Nonfiction Unlimited has signed director Marcus Ubungen for commercial representation. At home in both the ad and documentary worlds, Ubungen has directed spots for FitBit, Samsung, and Porsche, among others, and is in production on his documentary Beyond the Fields. The film, based in Thailand, follows children who engage in the combat boxing sport Muay Thai, stepping into the ring at great risk in order to get their families out of poverty. Additionally Ubungen’s docu short, Halloween Meets Gasoline–centered on guys hell-bent on having fun resurrecting junkyard cars for racing glory–went to SXSW and was a Vimeo Staff Pick.
Prior to joining Nonfiction, which is under the aegis of president Loretta Jeneski, Ubungen was repped in the ad arena by Recess Films. Earlier he was with Framestore.
A graduate of the Academy of Art University, where he studied cinematography, Ubungen is also an alum of agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners where he made his initial foray into advertising and commercials in 2014, serving on staff as director/DP for content spanning broadcast, web films and still photography for brands like Chevrolet, Motorola, Google, Specialized Bikes, TD Ameritrade, Adobe and Cheetos.
“Marcus makes storytelling look easy, which, of course, it isn’t,” noted Jeneski, “and his cinematic aesthetic takes his work to another level.”
When Ubungen isn’t directing, he can be found in San Francisco engaged in his passion project, street portraiture. Never without his medium format film camera in hand, Ubungen captures the unique characters he happens upon in locations evocative of the city. Art directed in the moment, the aesthetic of the format captures Ubungen’s hic et nunc journal of stylish people he meets. His still work for advertising includes assignments for AncestryDNA, Chevrolet, and Sutter Health.
Changing OpenAI’s Nonprofit Structure Would Raise Questions and Heightened Scrutiny
The artificial intelligence maker OpenAI may face a costly and inconvenient reckoning with its nonprofit origins even as its valuation recently exploded to $157 billion.
Nonprofit tax experts have been closely watching OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, since last November when its board ousted and rehired CEO Sam Altman. Now, some believe the company may have reached — or exceeded — the limits of its corporate structure, under which it is organized as a nonprofit whose mission is to develop artificial intelligence to benefit "all of humanity" but with for-profit subsidiaries under its control.
Jill Horwitz, a professor in law and medicine at UCLA School of Law who has studied OpenAI, said that when two sides of a joint venture between a nonprofit and a for-profit come into conflict, the charitable purpose must always win out.
"It's the job of the board first, and then the regulators and the court, to ensure that the promise that was made to the public to pursue the charitable interest is kept," she said.
Altman recently confirmed that OpenAI is considering a corporate restructure but did not offer any specifics. A source told The Associated Press, however, that the company is looking at the possibility of turning OpenAI into a public benefit corporation. No final decision has been made by the board and the timing of the shift hasn't been determined, the source said.
In the event the nonprofit loses control of its subsidiaries, some experts think OpenAI may have to pay for the interests and assets that had belonged to the nonprofit. So far, most observers agree OpenAI has carefully orchestrated its relationships between its nonprofit and its various other corporate entities to try to avoid that.
However, they also see... Read More