TechCrunch: LinkedIn adds Microsoft-powered translations and QR codes to connect more of its users faster. “LinkedIn — the social network with more than 560 million members who connect around work-related topics and job-seeking — continues to add more features, integrating technology from its new owner Microsoft, both to improve engagement on LinkedIn as well as to create deeper data ties between the two businesses.”
Monthly Archives: June 2018
New America: How We Can ‘Free’ Our Facebook Friends
New America: How We Can ‘Free’ Our Facebook Friends. “In the wake of the recent privacy controversy over Facebook and Cambridge Analytica, internet users and policymakers have had a lot of questions on the topic of ‘data portability’: Is my social network data really mine? Can I take it with me to another platform if I’m unhappy with Facebook? What does the new European privacy law, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), demand in terms of my being able to export my data? What even counts as my data that I should be able to download or share, and as my friends’ data that I shouldn’t?”
More than a magic electoral map: How Politico plans its (open source) Slack chats during the midterms (Nieman Lab)
Nieman Lab: More than a magic electoral map: How Politico plans its (open source) Slack chats during the midterms. “FiveThirtyEight fans can read its Slack-like conversations, adding statistical context to current events since 2015 (which political party would be more likely to survive the apocalypse, for example). The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and others have been orchestrating similar chats since then, too. But if you’re a local political diehard just trying to follow along with the experts on an election night — and you don’t want John King’s Magic Wall on CNN or local TV reporters reporting from hyped watch parties — Politico’s Slack chat set up could be just the ticket.”
Emory University: Preserving the Apollo 15 Flight Data Logs
Emory University: Preserving the Apollo 15 Flight Data Logs. “In 2017, Emory University took the unique opportunity to create a digital learning hub centering around the Apollo Space Program. Emory Library and Information Technology Services borrowed materials from the 1971 Apollo 15 mission (NASA’s fourth manned mission to the moon) to use in creating an interactive website featuring the digital archives from the mission.”
MakeUseOf: 5 Google News Alternatives That’ll Change How You Read News
MakeUseOf: 5 Google News Alternatives That’ll Change How You Read News. “For most of us, Google News remains one of the main ways we find out what is happening. But even with the new changes in Google News, it raises many of the old issues. Over the years, publications have gotten only better at gaming Google’s algorithms, and it’s only a matter of time before they trick the new Google News.”
Gizmodo: Quiz App Left 120 Million Facebook Users’ Data Exposed as Recently as Last Month
Gizmodo: Quiz App Left 120 Million Facebook Users’ Data Exposed as Recently as Last Month. “Facebook’s race to prove it’s a good and trustworthy company over the last few months kicked off when it was revealed that a quiz app sold user data to a political firm. Now, a different quiz app is getting some heat. A researcher discovered that a third-party app called NameTests left the data of 120 million Facebook users exposed to anyone who happened to find it.”
Ars Technica: Facebook patent would turn your mic on to analyze how you watch ads
Ars Technica: Facebook patent would turn your mic on to analyze how you watch ads. “As Facebook tries to get ahead of public pressure about what the service does and doesn’t track about its users, a patent application has emerged which would enable something that the service’s detractors have long theorized and feared: silently triggered microphones that keep tabs on Facebook users.”
TechCrunch: Twitter launches its Ads Transparency Center, where you can see ads bought by any account
TechCrunch: Twitter launches its Ads Transparency Center, where you can see ads bought by any account . “Twitter says that with this tool, you should be able to search for any Twitter handle and bring up all the ad campaigns from that account that have run for the past seven days. For political advertisers in the U.S., there will be additional data, including information around billing, ad spend, impressions per tweet and demographic targeting.”
Gulf News: The past will be the future
Gulf News: The past will be the future. “[Yusuf] Shegow is the founder of Somali Architecture, a project that digitally recreates buildings and monuments from Mogadishu’s pre-war age, presenting a positive vision of a city that was once a flourishing economic and cultural capital — and could be again. Their work includes an ambitious set of 3D digital models of prominent buildings now largely destroyed, created by Shegow after years of archival research.”
Washington Post: Inside Facebook and Twitter’s secret meetings with Trump aides and conservative leaders who say tech is biased
Washington Post: Inside Facebook and Twitter’s secret meetings with Trump aides and conservative leaders who say tech is biased. “Twitter and Facebook are scrambling to assuage conservative leaders who have sounded alarms — and sought to rile voters — with accusations that the country’s tech giants are censoring right-leaning posts, tweets and news. From secret dinners with conservative media elite to private meetings with the Republican National Committee, the new outreach reflects tech giants’ delicate task: satisfying a party in power while defending online platforms against attacks that threaten to undermine the public’s trust in the Web.”
CNET: 500px photo site abandons freely shareable images with commercialization push
CNET: 500px photo site abandons freely shareable images with commercialization push. “500px, a photo-sharing community that’s been transforming into an image-licensing business, has backed away from a framework that let people freely share their photos with others. On an FAQ website, the company said it’s disabling the ability for people to upload or download photos shared under Creative Commons licenses.”
Merry Jane: Senate Committee Approves $500,000 in Funding for National Database of Hemp Genetics
Merry Jane: Senate Committee Approves $500,000 in Funding for National Database of Hemp Genetics. “If a handful of U.S. Senators have their way, a treasure trove of cannabis seeds could soon be on its way to the federal government. According to a report from cannabis advocate and Forbes contributor Tom Angell, the Senate Appropriations Committee voted late last week to advance a funding plan for a national database of hemp genetics, hoping to house a stockpile of the controversial plant in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Plant Genetics Research Unit in Columbia, Missouri.”
University of California: Thank Instagram and Snapchat for your fading memories
University of California: Thank Instagram and Snapchat for your fading memories. “How much do you value your memories? Enough to forego that next amazing Instagram pic Research by UC Santa Cruz doctoral student Julia Soares has found compelling evidence that the act of taking a photograph impairs people’s memories of the event.”
Ars Technica: Google researchers created an amazing scene-rendering AI
Ars Technica: Google researchers created an amazing scene-rendering AI. “New research from Google’s UK-based DeepMind subsidiary demonstrates that deep neural networks have a remarkable capacity to understand a scene, represent it in a compact format, and then ‘imagine’ what the same scene would look like from a perspective the network hasn’t seen before.”
Reuters: Uganda telecom operators to start charging social media tax
Reuters: Uganda telecom operators to start charging social media tax. “Uganda’s major telecom operators, including the local division of South Africa’s MTN Group, said they will ask customers to pay a new government tax on social media accounts before they can access them. Last month, Uganda’s parliament passed new laws that introduced a new tax on use of so called Over The Top (OTT) services: communications platforms offered over the traditional telecom networks.”