Latest news with #Examiner
RTÉ News
26-05-2025
- Sport
- RTÉ News
Mayo manager Kevin McStay announces he is stepping back for the 'immediate future' due to health 'issues'
Mayo senior football manager Kevin McStay is stepping back from his role for the immediate future to deal with personal health issues. The county confirmed that assistant manager Stephen Rochford will take charge of the footballers for the foreseeable future as McStay recuperates from a reported 'medical episode' on Saturday. According to the Examiner, the episode occurred during a training session Hastings Insurance MacHale Park with the 63-year-old subsequently brought to hospital where he is being monitored. McStay has been in charge of the Mayo senior team since 2022 and led his county to Allianz League Divsion 1 glory in his maiden campaign in 2023. County chairman Seamus Tuohy confirmed that McStay intends to return to his role when he has recovered. "We extend our best wishes to Kevin and thank him for all his work to date," Tuohy said in a statement. "We look forward to him returning to the role as soon as it is practical for him to do so. We also stand fully behind Stephen and everyone involved in the set-up." McStay meanwhile gave his full support to Rochford and he believes that the presence of the Crossmolina man will ensure continuity within the team. Rochford is no stranger tot he role and was manager in his own right from 2016 until 2018, losing out on the All-Ireland final replay by one point to the Dubs. McStay said: "Mayo GAA Board and I are in strong agreement that current Assistant Manager/Head Coach Stephen Rochford will lead our preparations for upcoming games. "We are blessed to have a man of Stephen's calibre and, as a valued member of the management team for the past three seasons, he ensures continuity. While I will not be on the training field or on the sideline on match day, I will be with management and players in spirit every step of the way." Mayo, who lost their opening All-Ireland group match to Cavan last weekend, will be up against Tyrone next Saturday in Omagh, before playing their final group fixture against Donegal on Saturday, 14 June.
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Yahoo
A Momfluencer's Son Drowned. Now Other Parents Are Rethinking How Much They Share Online
On Sunday, three-year-old Trigg Kiser died following a drowning incident. According to local NBC affiliate 12 News, authorities responded to a call in Chandler, Arizona where they found the boy unconscious after being pulled out of a pool. The child was airlifted to Phoenix Children's Hospital. The circumstances of the drowning are unknown; an investigation is underway. 'Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with the child's family and loved ones during this unimaginable time,' said Chandler Police spokesperson Sonu Wasu in a statement. Trigg was the son of Emilie Kiser, a 26-year-old Arizona-based mom and beauty influencer who has 3.6 million TikTok followers and 1.4 million Instagram followers. (Neither Kiser nor her representatives have issued a statement, and didn't respond to Rolling Stone's request for comment.) When the drowning incident happened on May 12, it was reported on local Arizona news channels and the outside of the house was shown. Viewers recognized it as belonging to Kiser. Almost immediately, TikTok was ablaze with rumors that the boy who had drowned was Kiser's son. People posted videos comparing footage from the news report to Zillow listings of Kaiser's house, insisting that the boy who drowned must have been her son. There were tearful videos where creators prayed for Trigg's wellbeing and others where people redoubled their investigative efforts to prove that Trigg was the boy who had drowned. TikTok creators pointed to the fact that Kiser (and many of her close friends who are also influencers) hadn't posted in days. More from Rolling Stone RFK Jr. and Republicans Are Dismantling a Health Achievement: Fluoride in Water Mexican Beauty Influencer Shot and Killed on TikTok Live The Baby Tax: Trump's Tariffs Are an Assault on New Parents Kiser is among the most popular mom creators on TikTok and has welcomed millions of fans into her family's life. Trigg was a regular staple in Kiser's content, as Emilie showed footage of her getting the young boy ready for the day, playing with him, or putting him down for a nap. Through her daily vlogs, viewers came to feel that they knew her. More than that, some of them felt they loved her — and loved her children. This isn't uncommon for parasocial relationships, which are defined as one-way relationships fans develop with celebrities or influencers. The ones viewers form with mom creators can be particularly intense, according to Jess Rauchberg, an assistant professor of communication technologies at Seton Hall University. 'She's walking you through her life. It's super intimate. It feels like you're spending the morning with your best friend,' Rauchberg says. On Monday, news reports confirmed that Trigg had died. Seemingly instantaneously, online sleuths dug for proof of the boy's passing, even going as far as posting screenshots from the Maricopa County Office of the Medical Examiner confirming his death. That didn't surprise Brandon Harris, a professor of social media analytics and production at the University of Alabama who studies parasocial relationships. 'For better or worse, these content creators are public figures and celebrities at this point,' he says. 'We can debate the limit of what the expectation of privacy should be but they have primarily made their wealth by making their lives accessible to other people.' And fans seem to expect that access even in the wake of unimaginable tragedy. There was also an outpouring of grief on social media, as viewers and fans struggled to understand the death of a boy with whom they had formed such a parasocial bond. They had watched Trigg grow up, their videos and captions lamented, and now he was gone. Creators posted videos of themselves sobbing onto the camera. One video with hundreds of thousands of views offered the Kiser family a place to stay if they wanted to leave Arizona. Another account, which has now been deleted, posed as Emilie posting a tribute to her late son. 'Social media collapses the distance between viewers and the person on the other side of the screen. The tragedy becomes so much more than just a family's grief or a community's grief when millions of people are now grieving with you,' Rauchberg says. 'And that's not always a good thing. We don't actually know this family.' Alongside the expressions of grief, creators and commenters threw blame and accusations. They insisted Emilie and her husband, Brady, should be charged with child neglect. An unsubstantiated rumor that Emilie refused to have a pool fence installed because it wasn't aesthetically pleasing has been often repeated. People zoomed into old videos of Kiser's, trying to prove that she did or didn't have safety measures in place. They looked through her content, trying to pinpoint where she was when the drowning incident occurred. Had she been home? Was she out? Was she at fault or was her husband? In a video viewed over 200,000 times, a creator who goes by @neurodivergent_nate said, 'this is parental neglect. You're the parent and you need to be protecting them. And you failed.' The TikTok videos addressing the Kaiser family tragedy largely fall into two categories: grieving Trigg or blaming his parents for his death. The intensity of the reactions leave Rauchberg wondering whether the intense parasocial reaction to Trigg's death may change the culture of parents sharing content about their kids online. 'Let's say I'm an influencer and, God forbid, something happens to my kid, do I want people making content about my child and getting views and clicks and likes because my child died?' Losing a child is a tragedy; losing a child in front of millions of people who think they know is a dystopian nightmare – and it's making mom influencers rethink what they're sharing online. One mom creator posted a TikTok of herself overlaid with the words, 'Anyone else questioning how much of their life they share online after seeing Emilie Kiser get ripped apart by the internet?' In another video, a creator who posts about being a mom in law school said, 'I just want you guys to know this will be the last public video from me. The things that I've seen after someone going through the worst thing imaginable are vile and disgusting and I don't wanna share my life. I don't wanna share my kids.' Rolling Stone reached out to this creator, who said she had nothing to add to what she said in the video. A mom creator who has hundreds of thousands of followers, and requested to remain anonymous because of possible backlash, tells Rolling Stone that she was stunned by the lack of sensitivity of viewers and fans. 'People watch creators on the internet and they don't realize that they're real people with real lives and real families outside of what they see on the internet,' she says. Because of the response to the Kiser family tragedy, this creator is taking a break from posting on social media and is even debating quitting altogether despite the benefits from an influencing career. 'Having a following can be a creative outlet and a monetary blessing for sure, but the cost is your privacy and your peace. No amount of money is worth that. The money you can make from social media is not worth this. Everything that happens to you, good or bad, will be dissected by the internet. Nothing is worth your privacy and your peace.' 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Irish Examiner
11-05-2025
- Sport
- Irish Examiner
Lowry left frustrated by another Sunday slip-up as Straka wins Truist Championship
Shane Lowry and Sepp Straka walked off the 7th tee box at The Philadelphia Cricket Club on Sunday afternoon and began comparing notes on what they'd got their mams for Mother's Day. It was confirmation that the two-man final-round showdown for the $20m Truist Championship was very much a friendly face-off. While the mics picked up talk of flowers, it was also all too obvious what Bridget Lowry would have fancied to mark the Stateside version of Mothering Sunday. At 38, her son has savoured career milestones. But not too as many glory moments lately. Heading out co-leader with his Ryder Cup teammate from Austria, Lowry was looking for a first solo PGA Tour victory since 2019 and first Stateside solo win in a decade. The timing of a potential triumph, with the season's second major kicking off Thursday at Quail Hollow, was tantalising. Alas, another struggling Sunday was about Lowry's lot as Straka held his nerve for a steady but far from spectacular two-shot victory over the Offaly man. In keeping with title tilt that mostly foundered on his inability to get the putter going, Lowry three-putted from 20 feet for an ugly bogey on the final hole when a birdie would have forced a playoff. He rubbed his temples as Straka sealed his second win of the season with a par, Lowry perhaps wondering how he'd mustered just a level-par 70 when a 67 would have ended what is, in the wake of Rory McIlroy finally completing his slam, the most agitating run in Irish golf. The early part of Lowry's week had been much more light-hearted with some very on-brand self-slagging. 'Better to be lucky than good,' he wrote on Friday, sharing footage of a putt on the 11th which hurtled to the hole, hit the back of the cup and somehow spun back in for birdie. Lucky? Sure. But Lowry has been damn good lately too, the kinda good that makes it easier to make fun of oneself. This week made it 10-straight cuts made since February. In the previous nine events he had seven top-25s, three top 10s and a runner-up spot at the AT&T in Pebble Beach. Now he has another, joint second-place alongside Justin Thomas his lot after the closing bogey. 'I've been like this for the past couple of years. Since the Ryder Cup in Rome, I feel like I've kicked on a little bit and been quite mature,' he said Saturday night. 'I've put a lot into it the last two years, my whole career, but particularly the last two years. Starting to see some rewards is good. Obviously you want trophies, and that's going to be my number one goal [tomorrow].' For too long now, finishing the job has been a vexing thing. Given his ability and consistency, there should be more pots and pans on the mantlepiece goes a fair argument. In a sit-down with the Examiner last summer, Lowry reflected on sabbath slips. 'When I've a chance to do something on Sunday I'm never happy with anything other than the win,' he said then. 'Even though I don't win loads, I've won enough, a bit in my career. But when you've a chance on a Sunday…' He had more than a chance in Philadelphia. A late birdie Saturday ensured he went off tied with Straka, three shots clear of Thomas who did do his best to barge into contention. When Lowry lashed a driving iron down the first fairway a punter near the tee box bellowed 'Go Birds!', the refrain for Philly's beloved NFL Eagles. The Offaly man duly delivered, rolling in a 12-foot birdie putt to take the outright lead on 15 under. Driving well, Lowry's brilliant scrambling game found him another birdie on the long 5th but Straka's stellar putting helped him to an eagle to leave the pair tied at the top. When Straka bogeyed the 6th, Lowry was back in front until he bogeyed the 8th and suddenly found himself two back. By the 12th they were level again with Thomas just one more back. Some heart medication may have been the more appropriate Mother's Day gift. On and on they went. It was compelling without being particularly sparkling. Lowry simply couldn't get the putter working. The duo went shot for shot to an almost bizarre level, both coming up surprisingly short on the long 15th. Lowry went first and produced a quite gorgeous chip which shaved the hole for eagle. So close to a key moment. In the scorer's tent, TV cameras caught Rory McIlroy putting his hands to his head in frustration for his close friend. The resulting tap-in birdie put Lowry in the lead again but it was all too brief as Straka also birdied. That would be as close as it got. On the short 16th Lowry tried a fade that didn't fade, only finding a horrible lie in the greenside rough. Another impressive chip gave him a shot of an escape but his par putt agonizingly lipped back around and out. Straka had a one-shot lead and an all-too familiar pain hovered into view. After driving the ball so well all day, Lowry lashed on wildly wide and towards the fairway hospitality on the 18th but was given a drop. When Straka hit a gem out of the bunker from 200-plus yards back, Lowry was in sudden death mode. He hit his to 20 feet and would have a chance at forcing a play-off. Instead, that dastardly three-putt and a sickening 70. Perhaps he'll take out some frustration on Quail Hollow this for now the wait goes on.
North Wales Live
09-05-2025
- North Wales Live
UK tourists reconsider holidays in Spain as anti-tourism protests escalate
UK holidaymakers are being advised to tread carefully as a rash of anti-tourism demonstrations breaks out across Spain, with the nation holding the title as Europe's favoured destination for British tourists. Anti-tourism parades have cast a shadow over sun-soaked hotspots such as Majorca, Tenerife, Lanzarote, and Barcelona, where protestors have unfurled stark banners proclaiming "tourists go home", reports the Examiner. Steve Heapy, boss of airline giant Jet2, has observed a surge in worried customer calls, saying: "We've had people ringing the call centre and going into travel agents, asking questions like 'is Spain safe', 'are we still welcome in the resort'." He added: "It is becoming a big issue unfortunately, and perception becomes truth." However, Manuel Butler, chief of the Spanish Tourist Office in London, presents an opposing view. He says: "It is important to distinguish between specific local tensions and the broader national picture," adding: "The vast majority of Spain remains enthusiastic in welcoming tourists." Mr Butler chalks up the discontent to "broader societal issues" such as housing shortages, rising living expenses, and tourism's environmental toll on congested locales. Furthermore, he revealed plans to bolster Spain's welcoming approach to tourists through legislative measures on short-term rentals, implementing tourism taxes in specific regions, and enhancing destination management. Additionally, Rosario Sanchez Grau, Spain's Secretary of State for Tourism, stepped forward to express her gratitude, stating: "We are proud and grateful that Spain remains the number one holiday destination for UK visitors. It is our priority to protect and nurture this relationship for the future." However, some Brits are not convinced. One said: "Why are people still going to Spain? It had it's day years ago." A second individual agreed, stating: "I think you are right. We were just deliberating about booking a repeat visit to our favourite Spanish haunt - no longer - we shall be looking elsewhere." An angry Brit said: "They don't deserve our business. They really are shooting themselves in the foot and risking damaging a major part of their economy. Foolish, I say." Another person added: "Leave them with thousands of unfilled hotels and hotels partially built." They also highlighted the potential repercussions, including "Not to mention loss in Spanish jobs, hotels, catering, shops etc..I will not be back to Spain now. Bring our expats home to Britain."
San Francisco Chronicle
08-05-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
John Hillyer, longtime Giants and Warriors beat writer for S.F. Examiner, dies at 88
Covering the Golden State Warriors and San Francisco Giants in the 1980s and '90s, San Francisco Examiner beat reporter John Hillyer was known for cranking out game stories that were clean and polished — and hard for his competitors to equal. On the road with the Warriors, Hillyer could never get his creativity flowing at the courtside press table after a game. His style was to go back to his hotel room, get comfortable, pour a drink and then start writing — a process that could take into the small hours. But he had the luxury of working for an afternoon daily, so his final deadline was not until 3 a.m. His writing routine, which included stripping to his skivvies, became 'road legend' among Bay Area reporters who traveled with the Warriors and the Giants. Dan McGrath, who covered the Giants for the morning Chronicle, would file his own story and wait for Hillyer's version of the game they'd both just witnessed. 'I'd be driving home thinking 'Well, I hope it was good because that's the best I can do,'' said McGrath, who became sports editor of the Chronicle. 'The next day I'd pick up the Examiner and John would have written a better story pure and simple. Tough to compete against, for sure.' But it was also tough for the afternoon papers to compete against the morning dailies. Hillyer had already worked for two of them that failed in Chicago, and he could see what was coming. He retired a few years before the merger of the morning Chronicle and the afternoon Examiner, in 2000. He then pivoted from Oakland to San Francisco and from sports to the fine arts, swapping those nights he'd spent covering basketball for nights at SFJazz or the San Francisco Symphony. He was a longtime subscriber to both, and his dedication to the symphony was so intense that he reduced his subscription from two tickets to one because he could never find a guest as committed to the performance as he was. That one ticket got him closer to the stage, where he could listen more carefully. He also attended the annual San Francisco Film Noir Festival, and knew those 1950s black-and-white murder mysteries by heart. 'John was cultured,' said Glenn Schwarz, longtime Examiner and Chronicle sports editor who was among sports department staffers introduced to classical performance by Hillyer. 'He just loved the theater of it all.' Hillyer had an office at his home near Twin Peaks with all four walls covered either by his album and CD collection of jazz and classical, or his autograph collection. He had 1,000 signatures from sports stars to movie stars, all organized on a spreadsheet. The composers category ended with 195 signatures, the jazz category with 167 names. He also had signed photos of movie stars, which were on display in his annual Oscars party, with ballots distributed and tallied for the prize of a tiny statuette of a director's chair. Hillyer served as emcee up until March, when dementia required a move to assisted care at the Frank Residence in San Francisco. He died April 28, said his companion of 40 years, Charlene Thomas. Hillyer had come down with a respiratory infection complicated by COVID-19. He was 88. 'John never stopped being curious and he had so many interests that he was never bored, and he was never boring to be around,' said Thomas, a retired registered nurse. 'He had a wonderful quick wit. Even with his dementia he never lost his quick wit.' As a member of the Examiner sports staff for nearly 20 years, Hillyer's longest tenure on a beat was with the Warriors during the Don Nelson era. On-court magic was created by Mitch Richmond, Chris Mullin and Tim Hardaway, a fast-breaking, high-scoring trio known as Run TMC. This was at the end of the 1980s when interest in the team was suddenly high and media saturation was low. With a later nightly deadline, Hillyer was expected to deliver. 'Because he had a little more time to file his story he could spend more time in the locker room and offer more insight and more reporting nuggets than other writers,' said Schwarz. As a basketball reporter, Hillyer had the advantage of being 6-foot-5, which put him at eye level with the players he interviewed — and earned him the nickname 'the tall guy,' shortened to simply 'Tall.' He took on the Warriors beat at age 50 and survived the daily grind for a decade. He never minded the travel. He could find live jazz or a symphony performance or a repertory theater screening an old movie in any city where he found himself on an off-night. 'John was a really good natured fellow and a solid pro,' said Chronicle Sunday columnist Bruce Jenkins, who has been covering sports in the Bay Area since 1973. 'He had that knack for writing something that seemed really fresh and made you want to read about a game that you had actually written about yourself. I read him without fail for years and years and just admired the hell out of him.' John Whitfield Hillyer was born June 7, 1936, in Evanston, Ill., and grew up in the Chicago suburb on the North Shore of Lake Michigan. His mother, Elinor, was a classical pianist and encouraged John to take lessons. His father, Whitfield, played clarinet in a Dixieland band, and was also columnist for Popular Photographer magazine. He supplied John with a camera, which was put to use the day Gen. Douglas MacArthur came to Evanston. Hillyer, 15 at the time, worked his way to the front of the crowd to get a picture that he carried with him and hung on his kitchen wall wherever he lived, said his son, Michael Hillyer. 'He wanted to be a sports writer from very early on,' said Bob Martin, Hillyer's classmate at Evanston Township High School. At the senior awards night, in 1954, Hillyer won the award for Excellence in Journalism and he was on his way. 'He loved the White Sox and he bled Michigan Blue,' Martin said. At Michigan, he tried out for the freshman basketball team but was cut by the coach, Dave Strack. By the next practice, Hillyer had switched to the Michigan Daily sports staff and was covering the freshman team. 'Oh, you again,' said Strack. Hillyer was assistant sports editor at the Michigan Daily and after graduating in 1958 proceeded directly to a position with the Associated Press in Springfield, Ill. He then advanced to jobs at the Dekalb Daily Chronicle and St. Louis Post Dispatch, before returning home to join the Chicago American, which became a tabloid called Chicago Today. Readers counted on him, and when opening day for the White Sox was rained out in 1973, Hillyer wrote a poem that filled four columns under the headline 'Chill Gives Sox Claus for Concern.' 'Twas the night before the opener and all through Sox Park, the ghosts of the season permeated the dark,' it began, before progressing to the crescendo, 'Happy springtime to all, and for bleep's sake, play ball!' The San Francisco Examiner, which published six afternoons a week and Sunday mornings, in a joint operating agreement with the morning Chronicle, was known for being a writer's paper, and Hillyer fit right in. 'I really liked his company, he was a fascinating and intelligent guy to talk to,' said Duffy Jennings, who was publicity director for the Giants from 1981-93. 'John's stories were always fair and descriptive. He was never adversarial or confrontational with me.' Once Hillyer retired from sportswriting, he was allowed to be partisan, and it all came out in the 1997 college football season when Michigan went from nowhere to national champion. Pat O'Shea's Mad Hatter on San Francisco's Geary Boulevard televised the games live at the bar, with a 9 a.m. kickoff. Hillyer dug up a faded and tattered navy blue T-shirt from his college days and wore it every Saturday. 'We literally would open the bar,' said Leba Hertz, an editor at both the Examiner and the Chronicle, who was with him week to week in a 12-0 season that ended in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. When the Michigan Men's Chorus came to San Francisco to perform, Hiller was in the audience, standing up to sing along with the fight song, 'Hail to the Victors.' 'He had tears rolling down his face,' said Hertz, who would also see this expression of emotion when she went with him to Davies Symphony Hall. 'He probably knew as much if not more about the symphony as he knew about the Warriors,' said Hertz. 'John knew everything about everything. He was the kind of guy who could have gone on 'Jeopardy!' and won the Tournament of Champions.'
