# DIRECTV Announces Conference Call & Webcast for Second Quarter 2008 Financial Results



## cforrest (Jan 20, 2007)

http://dtv.client.shareholder.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=322944

EL SEGUNDO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--DIRECTV (NASDAQ: DTV) will host a conference call and Internet webcast to discuss its 2008 second quarter financial results, outlook and other forward looking information on *Thursday, August 7th, 2008 at 2:00 p.m. ET, 11:00 a.m. PT. *

Date: Thursday, August 7th, 2008 
Time: 2:00 p.m. ET/11:00 a.m. PT 
Dial-In: 866-409-1555 (US) 
913-312-0400 (International) 
Conference ID Number: 8928342 
Webcast: http://www.directv.com/investor

Host: Jon Rubin, Senior Vice President 
DIRECTV Financial Planning and Investor Relations


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## PaulieORF (Jun 12, 2006)

cforrest said:


> http://dtv.client.shareholder.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=322944
> 
> EL SEGUNDO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--DIRECTV (NASDAQ: DTV) will host a conference call and Internet webcast to discuss its 2008 second quarter financial results, outlook and other forward looking information on *Thursday, August 7th, 2008 at 2:00 p.m. ET, 11:00 a.m. PT. *
> 
> ...


I smell some D11 and HD goodness coming.


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## kevinwmsn (Aug 19, 2006)

Hopefully they will talk about D11 is at 99 and showing HD.


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## bbaleno (Aug 1, 2007)

is it a coincedence that it is on a thursday. maybe the day after go live


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## tcusta00 (Dec 31, 2007)

bbaleno said:


> is it a coincedence that it is on a thursday. maybe the day after go live


Hopefully a week and a day...


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## Christopher Gould (Jan 14, 2007)

tcusta00 said:


> Hopefully a week and a day...


i'd go with the week and a day give them time to workout the quirks


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## ThomasM (Jul 20, 2007)

Well, the last "investors conference" yielded a lot of valuable information, much of which has actually been implemented (the R22 for example).

It will be interesting to read about what is discussed after the info is posted here on DBSTALK.COM.


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## Newshawk (Sep 3, 2004)

bbaleno said:


> is it a coincedence that it is on a thursday. maybe the day after go live


It's also the day before the opening of the Beijing Summer Olympics.


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## Sixto (Nov 18, 2005)

Chase will have much goodness to talk about on 8/7.


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## woj027 (Sep 3, 2007)

I hope this conference call gives us some answers to the future HD lineups, or even new recievers, or anything juicy. Now that D11 is working fine, we need something else to get excited about?

Anyone have any predictions of what they might talk about?


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

woj027 said:


> Anyone have any predictions of what they might talk about?


Use past reports as a template. There will be talk of D11, churn numbers, "higher quality customers" (this will be repeated many times), lower receiver costs and an even higher subscriber acquisition cost.


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## woj027 (Sep 3, 2007)

Oh, thats not what I was hoping for. 

I was looking forward to hearing about all the new channels we will be getting in the near future. 

I was looking forward to D12 launch dates.

Jeeze Harsh, why do you have to bring me down to reality?


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

I predict that DirecTV will have a significant drop in new subscribers although still report a net gain.

I see them reporting generally good numbers overall

I'm sure someone will ask about another buy-out attempt by Dish.


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## jefbal99 (Sep 7, 2007)

Is nobody tracking this live?


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## CoachGibbs (May 23, 2007)

jefbal99 said:


> Is nobody tracking this live?


It's not till tomorrow.


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## jefbal99 (Sep 7, 2007)

CoachGibbs said:


> It's not till tomorrow.


My bad  :lol:


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

woj027 said:


> I was looking forward to hearing about all the new channels we will be getting in the near future.


Specifics about upcoming channels are pretty rare in these financial reports. I would expect that they _may_ say something about their expansion goals in terms of numbers of channels/markets, but naming channels doesn't happen very often.


> I was looking forward to D12 launch dates.


Announcements of who's launching usually come from the launch agency. Absent such an announcement and without the faintest hint of smoke signals from the Russians, the best you're going to get is probably 2009.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Yea, typically these financial calls are pretty boring and filled with...well...financial information. I'm sure they'll touch on the HD expansion by pretty much reading off the press release but may give an extra tidbit. I'm sure a question will be asked about a merger with Dish, but then that gets asked every quarter and it's the same standard "sure, we always look at things like that when they make sense" type answer. In other words nothing substantial.


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## Sixto (Nov 18, 2005)

The DIRECTV Group Announces Second Quarter 2008 Results ...

DIRECTV Group Operating Profit Before Depreciation and Amortization (OPBDA) Increases 20% to $1.4 Billion ...

DIRECTV Group Revenues Increase 16% to Over $4.8 Billion ...

DIRECTV Group Net Subscriber Additions Increase 16% to 313,000 ...

DIRECTV U.S. Net Additions of 129,000 ...http://investor.directv.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=326924​


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## Steve Robertson (Jun 7, 2005)

Glad to see they are making a buck or 2


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## DodgerKing (Apr 28, 2008)

Sixto said:


> The DIRECTV Group Announces Second Quarter 2008 Results ...
> 
> DIRECTV Group Operating Profit Before Depreciation and Amortization (OPBDA) Increases 20% to $1.4 Billion ...
> 
> ...


Also, the LOWEST second quarterly churn rate in 4 years


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## Sixto (Nov 18, 2005)

DodgerKing said:


> Also, the LOWEST second quarterly churn rate in 4 years


Yep ... "Driven by Lowest Second Quarter Monthly Churn Rate in Four Years of 1.49%"


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## ATARI (May 10, 2007)

Looks a lot better than I thought it would.

Definately better than DISH (and a lot of other companies).

I guess D* is recession proof?


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## hancox (Jun 23, 2004)

ATARI said:


> Looks a lot better than I thought it would.
> 
> Definately better than DISH (and a lot of other companies).
> 
> I guess D* is recession proof?


Commitments are recession-proof 

:soapbox:


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## cforrest (Jan 20, 2007)

Also the higher credit requirements D* put in place last year for new subscribers helps make D* insulated better from economic slowdowns, as we are experiencing. Looks like D* stuck it to E* pretty well comparing the numbers from both providers.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

I missed my call on the SAC. It actually went down $5 to $707 per new account.

For those who don't understand why the up front costs and commitments, that number should tell you why.

For perspective, DISH Network's SAC rose to $699.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

Did they break down voluntary vs. involuntary churn?


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

I should be able to blog part of this, listening to the hold music now.

And yes, the reason why DirecTV is doing well still is because of their being more stingy on who signs up. Dish laughed at them for doing that but look at what's happening to Dish. People are dropping it or getting dropped because they aren't paying their bills. DirecTV isn't encountering that all that much.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

While sub additions were flat from last year and this includes losing 90K in Bell South territory so they feel real good there.

Side comment from me: 2nd quarter is typically the slowest quarter for adds.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Majority of lower churn was due to much lower involuntary churn.
Lower "first year" churn.

2nd half of the year is the goal to lower long term subscriber churn and their new loyalty rewards program is to address that.

Their goal is to keep churn around 1.5%


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Added 3-4 times more HD and DVR subscribers then Comcast did in the same quarter.

A trend is to keep lowering up front fees for set top boxes.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Economy has had little effect on the business. Some yes, but limited unlike their competitors.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Status quo on their relationship with Liberty.

Q&A begins.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Question about growth and "high value" customers.

Feel they have a huge momentum in the market and really happy with their spot. However there is a lot more they can do.

They are not all that concerned totally with growth but creating a long term value money generator.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Ahhh, question on Dish finally. Question about how they can work with Dish.

Chase snickered a little.

Same old same old - they will keep on looking at things (as any business should do) but honestly there isn't a whole lot they are looking at.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Dish advertising more. How does that effect them.

Industry will keep getting more competitive and they need to keep raising their game. They like their competitive position.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Q: Dish has seems to close the gap in channel count, how does that effect them?

Not wanting to comment too much but there seems to be a bit weird thing with channel counts like one game a week being counted as a channel. DirecTV has solid 24x7 RSNs, sports packages in all HD, more HD LIL to over 80% of the country.

Q: Dish's 1080p channel the difference?

DirecTV has also announced 1080p. Overall DirecTV is very happy with their leadership position with HD.


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## hdtvfan0001 (Jul 28, 2004)

Nice work on your "blog" updating Bonscott!


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Dish Merger talk: They have nothing to say (and he laughed about it). Asked if the WSJ was just trying to sell papers.

Liberty merger: Nothing to report as Liberty is frozen from talking about it due to tax law until end of August (assuming there is any interest).


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## Greg Alsobrook (Apr 2, 2007)

I'm pretty sure he basically just said the merger won't happen... by the way he answered that question...


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Q: Any idea where their subscriber gains are coming from?

They come from everyone but probably more from cable just because they have many more subs overall.

Q: VOD hours and in HD

Not sure but 3000-4000. Also pushing movies to the DVR. HD is small at this point but will grow. It's just very early because they just launched it last month.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

And that's it, call is over.


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## RobertE (Jun 10, 2006)

AirRocker said:


> I'm pretty sure he basically just said the merger won't happen... by the way he answered that question...


Thats the vibe I got too. :lol:


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

AirRocker said:


> I'm pretty sure he basically just said the merger won't happen... by the way he answered that question...


Well I think we all knew that anyway. :lol: It was just Charlie trying to create some press and hopefully raise his stock up a bit. He may really want to try again but DirecTV is in the drivers seat this time.

Chase also seemed to poo-poo much in the way of working together. That question always gets asked and he gave the politically correct answer of "we're always looking at things to make our business better" but did comment that they really aren't looking at much, there just isn't much they can work on together frankly.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

hdtvfan0001 said:


> Nice work on your "blog" updating Bonscott!


No problem. Working is overrated as it is.


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## jacmyoung (Sep 9, 2006)

No mentioning of 8/14 HD expansion? I want to know what new HDs.


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

jacmyoung said:


> No mentioning of 8/14 HD expansion? I want to know what new HDs.


There was just a mention of the new sat going online and new channels coming which they already announced. He didn't go into any detail other then that. They rarely if ever actually make any channel announcements in financial calls, it's more about the bottom line for the investors so not surprising there weren't any specific channel announcements.


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## smiddy (Apr 5, 2006)

Good Stuff bonscott87, thanks!


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## dduitsman (Dec 8, 2007)

bonscott87 said:


> I should be able to blog part of this...


Many thanks for your effort.
dd


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## jacmyoung (Sep 9, 2006)

bonscott87 said:


> There was just a mention of the new sat going online and new channels coming which they already announced. He didn't go into any detail other then that. They rarely if ever actually make any channel announcements in financial calls, it's more about the bottom line for the investors so not surprising there weren't any specific channel announcements.


I understand that, though in the last call they talked about upcoming new hardware in great detail.


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## Newshawk (Sep 3, 2004)

jacmyoung said:


> No mentioning of 8/14 HD expansion? I want to know what new HDs.


Remember, this is a discussion of the financial situation of DirecTV for the last quarter, not a DirecTV version of a "Charlie Chat".


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

jacmyoung said:


> I understand that, though in the last call they talked about upcoming new hardware in great detail.


Ahhh, you might be thinking of their yearly investor call. I think it was in the spring they had their normal financial call like this one and then 2 weeks later they had a big all morning investor call where they talked details of their business plan for the next 2 years which included a lot of hardware talk and channels.


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

Nice job bonscott keeping us up to date. You work in a steno pool?


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## grover517 (Sep 29, 2007)

ATARI said:


> I guess D* is recession proof?


It's just that D* for a whole month or Premier service is cheaper than one tank of gas in my Avalanche. Much more enjoyable also !


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## jacmyoung (Sep 9, 2006)

bonscott87 said:


> Ahhh, you might be thinking of their yearly investor call. I think it was in the spring they had their normal financial call like this one and then 2 weeks later they had a big all morning investor call where they talked details of their business plan for the next 2 years which included a lot of hardware talk and channels.


That was why, thank you. Any investor call planned this time? I want more free HD VODs.


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## kw2957 (Apr 5, 2008)

Thanks a lot for the information bonscott!


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

jacmyoung said:


> That was why, thank you. Any investor call planned this time? I want more free HD VODs.


Nothing on the schedule, but if you want to keep tabs on that kind of thing here's the link:

http://investor.directv.com/


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## bonscott87 (Jan 21, 2003)

Yea that investor call from earlier this year where they laid out their plans is just a once every year (or two) thing.


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

Apparently Chase Carey DID break some news about the HD rollout, as explained by new forum member Cindy!



CindyJ said:


> Since I'm new here, I can't post the link to the complete second quarter results press release that came out today, but it includes the following:
> 'Carey concluded, "As we head into the second half of 2008, we are poised to extend our video leadership position as we significantly expand our industry-leading HD lineup *with the launch next week of more than 30 new channels, bringing our total HD offering to 130 channels*.'
> 
> Sounds like we get all the new channels next week not just a rollout "beginning" next week.
> ...


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## Sixto (Nov 18, 2005)

The full Q2-2008 Earnings Call Transcript:http://seekingalpha.com/article/89864-the-directv-group-inc-q2-2008-earnings-call-transcript?page=-1​


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## K4SMX (May 19, 2007)

bonscott87 said:


> .....2nd half of the year is the goal to lower long term subscriber churn and *their new loyalty rewards program* is to address that......


Huh?! "Hearts II?"

Edit: OK, discussed here.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

bonscott87 said:


> A trend is to keep lowering up front fees for set top boxes.


What functionality will they remove next?


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

jacmyoung said:


> No mentioning of 8/14 HD expansion? I want to know what new HDs.


As I noted previously, financial conference calls are not where this kind of information comes out. More than likely you'll hear about it after it happens in the form of a grand press release.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

harsh said:


> What functionality will they remove next?


You obviously haven't been paying attention to DirecTV's publicly disclosed plans. They will be deploying only MPEG4 HD capable receivers even to SD only subscribers, and they are expanding the recording capacity of the DVRs that will be used for HD installs. Clearly the plan is to add functionality. Educate yourself.


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

harsh said:


> jacmyoung said:
> 
> 
> > No mentioning of 8/14 HD expansion? I want to know what new HDs.
> ...


And as I noted previously, Chase Carey *DID* make a comment about the HD expansion (a few posts above yours).

Here's the proof: http://investor.directv.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=326924



> Carey concluded, "As we head into the second half of 2008, we are poised to extend our video leadership position as we significantly expand our industry-leading HD lineup *with the launch next week of more than 30 new channels, bringing our total HD offering to 130 channels*. In addition, we recently launched DIRECTV On Demand and our most popular promotion of the year linked to our exclusive NFL SUNDAY TICKET(TM) package. With these in place, we expect to build on the momentum established in the first half of the year to continue delivering strong financial results and substantial cash flow growth going forward."


*Per his statement, more than 30 new channels are lighting up the week of 8/11 to bring the total to 130 HD channels.*


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## jefbal99 (Sep 7, 2007)

Drew2k said:


> And as I noted previously, Chase Carey *DID* make a comment about the HD expansion (a few posts above yours).
> 
> Here's the proof: http://investor.directv.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=326924
> 
> *Per his statement, more than 30 new channels are lighting up the week of 8/11 to bring the total to 130 HD channels.*


But, satelliteracer said here it may be a bunch of HDPPV and then they will be replaced as agreements/hd channels become available.


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## ATARI (May 10, 2007)

Somebody wake me up when Travel Channel is in HD...


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

Drew2k said:


> And as I noted previously, Chase Carey *DID* make a comment about the HD expansion (a few posts above yours).


This wasn't news and there weren't any specifics about what the channels will be. My impression was that the repeated calls for information were to find out specifically if channels like Travel and WGN would be available as part of this expansion.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

cartrivision said:


> Clearly the plan is to add functionality.


Additional space isn't additional functionality. The software still has the same limitations with respect to how you might load up the DVR. The price on storage has come down on its own.

Adding MPEG4 to SD receivers doesn't bring any new functions either. Additional functionality would be things akin to what has been taken out of the flagship receiver to get the cost down. OTA tuners is one such example. Consolidating the BBCs into the receiver is another example of capability removed.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

harsh said:


> Additional space isn't additional functionality. The software still has the same limitations with respect to how you might load up the DVR. The price on storage has come down on its own.
> 
> Adding MPEG4 to SD receivers doesn't bring any new functions either. Additional functionality would be things akin to what has been taken out of the flagship receiver to get the cost down. OTA tuners is one such example. Consolidating the BBCs into the receiver is another example of capability removed.


Do you even stop to think before you type this tripe? MPEG4 capability is added functionality, and built in BBCs are not "capability removed", and there is no OTA capability in the currently manufactured DVRs, so removing it isn't an example of how they could reduce costs going forward. You didn't get one thing right. As I said before, educate yourself.


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