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New York City, Sept. 4, 1999: in an action that capped a decade of multibillion-dollar takeovers, the world's last two international media conglomerates today announced that they would merge. BMCAA Viafox (created out of Bertelsmann, MCA, CAA, Viacom and Fox) agreed to accept a bid of $638 billion in cash and stock from Disony GETCITWest (formed from a fusion of Disney, Sony, GE, TCI, Time Warner and Westinghouse). The new entity, which now controls all entertainment on film, TV, CD, video, telephone and computer, will be called, simply, Diller.

At the moment, that news from the future may only be Barry...

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RAY KELLY, New York City Police Commissioner, on the arrest of a New Jersey man in one of the nation's most baffling missing-children cases, the disappearance more than three decades ago of 6-year-old Etan Patz.
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