New researches

Monday, May 24, 2021

Fighting Game Glossary, Royal Institute of British Architects, Blocks Magazine, More: Monday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, May 24, 2021

Fighting Game Glossary, Royal Institute of British Architects, Blocks Magazine, More: Monday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, May 24, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

IGN: The Fighting Game Glossary Is an Incredible Resource for New Players. “Members of the fighting game community have revealed The Fighting Game Glossary, a new website that explores, defines and breaks down fighting game terminology for old and new players alike…. Per [fighting game community member] Infil, the glossary includes, ‘Over 650 terms carefully explained with 200+ video examples and Japanese translations. Easily search by term or game, share links to terms with your friends, and explore related concepts without losing your place’.”

Wallpaper: RIBA announces Google Arts and Culture partnership. “The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has unveiled a new platform on Google Arts and Culture. The platform launches with 15 online stories free to view, from the creation of New York’s Central Park to a deep-dive into the aesthetically-pleasing Picturesque movement.”

Brickset: Digital archive of Blocks magazine now online. “Blocks is delighted to announce that we’re opening up the back catalogue, providing access to more than 80 digital back issues of the LEGO magazine for fans, including the rare pilot issue. Print subscribers will get this new perk completely free for the duration of their subscription!”

USEFUL STUFF

MakeTechEasier: Everything You Need to Know About the iOS Keyboard. “As a key component for typing anything, the iOS keyboard is an essential and invaluable part of the whole iOS system. Since you are spending a lot of time typing on it, why not learn the best iOS keyboard tips and tricks and get the best out of it? While there are numerous third-party keyboards that promise to make your life better, learning the default keyboard is the best course of action. Here are some of the most important things you need to know about the iOS keyboard.”

Mashable: The 25 best educational podcasts for learning what you missed in school . “Podcasts radically shift the dynamics around who gets to teach, and who gets to learn. A lot of the most beloved and popular shows, like Radiolab and Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History, basically boil down to what you wish your science or history class had been like in the first place. Many others, like 1619 and You’re Wrong About, aim to correct the misinformation in many accepted cultural narratives from both our near and distant pasts. Now, obviously, podcasts can’t replace a world-class, bonafide, IRL, teacher-to-student relationship. But they can teach us more than a few vital lessons. Here are a few of our most educational favorites.”

Fstoppers: How to Create a 360×180 Spherical Pano With Any Camera. “First, let me start out by saying that the absolute easiest way to take full 360×180 spherical panos is to buy a 360-degree camera. These cameras used to be really expensive, but now, you can buy some pocket-sized versions for less than $1,000 that can create perfect panos instantly. But, if you don’t want to buy more gear, I’ll tell you how to do it with whatever camera you currently own.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

EurekAlert: Digital disclosure of Dutch East India Company archives by Huygens Institute. “Together with the VU Amsterdam, the National Archives, the International Institute for Social History and the Humanities Cluster of the Royal Netherlands Academy, the Huygens Institute for History of the Netherlands is building a state-of-the-art scientific infrastructure, enabling a better understanding of colonial history, the Dutch East India Company and the early-modern histories of countries and cultures of the Indian Ocean and Indonesian Archipelago Worlds.”

CBC: Black market in Google reviews means you can’t believe everything you read. “When Roman Abramovich, a Russian billionaire and owner of the English Premier League’s Chelsea Football Club, appeared to have posted a Google review complaining that a Manitoba moving company lost three of his watches, Chris Pereira knew something was wrong. The oligarch had never been a customer at Riverbend Moving and Storage, a small business that offers residential and commercial moving services in Winnipeg. The review was fake, and fit a pattern that Pereira, the company’s vice president of sales, had been observing for months — a slew of made-up complaints targeting the company’s online reputation.”

KBS World: Digital Archive on Japan’s Wartime Sexual Slavery to be Set up in UCLA. “A digital archive with translated primary sources and documentary evidence on Japan’s wartime sexual slavery is set to be established at the University of California, Los Angeles(UCLA). Comfort Women Action for Redress and Education(CARE), an advocacy group for the victims of Japan’s wartime sexual slavery, said Tuesday that the online archive will be set up at UCLA’s Center for Korean Studies as early as July. ”

RESEARCH & OPINION

AFP: Fans of Sci-Hub are mobilizing to save the pirate science platform. “A group of Reddit users are protesting against the FBI’s attempts to pressure Alexandra Elbakyan, creator of the Sci-Hub website, which publishes scientific studies for free. The community is mobilizing around her vision: to create a digital library of scientific articles accessible for free.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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May 25, 2021 at 12:16AM
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Lyndon B. Johnson Phone Calls, Compendium of U.S. Jails, Jack Stout, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, May 24, 2021

Lyndon B. Johnson Phone Calls, Compendium of U.S. Jails, Jack Stout, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, May 24, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

LBJ Presidential Library: LBJ Presidential Library celebrates its 50th anniversary with LBJ’s recorded telephone conversations. “Designed and built by the Miller Center’s web team, the website, ‘Inside the Presidency of Lyndon Baines Johnson,’ will focus on more than 100 pivotal telephone conversations spanning key areas of the Johnson presidency. While listening to a conversation, users will be able to read the scrolling transcript and each telephone recording webpage includes supporting historical materials such as photographs, documents, biographies, and oral histories from the LBJ Library and Miller Center collections.”

Health & Justice Journal: The Compendium of U.S. jails: creating and conducting research with the first comprehensive contact database of U.S. jails. “Millions of people pass through U.S. jails annually. Conducting research about these public institutions is critical to understanding on-the-ground policies and practices, especially health care services, affecting millions of people. However, there is no existing database of the number, location, or contact information of jails. We created the National Jails Compendium to address this gap. In this paper, we detail our comprehensive methodology for identifying jail locations and contact information. We then describe the first research project to use the Compendium, a survey assessing jails’ treatment practices for incarcerated pregnant people with opioid use disorder.”

EMS1: National EMS Museum publishes online archive of writings by late EMS visionary Jack Stout. “The National EMS Museum has published an online archive of the writings of late EMS visionary Jack Stout through a partnership between FirstWatch and the Academy of International Mobile Healthcare Integration (AIMHI). The Jack Stout Archive is an open-access collection of more than 100 of Stout’s articles and essays, digitized through funding from FirstWatch and AIMHI, according to a press release.”

AP: Old records shed new light on smallpox outbreaks in 1700s. “A highly contagious disease originating far from America’s shores triggers deadly outbreaks that spread rapidly, infecting the masses. Shots are available, but a divided public agonizes over getting jabbed. Sound familiar? Newly digitized records — including a minister’s diary scanned and posted online by Boston’s Congregational Library and Archives — are shedding fresh light on devastating outbreaks of smallpox that hit the city in the 1700s.”

Vice: The Website Amplifying the Search for Missing Black People. “Across the UK, Black people have been going missing in disproportionate numbers. Despite making up only 3.3 percent of the population of England and Wales, National Crime Agency statistics indicate that Black people made up 14 percent of missing persons cases in 2019 and 2020 – over four times their relative population. In London, 36 percent of missing persons in the city were Black, almost three times their city population of 13.3 percent. Dominic Norton, a self-taught software developer, is hoping to step up the search for missing Black people in the UK. ”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Dot LA: Snap Unveils Its New AR Glasses and Innovation Lab. “Snap unveiled its latest AR glasses, pushing deeper into the technology it considers its big bet. Chief executive Evan Spiegel demonstrated the latest version of ‘Spectacles’ that overlay computer graphics atop the wearer’s field of vision during the company’s annual partner summit on Thursday.”

Publishers Weekly: Amazon Publishing, DPLA Ink Deal to Lend E-books in Libraries. “The Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) today announced that it has signed a much-anticipated agreement with Amazon Publishing to make all of the roughly 10,000 Amazon Publishing e-books and digital audiobooks available to libraries, the first time that digital content from Amazon Publishing will be made available to libraries.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Mashable: QAnon believers go undercover to spread conspiracies online…and it’s working. “The reason you may not be seeing so much QAnon online isn’t because they’re not there. It’s because they’ve gone undercover. QAnon content is still spreading on mainstream social media platforms thanks to a number of tactics its believers are using to get around the bans.”

CNN: Google to open its first retail store to sell devices. “Almost exactly 20 years to the day after Apple opened its first retail store, Google is finally following suit. The company announced Thursday that it is opening its first physical retail store, called Google Store, this summer in New York City. The store will be located under its offices in the Chelsea neighborhood, where it employs many of its more than 11,000 employees in the city.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Monash University: New study finds ancient Australian Aboriginal memory tool superior to “memory palace” learning among medical students. “The researchers found that the students who used the Aboriginal technique for remembering – ie a narrative plus locations from around the campus – were almost three times more likely to correctly remember the entire list than they were prior to training (odds ratio – 2.8). The students using the memory palace technique were about twice as likely to get a perfect score after training (2.1), while the control group improved by about 50% (1.5) over their pre-training performance.”

EurekAlert: Warnings on the dangers of screen time are ill founded — New study. “University researchers have carried out the largest systematic review and meta-analysis to date of how people’s perceptions of their screen time compare with what they do in practice, finding estimates of usage were only accurate in about five per cent of studies.”

Loyola Marymount University: Snapchat, Instagram Linked to Alcohol Abuse Among College Students. “Exposure to alcohol-related content on social media is associated with increased drinking among college students, according to several new studies from researchers at Loyola Marymount University. The effect stems from perceptions of drinking norms — the idea that everyone else is drinking, or drinking a lot, which in turn drives how much or how often college students really do consume alcohol, said Joe LaBrie, LMU psychology professor and lead author of the studies.” Good morning, Internet…

May 24, 2021 at 05:31PM
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Sunday, May 23, 2021

Wholesale Energy Prices, Tennessee Early Readers, Missing Persons Montana, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, May 23, 2021

Wholesale Energy Prices, Tennessee Early Readers, Missing Persons Montana, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, May 23, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Berkeley Lab Electricity Markets & Policy: New data tool explores trends in wholesale power prices and renewable energy supply. “Variable renewable generation can have important impacts to pricing patterns at the local level, but those patterns are often obscured when looking at regional average annual pricing trends. The Renewables and Wholesale Electricity Prices (ReWEP) tool allows users to compare pricing trends across locations, regions, and a number of different timeframes, down to the nodal level. These comparisons illustrate the ongoing interactions between wind and solar generation and wholesale energy prices.”

Chattanooga Times Free Press: State education department launches free decodable books program to strengthen K-2 reading skills. “The Tennessee Department of Education has a new tool in its effort to make students proficient readers by the time they enter third grade. Called ‘decodables,’ the free, at-home reading supplement for students in kindergarten through second grade helps parents work with their youngsters to build reading skills and practice phonics.”

KHQ: New database and portal aims to ‘streamline’ reports of missing indigenous people. “The Blackfeet Community College unveiled a new portal that will help people report cases of Montana’s missing and murdered indigenous people…. People can submit a missing persons report, which will get sent to local law enforcement agencies. The coalition will make sure that agencies got it, and will keep in touch with the person who submitted it. They’ll also post the report on social media pages.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Input: Scan Band turns your lunch into a playable AR musical instrument. “Artiphon, the company behind novel musical instruments the Orba (which we reviewed last year) and Instrument 1, has made an augmented reality (AR) app called Scan Band that lets users turn objects around them into virtual instruments…. Once a user’s opened Scan Band in Snapchat they can point their cameras at quotidien objects (like food, pets, plants) and they’ll be transformed into AR stickers. They can then bang out sounds on the stickers.”

RouteNote: Pinterest launches Idea Pins – TikTok meets Stories. “Even Pinterest has Stories now. The platform’s new Idea Pins let creators add pages of videos to their profile, with voiceovers and music.”

CNET: Twitter’s Ticketed Spaces to launch in coming weeks. “Twitter is preparing to launch its Ticketed Spaces feature in the next couple of weeks, the company announced Friday, enabling people to host live, paid shows on the platform.”

USEFUL STUFF

MakeUseOf: How to Use Zoom Video Filters. “Zoom has become a popular pick for video conferencing. It may be for meetings, webinars, classes, or even catching up with friends. However, if we’re honest, facing a screen full of poker-faced people can be pretty boring if not their still photos or their names. In this article, we guide you on how to use built-in and third-party Zoom filters that you can show off at your next Zoom meeting.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Yahoo: Google CEO: Our ultimate moonshot is still Search. “For Google (GOOG, GOOGL) and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, his ‘ultimate moonshot’ is still Search, the company’s iconic and enormously successful search engine.” I’d comment but I’m afraid I’d melt the keyboard.

SECURITY & LEGAL

United States Department of Justice: Four Individuals Plead Guilty to RICO Conspiracy Involving “Bulletproof Hosting” for Cybercriminals. “Four Eastern European nationals have pleaded guilty to conspiring to engage in a Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organization (RICO) arising from their providing ‘bulletproof hosting’ services between 2008 and 2015, which were used by cybercriminals to distribute malware and attack financial institutions and victims throughout the United States.”

ProPublica: Addressing Rape in Four Minutes or Less: Dating App Reps Left Unprepared to Respond to Assault Victims. “The multibillion-dollar online dating industry has no meaningful standards for responding to reports of offline harm and removing those responsible from its platforms, Columbia Journalism Investigations and ProPublica found. Despite pledges to shield users from sexual predators, the companies have done little to abide by them. Most companies have loosely defined procedures that force employees to rely on their own judgment. Dating app users who report an attack, like [Natalie] Dong, often have to badger companies to take action.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Analytics India: How AI Is Breathing Life Into Animation. “According to Statista, the global animation market is expected to grow from $259 billion in 2018 to 270 billion by 2020. Animation has reached new heights because of the rapid evolution of deep learning and the proliferation of software tools. Here are some examples of how Artificial intelligence and machine learning are bringing animation to life in studios.”

BBC: Could my mum’s toaster help me care for her?. “An emerging technology allows relatives to keep an eye on elderly or vulnerable people living alone by monitoring their electricity usage – but as with all innovations, there is the potential for misuse.” Good morning, Internet…

May 23, 2021 at 09:01PM
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Saturday, May 22, 2021

Helsinki Photography, Ancient Chinese Books, RSS in Chrome, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, May 22, 2021

Helsinki Photography, Ancient Chinese Books, RSS in Chrome, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, May 22, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

New-to-me, from PetaPixel: Helsinki Has a Website of 65,000 Free Photos Anyone Can Use. “The collection has been around since 2017 and is operated by Helsinki City Museum, which has free admission and is the world’s only museum focused on Helsinki’s history and heritage. The museum has a vast collection of roughly 1 million photographs, of which a sizable portion has been digitized and put online for the world to view (and more are being added on a regular basis).”

China .org: Digitization helps to build online library of historical tomes. “For the 26th World Book and Copyright Day last week, 10 Chinese libraries jointly released the digitized editions of over 1,700 volumes of ancient Chinese books. This is the fourth expansion of the national database of ancient Chinese books since it went online in 2016. The database was launched by the National Center for Preservation and Conservation of Ancient Books, headquartered at the National Library of China in Beijing.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Lifehacker: How to Try Google’s Experimental New RSS Feature in Chrome Canary. “Google is testing an experimental RSS-based ‘Follow’ feature in Chrome Canary on Android. Google says the feature is only an ‘experiment’ for now and will decide whether to implement the feature publicly based on user and developer feedback, but this seems like good news for RSS lovers like me.” I’d rather Google Reader came back, to be honest.

CNET: Record and transcribe your Zoom meetings with this new tool, here’s how. “Zoom calls are a part of daily life for many professionals and as companies examine hybrid workplace models, that’s not likely to change anytime soon. A new tool from note-taking app Otter.ai aims to help you keep track of what happens during your Zoom meetings by automatically recording and transcribing notes so you don’t have to.”

BetaNews: Microsoft is finally ready to kill off Internet Explorer once and for all… for most people. “Internet Explorer may be a stalwart of the world of web browsers, but it has also been an object of ridicule and derision for pretty much its entire life. Since the emergence of the Chromium-based Microsoft Edge, the writing has been on the wall for the browser just about everyone loves to hate, but IE has been lingering for longer than many people would have expected. But now Microsoft is finally ready to pull the plug. Sort of.”

USEFUL STUFF

The World: ‘How to Report a Hate Crime’ booklets empower Asian Americans amid rise in discrimination. “From the kitchen counter of her parent’s house, where she was quarantining last spring, [Esther] Lim created free booklets aptly called ‘How to Report a Hate Crime.’ In about 15 pages, readers learn what to do and who to call if they are a victim. The booklets have now been translated into nine languages, including Thai, Vietnamese, Japanese and Korean. Lim says she has plans for expansion to reach other vulnerable communities, but over the past year, the booklets have mostly been distributed to elderly Asians across the US.”

FStoppers: How To Create a Cinematic Photo Series for Instagram. “There once was a time that you took a photograph you liked and you put it on Instagram and received likes, comments, and followers. It feels so ago now that I can barely remember how rewarding it must have been. Then, algorithm change upon monetization upon algorithm change happened, and many of the users were left confused and deflated. In all honesty, it sapped my interest in the platform almost entirely. However, it is still a great tool for photographers to share their work with large audiences and to even find clients and collaborators. The problem is, you need to be smarter than ever before to get even the thinnest sliver of the attention pie.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

BNN Bloomberg: Google Request to Move State Antitrust Lawsuit Denied by Judge. “Alphabet Inc.’s Google failed to have a monopoly lawsuit filed against the company by Texas and other states moved to California, where the company is based. U.S. District Judge Sean Jordan in Plano, Texas, on Thursday denied Google’s request to transfer the case, according to a court filing.”

BBC: Ransomware: Should paying hacker ransoms be illegal?. “Ransomware attacks prevent victims accessing computer systems or data until a ransom is paid. Law-enforcement agencies around the world are increasingly urging victims not to pay. But paying ransoms is not illegal. And many organisations pay in secret. Now, the Ransomware Task Force (RTF) global coalition of cyber-experts is lobbying governments to take action.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Phys .org: New AI-based tool can find rare cell populations in large single-cell datasets. “Researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have developed a first-of-its-kind artificial intelligence (AI)-based tool that can accurately identify rare groups of biologically important cells from single-cell datasets, which often contain gene or protein expression data from thousands of cells. The research was published today in Nature Computational Science.”

Chicago Sun-Times: Chicago plan for police misconduct database fails to meet the moment. “This week, the Chicago City Council is expected to vote to create a public database of allegations of police misconduct — one-stop-shopping for anybody in town to review all complaints and how they have been handled and resolved. Except it wouldn’t really work that way. The database proposed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot and allies in the City Council would be nothing but transparency-lite. More show than tell.”

Pew (PEW PEW PEW PEW PEW PEW PEW!): 70% of U.S. social media users never or rarely post or share about political, social issues. “When asked about five potential reasons for why they do not post about these topics, the top two reasons users cite are concerns that the things they post or share will be used against them and not wanting to be attacked for their views. About a third of those who never or rarely post or share about these issues say that each statement is a major reason.” Good afternoon, Internet…

May 23, 2021 at 12:43AM
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Wednesday, May 19, 2021

Church of Ireland Gazette, New Mexico Uranium Mines, U.S. Media Index, More: Wednesday ResearchBuzz, May 19, 2021

Church of Ireland Gazette, New Mexico Uranium Mines, U.S. Media Index, More: Wednesday ResearchBuzz, May 19, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Church of Ireland Historical Society: Church of Ireland Gazette Digital Archive Complete (1856-2010). “The Church of Ireland Gazette Digital Archive is complete. All editions of the newspaper, from its foundation in 1856 up to and including 2010, are freely available electronically, allowing the worldwide audience to view and search it using any name, place, or other search term.”

Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department of New Mexico: Mining and Minerals Division launches Uranium Mines Dashboard. This link goes to a PDF file. “The Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department (EMNRD) Mining and Minerals Division (MMD) announces the launch of the New Mexico Uranium Mines Dashboard, intended to provide the public with quick access to data on legacy uranium mines throughout the state. The dashboard compiles data from a variety of sources into one location, making it easier for the public to find information about legacy uranium mining in New Mexico. Built by MMD staff, the database includes mines that had verifiable uranium production, and that have been abandoned, may no longer be maintained, and are inactive.”

NiemanLab: The U.S. Media Index database shows news consumers who owns what. “If you ever wanted to track down who owns a news outlet, it’s now much easier to do it. The U.S. Media Index database by the Future of Media Project has done the grueling work of compiling that information for us. The databases includes three indices: The U.S. Mainstream Media Index details the 176 parent companies of daily news outlets; the index of emerging nonprofit media and donors lists 231 nonprofit news outlets and who funds them; and an index of the seven owners of daily newspapers is categorized by state.”

Nerdist: This Tool Lets You See World’s 1,000 Most-Polluting Rivers. “One of the biggest environmental disasters that needs to be addressed ASAP is the immense plastic pollution in the oceans. According to the nonprofit organization The Ocean Cleanup Project, the best way to do this is to tackle the incoming plastics at their source: rivers along coasts. With a new tool, the nonprofit allows people to see the 1,000 most-polluting rivers in the world; ones it aims to purify with its autonomous, plastic-collecting drone ships.”

Independent (Ireland): Claddagh reveals ‘treasure trove’ of music and poetry on website. “Claddagh and Universal are in the process of digitally remastering a ‘treasure trove’ of Claddagh material which has been stored in Bank of Ireland vaults for several decades. More than 600 products, including Irish music and poetry, will be available for sale internationally with plans for the Claddagh website to become a ‘go-to’ site for traditional Irish music and sound. ”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

MakeUseOf: Rumor: Twitter Will Release Its New Verification Tool in May. “According to a serial Twitter researcher, Twitter might relaunch its tool to request verification in the week beginning May 16. The new tool will allow users to request a blue tick on the platform.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

The Scotsman: New national museum proposed to honour Scots convicted of witchcraft. “The proposed attraction, which is hoped to secure public funding to help get it off the ground, would recall how 3,837 people were accused of witchcraft in Scotland between the 16th and 18th centuries – 85 per cent of them women. It is thought around 2,500 executions were carried out in Scotland under the Witchcraft Act during several waves of ‘satanic panic’ between 1563 and 1736.”

BuzzFeed News: Tumblr Says It’s The Queerest Social Media Platform, But Can It Hold On To That?. “Tumblr has declared itself “the queerest place on the internet” based on data it collected comparing its users to those of other platforms, like TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Reddit, Twitter, and Pinterest. According to Tumblr, the people who use its site are 193% more likely to be LGBTQ compared to those on other platforms. It estimates that 1 in 4 of its users identifies as LGBTQ.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CNET: Amazon sales of facial recognition software to police on pause indefinitely. “Amazon isn’t ready to begin sales of its facial recognition software to law enforcement agencies when a year-long moratorium expires in June. The company didn’t announce a new deadline, and the suspension of sales of the Rekognition software will stay in place until further notice, as reported earlier by Reuters.”

Yahoo News: Facial recognition, fake identities and digital surveillance tools: Inside the post office’s covert internet operations program. “The post office’s law enforcement arm has faced intense congressional scrutiny in recent weeks over its Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP), which tracks social media posts of Americans and shares that information with other law enforcement agencies. Yet the program is much broader in scope than previously known and includes analysts who assume fake identities online, use sophisticated intelligence tools and employ facial recognition software, according to interviews and documents reviewed by Yahoo News.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Getty Blog: A Rare Opportunity to Study Van Gogh’s Irises. “For more than 30 years, a wild patch of vibrant blue flowers and undulating greenery has been a landmark of the Getty Museum’s collection, drawing crowds from all over the world who flock to gaze on the distinctive, curling lines and thick impasto of Irises by Vincent Van Gogh…. If the Getty Museum is open, you can expect to see Van Gogh’s Irises. But the unprecedented closure allowed Irises to be moved into the Getty’s laboratory and conservation studio for an in-depth examination.”

MIT Technology Review: Language models like GPT-3 could herald a new type of search engine. “…a team of Google researchers has published a proposal for a radical redesign that throws out the ranking approach and replaces it with a single large AI language model—a future version of BERT or GPT-3. The idea is that instead of searching for information in a vast list of web pages, users would ask questions and have a language model trained on those pages answer them directly. The approach could change not only how search engines work, but how we interact with them.” Gee, like natural language searching? Like MIT sued Ask Jeeves over? Good morning, Internet…

May 19, 2021 at 06:14PM
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Tuesday, May 18, 2021

Reforesting Projects, Dark Patterns Game, Texas Volunteering, More: Tuesday Evening ResearchBuzz, May 18, 2021

Reforesting Projects, Dark Patterns Game, Texas Volunteering, More: Tuesday Evening ResearchBuzz, May 18, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Mongabay: How to pick a tree-planting project? Mongabay launches transparency tool to help supporters decide. “Mongabay has put together a directory to show whether tree-planting and reforestation projects publicly disclose the criteria that experts say are keys to success. We thought this would be a useful starting point for people wanting to fund reforestation, so they could identify projects that align with their interests. Our Reforestation Directory is built on a three-month research effort to record publicly available information on more than 350 tree-planting projects in 80 countries. Rather than make an assessment (and perceived endorsement) of the quality of the projects, Mongabay’s review is based on how much information is publicly disclosed by an organization.”

The Guardian: Can you solve it? Are you smart enough to opt out of cookies?. “Today’s puzzles are taken from Terms & Conditions Apply, a free game in which you are bombarded with pop-ups and must get to the end without signing up to cookies, T&Cs, newsletters, or any other data-extraction device. The game is a send-up of the tricks used by websites to get you to things you don’t want to do, setting the player tasks including word challenges, logic puzzles, dexterity tests and optical illusions.”If you want a hair-pullingly frustrating game to show you the danger of dark patterns, look no further.

KWTX: New website makes it easier for Central Texans to find volunteer opportunities. “A recent study found that around 66 percent of volunteers decreased their time volunteering or stopped completely during the pandemic. As life is getting back to normal, there’s a new website that’s making it easier for Texans to find ways to get involved in the community again. OneStar Foundation just launched VolunterTX [sic]. It’s a website that gathers places where people can volunteer from across the state, and puts them all in one place.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Google Blog: I/O 2021 . “This year, Google I/O went digital — available for everyone, for free — and was dedicated to showcasing a more helpful Google for all. The event brought together people from around the world for a first look at updates across our products, including new milestones in AI, helpful features in Android, Photos and Maps, and ways we’re building with security and privacy in mind. Here are more details about everything we announced this year.”

Android Police: $3 ‘Twitter Blue’ subscription may include Scroll news and better bookmarks, but not editable tweets. “The social network has some major ideas for its new service. Twitter has been working towards diversifying its platform away from ads all year, introducing Super Follows and testing a paid “Undo Send” feature. Once the acquisition is complete, Scroll will factor into these new premium plans, giving users the ability to read articles and newsletters on Twitter as a subscriber.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Khmer Times: Cambodia to have cultural heritage listed in Asean digital archives. “Details of Cambodian cultural heritage are to be included on the ASEAN Cultural Heritage Digital Archive (ACHDA) website, in order to share knowledge of Cambodian culture and arts among Asean countries.”

Sierra Nevada Daily: Punk family album. “As an awkward 14-year-old hovering around the edges of Reno’s punk and hardcore music scene in 2006, I have some memories of chaotic nights spent in the basements of some of the city’s DIY venues. They were cramped, dirty and sometimes lit by a single bare light bulb. I was just tall enough to catch the dozens of elbows and fists swinging in the darkness with my face—as my ringing ears were assaulted by the crackling PA speaker an arm’s length away. Houses with names like Fort Ryland, House of Dread or The Spacement would pair a local and touring band for a night’s show. The crowd would pay a few bucks at the door to beat each other up—and then it would happen again the next night. As far as cheap fun goes, it couldn’t be beat.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Los Angeles Times: Citizen app posts image of wrong man as arson suspect in Palisades fire. “An image of a young man was sent on the Citizen personal safety app to users in the Los Angeles basin after a brush fire broke out late Friday night and quickly grew…. But there was one problem: The man was not the person identified by an LAPD observer in a helicopter as the one seen igniting multiple fires that eventually swelled to consume more than 1,300 acres between Pacific Palisades and Topanga Canyon.”

Computerworld: Here’s what you can do about ransomware. “Last week, people in my neck of the woods, North Carolina, went into a panic. You couldn’t get gasoline for love or money. The root cause? Colonial Pipeline, a major oil and gas pipeline company, had been hit by a major ransomware attack. With four main fuel pipelines shut down, people throughout the southeast U.S. lined up at gas stations for every drop of gas they could get. You may not believe that ransomware is a serious threat. But I and most everyone else in the southeast? We believe.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

EurekAlert: Breakthrough Army technology is a game changer for deepfake detection. “Army researchers developed a Deepfake detection method that will allow for the creation of state-of-the-art Soldier technology to support mission-essential tasks such as adversarial threat detection and recognition. This work specifically focuses on a lightweight, low training complexity and high-performance face biometrics technique that meets the size, weight and power requirements of devices Soldiers will need in combat.” Good evening, Internet…

May 19, 2021 at 06:18AM
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Video Appeals to the President of Russia, Teach ME Outside, Cape Town University Fire, More: Tuesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, May 18, 2021

Video Appeals to the President of Russia, Teach ME Outside, Cape Town University Fire, More: Tuesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, May 18, 2021
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Ivy Plus Libraries Confederation: IPLC Launches the Video Appeals to the President of Russia Web Archive. “The Ivy Plus Libraries Confederation is pleased to announce the launch of the Video Appeals to the President of Russia web archive, preserving online videos created as direct appeals to Vladimir Putin by various groups and individuals in the Russian Federation and a number of other countries. The videos contain requests for the president’s direct involvement in resolving local and national social, economic, legal and environmental problems, assessment of Putin’s leadership, advice to him, and birthday wishes.”

Maine Department of Education: Maine Organizations Launch New ‘Teach ME Outside’ Website for Educators. “A collaborative effort between three Maine organizations called ‘Teach ME Outside’ has recently launched a new website to provide support for Maine educators and community members interested in environmental and outdoor learning for all Maine youth. The site contains educational resources, upcoming training opportunities, and data from across the state. Also featured on the website is the brand new Maine Environmental Education and Outdoor Learning Resource Directory, a dynamic and searchable map and tool that parents, educators, and community members can use to discover and connect with environmental and outdoor learning partners in their area.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

University of Cape Town: Minister Nzimande pledges help to UCT library, students after fire. “Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation Dr Blade Nzimande has pledged help from his department’s flagship funding agencies, the National Research Foundation (NRF) and the National Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences (NIHSS), to digitise and restore the University of Cape Town’s (UCT) library assets. This follows the 18 April fire that destroyed Jagger Reading Room and damaged other buildings. Dr Nzimande also promised to assist students whose research had been disrupted by the fire.”

National Archives News: 1950 Census on Track for 2022 Release, Despite Pandemic. “With less than a year to go before the release of the 1950 census, National Archives staff are working to ensure researchers around the world can access the records as planned on April 1, 2022.”

USEFUL STUFF

Make Tech Easier: How to Disable Web Page Auto-Refresh (All Major Browsers) . “There was a time when web pages were static once they loaded – no post-processing changing web pages before your eyes, no funny business. Today, features like auto-refresh are designed to help us, but sometimes they can get in the way, causing videos or text to reload when we’re in the middle of using them. To make your life a little easier, we show you how to disable auto-refresh on all the major browsers.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

New Statesman: How composer Kevin MacLeod became the king of royalty-free music . “If you’ve spent much time at all on YouTube or similar platforms over the last 15 years, you will have heard MacLeod’s work. The flute-filled, easily meme-able ‘Monkeys Spinning Monkeys’ appears in numerous TikToks. ‘Sneaky Snitch’, ‘Thatched Villagers’, ‘Carefree’: even if you’ve never heard MacLeod’s name, so much of his computer-generated, nostalgic-leaning work will sound weirdly familiar.”

Vietnam+: National Museum of History to go digital to attract more visitors. “Twenty national treasures at the Vietnam National Museum of History in Hanoi will be introduced to the public via a virtual gallery in June at the latest with support of digital technology. This is the museum’s very first effort to develop itself into a digital museum in the coming time.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

ARTNews: U.S. Government Seeks Forfeiture of Roman Statue That Was Allegedly En Route to Kim Kardashian. “A newly filed lawsuit reveals that, in 2016, the U.S. government seized an ancient Roman statue that was allegedly being delivered to Kim Kardashian. In the suit, filed on April 30 in the United States District Court of Central California’s Western Division, the U.S. government called for the forfeiture of the ‘illegally imported’ statue, which resembles the lower half of a person draped in fabric. The lawsuit, filed in rem (or against the statue itself), was first reported on Twitter by Robert Snell, a writer for the Detroit News.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

EurekAlert: ‘We’re playing Moneyball with building assets’. “Researchers have developed a tool to help governments and other organizations with limited budgets spend money on building repairs more wisely. The new tool uses artificial intelligence (AI) and text mining techniques to analyze written inspection reports and determine which work is most urgently needed.”

WWNO: Facebook Calls Links To Depression Inconclusive. These Researchers Disagree. “Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers’ biggest fear as a parent isn’t gun violence, or drunk driving, or anything related to the pandemic. It’s social media. And specifically, the new sense of ‘brokenness’ she hears about in children in her district, and nationwide. Teen depression and suicide rates have been rising for over a decade, and she sees social apps as a major reason.” Good afternoon, Internet…

May 18, 2021 at 11:45PM
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