Tuesday, April 6, 2021

Isle of Man History, Clearview AI, National Humanities Center, More: Tuesday ResearchBuzz, April 6, 2021

Isle of Man History, Clearview AI, National Humanities Center, More: Tuesday ResearchBuzz, April 6, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Isle of Man Today: Website is a one-stop shop for information about archaeology and old buildings . “Historic Environment Records are information services that provide access to resources relating to the archaeology and old buildings of a defined geographic area. They contain details on archaeological sites and finds, historic buildings and historic landscapes and are frequently updated. Information on the island’s historic places, archaeological sites, landscapes and historic buildings can be found on the site.”

BuzzFeed News: Surveillance Nation. “A controversial facial recognition tool designed for policing has been quietly deployed across the country with little to no public oversight. According to reporting and data reviewed by BuzzFeed News, more than 7,000 individuals from nearly 2,000 public agencies nationwide have used Clearview AI to search through millions of Americans’ faces, looking for people, including Black Lives Matter protesters, Capitol insurrectionists, petty criminals, and their own friends and family members. BuzzFeed News has developed a searchable table of 1,803 publicly funded agencies whose employees are listed in the data as having used or tested the controversial policing tool before February 2020.”

EVENTS

National Humanities Center: A virtual conference exploring the critical intersection between the humanities and artificial intelligence.. “Join us for a series of virtual events—presentations, conversations, webinars, film screenings, and an art exhibition—highlighting perspectives from leading humanists, scientists, engineers, artists, writers, and software company executives collectively advancing inquiry into key emerging questions…. Thanks to generous support from our sponsors, this conference is offered free of charge. However, registration is required to access conference sessions, view films, and explore the online art exhibit.” The conference takes place April 7-22.

NASA: Watch Next Space Station Crew Launch Live on NASA TV, NASA App. “Three space travelers, including NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, are poised to launch Friday, April 9, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to the International Space Station. NASA Television, the agency’s website, and the NASA app will provide comprehensive prelaunch and launch-to-docking coverage.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Yale University Library: Three new online student exhibitions reflect research in library’s collections. “Each year, Yale Library selects up to three students to transform their senior research papers or projects into the unique narrative form of a library exhibit with guidance and assistance from library staff. The exhibits are normally displayed in the Exhibition Corridor of Sterling Memorial Library, but with pandemic access restrictions, the 2020-2021 exhibits are now more widely viewable online. This year’s exhibits highlight the diversity of research underway in the library’s collections, with the three students coming from the English, Environmental Science, and Architecture departments at Yale.”

The Verge: Yelp is making it easier for users to search for Asian-owned businesses. “Yelp is rolling out a new tool that will allow businesses the option to identify themselves as Asian-owned, chief diversity officer Miriam Warren announced today. The new optional attribute will make it easier for Yelp users to find and support Asian-owned businesses easily.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

The New Republic: How a Bunch of Revolutionary War Reenactors Got Caught Up in Facebook’s Purge of Militia Groups. “[Rory] Nolan belongs to historical reenactment groups that sometimes dramatize Revolutionary War-era militias (you can begin to see the problem), and he manages the Facebook and Instagram pages for several of them. He tried to establish new accounts under new email addresses, but they didn’t last long before getting swept up in the same moderation process. Again, they were banned with no possibility of appeal. And like that, Nolan’s social media presence—and much of his social life—quietly winked out of existence.”

Reform Austin News: Gov. Greg Abbott Publicly Slammed Facebook. Privately, He’s Courting the Social Media Giant to Build a Second Data Center in Texas.. “Last month, Gov. Greg Abbott blasted the actions of Facebook as ‘un-American [and] un-Texan,’ accusing it and other social media giants of spearheading a ‘dangerous movement to silence conservative voices.’… At the same time, his office was working quietly with the company with the hope that it will soon build a second data center in the state, according to documents provided to The Texas Tribune by the Tech Transparency Project, a technology research arm of the nonprofit watchdog group Campaign for Accountability.”

University of Dayton: University of Dayton faculty develop courses, digital archive to preserve Paul Laurence Dunbar’s legacy with $150K grant from Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. “The two-year, $150,000 Mellon Foundation grant provides funding for building the digital Dunbar Library and Archive, which will make hundreds of Dunbar-related documents artifacts freely available online. It also provides funding for faculty who want to integrate Dunbar into their courses and for students to participate in Dunbar-related research experiences. In addition, the grant provides funding for two organizational partners, Saint Louis University’s Center for Digital Humanities and Ohio History Connection.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Interlochen Public Radio: Misleading social media ads bash a rooftop solar bill. They’re backed by big utility companies.. “Anyone scrolling Facebook in Michigan over the past week may have noticed ads attacking a new energy bill in the statehouse. The proposed legislation would allow more people to put solar panels on their homes or businesses. It gets rid of a cap limiting how many solar installations can connect to the grid. Social media ads say the proposal caters to out-of-state energy developers and threatens a reliable power grid. One of the ads reads, ‘Don’t let out-of-state special interests do to Michigan what they did to Texas.’ Clean energy advocates say the ads are misleading.

The Intercept: Lexisnexis To Provide Giant Database Of Personal Information To ICE. “THE POPULAR LEGAL RESEARCH and data brokerage firm LexisNexis signed a $16.8 million contract to sell information to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to documents shared with The Intercept. The deal is already drawing fire from critics and comes less than two years after the company downplayed its ties to ICE, claiming it was ‘not working with them to build data infrastructure to assist their efforts.'”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Video Games Chronicle: Analysis: 2,000 digital-only games will disappear when PlayStation closes its stores. “Although users will still be able to redownload their previous purchases for the foreseeable future, from July 2 it will no longer be possible to buy games on the PS3 or PSP online marketplaces, and come August 27 the same will apply to the Vita too. Of the games set to disappear from the formats, the vast majority are available on other platforms such as older PlayStation consoles or PC. However, around 138 games will essentially become lost forever once the stores close, our analysis suggests.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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April 6, 2021 at 10:29PM
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Monday, April 5, 2021

Montana Jobs, Google/Oracle, US Air Force, More: Monday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, April 5, 2021

Montana Jobs, Google/Oracle, US Air Force, More: Monday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, April 5, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

KPAX: New statewide website highlights earn-while-you-learn opportunities for young adults. “Too often, we see young adults leaving the great state of Montana to work somewhere else in the region or the country, and when that happens, Montana’s workforce suffers. Through a collaborative effort between the Missoula Chamber of Commerce and the Montana Department of Labor, Montana’s workforce is gaining some traction through a new website.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

CNBC: Supreme Court rules in Google’s favor in copyright dispute with Oracle over Android software. “The Supreme Court on Monday sided with Google against Oracle in a long-running copyright dispute over the software used in Android, the mobile operating system. The court’s decision was 6-2. Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who was not yet confirmed by the Senate when the case was argued in October, did not participate in the case.”

US Air Force: New ‘Air Force Review Boards Agency’ website launched . “The Department of the Air Force debuted a new website for past and present Airmen and Guardians to correct their military records, April 5. Members, and those submitting on their behalf, can submit applications and supporting documents to four boards: The Air Force Board for Correction of Military Records, Air Force Discharge Review Board, Department of Defense Discharge Appeal Review Board and Department of Defense Physical Disability Board of Review.”

The Verge: Yahoo Answers will be shut down forever on May 4th. “Yahoo Answers, one of the longest-running and most storied web Q&A platforms in the history of the internet, is shutting down on May 4th. That’s the day the Yahoo Answers website will start redirecting to the Yahoo homepage, and all of the platform’s archives will apparently cease to exist. The platform has been operating since 2005.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Vice: Alex Jones Incited the Capitol Riot on Facebook Even Though He Was Banned 2 Years Ago. “Research from digital rights group Avaaz published Thursday morning and shared exclusively with VICE News shows that in the 30 days leading up to the riots, content from Jones’ websites, promoting voter fraud claims telling fans to ‘prepare for war,’ amassed over 1.1 million interactions across Facebook.”

Las Cruces Sun News: New Mexico State Police’s first TikTok video goes viral. “About a month ago, the New Mexico State Police started a TikTok account. Last week, the agency debuted its first video, which is of a female officer getting ready for work. The video of Byanca Castro, a patrol officer based out Las Vegas, N.M., has been viewed more than 400,000 times.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

NBC News: Human smugglers use Facebook to connect with migrants and spread false hope of reaching U.S. . “Human smugglers are openly advertising their services on Facebook, falsely telling Central Americans interested in crossing illegally into the United States that they can promise a ‘100 percent’ safe journey. While the use of social media by smugglers is not new, the practice is growing, fueling false hope as more migrants fall prey to misinformation about how the Biden administration will welcome them, according to Department of Homeland Security officials, immigration experts and lawyers.”

Irish Times: Facebook and Twitter face barrage of criticism before Oireachtas committee . “Social media giants Facebook and Twitter faced a barrage of criticism before an Oireachtas committee on Tuesday over anonymous accounts, trolling and micro-targeting. TDs and Senators accused both companies, particularly Twitter, of undermining democracy and coarsening public debate by allowing anonymous accounts make false and misleading statements with neither fact-checking protections or any sanction.”

Chicago Tribune: FOIA for beginners: A state law guarantees access to public records. But it isn’t always that easy.. “At its core, the Freedom of Information Act is about the government being transparent and accountable to the people it’s meant to serve. Illinois’ FOIA law states ‘all persons are entitled to full and complete information regarding the affairs of government.’ Enacted in 1984 and updated with changes that took effect in 2010, the statute lays out a pretty straightforward process for citizens to obtain public records. A request doesn’t need to read like a document crafted by a law firm — it just needs to be put in writing and delivered via email, by mail or in person.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

EurekAlert: Exploring how storytelling tropes cluster in popular films. “An analysis of film tropes–common storytelling elements seen in different movies–explores combinations of tropes that tend to co-occur in films, identifying patterns that could help inform development of new movies. Pablo García-Sánchez and Juan Merelo of the University of Granada, and Antonio Velez-Estevez and Manuel Cobo from the University of Cádiz, Spain present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on March 31, 2021.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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April 6, 2021 at 02:13AM
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Black Voices of Vermont, Virtual Art Festival, Online Exhibitions, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, April 5, 2021

Black Voices of Vermont, Virtual Art Festival, Online Exhibitions, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, April 5, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

I spent Easter weekend working on a way to handle my curation/workflow issues, and ended up with an IFTTT/Google Sheets structure that’s got me cautiously delighted this morning. (Are you one of my Patreons? I sent you a note about it!) I’m still bug-crushing, though, so posting may be sporadic this week.

NEW RESOURCES

NBC 5: ‘Black voices of Vermont’ aims to build community and promote learning. “A new project in Vermont aims to amplify voices of Black youth and strengthen a sense of community. ‘We’re getting progressively better over time,’ Yeshua Armbrister, 19, said of Vermont communities’ goal of being ever more inclusive. Armbrister is one of the first participants in Black Voices of Vermont, a new, interactive media project focused on highlighting the experiences and viewpoints of Black teens in the predominantly white state.”

EVENTS

The Mercury: ‘Can You Find the Gun?’: virtual art festival explores social justice. “The festival showcases 13 projects that include short films and documentaries, animated shorts, an interactive digital archive and a video game. The pieces engage with topics ranging from the Black Lives Matter movement and police brutality to domestic violence and the impacts of the pandemic on different communities. The festival culminated in a panel event on March 31, but the works remain viewable on the [Social Justice Art & Film Festival] website.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

FAD Magazine: The Top 5 Online Exhibitions To See In April. “Tabish Khan the @LondonArtCritic picks five exhibitions to see online this month. Each one comes with a concise review to help you decide whether it’s for you. Readers should also check out his outdoor top 5.”

University of Rhode Island: University of Rhode Island joins HathiTrust. “The University of Rhode Island has become the newest member of HathiTrust, a forward-thinking global collaborative of research and academic libraries working to ensure the preservation and accessibility of the cultural record. HathiTrust holds the largest set of digitized books managed by the academic, research, and library community offering unprecedented opportunity for members of the URI community to access a wide array of research and scholarly materials.”

The Verge: Google’s AI reservation service Duplex is now available in 49 states. “More than two years after it initially began trials, Google’s AI-powered reservation service Duplex is now available in 49 US states. This looks like it’ll be the limit of Duplex’s coverage in the US for the time being, as Google tells The Verge it has no timeline to launch the service in the last hold-out state — Louisiana — due to unspecified local laws.”

Bloomberg: Singapore Blogger Crowdfunds $100,000 to Pay PM Defamation Award. “Singapore’s High Court on March 24 ordered [Leong Sze Hian] to pay S$133,000 ($98,800) to [Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong] for posting a link to a Malaysian news site that alleged the city-state’s leader had helped launder 1Malaysia Development Berhad funds. Since then more than 2,000 people donated to a crowdfunding campaign on social media to raise the full amount, Lim Tean, Leong’s attorney, posted to Facebook on Monday.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Maryland Today: UMD Libraries, Others Awarded $750K to Archive Social Justice Activism by College Students of Color. “The University of Maryland Libraries, the Atlanta University Center Robert Woodruff Library and the nationwide consortium Project STAND have received a $750,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to expand a free digital archive of documents and artifacts chronicling activism among college students of color. The multi-institutional collection includes oral histories, recordings of student radio, film and digital photography, posters, newspapers and other documentation of diverse movements and groups, stretching from the present as far back as student abolitionist activity during African American enslavement.”

New York Times: Gail Slatter, Who Helped Make the Times Newsroom Run, Dies at 68. “Gail Slatter never received a byline or a photo credit in The New York Times. During the 40 years she worked there, her name appeared in the newspaper only once, in 1997, when she helped flesh out a profile of a 15-year-old murder suspect who happened to have been on her daughter’s swim team at a Y.M.C.A. on Manhattan’s West Side. Ms. Slatter was a news assistant at The Times. But her unassuming job title belied the significant impact she had on what appeared in the paper and on the daily lives of her colleagues, particularly on the culture and photo desks. She was a guide, gatekeeper and guardian.”

Teen Vogue: Meet the Navajo Nation Skateboarder Going Viral on TikTok. “Naiomi Glasses, a Diné skateboarder in Navajo nation, happened upon a red sandstone slope to skate on — in her now-viral TikTok — by accident. ‘I live in the middle of nowhere and when I found that first sandstone, I was out looking for sheep. My grandma owns sheep and sometimes they get lost, and I thought the sandstone looked skate-able.’ With the nearest skatepark hours away, Naiomi resorted to turning the desert landscape into her own skatepark.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Business Insider: 533 million Facebook users’ phone numbers and personal data have been leaked online. “A user in a low level hacking forum on Saturday published the phone numbers and personal data of hundreds of millions of Facebook users for free online. The exposed data includes personal information of over 533 million Facebook users from 106 countries, including over 32 million records on users in the US, 11 million on users in the UK, and 6 million on users in India. It includes their phone numbers, Facebook IDs, full names, locations, birthdates, bios, and — in some cases — email addresses.”

KGAB: Wyoming Bill Aimed At Internet Viewpoint Discrimination Defeated In Committee. “A bill that would have taken aim against discrimination against viewpoints on politics, race, religion, and other topics by internet service providers and social media platforms was defeated on Monday in the Wyoming House Judiciary Committee by a 6-3 vote.”

Moscow Times: Russians Post More Profanities After Social Media Swearing Ban. “Russian-speaking social media users have posted 10% more profanity-laced content in the two months since a law requiring platforms to delete them came into force than before, the RBC news website reported Sunday. The Medialogia media monitor tallied 20.2 million posts containing swear words on Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram and Twitter, as well as three Russian platforms, from Feb. 1-March 31.” 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!



April 5, 2021 at 06:11PM
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Thursday, April 1, 2021

Historical Clothing, Mars Rover Photography, Google Forms, More: Thursday Evening ResearchBuzz, April 1, 2021

Historical Clothing, Mars Rover Photography, Google Forms, More: Thursday Evening ResearchBuzz, April 1, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

ResearchBuzz does not like April Fools Day. If there is any April Fool content that is not labeled as such, please let me know and I’ll remove it and apologize for being taken in.

NEW RESOURCES

BBC: Historical clothing from 14 museums displayed online. “Fourteen museums have joined forces to put on an online exhibition of clothing through the ages. The virtual display, called Highland Threads, features a selection of historical garments. They include a waistcoat and jacket said to have belonged to have belonged to Bonnie Prince Charlie from Inverness Museum and Art Gallery.”

CNET: Photos from NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover let you get lost on another world. “The Mars 2020 Perseverance rover sent back its first image, a tiny thumbnail of its landing spot in Jezero Crater, just moments after its dramatic soft touch-down on Feb. 18. The sedan-size rover has now been cautiously wheeling its way around for several weeks and has already sent back 16,448 total images as of April 1 — and that’s not an April Fools’ gag.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

9to5 Google: Google Forms will soon save progress as drafts, beta for Classroom/Workspace. “Amid distance learning, many educators have turned to using Google Forms for tests, quizzes, and other assignments. Google is soon adding the ability for Forms to automatically save draft progress in case users can’t complete in one sitting.”

The Verge: Periscope shuts down today. “Periscope, the app that popularized live streaming from smartphones, is shutting down today, just over six years after it launched. The service has already been removed from app stores, and most features will no longer be accessible after today.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

The Irish Times: National Library announces year-long LGBTI+ programme. “A year-long programme exploring Irish LGBTI+ identity and experiences over the last several decades to the present has been announced by the National Library of Ireland (NLI). It includes a physical and online exhibition of the work of activist Christopher Robson as well as a number of LGBTI+ online events.”

Man of Many: The New Lexus IS 350 F Sport was Designed on Twitch. “Combining a car with a gaming system seems rife with potential safety hazards, but that’s exactly what the Lexus Gamers’ IS is. The 2021 Lexus IS 350 F Sport was transformed into a gamer’s dream vehicle, complete with a full gaming system—for the passenger, fortunately. The design came about through input from the Twitch community, with the 15 million daily active users of the platform casting votes on the vehicle’s modifications.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

SCOTUS Blog: Court says Facebook did not violate anti-spam law when it sent unwanted text messages. “Facebook did not violate a federal telemarketing law when it sent unsolicited text messages to people without their consent, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled on Thursday. In an opinion by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the court sided with Facebook’s interpretation of a key clause in the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which restricts the use of devices known as ‘automatic telephone dialing systems.'”

Motherboard: People’s Expensive NFTs Keep Vanishing. This Is Why. “Last month, Tom Kuennen, a property manager from Ontario, coughed up $500 worth of cryptocurrency for a JPEG of an Elon Musk-themed ‘Moon Ticket’ from DarpaLabs, an anonymous digital art collective. He purchased it through the marketplace OpenSea, one of the largest vendors of so-called non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, in the hopes of reselling it for a profit. ‘It’s like a casino,’ he said in an interview. ‘If it goes up 100 times you resell it, if it doesn’t, well, you don’t tell anyone.’ He never got the chance to find out.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

ScienceDaily: New statistical method eases data reproducibility crisis. “A reproducibility crisis is ongoing in scientific research, where many studies may be difficult or impossible to replicate and thereby validate, especially when the study involves a very large sample size. Now researchers have developed a statistical tool that can accurately estimate the replicability of a study, thus eliminating the need to duplicate the work and effectively mitigating the reproducibility crisis.” 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!



April 2, 2021 at 06:13AM
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Thursday CoronaBuzz, April 1, 2021: 31 pointers to updates, useful stuff, research news, and more.

Thursday CoronaBuzz, April 1, 2021: 31 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

Miami Herald: People with intellectual disabilities can get COVID vaccination help from new website. “People with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) — such as Down syndrome, cerebral palsy and autism — have faced significant hurdles during the pandemic involving education, employment and mental and physical health…. To combat what experts deem a public health concern, the National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities launched a website on Wednesday to help guide people with IDD to trusted resources on COVID-19 vaccines, particularly where to find one in their area.”

NEW RESOURCES – STATE-SPECIFIC

WOBM: NJ launches new COVID vaccine finder tool for online appointments. “The state has launched a new web tool to better connect those eligible for COVID-19 vaccines with available appointments. A search page has been launched in ‘beta’ form, which means essentially it still is under construction, Gov. Phil Murphy announced on Wednesday at the state pandemic response briefing.”

SOCIETAL IMPACT

WRAL: COVID-19 was third leading cause of death last year, CDC confirms in early data. “Covid-19 was the third leading cause of death in the United States last year, after heart disease and cancer, according to provisional data released on Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The death rate from 2019 to 2020 increased by 15.9%, going up from 715.2 to 828.7 deaths per 100,000 people, according to the report.”

Lapham’s Quarterly: Revisiting the Dead. “Earlier in the year, I heard a news report that mentioned there were few, if any, memorials to those who died in the influenza pandemic of 1918. It just wasn’t the sort of mass death that lent itself easily to memorialization. I wondered if or how we would memorialize our own pandemic. Soon thereafter, I stumbled across a blog post about the burial grounds—and memorials—dedicated to those who died in nineteenth-century pandemics on Staten Island. I wanted to go see all three sites—the one in St. George, one up the road from there, and one farther south along the coast called Seguine Point—thinking maybe I would glimpse into our future.”

MISINFORMATION / DISINFORMATION

FactCheck: Viral Posts Misuse VAERS Data to Make False Claims About COVID-19 Vaccines. “Social media posts repeatedly misuse unverified data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System to falsely claim that COVID-19 vaccines are dangerous, and even lethal. But the government database is not designed to determine if vaccines cause health problems.”

ACTIVISM / PROTESTS

BBC: Belgium police break up fake festival started as April Fools’ joke. “Police in Belgium have used tear gas and water cannon to break up a crowd of people who had gathered for a fake concert that was announced on social media as an April Fools’ Day joke. About 2,000 people attended the event in Brussels’ Bois de la Cambre park, in defiance of the country’s Covid-19 measures.”

BUSINESS / CORPORATIONS

BBC: Google rejigs remote working as it reopens offices. “Google is changing its work-from-home policy as it looks to get more people back into its US offices. The tech firm will only allow employees to work from home for more than 14 days a year if they apply for it. Google will continue its current work-from-home arrangements until 1 September but will allow people to return voluntarily from next month.”

MarketWatch: Pfizer working on freeze-dried version of COVID-19 vaccine that doesn’t need ultracold storage. “In April, Pfizer is set to start a clinical trial evaluating a so-called lyophilized formulation in adults 18 to 55 years old in the U.S., according to a government database, clinicaltrials.gov, and confirmed by the company.”

CNN: Silicon Valley is starting to bring workers back to the office. “After years of building huge modern offices and a work culture that many industries have emulated, Silicon Valley was among the first to shutter those offices and go fully remote when the coronavirus pandemic began. Now, many of the tech industry’s biggest companies are slowly making plans to bring workers back, offering a potential road map in the process for what office work looks like in year two of the pandemic.”

HuffPost: Congress Bailed Out Uber’s Workers. Now What?. “With the coronavirus pandemic bearing down on the United States and Congress negotiating with the Donald Trump administration over a giant relief bill, Uber begged Trump not to leave out its drivers, who would normally not be eligible for unemployment benefits because they’re not regular employees. Congress soon created a whole new unemployment system that covered gig workers as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act in March 2020.”

WORLD / FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

BBC: Covid: Australia falls 85% short of vaccine delivery goal. “Australia has fallen 3.4 million doses short of its target of delivering four million Covid vaccinations by 31 March, prompting criticism of the government. The 85% shortfall comes two days after Brisbane entered another snap lockdown to combat a small outbreak.”

Deutsche Welle: Germany restricts use of AstraZeneca vaccine to over 60s in most cases. “German Health Minister Jens Spahn and the 16 state health ministers on Tuesday decided to suspend the routine use of the AstraZeneca vaccine for people under age 60 at an emergency meeting. Authorities in the cities of Berlin and Munich had earlier decided to limit the use of the vaccine.”

New York Times: Biden Administration Announces Ad Campaign to Combat Vaccine Hesitancy. “The Biden administration on Thursday morning announced an ambitious advertising campaign intended to encourage as many Americans as possible to be vaccinated against the coronavirus. The campaign, with ads in English and Spanish that will air
throughout April on network TV and cable channels nationwide, as well as online, comes as the administration is rapidly expanding access to coronavirus vaccines.”

BBC: Dutch government to let 3,500 fans watch Eurovision Song Contest. “The annual musical extravaganza will be staged at Rotterdam’s Ahoy Arena in May, after being cancelled last year. Under the plan, the venue would be half full and fans would need a negative Covid test before being allowed in.”

Politico: Federal watchdog calls for centralized Covid-19 data website. “Federal health agencies need to be more transparent about critical Covid-19 data, particularly on race and ethnicity and infections at nursing homes, the Government Accountability Office said Wednesday. The watchdog recommended those steps as part of its call for a sweeping overhaul of federal data on Covid-19, based on its probe of efforts to collect and analyze pandemic statistics across agencies.”

ProPublica: Documents Show Trump Officials Skirted Rules to Reward Politically Connected and Untested Firms With Huge Pandemic Contracts. “Peter Navarro, who served as Trump’s deputy assistant and trade adviser, essentially verbally awarded a $96 million deal for respirators to a company with White House connections. Later, officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency were pressured to sign the contract after the fact, according to correspondence obtained by congressional investigators. Documents obtained by the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis after a year of resistance from the Trump administration offer new details about Navarro’s role in a largely secretive buying spree of personal protective equipment and medical supplies.”

STATE / LOCAL GOVERNMENT

State of Washington: Inslee announces vaccine eligibility expansion to all adults April 15. “Gov. Jay Inslee today announced that effective April 15, all Washingtonians age 16 and up will be eligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccination. Over the past four months since Washington began administering doses of the vaccination, the state has followed a tiered eligibility system, beginning with those most at risk of hospitalization and death.”

State of Connecticut: Governor Lamont Announces Connecticut Remains on Track To Expand COVID-19 Vaccine Eligibility To All Adults on Thursday, April 1. “Governor Ned Lamont today announced that the State of Connecticut is on track to expand its COVID-19 vaccination program to the final group of adults, including all individuals between the ages of 16 and 44, on Thursday, April 1, 2021. Individuals in this age group will have access to schedule appointments beginning Thursday morning.”

INDIVIDUALS / BANDS / GROUPS

The Hill: Sarah Palin encourages mask wearing after revealing COVID-19 diagnosis. “Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) says that she previously tested positive for coronavirus and is encouraging Americans to mask up in order to slow its spread. Palin, 57, confirmed her COVID-19 diagnosis in an interview with People magazine published Wednesday, stating that she and some of her family members, including her son and daughter, tested positive.”

Politico: Interior Department chief of staff being removed from post after indoor party fiasco. “The White House is removing the Interior Department’s chief of staff, Jennifer Van der Heide, who recently planned a 50-person indoor party at the agency that the White House ordered canceled, and is moving her to a senior counselor job at the agency, according to two Biden administration officials.”

HIGHER EDUCATION

Washington Post: A mental health crisis was unraveling on college campuses. The pandemic has made it worse.. “Across the country, some school leaders and experts say the pandemic has brought new urgency to a mental health crisis that had been unraveling on college campuses for years. From social isolation to heightened feelings of inadequacy, students say it has made it harder to concentrate on school and put a strain on families and friendships.”

HEALTH

New York Times: More pregnant women died and stillbirths increased steeply during the pandemic, studies show.. “Reviewing data on more than six million pregnancies, the investigators found evidence that disruptions to health care systems and patients’ fear of becoming infected at clinics may have led to avoidable deaths of mothers and babies, especially in low- and middle-income countries.”

TECHNOLOGY

CNN: Robots are joining the fight against coronavirus in India. “In India, the country with the world’s second-highest number of Covid-19 cases, a handful of hospitals has started to use robots to connect patients with their loved ones, and assist healthcare workers on the frontlines of the pandemic.”

Infosecurity Magazine: #WorldBackupDay: Pandemic Has Emphasized the Need for Backups. “It is fair to say this year’s World Backup Day, held on March 31, takes on extra significance. This is not just because it is the 10th anniversary of this global campaign to educate people on the importance of backing up their digital documents as reliance on technology grows. It also comes around a year since countries throughout the world were plunged into lockdown restrictions in a bid to slow the spread of COVID-19, leading to a shift to home working and a much greater reliance on the internet for everyday services.”

CNN: Drones could help fight coronavirus by air-dropping medical supplies. “These are dangerous times for people with chronic health conditions. They often need to visit hospitals for treatment or to collect medication, but during the pandemic that means increased risk of exposure to coronavirus. In Africa, a US startup says it is reducing that risk by using drones to deliver medical supplies to local clinics, and freeing up hospital beds in the process.”

RESEARCH

CNET: Pfizer says its COVID-19 vaccine is 100% effective in younger teens. “Pfizer’s vaccine against COVID-19 shows 100% efficacy and “robust antibody responses” in younger teens, the company said in a statement on Wednesday. In a Phase 3 trial with 2,260 teenagers ages 12-15, the company found the vaccine’s efficacy was higher than for people ages 16-25.”

BBC: Covid: Will your pet need a coronavirus vaccine?. “…while scientists say there is currently no evidence that animals play a significant role in spreading the disease to people, infections have been confirmed in various species worldwide. These include dogs, cats, apes and even mink. To address these infections, scientists are developing Covid-19 vaccines that are specially designed for animals.”

University of Texas at Austin: Undetected Coronavirus Variant Was in at Least 15 Countries Before its Discovery. “A highly contagious SARS-CoV-2 variant was unknowingly spreading for months in the United States by October 2020, according to a new study from researchers with The University of Texas at Austin COVID-19 Modeling Consortium. Scientists first discovered it in early December in the United Kingdom, where the highly contagious and more lethal variant is thought to have originated.”

FUNNY

Reuters: Internet’s ‘Hide the Pain Harold’ accidentally used by Swedish COVID-19 vaccine website. “A health authority in Sweden unwittingly used ‘Hide the Pain Harold’ – one of the internet’s most-recognised figures – as the face of its COVID-19 vaccination booking website, officials said on Tuesday evening, adding the image had now been removed. Harold is actually Hungarian man Andras Arato, who in 2008 and 2009 posed as a model for stock photographs.”

CRIME / SECURITY / LEGAL

Department of Justice: Justice Department Warns About Fake Post-Vaccine Survey Scams. “Consumers receive the surveys via email and text message, and are told that, as a gift for filling out the survey, they can choose from various free prizes, such as an iPad Pro. The messages claim that the consumers need only pay shipping and handling fees to receive their prize. Victims provide their credit card information and are charged for shipping and handling fees, but never receive the promised prize. Victims also are exposing their personally identifiable information (PII) to scammers, thereby increasing the probability of identity theft.”

OPINION

CNET: Life during COVID has me wondering about the future of my fractured country. “In the UK, COVID-19 arrived in an already momentous post-Brexit landscape. The pandemic was a late, unwelcome guest to a party that had already dissolved into chaos and fighting. People and businesses alike are trying to find their feet in a new world outside of Europe (the UK officially left the EU on Dec. 31), but the country’s national identity has been in flux since the 2016 Brexit referendum. COVID has hardly served to unite us in the face of this uncertain future.”

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April 2, 2021 at 04:08AM
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Virtual Reality Headsets, Sustainable California Vineyards, Facebook, More: Thursday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, April 1, 2021

Virtual Reality Headsets, Sustainable California Vineyards, Facebook, More: Thursday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, April 1, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

ResearchBuzz does not like April Fools Day. If there is any April Fool content that is not labeled as such, please let me know and I’ll remove it and apologize for being taken in.

NEW RESOURCES

Spotted on Reddit: a pandemic project called VR-Compare. From the front page: “View summaries of 81 virtual reality headsets. Click on a headset’s name to view a full specification.” Spent a few minutes with it and it’s beautifully done, especially for a solo effort.

PR Newswire: New Website Spotlights Certified California Sustainable Wines, Vineyards and Wineries (PRESS RELEASE). “Users can search for certified wines, wineries and/or vineyards, and sort by varietal, region or appellation. With 2,247 Certified California Sustainable Vineyards that farm 204,000 acres (32% of California winegrape acres; another 22% are certified by other California sustainable winegrowing programs), 171 certified wineries producing 255 million cases (80% of California wine) and 9.4 million cases (113 million wine bottles) bearing the certification logo or claims, the search function is a valuable new tool to discover California wineries and vineyards that are committed to sustainability.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Al Jazeera: Facebook says will curb hate speech as Indian states go to polls. “Facebook has said it is taking steps to combat hate speech and misinformation in India as the world’s biggest democracy holds months-long multi-phase elections in four states and a federal territory. ‘We recognise that there are certain types of content, such as hate speech, that could lead to imminent, offline harm,’ the social networking giant said in a blog post dated March 30.”

Gizmodo: There’s Something Fishy About Amazon’s Anti-Union Twitter Army [Updated]. “Have you noticed a strange army of Amazon employees on Twitter recently, claiming that Amazon doesn’t engage in union-busting and disputing stories that workers sometimes have to piss in bottles? Many Twitter users are wondering whether the people are even real. And while there’s some evidence these people could be real, at least one of their photos appear to be fake.”

The Guardian: Facebook guidelines allow users to call for death of public figures. “Facebook’s bullying and harassment policy explicitly allows for ‘public figures’ to be targeted in ways otherwise banned on the site, including ‘calls for [their] death’, according to a tranche of internal moderator guidelines leaked to the Guardian. Public figures are defined by Facebook to include people whose claim to fame may be simply a large social media following or infrequent coverage in local newspapers.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

BBC: Stokes twins: YouTubers plead guilty over fake bank robbery. “A pair of YouTubers have pleaded guilty to faking a bank robbery that led to an unsuspecting Uber driver being held at gunpoint by police. Alan and Alex Stokes, 24, who have six million followers on their channel, wore balaclavas and called an Uber as a getaway vehicle.”

CNBC: Facebook’s acquisition of Giphy to face in-depth UK competition probe. “Britain’s competition regulator said Thursday that it was referring Facebook’s acquisition of GIF database Giphy for an in-depth investigation. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) recently completed its initial probe into the Facebook-Giphy merger — which has already closed — and concluded that the deal raises competition concerns.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

CNN: Microsoft earns contract worth up to $21.9 billion to make AR devices for the US Army. “The Army announced Wednesday that it had awarded Microsoft (MSFT) a contract to produce augmented reality systems based on its HoloLens 2 device called Integrated Visual Augmented Systems (IVAS). The devices are designed to help soldiers, ‘fight, rehearse and train using a single platform,’ the Army said. The deal has a five-year base and a five-year option to extend, and could be worth up to almost $21.9 billion over the full 10 years.”

NBC News: EPA empties out science panels stacked with Trump picks. “The Environmental Protection Agency is emptying out two top advisory panels stacked with experts picked under former President Donald Trump and will fill them with new members — the latest in a series of moves the Biden administration has taken with the goal of restoring integrity to science in decision-making.”

Berkman Klein Center: A meta-proposal for Twitter’s bluesky project. “Members of the Berkman Klein community, representing academics, activists, lawyers and technologists, came together to discuss the bluesky project, Twitter’s proposed protocol for public conversation. The discussions culminated in a ‘meta-proposal’ for the bluesky team and community, which presents suggestions on how to go about considering proposals and building out bluesky.” You can read more about Twitter’s proposed bluesky project here. Good afternoon, Internet…

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April 2, 2021 at 12:26AM
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Maine Women Activism, Birds by Zip Code, Carnivore Diets, More: Thursday ResearchBuzz, April 1, 2021

Maine Women Activism, Birds by Zip Code, Carnivore Diets, More: Thursday ResearchBuzz, April 1, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

ResearchBuzz does not like April Fools Day. If there is any April Fool content that is not labeled as such, please let me know and I’ll remove it and apologize for being taken in.

NEW RESOURCES

University of Maine: Online collection documents activism by women’s organizations in Maine. “The Maine Women’s History Collection documents the efforts of women’s organizations to address a variety of social and political issues including women’s suffrage, the Equal Rights Amendment, child care, health care, environmental pollution, reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights and social stratification, and provides evidence of persistent obstacles to gender equality, such as gender stereotypes, employment discrimination and domestic violence.”

StarTribune: Site shows you bird data by ZIP code. “Go to [the site], enter your ZIP code and hit update. You will be given the probability of a species having been reported there during the chosen month. You can click on a species to find out where best to find it during the selected month, a very cool service indeed. This works for any ZIP code in the U.S.”

EurekAlert: Ever wondered what red foxes eat? There’s a database for that. “Research into the diets of a large number of the world’s carnivores has been made publicly available through a free, online database created by a PhD student at the University of Sussex. From stoats in the UK to tigers in India, users are now able to search for detailed information about the diets of species in different geographical locations around the globe.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

USDA: New, Easy-to-Use Conservation Data in RCA Data Viewer. “Looking for [Natural Resources Conservation Service] conservation program data? Whether you need program financial information or number of conservation contracts, civil rights data or which practices are applied on how many acres – this and much more is available in the Soil and Water Resources Conservation Act (RCA) Data Viewer. The Viewer was recently updated with data for fiscal year 2020, and for those who want to use the numbers to create their own analysis, graphs or charts, conservation program data are now available in easier-to-use Microsoft Excel file format.”

GHacks: SimpleCodeGenerator is a new tool from NirSoft that lets you create QR Codes for URLs. “Nir Sofer has released a new program called SimpleCode Generator. It allows you to convert links to QR Codes that you can use with any smartphone.” Windows-only, and as it’s a standalone EXE file I guess it’s portable?

9to5 Google: Google canceling April Fools’ Day jokes for the second year in a row (Good.) “An internal memo sent by Google’s VP of global marketing, Marvin Chow, explains that the company will continue its ‘pause’ of April Fools’ Day pranks in 2021 as ‘much of the world’ is still dealing with ‘serious challenges’ during the pandemic.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

CNET: April Fools’ Day 2021: Cauliflower Peeps, Duolingo toilet paper and more pranks. “April 1 is typically a day for silly jokes, and companies have put a lot of effort into trying to make people laugh. Last year was an exception, but some brands are venturing back into the realm of April Fools’ Day for 2021. We’re keeping an eye on the shenanigans all day and will update with the latest knee-slappers as they appear.”

BBC: Facebook bans ‘voice of Trump’ from platform. “Facebook has removed a video of former US President Donald Trump from the page of his daughter-in-law Lara Trump. The social media giant banned Mr Trump from its platform in January following riots by his supporters on the Capitol building in Washington. Lara Trump, a new Fox News contributor, posted a video of herself interviewing Mr Trump on a range of issues.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

New York Times: Five Tech Commandments to a Safer Digital Life. “Tech is always changing, and so is the way we use it. That means we are always finding new ways to let our guard down for bad actors to snoop on our data. Remember when you shared your address book with that trendy new app? Or when you posted photos on social networks? Those actions may all pose consequences that weaken security for ourselves and the people we care about.”

TechRadar: Google is taking far more data from your Android devices than you may think. “Researchers have discovered that Android devices are collecting far more telemetry data on users than iOS. The findings from Douglas Leith from Trinity College in Ireland were part of a project looking to quantify the data both Android and iOS handsets send to their headquarters.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Phoenix New Times: Angry Residents, Abrupt Stops: Waymo Vehicles Are Still Causing Problems in Arizona. “A driverless Waymo vehicle caused a crash in October by stopping unexpectedly in the middle of the road, displaying a technical malfunction the Google-related company claims is rare. In another 2020 incident, a police officer claimed a sudden stop by a Waymo vehicle caused a rear-end collision, but the officer was cited. The incidents are detailed in newly released police reports obtained by Phoenix New Times that shed fresh light on the function and operations of the driverless vehicles, which are often cloaked in secrecy.”

University at Buffalo: Study: AI tool can help spot Type 2 diabetes trends in the U.S.. “A new University at Buffalo study reports on the advantages of using artificial intelligence to better understand Type 2 diabetes across the United States. The study describes how machine learning — a subset of AI that involves computers acting intelligently without being explicitly programmed — can help explore the prevalence of the disease, which effects more than 34 million Americans, as well as spot future trends.” Good morning, Internet…

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April 1, 2021 at 07:15PM
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