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Elon Musk Killing Twitter May Have Done Us All a Huge Favour

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Elon Musk’s decision, which seemed to have come out of left field, to replace Twitter’s blue bird with an “X” may not be a death blow, but it is another nail in the coffin. Basically, Twitter’s press release read, “As of Monday, July 24th, Twitter will be known simply as X.” While questionable, this is Musk’s boldest move since purchasing the social media site last October for $44 billion.

Predictably, Twitter’s constantly irritable users condemned the move as irresponsible, risky, and wrongheaded. Founder of Meta, Mark Zuckerberg, undoubtedly is chuckling at the boost rebranding Twitter as ‘X” will bring to his newly launched Twitter rival Threads, a venture he founded to capitalize on the opportunity Twitter’s decline under Musk’s ownership presents.

Twitter’s core strength is its relevancy. It never made money, nor did it ever become the most prominent social network. However, people immediately go to Twitter to learn more when something happens. Twitter’s appeal lies in its ability to collect information about the present moment, whether it is the death of a notable member of society, a weather event, or traffic. Due to Musk’s missteps, Twitter is losing its relevancy and giving other platforms an opportunity. (e.g., TikTok introducing text-only posts.)

Zuckerberg wants threads to be friendly and news-free, which is all nice and good, but is this what most social media users want? Such a business model does not satisfy the primary reason for being on social media, which is to get news and updates. Furthermore, Threads lacks the features that make Twitter “Twitter.” There are no hashtags to find like-minded individuals or groups. There is no direct messaging, no desktop version, and no way to view only the feeds of those you follow.

Twitter is widely used for informative purposes. It is also a place where people can post relatively freely, which unfortunately has attracted people looking to spread fake news and conspiracy theories or troll to express their anger against those with differing views, making Twitter a toxic digital soup.

As with any platform, Twitter faces the same tension regarding how much to moderate content, not just for users who want hate speech curtailed but also for advertisers who want to avoid risking their brand’s reputation. Instead of addressing this ongoing tension, Musk drove Twitter further into a free-for-all direction. Musk has been quoted saying that Twitter’s increasing moderation was one of the reasons he chose to acquire the company and transform it into a “free speech” platform.

Instead of criticizing Musk for his poor business decisions, we should be praising him. By making Twitter increasingly unappealing and frustrating, Musk has given millions of people a golden opportunity to reduce their social media addiction.

The 37% of Canadians who visit Twitter monthly can now eliminate this time thief. Twitter’s impending demise — yes, I could be wrong; after all, Musk has a business success record far beyond mine — is a chance to reduce the need for the dopamine hit that Twitter gives. The last thing anyone should do is replace the gift Musk is giving us with another social media time-sucking, anxiety-inducing platform, which Threads is no different; it steals time and self-worth.

When a product sucks, users leave or use it less. By making Twitter less useful and fun, Musk is forcing us to reduce our dependence on his product, which is a gift. Imagine he was in the cigarette business and suddenly rationed our access to only 10 cigarettes a day unless you paid extra for a pack stamped with a blue checkmark.

 

Now, smokers (READ: addicts) are faced with two choices.

Option A: Switch to a similar cigarette company such as Threads, Mastodon, BlueSky CounterSocial or Discord.

Option B: Drastically reduce smoking.

Most will consider Option B.

We are increasingly living our lives online. According to Statista, Canada had 3.3 million Twitter users in 2012. By 2019, the number had risen to 7.6 million. Today, there are approximately 7.9 million Twitter users in Canada. Additionally, according to Statista, 45% of Canadians use Twitter daily.

Due to its addictive properties, social media has rewired our brains. Collectively, we are more angst-ridden, less self-assured, less socially skilled, and more withdrawn today than we were post-social media.

Indeed, consciously uncoupling from a 24/7 short-content service has downsides and will be met with FOMO (Fear of Missing Out). I have yet to quit Twitter. However, in my defense, I have not joined Threads or any other alternatives. Since Musk announced that non-paying users would be limited in what they can see on Twitter, my phone shows that my “Twitter time” has plummeted.

I may not have kicked my Twitter habit completely, but by fundamentally spoiling his product Musk is setting me on the road to recovery. Fingers crossed, I have the discipline not to pick up another social media platform habit.

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Two youths arrested after emergency alert issued in New Brunswick

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MONCTON, N.B. – New Brunswick RCMP say two youths have been arrested after an emergency alert was issued Monday evening about someone carrying a gun in the province’s southeast.

Caledonia Region Mounties say they were first called out to Main Street in the community of Salisbury around 7 p.m. on reports of a shooting.

A 48-year-old man was found at the scene suffering from gunshot wounds and he was rushed to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

Police say in the interest of public safety, they issued an Alert Ready message at 8:15 p.m. for someone driving a silver Ford F-150 pickup truck and reportedly carrying a firearm with dangerous intent in the Salisbury and Moncton area.

Two youths were arrested without incident later in the evening in Salisbury, and the alert was cancelled just after midnight Tuesday.

Police are still looking for the silver pickup truck, covered in mud, with possible Nova Scotia licence plate HDC 958. They now confirm the truck was stolen from Central Blissville.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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World Junior Girls Golf Championship coming to Toronto-area golf course

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MISSISSAUGA, Ont. – Golf Canada has set an impressive stretch goal of having 30 professional golfers at the highest levels of the sport by 2032.

The World Junior Girls Golf Championship is a huge part of that target.

Credit Valley Golf and Country Club will host the international tournament from Sept. 30 to Oct. 5, with 24 teams representing 23 nations — Canada gets two squads — competing. Lindsay McGrath, a 17-year-old golfer from Oakville, Ont., said she’s excited to be representing Canada and continue to develop her game.

“I’m really grateful to be here,” said McGrath on Monday after a news conference in Credit Valley’s clubhouse in Mississauga, Ont. “It’s just such an awesome feeling being here and representing our country, wearing all the logos and being on Team Canada.

“I’ve always wanted to play in this tournament, so it’s really special to me.”

McGrath will be joined by Nobelle Park of Oakville, Ont., and Eileen Park of Red Deer, Alta., on Team Canada 2. All three earned their places through a qualifying tournament last month.

“I love my teammates so much,” said McGrath. “I know Nobelle and Eileen very well. I’m just so excited to be with them. We have such a great relationship.”

Shauna Liu of Maple, Ont., Calgary’s Aphrodite Deng and Clairey Lin make up Team Canada 2. Liu earned her exemption following her win at the 2024 Canadian Junior Girls Championship while Deng earned her exemption as being the low eligible Canadian on the world amateur golf ranking as of Aug. 7.

Deng was No. 175 at the time, she has since improved to No. 171 and is Canada’s lowest-ranked player.

“I think it’s a really great opportunity,” said Liu. “We don’t really get that many opportunities to play with people from across the world, so it’s really great to meet new people and play with them.

“It’s great to see maybe how they play and take parts from their game that we might also implement our own games.”

Golf Canada founded the World Junior Girls Golf Championship in 2014 to fill a void in women’s international competition and help grow its own homegrown talent. The hosts won for the first time last year when Vancouver’s Anna Huang, Toronto’s Vanessa Borovilos and Vancouver’s Vanessa Zhang won team gold and Huang earned individual silver.

Medallists who have gone on to win on the LPGA Tour include Brooke Henderson of Smiths Falls, Ont., who was fourth in the individual competition at the inaugural tournament. She was on Canada’s bronze-medal team in 2014 with Selena Costabile of Thornhill, Ont., and Calgary’s Jaclyn Lee.

Other notable competitors who went on to become LPGA Tour winners include Angel Yin and Megan Khang of the United States, as well as Yuka Saso of the Philippines, Sweden’s Linn Grant and Atthaya Thitikul of Thailand.

“It’s not if, it’s when they’re going to be on the LPGA Tour,” said Garrett Ball, Golf Canada’s chief operating officer, of how Canada’s golfers in the World Junior Girls Championship can be part of the organization’s goal to have 30 pros in the LPGA and PGA Tours by 2032.

“Events like this, like the She Plays Golf festival that we launched two years ago, and then the CPKC Women’s Open exemptions that we utilize to bring in our national team athletes and get the experience has been important in that pathway.”

The individual winner of the World Junior Girls Golf Championship will earn a berth in next year’s CPKC Women’s Open at nearby Mississaugua Golf and Country Club.

Both clubs, as well as former RBC Canadian Open host site Glen Abbey Golf Club, were devastated by heavy rains through June and July as the Greater Toronto Area had its wettest summer in recorded history.

Jason Hanna, the chief operating officer of Credit Valley Golf and Country Club, said that he has seen the Credit River flood so badly that it affected the course’s playability a handful of times over his nearly two decades with the club.

Staff and members alike came together to clean up the course after the flooding was over, with hundreds of people coming together to make the club playable again.

“You had to show up, bring your own rake, bring your own shovel, bring your own gloves, and then we’d take them down to the golf course, assign them to areas where they would work, and then we would do a big barbecue down at the halfway house,” said Hanna. “We got guys, like, 80 years old, putting in eight-hour days down there, working away.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.

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Purple place: Mets unveil the new Grimace seat at Citi Field

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NEW YORK (AP) — Fenway Park has the Ted Williams seat. And now Citi Field has the Grimace seat.

The kid-friendly McDonald’s character made another appearance at the ballpark Monday, when the New York Mets unveiled a commemorative purple seat in section 302 to honor “his special connection to Mets fans.”

Wearing his pear-shaped purple costume and a baseball glove on backwards, Grimace threw out a funny-looking first pitch — as best he could with those furry fingers and short arms — before New York beat the Miami Marlins at Citi Field on June 12.

That victory began a seven-game winning streak, and Grimace the Mets’ good-luck charm soon went viral, taking on a life of its own online.

New York is 53-31 since June 12, the best record in the majors during that span. The Mets were tied with rival Atlanta for the last National League playoff spot as they opened their final homestand of the season Monday night against Washington.

The new Grimace seat in the second deck in right field — located in row 6, seat 12 to signify 6/12 on the calendar — was brought into the Shannon Forde press conference room Monday afternoon. The character posed next to the chair and with fans who strolled into the room.

The seat is available for purchase for each of the Mets’ remaining home games.

“It’s been great to see how our fanbase created the Grimace phenomenon following his first pitch in June and in the months since,” Mets senior vice president of partnerships Brenden Mallette said in a news release. “As we explored how to further capture the magic of this moment and celebrate our new celebrity fan, installing a commemorative seat ahead of fan appreciation weekend felt like the perfect way to give something back to the fans in a fun and unique way.”

Up in Boston, the famous Ted Williams seat is painted bright red among rows of green chairs deep in the right-field stands at Fenway Park to mark where a reported 502-foot homer hit by the Hall of Fame slugger landed in June 1946.

So, does this catapult Grimace into Splendid Splinter territory?

“I don’t know if we put him on the same level,” Mets executive vice president and chief marketing officer Andy Goldberg said with a grin.

“It’s just been a fun year, and at the same time, we’ve been playing great ball. Ever since the end of May, we have been crushing it,” he explained. “So I think that added to the mystique.”

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AP MLB:

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