REDMOND, Wash. - A three-way collaboration between Queen, David Bowie and Microsoft Corp. will mark World AIDS day, Dec. 1, 1999, with a global Internet-based AIDS fund-raising event.
Through WindowsMedia.com, the MSN? online guide to multimedia on the Internet, Microsoft will host a free* video download featuring Queen and David Bowie and will provide people with an opportunity to donate money to fight AIDS. The download will be available for two weeks at http://windowsmedia.microsoft.com/preview/queen, beginning Dec. 1, exclusively in Microsoft® Windows Media? format, providing industry-leading sound and video quality.
The WindowsMedia.com site will help educate visitors about the worldwide AIDS epidemic and give people the opportunity to contribute online to Queen's Mercury Phoenix Trust charity, which raises funds to fight AIDS. Microsoft will also make a contribution to the trust.The free video download will feature the recent groundbreaking video of Queen and David Bowie together performing their classic collaboration, "Under Pressure." Although Freddie Mercury and David Bowie never actually appeared on stage together, breakthrough video technology has brought these two great performers together for the first time using unique footage. The audio track to the video is a new 1999 "Rah mix" version that features fresh recording work by Queen; the track was remixed for the new album, "Queen + Greatest Hits III." Already receiving major radio airplay, the track will be released as a single on Dec. 6 along with Queen's song of the millennium, "Bohemian Rhapsody" and the perennial "Thank God It's Christmas."
The Queen and Bowie World AIDS Day video download reunites the two music giants in the cause of AIDS fund raising. Bowie was among the legendary musicians who joined Brian May, John Deacon and Roger Taylor at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert in April 1992, an event that lead to the founding of the Mercury Phoenix Trust.
The members of Queen are among the few music artists to have established their own official AIDS charity, which continues to work unrelentingly to provide both education and funds to AIDS projects worldwide and is one of only a handful of registered AIDS charities that gives globally.
AIDS Continues to Spread Around the World, Largely UncheckedDespite recent developments in drug treatments and regimens, the global rate of HIV infection continues to grow. Recent reports show that in 1998 the total number of adults and children living with HIV and AIDS exceeded 34 million worldwide. The most severely affected areas are Southeast Asia, where the infection has spread swiftly since 1992, and the southern countries of Africa. In Botswana, the proportion of the adult population living with HIV has doubled over the past five years, with 43 percent of pregnant women testing positive in 1997.Eastern Europe has also seen a dramatic rise in the number of people affected by HIV or AIDS. The most notable example is the Ukraine, where the rate of incidence has shot up more than 30-fold in the past three years, a pattern being repeated in the Russian Federation.In North America and Western Europe, more than 1.3 million people are living with HIV or AIDS.The Mercury Phoenix Trust has supported AIDS projects in many of these countries and to date has donated more than £6 million ($9.7 million) to combat the spread of AIDS and HIV infection.
About WindowsMedia.com
WindowsMedia.com (http://windowsmedia.com/), part of the MSN network of Internet services, is among the fastest-growing major audio and video guides on the Internet. WindowsMedia.com provides access to localized audio and video content worldwide, including major music and video events from more than 1,000 radio stations and more than 1,000 content providers.
About Windows Media Technologies
Windows Media Technologies is the leading digital media platform that provides consumers, content providers, solution providers, software developers and corporations with unmatched audio and video quality. Windows Media Technologies 4, which includes Windows Media Player, Windows Media Services, Windows Media Tools and the Windows Media SDK, is available for free* download at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/. More than 50 million copies of the free* Windows Media Player have been downloaded to date - growing by more than one every second.
About Microsoft
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software - any time, any place and on any device.
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Microsoft, MSN and Windows Media are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.Other product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.
For more information, press only:
Ryan James
Waggener Edstrom
(503) 443-7000
ryanj@wagged.com
Rapid Response Team
Waggener Edstrom
(503) 443-7000
rrt@wagged.com
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Appendix
The Mercury Phoenix Trust
-Queen lead singer Freddie Mercury died of AIDS-related causes on Nov. 24, 1991.
-The Mercury Phoenix Trust was founded in 1992 to distribute the money raised by the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert for AIDS Awareness, which took place at Wembley Stadium, London, on April 20, 1992.
-Since 1992, the Mercury Phoenix Trust has been responsible for donating more than £6 million ($9.7 million) in the fight against the AIDS crisis to more than 100 different charities in countries in Europe, Africa, Asia and America.
Facts: AIDS Worldwide
-During 1998, more than 8,500 children and young people became infected with HIV every day - six every minute.
-By the end of 1997, 8.2 million children had lost their mothers to AIDS before they turned 15.
-In 1998, approximately one-third of the 33 million people living with HIV were young people between the ages of 15 and 24.
-AIDS is increasingly hitting young, healthy people of both sexes.
