Hawaii Governor: Who Owns This Land? New DLNR Website Has Some Answers. “A new tool available for the first time to anyone who wants to know about state- and county-owned lands in Hawai‘i was launched recently by the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.”
Lifehacker: All the Information You Need to Vote in the 2018 Midterm Elections. “Midterm elections are on November 6th—are you registered? If you’re not sure, you can check here. And if you’re not, or you need to re-register, don’t worry: You still have time in every single state to register and/or plan if you need to submit an absentee ballot for the Midterms.”
Engadget: Facebook will never be completely secure. “Facebook has come a long way since one person could actively manage it from a dorm room. Aaron Chiu, a software engineer for Facebook, noted on Quora that as of five years ago, core Facebook was made up of 62 million lines of code. A codebase that complex requires a great many stewards and the service has only grown more sophisticated since then. More moving parts means more things that could potentially go awry, but the service’s growing complexity means it’s highly unlikely the company will ever be able to completely secure its products.”
BetaNews: Tim Berners-Lee launches open source project Solid to decentralize the web and place users in control of data. “Tim Berners-Lee is famous for inventing the world wide web, and now he’s ready to take things to the next level with an ambitious open source project called Solid. Noting that the web has become ‘an engine of inequity and division’, Berners-Lee wants to restore the power and agency of individuals online and move the balance of power away from ‘powerful forces who use it for their own agendas’.”
Civic Media: Twitter suspended me for tweeting feminist academic research. Here’s why that’s a problem.. “This morning, I did what I always, lamentably, do, which is wake up and check Twitter. I noticed that the account for MIT, where I work as an admissions officer and research affiliate, had tweeted a story about Math Prize for Girls, an annual competition, hosted on campus last weekend, for women with an affinity for STEM. I’m a longtime fan and supporter of Math Prize. In fact, I had spoken at the competition, giving a talk about applying to MIT (and colleges in general) as a mathematically inclined women. As part of that talk, I mentioned that research has shown the gendering of science to be a historical, not a natural, phenomenon.”
BuzzFeed News: Facebook Just Met With Reps From Myanmar, The Philippines, And Sri Lanka To Discuss Its Global Misinformation Problem. “Facebook last week held a two-day meeting with academics, researchers, and civil society organizations from Myanmar, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and elsewhere to discuss misinformation and propaganda, three sources told BuzzFeed News.”
CNET: Reddit adds appeals process to offensive-subreddit Quarantine policy. “It’s been a few years since Reddit instituted its Quarantine policy, which added an opt-in click to view subreddits deemed offensive. Now the company has added a major update to it: an appeals process for the flagged-subreddit moderators.”
Arab News: Saudi national library of film-shooting sites launched. “The General Authority for Culture, represented by the Saudi Film Council, has launched the first national library of film-shooting sites in the Kingdom.”
TechCrunch: US government loses bid to force Facebook to wiretap Messenger calls . “US government investigators have lost a case to force Facebook to wiretap calls made over its Messenger app. A joint federal and state law enforcement effort investigating the MS-13 gang had pushed a district court to hold the social networking giant in contempt of court for refusing to permit real-time listening in on voice calls.”
Search Engine Journal: Instagram Brings Notifications to Web Browsers. “Instagram has added notifications to the web-based version of its app. Those who use Instagram on web browsers will now receive (almost) all the same notifications that are sent on the native mobile app.”
Techdirt: Louisiana’s Attorney General Wants To Break Up Google Over ‘Bias’. “The latest in this ridiculous political fight over the claimed, but not proven, ‘political bias’ found in search results and social media is that Louisiana’s Attorney General says we should break up the big internet companies because of it.”
CTV News: With grid now crowdsourced, digital maps can steer you wrong. “For centuries, people have relied on maps to figure out where they are and where they’re going. But today’s digital maps — seemingly more precise than ever –aren’t always as dependable as they appear.”
MakeUseOf: The 12 Best Udemy Courses for Blockchain and Cryptocurrency. “It doesn’t matter whether you’re a cryptocurrency newbie or a blockchain expert, there’s always something new to learn. Udemy courses are one of the best ways to grow your knowledge in any area, and crypto is no different. If you’d like to expand your horizons, check out these 12 Udemy courses for blockchain and cryptocurrency.”
Search Engine Journal: Google Confirms An Algorithm Update Occurred This Week. “SEOs and site owners are seeing significant spikes and drops in traffic. The most common theme seems to be sites that got hit by the August core algorithm update are now making a recovery.”
TechCrunch: Until data is misused, Facebook’s breach will be forgotten . “The social network’s engineering was sloppy, allowing three bugs to be combined to steal the access tokens of 50 million people. In pursuit of rapid growth at affordable efficiency, Facebook failed to protect its users. This assessment doesn’t discount that. Facebook screwed up big time. But despite the potential that those access tokens could have let the attackers take over user accounts, act as them, and scrape their personal info, it’s unclear how much users really care. That’s because for now, Facebook and it’s watchdogs aren’t sure exactly what data was stolen or how it was wrongly used.”
