TikTok may lose Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny and more as licensing dispute grows

Universal Music Group, which represents artists including Taylor Swift, Drake, Adele, Bad Bunny and Billie Eilish, says that it will no longer allow its music on TikTok now that a licensing deal between the two parties has expired. UMG said it had not agreed to terms of a new deal with TikTok, and plans to … Read more

Who benefits most from Canada’s ambitious EV targets? Maybe China

Flavio Volpe, head of the Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Association, believes the recent electric vehicle targets set out by Canada’s environment minister also carried this pointed message to Canada’s domestic auto industry: “Let them eat cake.” Volpe says he has come to this conclusion because he believes those goals, which include a national target of 100 per cent zero-emission vehicle sales by 2035, cannot be … Read more

Director of Mickey Mouse slasher film fully expects you to hate-watch it

As It Happens6:28Director of Mickey Mouse slasher film is totally cool with you hate-watching it The director of a Mickey Mouse slasher movie has a message for all the haters out there: Bring it on. The trailer for Mickey’s Mouse Trap dropped on Jan. 1, the same day the beloved Disney icon’s earliest iteration entered … Read more

How the music business is putting a green spin on vinyl records

Vinyl records were once written off as relics. First, they were replaced by shiny compact discs that (supposedly) offered superior sound. Then streaming took over, allowing fans to carry vast music collections with them wherever they go. In recent years, vinyl sales have turned around. In 2022, vinyl outsold CDs in the U.S. for the first … Read more

Ukraine digs in as the West stumbles to keep up with Russian war production

“War,” said British philosopher, mathematician and pacifist Bertrand Russell, “does not determine who is right — only who is left.” Those words might be the perfect lens through which to view what probably lies ahead for Ukraine in the coming year as its troops dig in — and dig deep — along a front roughly 960 kilometres wide. … Read more

Canada’s inflation rate holds steady at 3.1%

Canada’s annual inflation rate held steady at 3.1 per cent in November, matching the previous month’s rate, according to data released by Statistics Canada on Tuesday. Economists were expecting the rate to fall below the three per cent threshold, putting the economy closer to the Bank of Canada’s two per cent inflation goal. Mortgage interest costs and the high cost … Read more

As U.S., U.K. and EU sanction violent Israeli settlers, Canada hangs back

The Trudeau government still won’t say if it’s considering imposing sanctions on violent Israeli settlers in the wake of travel bans announced by both the U.S. and the United Kingdom in recent days. The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said last week that he will recommend EU sanctions as well.  Canada, like its American, British … Read more

In case you weren’t aware, outdoor cats are stone-cold killers

There are differing opinions on cats’ personalities and behaviour: They’re affectionate, they’re aloof, they love you, they hate you. Then there’s the undeniable fact of what they become when left to roam free outside: indiscriminate, stone-cold killers. A new study has found cats roaming free prey upon almost any animal, reptile, insect, and amphibian around the world … Read more