🌍 Tragedy in Thailand

Good morning, Quartz readers!

Here’s what you need to know

A gun and knife rampage in Thailand left at least 36 dead. An ex-police officer attacked a daycare center, killing 24 children in one of the nation’s deadliest incidents of its kind.

The European Political Community held its first summit. French president Emmanuel Macron is the architect behind the new political club of 44 countries whose goals are yet to be defined.

Swedish investigators found the Nord Stream pipelines were damaged by detonations. Evidence from the site may open the door to prosecution. Meanwhile, this winter UK households could face three-hour-long power cuts due to natural gas shortages, a problem developing countries are already facing.

The World Bank lowered its GDP forecast for India. June’s estimate of 7.5% growth was dropped to 6.5%.

Kenya’s Safaricom mobile network launched in Ethiopia. The private telecoms company plans to offer its mobile money service to Africa’s second-most populous country in the coming months.

Hong Kong’s pension fund reported a record loss. The Mandatory Provident Fund shrank by $32.98 billion over the past nine months.

Annie Ernaux won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature. The French author and feminist icon has written mostly autobiographical works on topics including gender, class, and race.

What to watch for

TwitchCon, the annual convention for Amazon’s live streaming platform Twitch, is kicking off today (Oct. 7) in San Diego, California. The sold-out event will feature an esports tournament, meet and greets with streamers, and IRL meetups for community members. While the event will, in fact, be all fun and games, the real competition is heating up in the livestreaming space.

Twitch continues to dominate the market, having racked up 5.64 billion hours of live streaming in the second quarter this year. But a gambling scandal, reports about child abuse on the platform, and a decision to cut ad revenue for the site’s biggest stars has rocked the waters in recent weeks. In an attempt to retain talent, the company has waived exclusivity rights on its partners. But for Twitch streamers, unionization may be on the horizon.

Meanwhile, YouTube has managed to poach some of Twitch’s top personalities in the past year, and Meta has its own live streaming ambitions in the works with a new platform called Super.

Will an Elon Musk Twitter have a different name?

Pop quiz: What do you think Elon Musk’s favorite letter is? Let’s review some of his naming choices in the past:

🚗 Tesla’s Model X

👶 X Æ A-12

Musk plans to buy Twitter for $44 billion appear to be back on, so, you guessed it, the Gen Xer is tweeting about it again. “Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app,” he wrote on Oct. 4. Musk has been obsessed with the X.com domain since at least 1999 when it launched as an online banking services platform later renamed PayPal.

After his Twitter acquisition process stalled in August, Musk mentioned hauling X.com out of dormancy and turning it into a new social media platform. Now that the deal’s in motion again, he’s making noise, mostly in recently released text messages, about how Twitter will become this “everything app,” whatever that may be. It’ll likely be years, if ever, before the X revolution though, so don’t go trying to work it into your lexicon just yet.

Consider the Maine lobster

In September, the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch—an organization that monitors the environmental impact of seafood—downgraded the American lobster to its red list, which advises consumers to avoid them, as “they’re caught or farmed in ways that harm other marine life or the environment.”

American lobsters—also known as Maine lobsters—have a history of being sustainably harvested to help maintain a healthy population. But sustainability is about more than just the depletion of a given species, and Maine lobster practices are, literally, tangling with whale migration. Michelle Cheng explains how the Maine lobster issue demonstrates just how tricky it is to get sustainability right.

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Surprising discoveries

Parrot heists are on the rise. Keep an eye on Polly, she could fetch a pretty penny with these pandemic prices.

Egypt has called on the British (again) to return the Rosetta Stone. The stolen slab was, after all, deciphered 200 years ago.

There’s a mint chocolate craze going on in South Korea. Everything from burgers to fried chicken is getting the “mint choco” treatment.

Christie’s and Highsnobiety made some tone-deaf merch. With a price tag of $125, the “Art Handler” crew neck didn’t seem cool to actual auction handlers, who report they’re overworked and underpaid.

Monks invented the standing desk (well, sort of). Find out more in the first episode of our newly launched podcast, Work Reconsidered!

🎧 Listen on: Apple Podcasts | Google | Spotify | Stitcher 

Our best wishes for a productive day. Send any news, comments, legally-obtained parrots, and vibey merch to [email protected]. Reader support makes Quartz available to all—become a member. Today’s Daily Brief was brought to you by Susan Howson, Adario Strange, Michelle Cheng, and Julia Malleck.