Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - 12:36: Toronto Mike'd #224

Episode Date: March 13, 2017

Mike chats with Marc Weisblott of 12:36 about the current state of the media in Canada.

And I'm doing it again, I didn't like that, hold on, louder. Welcome to episode 224 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a local independent brewery producing fresh craft beer, and chef's plate, delivering delicious and locally sourced farm-fresh ingredients in refrigerated kits directly to your door. I'm Mike from torontomike.com, and joining me this week is 1236's own Mark Weisblot. Welcome back, Mark. Hey, and I think of all days my brain is on the verge of exploding right we

just went through the time change daylight saving time and i i'm just completely overloaded like i've got no bandwidth left and yet here i am to talk to you about everything that's gone on since i last visited. You know, I miss that hour. I got to say, you know, you don't think you're going to miss it. You got 24 in a day. You're not going to miss one hour, but I miss it. I think I could have used it. Yeah. And yet here we are. I mean, when you were younger, you don't remember being so conscious of it, right? It's sort of as the years go by, it's something that you feel in your bones. And I don't think either of us have the luxury to sleep in indefinitely through a Monday morning

to get used to it. So it puts us at risk for a whole bunch of other factors. Mercifully, I wasn't on the road, wasn't at risk of any kind of car accident. But yeah, that's a real thing. It's a big deal what this DST does to people's brains. Right off the top, this was breaking news. Breaking news last week, I guess it was. But I confirmed that boy-in-the-box story that Steve Anthony told on Toronto Mike. A good friend of Corey Hart's corroborated Steve Anthony's statements. So it's true that he was the inspiration for Boy in the Box by Corey Hart.

Steve Anthony, I mean. And the intersection between Corey Hart friends and Toronto Mike listeners is small enough that I was able to guess the close friend of Corey Hart who confirmed this for you. Right. and my next objective here is, now don't laugh, I'm going to try to get Corey Hart on Toronto Mike. I know he's like beaching in the Bahamas or something like that, but he's got to cross through

at some point. Well, three years ago, right, he announced it was his 50th birthday farewell concert at the Montreal Forum. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was never going to perform again, yet he's back on the road. He unretired as quickly as he packed it in.

And he's working with... This is going to bring it full circle with the sports enthusiasts out there. Patrick Roy's son is a musician now, and Corey Hart is working with him. Something Roy. I don't remember. Jonathan Raw? Yes, that's it.

That's it. So it all comes together. There's sports in that story. There's CanCon. There's Steve Anthony. That's a great story for Toronto Mike. Boy in the box. That's my favorite story

since the Summertime Summertime exclusive on the cowboy Dalton Pompey's dad, but I digress. A couple of things, like notes off the top, I'm glad you're here, is one thing is I get flack by certain people for mentioning Ann Romer too often.

Oh, well, as long as I'm here, you can mention Ann Romer all you want, especially the fact that she had two retirement parties with cake, gift cards from the keg and the bay. Did you listen to Kevin Frankish by any chance on Toronto Mike? Yeah, of course. Okay. He says three.

He says he remembers three retirements. Retired from breakfast television, maybe, to go to CP24. Yeah. And then the two at CP24. Maybe she left in the interim, but we didn't notice. They didn't have the party with the cake and the gift cards. Maybe Kevin Frank, you're right. Maybe this is it.

The first retirement that Kevin remembers might not have been a retirement. It might have been, I'm leaving City TV. And maybe he remembers it as a retirement because she had two more later, not too long later. So I still think it was only two retirements, even though Kevin says there's three. I think he's mistaken the A, Anne's leaving us party for a retirement party,

but I don't think she ever intended to retire. You get so much flack for talking about Anne Romer in the comments on your site. I do, yeah. I'm cringing, right, as you drag this thing out. How much of a backlash is it going to be for mentioning it again with me here? Because Baba O'Neill was

here, and I just said a joke, and it was probably 10 seconds of the whole episode, a joke about something he mentioned, something about you can't retire and come back or something, and I did, like, how could I resist? I did a 10-second Ann Romer joke, and I got comments about, oh, another Ann Romer reference on Toronto Mike.

Like, so I'm sensitive to it, but I don't really know how to avoid it. Okay, and yet 2017, we've established this, right? Ann Romer will be here. Yes. In the basement, the Toronto Mike studios. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For her very own podcast.

And we're very friendly via email, Anne and I, like pet names and things. Like it's really progressed nicely. Okay, but has she been on lately? I haven't gotten the sightings on Twitter. The alarm hasn't been sounded. The drudge fire engine hasn't been activated about Anne being on.

I guess she's there for keeps, right? This whole idea of her being a summer fill-in. She's there for keeps. We got over believing that. Yeah, she's the lead anchor. So Anne Romer, coming soon. And one more, Toronto Mike. I don't want to cut a controversy.

Maybe it's a controversy, but I got a number of emails and DMs and tweets and comments about, I wasn't tough enough on Barry Davis. Barry Davis is no longer on Sportsnet. I know you don't tune into a lot of Jay's games, but you know Barry's there if you ever want to tune in. He's not there anymore.

And I asked Barry, as I had to a couple of times, and as nicely as I could, I asked him, did you jump or were you pushed? Do you have any details you can share with us? And he very clearly gave no comment, if you will. Like, he's not commenting on why he's there. He's just letting us know he's not there. At that point, I don't know what I'm supposed to do.

And I made a joke on the podcast that I was roughing him up, Shapiro style, trying to get it out of him. But, you know, he's an adult, an adult who's here of his own will. Like, what was I supposed to do at that point? But the people listening, they understand the spin, right? You're here pulling back the layers of how the media business works on almost every episode.

And I think people can catch on pretty quick when they hear somebody just reciting a script, right? I mean, Greg Brady was here. He caught a lot of flack for the same reason. Right. But give the guy a break. He was just about to start this job that he completely fluked back into getting. I don't know if it was really the best time for him to speak out of turn and say anything critical about the company, let alone Dean Blundell.

Not every guest is going to be Ann Roszkowski or Mike Richards, for example, who was on the day before Greg Brady and just shoots from the hip. It's just like a bull in a china shop. You know what I mean? Some guests want to work again, maybe for the same conglomerate that controls so many radio stations and television stations. And they don't really want to burn that bridge because they're far too young to retire. Okay, so this is the risk that they take by coming down here, right? Right. Realizing that the people listening to the podcast will catch on if what they're saying

is a little bit disingenuous, right, to protect their neck. And I saw on Reddit that a commenter on reddit said it was cringy that i after i asked him the first time and barry gave me the no comment i guess i tried a second time maybe i phrased it differently and i just tried a second time and that's when i think i did my tongue and cheek i'm roughing barry up right now my hands are around his neck like i was smiling at barry as i said this and he was smiling smiling back. I had to ask him just one more time. Cringy? I don't think so. I asked him twice, and I was nice about it.

He had a great time. He wants to come back. But that's it. At that point, maybe you should just change the topic to Ann Romer and hope for the best. We got to move, because I know you got a lot to say as we update the Toronto Mic listeners on the state of the union,

like when it comes to radio and television and digital garden, et cetera. But my boys got a hockey game, so we can't go unlimited here. We got to dive in. And I was thinking, since the Great Lakes Brewery sponsorship, has anyone, including myself, Lakes Brewery sponsorship, has anyone, including myself, has anyone benefited as much from this sponsorship as Mark Weisblot has? No. Because you've been here six times since the sponsorship. As a result, Great Lakes beer is pretty much the only beer that I drink, right?

Can you keep up? I leave here with a six pack. It keeps me going. Do you drink six beers a quarter? At the rate that I drink, yeah. It works out okay. That's perfect, man. Close enough.

I really like the pumpkin spice last time. I guess that was a seasonal thing, maybe from October, just like they have pumpkin spice everything. So this time I'm leaving with Apocalypse Later. And the Lake Effect, which I was feeling on my ride today for what it's worth. There's a Lake Effect out there. Yeah, Lake Effect.

Another one in there. What else? Anything new? Anything different? Lake Effect representing... I noticed they have the staples, like the Canuck Pale Ale and the lager.

Yeah, that's really good, too. And that one. Oh, that's the Pompous Ass. There's certain beers they have. All year round, you can get them. And then these Harry Porters and Apocalypse Later and Lake Effects. These are the IPAs that come and go in different schedules. So you've got a mixed bag there.

I will stop playing with the beer cans and get on with the show. My math tells me that's 36 beers you've received just from making the trek to the land of the Rogue Byway. Land of the Rogue Byway, the Blockbuster Quick Drop, and what must be one of the last surviving vending boxes from The Grid magazine. You found one? Did you take a picture? Yeah, it's on the corner of Lakeshore and Islington. It's recycled, though, for the job classified newspaper, but they never bothered to paint it over.

That's typical New Toronto behavior. Three artifacts of Toronto pop culture history that everyone can see by coming down here to New Toronto, home of Toronto Mike. I'm glad you mentioned the quick drop, because I had a chat with the owners. This is a fitness, I guess a gym, I guess.

It's turning into a gym. It was a block it's, it's a fitness, uh, I guess a gym, I guess it's, it's turning into a gym and it used to be, it was a blockbuster. Then it was like a dollar store and now it's going to be a gym and they are clearly keeping the quick drop box from, uh, the blockbuster. And I told him, I said, you know, I got my, my good eye on this one. I said, it's important to the community. This is what I said to the owner. It's important to the community that you keep that quick draw box. In my mind, I treat it like it's a 200 year old heritage

monument protected somehow, even though, of course, it's not protected by anything. And yet, the death of Blockbuster was not all that long ago. There's a tweet that makes the rounds every so often. It's Blockbuster in the summer of 2011 encouraging people who quit Netflix to sign up or tweet

or say something about why they prefer renting videos at Blockbuster. Because at the time, Netflix announced in the United States that they were moving to the streaming model. They were going to spin off the DVDs that they would send you at home. They never launched that part of Netflix in Canada, but in the United States, it built up a following that you would get these DVDs by mail. I'm not even sure if that's still around or not, but at the time, they said they were spinning it off into a different company, Quickster. Do you remember any of this? Okay, well, it's five and a half, six years ago,

and Blockbuster tried to capitalize on that and recognizing that a lot of these Netflix customers were disappointed they couldn't get their DVDs anymore, tried to move in. And it was only a few months later that Blockbuster was over and done with. So did the last Toronto Blockbuster close its doors in 2011? Is that what I'm to hear?

Somewhere in that range. They started disappearing in 2010. I remember a bunch of them started being reused for different purposes. They were very popular as election offices at one point in time. You know, they wouldn't bother to take down the sign. You would still see that it used to be a blockbuster, but it was the kind of place that candidates would rent for the cycle of campaigning during an election. Also, I remember Halloween costume stores were big on renting out blockbusters not all that long ago. So you talk about the quick drop like it's something from decades and decades ago.

But there was Blockbuster operating around here until at least 2010 into 2011. You're right. In my mind, that's a 90s thing. 2011, forget about it. But I treat it like it's from 1811. So that's the way I'm treating the quick drop box. And if I ever see them,

it can look like they might be, I don't know, taking it down or getting rid of that, even the label Quick Dropbox or the blue color with the yellow that's so blockbuster, I'm going to go in there and talk to the owner because that's not going to be allowed. No. Hey, everybody listening who wants to keep this conversation going, go to patreon.com slash Toronto Mike. That's where you can give what you can. I've had a couple of people say they don't like the fact Patreon's taking US dollars. And hey, I don't blame you. Like that dollar is like $1.40 or something. I don't know how that math works. But if you wanted to work something out with me,

somebody is actually emailing me like a one-time payment just to thank, to keep it going and keep the overhead lower. If you want to work something out like that, just drop me an email and I'm happy with whatever you can spare. Brother, if you can spare a dime. You got the beer there for the sixth time and I'm happy to

keep you drinking. The people at Chef's Plate, Mark, want to send you... Wait, did you take advantage of this yet? Have you ever done this? I'm not going to say. I mean, because you drinking. The people at Chef's Plate, Mark, want to send you... Wait, did you take advantage of this yet? Have you ever done this? I'm not going to say. I mean, because you offered them to me on the podcast. You know, I'm all about real talk. It's got to sound like I follow it through.

All right. If you wanted a couple of free meals from Chef's Plate, and I promise they're fantastic, I just arranged this just the other day. This was arranged with Greg Brady and Bubba O'Neill. And if you want a meal, just let me know and they will send you two free kits to the address of your choice. And if anyone listening wants two free meals from Chef's Plate, go to chefsplate.com and use the promo code Toronto Mike. And you get two plates. Well, you're telling

me that anyone can do it. So it's not so special after all. I'm sure there's a catch of the others. I'm sure you get two meals if you buy one. I don't know what the details are, but you get two. No questions asked. Just let me know if you're hungry. All right, buddy, let's dive in. Let's start with radio because we always enjoy starting with radio. So let's talk about the Edge 102. Actually, I believe it's 102.1 The Edge, and I keep calling it Edge 102. Well, yeah, and it's another topic you can't stop discussing on your blog, right? And maybe as the years go by here, people are starting to wonder why you're so concerned about this radio station that they haven't given any thought to in years, maybe even a decade or two. But it is part of the fabric of Toronto popular culture, this frequency and this format.

So, yeah, it's something we pay attention to, even if we're not tuning in. So what are the recent changes? I know they changed the logo. I shared that on TorontoMic.com, the brand new Edge logo. And they're changing up the morning show again, right? Tell me a little bit of detail. I mean, logo changes, as I've mentioned before, that's definitely a job responsibility that never goes away in broadcasting, right? There's always a new logo.

There's always some new branding that a station has to roll out. The DJs come and go, but the need for graphic designers to keep the branding fresh, that will always be around. But over at The Edge, CFNY, they kept this same distressed font logo, right?

All through the early, early, early 2000s, right up until a couple weeks ago. And what do you think of the new logo? Is it, are you indifferent to that? Is it, you think it's more modern? Could it be any more generic? I don't know that this is really something that's worthy of fixating upon. I mean, I guess radio logos mean very little to anyone, but what else would we talk about here for 90 minutes? the fact that people were chatting about him on your website. And he was complaining, saying that you were out to get him. And he sounded genuinely paranoid, right? He was talking about, like, threats that he was getting upon his wife and kids. And everybody was looking to cause him some sort of harm before he got to town.

This is a DJ on a fading rock radio station. So I'm not saying that maybe he wasn't a little annoyed, but it was an exaggerated threat. Well, somebody even said, I think it might have been Humble Howard or something, said, hey, you know, you would like this guy if you just give him a chance, and you

met him, and I think his response was like an immediate, like, no, I do never, I never want to meet this man. Like, I don't like this guy okay whatever okay I mean here we before moving into town right the new badass on the rock radio station he needed to build his brand and develop some sort of equity and he was using you I think as a as a way to bounce off something, somebody in Toronto where he could position himself as being, you know, a new fearless, you know, omnipotent, invincible, you know, something different, a new pump up the volume, you know, a rebel with a microphone. Volume, you know, rebel with a microphone. He was going to be that guy on the Toronto Airwaves. And they ended up putting him on in the morning show.

And now he's not on there anymore. It didn't work out. They brought in Rick the Temp, Rick Campanella, because they had Mel there. I think Mel might have gone off and had a baby. I'm not sure if she's still in maternity leave or not. But Fred was doing mornings, and Rick the Temp came in, and unbeknownst to us, Rick the Temp

quit, I guess. It was too much to balance with his family life and everything, doing E.T., Canada, and everything. He quit, and then they moved Fred to afternoons. And who's the morning... Who is the... Right now, is it... You tell me. Is it Adam? It's another guest that you had on your podcast.

A tall guy. I think Adam. Adam Ricard. Adam Ricard. So I think these people are indebted to you. Are they? That you had them on the podcast, and you're indebted to them, right? That they were willing to come over.

I'll never forget my Kid Craig conversation. It was a highlight of my 224 episodes. Okay, but the underlying theme here, as we talk about changes on this radio station we all used to listen to, right? What happened to the radio industry? What went wrong to the point where they put this guy in Morning Drive,

Fearless Fred, no promotion, no one really hears of him. He doesn't say anything that you ever hear about. There's nothing on social media about him. He just sort of operates in this filter bubble, a silo, all his own. You wouldn't know his name. You wouldn't have heard of him. You wouldn't know anything. So maybe it's not fair to him being put in that position that it was always the goal to be a morning guy on a Toronto radio station. He got that opportunity. He climbed to the top of the mountain and nothing, right? Tumbleweeds, crickets, like no buzz,

no reaction, no momentum, really nothing to work with. I don't know what he did there. I know they had Rick the Temp on there. At one point in time, I listened to some of the clips. They were incredibly awkward. Maybe they didn't have the right kind of direction about what they were trying to do.

So here they are trying again. The door revolves, and they're giving another voice a chance to be in there in the morning. And I don't know how it works out any better for him than it did for the guy before. So Adam is... Is it Adam and Mel?

Is Mel going to be Adam's co-host? Yeah, Adam. Okay, because Fearless is going to be solo. Meanwhile, has Josie Dye started at Indie 88? Is that today? I'm not sure. I think that's starting in April. April.

But again, this is something else that's so completely off the radar. I think Josie, a familiar voice from 102.1, a lot of the people who've been involved with Indie 88 used to work for Chorus and The Edge. And she's joining other familiar voices on the station. I guess the idea is to try and recruit the audience that they managed to lose over at CFNY.

Bring them to the left of the dial, they managed to lose over at CFNY. Yeah. Bring them to the left of the dial, this new station that's still trying to get its legs and figure out what role it has to play in this market after they've got this license. And again, you know, we'll have to see. Does it really mean anything anymore about who the host is?

Morning Drive Radio in Toronto. it really mean anything anymore about who the host is morning drive radio in toronto is it is it the kind of uh media position that it used to be you know does it does it yeah because it used to be does it have yeah does it that does it have the same status, right, that we grew up with? And, I mean, the answer is no. We're talking about a faded format, a style of broadcasting that is not going to connect with the demographic that used to listen to it. Because they found new ways of accessing what they were looking for. is the role of radio in this current climate of Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and Snapchat? Does radio have any role to play? Is there anything that they can do to get people to tune back in who've disappeared and faded away? When this started to be cause for concern about 10 or even 15 years ago, I think there was always some hope that people would find the magic formula to bring the old audiences back.

But look, we're so far down the road in this. I'm not sure what can happen. Meanwhile, on Q107, they've introduced a co-host, a female voice for a co-host for John Derringer. Jennifer Valentine has surfaced as John's new co-host on Q. Have you heard any of that yet?

I heard a bit of it. What did you think? Because if you Google this right now, I'm like number one. I mean, he was making it sound like it was the most exciting announcement in the history of Q107, right? I had Maureen Holloway here

shortly after the announcement, and we joked, because it's true, he overhyped that thing to a point where, oh, that's all? You're left with, oh, that's the announcement? That was super hyped. Okay, well, what was the catch?

It was the fact that he got to choose who the new sidekick would be, right? So I guess he was excited personally because it was a decision that he got to make. And here we have Q107 again, you know, still a resilient brand in the Toronto media market. I would guess that if somebody's been listening to it all this time, they're probably still going to stick around if they don't stray in the direction of other radio stations. Jennifer Valentine, who was fired from Breakfast Television, she has some sort of following, right? I mean, she was there 25 years or 30 years? They ditched her from City TV.

There were all sorts of threatening comments online, people saying that Kevin and Dina on breakfast television, right, they didn't deserve to live because Jennifer lost her job. So I think in the long haul, that worked out pretty well for her, that she was seen as somebody that had a following and that they would tune in to the station. Most of what I know about what they're doing there, I learned from reading comments on Toronto Mike. And it was a few people, I think, who remarked upon the fact that she sounded maybe a little out of place at first, that she didn't

know that much about the music that they were playing, that they were trying to work her into this room full of guys and play off her in a way that she didn't sound so naturally comfortable with. I don't know. I don't know what kind of hope they have for the situation. Derringer, you know, he's been there doing the morning show for 15 years. And he has a history with Q107 that goes back, what is it, more than 30 years at this point. Yeah, late 80s, right? Yeah, I think he said, yeah, 33 years to the early 80s at the radio station,

and he announced that this hiring of Jennifer Valentine was the most exciting thing to happen in the entire history of the station. Hey, if he wants to feel that way, good for him. I can't really take that away from him. My initial guess about what they were doing there was that they were going to announce a Rolling Stones concert at the El Macombo. Right, right. Which I suspect will happen anyway. I suspect will happen anyway. Once they reopen this place, Michael Weckerle, who's put in all this money, resurrect the old neon palms.

And again, here we're down the road of a kind of Toronto nostalgia that maybe to most people seems a little tired at this point, right? But, you know, there's a lot of mythology surrounding the fact that 30 years ago, or sorry, 40 years ago this month, the Rolling Stones performed at the El Macombo. You had Margaret Trudeau mixed up with all of that. There was Keith Richards busted for heroin possession at the Harbor Castle Hotel. And that, you know, with this billionaire who now owns the El Macombo, I guess it's a natural thing that he would book Mick and Keith and the boys back to where they played for their most legendary club show to do it all over again one more time. Could that possibly be as big as the Jennifer Valentine hiring?

No chance. The verdict is out on all that. Look, these radio stations still make a lot of money for the companies. A lot of it has to do with the fact that they've cut it down to the bone as far as staff costs are concerned and the way that things operate is based on extracting all the value that they can from these old radio licenses. And as I'm trying to say here, I think we're into the final stretch of a lot of this. think we're into the final stretch of a lot of this. I don't know how long this final stretch lasts for, but a lot of what goes on in terrestrial radio is the legacy of the 60s, 70s, and 80s. I'm not saying these licenses will eventually be worthless. In fact, a lot of them have sold for a whole lot of money in recent years.

We're talking about nine-figure transactions between these different companies taking over these stations. I just wonder what lies ahead. I find the radio preservationist types to be more and more embarrassing. preservationist types to be more and more embarrassing. The script that they share, right, about how they're going to make radio great again and introduce all these different apps that will bring people back to the medium. After a while, I think they've come to the point where they're running out of road. What are you know, what are you going to do? How are you going to make people excited about a style of broadcasting, an approach to media that is just so rooted in the past?

And, you know, does it really have a place amidst everything that's evolved since that point in time? amidst everything that's evolved since that point in time? How do you do it in a way that is both commercially viable, that can return the profits that they're looking for, and at the same time be interesting? And I'm listening to radio all the time, right? Whether it's live or podcasts that are generated from different radio stations. podcasts that are generated from different radio stations. And somewhere in there, there has to be a solution, right?

There has to be a way to synthesize all of the talent that's out there and turn it into something. And a lot of these solutions that I hear these companies touting and the way that they imagine things working in the future, it just seems like a lot of people in a tailspin just trying to get to the point where they can retire or come close enough to it that they can afford to get by. So we've seen this in radio. We've seen this with the print media, especially daily newspapers, with traditional over-the-air television struggling to find its place with everything. And yeah, it's anybody's guess where it all ends up. And usually you have to work for one of these companies in order to make a living in the media. It's just really a matter of seeing where it's all going to land. Eventually we're going to get there, right? All this talk about radio stations and who's on the air at which station in the morning will start to seem like such an archaic thing to talk about.

start to seem like such an archaic thing to talk about like a discussion from another century that you know in five years from now this will seem as as ancient as talking about blockbuster video that's is that is that where we're headed what do you think i'll still do it just just for nostalgic purposes but before we i want to dive into the you mentioned apps and i want to talk about radio player app but really quickly because we were talking about Derringer, who does mornings on cue. Scruff Connors, we spoke last time, Scruff Connors used to do mornings on cue. He passed away. His son,

TJ Connors, is now moving to Hits FM in St. Catharines, and he'll be doing afternoons there, because Jesse Mods is moving to Calgary to do mornings there. Okay, see, that's a nice story, right? Scruff was on Hits FM.

He helped establish that station in St. Catharines. It was set up by Standard Broadcasting, right? He had been on Q107. Then he tried to make a go of it in Philadelphia. Ended up being replaced by Howard Stern. And back in this part of the world, on Hits FM for a while, I guess he maintained that image that he had as this irreverent, raunchy morning radio guy that lasted as long as it did. So, you know, with him having died late last year,

I think it's very nice, right, that here his son is picking up that baton, getting a chance to continue the legacy. So, yeah, that's a sweet story. That's a good one. That's a good one, yeah. Darren and Mo, so they're on CHFI. Maureen Holloway, since you were last here,

Maureen Holloway has visited, and we talked at great lengths about this. So she is the new Erin Davis, if you will, slides into that spot on CHFI mornings. Have you heard any of Darren and Mo? Yeah, and it sounded really energetic. It was different from what was there before, I think. Had a more youthful attitude to it.

The music sounded a lot brighter. I think CHFI, I might be wrong about this, but it sounds like more than a lot of the other radio stations there, they have a unique independence when it comes to picking the songs that are on the station, right? A lot of these stations out there are all working from the same hard drive, the same template of songs on the playlist. I have a hard time listening to Chum FM, for one thing, because it sounds like everything

has just been researched to death. There's nothing that makes it on to the airwaves at Chum FM, which had a reputation for doing this for a really long time. Independent records and things that were found in England or Europe that hadn't crossed over here yet. And I can just sense when things sound a little too processed, a little too calculated. So even though they're playing a lot of stuff from that same pool of, you know, moldy oldies and tunes from the 80s and 90s and Justin Bieber, whatever, out there.

There seems to be more of an instinctive sound to what they're playing on CHFI. I don't know if you listen. I don't know if you detect any of this. I've read a little bit. I don't know if you hear. I mildly care. I care about everything at least a little bit.

And I haven't listened to any morning radio outside of CBC Radio 1 in a very long time. But I did go to the website a couple of times just to see the playlist before Maureen Holloway visited, for sure. And it did seem a little more... It seemed like kind of a hybrid between your top 40 kind of a virgin stuff

and boom, kind of like if they had a baby or something, maybe that's CHFI. Yeah, sort of music that the soccer mom would consider like catering to her aggro side, right? Like Big Shot by Billy Joel. Right, right.

The kind of tune that they associate with having a bad attitude. By the way, my 12 year old, almostyear-old, her two stations she toggles are 99.9 Virgin and Kiss, 92.5. And I swear to you, it's impossible to tell them apart based on the playlist. I think it's the identical pool of whatever X songs. I think it's identical. There's nothing different.

Okay, but they're supposed to be different because why would they be competing? Why would you choose one over the other? Okay, you got to do some analysis for me. I don't know. I think Kiss 92 has the more muscular sound to it, kind of like the old CFTR. Maybe there's a little bit of that legacy there.

I'm loathe to give people more credit than they deserve for these things. It's all like a Chainsmokers song, the Bieber song, the Weeknd song, the Drake song, maybe another Chainsmoker, then another Bieber, another Weeknd. The guy from Ajax, Stitches, what's his name? Shawn Mendes. Shawn Mendes. Look, I realize it's been decades since there's been anybody on these radio stations sitting in the booth, you know, choosing which music to play. But for some reason, I still like the illusion that that's actually what's going on.

I think when it comes to that format, the CHR, contemporary hit radio format, the best stations are able to create this illusion, right? That they're DJing on the fly. That there's somebody working the decks who's picking the song spontaneously based on whatever mood they happen to be in. I mean, especially if you're like a tweenage listener, right? This is what you want to believe, right? This is the illusion that they're working on, that the stuff is being played on the radio because the voice that comes on between the tracks

personally likes what they're playing. And as soon as that illusion is shattered, then you lose a lot of the audience. So the best stations, I think, are able to make it seem spontaneous. And I think about this Zoomer radio live stream, which has become like a new fetish for my radio fanaticism. Every time you tweet it, and that's at 1236 for anybody who wants to follow you, but when you tweet a link to that, I always click over and watch

because even if it's a guy reading the news or whatever it is, or the guy in the cool hat or whatever, you're right. It's just like there's a voyeuristic kind of Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a radio fishbowl. So lately, that's been my favorite thing of all. And yet, of course, the whole thing is pre-programmed and already in the hard drive, right? And you've got this afternoon guy at Zoomer Radio, Norm Edwards.

He's a holdover from when the station was originally based in Oshawa. He's like the last of the old-time Toronto AM radio rat packers, right? You hear him speak, you imagine some guy wearing an ascot, right? Like the ascot takes the place of the microphone when it comes to amplifying his voice. But you get to see him at work on this Zuma Radio YouTube stream.

And yeah, most of the time he's just like, you know, kicking up his legs and waiting for the song to end. It looks like a pretty simple job. And yet, for anybody interested in media and broadcasting, how the sausage gets made. That's me. Yeah, it's become, at least for the time being, the greatest thing going on in Toronto media, the Zoomer Radio YouTube stream. Coming soon, the Toronto-mic'd YouTube stream inspired by Zoomer radios.

By the way, we recently, like a couple minutes ago, I mentioned Virgin. Virgin is owned by Bell Media as a result you can hear that station on the iHeart Media iHeart Radio? What is it? iHeart Radio app, which I downloaded

and that's the Bell Media one the Bell Media one which makes you sit through or walk through depending on how you're accessing it, an unskippable 30-second pre-roll commercial. Now, I realize this is the business model.

This is how they expect to make money. Boo. Selling your attention to advertisers. And I'm willing to watch one of them. But in accessing the app, part of the novelty is to be able to flip around from one station to the next. And you can't do that without watching the same 30-second spots over and over and over again. So it's a buzzkill. I don't really think that's what they have in mind.

But look, I'm in the media business. I recognize that the way that all this stuff is going to be sustainable is by selling your attention to advertisers. But I soured on that app because it became something else that was just a little too intrusive. And it's far from the only offender look. I mean, if you try to watch TV shows on these website players, you know, archive shows, right, they'll make you sit through ad after ad after ad. It's the same ones over and over again, and it's just not intuitive a lot of the time. They haven't figured out a way, you know, to make you have to sit through the commercial and endure, you know, the word from the sponsor and somehow figure out how

to make it entertaining. I think, you know, how is advertising going to work in the future? I mean, you know, here we are in this 21st century with all these agencies trying to, you know, figure out what to do. They were all over social media, right? It became about like, let's get brands on Twitter. You notice a lot of that has faded in the last year or two, right? You don't have as many of these companies trying to get all weird. Yeah, the Wendy's stuff and all that. Yeah, some of them are still out there.

Yeah, Denny's, Arby's. There were some that are still together. They're trying to be subversive in different ways. But a lot of people tried it out, and I think a lot of people just had nothing to show for it. I mean, they couldn't figure out how to connect. They just couldn't get the numbers. They couldn't get the metrics. They couldn't show that anyone cared.

They couldn't get the followers. You can't show an ROI on that. It's very difficult to tie it to any kind of revenue. Yeah, I think a lot of it would come down to trying to figure out how to make news. Remember, it was a big deal. An awareness campaign. Remember, a few years ago, Oreo think a lot of it would come down to trying to figure out how to make news. Remember, it was a big deal. The awareness campaign. Remember, a few years ago, Oreo did a tweet. It was during the Super Bowl.

There was a blackout during the Super Bowl, 2013. And they created some kind of tweet, you can still dunk in the dark. I think that was the wording. And they were praised as being brilliant. Who was the genius that came up with the idea that you could put a tweet on the Oreo cookie Twitter account that could be synthesized with what was happening in the real world. On the Super Bowl, this TV show that everybody was watching and we could synchronize a message on Twitter that reflected what everybody was thinking.

On the last Super Bowl, I was spurred to look into the Oreo Twitter account, see what was going on there, see if they still set up their Twitter war room to respond in real time to what was happening

on the field. And the Oreo Twitter account had pretty much shut down. They had given up. So I think it was at that moment that I realized that this is a thing of the past. This is something from a whole other era, four years ago, when everybody invested all their hopes and dreams in this notion that you could respond to world events on Twitter in real time and that people would love you and love your brand. And they would just be amazed at this ability to do advertising that was responsive.

I mean, there were too many miscues, right? that was responsive. I mean, there were too many missed cues, right? I mean, think about like the history of brands on Twitter. There was one, I can't, brands saying bae, B-A-E. Right. You know, just this whole trend

of like trying to seem all millennial, you know, trying to adopt like- Like Bruce Shemmy with the skateboard, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The language of the youth of today. How could brands figure out how to get there? Based on my surveillance, it seems like most of them have now abandoned it.

What's a new thing? It's become Snapchat. That's where all of their hopes have turned. Snapchat had its IPO a couple of weeks ago. It looks like it's here to stay. And so now a lot of the branding energy is going into creating these Snapchat filters. I think you've talked on here about trying to figure out Snapchat, that your daughter is on there. That's where my two oldest kids are.

That's where they live. They don't want anything to do with Facebook. They don't tweet, but they're all over Snapchat. Okay, so today a press release at Bailey's Irish Cream. So don't let your kids near that stuff. They are setting up Snapchat filters, right, for St. Patrick's Day. And the whole idea that you could then personalize, you know, any photos that you were taking on Snapchat.

You could figure out a way to get a Bailey's filter in there. Maybe they would dress you up in some sort of Lucky Charms costume. And you could promote alcohol at the same time that you were sharing pictures of yourself. So that's where a lot of the energy has shifted. pictures of yourself. So that's where a lot of the energy has shifted. It's a lot harder for people like me to monitor and make fun of because it's all very private, right? I mean, it's people sharing their snaps between their list of friends. So not a lot of it really leaks out, unless somebody takes a screenshot or something and puts it elsewhere. And a lot of times like that, you're kind of violating the code of Snapchat.

A lot of this performative social media thing has started to fade away because here we have a younger generation realizing, why would I run the risk of leaving a searchable trail of myself on the Internet? They've seen the news stories. They're familiar. They recognize the risks. They've seen all the grown-ups whose lives have been ruined by the fact that they were posting updates to Facebook or Twitter

or even back in the day of blogging, right? That all these people, if it was posted on the internet, it was there for life. And here the tide is starting to turn, and the trend is moving away from putting yourself on display like that. Now, you mentioned you listen to the iHeartRadio app. And, of course, where I was going with that is that the big news, I think it was last week, I think, is that the other app has finally dropped and that is are we still on that

topic radio we left that dingling there dangling radio player radio radio player app so another thing that was developed in europe and so all the other companies are in bell signed up to this new app it it doesn't have those same intrusive pre-roll commercials. Again, you're listening to commercial radio. This is why I'm complaining about the intrusive pre-rolls because

you're supposed to be hearing commercials anyway. Your attention is already. You flip away, but it sounds like in the other one that when you flipped away, you got hit with another ad, usually the same ad. Is that what I heard you say? A lot of the time, yeah.

Or the same little sequence. By the way, your job is to survey all this for us. But I can tell you as a listener, I'm gone. I can't do that. If I flip it, I got another 30 seconds I'm fixed to, I'm going to go listen to something else. Okay, so this radio player launch, which involves Rogers, Chorus, New Cap, what are the other companies?

There's a lot of smaller players involved there. It overlaps with another app that seems to already be popular, TuneIn. Yeah, TuneIn. But TuneIn has, as far as I can tell, it has all the bell ones as well. For now, I mean, they have the ability to block them. I think that kind of thing might be in the future, but that's fine. The TuneIn app gives you access to a lot of public radio stations, community radio stations. This podcast, you can actually subscribe to podcasts in TuneIn.

Okay, so then why would anybody download some big corporate radio app, I guess? Well, because it's going to be the only way to access these stations on your mobile device. But I think they are, yeah, that's what I'm talking about. When I reference the language of the commercial radio industry and the people trying to keep it afloat, the preservationists who are convinced that they've always found the solution to moving it forward into the future.

Here they are with another round. It's another thing. It's another idea. It's another concept to say, okay, this is how we're going to beat back Apple and Spotify and Napster. I don't know. Google Play.

Yeah, and here we'll use the muscle of these radio stations to bring people on board with something new. It doesn't seem all that much different than the Toronto Star trying to tell people that they should download an iPad app. And we saw how well that went. And there was no one interested because no one had the device required to access this thing that they were selling. Now, everybody has a smartphone. Can smartphone apps about commercial radio stations, can they really be that bad? Can they do anything wrong? They're

just taking broadcasts that are going out there regardless. But if the enthusiasm isn't there, they risk being drowned out. And there won't be any attention available if they don't figure out how to convert people to these new platforms. So whether we have figured out the future or this is just going to be another cycle that we look back at and find those old press releases and laugh at how much hope was invested in these things. because really you're up against every idea that is being conceived in the entire universe. You have to find a way to compete with it. You have to establish some kind of angle that no one else out there is offering. We hear endlessly about how radio stations will survive because local. Only radio can be local. Well, Q107 in Toronto runs a Vancouver morning show as its early evening program now.

So that kind of blows that theory apart. Well, before we leave audio here, remind me, theory apart. Well, before we leave audio here, remind me, how many podcasts do you subscribe to in that Outcast app that you use for podcasts? Overcast. Yeah, I subscribe. I'm terrible at the names today.

I currently subscribe to somewhere around 1,000 podcasts. Okay, I'm sure I'm not the only one to tell you that that breaks my brain. I can't digest that number. That's too much. You don't have enough time.

So when you have a, let's say, I don't know what percentage actually update every week or whatever, but how do you choose what you listen to? Well, because of this Overcast app, right, which only works for iOS right now. So you're out of luck there with your Android. I am. I have a link on the desktop. On my desktop, I can listen because I like the listen at two times the speed, for example, feature that's just really easy to use with the Overcast.

So there's a way to set up playlists, right? So when I see something that I'm interested in, I can save it to the playlist, come back to it later. save it to the playlist, come back to it later. If I scan past something, look at the topic being discussed, because most podcasts have some sort of description that tells you what was on the show. If I'm not interested, I just flick past. No different than looking at Twitter or Facebook.

Sure, sure. It's just the endless stream, the infinite flow. So applying that to podcasts gives me a chance to be on top of everything that's going on. Even if I'm not listening to the podcast, I'm familiar with it. You know, who's on it, what they're talking about. And, you know, it's not an issue of having to listen to everything. With a thousand podcasts, how is that ever going to happen? I've been subscribed to podcasts that I have yet to get around to listening to.

But the fact is that the app is there, makes it easier to monitor everything that's going on. And for me, this is a media junkie's dream. Yeah, no doubt. This is a fantasy come true. This was space age technology when I was growing up that I could have access on demand to every audio program in the world that I could see what was up and what they were talking about and listen to it whenever I wanted. So, of course, I'm reveling in it. I'm not going to shortchange myself by not exploiting everything that you can do.

And listeners probably know this by now, but you don't listen at regular speed. Is it three times? What is your go-to? They have a setting, right? It's double speed and then it's smart speed, which cuts out the silences. So if there's a lot of silences in a conversation, it accelerates to like three times. Gotcha. Or more.

Yeah, there's not— Usually, yeah, two and a half, sometimes two and three quarters. Anyway, yeah, there was an article about podcasts in Bloomberg by Toronto writer David Sachs. Right, I saw you link to this. I read this, yes. And it was just trying to make a trend piece out of a modern-day dilemma. First world problem.

Too much content? How do you keep up on all these podcasts? How can you go about your indie yuppie lifestyle and do what you have to do in life and get around to listening to all of these downloads that have accumulated on your phone. And he put something on Facebook looking for answers to this question for subjects for the article. I don't think I've ever done this before.

I was trying to get into the article. I left a comment to try and be a subject of a trend piece. There's so little that I am qualified to be quoted about. I thought this was my chance to be in the spotlight, but here's a problem. I didn't fit his thesis. He was looking for people that couldn't keep up on podcasts. Yeah, he'd blow that up. And I was taking the attitude. I subscribed to a thousand of them. I don't have any problem at all. To me, it's like I'm listening to whatever I want to listen to. Now, this is a Toronto-centric podcast, in case people didn't know right now, Toronto Mic'd.

Let me ask you this. If you were going to recommend to a listener now, like, I don't know, a handful of other Toronto-centric podcasts that are, like, really good and worth the time, could you drop some names right now for people listening? Oh, could I? Well, one guy who's really impressed me lately with his guests is a podcast you were on, Kareem Kanji. I was on it. I was, like, an early...

I know! You were an early guest! Because his audio wasn't working yet. I hate the episode, not the content, but he didn't have the mix yet proper. So it's very hard to listen to it. I mean, not to put Toronto Mike down or anything, but I also don't think he was really in the zone yet

when it came to getting great guests. But lately, yeah, he's been on a roll. Is it like, I don't want to be the member of any club that would have me as a member? Is that a spin on that? If Toronto Mike is your guest, you need to's been on a roll. Is it like, I don't want to be the member of any club that would have me as a member? Is that a spin on that? If Toronto Mike is your guest, you need to step it up a notch. So, yeah, I'd recommend him. Another guy, and, you know, unfortunately it tends to be a lot of guys, right?

It's like a very male-centric medium, this stuff. Although that's also changing. Will Sloan, who writes for Torontoist, among other websites out there, he's into movie criticism. That's a big thing for him. So he's got a couple out there right now. One's called The Important Cinema Club

that recently did an episode about Adam McGoyan movies that I thought it was amazing, right? Because I'd never heard in my life, like, people laughing about the cinematic oeuvre of Adam McGoyan. Right, right, like the Sweet Hereafter and all this. They were talking about Adam McGoyan in the way that you would talk about Frank D'Angelo movies. That's how great it was. And another one that he has with another writer, Luke Savage, it's called Michael and Us. They started going through the movies of Michael Moore one by one. But now they've moved on to doing a discussion about political propaganda films. So they're going through different movies,

including The Great Dictator was a recent episode, Charlie Chaplin talking about that. And then they talked about a movie called How to Be a Man, made by Gavin McInnes, the infamous co-founder of Vice, who's just found himself in a spot of trouble for comments he made while on a trip to Israel

with Ezra Levant. That aside, they did a podcast, yeah, talking about this movie. Oh, I get it. The title's like Roger and Me. I get it. Yeah, so the origins of the alt-right movement, that was one of the things they talked about in this Michael and Us podcast.

So those are two that come to mind that are Toronto-based. I'm impressed. The Karim one is great to hear because, like, I don't want to say I consulted on that or whatever, but we had lots of chats about it, like, because he was listening to this

and he wanted to try something and we had lots of conversations as he was starting. As you know, I went on that show and as he worked out his audio issues, I was a very good guinea pig to work that out. And I did see he had a guest on that I was thinking I should reach out to

and I was thinking, wow, he has stepped it up because Steve Paikin, he had Steve Paikin on and I was thinking, that's the kind of guy I want to talk to. I got to steal this idea. He had a guest, we've had only one guest I want to talk to. I've got to steal this idea. He had a guest. We've had only one guest, I think, that we both had. Jackie Redmond. He had Jackie Redmond on before I had Jackie

Redmond on. I'm thinking, this guy's starting to eat my lunch. I've got to step it up a notch myself. I was also on another podcast with Josh Holliday. Yeah, with Eileen Ross. It involves with Eileen Ross. Yeah, so it involves going into another basement.

This one much closer to where I live. A nicer, right? A much nicer basement. A much nicer basement in the Deer Park neighborhood. And yeah, there's Josh Holliday, longtime voice from Toronto Radio and elsewhere

trying to figure this podcasting thing out. So yeah, he deserves a boost trying to make this thing work on a weekly basis. The Josh and a Lady podcast with Eileen Ross. Yes, and that's cool too because yeah, he's been here. And Eileen, I know from back in the day when she was on the Humble and Fred show

when they were starting their podcast. Okay, but here's the thing. I still can't find the podcast that I want from back in the day when she was on the Humble and Fred show when they were starting their podcast. Okay, but here's the thing. I still can't find the podcast that I want to listen to the most. Like the podcast that's such a priority listen for me, right, that I want to listen to it first thing in the morning and start my day. What about that Richard Simmons podcast? Have you tried that? Because I hear a lot of buzz about it. I haven't sampled it myself yet.

Yeah, just like Serial a couple of years ago. Should I do something like that with Ann Romer? Like, should I spin off into some kind of a... Well, some would say you have already done that, right? It's just been in this, like, disorganized fashion where you bring her up at random, no matter which guest you have in your basement. But yeah, the Richard Simmons one,

that's been the kind of thing that has gotten people interested in your basement. But yeah, the Richard Simmons one, that's been the kind of thing that has gotten people interested in podcasting. But yeah, I think there's still a long way to go as far as the medium and the format and the idea of getting people to listen to audio

on demand. Of course, my friend Jesse Brown is now a few years into his CannaLand empire. My appearance on there back last fall, which probably did me more harm than good.

You think so? Yeah, because I think it framed me in a context that was not accurate. Didn't I gripe about that here already once before? No, you did. It was a highlight for me. Okay, but I'm saying I've now got to live this reputation down

because so many people only heard about what I was doing through Canada land, and I think it made it out like I'm paying attention to all this stuff that's going on in the media for the sole purpose of deploring it and that all of my consumption of everything that's going on out there, like it only exists to, uh, uh, find out what, what's wrong with it. And that couldn't be, that's not fair. That could be farther from the truth. Yeah. But why, you know, why am I watching and listening and reading all of these things? I'm, I'm looking for something great. I'm trying to find those moments

that nobody else has caught on to. I mean, you end up going through a lot of dreck. It means keeping up on what Joe Warmington is tweeting about. That's all par for the course. But no, I'm mostly in this to shine light on different corners of communication that other people haven't found. There's nothing better than that. And so many of these social media narcissists have no concept of how to do that.

They make it all about them. I'm harvesting all these links all the time that are about other people's creativity. When you get all this agitation about wanting to have your say and your place in the media to be known

and recognized for doing something creative, I see more of that than I actually see output that reflects if all these young voices are out there with something to say, maybe they should figure out how to say something rather than being on Twitter all day saying that no one listens to what they have to say. Like, you actually have to follow through, right? I need you to say things triple speed

because I have a number of topics I need to hit and I need to do it. We're at the hour mark here. I need to hit it in like 30 minutes. So you're going to work with me. We're going to do this. It's going to be basically, we're going to be succinct and talk fast.

You mean I can't go on a tangent about the gamification of identity that has taken over Twitter. gamified so i ride my bike every day and i in my head i've gamified it because i record it and then i do my analysis so this is i try to beat my the previous that same month in the previous year and then i'll do year over year analysis and i'll go back and say oh look i'm 20 more than that whatever and it's so gamified that on sat Saturday morning when my phone died and I had to bike to Rogers to get my new phone,

it's the first ride in five years I did not record of my app. And I actually had this sensation like, oh, this ride isn't really happening. I'm not actually biking because I'm not recording it. Isn't that terrible? So extend that to like your entire existence, right?

Like my life isn't happening if I don't have my phone in my hand. I can't express myself. I can't tell people what's wrong with the world, right? I can't vent about everything that I see not going according to the standard

that I want it to go in. That's right. And there's so much of that. We're inundated with that all the time, definitely since Donald Trump's inauguration on January 20th, right? I mean, that was like a whole new world. It was this idea that, you know,

all of a sudden, everybody's got to take a side. Either you're with the deplorables or against them. Yeah, I think that was W. This is the world that we're in. I'm going to hit the hot five. So that radio, that hour on radio, because that's how much we love radio. Is that an hour?

Pretty much. Why did we even do that? We love radio. Let's drop the radio topic. Not on my watch. Maybe on the Josh Holiday podcast, we can drop the radio on. Media.

Media. We're going to hit some hot spots. One is, okay, CP24 had a young woman working there named Jill Colton. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. So I'll set this up with. Okay, that's a great one. Jill Colton. I'm going to get into the good ones here.

Because, you know, if I mentioned CP24, now I need to go into Anne and I'm going to get in trouble. So let's get into Jill Colton. So I would see her on weekends doing some weather stuff. And somebody tipped me off one day and was like hey mike have you followed her on twitter because like there's a there's a lot of pro trump stuff happening there and i'm like out of curiosity i followed her i could only stomach it for a couple of days but she was very alt-right and very tea party-esque and a lot of pro trump stuff and next thing i next thing I know, she's saying goodbye, that she's left CP24 and she's gone south, I think, Florida.

Jupiter. Jupiter, Florida. Jupiter, Florida. So what happened? Jill Colton, and it sounds, because we had a chat about her coming on, but of course she's not local anymore, so it's going to be a while. But Jill, it sounded like she did not leave of her own volition. She wasn't welcome

there anymore on CP24, and now she's going to do what? Is that what happened? Because she did tweet amicable goodbye. That she was moving away. You gotta ask the right questions. It's clear to me, anyways, and I've done this a while, I'm an expert now in this.

You can say amicable all you want, but she was pushed. Okay, but yeah, it's amazing. I think the whole idea that this could be like an innocuous, somewhat anonymous, I'd not really heard of her before, CP24 weather lady, she loses her job,

the way you're explaining it, or she's no longer with Bell Media. Definitely no longer with Bell Media. And her replacement is a young lady named, I want to get it right, Kayla Williams, I believe, who is, when I was talking to Bubba O'Neill about the lack of, basically the lack of non-white people in sports media in this country,

she pointed to this person, Kayla Williams, I think, she's biracial and is an example of a young black woman who has a future in sports media. Okay, but why would I be paying any attention to Jill Colton if it wasn't for her going all unhinged, right? I mean, so that to me is just the most amazing thing ever. Whether this is what she actually believes, I'm a lot more accepting and tolerant and appreciative of people who are speaking from a pro-Trump perspective than the typical Toronto media person. I take a lot of it in. I think this is an astonishing time in history. And look, it's up for grabs. If somebody wants to be that Toronto media person, a mainstream broadcaster who puts themselves on the right side of Donald Trump, I think that's terrific. I'm all for it. I think she should run with this thing.

It's like nothing I've ever seen before. So, yeah, she went from tweeting about the weather to tweeting about special snowflakes. Right. Right. At the university campuses today. So that's the pivot that she is trying to do. And, yeah, I wish her the best of luck. I don't hold back.

I mean, we're past the era of the Sun News Network. We've got my friend Ezra and Rebel Media. Tell me a case. They've got a whole enterprise happening there. I don't know if she'd really fit in with them. But everything I know about Rebel Media, I know from your tweets and maybe Jesse Brown's stuff. Like, I actually, it's not on my radar anywhere

except that I know this is, this is the Sun TV guy, Ezra Levant. Is that right? Yeah, Ezra Levant. Levant, sorry. I said Levant to be pretentious. Levant sounds more, you know, pretentious.

Yes, exactly. And this is a right-wing media, digital media. Yeah, yeah. Canada's answer. Well, first, there was Glenn Beck, who started out the Blaze Network. It was his own independent thing because he was no longer on Fox. And he set up a template to be his own broadcaster.

It was at least a modest success for a little while, but then Glenn Beck decided that he was going to be one of those never-Trump people who wasn't happy with the fact that the Republican Party bought into this guy, and now he's approaching from another angle. So the blaze is still around, though, in some form or another. And then you've got Breitbart, right? Another big American success story as far as, I mean, if you want to call, like, influencing, you know, White House policy with Steve Bannon. That would certainly be a coup d'etat for Breitbart, everything it represents. So here we've got Ezra in Canada, slowly but gradually developing the same kind of clout.

Conservative leadership race going on right now. A lot of the candidates are showing up at his events, doing interviews with him, using him as a conduit, as a way to sign up supporters. So in this sense, he's created something that goes against the establishment media party. You know, everything that we ever assumed about the CBC and the way that media works in Canada. He's shown that there's another way to do it. As far as the ideology and the sensibilities and the mindset that's driving him and his cast of characters, I try to be an impartial observer

and not reveal what it is where I might agree or disagree with what they're saying. Make America Great hat, I should tell the listeners. Well, you see, that's it. I don't need to be, I cannot afford to be some kind of Canadian media pariah. Ezra, on the other hand, has made it his entire raison d'etre, right? I mean, that's what his whole career is based on. But I would say, I mean, whether it's me or anybody else there who's watching the media, you cannot ignore what these people are doing, right? Even if you find all of it reprehensible, I think it's at your peril that you tune it out.

And we're seeing this now. So we've got the Walrus magazine has Ezra on the cover, like a caricature of Ezra, drawn by Barry Blitt, who's a famous illustrator from The New Yorker. Litt, who's a famous illustrator from The New Yorker. So I think you have to look at that and think, look, the guy has hit the big time, regardless of the fact that it's not the most exciting

article. A guy went undercover on the Rebel Media Cruise and wrote about it. But look, they put Ezra on the cover. They're hoping to sell magazines by talking about this guy. So that's a step up from having Frank Magazine writing about you. And here we have Vice also covering Rebel Media, the rally that they did opposing M103 at Canada Christian College.

People from Vice sort of moved in on the whole thing, and I thought they did some compelling coverage, just their perception about what was happening there. There was some debate about whether or not there were Nazi salutes in the audience. Do you follow any of this, Mike? I don't know. Was this on your radar at all? No. I think I—

It's not—listen, it's not the most life most life affirming stuff. This is not feel good news. This is all we get into some pretty nasty turf here as far as the arguments are concerned. But yeah, I don't think you can look away from it. in the Canadian media, that all the stuff that's going on with the rebel is seen as important enough, that it can't be ignored. Can't ignore the rebel. Yeah, can't ignore it. So there's Lauren Southern, who was a 21-year-old university student last year. She was doing YouTube videos

about how she didn't like political correctness on her university campus on the West Coast. Ezra brought her to Toronto to be a young star, that she would be like the voice of a new generation. He even published a book of everything that she believes in. All of her wisdom accumulated in 21 years. And last week, she went off and said that she's now going independent, and she's not going to be working with the rebel anymore.

Okay, so here, but the people, the people that get excited about this, you will notice something, you will notice something in a lot of their comments and their replies about her, and a lot of it seems to be like totally anti-Semitic. So we're down this dark road of white nationalism. This is dark stuff. This is hard to take. This is not something really that I want to know that's out there. But it's out there.

It's a factor. It's not really all that fun or funny to know that this is what the online media can become. So I think, you know, we got to be a little more vigilant here about what's going on in our midst. And I think as far as rebel media is concerned, I would think that they have to

clarify a bit of their messaging and make it a little bit clearer about which side they're on when it comes to policy and perspective. So yeah, this has been a strange time and this is one of the lenses that you're able to see it through and we'll see where it all goes. I don't know. I'm talking about it here and I'm starting to get nervous, like scared. I don't want to be... It's a dark time.

Yeah, I think it's important to follow the things that have been able to build up an audience and know who's paying attention and why they're interested in this over and above the mainstream media. My next guest is going to be Carly Agro from Sportsnet. And her twin sister is Charles C. Agro who works for the CBC and they I believe it's the CBC marketplace and they did the subway chicken analysis where they tested the

DNA of these of different fast food chicken offerings and they said that a good chunk of the Subway chicken was soy and not actually chicken. You've been following this? Yeah. Speaking of crisis communications, this is maybe not quite White House level, although, I don't know, Subway's a pretty big company, right?

That's massive. It's pretty close. They went through... It's got to be the most outlets. I believe it might be the most. Of all the fast food through... It's got to be the most outlets, I believe it might be the most, of all the fast food chains, there's more subways than anything else, I think. Well, they went through that drama

with their spokesman, Jared Fogle. That could not have been good for business. So, you know, maybe they're equipped to know how to react to a whole other kind of crisis. And this one centered around the fact that they sent samples to a DNA test at a wildlife laboratory at Trent University.

And they came up with some kind of calculation, right, that about half the chicken being sold at Subway inside sandwiches was not actually chicken, but some kind of soy protein. So that was the expose that they put out there on Marketplace. Subway retaliated, as you would think, saying this was not true. The notion that their chicken is only 50% chicken is 100% false. So they took out newspaper ads and did the whole social media thing to counter what was in the CBC report. CBC retaliated, but they did it in such a way as to say that there were nuances in the way that the

chicken was being tested, and that while their test showed one thing, Subway's test might have shown a different thing, and that somehow both of them could be equally accurate. Are you following any of this? Yeah, it's very nuanced, but I think it sounds like there's a lot of spin doctrine and damage control. I thought I read somewhere that CBC was backtracking a little bit. Backtracking a little bit?

Well, the thing is, they could probably be sued for a whole lot of money if they were promoting the fact that... It's got a lot of traction. CBC, first of all of all big enough in this country? But I saw this picked up by a lot of big American

outlets. They got a lot of traction. I guess they were saying that their test was accurate in the way that the test was conducted. Which was different from the results that the Subway test generated.

I got to say, when I first read about this and they said, okay, I don't know, 57% chicken, my first instinct was, oh no, what's the other 43%? And then they revealed it's some soy-based protein, and I was a little bit relieved. I thought, okay, well, you know what I mean? It could be so much worse, right? Yeah, yeah, well, it's still soy protein, right?

At least it's still edible. It's not sawdust. I won't mention some other things it could have been, but it could have been a lot of things that you would never want to actually eat if you were a fast food chicken. Okay, so here's a big question, right? When people, I mean, look, hot dogs. What are hot dogs?

Other than the greatest food on the planet, yeah, that's probably the worst food on the planet. But one of the tastiest treats you could ever have is a hot dog of mustard. If I had one, in fact, I'm craving one right now. My great weakness, I try to have like eight a calendar year, okay? I'm trying to keep it down to less than a dozen per calendar year. But if somebody said hot dogs weren't terrible for you and the worst of the worst, I could easily down four a day. That's how much I love if somebody said hot dogs weren't terrible for you and the worst of the worst,

I could easily down four a day. That's how much I love the taste of hot dogs. But what's in the hot dog? All the stuff they swept up from the factory floor, right? I'm sure, I'm sure. All the residual stuff from the real meat

that they were making in there. That's right, that's right. Okay, so I don't know. Is it that scandalous that Subway chicken might not be entirely chicken? Is that so bad that it would turn people off eating at Subway? I don't know. I don't know. I bet you not. They didn't say it was... They said... How did they phrase it? The fact, the report that our chicken is only 50% chicken is 100% false.

That was the wording of the ad that they took out in the Globe and Mail. They didn't say what percent. Right, it was 58%. Yeah, it wasn't chicken. Right, right, right. So this all gets a little bit confusing, and I think if you confuse people enough, then they're not going to believe either side of the argument and if they like subway chicken that much you're just going to keep eating it as a joke i thought it might be funny now i'm not going to do it because then i realize it's not that funny just mildly funny to me but if i pretended when i'm with carly aggro if i

pretended like i mistook her for charlsey and i was asking her charlsey aggro questions i thought this would be hilarious if i just pretended like I made a mistake, I thought I invited Charlesy, not Carly, because they're twins. Not that funny, is it? I'm not going to do it. I can tell by your reaction that's a bad idea. Hey, you can always try.

Here's some Toronto stuff, rapid fire stuff. Tell me about the sticker lady. Who's the sticker lady? Do you remember the sticker lady? Because she's been working the Young and Queen area for at least 25 years. Maybe even 30.

She would go up mostly to men and approach them with a come on. You look really handsome today. Although she'd do it to women as well. Men are naturally going to respond more actively to the idea, you know, here was a cheerful lady remarking upon their good looks. Why wouldn't they listen to what she had to say?

And her pitch was the idea that she would give you a sticker that would be an affirmation of your attractiveness. In exchange, you would give her a loony or a toony. The sticker lady made the Toronto Sun around 2005. Around that time, they were on a real kick to try and expose dishonest street people. There was the shaky lady. Remember the shaky lady? That was a big one. Somebody drove a beamer or something.

Somebody was driving a beamer to where they would beg for money at the corner. I can't remember if that was the shaky lady. Yeah, the shaky lady. She would sit there on the corner, and she would shake. And they found out where she lived. And it might not have been a life of luxury, but the fact was that, you know, she was presenting herself as homeless and helpless. And they found evidence, none of the above.

Sticker Lady was a little more complicated because there were allegations that she was saying that the stickers that she was giving out were meant for charity, that she was saying that the stickers that she was giving out were were meant for charity that she was taking donations uh for the sticker um but uh you know the the donations weren't weren't going anywhere to the human fund she did yeah she denied uh the the fact that that she was claiming uh that she was taking money for any charitable purpose. And I guess in the process, she admitted that all the money was going to her and that she lived in Hamilton and she would come into Toronto. They found out where she lived and turned her into an infamous Toronto character for a little while.

Maybe she disappeared from downtown, but just a few weeks ago on Reddit, someone spotted her, had a sighting of the shaky lady. My first reaction when I saw her was, gee, I remember her when she was a lot younger. You know, like, we're all getting old here, but, you know, time moves forward for all of us. And here she is.

She's in her mid-60s at this point, based on what her age was reported as. So, you know, there's nothing wrong with her looking a little closer to grandmotherly than she did in her younger years. I think mostly the story made me a little sad because it made me think about how much time has passed, how much older I have gotten in the 20 or 30 years since I first encountered the sticker lady. Not that I ever fell for what she was selling. You know who's aging well? Moe Berg is aging well. Here, this song, by the way, has got to be 30 years old? Yeah, 30 years old.

Wow. And this was the coolest track. I mean, because it came out before Love Junk, like a 12-inch single or whatever, and then they cleaned it up a bit for Love Junk, which was like an amazing album anyways. Because, you know, as you know, my daughter, when she had a podcast, when she was eight years old, her theme song was She's So Young, which was on Love Junk. But anyway, the video, tell me what happened to the parking lot. What's happening to the parking lot where Pursuit of Happiness filmed the video for this song?

Okay, so that's becoming a mental equipment co-op store. Because I go to that King. I'm a card-carrying member, and I go to the King Street location. Yeah, I remember they said they were moving to Queen Street soon, I guess. So they're going to build up where this parking lot is. Yeah, so they started building it. So earlier in the winter, that was a story for a few moments, one of those Toronto things,

the fact that the Pursuit of Happiness parking lot, the setting of that video, you know, just across from the Chum City Much Music building. And so many people became familiar with that space, right? That it was like the stage where they shot the video for the Pursuit of Happiness. I'm an adult now. Great video,

great song. So yeah, soon enough it will be another symbol of Toronto gentrification and the hands of time surging forward and here we all are getting older. Remember the fact that this was once a spot on Queen Street, right? Queen West.

I mean, this is we're talking about back in the era of the Silver Snail comic book shop, right? And Pages Bookstore that was right nearby. All sorts of bookstores along that strip. And I think that neighborhood has lost a lot of its luster, right? Back when it served as like the setting for much music, it was like the place where everything was happening in Toronto. Things moved a lot further west down Queen Street and that area's a lot sleepier than it used to be, right? The club district around there mostly got taken over by condos. And the Pursuit of Happiness parking lot

will soon be a mountain equipment co-op store. We can all point to it and talk about the ghost of what used to be there before. Another reason I need to make sure that that quick drop at the blockbuster is saved. You just reminded me, I've got to keep fighting that good fight. A&W is opening in the Junction. Did that open yet?

Yeah, it already opened. And I think that was a source of some hilarity, especially on Twitter, right? Because they set up this A&W with the neon signs and everything in this place. Campbell Block. Like, are you familiar with it? In the neon signs and everything in this place. Campbell Block. Are you familiar with it? In the junction, it's kind of like the gateway to the whole neighborhood there.

Dundas and Kiel? Dundas and Kiel. For 40 years, it was super submarine. That was independent, sub shop. And it was the kind of place that gave the neighborhood its charm. This whole idea that here was an authentic artisanal Toronto neighborhood experience.

I can't tell you how familiar, because I went to school at St. Cecilia's for a while, which is kind of like running me in a net, I want to say. But tonight, my son's playing hockey at George Bell Arena, which is right there in the junction. But I know this place super well. They had the Canadian Tire forever,

just, I guess, a little bit north on Keele, past Dundas there. And my good friend growing up, his dad used to cut hair at a small barbershop there at Keele and Dundas. This is the old junction. So A&W is trying to start up a millennial franchise program where younger people with a modest investment can get into this whole world of fast food franchise ownership. And they chose this junction location as their first one where they could show off how the dream could still be alive of owning your

own fast food restaurant, you know, that it wasn't a relic of an era gone by. So, yeah, the fact that they were setting it up for weeks and weeks and weeks and it wasn't open, it was something of a joke. Like, you know, when is this thing ever going to happen? It was something of a joke, like, you know, when is this thing ever going to happen? You know, one guy on Twitter wanted to be the first customer there. Is that right? And he managed to get there on the opening morning, documented his consumption of an A&W meal on its first day in business. They're running slow behind the counter.

They gave him a free apple turnover. slow behind the counter. They gave him a free Apple turnover. So now, here we go. The gentrified junction where, like, six or seven years ago, people were terrified that there was going to be a Starbucks there. It was the death

of everything that the neighborhood stood for. All this authenticity was going down the drain by Starbucks moving in. But here we are in another era of Toronto detached homes costing a million dollars or more, even in these neighborhoods that used to be nobody wanted to live there.

And so A&W is seen as a symbol, a sign of how things have evolved since then. And Edward Keenan wrote a column about the Junction A&W, and he was extolling the fact that as a 24-hour fast food restaurant, it was great for the neighborhood because here were some eyes on the street. And a neighborhood that he lives in where before things got a little dark and gloomy and dangerous, all of a sudden it's gotten to the point

where there will always be somebody watching what's going on through the window of the A&W. So in that sense, what people are complaining about on social media, another Toronto neighborhood ruined by the A&W root bear in fact

has been transformed into something else. Altogether and all you artists and hippies will have to find a new part of town. If there's any part of town left where anybody can move and have that authentic experience, the purity

of no corporate fast food logos anywhere around. Are there any neighborhoods left? No, there's not. I know a Rogue Byway. If anybody wants to move an A&W in the neighborhood, we can welcome it there. So Ed Keenan, you mentioned, he lives in that neighborhood. But just off the top of my head,

because you mentioned Ed Keenan, I was thinking there are a couple of other former guests who live in that junction area, Colleen Rusholm and Siobhan Morris. So those three that I know of anyways are junctioners that appeared on Toronto Mike. Okay, and I had family that started out there in Toronto. And in fact, a family business that was in that neighborhood,

a scrapyard no longer in the family. But yeah, when I was growing up, it was not a neighborhood that you would ever want to go to. It was a place where everybody escaped from. And remember, for a long time, not quite the junction. I guess it's more stockyards. Like now they've bled out. Like the junction is now this big triangle or whatever.

But that was the stinky part of town, the stockyards. Yeah, exactly. The packing plants. What was the stockyards now? Now it's everything. A Target store that was open for four months before. Oh, my God. If you could take someone from like 30 years ago

and just drop them in that stockyards area and say, hey, look around. The smell's gone, first of all, which is amazing, and completely unrecognizable. Well, how do you think I feel? My family had real estate around there. Long gone. Long gone.

Didn't stick around long enough to cash in near that george bell arena i know that when you come out there's still like small pockets of packing plants still going on there i don't know if it's maple leaf or who's there but somebody so not like it used to be though you don't get that stench that was i remember that stench um so yeah i think for the longest time if you grew up in toronto for the most part you would not imagine hanging out around there, right? For any social reason. No, you're right. You didn't know anybody there.

Unless you were Maltese, because that's where you got your pastizzi, at the Malta Bake Shop, across from Malta Park. And as my Maltese friend growing up would tell me, that is the Maltese neighborhood, Dundas and Kiel. That is where the Maltese neighborhood, Dundas and Kiel. That is like where the Maltese gathered. Okay, so as the city keeps getting bigger, you know, these areas that we didn't give much thought to even 10 years ago are now considered like a cornerstone of what's going on here. And if you get pastitsis, get six and six.

Six with cheese, six without. That's what you got to do. Okay, real quick on the signage, and then we're going to talk about some digital things. So Sam the Record Man, I read that it's going to be resurfacing in, is that Young Dundas Square? Yeah, in the back

of Young Dundas Square, right? Toronto Public Health Building? I'm trying to think, because I know the Bell's there, right? Is that right? Is it in Rogers? Who's there now? Is it Bell Media or Rogers? No, Rogers. City TV.

Yeah. Right. Okay. So Sam the Record Man sign will be there. The Honest Ed sign will be there. Right, because Mirvish is saving that. And breaking news today, Shopper's Drug Mart will be there. So, you know, the Hard Rock Cafe.

Wait, wait, wait. Time out. What do you mean Shopper's Drug Mart is moving into the Young Dundas Square? The Hard Rock Cafe, right? Situated just south of Dundas on Young. Yeah. Its lease is expiring. And it has a new tenant, Galen Weston Jr.

And Shopper's Drug Mart. That is breaking news. Dylan Weston Jr. and Shopper's Drug Mart. That is breaking news. And that is, by the way, they did a very, very good job preserving the Runnymede Theater, Shopper's Drug Mart.

So you want to preserve the Hard Rock Cafe? Yeah, absolutely. The jeans machine is gone though, right? They totaled that one, Young and Dundas Square. Remember the jeans machine? Rockwell, a jeans store. Yeah, a thing of the past.

But look, the rent on that Hard Rock Cafe is $2 million a year. So with its lease running out of time, I guess it was easy for somebody else to sweep in and offer to pay that much money or more to take it over. And it happens to be Shoppers Drug Mart. So cue all the groans about how this is yet another corner that's been capitalized by capitalism. There's so much there already. What do we need another Shoppers Drug Mart for?

There's already one in that 10 Dundas East building. There's already one in that 10 Dundas East building. There's already one in the Eaton Center. How many Shoppers Drug Mart does one intersection need? You can get President's Choice there now. That's what matters.

Looking on the brighter side, though, it's a big space, and if they're going to do anything interesting with the Shoppers Drug Mart that they haven't done before, just like at the Runnymede Theater

that you mentioned. Maybe they'll do it there. Maybe it will be a fantastic new Shopper's Drug Mart experience, if that's even possible. Because who went to the Hard Rock Cafe, really? It's a tourist trap. Yeah, tourist trap. They had a music venue upstairs, Club 279, I think it was called, and rock memorabilia everywhere, and an intersection that goes way back.

From what I read, they're going to find another location for the Hard Rock Cafe. They're not finished with downtown Toronto, but the real estate associated with the spot will now belong to Shoppers Drug Mart. And this was big news that Sunrise was going to go into some of the HMVs. Most of the HMVs, but not in Toronto yet. But does anybody really care? Is it going to make you more just like talking about radio and how it isn't what it used to be?

Would you suddenly take an interest in the idea that your HMV is now a sunrise? They say that they're going to be big on vinyl. Most of the music industry experts say that's kind of been a non-starter. I mean, you hear endlessly about the comeback of vinyl records. endlessly about the comeback of vinyl records. But when it comes to the bottom line and the actual number of albums that are sold, it's not all that much. It hasn't replaced all the revenue lost by CDs.

Not even close. A small fraction of a fraction of a fraction. But they're gambling on it nonetheless. I'm no businessman. I'm not a business person. But if HMV was bleeding out cash, I don't understand how the same would not be true for Sunrise. Yeah, I think they were able to get a better deal with the landlords at the malls. I mean, essentially, you know, here you have their tenant, HMV, moving out.

And here's a quick fix. We'll just have to renegotiate, make it a little bit friendlier. And I think also another factor is the music industry itself, also the movie studios, because DVDs, Blu-rays, also still a big part of that business. And in recognizing that they, you know, would not have a retail chain across the country selling what they put out, physical stores, that they were able to set up a deal

on friendlier terms with the suppliers so that, you know, they're not going to be in such a precarious situation. But then you've got a lot of people that are just saying this could never work. And another year or two, we'll be hearing the same story about Sunrise. Now, what I'm curious about is 333 Yonge Street.

That's the flagship HMV, the big one downtown, close to Yonge and Dundas there. Do you have an update? Are they still negotiating? Yeah, first they said they're not going to bother, then they said they're still negotiating. But they can't get the old Sunrise right now

because that's now a toy store. Right, that's across the street, right? That was across the street from the HMV. Because wasn't it Sam's HMV and A&A were on the one side? And I think my memory could be wrong. HMV and A&A were not co-existent. Yeah, for sure they weren't. They didn't know they weren't around at the same time?

No, no, definitely not. If they were, it wasexistent. Yeah. They didn't know they weren't around at the same time. No, no, definitely not. If they were, it was for a few months. Okay, because I have distinct... And this memory is a funny thing, this copy of a copy of a copy, but I have memories of going downtown

and, like I said, my memory could be wrong, but I remember I visited the three near Yonge-Dundas, three pretty much in a row, Sam's, HMV, and ANA. And I remember price-checking my CD of choice at all three

and then buying it at the cheapest place. Now, I have to Google this later and find out, but that's how I remember it. Okay, you'll have to find it. If ANA's and Sam's coexisted, it was for weeks, maybe, before they threw in the towel. We will find out.

I'm going to, since we're doing this guest, you can see I haven't Googled anything. Because my brain thinks it was at least a couple of years. I don't think it was a week. So let's get next episode. Okay, so just another topic

to make us feel old, even older than we already are. In these final minutes, tell me about, okay, so reminding everybody, first of all, that the newsletter 1236, you send it at 1236 every weekday. Yeah, Toronto's Daily News Burrito, 1236.

So 1236.ca allows you to sign up. And in exchange for signing up for free. Free. up for free free a daily newsletter for toronto and environs covering everything that's happening in media politics celebrity business all the twitter Rogue byways. Everything that's happening, mostly according to me, but really based on what I think people need to know about. or hunting around Reddit, or trying to figure out Facebook, trying to find anything on there that's really worth hearing. Leave it to me.

Leave it to you. I will harvest all the most important lunchtime tabloid news of every day. 1236.ca. But for the people who are on Twitter, they should follow you at 1236. I guess. Yeah, well, alas. I mean, we'll see.

It's not what it used to be. I mean, it used to get up in the morning, there would be all these sparks on Twitter, people getting in fights, arguments, right? It would be like, look, do you believe what kind of argument I was able to see going on with Twitter? But that's just fine with me because I like Twitter as a newswire, right, as a personally curated source of information.

I'm not really into participating in it as, you know, as a place for debate. you know, it's a place for debate. I don't really find the people that use Twitter to put on this, like, performative identity politics thing to be, you know, all that captivating. Most of the time, it just seems like personal train wrecks waiting to happen. So, you know, I think the faster that people give up on Twitter as a source of that kind of thing, the better. But yeah, at the same time I sort of miss the old days when you would tune in and constantly see people going at it. But a lot of that

turned out to be futile. Just a whole bunch of noise. We're not that far removed from Damano versus Warmington. Those are professional columnists. Oh, no, no, no. The people who are using Twitter

to pretend like it's how they make a living, those ones aren't going anywhere. And I encourage more creative use of Twitter. I want to see people using the medium and everything you can do with it as a way to share stories about themselves and their lives, you know, photos about their surroundings. That's what I want to see. I don't really need like a stock predictable opinion about what's happening in the world.

I don't need to read another hot take about the BBC dad. Oh, yeah, yeah. And the Filipino, not Filipino, actually. She was Korean, I think. But the Asian mom being mistaken for the nanny. Did you read all those pieces? And why do we assume that's the nanny? Because it's a white man and an Asian woman.

Yeah, so that would be the latest example. And there'll be another one by the end of this week of why maybe people should just keep opinions to themselves but they never will here's how i use twitter uh this was just i want to say it was maybe it was yesterday i was biking by the uh venue formerly known as molson amphitheater and i saw this they had removed of course the signage had already been removed but but there was scaffolding going up, and they were painting it. Clearly, the Budweiser stage signage is imminent. So I get off my bike, I take out my new Android device,

I snap a picture, and I tweet it. That's my service to the Twittersphere. Yeah, so that's what I want to see. And send all that stuff to me at 12.36. I need to know everything. I can't be everywhere, and the way things have gone this past winter, I've barely gone anywhere. So here I am covering the city,

not even leaving my own neighborhood. We'll have to change that once the winter gets over. He says during the epic snowstorm, you might be spending the night here if this snow hasn't looked outside in a while. Do another podcast tomorrow, right? That's right. Episode 234.

And that brings us to the end of our 224th show. Oh, I got the number wrong. I told you this Daylight Savings Time. Forget everything I said. You can follow me on Twitter at Toronto Mike. And Mark is at 1236 and our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at

Great Lakes Beer and Chef's Plate is at Chef's Plate CA see you all well I was going to say see you all next week but I'll see you all in a couple of days with Carly Agro. I know it's true, yeah. I know it's true. How about you?

While they're picking up trash and they're putting down roads. And they're brokering stocks, the class struggle explodes. And I'll play this guitar just the best.