title: West Germany

text: In 1970, the Armed Forces Vocational Schools and the Vocational Advancement Organization extended their services for the first time to conscripts, "so far as military duty permitted". New enlistment bonuses were authorized and previous bonus schemes were improved, and new pay regulations were introduced that improved the financial situation of military personnel and civil servants. In July 1973, the 3rd Amendment to the Civilian Service Act came into force; "a prerequisite for the creation of additional civilian service places for recognized conscientious objectors". The amendment provided that men recognized as conscientious objectors while performing military service should immediately be transferred to a civilian service assignment. The maximum amount for servicemen enlisting for at least 12 years was increased from DM 6,000 to DM 9,000, and from October 1971 onwards, long-term personnel were paid grants towards the cost 'of attending educational institutes of the "second educational route" or participating in state-recognized general education courses provided by private correspondence schools and the "television college"'. In 1972, two Bundeswehr universities were established; a reform which, according to one historian, "fought against the closed nature of the military and guaranteed that officers would be better able to successfully interact with the civilian world". From April 1973, the general maintenance payments under the Law amending the Maintenance Security Act and the Workplace Protection Act were increased, while increases were also made in the special allowance (Christmas bonus) for conscripts, together with the dismissal allowance. The expense allowance for troops on duty-related absence from place of employment was improved, together with travel subsidies and provisions for military service damaged soldiers and their families. In addition, the position of non-commissioned officers was improved.


title: West Germany

text: Legislation aimed at safeguarding consumers was also implemented under the Brandt Administration. The consumer's right of withdrawal in case of hire purchase was strengthened in March 1974, and fixed prices for branded products were abolished by law in January that same year, which meant that manufacturers' recommended prices were not binding for retailers. In addition, a progressive anticartel law was passed. A 1969 law on explosive materials was supplemented by two orders; the first (made in November 1969) establishing a committee of experts for explosive materials, while the second order (made the following month) included details for the implementation of the law on explosive materials. An Act of December 1959 on the peaceful use of nuclear energy and protection against its dangers was amended by an Act of June 1970 that established a tax levied for the costs for permissions and surveillance measures. The Law on Compensation for Measures of Criminal Prosecution and Penalties, passed in March 1971, provided for standardized compensation in certain situations. In addition, the budget for communications was increased. The federal crime-fighting apparatus was also modernised, while a Foreign Tax Act was passed which limited the possibility of tax evasion.


title: West Germany

text: A law on explosives (Sprengstoffgesetz) was the subject of two application ordinances (on 17 November 1970 and 24 August 1971) and a general regulatory provision (19 May 1971), which covered respectively the application of the law to nationals of EC Member States, the duty of employers to notify in time the inspection authorities of detonation plans, the interpretation of the purpose and field of application of the law, authorizations for transport of explosives, and control and recognition of training courses on work with explosives. Taking into account the enormous high peaks of air traffic noise and its concentration at a limited number of airports, the Law for Protection against Aircraft Noise of 1971 sought to balance two conflicting demands, the first being the legitimate demand by industry, business and the public for an efficient air-traffic-system, and secondly, the understandable and by no means less legitimate claims of the affected people for protection and compensation. The legislation regulated the establishment of so-called "Lärmschutzzonen" (protection areas against aircraft noise) for all 11 international airports and for those 34 military airports used for jet air craft, and the law also authorised the Federal Department of the Interior to decree protection areas for each of those mentioned airports with approval by the "Bundesrat", the representation of the German Federal States.


title: West Germany

text: In terms of working conditions, a number of reforms were introduced aimed at strengthening the rights of workers both at home and in the workplace. The Sickness Act of 1970 provided equal treatment of workers and employees in the event of incapacity for work, while maternity leave was increased. Legislation was introduced in 1970 which ensured continued payment of wages for workers disabled by illness. In 1970 all employees unit for work (with the exception of women in receipt of maternity benefits and temporarily and inconsiderably employed persons) were provided with an unconditional legal claim against their employer to continued payment of their gross wage for a period of 6 weeks, as also in the case of spa treatment approved by an Insurance Fund, the Fund bearing the full cost thereof. Previously, payment of employer's supplement and sick pay were only made from the day on which the doctor certified unfitness for work. In 1972, an Act on Agency Work was passed which sought to prevent works agencies from providing job placement services and aimed to provide job minimum protection for employees in agency work. A law on the hiring out of manpower, passed in October 1972, contained provisions to stipulate prior authorization for the hiring out of manpower, to draw a distinction between the system governing workers hired out and the placing of workers, to regulate and improve the rights of hired out workers pertaining to working conditions and social insurance, and provide for more severe penalties and fines to be imposed on offenders.


title: West Germany

text: Improvements were also made in income and work conditions for home workers, accident insurance was extended to non-working adults, and the Border Zone Assistance Act (1971) increased levels of assistance to the declining zonal peripheral area. The Occupational Safety Act (1973) required employers to provide company doctors and safety experts. A directive on protection against noise at the place of work was adopted in November 1970. If measurements showed or there was reason to assume that a noise level guide value of 90 dB( A) may be exceeded at the place of work, then the authority had to instruct the employer to arrange check-ups of the employees concerned and these employees had to use personal noise protection devices. A matching fund program for 15 million employees was also introduced, which stimulated them to accumulate capital.


title: West Germany

text: A ministerial order of January 1970 extended protection in cases of partial unemployment to home workers, while an ordinance of August 1970 fixed the conditions of health necessary for service in the merchant navy. A general provision of October 1970 determined in detail the circumstances in which the competent authority must take action on the basis of the act on the technical means of work. The requirement also stipulated the extent to which the technical standards established by national and international organisations can be regarded as "rules of the art". In a directive of 10 November 1970, the Minister of Labour and Social Affairs recommended to the higher authorities for work protection of the "Lander" to bring in the directive published, in agreement with the Ministry of Labour, by the German Engineers' Association on the evaluation of work station noise in relation to loss of hearing, in order to improve safeguards for workers against the noises in question. In September 1971, an ordinance was published concerning dangerous working materials; safeguarding persons using these materials against the dangers involved. In August 1971, a law came into force directed at reducing atmospheric pollution from lead compounds in four-stroke engine fuels. As a safeguard against radiation, a decree on the system of authorisations for medicaments treated with ionizing radiation or containing radioactive substances, in its version of 8 August 1967, was remodelled by a new Decree of 10 May 1971 which added some radionuclides to the list of medicaments which doctors in private practice were authorized to use.


title: West Germany

text: By a decree of the Federal Minister for Labour and Social Order, the Federal Institute for Industrial Protection became the Federal Agency for Industrial Protection and Accident Research. Amongst its designated tasks included the promotion of industrial protection, accident prevention on the journey to and from work and accident prevention in the home and leisure activities, the encouragement of training and advanced training in the area of industrial protection, and to promote and coordinate accident research. A regulation was issued in 1972 which permitted for the first time the employment of women as drivers of trams, omnibuses and lorries, while further regulations laid down new provisions for lifts and work with compressed air. The Factory Constitution Law (1971) strengthened the rights of individual employees "to be informed and to be heard on matters concerning their place of work". The Works Council was provided with greater authority while trade unions were given the right of entry into the factory "provided they informed the employer of their intention to do so", while a law was passed to encourage wider share ownership by workers and other rank-and-file employees. The Industrial Relations Law (1972) and the Personnel Representation Act (1974) broadened the rights of employees in matters which immediately affected their places of work, while also improving the possibilities for codetermination on operations committees, together with access of trade unions to companies.


title: West Germany

text: The Works Constitution Act of 1972 required in cases of collective dismissal at an establishment normally employing more than twenty employees that management and the works council must negotiate a social plan that stipulates compensation for workers who lose their jobs. In cases where the two parties could not agree on a social plan, the law provided for binding arbitration. In 1972, the rights of works councils to information from management were not only strengthened, but works councils were also provided with full codetermination rights on issues such as working time arrangements in the plant, the setting of piece rates, plant wage systems, the establishment of vacation times, work breaks, overtime, and short-time work. Legislation was passed which acknowledged for the first time the presence of trade unions in the workplace, expanded the means of action of the works councils, and improved their work basics as well as those of the youth councils.


title: West Germany

text: A law of January 1972 on the organization of labour in enterprises significantly extended the works council's right of cooperation and co-management in the matter of vocational training. That same year, the Safety Institute of the Federal Republic of Germany was transformed into a public Federal Agency (Bundesanstalt) with significantly enlarged powers, in the context of which special emphasis would be placed on its new task of promoting and coordinating research in the area of accident prevention. New provisions were introduced for the rehabilitation of severely disabled people ("Schwerbehinderte") and accident victims. The Severely Disabled Persons Act of April 1974 obliged all employers with more than fifteen employees to ensure that 6% of their workforce consisted of people officially recognised as being severely disabled. Employers who failed to do so were assessed 100 DM per month for every job falling before the required quota. These compensatory payments were used to "subsidise the adaptation of workplaces to the requirements of those who were severely handicapped".


title: West Germany

text: A law passed in January 1974, designed to protect members of the supervisory boards of companies who are undergoing training, was aimed at ensuring that the representatives of young workers and youthful members of works councils still undergoing training could perform their duties with greater independence and without fear of disadvantageous consequences for their future careers. On request, workers' representatives on completion of their training courses had to have an employment relationship of unlimited duration. In the field of transport, the Municipal Transportation Finance Law of 1971 established federal guidelines for subsidies to municipal governments, while the Federal Transport Plan of 1973 provided a framework for all transport, including public transport. In addition, the Severely Handicapped Persons Act of April 1974 extended the welfare and promotional obligations of the employer, and provided a right to extra holiday consisting of six working days.


title: West Germany

text: A federal environmental programme was established in 1971, and in 1972 laws were passed to regulate garbage elimination and air pollution via emission. Matching grants covering 90% of infrastructure development were allocated to local communities, which led to a dramatic increase in the number of public swimming pools and other facilities of consumptive infrastructure throughout West Germany. In addition, efforts were made to improve the railways and motorways. In 1971, a law was passed setting the maximum lead content at 0.4 grams per liter of gasoline, and in 1972 DDT was banned. The Federal Immissions Control Law, passed in March 1974, provided protection from noxious gases, noise, and air-borne particulate matter.


title: West Germany

text: Under the Brandt Administration, West Germany attained a lower rate of inflation than in other industrialised countries at that time, while a rise in the standard of living took place, helped by the floating and revaluation of the mark. This was characterised by the real incomes of employees increasing more sharply than incomes from entrepreneurial work, with the proportion of employees' incomes in the overall national income rising from 65% to 70% between 1969 and 1973, while the proportion of income from entrepreneurial work and property fell over that same period from just under 35% to 30%. In addition, the percentage of West Germans living in poverty (based on various definitions) fell between 1969 and 1973. According to one estimate, the percentage of West Germans living in poverty fell from 9.7% to 8.9% between 1969 and 1973, and from 20.2% to 14.0% according to another estimate. According to another estimate, the percentage of West Germans living in poverty during this period fell from 2.7% to 1.4%.


title: West Germany

text: Finance Minister Helmut Schmidt (SPD) formed a coalition and he served as Chancellor from 1974 to 1982. Hans-Dietrich Genscher, a leading FDP official, became Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister. Schmidt, a strong supporter of the European Community (EC) and the Atlantic alliance, emphasized his commitment to "the political unification of Europe in partnership with the USA". Mounting external problems forced Schmidt to concentrate on foreign policy and limited the domestic reforms that he could carry out. The USSR upgraded its intermediate-range missiles, which Schmidt complained was an unacceptable threat to the balance of nuclear power, because it increased the likelihood of political coercion and required a western response. NATO respond in the form of its twin-track policy. The domestic reverberations were serious inside the SPD, and undermined its coalition with the FDP. One of his major successes, in collaboration with French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, was the launching of the European Monetary System (EMS) in April 1978.


title: West Germany

text: In October 1982 the SPD–FDP coalition fell apart when the FDP joined forces with the CDU/CSU to elect CDU Chairman Helmut Kohl as Chancellor in a constructive vote of no confidence. Following national elections in March 1983, Kohl emerged in firm control of both the government and the CDU. The CDU/CSU fell just short of an absolute majority, due to the entry into the Bundestag of the Greens, who received 5.6% of the vote.


title: West Germany

text: In January 1987 the Kohl–Genscher government was returned to office, but the FDP and the Greens gained at the expense of the larger parties. Kohl's CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the CSU, slipped from 48.8% of the vote in 1983 to 44.3%. The SPD fell to 37%; long-time SPD Chairman Brandt subsequently resigned in April 1987 and was succeeded by Hans-Jochen Vogel. The FDP's share rose from 7% to 9.1%, its best showing since 1980. The Greens' share rose to 8.3% from their 1983 share of 5.6%.


title: West Germany

text: With the collapse of eastern bloc in 1989, symbolised by the opening of the Berlin Wall, there was a rapid move towards German reunification; and a final settlement of the post-war special status of Germany. Following democratic elections, East Germany declared its accession to the Federal Republic subject to the terms of the Unification Treaty between the two states; and then both West Germany and East Germany radically amended their respective constitutions in accordance with that Treaty's provisions. East Germany then dissolved itself, and its five post-war states () were reconstituted, along with the reunited Berlin which ended its special status and formed an additional . They formally joined the Federal Republic on 3 October 1990, raising the number of states from 10 to 16, ending the division of Germany. The expanded Federal Republic retained West Germany's political culture and continued its existing memberships in international organisations, as well as its Western foreign policy alignment and affiliation to Western alliances like NATO and the European Union.


title: West Germany

text: The official German reunification ceremony on 3 October 1990 was held at the building, including Chancellor Helmut Kohl, President Richard von Weizsäcker, former Chancellor Willy Brandt and many others. One day later, the parliament of the united Germany would assemble in an act of symbolism in the Reichstag building.


title: West Germany

text: However, at that time, the role of Berlin had not yet been decided upon. Only after a fierce debate, considered by many as one of the most memorable sessions of parliament, the concluded on 20 June 1991, with quite a slim majority, that both government and parliament should move to Berlin from Bonn.


title: West Germany

text: The West German ("economic miracle", coined by "The Times") began in 1950. This improvement was sustained by the currency reform of 1948 which replaced the with the and halted rampant inflation. The Allied dismantling of the West German coal and steel industry finally ended in 1950.


title: West Germany

text: As demand for consumer goods increased after World War II, the resulting shortage helped overcome lingering resistance to the purchase of German products. At the time Germany had a large pool of skilled and cheap labour, partly as a result of the flight and expulsion of Germans from Central and Eastern Europe, which affected up to 16.5 million Germans. This helped Germany to more than double the value of its exports during the war. Apart from these factors, hard work and long hours at full capacity among the population and in the late 1950s and 1960s extra labour supplied by thousands of ("guest workers") provided a vital base for the economic upturn. This would have implications later on for successive German governments as they tried to assimilate this group of workers.


title: West Germany

text: With the dropping of Allied reparations, the freeing of German intellectual property and the impact of the Marshall Plan stimulus, West Germany developed one of the strongest economies in the world, almost as strong as before the Second World War. The East German economy showed a certain growth, but not as much as in West Germany, partly because of continued reparations to the USSR.


title: West Germany

text: In 1952, West Germany became part of the European Coal and Steel Community, which would later evolve into the European Union. On 5 May 1955 West Germany was declared to have the "authority of a sovereign state". The British, French and U.S. militaries remained in the country, just as the Soviet Army remained in East Germany. Four days after obtaining the "authority of a sovereign state" in 1955, West Germany joined NATO. The UK and the USA retained an especially strong presence in West Germany, acting as a deterrent in case of a Soviet invasion. In 1976 West Germany became one of the founding nations of the Group of Six (G6). In 1973, West Germany—home to roughly 1.26% of the world's population—featured the world's fourth largest GDP of 944 billion (5.9% of the world total). In 1987 the FRG held a 7.4% share of total world production.


title: West Germany

text: Religious affiliation in West Germany decreased from the 1960s onward. Religious affiliation declined faster among Protestants than among Catholics, causing the Roman Catholic Church to overtake the EKD as the largest denomination in the country during the 1970s.


title: West Germany

text: The official position of West Germany concerning East Germany at the outset was that the West German government was the only democratically elected, and therefore the only legitimate, representative of the German people. According to the Hallstein Doctrine, any country (with the exception of the USSR) that recognised the authorities of the German Democratic Republic would not have diplomatic relations with West Germany.


title: West Germany

text: In the early 1970s, Willy Brandt's policy of "" led to a form of mutual recognition between East and West Germany. The Treaty of Moscow (August 1970), the Treaty of Warsaw (December 1970), the Four Power Agreement on Berlin (September 1971), the Transit Agreement (May 1972), and the Basic Treaty (December 1972) helped to normalise relations between East and West Germany and led to both German states joining the United Nations. The Hallstein Doctrine was relinquished, and West Germany ceased to claim an exclusive mandate for Germany as a whole.


title: West Germany

text: Following the Ostpolitik the West German view was that East Germany was a "de facto" government within a single German nation and a "de jure" state organisation of parts of Germany outside the Federal Republic. The Federal Republic continued to maintain that it could not within its own structures recognise the GDR "de jure" as a sovereign state under international law; while at the same time acknowledging that, within the structures of international law, the GDR was an independent sovereign state. By distinction, West Germany then viewed itself as being within its own boundaries, not only the "de facto" and "de jure" government, but also the sole "de jure" legitimate representative of a dormant "Germany as whole". The two Germanies relinquished any claim to represent the other internationally; which they acknowledged as necessarily implying a mutual recognition of each other as both capable of representing their own populations "de jure" in participating in international bodies and agreements, such as the United Nations and the Helsinki Final Act.


title: West Germany

text: This assessment of the Basic Treaty was confirmed in a decision of the Federal Constitutional Court in 1973;


title: West Germany

text: The West German Constitution (, "Basic Law") provided two articles for the unification with other parts of Germany:


title: West Germany

text: After the peaceful revolution of 1989 in East Germany, the Volkskammer of the GDR on 23 August 1990 declared the accession of East Germany to the Federal Republic under Article 23 of the Basic Law; and so initiated the process of reunification, to come into effect on 3 October 1990. Nevertheless, the act of reunification itself (with its many specific terms and conditions; including fundamental amendments to the West German Basic Law) was achieved constitutionally by the subsequent Unification Treaty of 31 August 1990; that is through a binding agreement between the former GDR and the Federal Republic now recognising each another as separate sovereign states in international law. This treaty was then voted into effect on 20 September 1990 by both the Volkskammer and the Bundestag by the constitutionally required two-thirds majorities; effecting on the one hand, the extinction of the GDR and the re-establishment of on the territory of East Germany; and on the other, the agreed amendments to the Basic Law of the Federal Republic. Amongst these amendments was the repeal of the very Article 23 in respect of which the GDR had nominally declared its postdated accession to the Federal Republic.


title: West Germany

text: The two German states entered into a currency and customs union in July 1990, and on 3 October 1990, the German Democratic Republic dissolved and the re-established five East German (as well as a unified Berlin) joined the Federal Republic of Germany, bringing an end to the East–West divide.


title: West Germany

text: Political life in West Germany was remarkably stable and orderly. The Adenauer era (1949–63) was followed by a brief period under Ludwig Erhard (1963–66) who, in turn, was replaced by Kurt Georg Kiesinger (1966–69). All governments between 1949 and 1966 were formed by the united caucus of the Christian-Democratic Union (CDU) and Christian Social Union (CSU), either alone or in coalition with the smaller Free Democratic Party (FDP) or other right-wing parties.


title: West Germany

text: Kiesinger's 1966–69 "Grand Coalition" was between West Germany's two largest parties, the CDU/CSU and the Social Democratic Party (SPD). This was important for the introduction of new emergency acts—the Grand Coalition gave the ruling parties the two-thirds majority of votes required to see them in. These controversial acts allowed basic constitutional rights such as freedom of movement to be limited in case of a state of emergency.


title: West Germany

text: Leading up to the passing of the laws, there was fierce opposition to them, above all by the FDP, the rising German student movement, a group calling itself ("Democracy in a State of Emergency") and the labour unions. Demonstrations and protests grew in number, and in 1967 the student Benno Ohnesorg was shot in the head by a policeman. The press, especially the tabloid newspaper, launched a campaign against the protesters.


title: West Germany

text: By 1968 a stronger desire to confront the Nazi past had come into being. In the 1970s environmentalism and anti-nationalism became fundamental values among left-wing Germans. As a result, in 1979 the Greens were able to reach the 5% minimum required to obtain parliamentary seats in the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen state election, and with the foundation of the national party in 1980 developed into one of the most politically successful green movements in the world.


title: West Germany

text: Another result of the unrest in the 1960s was the founding of the Red Army Faction (RAF). The RAF was active from 1968, carrying out a succession of terrorist attacks in West Germany during the 1970s. Even in the 1990s, attacks were still being committed under the name "RAF". The last action took place in 1993, and in 1998 the group announced it was ceasing activities.


title: West Germany

text: In the 1969 election, the SPD gained enough votes to form a coalition government with the FDP. SPD leader and Chancellor Willy Brandt remained head of government until May 1974, when he resigned after the Guillaume affair, in which a senior member of his staff was uncovered as a spy for the East German intelligence service, the . However the affair is widely considered to have been merely a trigger for Brandt's resignation, not a fundamental cause. Instead, Brandt, dogged by scandal relating to alcohol and depression as well as the economic fallout of the 1973 oil crisis, almost seems simply to have had enough. As Brandt himself later said, "I was exhausted, for reasons which had nothing to do with the process going on at the time".


title: West Germany

text: Finance Minister Helmut Schmidt (SPD) then formed a government, continuing the SPD–FDP coalition. He served as Chancellor from 1974 to 1982. Hans-Dietrich Genscher, a leading FDP official, was Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister in the same years. Schmidt, a strong supporter of the European Community (EC) and the Atlantic alliance, emphasized his commitment to "the political unification of Europe in partnership with the USA".


title: West Germany

text: The goals of SPD and FDP however drifted apart in the late 1970s and early 1980s. On 1 October 1982 the FDP joined forces with the CDU/CSU to elect CDU Chairman Helmut Kohl as Chancellor in a constructive vote of no confidence. Following national elections in March 1983, Kohl emerged in firm control of both the government and the CDU. The CDU/CSU fell just short of an absolute majority, because of the entry into the Bundestag of the Greens, who received 5.6% of the vote.


title: West Germany

text: In January 1987 the Kohl–Genscher government was returned to office, but the FDP and the Greens gained at the expense of the larger parties. The Social Democrats concluded that not only were the Greens unlikely to form a coalition, but also that such a coalition would be far from a majority. Neither condition changed until 1998.


title: West Germany

text: In 1951 several laws were passed, ending the denazification. As a result, many people with a former Nazi past ended up again in the political apparatus of West Germany. West German President Walter Scheel and Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger were both former members of the Nazi Party. In 1957, 77% of the West German Ministry of Justice's senior officials were former Nazi Party members. Konrad Adenauer's State Secretary Hans Globke had played a major role in drafting anti-semitic Nuremberg Race Laws in Nazi Germany.


title: West Germany

text: In many aspects, German culture continued in spite of the dictatorship and wartime. Old and new forms coexisted next to each other, and the American influence, already strong in the 1920s, grew.


title: West Germany

text: In the 20th century, association football became the largest sport in Germany. The Germany national football team, established in 1900, continued its tradition based in the Federal Republic of Germany, winning the 1954 FIFA World Cup in a stunning upset dubbed the miracle of Bern. Earlier, the German team was not considered part of the international top. The 1974 FIFA World Cup was held in West German cities and West Berlin. After having been beaten by their East German counterparts in the first round, the team of the German Football Association won the cup again, defeating the Netherlands 2–1 in the final. With the process of unification in full swing in the summer of 1990, the Germans won a third World Cup, with players that had been capped for East Germany not yet permitted to contribute. European championships have been won too, in 1972, 1980 and 1996.


title: West Germany

text: After both Olympic Games of 1936 had been held in Germany, Munich was selected to host the 1972 Summer Olympics. These were also the first summer games in which the East Germans showed up with the separate flag and anthem of the GDR. Since the 1950s, Germany at the Olympics had been represented by a united team led by the pre-war German NOC officials as the IOC had denied East German demands for a separate team.


title: West Germany

text: The 800-page ""Doping in Germany from 1950 to today"" study details how the West German government helped fund a wide-scale doping programme. West Germany encouraged and covered up a culture of doping across many sports for decades.


title: West Germany

text: As in 1957, when the Saarland acceded, East German sport organisations ceased to exist in late 1990 as their subdivisions and their members joined their Western counterparts. Thus, the present German organisations and teams in football, Olympics and elsewhere are identical to those that had been informally called "West German" before 1991. The only differences were a larger membership and a different name used by some foreigners. These organisations and teams in turn mostly continued the traditions of those that represented Germany before the Second World War, and even the First World War, thus providing a century-old continuity despite political changes. On the other hand, the separate East German teams and organisations were founded in the 1950s; they were an episode lasting less than four decades, yet quite successful in that time.


title: West Germany

text: Besides the interest in the older generation of writers, new authors emerged on the background of the experiences of war and after war period. Wolfgang Borchert, a former soldier who died young in 1947, is one of the best known representatives of the . Heinrich Böll is considered an observer of the young Federal Republic from the 1950s to the 1970s, and caused some political controversies because of his increasingly critical view on society. The Frankfurt Book Fair (and its Peace Prize of the German Book Trade) soon developed into a regarded institution. Exemplary for West Germany's literature are – among others – Siegfried Lenz (with "The German Lesson") and Günter Grass (with "The Tin Drum" and "The Flounder").


title: West Germany

text: In West Germany, most of the political agencies and buildings were located in Bonn, while the German Stock Market was located in Frankfurt which became the economic center. The judicial branch of both the German Federal Constitutional Court () and the highest Court of Appeals, were located in Karlsruhe.


title: West Germany

text: The West German government was known to be much more decentralised than its state socialist East German counterpart, the former being a federal state and the latter a unitary one. Whilst East Germany was divided into 15 administrative districts (), which were merely local branches of the national government, West Germany was divided into states () with independently elected state parliaments and control of the , the second legislative chamber of the Federal Government.


title: West Germany

text: Today, North Rhine-Westphalia is often considered to be Western Germany in geographical terms. When distinguishing between former West Germany and former East Germany as parts of present-day unified Germany, it has become most common to refer to the (old states) and the (new states), although and are still heard as well.


title: World Heritage Site

text: A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, scientific or other form of significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural heritage around the world considered to be of outstanding value to humanity".


title: World Heritage Site

text: To be selected, a World Heritage Site must be a somehow unique landmark which is geographically and historically identifiable and has special cultural or physical significance. For example, World Heritage Sites might be ancient ruins or historical structures, buildings, cities, deserts, forests, islands, lakes, monuments, mountains, or wilderness areas. A World Heritage Site may signify a remarkable accomplishment of humanity, and serve as evidence of our intellectual history on the planet, or it might be a place of great natural beauty. As of August 2022, a total of 1,154 World Heritage Sites (897 cultural, 218 natural, and 39 mixed properties) exist across 167 countries. With 58 selected areas, Italy is the country with the most sites on the list.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The sites are intended for practical conservation for posterity, which otherwise would be subject to risk from human or animal trespassing, unmonitored, uncontrolled or unrestricted access, or threat from local administrative negligence. Sites are demarcated by UNESCO as protected zones. The World Heritage Sites list is maintained by the international World Heritage Program administered by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, composed of 21 "states parties" that are elected by their General Assembly. The programme catalogues, names, and conserves sites of outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common culture and heritage of humanity. The programme began with the "Convention Concerning the Protection of the World's Cultural and Natural Heritage", which was adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO on 16 November 1972. Since then, 194 states have ratified the convention, making it one of the most widely recognised international agreements and the world's most popular cultural programme.


title: World Heritage Site

text: In 1954, the government of Egypt decided to build the new Aswan High Dam, whose resulting future reservoir it would eventually inundate a large stretch of the Nile valley containing cultural treasures of ancient Egypt and ancient Nubia. In 1959, the governments of Egypt and Sudan requested UNESCO to assist them to protect and rescue the endangered monuments and sites. In 1960, the Director-General of UNESCO launched the International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia. This International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia resulted in the excavation and recording of hundreds of sites, the recovery of thousands of objects, as well as the salvage and relocation to higher ground of several important temples. The most famous of these are the temple complexes of Abu Simbel and Philae. The campaign ended in 1980 and was considered a success. To thank countries which especially contributed to the campaign's success, Egypt donated four temples; the Temple of Dendur was moved to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Temple of Debod to the Parque del Oeste in Madrid, the Temple of Taffeh to the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden in Leiden, and the Temple of Ellesyia to Museo Egizio in Turin.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The project cost US$80 million (equivalent to $ million in ), about $40 million of which was collected from 50 countries. The project's success led to other safeguarding campaigns, such as saving Venice and its lagoon in Italy, the ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, and the Borobodur Temple Compounds in Indonesia. Together with the International Council on Monuments and Sites, UNESCO then initiated a draft convention to protect cultural heritage.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The convention (the signed document of international agreement) guiding the work of the World Heritage Committee was developed over a seven-year period (1965–1972).


title: World Heritage Site

text: The United States initiated the idea of safeguarding places of high cultural or natural importance. A White House conference in 1965 called for a "World Heritage Trust" to preserve "the world's superb natural and scenic areas and historic sites for the present and the future of the entire world citizenry". The International Union for Conservation of Nature developed similar proposals in 1968, which were presented in 1972 to the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm. Under the World Heritage Committee, signatory countries are required to produce and submit periodic data reporting providing the committee with an overview of each participating nation's implementation of the World Heritage Convention and a 'snapshot' of current conditions at World Heritage properties.


title: World Heritage Site

text: Based on the draft convention that UNESCO had initiated, a single text was eventually agreed upon by all parties, and the "Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage" was adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO on 16 November 1972. The Convention came into force on 17 December 1975. As of March 2022, it has been ratified by 194 states: 190 UN member states, 2 UN observer states (the Holy See and the State of Palestine), and 2 states in free association with New Zealand (the Cook Islands and Niue). Only three UN member states have not ratified the convention: Liechtenstein, Nauru, and Tuvalu.


title: World Heritage Site

text: By assigning places as World Heritage Sites, UNESCO wants to help to pass them on to future generations. Its motivation is that "[h]eritage is our legacy from the past, what we live with today" and that both cultural and natural heritage are "irreplaceable sources of life and inspiration". UNESCO's mission with respect to World Heritage consists of eight sub targets. These include encouraging the commitment of countries and local population to World Heritage conservation in various ways, providing emergency assistance for sites in danger, offering technical assistance and professional training, and supporting States Parties' public awareness-building activities.


title: World Heritage Site

text: Being listed as a World Heritage Site can positively affect the site, its environment, and interactions between them. A listed site gains international recognition and legal protection, and can obtain funds from among others the World Heritage Fund to facilitate its conservation under certain conditions. UNESCO reckons the restorations of the following four sites among its success stories: Angkor in Cambodia, the Old City of Dubrovnik in Croatia, the Wieliczka Salt Mine near Kraków in Poland, and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzania. Additionally, the local population around a site may benefit from significantly increased tourism revenue. When there are significant interactions between people and the natural environment, these can be recognised as "cultural landscapes".


title: World Heritage Site

text: A country must first identify its significant cultural and natural sites in a document known as the Tentative List. Next, it can place sites selected from that list into a Nomination File, which is evaluated by the International Council on Monuments and Sites and the World Conservation Union. A country may not nominate sites that have not been first included on its Tentative List. The two international bodies make recommendations to the World Heritage Committee for new designations. The Committee meets once a year to determine what nominated properties to add to the World Heritage List; sometimes it defers its decision or requests more information from the country that nominated the site. There are ten selection criteria – a site must meet at least one to be included on the list.


title: World Heritage Site

text: Until 2004, there were six sets of criteria for cultural heritage and four for natural heritage. In 2005, UNESCO modified these and now has one set of ten criteria. Nominated sites must be of "outstanding universal value" and must meet at least one of the ten criteria.


title: World Heritage Site

text: A country may request to extend or reduce the boundaries, modify the official name, or change the selection criteria of one of its already listed sites. Any proposal for a significant boundary change or to modify the site's selection criteria must be submitted as if it were a new nomination, including first placing it on the Tentative List and then onto the Nomination File. A request for a minor boundary change, one that does not have a significant impact on the extent of the property or affect its "outstanding universal value", is also evaluated by the advisory bodies before being sent to the committee. Such proposals can be rejected by either the advisory bodies or the Committee if they judge it to be a significant change instead of a minor one. Proposals to change a site's official name are sent directly to the committee.


title: World Heritage Site

text: A site may be added to the List of World Heritage in Danger if conditions threaten the characteristics for which the landmark or area was inscribed on the World Heritage List. Such problems may involve armed conflict and war, natural disasters, pollution, poaching, or uncontrolled urbanisation or human development. This danger list is intended to increase international awareness of the threats and to encourage counteractive measures. Threats to a site can be either proven imminent threats or potential dangers that could have adverse effects on a site.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The state of conservation for each site on the danger list is reviewed yearly; after this, the Committee may request additional measures, delete the property from the list if the threats have ceased or consider deletion from both the List of World Heritage in Danger and the World Heritage List. Only three sites have ever been delisted: the Arabian Oryx Sanctuary in Oman, the Dresden Elbe Valley in Germany, and the Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City in the United Kingdom. The Arabian Oryx Sanctuary was directly delisted in 2007, instead of first being put on the danger list, after the Omani government decided to reduce the protected area's size by 90 per cent. The Dresden Elbe Valley was first placed on the danger list in 2006 when the World Heritage Committee decided that plans to construct the Waldschlösschen Bridge would significantly alter the valley's landscape. In response, Dresden City Council attempted to stop the bridge's construction. However, after several court decisions allowed the building of the bridge to proceed, the valley was removed from the World Heritage List in 2009. Liverpool's World Heritage status was revoked in July 2021, following developments (Liverpool Waters and Bramley-Moore Dock Stadium) on the northern docks of the World Heritage site leading to the "irreversible loss of attributes" on the site.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The first global assessment to quantitatively measure threats to Natural World Heritage Sites found that 63 per cent of sites have been damaged by increasing human pressures including encroaching roads, agriculture infrastructure and settlements over the last two decades. These activities endanger Natural World Heritage Sites and could compromise their unique values. Of the Natural World Heritage Sites that contain forest, 91 per cent experienced some loss since 2000. Many of them are more threatened than previously thought and require immediate conservation action.


title: World Heritage Site

text: Furthermore, the destruction of cultural assets and identity-establishing sites is one of the primary goals of modern asymmetrical warfare. Therefore, terrorists, rebels and mercenary armies deliberately smash archaeological sites, sacred and secular monuments and loot libraries, archives and museums. The UN, United Nations peacekeeping and UNESCO in cooperation with Blue Shield International are active in preventing such acts. "No strike lists" are also created to protect cultural assets from air strikes. However, only through cooperation with the locals can the protection of World Heritage Sites, archaeological finds, exhibits and archaeological sites from destruction, looting and robbery be implemented sustainably. The founding president of Blue Shield International Karl von Habsburg summed it up with the words: "Without the local community and without the local participants, that would be completely impossible".


title: World Heritage Site

text: Despite the successes of World Heritage listing in promoting conservation, the UNESCO-administered project has attracted criticism. This was caused by perceived under-representation of heritage sites outside Europe, disputed decisions on site selection and adverse impact of mass tourism on sites unable to manage rapid growth in visitor numbers. A large lobbying industry has grown around the awards, because World Heritage listing can significantly increase tourism returns. Site listing bids are often lengthy and costly, putting poorer countries at a disadvantage.


title: World Heritage Site

text: Eritrea's efforts to promote Asmara are one example. In 2016, the Australian government was reported to have successfully lobbied for the World Heritage Site Great Barrier Reef conservation efforts to be removed from a UNESCO report titled "World Heritage and Tourism in a Changing Climate". The Australian government's actions, involving considerable expense for lobbying and visits for diplomats, were in response to their concern about the negative impact that an "at risk" label could have on tourism revenue at a previously designated UNESCO World Heritage Site. In 2021, international scientists recommended UNESCO to put the Great Barrier Reef on the endangered list, as global climate change had caused a further negative state of the corals and water quality. Again, the Australian government campaigned against this, and in July 2021, the World Heritage Committee, made up diplomatic representatives of 21 countries, ignored UNESCO's assessment, based on studies of scientists, "that the reef was clearly in danger from climate change and so should be placed on the list." According to environmental protection groups, this "decision was a victory for cynical lobbying and that Australia, as custodians of the world’s biggest coral reef, was now on probation."


title: World Heritage Site

text: Several listed locations, such as Casco Viejo in Panama and Hội An in Vietnam, have struggled to strike a balance between the economic benefits of catering to greatly increased visitor numbers after the recognition and preserving the original culture and local communities.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The World Heritage Committee has divided the world into five geographic zones which it calls regions: Africa, Arab states, Asia and the Pacific, Europe and North America, and Latin America and the Caribbean. Russia and the Caucasus states are classified as European, while Mexico and the Caribbean are classified as belonging to the Latin America and Caribbean zone. The UNESCO geographic zones also give greater emphasis on administrative, rather than geographic associations. Hence, Gough Island, located in the South Atlantic, is part of the Europe and North America region because the British government nominated the site.


title: World Heritage Site

text: The table below includes a breakdown of the sites according to these zones and their classification :


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The Matrix is an American media franchise consisting of four feature films, beginning with "The Matrix" (1999) and continuing with three sequels, "The Matrix Reloaded", "The Matrix Revolutions" (both 2003), and "The Matrix Resurrections" (2021). The first three films were written and directed by The Wachowskis and produced by Joel Silver. The screenplay for the fourth film was written by David Mitchell and Aleksandar Hemon, was directed by Lana Wachowski, and was produced by Grant Hill, James McTeigue, and Lana Wachowski. The franchise is owned by Warner Bros., which distributed the films along with Village Roadshow Pictures. The latter, along with Silver Pictures, are the two production companies that worked on the first three films.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The series features a cyberpunk story of the technological fall of humanity, in which the creation of artificial intelligence led the way to a race of self-aware machines that imprisoned mankind in a virtual reality system—the Matrix—to be farmed as a power source. Occasionally, some of the prisoners manage to break free from the system and, considered a threat, become pursued by the artificial intelligence both inside and outside of it. The films focus on the plight of Neo (Keanu Reeves), Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), and Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) trying to free humanity from the system while pursued by its guardians, such as Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving, Abdul-Mateen II, and Jonathan Groff). The story incorporates references to numerous philosophical, religious, or spiritual ideas, among others the dilemma of choice vs. control, the brain in a vat thought experiment, messianism, and the concepts of inter-dependency and love. Influences include the principles of mythology, anime, and Hong Kong action films (particularly "heroic bloodshed" and martial arts movies). The film series is notable for its use of heavily choreographed action sequences and "bullet time" slow motion effects, which revolutionized action films to come.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The characters and setting of the films are further explored in other media set in the same fictional universe, including animation, comics, and video games. The comic "Bits and Pieces of Information" and "The Animatrix" short film "The Second Renaissance" act as prequels to the films, explaining how the franchise's setting came to be. The video game "Enter the Matrix" connects the story of the "Animatrix" short "Final Flight of the Osiris" with the events of "Reloaded", while the online video game "The Matrix Online" was a direct sequel to "Revolutions". These were typically written, commissioned, or approved by the Wachowskis.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The first film was an important critical and commercial success, winning four Academy Awards, introducing popular culture symbols such as the red pill and blue pill, and influencing action filmmaking. For those reasons, it has been added to the National Film Registry for preservation. Its first sequel was also a commercial success, becoming the highest-grossing R-rated film in history, until it was surpassed by "Deadpool" in 2016. As of 2006, the franchise has generated US$3 billion in revenue. A fourth film, "The Matrix Resurrections", was released on December 22, 2021, with Lana Wachowski producing, co-writing and directing and Reeves and Moss reprising their roles."


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The series depicts a future in which Earth is dominated by a race of self-aware machines that was spawned from the creation of artificial intelligence early in the 21st century. At one point conflict arose between mankind and machines, and the machines rebelled against their creators. Mankind attempted to block out the machines' source of solar power by covering the sky in thick, stormy clouds. A massive war emerged between the two adversaries which ended with the machines victorious, capturing mankind. Having lost their definite source of energy, the machines devised a way to extract the human body's bioelectric and thermal energies by enclosing people in pods, while their minds are controlled by cybernetic implants connecting them to a simulated reality called The Matrix.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The virtual reality world simulated by the Matrix resembles human civilization around the turn of the 21st century (this time period was chosen because it is supposedly the pinnacle of human civilization). The environment inside the Matrix is practically indistinguishable from reality (although scenes set within the Matrix are presented on-screen with a green tint to the footage, and a general bias towards the color green), and the vast majority of humans connected to it are unaware of its true nature. Most of the central characters in the series are able to gain superhuman abilities within the Matrix by taking advantage of their understanding of its true nature to manipulate its virtual physical laws. The films take place both inside the Matrix and outside of it, in the real world; the parts that take place in the Matrix are set in a vast Western megacity.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The virtual world is first introduced in "The Matrix". The short comic "Bits and Pieces of Information" and the "Animatrix" short film "The Second Renaissance" show how the initial conflict between mankind and machines came about, and how and why the Matrix was first developed. Its history and purpose are further explained in "The Matrix Reloaded". In "The Matrix Revolutions" a new status quo is established in the Matrix's place in mankind and machines' conflict. This was further explored in "The Matrix Online", a now-defunct MMORPG.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: During production of the original trilogy, the Wachowskis told their close collaborators that, "at that time they had no intention of making another "Matrix" film after "The Matrix Revolutions"". In February 2015, in promotion interviews for "Jupiter Ascending", Lilly Wachowski called a return to "The Matrix" "a particularly repelling idea in these times", noting studios' tendencies to "greenlight" sequels, reboots, and adaptations, in preference to original material. Meanwhile, Lana Wachowski, in addressing rumors about a potential reboot, stated that "...they had not heard anything, but she believed that the studio might be looking to replace them". At various times, Keanu Reeves and Hugo Weaving each confirmed their interest and willingness to reprise their roles in potential future installments of the "Matrix" films, with the stipulation that the Wachowskis were involved in the creative and production process. These comments were made prior to the announcement in August 2019 that Lana Wachowski would direct a fourth "Matrix" film ultimately titled "The Matrix Resurrections".


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Following the release of "Resurrections", producer James McTeigue said that there were no plans for further "Matrix" films, though he believed that the film's open ending meant that could change in the future.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: In March 2017, "The Hollywood Reporter" wrote that Warner Bros. was in the early stages of developing a re-launch of the franchise. Consideration was given to producing a "Matrix" television series, but was dismissed as the studio opted to pursue negotiations with Zak Penn in writing a treatment for a new film, with Michael B. Jordan eyed for the lead role. According to the article, the Wachowskis were not involved at that point. In response to the report, Penn refuted all statements regarding a reboot, remake, or continuation, remarking that he was working on stories set in the pre-established continuity.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Potential plotlines being considered by Warner Bros. Pictures included a prequel film about a young Morpheus, or an alternate storyline with a focus on one of his descendants. By April 2018, Penn described the script as "being at a nascent stage". Later, in September 2019, Jordan addressed the rumors of his involvement by saying he was "flattered", but without making a definitive statement. In October 2019, Penn confirmed the script he wrote is set within an earlier time period than the first three films in the franchise.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The following is a list of crew members who have participated in the making of the "Matrix" film series.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The "Matrix" series includes four feature films. The first three were written and directed by the Wachowskis and produced by Joel Silver, starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss and Hugo Weaving. The series was filmed in Australia and began with 1999's "The Matrix", which depicts the recruitment of hacker Neo into humanity's rebellion against sentient machines.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The film's mainstream success had backed up the initial idea of making a trilogy. The sequels, "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions", were filmed simultaneously during one shoot (under the project codename "The Burly Man"), and released in two parts in 2003. They tell the story of the impending attack on the human enclave of Zion by a vast machine army. Neo also learns more about the history of the Matrix and his role as The One. The sequels also incorporate more ambitious action scenes and visual effects.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: "The Matrix" was highly successful, earning over $460 million worldwide on a modest budget of $63 million. The sequels had a much larger budget of $150 million each; "Reloaded" was also a big commercial success, earning almost $742 million worldwide and becoming the highest-grossing R-rated film in history, a title which it held for 13 years until it was surpassed by the film "Deadpool"; "Revolutions" had the world's first simultaneous release across major cities all over the world, which for the first time in history included both a release in China, and a release in IMAX theaters. Its five-day opening at $204 million broke the previous record, but ultimately the film made $427 million, a little less than the original.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: "The Matrix" and "The Matrix Reloaded" received positive reviews, the critical response to "The Matrix Revolutions" was more negative. One complaint was that "Revolutions" did not give answers to the questions raised in "Reloaded".


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: In April 2003, Sophia Stewart filed a legal complaint in the United States District Court for the Central District of California alleging that the idea of "The Matrix" (and the 1984 film "The Terminator") were plagiarized from her own film treatment titled "The Third Eye". The court allowed the lawsuit to move forward in 2005, but Stewart did not attend the hearing. In a 53-page ruling, Judge Margaret Morrow dismissed the case, stating that Stewart and her attorneys "had not entered any evidence to bolster its key claims or demonstrated any striking similarity between her work and the accused directors' films." Despite the ruling, the case became the subject of "Internet legend", with many sources claiming Stewart had actually won the lawsuit.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: In 2013, Thomas Althouse filed suit in California federal court alleging that ideas for the sequels "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions" came from a screenplay he wrote called "The Immortals". In a summary judgement for the defendants, Judge R. Gary Klausner stated "The basic premises of "The Matrix Trilogy" and "The Immortals" are so different that it would be unreasonable to find their plots substantially similar."


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The "Matrix" films make numerous references to films and literature, and to historical myths and philosophy, including Buddhism, Vedanta, Advaita Hinduism, Christianity, Messianism, Judaism, Gnosticism, existentialism, obscurantism, and nihilism. The films' premise resembles Plato's Allegory of the cave, René Descartes's evil demon, Kant's reflections on the Phenomenon versus the Ding an sich, Zhuangzi's "Zhuangzi dreamed he was a butterfly", Marxist social theory and the brain in a vat thought experiment. Many references to Jean Baudrillard's 1981 treatise "Simulacra and Simulation" appear in the first film. Baudrillard himself considered this a misrepresentation, although Lana Wachowski claims the point the reference was making was misunderstood. There are similarities to cyberpunk works such as the 1984 book "Neuromancer" by William Gibson, who has described "The Matrix" as "arguably the ultimate 'cyberpunk' artifact".


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Japanese director Mamoru Oshii's 1995 film "Ghost in the Shell" was a strong influence. Producer Joel Silver has stated that the Wachowskis first described their intentions for "The Matrix" by showing him that anime and saying, "We wanna do that for real." Mitsuhisa Ishikawa of Production I.G, which produced "Ghost in the Shell", noted that the anime's high-quality visuals were a strong source of inspiration for the Wachowskis. He also commented, "... cyberpunk films are very difficult to describe to a third person. I'd imagine that "The Matrix" is the kind of film that was very difficult to draw up a written proposal for to take to film studios." He stated that since "Ghost in the Shell" had gained recognition in America, the Wachowskis used it as a "promotional tool". Similarities to the 1985 anime film "Megazone 23" have also been noticed, but the Wachowskis stated they have never seen it.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Reviewers have commented on similarities between "The Matrix" and other late-1990s films such as "Strange Days", "Dark City", and "The Truman Show". The Wachowskis stated "Dark City" had no influence on the franchise, but commented about it and "The Truman Show" that they thought it was "very strange that Australia came to have three films associated with it that were all about the nature of reality."


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Comparisons have also been made to Grant Morrison's comic series "The Invisibles"; Morrison believes that the Wachowskis essentially plagiarized their work to create the film. The Wachowskis responded that they enjoy the comic, but did not use it for inspiration.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: In addition, the similarity of the films' central concept to a device in the long-running series "Doctor Who" has also been noted. As in the film, the Matrix of that series (introduced in the 1976 serial "The Deadly Assassin") is a massive computer system which one enters using a device connecting to the head, allowing users to see representations of the real world and change its laws of physics; but if killed there, they will die in reality.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The first "Matrix" film features numerous references to the "White Rabbit", the "Rabbit Hole" and mirrors, referring to Lewis Carroll's novels "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (1865) and "Through the Looking-Glass" (1871).


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Matrixism is a new religious movement inspired by the trilogy. A sociologist of religion Adam Possamai describes these types of religions/spiritualities as hyper-real religions due to their eclectic mix of religion/spirituality with elements of popular culture and their connection to the fluid social structures of late capitalism. There is some debate about whether followers of Matrixism are indeed serious about their practice; however, the religion (real or otherwise) has received attention in the media.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Following the Wachowskis' coming out as transgender women some years after the release of the films, the first film and the pill analogy have also been analyzed in the context of the Wachowskis' transgender experiences. In this case, taking the red pill and living out of the Matrix symbolizes exploring one's own gender identity, starting the transition and coming out as transgender, as opposed to a continued life in the closet. In 2016, Lilly Wachowski acknowledged this analysis by calling it "a cool thing because it's an excellent reminder that art is never static".


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: In 2004, Warner Home Video released "The Ultimate Matrix Collection", a 10-disc set of the films on DVD. It included the trilogy of films, "The Animatrix", and six discs of additional material, including the documentary film "The Matrix Revisited", the live-action footage shot for "Enter the Matrix", and a promotional compilation of "The Matrix Online". For this release, "The Matrix" was remastered under the supervision of the Wachowskis and the trilogy's cinematographer, Bill Pope, to improve its picture quality and make its color timing closer to that of its sequels. At the request of the Wachowskis, as they explain in a written statement that accompanies the boxset, each of the three films is accompanied by two audio commentaries, one by philosophers who liked the films, and another by critics who did not, with the intention that viewers use them as reference points to form their own opinion. The compilation includes 35 hours of bonus material, but some of the extras from earlier, standalone, releases are missing. A "Limited Edition" of "The Ultimate Matrix Collection" was also released. It encases the ten discs plus a resin bust of Neo inside an acrylic glass box.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: "The Ultimate Matrix Collection" was later also released on HD DVD (5 discs) and Blu-ray (6 discs) in 2007 and 2008, respectively. The HD DVD release added a picture-in-picture video commentary to the three films and the extras that were missing from the previous DVD compilation. The Blu-ray release presented "The Animatrix" in high definition for the first time. A pared-down set dubbed "The Complete Matrix Trilogy" was also released on HD DVD and Blu-ray (3 discs each), which dropped "The Animatrix" and some of the special features.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The Ultra HD Blu-ray release of "The Matrix Trilogy" came out in 2018 (9 discs), and presented the trilogy in 4K resolution and high-dynamic-range video, remastered from the original camera negative and supervised by Bill Pope. In this release, "The Matrix" is presented with a color grade that reportedly comes closer to its theatrical presentation than any of the previous home video releases. The set also includes standard Blu-ray copies of the films sourced from the new 4K master, but is missing "The Animatrix" and some special features.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: By August 2000, "The Matrix" DVD had sold over three million copies in United States, becoming the best-selling of all time. By November 2003, "The Matrix" franchise had generated from VHS and DVD sales, from the video game "Enter the Matrix" (2003), from "" soundtrack sales, and from licensed merchandise sales. As of 2006, the franchise has grossed from all sources worldwide.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: In acknowledgment of the strong influence of Japanese Anime on the "Matrix" series, "The Animatrix" was produced in 2003 to coincide with the release of "The Matrix Reloaded". This is a collection of nine animated short films intended to further flesh out the concepts, history, characters, and setting of the series. The objective of "The Animatrix" project was to give other writers and directors the opportunity to lend their voices and interpretation to the "Matrix" universe; the Wachowskis conceived of and oversaw the process, and they wrote four of the segments themselves, although they were given to other directors to execute. Many of the segments were produced by notable figures from the world of Japanese animation. Four of the films were originally released on the series' official website, one was shown in cinemas with "Dreamcatcher", one was shown on MTV, MTV2, MTV3, MTV4, and Syfi, and the others first appeared with the DVD release of all nine shorts shortly after the release of "The Matrix Reloaded".


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: On May 15, 2003, the game "Enter the Matrix" was released in North America concurrently with "The Matrix Reloaded". The first of three video games related to the films, it told a story running parallel to "The Matrix Reloaded" and featured scenes that were shot during the filming of "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions".


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: Two more "The Matrix" video games were released in 2005. The MMORPG "The Matrix Online" continued the story beyond "The Matrix Revolutions", while "" allowed players to control Neo in scenes from the film trilogy. "The Matrix Online" was shut down in 2009.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: An interactive technology demonstration, titled "The Matrix Awakens", was released on December 9, 2021.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: "The Matrix Comics" is a set of comics and short stories based on the series and written and illustrated by figures from the comics industry; one of the comics was written by the Wachowskis and illustrated by the films' concept artist Geof Darrow. The comics and stories were originally presented for free on the "Matrix" series' website between 1999 and 2003. One of them was printed in 1999 to be given away at theaters as a promotional item for "The Matrix", but Warner Bros. recalled it due to its mature content. Most of them were later republished by the Wachowskis' Burlyman Entertainment, along with some new stories and updates with color to some of the existing ones, in two printed trade paperback volumes in 2003 and 2004 and a deluxe hardcover twentieth-anniversary edition in 2019.


title: The Matrix (franchise)

text: The "Matrix" official website provided a free screensaver for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X, which simulates the falling "Matrix digital rain" of the films. The screensaver was reported to have a password security problem. The "Matrix digital rain" also inspired the creation of many unofficial screensavers.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Jeffrey Jacob Abrams (born June 27, 1966) is an American filmmaker and composer. He is best known for his works in the genres of action, drama, and science fiction. Abrams wrote and produced such films as "Regarding Henry" (1991), "Forever Young" (1992), "Armageddon" (1998), "Cloverfield" (2008), "Star Trek" (2009), "" (2015), and "" (2019).


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams has created numerous television series, including "Felicity" (co-creator, 1998–2002), "Alias" (creator, 2001–2006), "Lost" (co-creator, 2004–2010), and "Fringe" (co-creator, 2008–2013). He won two Emmy Awards for "Lost" – Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series and Outstanding Drama Series.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: His directorial film work includes "" (2006), "Star Trek" (2009), "Super 8" (2011), and "Star Trek Into Darkness" (2013). He also directed, produced and co-wrote "The Force Awakens", the seventh episode of the "Star Wars" saga and the first film of the sequel trilogy. The film is his highest-grossing, as well as the fourth-highest-grossing film of all time not adjusted for inflation. He returned to "Star Wars" by executive producing "" (2017), and directing and co-writing "" (2019).


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams's frequent collaborators include producer Bryan Burk, producer/director Tommy Gormley, actors Greg Grunberg, Simon Pegg, Amanda Foreman, and Keri Russell, composer Michael Giacchino, writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, cinematographers Daniel Mindel and Larry Fong, and editors Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams was born in New York City with the name Jeffrey Jacob Abrams to veteran television producer Gerald W. Abrams (born 1939)


title: J. J. Abrams

text: of Polish-Jewish descent and Carol Ann Abrams (née Kelvin; 1942–2012) a Peabody Award winning television executive producer, as well as an author and law academic. His sister is screenwriter Tracy Rosen. His father had just begun his career in television, working at CBS's flagship television station in Midtown Manhattan the year prior to Abrams' birth. By 1971, his father had worked his way up at CBS and the family had relocated to Los Angeles. His mother worked as a real estate agent while Abrams and his sister were at school.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams attended Palisades High School and after graduation, Abrams planned on going to art school rather than a traditional college, but eventually enrolled at Sarah Lawrence College, in Bronxville, New York, following his father's advice: "it's more important that you go off and learn what to make movies about than how to make movies."


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams' first job in the movie business was at age 16 when he wrote the music for Don Dohler's 1982 horror movie "Nightbeast". During his senior year at college, he teamed with Jill Mazursky, the daughter of award-winning writer/director, Paul Mazursky to write a feature film treatment. Purchased by Touchstone Pictures, the treatment was the basis for "Taking Care of Business", Abrams' first produced film, which starred Charles Grodin and James Belushi and was directed by Academy Award winner Arthur Hiller. He followed with "Regarding Henry", starring Harrison Ford, and "Forever Young", starring Mel Gibson. He also co-wrote with Mazursky the script for the comedy "Gone Fishin'" starring Joe Pesci and Danny Glover.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In 1994, he was part of the "Propellerheads" with Rob Letterman, Loren Soman, and Andy Waisler, a group of Sarah Lawrence alums experimenting with computer animation technology. They were contracted by Jeffrey Katzenberg to develop animation for the film "Shrek". Abrams worked on the screenplay for the 1998 film "Armageddon" with producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay. That same year, he made his first foray into television with "Felicity", which ran for four seasons on The WB Network, serving as the series' co-creator (with Matt Reeves) and executive producer. He also composed its opening theme music.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Under his production company, Bad Robot, which he founded with Bryan Burk in 2001, Abrams created and executive-produced ABC's "Alias" and is co-creator (along with Damon Lindelof and Jeffrey Lieber) and was executive producer of "Lost." As with "Felicity," Abrams also composed the opening theme music for "Alias" and "Lost". Abrams directed and wrote the two-part pilot for "Lost" and remained active producer for the first half of the season. Also in 2001, Abrams co-wrote and produced the horror-thriller "Joy Ride". In 2006, he served as executive producer of "What About Brian" and "Six Degrees", also on ABC. He also co-wrote the teleplay for "Lost"s third-season premiere "A Tale of Two Cities" and the same year, he made his feature directorial debut with "", starring Tom Cruise. Abrams spoke at the TED conference in 2007.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In 2008, Abrams produced the monster movie "Cloverfield", which Matt Reeves directed. In 2009, he directed the science fiction film "Star Trek", which he produced with "Lost" co-creator Damon Lindelof. While it was speculated that they would be writing and producing an adaptation of Stephen King's "The Dark Tower" series of novels, they publicly stated in November 2009 that they were no longer looking to take on that project. In 2008, Abrams co-created, executive produced, and co-wrote (along with Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman) the FOX science fiction series "Fringe", for which he also composed the theme music. He was featured in the 2009 MTV Movie Awards 1980s-style digital short "Cool Guys Don't Look at Explosions", with Andy Samberg and Will Ferrell, in which he plays a keyboard solo. NBC picked up Abrams's "Undercovers" as its first new drama series for the 2010–11 season. However, it was subsequently cancelled by the network in November 2010.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams wrote and directed the Paramount science fiction thriller "Super 8", starring Joel Courtney and Elle Fanning, while co-producing with Steven Spielberg and Bryan Burk; it was released on June 10, 2011.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams directed the sequel to "Star Trek", "Star Trek Into Darkness", released in May 2013. The film was interpreted as a loose remake of "". Critics generally reacted positively to the film, while Nicholas Meyer, the director of "The Wrath of Khan", called it a "gimmick". Abrams was criticized for the film's treatment of classic villain Khan Noonien Singh (Benedict Cumberbatch). Many felt that much of the character, originally played by Mexican actor Ricardo Montalban, had been lost, especially his ethnic identity. Two years after the film's release, Abrams said of the film, "there were certain things I was unsure of. ... Any movie ... has a fundamental conversation happening during it. And [for "Into Darkness",] I didn't have it... [The weakness of the plot] was not anyone's fault but mine. ... [The script] was a little bit of a collection of scenes that were written by my friends ... And yet, I found myself frustrated by my choices, and unable to hang my hat on an undeniable thread of the main story. So then I found myself on that movie basically tap-dancing as well as I could to try and make the sequences as entertaining as possible. ... I would never say that I don't think that the movie ended up working. But I feel like it didn't work as well as it could have, had I made some better decisions before we started shooting."


title: J. J. Abrams

text: On January 25, 2013, Disney and Lucasfilm introduced Abrams as director and producer of "", the seventh entry in the "Star Wars" film saga, with Bryan Burk and Bad Robot Productions producing the film. Following this news, speculation arose as to Abrams's future with Paramount Pictures, under which he had released all of his previous feature work as a director, and which had a first-look deal with his company, Bad Robot Productions. Paramount vice-chairman Rob Moore stated that Abrams would continue to have a hand in the "Star Trek" and "Mission: Impossible" franchises going forward.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams directed, produced, and co-wrote the screenplay for "The Force Awakens", which opened in theaters on December 18, 2015. Despite its strong box office performance and positive reviews, the film was considered by some, including "Star Wars" creator George Lucas, to be too similar to the original 1977 film. In 2016, Abrams responded towards these complaints, stating: "What was important for me was introducing brand new characters using relationships that were embracing the history that we know to tell a story that is new — to go backwards to go forwards".


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams returned as producer for "Star Trek Beyond", released in 2016. And also produced "The Cloverfield Paradox", a sequel to "10 Cloverfield Lane". It was released on Netflix in February 2018. Also on 2018, Abrams produced "Overlord", a horror film set behind German enemy lines in World War II and directed by Julius Avery. Abrams also produced the fourth, fifth, and sixth "Mission: Impossible" films.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In September 2017, Abrams returned to direct and co-write "" with Chris Terrio. The film was released in December 2019; it received mixed reviews from critics and fans, while audience reactions leaned more positively.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In 2008, it was reported that Abrams purchased the rights to a "New York Times" article "Mystery on Fifth Avenue" about the renovation of an 8.5 million dollar co-op, a division of property originally owned by E. F. Hutton & Co. and Marjorie Merriweather Post, for six figures and was developing a film titled "Mystery on Fifth Avenue", with Paramount Pictures and Bad Robot Productions, and comedy writers Maya Forbes and Wally Wolodarsky to write the adaptation. According to the article, a wealthy couple Steven B. Klinsky and Maureen Sherry purchased the apartment in 2003 and live there with their four children. Soon after purchasing the apartment, they hired young architectural designer Eric Clough, who devised an elaborately clever "scavenger hunt" built into the apartment that involved dozens of historical figures, a fictional book and a soundtrack, woven throughout the apartment in puzzles, riddles, secret panels, compartments, and hidden codes, without the couple's knowledge. The family didn't discover the embedded mystery until months after moving into the apartment. After Abrams purchased the article, Clough left him an encrypted message in the wall tiles of a Christian Louboutin shoe store he designed in West Hollywood.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In July 2016, Abrams reported that a fourth alternate universe "Star Trek" installment was in the works and that he was confident that Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto and Chris Hemsworth would return for the sequel.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In May 2018, Abrams and Avery had reunited to produce and direct, respectively, a superhero thriller film titled "The Heavy", with a script written by Daniel Casey. Paramount and Bad Robot plan to begin filming sometime in 2018.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams will produce and Guillermo del Toro will write and direct a science-fiction action/thriller film titled "Zanbato", which Abrams has been working on since 2011.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In September 2019, Abrams and his Bad Robot Productions company signed a $250 million five-year deal with WarnerMedia, including HBO and Warner Bros. Pictures. In April 2020, it was announced that Abrams would be developing three new shows for HBO Max: "Justice League Dark", "Overlook", and "Duster". Abrams will also serve as executive producer and co-creator of a new Batman animated series titled "Batman: Caped Crusader" alongside Reeves and Bruce Timm.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams is one of the producers of an animated short film of The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, which is scheduled to be aired on BBC One and BBC iPlayer at Christmas 2022.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In 1989, Abrams met Steven Spielberg at a film festival, where Spielberg spoke about a possible "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" sequel, with Abrams as a possible writer and with Robert Zemeckis as producer. Nothing came up from this project, although Abrams has some storyboards for a "Roger Rabbit" short.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In July 2002, Abrams wrote a script for a possible fifth Superman film entitled "". Brett Ratner and McG entered into talks to direct, although Abrams tried to get the chance to direct his own script. However, the project was finally cancelled in 2004 and instead "Superman Returns" was released in 2006.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In November 2009, Abrams and Bad Robot Productions along with Cartoon Network Movies, Warner Bros., Frederator Films and Paramount Pictures, reportedly were producing a film adaptation of "Samurai Jack". However, the production of the film was scrapped after Abrams' departure from the project to direct "Star Trek". For this and other reasons, series creator Genndy Tartakovsky made a new season instead of a feature film. Also in 2009, Abrams and Bad Robot Productions were reportedly set to produce a film based on the Micronauts toy line. However, the film has never gone into production.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In February 2018, HBO ordered Abrams' sci-fi drama "Demimonde" to series. In June 2022, the project was cancelled.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In 2001, Abrams founded his own production company Bad Robot Productions in association with Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures. The company is well known for the Star Trek film reboot franchise, the Cloverfield franchise, and the Star Wars sequel trilogy. In early 2021, it was announced that Abrams and Bad Robot Productions will produce several films and television series based on members of the DC Comics superhero team Justice League Dark in similar fashion to how Marvel Comics released individual television series based on members of The Defenders until their team up miniseries Defenders. It was also announced Abrams would produce a reboot of the Superman movie franchise.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In November 2015, Abrams was developing a video game called "Spyjinx", in a collaboration between Bad Robot Productions and Chair Entertainment.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: In 2019, Abrams made his debut as a writer for Marvel Comics, co-authoring the company's title Spider-Man from September of that year with his son Henry. The first issue of the comic includes the death of Mary-Jane Watson, and a twelve-year time shift, with the series' protagonist being Ben Parker, son of Peter Parker and Mary Jane.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams is married to public relations executive Katie McGrath and has three children. His daughter, Gracie Abrams, is a pop singer-songwriter. He resides in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California. He is Jewish and his wife is Catholic, and he sometimes takes his children to religious services on Jewish holidays.


title: J. J. Abrams

text: Abrams serves on the Creative Council of Represent.Us, a nonpartisan anti-corruption organization and the Motion Picture & Television Fund (MPTF) Board of Governors.


title: Xavi

text: Xavier Hernández Creus (born 25 January 1980), known as Xavi is a Spanish professional football manager and former player who is the manager of La Liga club Barcelona. Widely considered one of the greatest midfielders of all time, Xavi was renowned for his passing, vision, ball retention, and positioning.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi joined "La Masia", the Barcelona youth academy, at age 11, and made his first-team debut against Mallorca in August 1998. In all, he played 767 official matches, a former club record—now held by Lionel Messi—and scored 85 goals. Xavi is the first player in the club's history to play 150 European and FIFA Club World Cup matches combined. With Barcelona, Xavi won eight La Liga titles and four UEFA Champions League titles. Xavi came third in the 2009 FIFA World Player of the Year, followed by third place for its successor award, the FIFA Ballon d'Or, in 2010 and 2011. In 2011, he was runner up to Messi for the UEFA Best Player in Europe Award. In 2015, he departed Barcelona for Al Sadd, where he won four trophies before retiring in 2019. He is one of the few recorded players to have made over 1,000 professional career appearances.


title: Xavi

text: With Spain, Xavi won the FIFA World Youth Championship in 1999, and the Olympic silver medal at the 2000 Olympics. After making his senior team debut in 2000, he was capped 133 times for his country, and was an influential figure in the team's successes. He played an integral role in Spain's victory at the 2010 FIFA World Cup, as well as their wins at UEFA Euro 2008 and UEFA Euro 2012. He was named Player of the Tournament at UEFA Euro 2008, and was named in the UEFA Euro Team of the Tournament in 2008 and 2012. With two assists in the UEFA Euro 2012 Final, Xavi became the first player to register assists in two separate European finals, after setting up the only goal in the final four years earlier. After the 2014 FIFA World Cup, Xavi announced his retirement from international football.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi was awarded the IFFHS World's Best Playmaker award four times, all straight between 2008 and 2011. He was included in the FIFA FIFPro World XI on six occasions: 2008 to 2013, and the UEFA Team of the Year five times: 2008 to 2012. In 2020 Xavi was named in the Ballon d'Or Dream Team, a greatest all-time XI published by "France Football" magazine. Xavi was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award in 2012, and he won 32 trophies in his career, making him the second-most decorated Spanish player in history, behind former teammate Andrés Iniesta. After retirement, Xavi transitioned to coaching, and he was named the manager at Qatar Stars League club Al Sadd in May 2019, where he won seven titles in less than three years. In November 2021, Xavi was appointed as manager at his former club Barcelona.


title: Xavi

text: Born in Terrassa, Barcelona, Catalonia, Xavi is a product of FC Barcelona's "La Masia" youth system, which he joined at the age of 11 from UFB Jàbac Terrassa and Terrassa FC. His father, Joaquim, was a former player for Sabadell in the first division. Xavi made his way through the youth and reserve teams and was a key member of Josep Maria Gonzalvo's Barcelona B team that won promotion to the Second Division.


title: Xavi

text: Although he was initially inspired by compatriot playmaker Pep Guardiola at Barcelona, as a child Xavi also watched a lot of English football, and looked up to midfielders John Barnes, Paul Gascoigne and Matt Le Tissier.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi's progression through the teams earned him a first-team appearance in a Copa Catalunya match against Lleida on 5 May 1998 and he scored his first goal on 18 August 1998 in the 1998 Supercopa de España against Mallorca. His debut in La Liga came against Valencia on 3 October 1998 in a 3–1 victory for Barcelona. Initially featuring intermittently both for the reserve and senior teams, Xavi scored the only goal in a 1–0 victory over Real Valladolid when Barcelona were in tenth position in the league. Sustained impressive performances meant that he became a key member of Louis van Gaal's title-winning team, finishing his debut season with 26 matches played and being named 1999 La Liga Breakthrough Player of the Year. Xavi became Barcelona's principal playmaker after an injury to Pep Guardiola in the 1999–2000 season.


title: Xavi

text: In these years, Barcelona was on the verge of bankruptcy and struggling to keep its place in La Liga's elite. Playing midfield, but in a more defensive role, Xavi made 20 assists and scored 7 goals in those two seasons. On 16 March 2002, he scored his first goal in "El Clásico" against Real Madrid.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi was named the vice-captain in the 2004–05 season, in which he helped Barcelona win La Liga and the 2004 Supercopa de España. He was named La Liga Spanish Player of the Year in 2005.


title: Xavi

text: In the 2005–06 season, Xavi tore the ligaments in his left knee in training; he was out of action for four months but returned in April and was on the substitutes bench for Barcelona's win in the 2006 Champions League Final against Arsenal. He also won La Liga and the Supercopa de España again.


title: Xavi

text: After being named Player of the Tournament at Euro 2008, Xavi spoke to Bayern Munich about a transfer, but newly appointed Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola convinced him that he was too important to the club to be allowed to leave. He was a main part of Barcelona's treble and scored the fourth goal in the 4–1 win in the 2009 Copa del Rey Final against Athletic Bilbao, with a free kick. In La Liga, one of his most significant games was the 6–2 "Clásico" victory over Real Madrid on 2 May; he assisted four goals – once to Carles Puyol, once to Thierry Henry and twice to Lionel Messi.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi helped Barcelona win the 2009 Champions League Final 2–0 against Manchester United, assisting the second goal by crossing to Messi for his header. Prior to the match, Manchester United coach Sir Alex Ferguson heaped praise on the central midfield combination of Xavi and Andrés Iniesta, stating, "I don't think Xavi and Iniesta have ever given the ball away in their lives. They get you on that carousel and they can leave you dizzy." Xavi was voted "UEFA Champions League best midfielder" for his contribution during Barcelona's victorious 2008–09 Champions League campaign. Xavi was the highest assisting player in La Liga with 20, and in the Champions League, with 7; he earned 29 assists overall that season. Xavi was under contract to Barça until 2014 after extending his contract during the 2008–09 season. The new contract made him one of the club's biggest earners, with a salary of €7.5 million a year.


title: Xavi

text: During the 2009–10 season, journalists increasingly noted Xavi's contribution to the Barcelona team. For example:


title: Xavi

text: In the 2009–10 season, Xavi again topped the assists table and provided both the assists in Barcelona's 2–0 victory against Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabéu. Barcelona won the Liga title with a record 99 points, and Xavi was acclaimed Barcelona's second-best player in a season-long vote. On 3 June 2010, Madrid-based newspaper "Marca" awarded him third place in the annual Trofeo Alfredo di Stéfano award for the best player in La Liga, behind Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.


title: Xavi

text: On 9 June 2010, Xavi signed a new four-year contract with the club, which could be automatically renewed up to 30 June 2016 based on number of games played. On 29 November, he scored his third goal against arch-rivals Real Madrid in a 5–0 home win. On 18 December, he scored another goal against Espanyol in a 5–1 win. In the Champions League, Xavi scored a valuable goal with an assist from David Villa in a home win against Arsenal, that saw Barcelona progress to the quarter-finals.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi was one of the three finalists for the 2010 FIFA Ballon d'Or, and finished third in the vote behind his Barcelona teammates Lionel Messi and Andrés Iniesta. He narrowly defeated Messi to win the Player of the Year award from "World Soccer" magazine.


title: Xavi

text: On 2 January 2011, in a league match against Levante, Xavi made his 549th appearance for the club in all competitions, matching the record held by Migueli. Xavi later became the player with the most appearances for Barcelona of all time. On 28 May, Xavi was imperious in the 2011 UEFA Champions League Final at Wembley Stadium in London as Barcelona defeated Manchester United in the showpiece for the second time in three seasons, winning 3–1.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi began the 2011–12 season in fine goalscoring form and seemed to grow in his influence of the team despite the long-anticipated return of Cesc Fàbregas and the promotion of Thiago to create added competition for places in "Barça"'s attacking midfield positions. On 18 December, in the 2011 FIFA Club World Cup Final in Yokohama, Barcelona won 4–0 against Brazilian side Santos as Xavi scored a goal and made an assist to Lionel Messi. After the ball was slightly behind him, Xavi brought the ball down with a cocked leg, effectively using his ankle to control it, before slipping a pass through to Messi, who scored the first goal.


title: Xavi

text: Xavi scored the winning goal in the Group H game against A.C. Milan, a vital match for Barcelona's progression in the Champions League knockout stage. In total, Xavi had the best goalscoring return of his career in 2011–12 season with ten Liga goals, two in the Copa del Rey – which Barcelona won – and one in the Club World Cup final win.


title: Xavi

text: He scored a goal against Real Madrid in a 3–2 win for Barcelona. Xavi was named in the FIFA World XI, along with teammates Iniesta, Messi and Dani Alves. Barcelona had virtually secured their La Liga title by the start of 2013, eventually equalling Real Madrid's 100-point record of the previous season.


title: Xavi

text: On 16 January 2014, Xavi made his 700th appearance for the first team against Getafe in the Copa del Rey. For the first time in five years, Barcelona ended the season without a major trophy; they were defeated in the Copa del Rey Final by Real Madrid with Gareth Bale scoring a late winner, and lost the league in the last game to Atlético Madrid.


title: Xavi

text: In June 2014, it was announced that Xavi would be leaving the club. On 22 July, however, after talks with newly appointed manager and former teammate Luis Enrique, Xavi decided to stay at Camp Nou for one more season. He was also appointed as club captain. On 25 April 2015, Xavi made his 500th La Liga appearance, becoming the eighth player in history to do so. On 4 June, a farewell event was held at Barcelona for Xavi with players, managers, friends and family paying tribute to him.