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Meta takes aim at Twitter with the launch of rival app Threads

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

By KELVIN CHAN (AP Business Writer)LONDON (AP) — Meta unveiled an app to rival Twitter on Thursday, appearing to target users looking for an alternative to the social media platform owned — and frequently changed — by Elon Musk.Called Threads, the new offering is billed as a text-based version of Meta’s photo-sharing app Instagram that the company says provides “a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations.” The app is live in Apple and Google Android app stores in more than 100 countries including the U.S., Britain, Australia, Canada and Japan. Users will get a Twitter-like microblogging experience, according to screenshots provided to media, suggesting that Meta Platforms has been gearing up to directly challenge the platform after Musk’s tumultuous ownership has resulted in a series of unpopular changes that have turned off users and advertisers. There are buttons to like, repost, reply to or quote a “thread,...

Orioles call up 2021 first-round pick Colton Cowser; outfielder makes major league debut vs. Yankees

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

The Orioles’ strong start to the season came with a pair of prospects pounding on the door to make their respective debuts. In a little more than a week’s time, both have arrived in the majors.Nine days after calling up infielder Jordan Westburg, the Orioles promoted outfielder Colton Cowser, their No. 2 prospect according to Baseball America, to the majors ahead of Wednesday night’s game at the New York Yankees. Drafted fifth overall in 2021, the 23-year-old Cowser was hitting .330/.459/.537 in 56 games with Triple-A Norfolk.“This year, I came in with some goals I wanted to achieve,” Cowser said. “I didn’t get off to the greatest start, but ultimately, I think turning that around and then really starting to hit my stride was something that I wanted to do. Have some struggles, how quickly can you combat that, and ultimately, I think that I did.”The Orioles opened space for Cowser on their active and 40-man rosters with a flurry of rost...

Elgin News Digest: Cubs organist to host sing-a-long at Dundee Library; gun buyback and safety event in Elgin this Saturday; Northern Illinois Food Bank holding Saturday pop-up mobile market at ECC

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

Cubs organist to host sing-a-long at Dundee LibraryJohn Benedeck, who plays the organ for Chicago Cubs home games at Wrigley Field, will be hosting a sing-a-long music lesson Friday, July 7.The free event for children and families is set for 4 to 4:30 p.m. in the meeting room of the library at 555 Barrington Ave. in East Dundee.Benedeck, a radio producer who graduated from McHenry County College and Western Illinois University, landed the Cubs job in 2020.To register, go to www.frvpld.info/events/upcoming.Gun buyback and safety event in Elgin this SaturdayThe Elgin Police Department and the Kane County State’s Attorney’s Office are holding a gun buyback and safety event from 10 a.m. to noon Saturday, July 8, at Elgin City Hall, 150 Dexter Court.Each person who turns in a gun will receive $100 for every weapon or weapons, police officials said on a Facebook post. Guns must be unloaded and transported in a case, box or bag or inside a vehicle trunk.Be SMART for Kids w...

First woman athlete diagnosed with CTE, Australian organization determines

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

ADELAIDE, Australia (AP) — A former Australian rules football player has been diagnosed with chronic traumatic encephalopathy in a landmark finding for female professional athletes.The Concussion Legacy Foundation said Heather Anderson, who played for Adelaide in the Australian Football League Women’s competition, is the first female athlete diagnosed with CTE, the degenerative brain disease linked to concussions.Researchers at the Australian Sports Brain Bank, established in 2018 and co-founded by the Concussion Legacy Foundation, diagnosed Anderson as having had low-stage CTE and three lesions in her brain.CTE, which can only be diagnosed posthumously, can cause memory loss, depression and violent mood swings in athletes, combat veterans and others who sustain repeated head trauma. Anderson died last November at age 28.“There were multiple CTE lesions as well as abnormalities nearly everywhere I looked in her cortex. It was indistinguishable from the dozens of male cases I’ve seen...

Victims of fatal 2021 B.C. library stabbing describe shattered lives at sentencing

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

NEW WESTMINSTER, B.C. — Victims of a stabbing spree and their relatives have told a sentencing hearing how their lives were shattered two years ago by the deadly attack in and around the Lynn Valley Library in North Vancouver, B.C.Yannick Bandaogo, 30, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and several attempted murder charges earlier this year.Several victims spoke before Justice Geoffrey R.J. Gaul of the B.C. Supreme Court on Wednesday, including the mother of the lone victim killed in the attack.The woman said her daughter was “fearless” and “gentle,” and her death had destroyed the family.“We’re left merely to exist,” the woman told the court.The victim’s father held his wife throughout the testimony, occasionally glaring at Bandaogo who was seated in the back of the courtroom.Neither the young woman who died in the attack nor her relatives can be identified due to a publication ban on the victim’s name.Another victim, Emma H...

Toby Keith’s shows at his Oklahoma music venue mark return to stage after revealing cancer diagnosis

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

NORMAN, Okla. (AP) — Country music star Toby Keith was back on stage over the Fourth of July weekend with his first shows since revealing last summer that he had been fighting stomach cancer. Hundreds attended the native Oklahoman’s pop-up concerts Friday and Saturday night in Norman, where he lives, The Oklahoman reports. He performed at Hollywood Corners, a 1920s roadhouse and service station that he bought and converted into a deli, bar and music venue. Norman resident Joanna Hall, who attended Friday’s show, told the newspaper that Keith put on a great performance and was “very thankful for everybody who showed up.”“He seemed a little taken aback that that many people were there,” Hall said. “He was like, ‘This was supposed to be a secret. … This was a bigger secret than what I intended.’ ”Keith’s publicist confirmed that Keith and his Easy Money Band played for about two and a half hours both nights. Last June, Keith said that he had been battling stomac...

El Salvadoran ex-President Mauricio Funes sentenced to 6 years for tax evasion

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — An El Salvador court sentenced former President Mauricio Funes Wednesday to six years in prison for tax evasion, the second time in barely more than a month that a court has sentenced the ex-leader in absentia.Prosecutors had asked for an eight-year sentence against Funes, who lives in Nicaragua.In late May, another tribunal sentenced Funes to 14 years in prison for negotiating with the country’s powerful street gangs during his administration.El Salvador has pursued Funes, 64, who governed from 2009 to 2014, for other alleged crimes in at least a half dozen cases. Nicaragua gave him citizenship in 2019.Funes is the second former Salvadoran president sentenced to prison for illegal activity during his administration. In 2018, former President Tony Saca was sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to diverting more than $300 million in state funds. He was Funes’ predecessor, governing from 2004 to 2009.El Salvador changed its laws last ye...

Manitoba government says searching landfill for remains of Indigenous women too risky

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

WINNIPEG — The Manitoba government says a proposed search for the remains of two slain Indigenous women believed to be in a landfill north of Winnipeg is too risky.Premier Heather Stefanson says the province cannot knowingly risk workers’ health and safety for a search with no guarantee that the remains will be found.Stefanson made the comments in a written statement after meeting with relatives of some of the women believed to have been killed before ending up in the Prairie Green landfill.Her office later clarified that the province would not stop a search if the federal government supports one and can provide sufficient safeguards around the risks.Cambria Harris, a daughter of one of the victims, posted on social media that Stefanson is retraumatizing the family and being disrespectful.Morgan Harris and Marcedes Myran are believed to have been killed last year.Jeremy Skibicki has been charged with first-degree murder in their deaths as well as the deaths of Rebecca Contois,...

Rep. Adam Schiff, censured by GOP-led House, raises $8.1 million for his California Senate race

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff’s Senate campaign said Wednesday that the California Democrat had raised $8.1 million over the past three months, a period that includes his recent censure by the Republican-led House.His team said that was a record for a Senate campaign for the April-through-June quarter of a year in which an election is not taking place. The 2024 race is to fill the seat of retiring Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein.However, federal records show that Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s main campaign committee raised over $11 million in the second quarter of 2021, a year when he was not facing reelection. Schiff’s campaign said in the announcement that the $8.1 million amount represented “the most any Senate campaign nationwide has raised in Q2 of an off-cycle year, ever.” Campaign communications director Marisol Samayoa said in an email the “record” amount referred to fundraising in open Senate contests, where an incumbent is not running. That ...

In Trump case, Justice Dept. unseals previously blacked-out portions from search warrant application

Published Sun, 23 Feb 2025 11:25:20 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department on Wednesday disclosed some of the previously blacked-out portions of a warrant application it submitted last year to gain authorization to search former President Donald Trump’s Florida property for classified documents.Key portions of the document had already been made public, but media organizations including The Associated Press had pressed for further unsealing in light of a 38-count indictment last month charging Trump and his valet, Walt Nauta, with concealing classified records at Mar-a-Lago from investigators. The magistrate judge, Bruce Reinhart, declined to order the Justice Department to unseal the search warrant affidavit in its entirety but did require prosecutors to publicly file a less-redacted affidavit.Many of the newly revealed paragraphs recounted how surveillance camera footage from inside the property showed dozens of boxes being relocated in the days before FBI and Justice Department investigators visited the home...