robotic sailboats, known as “Voyagers,” have been put into service by Denmark’s armed forces for a three-month operational trial.Built by Alameda, California-based company Saildrone, the vessels will patrol Danish and NATO waters in the Baltic and North Seas, where maritime tensions and suspected sabotage have escalated sharply since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.Two of the Voyagers launched Monday from Koge Marina, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of the Danish capital, Copenhagen. Powered by wind and solar energy, these sea drones can operate autonomously for months at sea. Saildrone says the vessels carry advanced sensor suitesradar, infrared and optical cameras, sonar and acoustic monitoring.Their launch comes after two others already joined a NATO patrol on June 6.Saildrone founder and CEO Richard Jenkins compared the vessels to a “truck” that carries sensors and uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to give a “full picture of what’s above and below the surface” to about 20 to 30 miles (30 to 50 kilometers) in the open ocean.He said that maritime threats like damage to undersea cables, illegal fishing and the smuggling of people, weapons and drugs are going undetected simply because “no one’s observing it.”Saildrone, he said, is “going to places . . . where we previously didn’t have eyes and ears.”The Danish Defense Ministry says the trial is aimed at boosting surveillance capacity in under-monitored waters, especially around critical undersea infrastructure such as fiber-optic cables and power lines.“The security situation in the Baltic is tense,” said Lt. Gen. Kim Jrgensen, the director of Danish National Armaments at the ministry. “They’re going to cruise Danish waters, and then later they’re going to join up with the two that are on (the) NATO exercise. And then they’ll move from area to area within the Danish waters.”The trial comes as NATO confronts a wave of damage to maritime infrastructureincluding the 2022 Nord Stream pipeline explosions and the rupture of at least 11 undersea cables since late 2023. The most recent incident, in January, severed a fiber-optic link between Latvia and Sweden’s Gotland island.The trial also unfolds against a backdrop of trans-Atlantic frictionwith U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration threatening to seize Greenland, a semiautonomous territory belonging to Denmark, a NATO member. Trump has said he wouldn’t rule out military force to take Greenland.Jenkins, the founder of Saildrone, noted that his company had already planned to open its operation in Denmark before Trump was reelected. He didn’t want to comment on the Greenland matter, insisting the company isn’t political.Some of the maritime disruptions have been blamed on Russia’s so-called shadow fleetaging oil tankers operating under opaque ownership to avoid sanctions. One such vessel, the Eagle S, was seized by Finnish police in December for allegedly damaging a power cable between Finland and Estonia with its anchor.Western officials accuse Russia of behind behind a string of hybrid war attacks on land and at sea.Amid these concerns, NATO is moving to build a layered maritime surveillance system combining uncrewed surface vehicles like the Voyagers with traditional naval ships, satellites and seabed sensors.“The challenge is that you basically need to be on the water all the time, and it’s humongously expensive,” said Peter Viggo Jakobsen of the Royal Danish Defense College. “It’s simply too expensive for us to have a warship trailing every single Russian ship, be it a warship or a civilian freighter of some kind.”“We’re trying to put together a layered system that will enable us to keep constant monitoring of potential threats, but at a much cheaper level than before,” he added. James Brooks, Associated Press
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