Morning Brew: Scott Thompson thinks Toronto needs to have more fun, the Zoo recommends that the elephants leave, the Globe and Mail has app issues, and McGuinty passes buck to Harper over G20 secret law
Maybe he's got a point. Scott Thompson of "Kids in the Hall" fame seriously wants Toronto to stop taking itself so seriously. In an interview with the Globe and Mail, Thompson, a proud Torontonian, believes the only thing missing in Toronto is... fun. Too much bread, not enough circus. He wants the city to loosen up a bit and stop always trying to be something instead of just being. His suggestion on how to bring in the funk and the noise: a "Dress Up in Drag Day." Of course.
Looks like Toronto's pachyderms are packing up. The Toronto Zoo staff is recommending that the best thing for their three surviving elephants is to leave, as the high cost of building the appropriate facilities combined with future operating costs to keep them isn't the best option for the zoo. The three elephants will most likely be transferred to a zoo in a warmer climate.The zoo board is set to vote on the recommendation on May 12.
I'm sure there's a lot of people who read the news from an app on their phone. But what if the app you have isn't a real app for the news publication? That's what happened with the Globe and Mail's mobile application. For the past two years, the Globe's app was created by Spreed Inc., a Toronto-based developer--or what was thought to be a "Globe and Mail" app. Turns out the application readers had downloaded merely featured content from the Globe. This was only discovered when the newspaper launched a new mobile site and the old Globe app suddenly had become an application for a new site called Free Press News. Of course there is now a legal dispute between Spreed Inc. and the Globe.
I guess you can never be too careful. A section of Front Street West was closed off between John and Simcoe Streets yesterday after 2 p.m. after a suspicious backpack was found outside the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service offices. Turns out the backpack just had some clothing and personal items inside, and the street was reopened around 5 p.m. just in time for rush hour.
It shouldn't surprise too many people that the man responsible for pushing Toronto to privatize garbage collection is jumping to the private sector himself. Geoff Rathbone, who was behind the report that recommended the city contract out some of its garbage, announced he is leaving his city job to become vice-president of resource recovery for Progressive Waste Solutions. His last day at the city is May 27. Rathbone admitted the timing of his departure "may not be perfect" but "you can't necessarily choose when opportunities come to you."
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