Category «Social Media»

Donor List Suggests Scale of Trump’s Pay-for-Access Operation

The New York Times – gift article – “…A new disclosure shows how corporations and individuals, including many in the crypto business, wrote big checks while seeking favor from the president…Since Mr. Trump’s election last fall, fund-raisers and lobbyists have been steering corporations and donors to a buffet of options for unlimited giving, some of …

Subjects: Cryptocurrency, Economy, Financial System, Government Documents, Legal Research, Social Media

Substack Is Where Writers Go to Be Weird

Vulture [no paywall] “It has become the premier destination for literary types’ unpublished musings. What is an author without an editor? Look to Substack for your answer. You’ll find the novelist Garth Greenwell reflecting on a single paragraph from James Baldwin’s Another Country for 3,500 words; Fuccboi author Sean Thor Conroe on “why Faulkner is …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Free Speech, Internet, Social Media

Why Smart People Fall for False Information and What to do About It

UCSF – “In a post-truth world, this false belief researcher offers a simple three-step recipe for building trust and finding common ground. Hint: It starts by recognizing you might be wrong. America has a misinformation problem. It’s in our news feeds, on our social media timelines, and at our kitchen tables. It’s driving wedges between …

Subjects: AI, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines, Social Media

Online Monitoring Program is Expanding Behind the Scenes

Reddit/privacy: “You do not have to be famous or break any laws to end up under digital watch. New reports confirm that a US agency is expanding its contracts with private firms to quietly track internet activity. This includes what you post, what you like, what you share, and even how you express emotion. The …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, E-Records, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Privacy, Social Media

Extreme Weather Disinformation Reporting

“How a storm of false and misleading claims about extreme weather events spread unchecked on social media putting lives at risk CCDH’s new research shows that social media companies are letting falsehoods about extreme weather events like the LA Fires and Hurricane Helene spread unchecked on their platforms. CCDH found that X, YouTube, and Meta …

Subjects: Climate Change, Environmental Law, Internet, Knowledge Management, Social Media

OSINT tools and techniques for research on Reddit

OSINTMe – “Reddit remains to be a useful source of intelligence for OSINT professionals and enthusiasts, given the presence of unfiltered user content and niche communities. Obviously, the contrast between “normal” user interactions and AI-generated slop on social media in general is what makes Reddit stand out. At the same time, Reddit communities often host …

Subjects: Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines, Social Media

What is AI Reading – Report by Muck Rack

Muck Rack Complete Report – Snipped from Executive Summary • Citations affect responses: Simply enabling or disabling the ability for AI to search the web drastically modifies responses, indicating that the systems are truly basing their responses on the cited works. • Journalism and earned media are important drivers: More than 95% of links cited …

Subjects: AI, Copyright, E-Commerce, E-Government, Education, Government Documents, Intellectual Property, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines, Social Media

New ICE mobile app pushes biometric policing onto American streets

BiometricUpdate.com: “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has quietly deployed a new surveillance tool in its Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) arsenal – a smartphone app known as Mobile Fortify. Designed for ICE field agents, the app enables real-time biometric identity verification using facial recognition or contactless fingerprints. Based on leaked emails reported by 404 Media, the …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, E-Government, E-Mail, E-Records, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Privacy, Social Media

Here’s the list of websites gig workers used to fine-tune Anthropic’s AI models

Business Insider – Its contractor left it wide open. “An internal spreadsheet obtained by Business Insider shows which websites Surge AI gig workers were told to mine — and which to avoid — while fine-tuning Anthropic’s AI to make it sound more “helpful, honest, and harmless.” The spreadsheet allows sources like Bloomberg, Harvard University, and …

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Education, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Social Media

Extreme Weather

“Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCHD) How a storm of false and misleading claims about extreme weather events spread unchecked on social media putting lives at risk. CCDH’s new research shows that social media companies are letting falsehoods about extreme weather events like the LA Fires and Hurricane Helene spread unchecked on their platforms. CCDH …

Subjects: Climate Change, Environmental Law, Internet, Social Media