All signatures are obtained, but one. That is 35 or more publishers, 16 defendants and the plaintiffs. One defendant is in a bankruptcy reorganization and it must obtain court approval to sign the agreement. The approval is expected without problem. It will take about 3-4 weeks to obtain that approval, but that will hopefully not delay proceeding.

Soon (matter of days) plaintiffs will request preliminary approval from Judge Daniels. Once obtained (expected to be matter of weeks) the process of notice will start. Then in a matter of months there will be a hearing on final approval.

I will try to predict time lines before too long, but a rough estimate is that it will be approximately a year from now before claim payments go out.

Once preliminary approval is obtained I will conduct inquiries with the class and individual members with the aim of preparing for the process of claim review and defense challenges to claims. The review and defense challenge will not start until after final approval (and the passage of 30 additional days to see that there is no further appeal). But many of the issues that are likely or certain to be presented are foreshadowed by the initial review that has already taken place and by the negotiations over the last year or more. Thus, the effort will be to anticipate those issues and try to have their resolution take as short a time as possible.