FYI 2007 LAUNCHES DURING Sundance

Admin — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 10:15:00 -0500

Last year, FYI Film Your Issue 2006 launched during film festival season in Park City with two informal coffeehouse receptions in the afternoon.

This year, FYI Film Your Issue came back to Park City in style — and with a crew of twenty!

We had a joint Yahoo! - Jumpcut - FYI camera crew cruising Main Street asking Sundance Film Festival attendees "What's Your Issue?", and posting responses on the Yahoo! - Jumpcut website. Check out some of the person-on-the-street footage at Jumpcut.com.

We also had our talented winners with us — Benjamin Snow, Kurt Lustgarten, Molly Conners, Gabriel Veenendaal, Brian Gonzales, Tim Leaton and Scott Hamann — as well as their films to present to the media and film industry at a Starz-hosted cocktail reception launching FYI 2007 at Cafe Terigo on Main Street on Sunday, January 19. (The co-hosts were USA TODAY and Yahoo! Jumpcut).

Our Special Guests included actor-social entrepreneur Kevin Bacon, who spoke to the crowd spontaneously about his transforming the "Six Degrees of Separation" concept from a joke into a powerful tool to manifest change on the planet — which is interesting because it's all of our challenge to turn the tools we have at our disposal — including our own talents, passions and unique perspective — into ways to help the planet, and on our journey!

Actor-singer Mandy Moore, who along with Kevin Bacon joined the VIP Jury of FYI, shared her own passion for environmental issues, including driving a Prius whose engine she had converted to run on soybean oil.

Netflix guru Ted Sarandos told the crowd how proud he was for Netflix to be a partner of FYI — Film Your issue, and Michael Ruggiero, content chief for Starz, which hosted the party, echoed those sentiments.

For the first time ever in Park City during festival season, the United Nations Department of Public Information sent an envoy to speak to the film community as a FYI Film Your Issue partner on the power of film to impact social consciousness on a global platform. Our Special Guest Yvonne Acosta, U.N. Goodwill Ambassador Liaison, told the crowd how the United Nations was working with FYI - Film Your Issue to enroll young adults globally to the competition, and is supplying archival film footage for use by filmmakers.

The Awards Ceremony for FYI 2007 will take place at the United Nations on Tuesday, June 26, in New York City, again hosted by USA TODAY.

Daniel Hinerfeld and Kathy Bauch, communication heads of the Natural Resources Defense Council and The Humane Society of the United States respectively, also shared with the gathering their organizational support for FYI, and the larger vision of Film and Social Consciousness, which had brought all of us to the Sundance Film Festival!

Of course we can't leave out Ed Cassidy, the charismatic Vice President of USA TODAY, who spoke to the crowd about his company — the large newspaper in America — and its enthusiasm for FYI - Film Your Issue. This isn't spin to say that USA TODAY has been an amazing enthusiastic partner, from its campus street teams to education division to events marketing and advertising division.

FilmYourIssue Blog: FYI 2007 LAUNCHES DURING Sundance

FYI 2007 LAUNCHES DURING Sundance