Man arrested following intense vehicle pursuit; accused of shooting into pregnant girlfriend’s homeVehicle pursuit in Charlotte County ends in crash
Man arrested following intense vehicle pursuit; accused of shooting into pregnant girlfriend’s home The Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office arrested a man accused of shooting into his pregnant girlfriend’s home and leading law enforcement through a multi-county pursuit.
Vehicle pursuit in Charlotte County ends in crash A pursuit between the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office and a vehicle on Interstate 75 ended in a crash.
Red tide looms off Southwest Florida coastline Beware of the beach! Red tide is making its way towards Southwest Florida once again.
FORT MYERS BEACH $1.2 million approved for repairs for FMB and Sanibel schools This hurricane season left an expensive mess at Fort Myers Beach Elementary and the Sanibel school, but who’s paying the $1.2 million price tag?
FORT MYERS Teen carjacks woman after escaping mental health facility A teenager accused of carjacking a woman in a church parking lot on Friday had just escaped from a facility where he was being held under the Baker Act, according to the Lee County Sheriff’s Office.
Teachers union raises issues with Lee County School District after arbitration Being a teacher is just like any other profession. Teachers need to take days off, get sick, and sometimes cover for co-workers.
LABELLE LaBelle Animal Shelter hoping to raise money to avoid property being sold The owner of Animal Rescue Inc. in LaBelle is doing everything she can to prevent the shelter from disappearing in a matter of months.
County settlement allows Links of Naples golf course to redevelop into homes Collier County residents are vocalizing their concerns over the commissioner’s decision to develop housing on the Naples Golf Course.
FORT MYERS Fort Myers mayor weighs in on possible city hall relocation With Lee Memorial Hospital scheduled to close in 2027, discussions over what will replace the building are in full swing and whether Fort Myers City Hall is the right choice.
Toys for Tots: A 77-Year tradition of service and holiday cheer Toys for Tots aims to bring gifts to children and their families who may not be able to afford them for the holidays.
Inside the mind of accused CEO gunman WINK News is learning more about the man accused of shooting and killing a health insurance CEO on a New York City sidewalk last week, and breaking down what he may think of himself based on the writings he left behind.
1 dead after crash on Airport-Pulling Road in Collier County The Florida Highway Patrol is investigating a fatal crash involving a sedan and pick-up truck that occurred near Airport Pulling Road.
bonita springs Prostate cancer treatment aims to freeze further development When it comes to cancer treatment, several options come to mind, such as chemotherapy, surgery, and or radiation; however, there is another option that may prove to be as effective.
FORT MYERS Fort Myers man convicted of sexually assaulting teenager A Fort Myers man has been convicted of several charges, including the sexual assault of a 17-year-old teenager.
Red tide advisory issued for Clam Pass and Barefoot Beach The Florida Department of Health issued a red tide advisory after presence of the algae bloom was found near Clam Pass and Barefoot Beach in Collier County.
Man arrested following intense vehicle pursuit; accused of shooting into pregnant girlfriend’s home The Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office arrested a man accused of shooting into his pregnant girlfriend’s home and leading law enforcement through a multi-county pursuit.
Vehicle pursuit in Charlotte County ends in crash A pursuit between the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office and a vehicle on Interstate 75 ended in a crash.
Red tide looms off Southwest Florida coastline Beware of the beach! Red tide is making its way towards Southwest Florida once again.
FORT MYERS BEACH $1.2 million approved for repairs for FMB and Sanibel schools This hurricane season left an expensive mess at Fort Myers Beach Elementary and the Sanibel school, but who’s paying the $1.2 million price tag?
FORT MYERS Teen carjacks woman after escaping mental health facility A teenager accused of carjacking a woman in a church parking lot on Friday had just escaped from a facility where he was being held under the Baker Act, according to the Lee County Sheriff’s Office.
Teachers union raises issues with Lee County School District after arbitration Being a teacher is just like any other profession. Teachers need to take days off, get sick, and sometimes cover for co-workers.
LABELLE LaBelle Animal Shelter hoping to raise money to avoid property being sold The owner of Animal Rescue Inc. in LaBelle is doing everything she can to prevent the shelter from disappearing in a matter of months.
County settlement allows Links of Naples golf course to redevelop into homes Collier County residents are vocalizing their concerns over the commissioner’s decision to develop housing on the Naples Golf Course.
FORT MYERS Fort Myers mayor weighs in on possible city hall relocation With Lee Memorial Hospital scheduled to close in 2027, discussions over what will replace the building are in full swing and whether Fort Myers City Hall is the right choice.
Toys for Tots: A 77-Year tradition of service and holiday cheer Toys for Tots aims to bring gifts to children and their families who may not be able to afford them for the holidays.
Inside the mind of accused CEO gunman WINK News is learning more about the man accused of shooting and killing a health insurance CEO on a New York City sidewalk last week, and breaking down what he may think of himself based on the writings he left behind.
1 dead after crash on Airport-Pulling Road in Collier County The Florida Highway Patrol is investigating a fatal crash involving a sedan and pick-up truck that occurred near Airport Pulling Road.
bonita springs Prostate cancer treatment aims to freeze further development When it comes to cancer treatment, several options come to mind, such as chemotherapy, surgery, and or radiation; however, there is another option that may prove to be as effective.
FORT MYERS Fort Myers man convicted of sexually assaulting teenager A Fort Myers man has been convicted of several charges, including the sexual assault of a 17-year-old teenager.
Red tide advisory issued for Clam Pass and Barefoot Beach The Florida Department of Health issued a red tide advisory after presence of the algae bloom was found near Clam Pass and Barefoot Beach in Collier County.
This Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2020 photo shows the icon for TikTok taken in New York. From the perspective of teens flooding onto TikTok, the Chinese-owned online video app is a major new outlet for self-expression, one proudly home to the silly, the loud and the weird. To others, though, the service is an unnerving black box that could be sharing information with the Chinese government, facilitating espionage, or just promoting videos and songs some parents consider lewd. (AP Photo) From the perspective of teens, TikTok is a major new outlet for self-expression, one proudly home to the silly, the loud and the weird. To others, the Chinese-owned online video service is an unnerving black box that could be sharing information with the Chinese government, facilitating espionage, or just promoting videos and songs some parents consider lewd. (TikTok denies the first two concerns and says it’s working on the third.) Welcome to the bifurcated world of TikTok, an emerging social-media powerhouse that lets users create and share short videos, many no longer than 15 seconds. “That’s where the Gen Z party is,” says Kory Marchisotto, chief marketer for e.l.f. Cosmetics. “That’s where they’re all hanging out.” There’s little doubt that TikTok users find it irresistible. But TikTok is also the subject of a U.S. national-security review and a Pentagon ban. U.S. lawmakers are worried about national security and censorship risks posed by TikTok’s Chinese ownership. TikTok draws so much attention because it’s the first China-owned social-media service to make serious inroads in the West. It’s a smash in the U.S. and other countries, attracting celebrities and companies eager to reach kids and young adults disconnected from traditional media. The NFL has an account. So do Chipotle, Reese Witherspoon, and The Washington Post. The U.S. Army previously used it to recruit soldiers. People have downloaded TikTok 1.65 billion times, the analysis firm Sensor Tower estimates. In 2019, it was the second-most downloaded app in the Apple and Google app stores, trailing only WhatsApp. Research firm eMarketer estimates that TikTok roughly doubled its U.S. user base to 37.2 million in 2019. To many users, what’s special is TikTok’s goofiness and sense of genuine fun. To use, just download the app and start swiping through videos. You don’t have to friend anyone or search for anything to watch. If you don’t go looking for it, you might not ever come across angry political discussions, much less envy-generating vacation shots from friends. Instead, you’ll likely to encounter a barrage of funny, meme-y videos from total strangers that TikTok spools up for you, personalizing the feed as you go. Politics, of course, is still there; so is the social-media plague of misinformation. TikTok says it prohibits harmful misinformation. TikTok makes money from ads, and sometimes the campaigns aren’t readily identifiable as ads. Companies can start hashtag-based “challenges” that invite users to participate by posting their own videos, often incorporating a particular dance or dance move. E.l.f. Cosmetics’ “eyeslipsface” campaign, for example, had people wink and purse their lips to go with the lyrics of an original song. Users created 3 million videos, with 4 billion views. The service has helped launch musical stars like Lil Nas X, whose “Old Town Road” is the longest-running No. 1 song in the history of Billboard’s charts. There are pranksters, funny skits, behind-the-scenes of fast-food operations and “glow-ups” — before-and-after shots of someone making themselves look cuter. Some are more random: Kim Kardashian cooking parodies? Some users say TikTok is more authentic than the self-consciously pretty and polished Instagram. Emilie Richer, a 19-year-old from Simcoe, Ontario, says she uses Instagram for “photos that look nice, or the good things I’m doing” and TikTok to “get loose, make jokes, pull pranks and stuff, dress up weird.” A TikTok video of Richer catching a pickle thrown into her mouth went viral in November. A Chinese startup, ByteDance, launched TikTok internationally over two years ago. It then bought Musical.ly, another Chinese video service popular with teens in the U.S. and Europe. ByteDance combined the two, but kept TikTok separate from a twin service called Douyin, which it offers only in China. Until recently, Chinese social media services, built in a country hemmed in by censorship, have largely been confined to a domestic audience. TikTok’s rise, fueled in part by ads on Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat, has in turn shaken those U.S. services. The company behind Snapchat started listing TikTok as a competitor in 2019. Facebook, which famously copies features of its rivals, launched a knockoff called Lasso in 2018 and added TikTok-ian video-editing features to Instagram. Beyond rivalries, concerns range from the sexual nature of some videos to censorship by China’s communist government. India and Indonesia temporarily banned TikTok because of worries about children. Anastasia Basil, a Los Angeles writer whose children are 10 and 12, says she was upset by the explicit lyrics in songs and “extremes of sexualized content” she saw. Her 10-year-old’s best friend loves TikTok, she says; she told the friend’s mother not to let Basil’s daughter use it during sleepovers. TikTok is working hard to ensure that it’s a “safe and positive environment,” says Kudzi Chikumbu, the company’s head of creator partnerships. TikTok has fleshed out its community guidelines on what’s allowed. It offers a restricted mode for inappropriate content and limited accounts for under-13 users, although it doesn’t verify ages. Last year, the company agreed to a $5.7 million U.S fine over collecting personal information from kids under 13. The company says it deletes “wrongly created” accounts, such as those of underage users with fake birthdates, when they’re reported by other users. But many security experts worry about the information sucked up by the service. People’s social connections, biometric data and interests that would be useful to an advertiser could also assist a hostile government in cultivating spies or tracking dissidents, says John Dermody, a former official with the National Security Council and Department of Homeland Security. These national-security worries parallel a broader U.S. security crackdown on Chinese companies and President Donald Trump’s trade war with China. A U.S. national-security agency is reviewing ByteDance’s Musical.ly deal, while the Army, Navy and Marine Corps recently banned service members and personnel from installing TikTok on government-issued phones. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has criticized TikTok for allegedly censoring protests. Newsreports have asserted that TikTok has banned videos and topics in line with Beijing’s own censorship rules. TikTok now insists that it doesn’t do so, nor would it even if the Chinese government asked it to. As for spying, the company denies it and says it stores U.S. user data in the U.S. and Singapore, not China. Not everyone buys that. The Chinese government “can exert a fair amount of soft pressure” and get what it wants, says Chris Calabrese of the U.S. tech watchdog group Center for Democracy & Technology. AP Business Writer Joe McDonald in Beijing and AP Technology Writer Matt O’Brien in Providence, Rhode Island, contributed to this report.