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The Chronicle of Higher Education – “Every day, critics of the American president decry his penchant for “false or misleading claims,” while he and his supporters fire back with accusations of “fake news.” It’s no wonder those of us who teach are worried more than ever about information literacy. The flourishing of misperceptions makes it …
The Verge – The open-source program is designed for security researchers: “Today, researchers at Trustwave released a new open-source tool called Social Mapper, which uses facial recognition to track subjects across social media networks. Designed for security researchers performing social engineering attacks, the system automatically locates profiles on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other networks …
A decade of digital dependency – 02 August 2018 – “Most people in the UK are dependent on their digital devices and need a constant connection to the internet, according to research published today by Ofcom… Ofcom’s Communications Market Report is our most comprehensive study of how communications services in the UK are changing. This …
Via Haggard Hawks – “In the late 1500s, the English printer Henry Denham proposed using a reverse question mark, ⸮, called a PERCONTATION POINT to indicate that a question was rhetorical and so didn’t require an answer.” So – just an idea – how about we use this as a standard response rather than reacting …
The Atlantic: “”Why We Forget Most of the Books We Read” This has applications beyond books — it applies to TV, too, and for that matter, email newsletters. Ask me at 4 P.M. what I emailed out that morning and it’s a 50/50 proposition whether I’ll remember. The good news: that’s pretty normal, and arguably …
Reporters Without Borders: “In a report published today, entitled “Online harassment of journalists: the trolls attack”, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) voices concern about the scale of a new threat to press freedom, the mass harassment of journalists online. The perpetrators may be ordinary “haters” (individuals or communities of individuals hiding behind their screens) or “troll …
The New York Times: “For years, President Trump has used Twitter as his go-to public relations weapon, mounting a barrage of attacks on celebrities and then political rivals even after advisers warned he could be creating legal problems for himself. Those concerns now turn out to be well founded. The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller …
Pew Research Center – Favorable views of FBI have fallen sharply among Republicans – A new survey of public attitudes toward federal agencies finds that partisan differences in views of the FBI have increased markedly over the past year. And Americans’ opinions about Immigration and Customs Enforcement are deeply polarized: 72% of Republicans view ICE …
EurekAlert: “People are either Facebook users or they are not. Facebook user data can be used to draw conclusions about general social phenomena. According to Eric P.S. Baumer, who studies human-computer interaction, the simple statements above are, in fact, not so simple–nor are they true. Baumer’s new research takes a fine-grained look at Facebook use …
About half of Google’s workers are contractors who don’t receive the same benefits as direct employees – “Every day, tens of thousands of people stream into Google offices wearing red name badges. They eat in Google’s cafeterias, ride its commuter shuttles and work alongside its celebrated geeks. But they can’t access all of the company’s celebrated …
Lazy, not biased: Susceptibility to partisan fake news is better explained by lack of reasoning than by motivated reasoning. Gordon Pennycook and David G. Rand. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2018.06.011. Cognition. Available online 20 June 2018 [paywall – but Table of Contents, Abstract, Figures and Supplementary Data are available at no fee] Participants rated perceived accuracy of fake and …
Poynter: “YouTube will be surfacing authoritative sources in search results during breaking news in order to push out the regular dribble of conspiracy theories, but defining “authoritative” might be tricky. WhatsApp is now labeling forwarded messages and working with fact-checkers and researchers, but will it be enough to limit the spread of viral rumors? Facebook launched its data-sharing partnership with academics, but will …
