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Goodyear Blimps Help Fight World Poverty

6 October 1999

Goodyear Blimps Help Fight World Poverty

    AKRON, Ohio, Oct. 6 -- The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company
will lend its good name and two of its global airships to assist the United
Nations in a historic concert to fight world poverty called NetAid.
    NetAid will take place Saturday, Oct. 9, and will feature concerts from
East Rutherford, N.J.; London, England; and Geneva, Switzerland, all broadcast
live over the Internet.  The concerts also will be broadcast around the world
on television, radio and the Internet.
    World-class artists such as David Bowie, Jewel, Jimmy Page, Wyclef Jean,
Sting, Sheryl Crow and Bon Jovi will provide a musical platform drawing
millions to the Internet where people worldwide can take action to fight
poverty.
    The Web site, http://www.netaid.org , developed by Cisco Systems, will be the
largest and most sophisticated ever, concert organizers say.  It can handle
500,000 simultaneous visits.  Historically, it is the first concert
simultaneously broadcast on TV, radio and the Internet and is accessible in
every country in the world.
    Goodyear's airship "Stars & Stripes" will be helping televise the concert
at Giants Stadium at the Meadowlands, located 30 miles outside of New York
City.  Airship "Spirit of Europe I" will be covering the concert at Wembley
Stadium in London.
    The concerts will be widely broadcast by U.S. cable networks MTV and VH1,
and by the British Broadcasting Corp.  The entire program also will be webcast
live with the help of Real Networks on two Internet channels -- one carrying
the concert and the second showing backstage scenes.
    United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan noted that "NetAid is an
inspiring example of the kind of corporate citizenship and public-private
partnership that will be crucial in addressing the challenges of the 21st
century."
    For Goodyear, it provides an enormous audience on a global stage.  "This
is an excellent opportunity to use the company's resources to get behind an
important cause," said Tom Riley, director of Goodyear's global airship group.
    Goodyear's blimp tradition began in 1925 when the company built its first
helium-filled public relations airship, the "Pilgrim."  Over the next seven
decades, Goodyear built more than 300 airships.
    Today, Goodyear has the world's largest airship fleet, with three blimps
in the United States, two in Europe, one in South America and one in
Australia.  The Goodyear blimp is one of the world's most-famous corporate
icons.
    Goodyear is the world's largest tire and rubber company.  Headquartered in
Akron, Ohio, the company manufactures tires, engineered rubber products and
chemicals in more than 90 facilities in 30 countries.  It has marketing
operations in almost every country around the world.  Goodyear, with the
addition of its Dunlop tire joint ventures, employs more than 105,000 people
worldwide.