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October 8

Sony Pictures

On September 1, 1987, The Coca-Cola Company announced plans to spin off its assets of Columbia Pictures, which it had owned since 1982. Under this arrangement, Coca-Cola would sell its entertainment assets to TriStar Pictures, of which it owned 39.6%. Tri-Star would be renamed to Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc. (CPE), with Coca-Cola owning 49%, its shareholders owning 31%, and Tri-Star's shareholders owning 20%. A new company was formed in early 1988 with the Tri-Star name to take over the studio's operations.

Now, which studio does "the studio's" exactly refer to and does the phrase "Coca-Cola would sell its entertainment assets" imply in fact that the Columbia shares were Coca-Cola's only entertainment assets? I'm a bit confused...--Tuchiel (talk) 11:30, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Didn't this same question pop up a week or two ago? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:42, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Found it. Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2017 September 30 ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:48, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but not all questions have been resolved yet. Hence, I've only resumed those here. Best wishes--Tuchiel (talk) 11:55, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm confused on how Coca-Cola can own something its shareholders don't, or vice versa. I double-checked shareholder and share (finance). They seem to be about sharing, but this deal doesn't. InedibleHulk (talk) 00:25, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If I'm reading it correctly, the 49% of Columbia will be owned by Coca Cola, and therefore indirectly it's shareholders, while Coca Cola's shareholders also directly get 31% of Columbia. The difference is that the Coca Cola board of directors will have no say in the 31%'s votes, while they will represent the interest of the 49%. As a practical matter, this means the Coca Cola board can't just dictate what Columbia does, they would need to put proposals before Columbia's board and/or all the shareholders. (A good thing, too, or else every scene in Columbia films might well have featured characters drinking Coke.) StuRat (talk) 00:32, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

So "Coca-Cola" is shorthand for the board of directors, and for the whole company? Does the inner group get a bigger dividend per share than the "normal" owners? If not, I can't see why the 31% would be more or less inclined than the 49% to sell more Coca-Cola (the product) in movies (or do anything that makes them all richer). InedibleHulk (talk) 01:00, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Just let me wonder, this is Tuchiel's time. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:03, 10 October 2017 (UTC) [reply]

Besides the matter of stockholders' votes, another obvious consequence of this arrangement is that the Coca-Cola shareholders who received Columbia stock have the right to sell it. If they don't want to own shares in Columbia, they can sell them for cash. This will not affect Coca-Cola's own ownership of 49% of Columbia.

Similarly, consider the payment of dividends. Each time a company issues a dividend, the money goes to its shareholders in proportion to their number of shares. So 49% of the amount paid out will go directly to the Coca-Cola corporation, while the people who received Columbia shares because they were Coca-Cola shareholders will collectively receive 31% of the total (if none of them sold their Columbia shares, and assuming for simplicity I'm assuming that only common stock is involved.) --69.159.60.147 (talk) 02:22, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to all of you for your comments, though I'm not quite sure about whether they really answer my questions in fact…--Tuchiel (talk) 13:14, 11 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The studio is Tristar Pictures, if that answers your first question. Had different names, different bosses and different assets through time, but it's still the same thing it always was, in a philosophical sense (though not in others). I don't think The Coca-Cola Company owns, has owned or will ever own another studio, unless they've buried it in complex business jargon. InedibleHulk (talk) 22:24, 11 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

They have a piece of that Coke Studio, Coke Studio and Coke Studio pie, though. Not the same. Not at all. InedibleHulk (talk) 22:28, 11 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Are we due for a remake of The Coca-Cola Kid ? I'm sure Sony could obtain the rights. They could also do a remake of One, Two, Three, but it would need a modern rewrite, as the Cold War theme is a bit outdated. Perhaps a prequel would be better, showing the fiasco trying to sell Coke in the Middle East. StuRat (talk) 22:53, 11 October 2017 (UTC) [reply]

Orochimaru (Naruto)

As anybody who knows of Japanese mythology, Orochimaru's character represents a lot about stories. I managed to find information about how he is related to the Kusanagi sword and the famous Yamata no Orochi in Google books. However, I have not been able to find anything about where he comes from to add more creation information to the article. Anybody knows of sites that might contain this type of information? Cheers.Tintor2 (talk) 14:03, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The oldest song fragment

The Hurrian songs is the oldest clomplete song, but what is the oldest song fragment?--2001:B07:6463:31EE:E917:DF39:C94D:7ABC (talk) 14:42, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The Old Babylonian Nabnitu tablets (circa 1800 BCE), and specifically "Tablet XXXII (often called as U.3011) is a Sumerian-Akkadian text from Ur, and notable as one of the oldest extant documented examples of musical notation". More detail is in The Earliest Musical Notation by David Wulstan, although it gives a later date for the tablets (perhaps things have moved on since 1971 when it was written). Alansplodge (talk) 15:10, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

But, our Musical notation#Ancient Near East section gives "The earliest form of musical notation can be found in a cuneiform tablet that was created at Nippur, in Sumer (today's Iraq)". The quoted source doesn't seem to be viewable online. A few more details are at A New Interpretation of the Nippur Music-Instruction Fragments but I can only see a preview. Our Music of Mesopotamia needs a lot of attention. Alansplodge (talk) 15:21, 8 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"In the Good Old Sumer Time..." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:03, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, that's my gag. Clarityfiend (talk) 06:23, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

We must both like to babble on. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:49, 10 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Deploying troops to protect cuneiform tablets from destruction by ISIS threatens to become a wedge issue. StuRat (talk) 21:22, 10 October 2017 (UTC) [reply]