New researches

Thursday, October 6, 2022

Velma, Vivaldi, Test-Making Tools, More: Thursday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, October 6, 2022

Velma, Vivaldi, Test-Making Tools, More: Thursday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, October 6, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Independent: Google pays tribute after Scooby Doo character Velma ‘comes out’ ahead of new film. “Google has celebrated Scooby Doo character Velma Dinkley officially coming out as lesbian with a joyful animation. On Wednesday (5 October), Prime Video released a clip of Velma’s first encounter with her crush, villain Coco Diablo, in the newest iteration of the beloved franchise titled Trick or Treat Scooby Doo!.”

How-To Geek: Vivaldi Borrows a Feature From Outlook and Thunderbird. “Vivaldi started as a power user alternative to browsers like Chrome and Firefox, but these days, it’s a full-featured suite of productivity tools. Now there’s a new feature that improves upon the existing calendar functionality.”

USEFUL STUFF

MakeUseOf: These 4 Sites Make Test-Making Easier. “Being a teacher isn’t easy, and making resources can be some of the most difficult work that you have to do. Printing tests can be time-consuming, difficult, and not to mention has an environmental impact as well. If you want to share tests digitally, however, it can be overwhelming with all the different options available for you to choose from. Fortunately, you don’t have to trawl through all the available options yourself.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Newsfile: Canadian Federation of Library Associations Calls for the Release of all Outstanding Residential School Records. “The Canadian Federation of Library Associations (CFLA) has sent an open letter to federal Cabinet Ministers calling on their support for the full public release of outstanding residential school records currently being withheld by the Catholic Church and other orders of government.”

Bloomberg: Green Search Engine Ecosia Invests in Wind Farms Via Ripple. “Ecosia GmbH, a search engine that donates its profits toward planting trees, said it would spend 250,000 euros ($239,110) in renewable infrastructure with Ripple Energy, a UK startup that lets people and companies buy shares in green energy projects like wind-farms.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Snopes: How Max Polyakov Hides His Financial Interest in an International Web of Online Deception . “Simply put, Polyakov sits atop a massive, internationally significant digital empire that incentivizes overtly deceptive advertising, and that allows him and his associates to profit in multiple ways from the scams pushed by that deception. By uncovering the mechanics of this ecosystem in forensic detail, Snopes hopes to highlight the technical, financial, and legal schemes required both to profit from internet scams and — perhaps — to stop their proliferation.”

Krebs on Security: Glut of Fake LinkedIn Profiles Pits HR Against the Bots. “A recent proliferation of phony executive profiles on LinkedIn is creating something of an identity crisis for the business networking site, and for companies that rely on it to hire and screen prospective employees. The fabricated LinkedIn identities — which pair AI-generated profile photos with text lifted from legitimate accounts — are creating major headaches for corporate HR departments and for those managing invite-only LinkedIn groups.”

TechCrunch: Popular censorship circumvention tools face fresh blockade by China. “Tools helping China’s netizens to bypass the Great Firewall appear to be facing a fresh round of crackdowns in the run-up to the country’s quinquennial party congress that will see a top leadership reshuffle. Greater censorship is not at all uncommon during countries’ politically sensitive periods, but the stress facing censorship circumvention tools in China appears to be on a whole new level.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

PsyPost: Talking with a virtual human might help to reduce negative emotions. “There is a common idea that technology can replace humans in regard to workplace labor, but could they take over the task of emotional support? A study published in Computers in Human Behavior suggests that people felt support and closeness after speaking to a virtual human.”

WIRED: Biden’s AI Bill of Rights Is Toothless Against Big Tech. “The White House’s blueprint for AI rights is primarily aimed at the federal government. It will change how algorithms are used only if it steers how government agencies acquire and deploy AI technology, or helps parents, workers, policymakers, or designers ask tough questions about AI systems. It has no power over the large tech companies that arguably have the most power in shaping the deployment of machine learning and AI technology.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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October 7, 2022 at 12:12AM
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Indigenous Enslavement in the Americas, Food Safety, Twitter, More: Thursday ResearchBuzz, October 6, 2022

Indigenous Enslavement in the Americas, Food Safety, Twitter, More: Thursday ResearchBuzz, October 6, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

New-to-me, from Brown University: Confronting Indigenous enslavement, one story at a time. “In 2015, in an effort to advance collaboration in the nascent effort, [Professor Linford] Fisher created Stolen Relations: Recovering Stories of Indigenous Enslavement in the Americas, an online repository that contains more than 4,400 records of Indigenous enslavement — and counting.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Wolfram Blog: Should I Eat That? Food Safety with Wolfram Language. “Foodborne illness, or food poisoning, is something many of us have experienced. According to the World Health Organization, almost 1 in 10 people in the world fall ill each year after eating contaminated food. Luckily, by following recommended food safety practices, we can do our best to avoid getting sick. September is Food Safety Education Month. To highlight the importance of food safety, we have introduced two new properties in Wolfram Language that can help users make smart choices about food storage.”

New York Times: Elon Musk Offered to Buy Twitter at a Lower Price in Recent Talks. “In the weeks before Elon Musk declared that his bid to own Twitter was back on the table, his representatives spoke with the company several times about redoing the deal at a lower price, four people familiar with the discussions said. Mr. Musk sought a discount of as much as 30 percent, three of the people said, a proposal that would have valued the company at roughly $31 billion. Twitter rebuffed the proposal, said the people, who requested anonymity because the talks were confidential.” This story is important on a macro level, but ridiculous on a day-to-day level, and I apologize if I inadvertently index an article that’s irrelevant by the time you see it in this newsletter.

USEFUL STUFF

Digital Inspiration: Formulas in Google Sheets Disappear When New Rows Are Added – The Solution. “The formulas in Google Sheets may get deleted when new rows are added in the sheet or when new responses come in through Google Forms. The fix is simple!”

Make Tech Easier: 5 of the Best Solutions for Monitoring Website Changes. “One of the quickest ways to check a website for new updates is to add the site to your favorite RSS reader and let the tool notify you of any new content. However, an RSS reader can only check for updates within the confines of RSS-formatted code. This limitation means RSS readers won’t work on any static webpages or dynamic websites without RSS components. Fortunately, you can use third-party tools to monitor website changes and receive notifications for any new changes.”

Mashable: 10 ways to watch movies online for free — legally, of course. “In the modern age of the internet, there are ways to watch movies for free that are completely legal. Yes, you read that correctly. There’s no need to visit any shady sites or jump around YouTube in order to watch free movies. Free (and legal) movies are waiting for you only a few clicks away, and there’s a pretty easy hack to get you there. It all hinges on one crucial step: Get creative with utilizing free trials, and you’ll have hundreds of free movies right at your fingertips.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Motherboard: Publishing Company Starts School Year by Removing Over 1,000 E-Textbooks. “Since late August, academic librarians in the U.S. and abroad have been scrambling to identify alternative textbook options for students and instructors after a major publishing company pulled a large amount of e-book and e-textbook titles from circulation.”

Daily Inter Lake: Saving the history carved into landscape of Canada’s Waterton Lakes National park. “Archaeologists and preservationists are working together to record information on a group of culturally modified trees (CMT) in Canada’s Waterton Lakes National Park. Using cutting edge laser scanning technology, archaeologists with the University of Calgary have created an extremely detailed model of the human-carved trees surrounding the original site of a cabin once inhabited by Waterton Lakes’ first park ranger, John George ‘Kootenai’ Brown.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CNN: The battle of narratives on Iran is being fought on social media. “As anti-government protests enter their third week in Iran, the Islamic Republic has imposed a near total blackout of independent information coming out of the country. A fierce battle to control the narrative is now being fought online, where supporters and opponents of the government alike are taking to social media to tell their version of the truth and, in some cases, go beyond the truth.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

News@Northeastern: Machine Vision Breakthrough: This Device Can See ‘Millions Of Colors’. “An interdisciplinary team of researchers at Northeastern have built a device that can recognize ‘millions of colors’ using new artificial intelligence techniques—a massive step, they say, in the field of machine vision, a highly specialized space with broad applications for a range of technologies.”

Ars Technica: Google’s newest AI generator creates HD video from text prompts. “Today, Google announced the development of Imagen Video, a text-to-video AI mode capable of producing 1280×768 videos at 24 frames per second from a written prompt. Currently, it’s in a research phase, but its appearance five months after Google Imagen points to the rapid development of video synthesis models.”

The Hill: Social media engagement increases government action, reduces pollution: study . “Citizen engagement through social media leads to a significant improvement in government response and a decrease in water and air pollution, a new study has found.” Good morning, Internet…

October 6, 2022 at 05:33PM
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Book of Mormon Art, Royal Opera House, Biden Administration, More: Wednesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, October 5, 2022

Book of Mormon Art, Royal Opera House, Biden Administration, More: Wednesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, October 5, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

LDSLiving: 2,000+ pieces of Book of Mormon art now available in new digital database. “The first permanent and comprehensive online database of Book of Mormon art is now available and provides searchable access to more than 2,000 pieces of visual art from public and private collections, museums, and the holdings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”

Royal Opera House: Royal Opera House Stream – world-class performances now available online. “Launching today, the brand-new streaming service from Royal Opera House offers 45 stunning works from the rich archives of The Royal Ballet and The Royal Opera, and over 85 behind-the-scenes features, trailers, talks and Insights.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

New York Times: White House Restores Arts Commission Dissolved Under Trump .”President Biden on Friday issued an executive order re-establishing the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, an advisory board that was dissolved five years ago after its members resigned in protest over President Donald J. Trump’s reaction to the deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va.”

USEFUL STUFF

Gizmodo Australia: Become a Productivity Gun With These 10 Google Chrome Extensions. “Whether it’s help with focusing on your assignment, sharing video with work colleagues or just trying to maximise your own productivity, we’ve rounded up 10 Google Chrome extensions we reckon will make your life easier.” It’s a solid collection, but even better, it’s NOT a slideshow.

Noupe: Shutterstock alternatives: Best Vector Websites to Find Free Illustrations . “It’s no doubt that when it comes to design, having more options, and more inspiration is never wrong. In this post, I am going to list the 10 best vector websites to find and download free illustrations as Shutterstock alternatives.” I am making a Halloween Gizmo and using Flaticon for the graphics. Recommended.

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

CNET: Election Misinformation in English Is Bad. In Other Languages, It’s Out of Control. “Misinformation in English is a pressing issue causing concerns about the upcoming midterm elections and the potential damage to the institutions of democracy and responsible for numerous deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social media companies continue to update their policies to address the problem. As much as social media companies have worked to curb the spread of disinformation and misinformation, content in different languages remains a critical blind spot.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

WIRED: This Chatbot Aims to Steer People Away From Child Abuse Material. “THERE ARE HUGE volumes of child sexual abuse photos and videos online—millions of pieces are removed from the web every year. These illegal images are often found on social media websites, image hosting services, dark web forums, and legal pornography websites. Now a new tool on one of the biggest pornography websites is trying to interrupt people as they search for child sexual abuse material and redirect them to a service where they can get help.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Ars Technica: Better than JPEG? Researcher discovers that Stable Diffusion can compress images. “Last week, Swiss software engineer Matthias Bühlmann discovered that the popular image synthesis model Stable Diffusion could compress existing bitmapped images with fewer visual artifacts than JPEG or WebP at high compression ratios, though there are significant caveats.”

XDA: If Google wants to be taken seriously, it needs to find ways to assure users it won’t kill new products. “Google’s biggest issue is that its own brand is now associated with killing services that don’t start on the right foot. If people are afraid to invest in Stadia (for fear of it shutting down), then it’s only going to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Obviously, people wouldn’t want to invest in a service that everyone sees is doomed to fail. It’s clear that Google needs to find a way past that perception. The problem is: how?”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

MIT News: MIT engineers build a battery-free, wireless underwater camera. “The high cost of powering an underwater camera for a long time, by tethering it to a research vessel or sending a ship to recharge its batteries, is a steep challenge preventing widespread undersea exploration. MIT researchers have taken a major step to overcome this problem by developing a battery-free, wireless underwater camera that is about 100,000 times more energy-efficient than other undersea cameras. The device takes color photos, even in dark underwater environments, and transmits image data wirelessly through the water.” Good afternoon, Internet…

October 6, 2022 at 01:49AM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/2WfiM3Y

Wednesday, October 5, 2022

Iowa Laws, OpenBibArt, Twitter, More: Wednesday ResearchBuzz, October 5, 2022

Iowa Laws, OpenBibArt, Twitter, More: Wednesday ResearchBuzz, October 5, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

KGAN: New website launches, striving to help Iowans easily navigate and understand Iowa’s laws. “A new collaboration between the State Library of Iowa and the UI Law Library tries to give Iowans easy access to the state law.”

Getty Library Blog: A Century of Western Art Bibliography Now Available Online. “Researchers may freely search OpenBibArt in French or English to discover a wide range of citations from among nearly 1.2 million journal articles, books, and exhibition and auction sales catalogues published between 1910 and 2007 on topics in the arts and archeology from late Antiquity to the mid-2000s.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Verge: Everything we know about Elon Musk’s messy new Twitter offer. “Elon Musk has changed his mind again: he does want to buy Twitter, actually. This, after months of drama! He signaled his intent in a new filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission — but there’s a catch: Twitter has to drop its lawsuit. We understand if you have questions about the whole situation; honestly, we do too. So we talked to some legal experts in hopes that would give us at least a fighting chance at providing some answers. Let’s get into it.”

C4ISRNET: GI Gmail: US Army launches Google Workspace for troops . “The U.S. Army is rolling out Google Workspace for soldiers new and old, months after the service quietly began testing the software suite as a potential solution to previous information technologies issues.”

WordPress: WordPress 6.1 Beta 3 Now Available. “The current target for the final release is November 1, 2022, which is about four weeks away.”

USEFUL STUFF

Global Investigative Journalism Network: Simple Tips for Verifying if a Tweet Screenshot Is Real or Fake. “Sharing screenshots of tweets is a common way of sharing information on Twitter. But unlike a quote tweet, in which the actual tweet posted by an account is accessible, screenshots rely on audiences trusting that the post seen in the screenshot is real. Unfortunately, as we know far too well, that’s not how the internet works. Screenshots of tweets can easily be faked using simple tricks and used to mislead audiences for a variety of purposes.”

MakeUseOf: The 6 Best Employee Review Sites to Learn More About a Company . “You can learn first-hand from employees currently working for the company or who are past employees. Some sites have rankings based on various categories, such as the best companies that practice diversity or the best companies for jobs in particular industries.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

NARA: National Archives Seeks Feedback on Draft Customer Research Agenda . “The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has posted a draft Customer Research Agenda and requests feedback from public and government customers, stakeholders, staff, and colleagues in the archival, historical, and records management communities.”

Tubefilter: Jack in the Box hunts for a “Head Twitch Creator” to stream on its behalf. “If you’re excited about streaming on Twitch but less excited about sharing your face with the internet, Jack in the Box has a solution for you. It is hiring a Head Twitch Creator, who will don a round, smiling head, put on a conical hat, and go live as Jack Box, the fast food brand’s mascot.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

San Francisco Chronicle: Google to pay $85 million to settle claims it deceptively tracked users. “Google will pay $85 million in a settlement with the State of Arizona to settle claims it deceptively captured people’s location data and used it to increase its advertising revenues. The settlement is one of the largest ever paid by the Mountain View tech giant in a consumer fraud lawsuit, the Arizona Attorney General’s office said in a statement.”

Oxford Mail: Cannabis farmer’s lawyer forced to use Google Translate to talk to client as interpreter fails to show. “Prosecutors dropped charges against a cannabis farmer who claimed to have been enslaved into the drugs trade – and whose lawyer was forced to use Google Translate after an interpreter failed to show-up for a second time. Pham Hoang, 18, was found in a flat in Underhill Circus, Barton, on July 19. The flat had been converted into a commercial-scale cannabis farm, with 270 plants growing in the property.”

Observer: Every Art Collector Needs This Database. But Is it Being Manipulated by Thieves?. “The Art Loss Register has been utilized by museums and auctions alike for the past three decades — but it also provides a tool for art traffickers to cover their tracks.” Good morning, Internet…

October 5, 2022 at 05:29PM
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Tuesday, October 4, 2022

Irish League Football, Lightning Climatology, Antitrust Economics, More: Tuesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, October 4, 2022

Irish League Football, Lightning Climatology, Antitrust Economics, More: Tuesday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, October 4, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Linfield Football Club: Ivan Little Belfast Telegraph article on new Irish League website constructed by Linfield member. “Below is a ‘Belfast Telegraph’ article by leading local journalist Ivan Little concerning Linfield senior member Haydn Milligan who’s recently launched a new website packed with statistics on Irish League football.”

NOAA: New lightning tool tells a striking story. “NOAA’s new Lightning Climatology tool for the continental U.S. shows when cloud-to-ground lightning flashes are historically most frequent for any location across the country.”

Yale School of Management: Thurman Arnold Project Offers an Online Primer in Antitrust. “Antitrust enforcement is frequently in the news, as governments grapple with powerful firms in technology and other industries. A new collection of online videos from Yale’s Thurman Arnold Project offers a wide-ranging introduction to antitrust economics for law students, attorneys, and journalists—as well as engaged citizens who want to understand how antitrust law shapes society.”

BusinessWire: Shueisha to open official website for popular comic series Naruto (PRESS RELEASE). “Along with the latest news and information about the globally popular ninja-action manga series by Masashi Kishimoto, the new website will cover comics, animations, games, and merchandise related to Naruto and the sequel Boruto-Naruto Next Generations. The site will be jointly operated with Bandai Namco Entertainment and all content will be available simultaneously in six languages: Japanese, English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

NARA: Press Statement on Public Release of NARA Records Concerning the 15 Boxes Received from Mar-a-Lago in January 2022 . “Today, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is releasing documents processed in response to numerous Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for NARA records related to the 15 boxes that we received in January 2022 from former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago, Florida estate.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

UNC University Libraries: North Carolina Digital Heritage Center extends operations with $600,000 grant. “The North Carolina Digital Heritage Center (NCDHC) at the University Libraries has received a $603,154 grant to continue its operations. The Library Services and Technology Act grant comes from the State Library of North Carolina with funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Established as a partnership between the University Libraries and the State Library of North Carolina, the NCDHC promotes learning by increasing open access to North Carolina’s historical and cultural heritage.”

SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry: ESF Shares a Century of Knowledge about Wood. “Detailed information about the expansive contents of ESF’s wood collection – 40,000 samples that represent 100 years of gathering wood from around the globe – will soon be made available to scientists all over the world. The contents of the H.P. Brown Wood Collection in Baker Laboratory are being painstakingly cataloged in the growing ESFWOOD database, to be shared eventually with laboratories, agencies and other universities involved in the study and identification of wood.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CNBC: Treasury’s financial stability watchdog warns cryptocurrencies could threaten safety of U.S. economy. “The Treasury Department warned Monday that unregulated cryptocurrencies could pose a risk to the U.S. financial system. The warning was a part of the first major public report released by the Treasury’s Financial Stability Oversight Council on digital assets. The council identified digital or ‘crypto’ assets such as stablecoins as well as lending and borrowing on the industry’s trading platforms as an ‘important emerging vulnerability.'”

Consumer Reports: How TikTok Tracks You Across the Web, Even If You Don’t Use the App. “A Consumer Reports investigation finds that TikTok, one of the country’s most popular apps, is partnering with a growing number of other companies to hoover up data about people as they travel across the internet. That includes people who don’t have TikTok accounts.”

The Verge: FCC threatens to block calls from carriers for letting robocalls run rampant. “On Monday, the FCC announced that it was beginning the process to remove providers from the agency’s Robocall Mitigation Database for failing to fully implement STIR/SHAKEN anti-robocall protocols into their networks. If the companies fail to meet these requirements over the next two weeks, compliant providers will be forced to block their calls.” Good afternoon, Internet…

October 5, 2022 at 12:55AM
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RB Search Gizmos: Explore Wikipedia Categories With the Wikipedia GenderScanner

RB Search Gizmos: Explore Wikipedia Categories With the Wikipedia GenderScanner
By ResearchBuzz

Sometimes I make Gizmos to solve a search problem or explore a resource. And sometimes I make them because I’m trying to learn something and I’m proving to myself that I know what I’m doing. (Sort of.) The Wikipedia GenderScanner is one of the latter; I’m goofing around with fetch and figuring out how to use an external library for the first time. This gizmo sketch is a little rough but still fun to play with. You can find it at https://researchbuzz.github.io/Wikipedia-Gender-Scanner/ .

The WGS does just what it says on the tin: takes the category you specify and evaluates the gender of the first 50 pages in that category. Category names start with Category: and are found in Wikipedia URLs, like so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Textile_artists .

I’m going to copy the Category:Textile_artists part of that URL, paste it into the WGS, and click the Scan the Category button. You will get a list of the genders in that category based on a set of six: male, female, transman, transwoman, intersex, and non-binary. (Please note those are Wikipedia’s gender determinations, not mine, so please address any complaints their way.)

Thanks to me wanting to learn external libraries, there’s also a little chart breaking down this information from Google Charts. (Though I’m not sure I learned much more than “know very seriously where the parameters are and then tweak the example code”.)

What happens if you try to use WGS with a Wikipedia category that has no actual people in it? Nothing, it just doesn’t respond. (I told you it was rough.) It will warn you if you put in something that’s not a category.

I told my husband that every time I figure out how to do something it’s like I’ve unlocked a new JavaScript puzzle piece. I’m sure the particular pieces I earned here will be appearing very shortly in some new projects, especially something ooky-spooky I’m putting together for Halloween.

(Okay, it’s not THAT ooky-spooky. But it is for Halloween. Stay tuned.)

October 4, 2022 at 06:33PM
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Black Lives Matter Memorial Fence, New York Law Enforcement, Academy for Creative Aging, More: Tuesday ResearchBuzz, October 4, 2022

Black Lives Matter Memorial Fence, New York Law Enforcement, Academy for Creative Aging, More: Tuesday ResearchBuzz, October 4, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Washington Post: A White House fence’s Black Lives Matter art has been saved for history. “The new online archive is the most comprehensive look yet at the ways the Black Lives Matter Memorial Fence became an art gallery of resistance, representing the outpouring of grief and anger among thousands of people in D.C. protesting racism and police brutality.”

Gothamist: New Yorkers can now look up the records of police they encounter. “Law Enforcement Look Up — shared exclusively with Gothamist ahead of its public launch Monday — allows users to search through thousands of records obtained by the public defender organization over the years. The records include civil lawsuits filed against police officers, documents from NYPD internal investigations, Civilian Complaint Review Board allegations and a trove of district attorney letters regarding officers’ credibility — some obtained by Gothamist.”

Government of Pennsylvania: PA Council On The Arts Unveils Free, Innovative Digital Platform For Teaching Artists And Older Adults. “Today, Karl Blischke, Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts (PCA), announced the launch of the Academy for Creative Aging, a free, digital platform that offers a certificate of completion for teaching artists and on-demand video lessons for older adults.” I tried accessing a couple of the on-demand lessons and they worked fine, so I don’t think this is restricted to Pennsylvania.

EVENTS

The Verge: How to watch the Google Pixel launch event. “Last May, at Google’s annual developer conference, Google I/O 2022, there were hints about the company’s upcoming Pixel 7 and 7 Pro phones. Now, five months later, at Google’s Pixel launch event this coming Thursday, we are finally going to be introduced to them.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

TechCrunch: Twitter’s edit button is rolling out to Blue subscribers in Canada, Australia and New Zealand . “Twitter is rolling out the ability to edit tweets to Twitter Blue subscribers in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the social network announced on Monday. The company says the edit button will roll out to Blue subscribers in the U.S. soon, but didn’t provide a specific launch date.”

WIRED: Success on Twitch No Longer Comes on Twitch. “Burnout is inseparable from the platform’s identity. Streamers toil for the approval of audience and algorithm. Even Pokimane, one of the site’s famous faces, has had to take extended time off. Smaller streamers burn out too, anonymously: only an extraordinary few earn enough to make a living. Of the 6 million people who create content on the platform, more than 90 percent stream to fewer than six viewers; 25 percent of the top 10,000 highest-paid streamers make less than minimum wage.”

USEFUL STUFF

Mashable: Smash texting scams: How to avoid smishing attacks. “If you’ve recently received a bunch of suspicious texts from unknown numbers claiming to be USPS, your bank, or another major company asking you to resolve some sort of urgent issue, you’re not alone. Hopefully these bizarre missives tripped your shadiness alarms and you kept your link-clicking fingers at bay, because those texts aren’t legit…. But since even the savviest among us have off days or unfocused moments when a smishing scam could slip by undetected, we’ve put together a primer on how to spot and avoid them.”

Search Engine Journal: How to Use Reverse Video Search (& Why It’s Useful). “Have you ever stumbled across an exciting video and wondered where it came from? If so, you’ll be pleased to know that there are many ways to find a video source through reverse video searches. This guide teaches how to conduct a reverse video search and why it’s useful.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

University of Connecticut: Sorting Through the Noise of Mental Health Apps. “Currently, there are more than 10,000 mental health and wellness apps available in the app store. And that number just keeps on growing. But these apps are largely unregulated, making it difficult for consumers to know what might offer them the greatest benefit. Sherry Pagoto, a clinical psychologist from the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources, sheds light on the differences between apps, what people should look for before they download, and when it’s time to seek professional help.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CBS News: Zelle faces surge in fraud and scams, Senate report finds. “Incidents of fraud and scams are occurring more often on the popular peer-to-peer payment service Zelle, according to a report issued Monday by the office of Sen. Elizabeth Warren, giving the public its first glimpse into the growing problems at Zelle.”

CNN: Supreme Court to hear cases that could decide future of internet speech and social media. “The Supreme Court will hear two pivotal cases later this term about online speech that could significantly shape the future of social media, the court announced on Monday.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Tech Xplore: Creepy apps cause emotional stress: The normalization of affective discomfort in app use. “We know that apps collect all sorts of data about us, and that makes us feel uncomfortable. In a new study researchers from the University of Copenhagen have measured how uncomfortable and ‘creeped out’ using apps can make us feel. Industry and policy initiatives are called for.” Good morning, Internet…

October 4, 2022 at 05:32PM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/zgTyQlj