The tourism ad Croatia: I Hear It’s Beautiful already featured a familiar face, but Pete Radovich gave the Weekend.19 audience another encounter with him. During a conversation about the making of the campaign, he called John Malkovich, who answered live and greeted the audience in Rovinj. Radovich also spoke about filming with Luka Modrić, and those present watched a behind-the-scenes video of the ad.
Radovich, a 45-time Emmy winner, spoke about the creative freedom and risk involved in the campaign. The question of how to capture an audience’s attention came up from a very different angle that same day: through content deliberately designed to provoke anger.
Maja Vučić, Mojmira Pastorčić and Krešimir Macan discussed rage bait. They considered the line between provocation with a purpose and a post that stirs anger to drive engagement. Pastorčić cautioned against using audience reaction as the sole measure: “Not all content that provokes anger is rage bait. Real journalism evokes emotions.” She added that audiences do not seek only negative content and that better journalism can be an answer to poor content.
Other conversations about the media showed what that kind of work requires. Investigative journalist Ivan Pandžić spoke about following seemingly small clues, from an unusual figure to a public tender or a tip-off. Boštjan Videmšek, who has reported from the world’s war zones for more than 25 years, spoke with Tomislav Krasnec about the consequences of conflict that persist beyond the battlefield itself, including environmental destruction.
Editors and journalists Damira Gregoret, Tihana Tomičić and Martina Bolšec Oblak, in a discussion moderated by Dražen Klarić, addressed the pressure to publish information ever faster. Social media and artificial intelligence are changing the pace of newsroom work, but accuracy, verification and the willingness of media outlets to question their own decisions remained central to the conversation.
For Sofascore, data is the foundation of a product used by millions of people every day. Co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer Ivan Bešlić explained why the company sees an advantage in up-to-date, reliable sports data and how it uses that data to develop the user experience. He also spoke about how Sofascore recognized the potential of artificial intelligence.
A business story that drew considerable audience interest was that of Mate Rimac. The founder and president of Rimac Group spoke with Tomislav Car, CEO of Productive, about his journey from growing up in Livno and his first experiments with cars to working with global manufacturers. He recalled the BMW engine he and a friend broke at Grobnik as teenagers, as well as negotiations with Volkswagen during which, by his own account, he felt as though the other side had all the weapons while he had a slingshot. Alongside stories about Bugatti and the Tourbillon was one about Will Smith, who ended up eating burek at Rimac’s mother’s home.
After the daytime program, Weekend OFF continued with Slušaona, featuring Nik Orosi and Arsen Oremović. The evening schedule included R&B Confusion, a performance by Songkillers on the Expo Stage, and DJ sets by Uroš and Bondža.
