Author: damazah@gmail.com

ToplineThe Buss family, the longtime owners of the Los Angeles Lakers, will sell their remaining stake in the iconic team to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger, according to multiple reports, expanding the pair’s control over the team even further after they agreed to purchase the Lakers for $12.5 billion from billionaire Mark Walter last week.Jeanie Buss, governor of the Los Angeles Lakers, attends a 2021-2022 season kick-off event.Los Angeles Times via Getty Images Allen J. SchabenKey FactsThe Buss family will sell its 17.8% stake in the Lakers, according to ESPN, which noted owner Jeanie Buss, the daughter of former team…

Disabled people across England will be able to use their free bus passes at any time of day from next April, as Andy Burnham expands a policy he introduced as mayor of Greater Manchester.The prime minister has said the current weekday restrictions on when disabled people can use their bus passes will be removed from 1 April 2027. Their passes are valid only between 9.30am and 11pm on weekdays, although some councils pay to allow people free travel outside those hours.The change means disabled bus pass holders will be able to travel free on local bus services where the pass…

Kira and Haleemah, the daughters of veteran actor and screenwriter Taiwo “Ogogo” Hassan, have revealed that their father is battling Stage 4 cancer and appealed for support as the family seeks treatment options. The actor’s daughters disclosed his condition in tearful videos posted on their respective Instagram pages on Monday night. They said several hospitals had refused to treat their father and appealed to individuals and organisations that could provide medical or traditional treatment to assist the family. Kira said, “I’m here for my daddy. He has cancer, and he’s in stage 4. The hospital is saying that they cannot…

Manchester City are faced with an Enzo Fernandez premium, Chelsea winger Pedro Neto has no shortage of potential suitors, and Manchester United midfielder Bruno Fernandes is offered a huge salary increase.Manchester City will have to pay Chelsea more than £120m to land Argentina midfielder Enzo Fernandez if they try to complete a deal in the final two weeks of the transfer window. (Telegraph – subscription required), externalChelsea want close to £100m if they are to sell Portugal winger Pedro Neto, 26, this summer with Saudi Pro League club Al-Hilal linked with a move. (Mail – subscription required), externalManchester City, Arsenal…

Taylor Lally is a blue-eyed, burly, bespectacled man, with a beard about halfway to the the full Duck Dynasty look. And just past midnight on a Monday evening this summer, he’s hawking candy bars inside a purple-painted room no bigger than 300 square feet, with a disco ball hanging from the ceiling. It’s not exactly Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. The thirty-something is an online auction maestro, broadcasting to a few dozen people competing to buy confections with the swipe of a finger. Mini auctions like this one on WhatNot, the liveshopping app, will help Lally cross one million…

By Progress Godfrey The Federal Government of Nigeria has unveiled a National Digital Cloud Policy aimed at attracting $750 million in private investment into Nigeria’s cloud and data infrastructure within 24 months. The policy, unveiled by the Federal Ministry of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, on Monday, is designed to expand local cloud and data centre capacity, create jobs, strengthen indigenous digital capability and position Nigeria as a regional digital services and hosting hub. Under the policy, government plans to mobilise $250 million in private investment within the first 12 months, with the target rising to $750 million by the…

Segun Awofadeji in Bauchi The Allied Peoples Movement (APM) has won all the 20 chairmanship seats contested in Monday’s Bauchi State local government elections. The Bauchi State Independent Electoral Commission (BASIEC) declared the results on Monday night. Announcing the results, the chairperson of BASIEC, Hon. Hajiya Jummai S. Abubakar declared the candidates of the APM winners of the chairmanship elections in the 20 local government areas. “Following the conclusion of voting, counting, collation and verification, I, Hon. Hajiya Jummai S. Abubakar (Gimbiyar Dass), Chairperson of BASIEC, hereby declared that all 20 APM candidates emerged victorious as Chairmen of the respective…

Governor Babagana Zulum of Borno State has approved the immediate implementation of promotion salaries and payments of leave grants for civil servants across the state. The implementation of the payments was conveyed in an executive approval granted by Governor Babagana Zulum following a closed-door meeting with the leadership of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), the Trade Union Congress (TUC), and the National Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE), held at the Government House, Maiduguri, on Monday. Zulum issued the directive following the submission of a service proposal by the Directorate of Establishment, Office of the Head of Service, which provided…

The world is familiar by now with the usual tropes of machine-generated text: overuse of the word “delve”, an excess of em dashes, and the chirpy, relentless construction of “it’s not X but Y”.But is it about to get even worse?Over the weekend, Anthropic released an update saying it would change how its Claude AI model generated prose. This is to comply with an EU regulation that requires all AI-generated text to be watermarked starting in December.Anthropic said the changes would be made at the granular, random level at which its models generated text and would be undetectable to the…

The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) MP Jim Shannon has been charged with common assault of a woman.It is alleged to have happened on 1 October 2023.In a statement, his solicitors said that the case was being “factually contested”.Shannon, 71, with an address at DUP offices on Frances Street in Newtownards, did not attend Newtownards Magistrates’ Court on Monday.Defence counsel Conan Rea told the court that Shannon had lodged a defence statement. The court heard that the Public Prosecution Service will be applying to amend dates on paperwork which they had lodged.Rea said that the defence will be objecting to that.He…