Wednesday, March 10, 2021

Wednesday CoronaBuzz, March 10, 2021: 30 pointers to updates, useful stuff, research news, and more.

Wednesday CoronaBuzz, March 10, 2021: 30 pointers to updates, useful stuff, research news, and more.
By ResearchBuzz

Please wear a mask (or even two). Wash your hands. Stay at home if you can. Please be careful. I love you.

NEW RESOURCES – STATE-SPECIFIC

News Center Maine: Maine DHHS now offering free transportation to Mainers who need rides to COVID-19 vaccine clinics. “Maine DHHS is partnering with ModivCare, one of the organizations that coordinates rides for MaineCare members, to provide rides for any Maine resident who is unable to drive, lacks reliable transportation or is otherwise unable to travel to their appointment.”

NEW RESOURCES – OTHER

Poynter: Newsrooms in Philly help people say goodbye to those lost to the coronavirus. “On Wednesday, Resolve Philly and 20 partner newsrooms launched a site meant to give people something the coronavirus pandemic took from a lot of us — the chance to say goodbye. With love: Messages to those lost to COVID is ‘not an obituary, it’s not a summary of a person’s life, it’s what I would say to you if I had the chance to say goodbye,’ said Resolve Philly senior collaborations editor Eugene Sonn.”

SOCIETAL IMPACT

BBC: Supermarkets warn pet boom causing food pouch shortages. “UK supermarkets have warned of a shortage of some dog and cat food products following an ‘unprecedented’ rise in pet ownership during lockdown. Sainsbury’s has apologised after running out of dog and cat food pouches due to a ‘national shortage’, although tinned and dry food are unaffected.”

Ars Technica: Traffic congestion dropped by 73 percent in 2020 due to the pandemic. “In 2020, the average US driver spent 26 hours stuck in traffic. While that’s still more than a day, it’s a steep decline from pre-pandemic times; in 2019 the average American sacrificed 99 hours to traffic jams. Around the world, it’s a similar story. German drivers averaged an identical 26 hours of traffic in 2020, down from 46 the year before. In the UK, 2019 sounded positively awful, with 115 hours in traffic jams. At least one thing improved for that island nation in 2020: its drivers only spent 37 hours stationary in their cars.”

MISINFORMATION / DISINFORMATION

UPI: Report: Instagram’s algorithm pushes certain users to COVID-19 misinformation. “Instagram’s algorithm recommended new users following COVID-19 misinformation to more of the same amid the pandemic, a report said Tuesday. The Center For Countering Digital Hate, a nonprofit company with offices in Britain and Washington, D.C., founded in 2018 by Imran Ahmed, published the report, on Tuesday, titled ‘Malgorithm.'”

NBC News: Latino churches push Covid vaccine enrollment, but some spread misinformation. “As the president of the National Latino Evangelical Coalition, with a database of over 6,000 pastors, Gabriel Salguero was getting messages from pastors and parishioners commenting about posts they had seen on social media about the Covid-19 vaccine. The information included false claims that the vaccines would alter people’s DNA, that microchips would be inserted and used to track people and that tissue from fetuses that had been aborted was used to develop the vaccines. That’s when Salguero decided to step up and create ways to educate members about the vaccines and help with vaccination efforts.”

New York Times: Black and Hispanic Communities Grapple With Vaccine Misinformation. “The false information arrives on social media and fringe news sites, influencing people already facing other hurdles to getting vaccinated. Some activists are going door to door to counter it.”

Poynter: Facebook has an apparent double standard over COVID-19 misinformation in Brazil, researchers say. “Researchers want Facebook’s Oversight Board to evaluate the platform’s exemption of politicians from fact-checking after new research from Brazillian fact-checking organization Agência Lupa pointed to 29 examples of President Jair Bolsonaro spreading COVID-19 misinformation.”

Idaho Statesman: Idaho man thought ‘the virus would disappear the day after the election.’ He was wrong. “[Paul] Russell once thought the coronavirus wasn’t a real threat. He didn’t believe in masks. All that has changed. ‘Before I came down with the virus, I was one of those jackasses who thought the virus would disappear the day after the election. I was one of those conspiracy theorists,’ he said. Instead, he was in the hospital with COVID-19 a week after the election.”

HEALTH CARE / HEALTH CARE PROVIDERS

Route Fifty: In Alabama, South Carolina and Louisiana, CVS Vaccine Appointments Go Unfilled. “In many counties across the three states — particularly in rural areas — retailers and outpatient clinics are among the few places offering covid-19 shots. CVS and other large pharmacies, including Walgreens and Walmart, are among the biggest providers of the vaccinations. South Carolina health officials said they noticed demand was waning at some vaccine sites — and, as a result, lowered the age eligibility for the shots from 65 to 55 starting Monday.”

BBC: Covid: Brazil experts issue warning as hospitals ‘close to collapse’. “Health systems in most of Brazil’s largest cities are close to collapse because of Covid-19 cases, its leading health institute warns. More than 80% of intensive care unit beds are occupied in the capitals of 25 of Brazil’s 27 states, Fiocruz said. Experts warn that the highly contagious variant in Brazil may have knock-on effects in the region and beyond.”

BUSINESS / CORPORATIONS

Business Insider: A mask-less Trader Joe’s customer in Texas had a meltdown after being denied entry – and it reveals how states’ new rules endanger workers. “A Trader Joe’s customer accused the grocer of violating Texas state law, after employees denied the man entry without a mask. The situation highlights how the state’s new rules have put many frontline workers in a vulnerable position, as they are forced to impose corporate rules without the support of the government.”

Axios: The long road to putting America back to work. “One year into the pandemic, more than 10 million Americans are still out of work — and many of the jobs they lost won’t even exist when this is over. The big picture: Putting the country back to work will require vast amounts of retraining and career shifting, as former bartenders learn to code and former cruise ship workers look for jobs at data centers. The U.S. is still unprepared to take that on at scale.”

WORLD / FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

CNET: Biden to mark anniversary of COVID-19 shutdown on Thursday. How to watch. “President Joe Biden on Thursday will deliver his first prime-time address, marking one year since shutdowns and other restrictions were put in place across the US in an attempt to slow the spread of the coronavirus. The president will discuss sacrifices many Americans have made over the last year and ‘the grave loss communities and families across the country have suffered,’ White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said on Monday.”

BBC: France coronavirus: Paris cuts non-Covid treatment amid intensive care surge. “Hospitals in and around Paris have been told to reduce non-Covid treatments by 40%, as demand for intensive care beds (ICU) neared saturation point. On Monday take up of ICU beds for Covid patients was just 83 short of the 1,050 capacity set aside for the region.”

Accounting Today: Momentum builds for delaying tax deadline. “House Ways and Means Committee chairman Richard E. Neal, D-Massachusetts, and Oversight Subcommittee chairman Bill Pascrell, Jr., D-New Jersey, on Monday urged the IRS to extend the 2021 tax filing season until July 15, noting that the COVID-19 pandemic is continuing to impose a ‘titanic strain’ on the agency as well as taxpayers. They pointed out that as of the end of February, the number of tax returns filed had declined nearly 25 percent compared to the same time last year, and the number of returns processed by the IRS was down 31 percent.”

STATE / LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Alaska Public Media: With many Alaska vaccine appointments unfilled, officials want you to know: You could be ‘essential’. “A 21-year-old with an asthma inhaler, a 30-year-old oil roughneck and a 56-year-old freelance graphic designer walk into a brew pub in Alaska. What do they have in common? No, this isn’t a joke: All of them are newly eligible to be vaccinated — plus the bartender, too. After months of tight vaccine supply, the state of Alaska last week made a massive expansion of the groups eligible for shots. But it’s not clear the expanded criteria are fully registering with Alaskans yet, public health officials said at a briefing for reporters Monday.”

CBS Baltimore: Maryland Lifts COVID Capacity Limits On Restaurant Dining, Retail And Other Businesses, Masks Still Required. “Maryland will lift capacity limits for outdoor and indoor dining, as well as other establishments starting March 12 at 5 p.m. For dining, only seated and distanced service will be allowed. Crowding in bars will not be permitted, Gov. Larry Hogan said Tuesday. Capacity limits for retail, religious facilities, fitness centers, casinos, personal services, indoor recreational establishments will also lift Friday.”

My San Antonio: Texas AG is threatening to sue Austin heath officials for enforcing face masks. “Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is threatening to sue Austin health officials for its face mask order. On Tuesday, Austin and Travis County public health leaders announced they will continue requiring residents wear masks in public. The order operates as a public health mandate under the recommendations of Austin-Travis County Interim Health Authority Dr. Mark Escott.”

INDIVIDUALS / BANDS / GROUPS

BBC: John Magufuli: Questions raised over missing Tanzania leader. “Questions have been raised over the health of Tanzanian President John Magufuli who has not been seen in public for 11 days. Opposition leader Tundu Lissu has told the BBC that according to his sources the president is being treated in hospital for coronavirus in Kenya. The BBC has not been able to verify this report independently.”

SPORTS

BBC: Tokyo 2020: ‘Safe and secure’ Olympics will take place – IOC president Thomas Bach. “A ‘safe and secure’ Tokyo Olympics will happen this year, International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach says. The German said it was no longer a question of whether the Games would take place this summer but how they would be held.”

K-12 EDUCATION

WDBJ: USDA extends free meals for kids through summer. “The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Tuesday it would extend several waivers that allow all children throughout the country to continue to receive meals while school is out during the summer. The waivers were previously extended through June 30, 2021, but will now be available until September 30, to make sure children who depend on school meals throughout the academic year have the same access to those meals in the summer months.”

HEALTH

CNBC: Brain fog, fatigue and chronic stress — 53% of U.S. women are burned out. Here’s how to cope. “Victoria Fricke had her first panic attack shortly after the coronavirus pandemic hit. The 34-year-old mother of two is a travel agent with her own business. The cancellations piled in as her children’s school and daycare shut down. One year later, Fricke is still struggling, often feeling burned out.”

NBC News: The vaccines are working. That’s why we shouldn’t panic about variants.. “Several new coronavirus variants have been identified in the United States in recent weeks, and scientists are grappling with whether these strains threaten the country — and, if so, how. One thing experts agree on, though, is that the available vaccines have outperformed expectations — even when it comes to what are known as the ‘variants of concern.'”

TECHNOLOGY

The Verge: Self-flying drones are helping speed deliveries of COVID-19 vaccines in Ghana. “The threat of COVID-19 has prompted many countries to draft new and emerging technologies to fight the pandemic, with the latest example taking flight in Ghana. This month, COVID-19 vaccines were delivered by drone for the first time in the West African nation, allowing the medicine to reach remote areas underserved by traditional logistics.”

RESEARCH

California State University Northridge: CSUN Professor Studies How Screen Time Affects Child Development During Social Distancing. “Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, many day-to-day interactions — such as learning, interacting with co-workers and socializing with friends and family — now take place through computer and phone screens. For parents of toddlers and young children, this has raised concerns about how this increase in screen time might affect their children’s development. While it may take some time before the effects of this increased screen interaction are known, California State University, Northridge child and adolescent development professor Emily Russell asserts that this isn’t necessarily all bad.”

News@Northeastern: These Researchers Are Predicting Covid-19 Trends Weeks Before Standard Surveillance. “Imagine trying to avoid a car crash. Every split second you spend deliberating what to do, you waste precious time needed to alter your course. Any delay between your brain’s perception of danger and your foot’s contact with the brake could mean the difference between life or death. Members of Northeastern’s Laboratory for the Modeling of Biological and Socio-technical Systems (MOBS) apply the same metaphor to COVID-19 response policies in their new paper, which outlines an early warning system that can predict coronavirus trends weeks in advance of standard surveillance techniques.”

CRIME / SECURITY / LEGAL

CBS News: 700 volunteers in California are escorting Asian American seniors to protect them against assaults. “The troubling wave of violence against Asian Americans across the country has prompted hundreds of volunteers to protect the elderly by escorting them through neighborhoods in Northern California. More than 3,000 hate incidents directed at Asian Americans nationwide have been recorded since the pandemic began, with many aimed at the elderly. In New York City, police data reportedly showed these violent attacks have increased by 1,900% over the course of the pandemic.”

New York Times: ‘My Turn to Get Robbed’: Delivery Workers Are Targets in the Pandemic. “Manuel Perez-Saucedo was making his last food delivery of the day in Brooklyn one evening last fall when two men on a motorcycle trailed him for several blocks and then passed him. But when he stopped his electric bicycle outside his destination on a dark street minutes later, the men emerged from the shadows. One had a pistol.”

OPINION

CNET: I got my first COVID-19 shot, and felt crushed by vaccine guilt. “On March 5, 2021, I got my first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Behind me in line inside The Pit, a basketball arena in Albuquerque, New Mexico, was a 91-year-old man I overheard telling a volunteer about how happy he was to be there. I was happy, too, but a heaviness tempered my elation. Why now? Why me and not others, more deserving? Vaccine guilt is real.” Personally I’m thrilled whenever anybody gets a shot. All right humans.

CoronaBuzz is brought to you by ResearchBuzz. I love your comments, I love your site suggestions, and I love you. Feel free to comment, send resource suggestions, or tag @buzz_corona on Twitter. Thanks!



March 11, 2021 at 04:51AM
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Internet Archive Scholar, Instagram Captioning, Software Verification, More: Wednesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, March 10, 2021

Internet Archive Scholar, Instagram Captioning, Software Verification, More: Wednesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, March 10, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Internet Archive Blog: Search Scholarly Materials Preserved in the Internet Archive. “IA Scholar is a simple, access-oriented interface to content identified across several Internet Archive collections, including web archives, archive.org files, and digitized print materials. The full text of articles is searchable for users that are hunting for particular phrases or keywords. This complements our existing full-text search index of millions of digitized books and other documents on archive.org. The service builds on Fatcat, an open catalog we have developed to identify at-risk and web-published open scholarly outputs that can benefit from long-term preservation, additional metadata, and perpetual access.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Ubergizmo: Instagram Introduces Automatic Captioning For Stories. “Having captions in videos is useful and is a great accessibility feature. We’ve seen similar features offered in video platforms such as YouTube, and now it looks like Facebook-owned Instagram is hoping to introduce something similar as well to its Stories feature. This is according to a discovery by Matt Navarra who shared his findings on Twitter.”

BetaNews: Linux Foundation launches free service to verify software authenticity. “The Linux Foundation, the non-profit organization enabling innovation through open source, has announced a new service to improve the security of the software supply chain by enabling the easy adoption of cryptographic software signing.”

USEFUL STUFF

ZDNet: Best cloud storage service in 2021. “Personal cloud storage all started in 2007, when Drew Houston, Dropbox’s CEO, got sick and tired of losing his USB drive. So, he created the first individual, small business cloud storage service. It was a radical idea in its time, and everyone loved it. Today, there are dozens of cheap or free cloud storage services. But — beyond giving you storage — they’re very different.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Washington Post: Want to borrow that e-book from the library? Sorry, Amazon won’t let you.. “You probably think of Amazon as the largest online bookstore. Amazon helped make e-books popular with the Kindle, now the dominant e-reader…. Amazon is a beast with many tentacles: It’s got the store, the reading devices and, increasingly, the words that go on them. Librarians have been no match for the beast. When authors sign up with a publisher, it decides how to distribute their work. With other big publishers, selling e-books and audiobooks to libraries is part of the mix — that’s why you’re able to digitally check out bestsellers like Barack Obama’s ‘A Promised Land.’ Amazon is the only big publisher that flat-out blocks library digital collections. Search your local library’s website, and you won’t find recent e-books by Amazon authors Kaling, Dean Koontz or Dr. Ruth Westheimer. Nor will you find downloadable audiobooks for Trevor Noah’s ‘Born a Crime,’ Andy Weir’s ‘The Martian’ and Michael Pollan’s ‘Caffeine.'”

SECURITY & LEGAL

The Verge: Security startup Verkada hack exposes 150,000 security cameras in Tesla factories, jails, and more. “Verkada, a Silicon Valley security startup that provides cloud-based security camera services, has suffered a major security breach. Hackers gained access to over 150,000 of the company’s cameras, including cameras in Tesla factories and warehouses, Cloudflare offices, Equinox gyms, hospitals, jails, schools, police stations, and Verkada’s own offices, Bloomberg reports.”

Ars Technica: T-Mobile will sell your web-usage data to advertisers unless you opt out. “T-Mobile next month will start a new program that gives customers’ web-browsing and device-usage data to advertisers unless customers opt out of the data sharing.”

Texas Tribune: Twitter sues Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, asks court to halt his investigation of the social media company. “Beleaguered Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who attended the pro-Donald Trump rally that preceded the U.S. Capitol siege, issued civil investigative demands to Twitter after the company banned the former president from its platform.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Food Business News: Nestle expands AI efforts with ‘cookie coach’. “Using artificial intelligence (AI), Nestle has debuted the ‘cookie coach,’ a lifelike virtual avatar that uses natural language AI and autonomous animation to answer basic questions about the company’s Toll House chocolate chip cookie recipe. The ‘coach’s’ name is Ruth, in honor of Toll House Inn founder Ruth Wakefield, and can interpret and respond to a range of written or spoken queries.”

BBC: In pictures: 3D return for Bamiyan Buddha destroyed by Taliban. “The ancient sandstone carvings in Afghanistan’s Bamiyan valley were once the world’s tallest Buddhas – but they were lost forever when the Taliban blew them up 20 years ago. One made a poignant return on Tuesday night in the form of a 3D projection, glowing in the rocky alcove where it used to stand.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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March 11, 2021 at 01:25AM
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Alexander Calder, 1980s Popular Culture, Google Poly, More: Wednesday ResearchBuzz, March 10, 2021

Alexander Calder, 1980s Popular Culture, Google Poly, More: Wednesday ResearchBuzz, March 10, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Smithsonian Magazine: Explore the Newly Digitized Archive of Alexander Calder, Famed ‘Sculptor of Air’. “During his lifetime, Alexander Calder’s whimsical ‘mobiles,’ or moving abstract sculptures that balance on thin wires and appear to float in the air, ensured his status as one of America’s most beloved sculptors. Forty-five years after the artist’s death in 1976 at age 78, admirers can explore materials linked to his life and work through a newly debuted digital archive from the Calder Foundation. Per a statement, the regularly updated site currently features 1,377 works of art, 1,000 historical photographs and archival documents, and 48 historic and contemporary scholarly texts.”

Open Culture: The Internet Archive Hosts 20,000 VHS Recordings of Pop Culture from the 1980s & 1990s: Enter the VHS Vault. “My neighborhood thrift store has a very large VHS wall, filled with Hollywood movies, endless children’s videos, instructional tapes, and best of all a box of unknown vids. Maybe they’re blank. Maybe they contain 6 episodes of Matlock. And maybe, just maybe, they have something completely nuts. But who has time or the old technology for that, especially when the Internet Archive has recently expanded its VHS Vault section to 20,000 digitized tapes under the (non) curation of archivist Jason Scott. We make no claims for the quality of the videos contained therein, because that’s really up to you.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

VR Focus: Let Your Google Poly 3D Models Live On At Sketchfab. “In December 2020 Google continued its run of abandoning support for its virtual reality (VR) initiatives by announcing that its 3D object library Poly would be shutting down in June. Which obviously made a lot of content creators who used the service since 2017 rather unhappy. Today, rival service Sketchfab has announced a new tool to transfer Poly models onto its platform.”

The Verge: Apple and nonprofit Common Sense Media team up to provide kid podcast recs. “Apple is making it easier for parents to find podcasts to listen to with their kids. The company is teaming up with nonprofit Common Sense Media, which specializes in age-based content reviews, to curate various collections that’ll appear in the Apple Podcasts app in the US and online. The initial four themes focus on narrative storytelling, shows that kids themselves recommend, mysteries and dramas, and Common Sense’s ‘all-time’ picks.”

TechCrunch: After similar moves for Shopping and Flights, Google makes hotel listings free. “Last year, Google made a significant change to its Google Shopping destination by making it free for e-commerce retailers to sell on Google, when before the Shopping tab had been dominated by paid product listings. It also made it free for partners to participate in Google Flights. Today, the company announced it’s now doing the same thing for hotel booking links on the Google.com/travel vertical.”

USEFUL STUFF

EurekAlert: New tool makes students better at detecting fake imagery and videos. “Researchers at Uppsala University have developed a digital self-test that trains users to assess news items, images and videos presented on social media. The self-test has also been evaluated in a scientific study, which confirmed the researchers’ hypothesis that the tool genuinely improved the students’ ability to apply critical thinking to digital sources.” The self-test is free and available to the public.

Gizmodo AU: 21 Tips To Make Google Docs, Sheets And Slides Work For You. “Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides have evolved to become very component online productivity tools, enabling you to churn out documents, spreadsheets and presentations from any computer (with other collaborators, if necessary). But are you taking full advantage of everything these web apps have to offer? These 21 tips will save you time, improve your work, and help you do more with these apps.”

How-To Geek: How to Use Excel’s “Quick Analysis” to Visualize Data. “Creating a chart in Excel is neither easy nor intuitive for inexperienced users. Luckily, there’s a feature called Quick Analysis that can create charts, tables, and more with just a click.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Silicon Valley Business Journal: Startups, investors are increasingly connecting via Clubhouse app. “In pre-pandemic times, Boston startup founders and investors could be found mingling at a few hotspots in town, like MassChallenge’s annual startup showcase on Drydock Avenue or any Thursday night event at Venture Café in Cambridge. But now, in the age of virtual meetings, the Boston innovation community has transitioned to a new hangout that is used to expand networks, get insider knowledge about topics related to the startup hustle, and even find new funding opportunities: The app called Clubhouse.”

New York Times: Google and Facebook Killed Free. “The big music companies once hoped that Pandora, YouTube or other methods of online listening sponsored by ads could replace the money that people once spent on CDs. Nope. Now record labels have gone full-bore into subscription streaming. YouTube and Instagram stars nudge people to follow them to subscription services like Patreon and OnlyFans, where they can generate more income.” Or not. Lol.

RESEARCH & OPINION

Engadget: NVIDIA and Harvard researchers use AI to make genome analysis faster and cheaper. “Scientists from NVIDIA and Harvard have made a huge breakthrough in genetic research. They developed a deep-learning toolkit that is able to significantly cut down the time and cost needed to run rare and single-cell experiments. According to a study published in Nature Communications, the AtacWorks toolkit can run inference on a whole genome, a process that normally takes a little over two days, in just half an hour. It’s able to do so thanks to NVIDIA’s Tensor Core GPUs.”

Harvard Business Review: 4 Ways to Democratize Data Science in Your Organization. “Many organizations have begun their data science journeys by starting ‘centers of excellence,’ hiring the best data scientists they can and focusing their efforts where there is lots of data. In some respects, this makes good sense — after all, they don’t want to be late to the artificial intelligence or machine learning party. Plus, data scientists want to show off their latest tools. But is this the best way to deploy this rare resource? For most companies, we think it unlikely. Rather, we advise companies to see data science both more strategically and broadly.” Good morning, Internet…

Do you like ResearchBuzz? Does it help you out? Please consider supporting it on Patreon. Not interested in commitment? Perhaps you’d buy me an iced tea. I love your comments, I love your site suggestions, and I love you. Feel free to comment on the blog, or @ResearchBuzz on Twitter. Thanks!



March 10, 2021 at 06:31PM
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Tuesday, March 9, 2021

Blackfeet Nation, Razer Smart Glasses, Instagram Bots, More: Tuesday Evening ResearchBuzz, March 9, 2021

Blackfeet Nation, Razer Smart Glasses, Instagram Bots, More: Tuesday Evening ResearchBuzz, March 9, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

KULR: Blackfeet woman creates international travel website and app to share history, resources, information. “A Blackfeet woman has started a non-profit organization to gather and share information, resources, and history of the tribe with travelers across Montana and Canada. The project promotes interaction and contribution from the public. Souta Calling Last collects centuries worth of information through storytelling, factual data, and social trends to help tribal members and tourists better understand the area where they live or explore.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Ubergizmo: Razer Launches A Pair Of Smart Glasses. “Razer is a company known for their gaming peripherals and computers, but it seems that the company is expanding on the products that they offer. In fact, it looks like the company has decided to get in the wearables space by announcing the Razer Anzu, a pair of smart glasses.”

USEFUL STUFF

D Magazine: 20 Best Instagram Bots to Try Right Now. “When used wisely, bots can be vital to helping kickstart your social media presence and build your brand. However, used irresponsibly, bots can be a source of annoying spam that will get your account banned. In 2017 and 2019, Instagram cracked down on bot-based spam. The Instagram bots in our list are designed for responsible use that will allow you to succeed on the platform in 2021.”

Neowin: Here’s what you need to know about FLoC: Google’s alternative to individual tracking. “Google made some waves earlier this week when it boasted that it will soon stop tracking individuals via ads and their browsing activities. Many have understandably been wary about this announcement and believe that there must be a loophole which will still allow Google to track you and present you targeted ads. As usual, it is important to look past the headlines, as the devil is in the details. In this piece, we will take a look at what Google is proposing as an alternative to its usual tracking capabilities.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Telengana Today (India): Mammoth digitisation drive at TS Central Library. “Established in 1891, the State Central Library also known as Asafia Library is one of the biggest public libraries in the country with a collection of over 5 lakh books, newspapers and other periodicals. Over the last two decades, the digital library staff has scanned and digitised 45,704 books and now are in plans of making that digitised collection available online at a nominal cost.”

PetaPixel: First-Ever Hologram to be Auctioned as Crypto Art Popularity Grows. “Hologram company Looking Glass Factory has announced a collaboration with musician Reggie Watts and electronic band Panther Modern to create a hologram crypto art piece to be auctioned through Zora on March 11 called ‘The NonCompliance of Being.’ The crypto art market is exploding, with non-fungible tokens (NFT) becoming a commonplace term. According to Looking Glass Factory, the popularity of the format is a long time coming.”

Yahoo News: Booming industry for fake Google reviews has ‘evaded detection’. “A booming industry has emerged in fake Google (GOOGL) reviews, with businesses across the UK paying to artificially boost their ratings online. According to an investigation by consumer group Which?, fake reviewers were employing similar manipulative tactics for a wide range of businesses – from a stockbroker in Canary Wharf to a bakery in Edinburgh.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Ars Technica: Egyptologists translate the oldest-known mummification manual. “Egyptologists have recently translated the oldest-known mummification manual. Translating it required solving a literal puzzle; the medical text that includes the manual is currently in pieces, with half of what remains in the Louvre Museum in France and half at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. A few sections are completely missing, but what’s left is a treatise on medicinal herbs and skin diseases, especially the ones that cause swelling. Surprisingly, one section of that text includes a short manual on embalming.”

Stanford: Algorithmic approaches for assessing pollution reduction policies can reveal shifts in environmental protection of minority communities, according to Stanford researchers. “Applying machine learning to a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency initiative reveals how key design elements determine what communities bear the burden of pollution. The approach could help ensure fairness and accountability in machine learning used by government regulators.”

OTHER STUFF I THINK IS COOL

Mail Tribune: Libraries to debut original animated series. “Ryan Bradley, marketing coordinator for Jackson County Library Services, has spent months leading development on an original animated series where that happens to the main characters — literally. And soon anyone with an internet connection will be able to watch it. The series, aptly titled “Lost in a Book,” concerns Daisy and Zak, two kids who get sucked into a book while visiting the library, resulting in an adventure through multiple genres, characters and stories as they try to make their way home.” Good evening, Internet…

Do you like ResearchBuzz? Does it help you out? Please consider supporting it on Patreon. Not interested in commitment? Perhaps you’d buy me an iced tea. I love your comments, I love your site suggestions, and I love you. Feel free to comment on the blog, or @ResearchBuzz on Twitter. Thanks!



March 10, 2021 at 06:26AM
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Tuesday CoronaBuzz, March 9, 2021: 32 pointers to updates, useful stuff, research news, and more.

Tuesday CoronaBuzz, March 9, 2021: 32 pointers to updates, useful stuff, research news, and more.
By ResearchBuzz

Please wear a mask (or even two). Wash your hands. Stay at home if you can. Please be careful. I love you.

NEW RESOURCES – MEDICAL/HEALTH

USA Today: Looking for a COVID-19 vaccine? This website may text you when a vaccine is about to go unused. “A new standby list for COVID-19 vaccines is rolling out across the country to connect people with doses that would otherwise go to waste. More than half a million people have already signed up on Dr. B, which texts users based on their eligibility status when there are extra doses nearby in jeopardy of going unused.”

NEW RESOURCES – OTHER

Spotted via my Google Alerts: Collecting These Times: American Jewish Experiences of the Pandemic. From the front page: “COVID-19 has altered the way people engaged with their communities and religious practices. Collecting These Times connects American Jews to Jewish institutions and other collecting projects which can gather and preserve their experiences of the pandemic. Individuals can find relevant collecting projects through the portal and easily contribute materials such as images, videos, audio recordings, documents, and oral histories to collecting institutions in different parts of the U.S.”

USEFUL STUFF

BBC: Covid: How to deal with lockdown social anxiety. “Smaller gatherings will be allowed outside from 29 March in England. And while for many people it’s been a really exciting time, for those with social anxiety there’s a worry about how they’ll adapt to life after lockdown.”

The Verge: Spice Up Your Daily Pandemic Walk With These Apps. “Taking a daily or, if I’m being honest, semi-daily walk is a lockdown habit that has seen me through These Unprecedented Times. I’m not alone, either — without gyms or really anywhere else to go at all, lots of us have embraced (or at times, endured) a daily walk around the neighborhood….Here are some techniques to keep your pandemic walk routine fresh and the apps that can help you put them into practice.”

Lifehacker: How to Help Your Kids Transition Back into School. “Transitioning kids back into the classroom after a three-month summer hiatus is often a challenge. Even the transition back to school after a couple of weeks off for winter break can send some kids into a tailspin. And now, as schools across the country plan to reopen, many families are facing the Mother of All Transitions—getting kids back into the classroom after a literal year at home.”

UPDATES

MLive: 12 months of coronavirus in Michigan: A look back by the numbers. “There were 118,000 known cases of COVID-19 and nearly 4,300 deaths attributed to the coronavirus worldwide when the World Health Organization declared the novel virus a global pandemic March 11, 2020. Almost a full year later, the state of Michigan alone has reported more than five times as many known infections, and more than three times as many fatalities linked to the novel virus that has altered life for everyone the last 12 months.”

SOCIETAL IMPACT

AP: AP-NORC poll: Many in US still face COVID-19 financial loss. “Roughly 4 in 10 Americans say they’re still feeling the financial impact of the loss of a job or income within their household as the economic recovery remains uneven one year into the coronavirus pandemic.”

Knowledge@Wharton: What’s Ahead in the Second Year of COVID-19?. “When COVID-19 began its insidious march across the globe more than a year ago, it disrupted every industry and forced fast innovation as business leaders worked to adjust to a new world order. Last year, in Wharton’s Fast Forward video series, several of the School’s faculty offered their insight into what the second half of 2020 would look like during the pandemic. That insight is needed even more this year as the ground keeps shifting, vaccines are rolled out, and new coronavirus mutations emerge.”

Brookings Institution: Digitizing civic spaces amid the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. “At the same time that physical civic space has been contracting, its virtual equivalent has been expanding in some places. The COVID-19 pandemic has witnessed a boom in online activity and the desire to participate, with the creation of hundreds of social media accounts and crowdsourced mapping projects coordinating assistance and sharing information. Civil society organizations (CSOs) and some governments have been working to remain connected during the pandemic. Governments have been relying on virtual public forums where citizens can submit claims, ideas, and opinions.”

MISINFORMATION / DISINFORMATION

Vox Recode: Facebook is finally cracking down hard on anti-vaccine content. It is facing an uphill battle.. “Facebook’s big push is meant to help bring an end to a pandemic that has killed more than 2.5 million people around the world. But for some of the people who have for years been sounding the alarm about the dangers of anti-vaccine groups and pages on Facebook and Instagram, the announcement — even if it’s a step forward — feels like too little, too late.”

ACTIVISM / PROTESTS

NPR: COMIC: How One COVID-19 Nurse Navigates Anti-Mask Sentiment. “Agnes Boisvert, an ICU nurse at St. Luke’s hospital in downtown Boise, Idaho, spends every day trying to navigate between two worlds. One is a swirl of beeping monitors, masked emotion and death; the other, she says, seems oblivious to the horrors occurring every hour of every day.”

HEALTH CARE / HEALTH CARE PROVIDERS

NBC News: Texans recovering from Covid-19 needed oxygen. Then the power went out.. “Mauricio Marin felt his heart tighten when the power flicked off at his Richmond, Texas, home on the evening of Feb. 14, shutting down his plug-in breathing machine. Gasping, he rushed to connect himself to one of the portable oxygen tanks his doctors had sent home with him weeks earlier to help his lungs recover after his three-week stay in a Covid-19 intensive care unit. Between the two portable tanks, he calculated, he had six hours of air.”

University of Alabama at Birmingham: Study shows high risk of anxiety, burnout in emergency department health care workers from COVID-19. “Front line health care workers in hospital emergency departments are at increased risk for anxiety, burnout, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder while coping with the COVID-19 pandemic, according to research published in Annals of Emergency Medicine in February. The study, done in 20 emergency departments at hospitals in the United States, found that symptoms of anxiety and burnout were prevalent across the full spectrum of emergency department staff during the pandemic, and as many as one-fifth of health care employees were at risk for PTSD.”

BUSINESS / CORPORATIONS

Washington Post: He put it all on the line opening his butcher shop a year ago. Then the pandemic hit.. “He remembers the moment it came to him, about 10 years ago — his dream. It was when he really understood the marketplace and what people were willing to spend on something he always considered ordinary. ‘Growing up, my moms would spend $150 to fill the refrigerator and we would eat for weeks,’ Wendell Allsbrook said. And his big hands held an imaginary plate to illustrate his next point. ‘I just sold a family $150 of meat for one night. That was my wake-up call.'”

Poynter: Can a business make you wear a mask if the state doesn’t require it?. “Imagine you are a Texas and Mississippi business that wants employees and customers to wear masks this week, even though the state is no longer requiring them. It will be on you to enforce the restrictions … and good luck with that. Big retailers like Macy’s and Kroger say with or without state mandates if you want to shop in their stores, wear a mask. The Texas-based H-E-B stores require their workers to wear masks and ask customers to do the same, but do not make it a requirement.”

Harvard Business Review: COVID Killed the Traditional Workplace. What Should Companies Do Now?. “A year ago, COVID-19 forced many companies to send employees home—often with a laptop and a prayer. Now, with COVID cases subsiding and vaccinations rising, the prospect of returning to old office routines appears more possible. But will employees want to flock back to buildings even when it’s safe again? Should companies do away with Zoom and return the workplace to its pre-COVID ways? The answer, in a word: No.”

INDIVIDUALS / BANDS / GROUPS

Reuters: Yellen says COVID-19 having ‘extremely unfair’ impact on women’s income, jobs. “The COVID-19 pandemic has had an ‘extremely unfair’ impact on the income and economic opportunities of women, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday, calling for long-term steps to improve labor market conditions for women.”

K-12 EDUCATION

Chalkbeat: A year into the COVID-19 pandemic, school as we know it has been transformed. “School during the pandemic looks different for every district, every school, every family. For some there are plexiglass dividers and face shields; for others, Zoom and Google Classroom. Where one teacher eagerly attends class in person, another is filled with fear. The random testing, the grading systems, the hybrid schedules vary wildly. But one thing unites them all — school as we know it has been completely transformed.”

HEALTH

10 News San Diego: In-Depth: New UCSD research aims to help COVID-19 ‘long haulers’. “New research is helping doctors and patients understand why some symptoms of COVID-19 linger in patients for weeks or months after their infection ends.”

Mayo Clinic: Expert Alert: Risk for chronic kidney disease even more critical due to COVID-19 pandemic. “An estimated 1 in 10 people worldwide have chronic kidney disease, but most of them don’t know it. That lack of awareness is especially concerning because people with chronic kidney disease who are infected with COVID-19 are at higher risk for serious illness.”

WRAL: Why you should wear a face mask even if your state doesn’t require it. “At least fifteen states — representing 30% of the country — don’t require face masks. With more than 500,000 Americans dead and new emerging variants of the virus, health experts warn that such policies could prolong the pandemic and result in more lives lost.”

TECHNOLOGY

Techdirt: Crappy US Broadband Is Also Hampering Equitable Vaccine Deployment. “s our recent Greenhouse policy forum on broadband made abundantly clear, COVID is shining a very bright light on US broadband dysfunction. The high cost of service, spotty coverage, slow speeds, and high prices are all being felt acutely in an era where having a decent broadband connection is the pathway to education, employment, healthcare, and opportunity.”

RESEARCH

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Single vaccine dose may offer protection to those who have had COVID-19. “New research from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill suggests that people who have had COVID-19 may need only one shot of vaccine. The study led by the UNC School of Medicine and Gillings School of Global Public Health showed one dose of either the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine – known as mRNA vaccines – boosted antibodies among those who previously had COVID-19.”

Penn State News: Deaths in the family can shape kids’ educational attainment in unexpected ways. “In a study, the researchers found that deaths in the family can affect the educational attainment of children. That impact most often is negative, but, in certain cases, a family death can improve the chances that children will further their education, said Ashton Verdery, associate professor of sociology, demography and social data analytics, Penn State.”

PsyPost: Study suggests that the modern anti-vaccine movement is shaped by Christian nationalist ideology. “New findings suggest that the contemporary anti-vaccine movement — also known as the anti-vaxx movement — is characterized by religious exclusivism. The study found that Christian nationalism was the second best predictor of anti-vaccine attitudes among Americans. The findings were published in Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World.”

Boing Boing: Scientists open arena for dance party to study COVID-19 exposure risk. “Pent-up clubgoers descended on Amsterdam’s Ziggo Dome on Sturday for a dance party enabling scientists to study how large events could be held as COVID-19 begins to subside. Around 1,300 people—all who tested negative for COVID-19—hit the dancefloor wearing electronic tags to track their interactions.”

Newswise: Rutgers Develops Rapid Test to Detect New Emerging Coronavirus Variants. “Rutgers researchers have designed a new rapid test that can detect all three of the rapidly spreading variants of the coronavirus in a little over one hour – much shorter than the three to five days required by current tests, which can also be more technically difficult and expensive to perform.”

EurekAlert: Study suggests wearing a face mask during intense exercise is safe for healthy people. “Researchers carried out detailed testing on breathing, heart activity and exercise performance in a group of 12 people while they were using an exercise bike with and without a mask. Although they found differences in some measurements between wearing a mask and not wearing a mask, they say that none of their results indicate any risk to health. This suggests that masks could be worn safely during intense exercise, for example to reduce COVID-19 transmission between people visiting an indoor gym.”

CRIME / SECURITY / LEGAL

ProPublica: Feds Investigating Lender That Sued Thousands of Lower-Income Latinos During Pandemic. “A federal consumer watchdog agency has launched an investigation into a company that aggressively sued thousands of Latino borrowers in Texas during the coronavirus pandemic while depicting itself as a financial ally of the community.”

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘You’re not Chinese, are you?’ Bay Area health workers describe racism during pandemic. “In California, 25% of active registered nurses are either Asian-born or Asian American, according to research from the Healthforce Center at UCSF. As workers on the front lines, they’re more likely to be exposed to COVID-19. They’re also more likely to die. The changing health care workforce is a result of 60 years of the United States recruiting Asia-trained nurses — especially from the Philippines — to fill shortages in American public hospitals. Now, these nurses are experiencing anti-Asian bigotry while they work to save American lives, said Catherine Ceniza Choy, professor of ethnic studies at UC Berkeley.”

Politico: The Pentagon had an email security problem. The pandemic fixed it.. “In December, the Pentagon quietly adopted a security measure for ensuring that its email conversations with outsiders would be encrypted — more than a decade after many private companies and other institutions had done the same. Attempts to permanently fix the flaw didn’t gain momentum until last year, when DoD officials realized that the weakness was exposing electronic conversations with a host of civilian agencies and companies developing Covid-19 vaccines.”

OPINION

Route Fifty: Economists: Biden’s $1,400 Covid-19 Checks May be Great Politics, but it’s Questionable Economics. “The coronavirus package contains a lot of provisions that will help struggling Americans, and we understand why the checks are so popular – with 78% support among adults in a recent survey. No one turns down extra money, after all. But as economists, we also believe that these direct payments make little economic sense – even with the lower income threshold. And this is true whether you think the purpose of the checks is relief or stimulus.”

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March 10, 2021 at 03:00AM
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Endangered Canada Nature, Google Chrome Labs, France Archives, More: Tuesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, March 9, 2021

Endangered Canada Nature, Google Chrome Labs, France Archives, More: Tuesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, March 9, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

CityNews 1130: Canadians encouraged to protect, connect with nature through online tool. “… a tool has been launched by the Nature Conservancy of Canada to show you where plants and animals are most at risk. Those interested can access a website, input their postal code, and see which parts in their area require more protection. The tool is part of a study which is considered the first comprehensive look at where nature in southern Canada needs to be protected as the world faces challenges around habitat loss and climate change.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Bleeping Computer: How to use Google’s ‘Chrome Labs’ to test new browser features. “When Google creates a new browser feature, it is first tested in Google Chrome Canary and Google Chrome Beta. In many cases, these new features must first be enabled using an ‘experiments’ configuration flag before they are accessible… However, the ‘Experiments’ page contains many options that are not for user-facing features but instead internal tests conducted by the Chrome development team. Due to this, it can get confusing to find new user-facing features that Google is actively developing.”

ABC News: France to speed up opening of secret archives on Algeria War. “French President Emmanuel Macron announced a decision Tuesday to speed up the declassification of secret documents related to Algeria’s 1954-62 war of independence from France. The measure comes amid a series of steps taken by Macron to reconcile France with its colonial past and address its brutal history with Algeria, which had been under French rule for 132 years until its independence in 1962.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Radio Connecting Vets: Military Women’s Memorial wants to hear from women veterans. “Women who have served in the U.S. armed forces have stories to tell — and the Military Women’s Memorial wants to help share them. The MWM recently launched a partnership with PenFed Credit Union to encourage military women and their families to preserve their experiences and submit their stories to the Military Women’s Memorial national registry.”

Israel 21c: New museum to showcase the women who helped build Israel. “The museum will showcase at least 100 noteworthy but not necessarily well-known women, from architects to lawyers to choreographers, says founder Yael Nitzan. A curator, art historian and TV producer, Nitzan has overcome many roadblocks and setbacks in realizing her dream of opening Israel’s first museum dedicated to women.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

The Register: University of the Highlands and Islands shuts down campuses as it deals with ‘ongoing cyber incident’. “The University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) in Scotland is fending off ‘an ongoing cyber incident’ that has shut down its campuses. In a message to students and staff yesterday afternoon, the institution, which spans 13 locations across the northernmost part of the UK, warned that ‘most services’ – including its Brightspace virtual learning environment – were affected.”

Reuters: Russia sues Google, Facebook, Twitter for not deleting protest content – Ifax. “Russian authorities are suing five social media platforms for allegedly failing to delete posts urging children to take part in illegal protests, the Interfax news agency cited a Moscow court as saying on Tuesday. Twitter, Google, Facebook each have three cases against them, with each violation punishable by a fine of up to 4 million roubles (around $54,000), and cases have also been filed against Tiktok and Telegram, the report said.”

New York Times: Tech’s Legal Shield Appears Likely to Survive as Congress Focuses on Details. “Former President Donald J. Trump called multiple times for repealing the law that shields tech companies from legal responsibility over what people post. President Biden, as a candidate, said the law should be ‘revoked.’ But the lawmakers aiming to weaken the law have started to agree on a different approach. They are increasingly focused on eliminating protections for specific kinds of content rather than making wholesale changes to the law or eliminating it entirely.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

The Verge: How Scientists Scrambled To Stop Donald Trump’s EPA From Wiping Out Climate Data. “After hearing the news that then President-elect Donald Trump had appointed a notorious climate change denier to lead the Environmental Protection Agency transition team in 2016, Nicholas Shapiro, an environmental anthropologist, penned an urgent email to a dozen or so fellow scientists. He was worried that the EPA was about to be torn apart from the inside under Trump’s leadership. Others on the email thread were concerned that vital environmental data would be taken down from federal websites and destroyed….So Shapiro took a cue from his sister, an organizer for the Women’s March, and tried to bring researchers together to mount an offensive.”

PsyPost: The memes we read might influence how we love, study finds. “The prevalence and importance of social media has made the sharing of internet memes a primary method of communicating ideas today. Short and punchy, memes are pervasive and often emotionally salient, making them prime candidates for influencers of human behavior. This observation led a team of researchers to explore the influence of romantic memes on relationship beliefs. Their research is published in Psychological Studies.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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March 10, 2021 at 01:40AM
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NYPD Misconduct Records, USDA Soil Moisture Portal, Ireland Higher Education, More: Tuesday ResearchBuzz, March 9, 2021

NYPD Misconduct Records, USDA Soil Moisture Portal, Ireland Higher Education, More: Tuesday ResearchBuzz, March 9, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

New York Times: N.Y.P.D. Releases Secret Misconduct Records After Repeal of Shield Law. “Nearly nine months after New York lawmakers, inspired by mass protests over police brutality, repealed a law that kept the discipline records of officers secret for decades, the New York Police Department on Monday began publishing some of the sealed information. The department released partial disciplinary records for all 35,000 active police officers dating back to 2014 in an online database, searchable by name. Separately, officials posted redacted copies of more than 200 decisions by judges in administrative trials, going back to 2017.” It’s my understanding that this is a separate release (though it may contain overlapping information) from the CCRB release last week.

NASA: NASA Data Powers New USDA Soil Moisture Portal. “Farmers, researchers, meteorologists, and others now have access to high-resolution NASA data on soil moisture, thanks to a new tool developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), NASA and George Mason University. The app, Crop Condition and Soil Moisture Analytics (Crop-CASMA), provides access to high-resolution data from NASA’s Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission and the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument in an easy-to-use format.”

Silicon Republic: Gender equality in Irish higher education to be tracked with new tool. “A new interactive dashboard has been launched to track staff in Ireland’s higher education sector and help identify progress that is being made towards gender equality. The National Gender Equality Dashboard will provide an interactive and comparative visualisation of key staff data from Irish higher education institutions including universities, colleges and institutes of technology. This dashboard will be updated annually, and currently offers baseline data from 2017 to 2019.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

CNET: Facebook VR venture could include realistic avatars, Zuckerberg says. “Facebook’s exploration into virtual reality could soon include more realistic avatars. During a podcast interview with The Information, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg gave more details about the social media company’s plans to explore virtual and augmented reality with the Oculus VR device.”

TechCrunch: Google unveils $25 million in grants aimed at empowering women and girls. “Google announced a range of programs as well as grants worth $25 million on Monday to fund works of nonprofits and social enterprises that are committed to empower women and girls. Google.org’s new Impact Challenge, unveiled on International Women’s Day, is aimed at addressing systemic barriers and inequities so that women have access to economic equality, opportunity to build financial independence and pursue entrepreneurism, said Google chief executive Sundar Pichai at a virtual event.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

The Verge: Google HR reportedly advised mental health leave in response to complaints of racist or sexist behavior. “Several current and former Google employees say the company’s human resources department would often suggest mental health counseling or leave in response to complaints about racist or sexist behavior in the workplace, NBC News reported.”

KHON: Hawaiian newspapers being re-digitized to preserve Hawaiian knowledge. “An effort was taken in 2002 to digitize Hawaiian newspapers from microfilm images captured nearly 40 years ago. They are accessible online but only about 30% are clearly visible. A new effort is now being taken to improve the quality and quantity of those collections.”

Ars Technica: Demand for fee to use password app LastPass sparks backlash. “Two investment firms, Elliott Management and Francisco Partners, acquired the service as part of their $4.3 billion buyout of Internet software group LogMeIn in September last year. Now, the app is warning users that they must pay as much as $36 a year if they want access to those cumbersome passwords on all their devices. Those who refuse to pay will have to choose between synching only to their desktop computers, or only to mobile devices such as phones.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

AP: Microsoft server hack has victims hustling to stop intruders. “Victims of a massive global hack of Microsoft email server software — estimated in the tens of thousands by cybersecurity responders — hustled Monday to shore up infected systems and try to diminish chances that intruders might steal data or hobble their networks. The White House has called the hack an ‘active threat’ and said senior national security officials were addressing it.”

The Guardian: Apple and Google face new antitrust battle over Arizona app store bill. “The bill – which passed the Arizona state house last week and now will move to the state’s senate – would require Apple and Google to allow app developers to use their own payment systems, rather than Google’s or Apple’s, to process user purchases within the app.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Berkeley: A tomb with a view: Egyptologist recreates after-death experience. “UC Berkeley Egyptologist Rita Lucarelli, a pioneer in the digitization of ancient funerary artifacts, is heading up an effort, enriched by high-end Vive Cosmos virtual reality headsets, to offer scholars and others an immersive tour of one of the world’s most spellbinding death cultures.”

OTHER STUFF I THINK IS COOL

ReviewGeek: Lay’s Browser Extension Turns on YouTube Captions When It Hears You Eating Chips. “When artificial intelligence rises up to take over Earth, it will be because of browser extensions like Lay’s Crispy Subtitles. The new AI-powered Chrome extension from Lay’s taps into your microphone and listens for the sound of crunchy, crispy potato chips. If it hears you eating chips while you watch a YouTube Video, the AI will automatically turn on captions for your video.” Good morning, Internet…

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March 9, 2021 at 08:29PM
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