Cryptocurrency analytics company MakroVision has shared its latest technical analysis of Ethereum. According to the company’s analysis, Ethereum managed to retest the $2,130 level, continuing its short-term recovery process for some time.
However, strong selling pressure encountered after reaching this level made it difficult for the price to maintain its position above this region.
MacroVision notes that while a short-term recovery is technically still valid in the current market structure, momentum has weakened recently. The analysis adds that the failure of attempts to break above $2,130 indicates continued selling pressure on upward movements. This situation, it is stated, makes price movements more delicate in the short term.
Highlighting key technical levels, the company notes that the $2,130 range is a critical threshold for Ethereum. If the price manages to hold above this level, a new upward attempt could be on the horizon, with $2,400 emerging as the next significant resistance. It’s worth noting that this region was strongly rejected during the last upward attempt.
However, there are warnings that if Ethereum clearly falls below the $2,130 level, the current recovery could weaken and the market outlook could deteriorate again. According to MacroVision, this scenario increases the risk that the recent upward movement will remain merely a technical reaction rather than a lasting trend reversal.
Kevin DiCicco, who as the owner of the basketball-playing golden retriever named Buddy helped tip off the lucrative, long-running Air Bud franchise, has died. He was 63.
DiCicco, who suffered from respiratory issues and had a recent bout with homelessness, died Saturday in hospice care in San Diego, his brother Mark told TMZ.
DiCicco adopted Buddy after finding him near his Sierra Nevada cabin in 1989. He trained the dog to play basketball, baseball, football, soccer, etc., and they appeared on America’s Funniest Home Videos and on installments of David Letterman’s “Stupid Pet Tricks.”
“My obsession with sport, and his obsession with ball playing, the combination of the two, created this tremendous canine athlete,” DiCicco said of Buddy in a 2024 interview.
He launched Air Bud Productions, and the first film, 1997’s Air Bud, directed by Charles Martin Smith, features Buddy as a circus dog who escapes his cruel clown master (Michael Jeter) and leads Josh Framm’s (Kevin Zegers) school basketball team to a championship.
The family-friendly movie, from Keystone Entertainment and Disney’s Miramax label, grossed $23 million on a $3 million budget and was followed by a big-screen sequel, Air Bud: Golden Receiver (1988), and direct-to-video releases in 2000, ’02, ’03, ’06, ’08, ’09, ’11 and ’12 (featuring such titles as Air Buddies, Snow Buddies and Santa Buddies). And another Air Bud film is on the way.
Buddy died in February 1998 at age 9 — he only appeared in the first film — but DiCicco bred and trained three of his offspring to keep things going.
‘Air Bud: Seventh Inning Fetch’ was released straight to video in 2002.
Buena Vista Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
Even though the films by some estimates have raked in more than $200 million, DiCicco said he didn’t receive much of the profits.
“They are so cleverly crafted to make sure that these films don’t really ever receive the big money,” he said. “That’s why we now find ourselves in a position of instead of enjoying those twilight years and sliding into retirement, we’re almost having to start over.”
DiCicco said he lost his job as a property manager during the pandemic, became homeless and clinically depressed and developed COPD from using medical marijuana, forcing him to use an oxygen tank to help him breathe. Money from a GoFundMe page helped him keep going.
For more than a month, employees of the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA), tasked with screening the millions of people who pass through airports across the United States each day, have not been paid.
The result can be seen in videos that have spread across social media, showing frustrated travellers waiting in long lines at some of the country’s busiest airports, where hundreds of TSA employees have quit or declined to show up for work.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
Hours-long delays have snarled airports, and morale among agency employees has suffered amid the lack of pay, the result of a partial government shutdown affecting the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees the TSA.
The administration of US President Donald Trump has deployed federal agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to airports across the country to fill gaps. That step that has drawn criticism given their lack of relevant training and a record of aggressive methods.
The delays also come at a time when the US-Israel war on Iran has resulted in additional complications when it comes to international travel, from cancelled or rerouted flights to heightened energy prices and concerns over security.
Taken together, analysts warn that the situation has created an image of systemic dysfunction and called into question the safety and reliability of the country’s air travel system.
“For years we’ve bragged about how the US has the best and safest aviation system in the world,” said William McGee, a researcher and consumer advocate at the American Economic Liberties Project.
“I’m not sure that’s something we get to say anymore.”
Exhausted workforce
More than 450 TSA workers have quit since the partial shutdown began on February 14, according to a CNN report citing Lauren Bis, acting assistant secretary for public affairs at DHS.
Call-out rates have also risen from an average of about two percent before the shutdown to around 10 percent last week. TSA did not respond to a request for updated figures.
Frustration among TSA employees has been compounded by the fact that many also went without pay during a previous government shutdown during contentious budget negotiations in October and November, the longest in history.
Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), a labour union that represents workers from numerous government agencies, including TSA, says the growing exhaustion is a natural response to the professional and financial instability workers experience.
“Across the country, TSA officers are once again being asked to report to work without a paycheck. They have families, mortgages and bills like everyone else,” Kelley said in a statement emailed to Al Jazeera.
Statistics on call-outs also don’t capture the full story, with some airports functioning normally while others experience chaotic delays and higher rates. Major airports in cities such as New York, Atlanta, and Houston have seen rates of nearly 30 percent or higher.
With conditions at each airport variable and hard to predict, McGee likens delays to a game of “Whac-A-Mole” that can occur at one location even as they ease at another.
“The bottom line is that, if you have to travel right now, you need to be getting to the airport very early,” he said.
Social media users have shared stories of showing up at the airport with ample time in advance and still missing their flights after waiting in line for several hours.
A spokesperson for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which oversees operations at major airports such as John F Kennedy International and Newark International, told Al Jazeera in a statement that while the Port Authority does not rely on federal funds to operate, workers for federal agencies such as TSA still do.
“Over the last several days, we’ve begun to see that translate into long wait times at security checkpoints during certain periods depending on passenger volumes, TSA shift changes and staff breaks, and the number of TSA staff who come to work for each shift,” the statement says.
US federal officers patrol around Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Virginia, on Tuesday, March 24, 2026 [Manuel Balce/AP Photo]
Political impasse
The situation is the result of a political stalemate over continued funding for DHS, which was set aside during the last shutdown for separate negotiations over immigration enforcement agencies such as ICE and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP). The impasse comes amid continued demands from activists and Democratic lawmakers to rein in immigration agencies, fuelled in part by the high-profile killing of US citizens such as Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents during a crackdown in Minnesota in January.
Widespread public anger over aggressive methods and what rights groups say are routine civil liberties violations during the Trump administration’s mass deportation raids led to calls to rein in agencies and implement reforms.
But to pass a funding bill to reopen the government in November, both parties agreed to negotiate DHS funding at a later date. That impasse is behind the current partial shutdown, which began when funding lapsed on February 14.
Several bills put forward by Democrats to fund TSA while a larger deal on DHS is worked out have failed to pass, with both sides blaming the other for chaos at airports across the country.
“Democrats have offered to pay the salaries — fully fund, no conditions — for TSA,” Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse said in a recent social media post. “It’s Republicans who keep blocking that.”
“Democrats are holding American travellers hostage and denying federal workers their paychecks for political leverage,” the White House social media account said in a post on Friday, sharing a video of long lines at an airport.
Media reports on Tuesday stated that the US Senate is moving to advance a bill that would fund much of DHS, including TSA, to address ongoing travel chaos, as an agreement focused on ICE reforms is worked out later.
McGee says that the situation has created a sense of general dysfunction.
“The US has launched a war against Iran, and because of that, there are heightened security concerns. That TSA is not being paid in that environment is kind of mind-boggling,” he said.
“On top of that, you have flight changes, logistical concerns, and rising energy costs,” he added. “It’s all a hot mess right now.”
It’s been another crazy week for Casey Bloys. On Monday, the HBO and HBO Max chief jetted into London to press the flesh in advance of the streaming platform finally launching in the U.K. His visit came just days after he was spotted having lunch with Netflix boss Ted Sarandos in Hollywood, instantly igniting rumors that Bloys may be eyeing the exit once Paramount completes its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.
The shadow of Paramount has inevitably also clouded what should have been a crowning moment for HBO Max as it finally arrives in the country where, as Bloys told Variety, so much of its content originates, from “Harry Potter” to “House of the Dragon” and the upcoming Richard Gadd series “Half Man” (a BBC co-production). While HBO have moved forward with launching the streamer on Thursday as planned, including flying in talent and execs for a glitzy party on Wednesday night, the truth is no one knows how long HBO Max will continue in its current format given Paramount boss David Ellis’s indication it will eventually merge with Paramount+.
Despite all the drama, Bloys sat down with Variety to talk about HBO Max’s content strategy in the U.K., what fans can expect from “Harry Potter” and whether he knows what’s going to happen after his WBD contract runs out next year.
When you spoke to Variety in 2023, not long after Discovery acquired Warner Bros., you mentioned that David Zaslav reached out to you almost immediately to tell you that HBO was big priority from him. In that vein, have you heard from David Ellison yet?
Yes, absolutely, he’s reached out. I’ve had lunch with him. He also is a big fan of HBO, so obviously can’t get too much into conversations. But it was a very, very nice lunch, and he had a lot of great things to say about not just HBO, but the entire team.
You also had lunch with Ted Sarandos last week…
I have lunch with lots of people.
Are you going to stay at HBO post-acquisition?
That is so far ahead of anything — because we are in the process — there are rules around what you can talk about, what you can’t talk about. But I’m going to go back to my lunch with David and the nice things he said about HBO and the team and all that. And you know, as we get closer to the close of transaction, we will be able to talk more about what does this look like, how will it work, that sort of thing. So I’m looking forward to that. But unfortunately, I mean — it’s actually legal — things you can and cannot discuss.
Do you mean in terms of your future at the company?
I wasn’t necessarily talking about my future. I was just talking about what a combined service would look like, you know, that sort of thing strategically, what he’s thinking. He said publicly, and also to me, that HBO is a big priority for him, and he feels strongly about that. So again, nice early signs, but there’s only so much we can talk about now.
But with your deal expiring next year are you thinking about the future at the moment?
Now do you really think I’m going to answer that?
Courtesy of Warrick Page/HBO Max
U.K. Originals
Turning to the U.K., have you been planning more U.K. originals in advance of HBO Max launching here? I know you have “Youth” with Sharon Horgan coming up and “Half Man” (although that will only be available on the BBC in the U.K.).
If you think about our slate, a lot of it is local original programming already. “Harry Potter,” “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” House of the Dragon.” [We’ve got] Sharon Horgan, we’ve got co productions with Michaela Coel, George Kay, so I feel like I work with a lot of a lot of U.K. talent.
In terms of U.S. streamers in the U.K., Apple TV’s creative director for international, Jay Hunt, has been particularly impressive in terms of “glocal” commissions. Do you envision having someone in a similar role here for HBO Max?
No and like I said, if you look at what we’ve done, at least in my time there at HBO, we’ve had a lot of successful co-productions. So we know a lot of not just talent, but a lot of executives, had a lot of good experiences with many different broadcasters. So I don’t anticipate needing someone in addition to that. You don’t know what the future holds. But for right now, I don’t think it’s necessary.
HBO has done a lot of co-productions with broadcasters in the U.K. where it takes the rights outside of the U.K. With HBO Max launching here, how is that going to work going forward?
We haven’t done one yet since launch. But given our history, I imagine it’s something we’d like to continue. It’ll be a conversation, though, about what streaming rights look like now. Where before we didn’t have to worry about it or think about it, now we will. I don’t know what that looks like because we haven’t dealt with it yet, but I’d like to have the option to continue to do them when we find the right project or the right talent.
Warner Bros.
Harry Potter
Is there anything new you can tell me about the “Harry Potter” series?
I don’t think I can other than I’m thrilled with what I’ve seen.
What made you feel like the time was right to bring it back?
Well, there’s no right number, but I do think it’s hard sometimes for people to really — you know, they’ll say, “The movies just came out!” It started about 20 years ago!
And what’s nice is the books have obviously remained popular, but you now have parents who grew up on it and wanting to share that with [their] kids, and kids on their own wanting it so just from a from a business point of view, that’s a big opportunity. From a creative point of view — I mean, look, I’ve always worked in television, it’s my preferred medium. One of the benefits of it, from my point of view, is spending more time with characters and story. And so if you’ve got a book, let alone a series of books, to kind of arbitrarily say, “Well, we’ve got two hours” you have to make some difficult decisions. So the idea is to have the freedom to let it breathe a little bit more and explore the world a bit more.
Has the fact that actors are effectively signing up to it for 10 years made casting difficult?
Not really. I mean, I think anytime someone signs on to a TV project, the hope is it’s gonna be [a] job for the next 10 years. I mean, that’s a dream. So we didn’t really have any issues with that. I think anybody who’s willing to go up for a television show, it’s possible they’re signing up for a long-term gig. So it’s something you have to think about. But we haven’t seen many people say, “Well, I don’t want to do that, because it’s going to be too long.”
Paapa Essiedu, who is set to play Snape in the show, recently talked about some of the toxic and racist reactions to his casting, including death threats. Did you anticipate that reaction?
With all actors on any kind of big IP shows — and this is obviously one of those where you’ve got, you know, passionate fans, people with a lot of opinions — it can get scary in places. So for any show like that, we anticipated it and tried to have training, you know, best practices in terms of social media and how to handle it. And obviously we’ve got a serious security team. So unfortunately, it was something that we thought might happen and we just try to be as careful as we can.
Have you cast Voldemort?
No, we have not.
Because there’s a lot of names in the mix. Tilda Swinton was one.
As a rule, I would say any rumors – don’t [believe them]. I don’t even know who we’re casting.
I’m not sure I believe that…
I really don’t! I would take everything you read with a grain of salt.
HBO
D.C. Universe
The proliferation of the DCU on HBO always felt like it moved at a slightly slower pace and volume than the MCU on Disney+. Was that a deliberate strategy?
That was deliberate because I do it based on the script. More than anything else — forget about anybody, any plan or anything like that — you have to do it based script by script. Is it a good script? Do we think it’s interesting creatively? Do we think it makes sense as a show? So for me, personally, I think anytime you lay out a thing dictating in advance how many shows you’re going to have per year, it sets up an opportunity where you might compromise creatively. And so I think it’s always better just start every project “What do we think of what’s in front of us here?” versus, well, “If we don’t have this one, we can’t have that one.” You’ve got to start with what’s in front of you.
There was a point where no one ever thought superhero fatigue would kick in and now it seems like it really has. Did you anticipate that?
I think, in retrospect, our approach creatively probably is the more prudent one. And I think one of the benefits also that we have at HBO / HBO Max / Warner Bros. Discovery, if you think about some of the shows, it’s not just “Game of Thrones.” It’s funny, when “A Knight of Seven Kingdoms” comes out there’s language around “another ‘Game of Thrones’ spinoff.” And I like to remind people, this is [only] the second one.
And I think part of it is because a lot of what gets written about is development and some people will talk about development like it is actually [in production]. So I’ve had to remind people, there’s been “House of the Dragon” and “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” — and that’s it, regardless of what else gets written about. We didn’t do five “Game of Thrones” spinoffs because we’ve got DC and we just did “It: Welcome to Derry” and they’re working on a second season. We’ve got other places to go. We’re developing a “Crazy Rich Asians” series. So we’re not locked into just one world or one universe. But I think logically, if you think about it, if you overdo anything, if you give to people too much of anything, kind of by definition it becomes less special. So I think it’s something you have to be careful about.
Is there a chance that Colin Farrell will return for a second season of “The Penguin”?
Colin is going to be in the [“The Batman: Part II”] movie. He’s got other movies going on. [..] I would say it’s certainly complicated, but something everybody involved would like to figure out. I just don’t know.
What about Viola Davis’ “Waller” spinoff – does it look like it might go into production?
Put it this way, I wouldn’t say it’s on the runway. But “Lanterns” is coming up this summer.
HBO
Other HBO Shows
Have you talked to Sam Levinsion about any “Euphoria” spinoffs?
No, no no. He is so focused on Season 3 that we haven’t gotten into what he wants to do next. So I will wait to hear from him, but we are deep in post. And the air date is, you know, we’re weeks out, so he is really laser focused on getting the show completed.
Has “White Lotus” Season 4 started shooting?
Hasn’t started yet, but they are deep into prep. It’s soon.
Do you have anything else in the pipeline with “Succession” creator Jesse Armstrong?
Well, we had his directorial debut in “Mountainhead,” which was last year. And let’s see, how would I categorize it? He’s noodling. I think anytime you come off a big show. it’s good for a creator to kind of take their time, maybe do other things. I’m pretty confident that he will come to us when the time is right.
“Succession” was a show that a lot of people said it took them a couple of episodes to really get into. Some people think that particularly in the streaming age, where there is so much content, it’s arrogant for creators and execs to expect audiences to invest that amount of time into a show before it “gets good.” What do you make of that?
I’ve heard people talk about that before. One thing I’ll say about “Succession” — people say, “Oh, in Episode 4, it really kind of clicked,” and I was like, “No, I believe it was there from the beginning. You just got the rhythm of it [now]. So it wasn’t the show. It was you.” But remember it used to take — we talked about seasons, like we talked about “Game of Thrones” in Season 3 is when it kind of clicked.
So I don’t think it’s arrogant. I think it’s letting artists do their thing. But the marketplace is the marketplace, and there’s a ton of new shows now, whereas before, you could stick around for Seasons 1, 2, see if it found its legs. I think it is a little crazy to think a show is going to be fully formed by, you know, whatever [early episode]. But you know, each show is different, too. Some come knowing exactly what it is. The beauty of television is you have the ability to evolve and change and turn into something.
OpenAI is shutting down its Sora video generation app. “We’re saying goodbye to Sora,” the company wrote in a X post published Tuesday afternoon. For now, OpenAI has yet to say when the app and its related API service would become unavailable. Instead, promising to share those details at a later date.
“We’ve decided to discontinue Sora in the consumer app and API. As we focus and compute demand grows, the Sora research team continues to focus on world simulation research to advance robotics that will help people solve real-world, physical tasks,” an OpenAI spokesperson told Engadget.
While today’s news might come as a surprise for some, there were warning signs Sora was heading in this direction since the start of the year. While Sora hit the top of the US App Store charts shortly after its debut, interest in the platform appears to have quickly fizzled out thereafter. At the start of 2026, data from analytics firm Appfigures suggested the app was seeing successive month-over-month declines in both new installs and user spending. In December alone, a time of year when most apps typically flourish, Sora reportedly saw a 32 percent decline in new downloads from November.
The shutdown also aligns with OpenAI’s recent shift in strategy. Since the release of GPT-5.2, the company’s “code red” response to Google’s Gemini 3 Pro model, OpenAI has tried to court professionals like coders and data analysts with systems that excel in those domains, seeing enterprise customers as a route toward profitability. However, today’s shutdown does appear to come with an additional cost for OpenAI. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Disney is exiting the deal it signed with the AI lab at the end of last year, and won’t, as a result, invest $1 billion into it.
Banks Took $434 Billion From Americans Last Year — Is it Time for Bitcoin?
Banks extracted hundreds of billions from American savers last year — and the scale of it shows a deep structural issue in America’s financial system. Bitcoin might help.
In 2025, U.S. banks generated roughly $434 billion in net interest income, or about $1,670 per adult, according to research from River.
The mechanism is straightforward: banks take customer deposits, lend or invest those funds at higher rates, and return only a fraction of the yield to depositors. With most savings accounts offering close to zero interest, that spread compounds into one of the most reliable profit engines in the economy.
At the same time, inflation has remained persistently above the Federal Reserve’s stated 2% target for years. In real terms, that means savers are losing purchasing power annually. When your bank pays 0.1% but inflation runs several percentage points higher, the result is not just stagnation — it’s erosion. Quietly, consistently, and at scale.
This dynamic helps explain why alternative systems — particularly Bitcoin — continue to resonate. For many, the issue is no longer just access to financial services, but whether those services are aligned with their long-term interests at all.
Yet the frustration isn’t limited to legacy banking. The fintech sector, once positioned as a corrective force after the 2008 financial crisis, is now facing its own identity crisis, Bitcoin might help.
Tricking users to gamble with their money
Over the past decade, companies like Robinhood, Coinbase, and Cash App lowered barriers to entry, onboarding millions of new users into investing, payments, and digital assets. For the first time, financial tools that were once reserved for the wealthy became widely accessible.
But according to River CEO Alex Leishman, that mission has drifted. What began as democratization has, in many cases, turned into monetization of user behavior. Investment platforms now promote memecoins, leveraged derivatives, and even sports betting-style features. The interface may look like a brokerage account, but the incentives increasingly resemble a casino.
The distinction matters. Data consistently shows that most retail participants lose money in high-frequency trading environments. Futures markets see the vast majority of traders underperform.
Options trading often results in repeated losses for the average user. And in jurisdictions where sports betting has expanded, personal bankruptcy rates have climbed in the years that follow.
This convergence — finance, gaming, and gambling — has been driven by a simple motive: engagement. The more often users trade, bet, or speculate, the more revenue platforms generate.
Push notifications, streaks, instant settlement, and social features all reinforce short-term behavior. Over time, the line between investing and entertainment becomes difficult to distinguish, according to River and Leishman.
Leishman’s critique is not that risk-taking should be eliminated, but that it should be transparent. Casinos don’t present themselves as wealth-building tools. Increasingly, financial apps do.
It’s time for bitcoin
Bitcoin, in contrast, sits outside this framework. Bitcoin does not promise yield, nor does it rely on user engagement to sustain itself. Its value proposition is narrower but more rigid: a fixed supply, a decentralized network, and the ability to self-custody without reliance on intermediaries.
Despite more than a decade of growth, ownership remains relatively low — less than one-fifth of American adults. That suggests two things at once: adoption is still early, and the gap between existing financial systems and viable alternatives remains wide.
The broader question now is directional. The original promise of fintech was to expand access and improve outcomes. In many ways, it succeeded. But access alone is not enough if the underlying products leave users worse off.
Banks continue to extract value through interest rate spreads. Bitcoin doesn’t. Fintech platforms increasingly optimize for activity over outcomes. And users — more informed, but also more exposed — are left navigating a system that often rewards participation more than prudence.
The opportunity, as Leishman frames it, is to realign incentives: build tools (like bitcoin) that prioritize long-term wealth creation over short-term revenue, and offer products that founders would trust their own families to use.
This post Banks Took $434 Billion From Americans Last Year — Is it Time for Bitcoin? first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.
Renowned technical analyst Francis Hunt, a guest on Michaël van de Poppe’s show, made striking statements about the future of the global financial system and Bitcoin’s place within it. Known for his predictions regarding gold and debt crises, Hunt shared his technical and macroeconomic analyses, which are of particular interest to Bitcoin investors.
Francis Hunt, while evaluating Bitcoin’s ($BTC) recent performance, drew attention to the asset’s decline in value against gold. According to Hunt, Bitcoin has begun to lose its “exponential growth” characteristic seen in past cycles.
Hunt argues that Bitcoin’s market capitalization can be misleading. He notes that in the early years, the low circulating supply allowed small capital inflows to create massive price movements, but as the asset grew, maintaining this momentum became more difficult.
The analyst claimed that “real and big money” is flowing into gold instead of Bitcoin. He stated that giant economies like China are closing their trade deficits with gold, and that Bitcoin has not yet achieved reserve asset status at the state level.
Hunt, noting that Bitcoin’s chart against gold ($BTC/GOLD) is weakening, believes the risk-return ratio is currently unfavorable for Bitcoin. He warned investors by asking, “Is it worth risking a drop to zero for Bitcoin to potentially rise from $70,000 to $120,000?”
Hunt, cautious about Bitcoin, noted that there are technically stronger assets in the cryptocurrency market. He specifically pointed out that the resilience shown by assets like Tron (TRX) and Binance Coin (BNB) during a bear market is technically interesting, arguing that these assets could emerge as key digital payment tools in the event of a potential collapse of the banking system.
While Jeff Probst may be the face of Survivor, one of the people most responsible for what viewers see onscreen has spent 50 seasons behind the scenes. John Kirhoffer has been with the show since inception as a co-executive producer, overseeing the iconic challenges that have become one of the series’ most defining and enduring elements.
He also created one of Survivor’s most lasting traditions: the Dream Team.
For the uninitiated, the Dream Team is a rotating group of 20somethings who test challenges before the castaways. If you’ve ever spotted mysterious knees or rogue calves in a challenge preview, those legs likely belonged to a Dream Teamer. Kirhoffer originally created the group so he, Probst, Mark Burnett and other producers wouldn’t have to run the obstacles themselves. What began as a practical workaround has since evolved into a training ground for young creatives hoping to break into television production.
On the day Survivor 50 kicked off, The Hollywood Reportercaught up with Kirhoffer who shares below the origins of the Dream Team, why Burnett might be the most competitive person alive and why — like Whitney Houston — he believes “the children are our future.”
***
How the idea of the Dream Team came about
“Season one, we had all these ideas [for challenges]. We would go to a park in L.A., any park we could find, and put together makeshift versions of these games we were going to do and test them. It was pretty rudimentary, to say the least. Then we get out on location and would start setting them up and we realized, Holy crap, we don’t have 16 designated people. I’m doing it. Mark Burnett’s doing it. Jeff Probst is doing it. And so right away I was like, We need designated people. It was us testing all these games, and nobody’s watching it. That’s part of the problem, we need to watch it to learn.
So we said, If we ever do this again, we need designated people. So the next season (season two in Australia), we went out, scouted, came back — and I’m talking to the money people saying, “Hey, I need a designated team of people to test, young people. They just have to be PAs (production assistants), and then they can also help other people and cameramen and stuff.” We never thought it would turn into the mentoring apprenticeship that it turned into. We just needed bodies. So those first dozen seasons or so, we’d go to wherever we were locally and get kids on holiday from all over the world.
We weren’t flying anybody in. We were going to get anybody we could. I would go to youth hostels and post up signs like: Needed for X amount of weeks, $200 a week, plus all your meals. That’s how it started, and then we decided we needed to give them a name. My friend Kevin McManus goes, What about the Olympic basketball team, the Dream Team? Let’s call them the Dream Team. So he named them the Dream Team — and it’s been the Dream Team ever since.”
Jeff Probst, John Kirhoffer, and Chris Marchand on the set of Survivor 50.
Getting on the Dream Team isn’t easy
“Hudson Smith, who’s a co-EP on our show, and Matt Van Wagenen, our EP, saw the mentoring potential in the Dream Team and wanted to focus on film school and get the best of the best — bring them in, let them work with professionals and watch them rise through the ranks. Supervising producer Chris Marchand [nicknamed ‘Milhouse’ by the crew] and I do most of the vetting. Matt and Hudson will then go out to colleges and talk to students, give them our information, and they write to us. I’ve spoken at schools, and anybody who’s interested to hear somebody from Survivor talk will come in. But we go through the film and TV departments.
We only have about 25 positions, usually the same number as the cast. We get a couple hundred applications. I have 175 people a year I turn down. We don’t advertise but people hear about it through word of mouth. Also, everyone [on the crew] has a niece, daughter, son, nephew, cousin — a buddy who they want that are of age and would be perfect. So you take everything into account. But every year, there’s a handful of people I’ve never met who have no association with anybody else. They just came in because they heard about the opportunity and got on.”
Being a Dream Teamer is just the first step
“Art Department and Challenges are like brother and sister. The majority of the time when the Dream Team, especially newer Dream Team, aren’t out testing things, they’re painting, helping load and unload trucks. They’re out in the field getting things together, helping out the prop and construction guys. Then we also have shadowing. Every season at the beginning of the season, we bring everybody in one by one to ask, What are you interested in? I always tell them right up front, First of all, just be a good Dream Teamer. But as you go, if you see something in television production, say, ‘Hey, I’m really interested in camera, I’m interested in audio, I’m interested in art. I want to be a producer.’ Let us know.
Brittany [Crapper] is a perfect case example. She’s a co-executive producer. She was a Dream Teamer. Now she’s at my level, we’re absolute contemporaries. And she worked for me many, many years ago. Her husband, Riley, was a Dream Teamer. Then he became our prop master, and we became friends and I was at their wedding. I’ve been to six different Dream Team weddings. Brittany and Riley have three of the 80-something Survivor babies that are out there from people who met on the show and had a family.”
A “marooning” rehearsal with Dream Teamers from season 50.
The legacy of the Dream Team
“The legacy of the Dream Team, I think, is finding talent where you weren’t initially looking. We were just looking for bodies to do something, and then you realize nobody aspires to be a production assistant all their lives. We get these young kids and they all have desires and passions and talents. We don’t look at them as a herd of labor, but as a bunch of individual potential superstars. I don’t want anybody being a PA for too many years. Move up, move up, move up.
I think it’s the responsibility of everybody who’s a boss or a manager to the people that are below them, not to just keep the good ones where they are, but to nurture them. As soon as possible, promote them up. I see people who don’t want to get rid of their production assistants because they’re such good assistants. It’s like, No, move them on, move them on, move on. Another crop of good ones will come through. I think the legacy of the Dream Team is, to quote Whitney Houston, I believe the children are the future. Treat them well and let them lead the way.”
Competing on a challenge with Mark Burnett
“One of my favorite stories from season one — it’s been a long time since I talked about this — but we had a challenge where you had to swim out, dive down and get a heavy chest. We called it In From the Deep, and we were on a sandbar out in the ocean. Back then it was probably 12 feet deep or so. We had to swim out and dive down to a really heavy chest filled with lead. There were two teams side by side and six handles. You go down, pick it up, then you walk as far as you can underwater, drop it. When you run out of breath, get some air, go back down and keep going.
Back then, 26 years ago, I was a 35-year-old surfer. I was a scuba diver. I was in pretty darn good shape. I consider myself a water guy. And Mark Burnett is the most competitive person I’ve ever met in my life. Mark and I are on one team, and some of our other friends are on another team.
We went down, we pick it up, and we’re heading towards the beach and get halfway. And I gotta go up and let go. We pop up and Mark goes, What happened? I go, What? He goes, What’s wrong? Are you okay? Yeah. Well, why’d you stop? I ran out of breath. He goes, You’re freaking kidding me. We have to win this thing.
And we’re going down and I was just dying. Finally, I could feel my head hit the surface of the water, three more steps and I could breathe. We went up and we won. And I realized, Oh my gosh, when you’re competing with Mark Burnett, you don’t stop. You just don’t stop at all. That was super fun.”
***
Survivor 50 airs new episodes Wednesday at 8 p.m. on CBS, streaming on Paramount+.
Local police concluded that the Reacher star acted in self-defense during an explosive fight with his neighbor, Ronnie Taylor, on Sunday in the Nashville suburb of Brentwood, Tennessee. As such, police have closed the investigation and will not pursue any charges in the matter, which stemmed from an altercation involving the two men over Ritchson’s motorcyle which Taylor claimed was causing a noise disturbance.
“After reviewing available evidence, including video footage and witness statements, authorities determined that no criminal charges will be pursued. Mr. Ritchson’s actions were found to be in self-defense,” Brentwood Police Captain Steven Pepin tells The Hollywood Reporter.
Pepin added that Ritchson declined to pursue any charges of his own against the neighbor who admitted that he instigated the physical contact. “Although a potential reckless endangerment charge was considered, Mr. Ritchson declined to pursue charges. With the agreement of the District Attorney’s Office, the case is now closed, and no further action will be taken,” per Pepin.
TMZ broke the story over the weekend by publishing a video that featured Ritchson in an altercation with Taylor. The man later told the outlet that the situation unfolded over two days, beginning on Saturday when he claims to have witnessed Ritchson speeding through the neighborhood on a motorcycle and causing a disturbance. Taylor then claimed that he spotted Ritchson on his motorcycle again, this time on Sunday joined by two individuals also on motorbikes, a pair that happened to be the actor’s young sons.
Taylor confronted Ritchson in the street at which point the situation allegedly turned physical with Taylor admitted on TMZ Live that he was the one who instigated the physical contact by shoving Ritchson and pushing him off his Kawasaki. The outlet also reported that Taylor “dared Alan to hit him” while Ritchson was still on the ground, though the actor tried to leave the scene until he was shoved by Taylor.
🚨NEW: Video shows how the fight started between Alan Ritchson and his neighbor
The neighbor stepped directly in front of the bike, causing Ritchson to flip over the handlebars
The neighbor previously said he told the actor to “slow it down.”
The New York Stock Exchange said that it’s working with Securitize on developing systems that will allow tokenized securities to trade round-the-clock.
The companies are collaborating on standards that will shape tokenized securities on a platform affiliated with the largest stock exchange by market capitalization.
Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo has advocated for “native” securities, which embody the rights of traditional counterparts while existing solely on-chain.
The New York Stock Exchange said Tuesday that it’s collaborating with Securitize, the BlackRock-backed tokenization specialist, on a program aimed at accelerating Wall Street’s shift toward trading infrastructure underpinned by digital assets.
As part of the arrangement, the world’s largest stock exchange by market capitalization will work with Securitize on developing standards for tokens that represent real-world assets like stocks and bonds, as well as exchange-traded funds, according to a joint press release.
Securitize is also slated to serve as the first digital transfer agent for NYSE’s Digital Trading Platform, the companies said. That will enable Securitize to create “blockchain-native securities” on the NYSE-affiliated platform, which is designed to facilitate round-the-clock trading.
The collaboration comes as the latest sign that giants in traditional finance are growing serious about perceived opportunities with blockchain-based trading infrastructure. Last year, SEC Chair Paul Atkins unveiled Project Crypto, describing it as an agency-wide initiative to develop rules and regulations that “enable America’s financial markets to move on-chain.”
Last week, Nasdaq gained approval from the watchdog for a pilot program involving tokenized securities. The system is expected to keep trading and settlement within traditional market rails through coordination with a subsidiary of Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation.
As experimentation with tokenization intensified last year, Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo told Decrypt that the only way to truly represent securities on-chain is through “native” tokenization. That means a token representing a stock, for example, would carry the same rights as its traditional counterpart, including the ability to vote or receive dividends.
Transfer agents typically record ownership of securities in “book-entry” form using centralized databases. Securitize uses a black-chain based system for that instead, including BlackRock’s $2 billion tokenized money-market fund BUIDL, which primarily exists on Ethereum.
“We are proud to support NYSE in helping design the foundational transfer agent infrastructure,” Domingo said in a statement. “This is about building tokenization in a way that works within real market structure, with the protections, controls, and operational integrity.”
Last month, World Liberty Financial, the DeFi project backed by U.S. President Donald Trump, tapped Securitize for issuing tokens tied to the development of a luxury Maldivian resort.
In October, the firm backed by the world’s largest asset manager unveiled plans to list on the Nasdaq at a $1.25 billion valuation. Before the president was elected on a pro-crypto platform, BlackRock led a $47 million strategic funding round for Securitize in 2024
Daily Debrief Newsletter
Start every day with the top news stories right now, plus original features, a podcast, videos and more.
