FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE

FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE

National "Issue Film" Competition Targeting Young Americans 18 to 26 Including 7 Million College Students on 1200 Campuses Launched January 24, 2006 at the Sundance Film Festival

In Partnership With Microsoft, MSN Spaces, MSNBC.com, USA Today, Entertainment Weekly and mtvU

And in Association With the United Nations, The Humane Society of the United States and USC Center for Public Diplomacy

VIP Jury Includes Walter Cronkite, George Clooney, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Senator Barack Obama, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Brian Williams, Amy Gross, Anderson Cooper, Gillian Sorensen

Walter Cronkite and George Clooney Have Each Penned Open Letters Urging Engagement in the Pressing Social Issues of Our Time

FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE Is Soliciting 30-to-60 Second 'Issue Films' To Encourage Young Americans to Add Their Voice To Public Dialogue on Current Issues, Via Film

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 6 /PRNewswire/ -- FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE, an unprecedented "issue film" competition inviting young Americans 18 to 26, including 7 million college and university students on 1200 campuses nationally, to add their voice to the public dialogue on contemporary issues via 30-to-60 second films, launched January 24, 2006 at the Sundance Film Festival.

The idealism and scope of the competition, now in its second year, has brought together such major media partners as Microsoft, MSN Spaces, USA TODAY, mtvU and Entertainment Weekly; national and international organizations like The United Nations and U.N. Millennium Campaign, The Humane Society of the United States and USC Center for Public Diplomacy; national and international leaders like Walter Cronkite, George Clooney, Senator Barack Obama, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Gillian Sorensen, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Brian Williams, Anderson Cooper, Amy Gross and Shashi Tharoor, as well as the heads of major studios, publishing, broadcasting and music industries.

The competition will be promoted to the 440 million monthly users of MSN and the 104 million users of MSN SPACES, as well as to readers of USA TODAY, the largest U.S. circulation newspaper, and Entertainment Weekly, the largest-circulation entertainment consumer magazine.

Young Americans 18 to 26 will be invited to create 30-to-60 second films -- live action or animated -- on any issue, as a way to empower young adults in being engaged, involved citizens and giving them a voice. Students may also choose from five suggested sub-categories, which will offer additional presentation platforms to winners: Global issues/ UN Millennium Development Goals; Animal Welfare; Arts as a Global Diplomat and Cultural Bridge; Music-driven, featuring solo, band, or music-video styled film in which music presents the issue; and Integration of Film and New Media, in which an issue will be expressed via the creation of an issue-based webpage on MSN Spaces which merges film and internet-based technologies. Submission deadline is May 1, 2006.

George Clooney and Walter Cronkite have each written an open letter to young Americans, currently being distributed across the U.S. on college campuses. The candid letters urge young Americans to engage in the pressing social issues of our times, and add their voices to the public dialogue. (Copies of letters available upon request).

MSN Spaces, which sponsored the launch of FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE at the Sundance Film Festival 2006, will sponsor the top finalists to attend the Sundance Film Festival 2007 and present their entries. The top finalist in each of the five categories will also be broadcast on mtvU, mtvU Uber at mtvU.com, MSN Video and MSNBC.com, and be invited guests, along with their faculty advisor, at the closing reception at The United Nations headquarters in New York City. The top finalists will also receive a Motorola RAZR V3 mobile phone, and their entries showcased at the Maui Film Festival in June 2006. The Vail Film Festival in April 2006 will offer the first-look of 2006 entries.

"It's very exciting that such an explicitly idealistic outreach can take wings and mushroom so quickly, among media leaders, academia, the Hollywood community, major corporations, government," says HeathCliff Rothman, who founded FYI - Film Your Issue in 2004. "I think that change in our society has to come from new paradigms. Visuals and film are the language of this generation. We want to engage young Americans in contemporary issues, invite them to tell us what matters to them, empower them to recognize that their voice is welcome and necessary in the public dialogue, in this case via film."

MSN Spaces ( http://spaces.msn.com/ ) is where the FYI filmmakers will also create personal profile pages, share their current and past projects and the progress of their "issue film," and where the public and filmmakers will be invited to blog on the issues they've seen. Finalists will be tallied by a combination of public and VIP Jury votes.

The semi-finalist films will be presented on MSN Video ( http://video.msn.com/ ), and the public will be able to vote on the semi-finalists by visiting MSNBC.com.

The top 20 finalists in the category of Global Issues/ UN Millennium Development Goals will be screened at a panel at UN Headquarters, co-hosted by USA TODAY. The top 20 finalists in the category of Arts as Global Diplomat and Cultural Bridge will be presented to opinion makers and public officials in Washington D.C., co-hosted by USC Center for Public Diplomacy. Top finalists in the category of Animal Welfare will be posted on the website of The Humane Society of the United States. Top finalists in the category of Integration of Film and New Media, in partnership with MSN Spaces, will receive an additional prize.

FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE academic partners include the leading organizations of higher education: The Association of American Colleges and Universities, The American Association of State Colleges and Universities (The American Democracy Project), The American Association of University Professors, Campus Compact and Imagining America.

Round 1 finalists focused on a judicial injustice case in Illinois, media accountability on the coverage of Iraq, widespread poverty, gay marriage, and education budget cuts, as follows: "The Innocence," on Judicial Injustice, Illinois State University; "Animated IRAQ" on Media Accountability in Iraq, Boise State University; "A Way of Life," on Poverty, University of Central Florida; "Equal Rights," on Gay Marriage, Castleton State College; "The Slasher," on Education Budget Cuts, University of Wisconsin - Stout.

FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE ROSTER

FOUNDER
HeathCliff Rothman -- Journalist/ Social Entrepreneur

DISTINGUISHED JURIST
Walter Cronkite -- News Anchor/ Journalist/ Author

VIP JURY
Jonathan Alter -- Newsweek / NBC
Brad Anderson -- Vice Chairman and CEO, Best Buy Co., Inc
Kurt Andersen -- Novelist / Journalist
Ben Bradlee -- VP at Large, The Washington Post
George Clooney -- Actor/ Director/ Producer
Lyor Cohen -- Chairman and CEO, U.S. Recorded Music, Warner Music Group
Dick Cook -- Chairman, The Walt Disney Company
Anderson Cooper -- CNN/ Anderson Cooper 360
Mark Cuban -- HDNet / Landmark Theatres / Magnolia Pictures /
Dallas Mavericks
Amy Gross -- Editor in Chief, O Oprah Magazine
Philip Seymour Hoffman -- Actor
Nicholas Kristof -- Political Op-ed Columnist, The New York Times
Robert Lynch -- President and CEO, Americans for the Arts
Ron Meyer -- Universal Studios President and COO
Craig Moon -- President and Publisher, USA TODAY
Barack Obama-- Senator, Illinois (D)
Wayne Pacelle -- President and CEO, The Humane Society of the
United States
Mercedes Paz -- The President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities
Richard Pena -- Chairman, New York Film Festival Selection Committee
Tom Rothman -- Chairman, Fox Filmed Entertainment
Gillian Sorensen -- Former Ass't Secretary-General, United Nations;
Senior Advisor, UN Foundation
Shashi Tharoor -- Under-Secretary-General for Communications and
Public Information, UN
Van Toffler -- President, MTV Networks Music / Logo/ Films Group
Antonio Villaraigosa -- Mayor, City of Los Angeles
Todd Wagner -- HDNet Films / Landmark Theatres / 2929 Productions /
Todd Wagner Foundation
Brian Williams -- Anchor and Managing Editor, NBC Nightly News

ADVISORY THINKTANK
Michael Barlow -- Paramount Classics
Harold Bronson-- Co-founder, Rhino Entertainment
Kimberly Shlain Brooks -- President, Lightray Productions
Dana Brunetti -- President, Trigger Street Productions
Ken Dozier -- Exec. Dir., Western Research Application Center Viterbi
School of Engineering USC
Joshua Fouts -- Executive Director, USC Center for Public Diplomacy
Stephen Nemeth -- President, Rhino Films
Michael Oppenheimer -- Professor, Geosciences and International Affairs,
Princeton University
Sara Risher -- Producer, New Line Cinema
Barry Rivers -- Founder and Director, Maui Film Festival
Eric Roth -- Executive VP, Co-Head of Business & Legal Affairs,
The Weinstein Company
Robert Rosen -- Dean, UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television
Bruce Royer -- President, Royer Studios
Michelle Satter -- Director, Feature Film Program at
The Sundance Institute
Kathi Sharpe-Ross -- President, The Sharpe Alliance
John Solomon -- Producer, Walt Disney Television Animation Shorts
John Tarnoff -- Senior Executive, Dreamworks Animation SKG
Marc Von Arx -- Creative Artists Agency (CAA)
Geoff Wells -- CIO and Vice President, Fox Television Group
Daphna Ziman -- Founder and Chairperson, Children Uniting Nations

Source: FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE

CONTACT: Kathi Sharpe-Ross of The Sharpe Alliance, +1-310-271-2323, or
kathi@sharpealliance.com, for FYI - FILM YOUR ISSUE

Web site: http://www.filmyourissue.org/

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