New researches

Monday, January 30, 2023

Datamuse Word Tools, Solar PV Photography, Jazz on the Tyne, More: Monday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 30, 2023

Datamuse Word Tools, Solar PV Photography, Jazz on the Tyne, More: Monday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 30, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Datamuse Blog: Our 2022 Waterloo co-op term: In which organising words is a labour of love!. “This past Fall, Datamuse hired three talented computer science students from the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. Over the course of their three-month co-op they improved our word-finding apps and built a new game. These projects required a diverse set of skills, spanning topics in natural language processing (NLP), data visualization, distributed data processing, design, and web application development. In this post, we will showcase eight of the projects the students completed during the Fall term.” I use the Datamuse API for one of my Search Gizmos, Smushy Search. If you like words and word games, you definitely need to check out the Datamuse site.

Data Descriptor: A crowdsourced dataset of aerial images with annotated solar photovoltaic arrays and installation metadata . “Overhead imagery is increasingly being used to improve the knowledge of rooftop PV installations with machine learning models capable of automatically mapping these installations. However, these models cannot be reliably transferred from one region or imagery source to another without incurring a decrease in accuracy. To address this issue, known as distribution shift, and foster the development of PV array mapping pipelines, we propose a dataset containing aerial images, segmentation masks, and installation metadata (i.e., technical characteristics).”

London Jazz News: Colin Muirhead (new JazzontheTyne website + broadcasting on Hive Radio). “Colin Muirhead has presented Jazz on the Tyne on Hive Radio since 2019, giving news of gigs and events in North East England and supporting musicians with airplay and interviews. … He has just launched a new website which will offer all episodes of his programme and give listeners an easy way of getting in touch.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Observer: Bored Apes Were at the Center of the NFT Boom. Now They’re Mired in Lawsuits and Plunging in Value. “In the past few months, the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT collection has been the target of SEC probes, falling sales and questions regarding copyright protection.”

Boing Boing: BBC took down own Modi documentary from Internet Archive. “Twitter’s censorship is readily explained, but the documentary was also removed from the Internet Archive. The archive’s Chris Butler explains what happened: the BBC itself DMCAd it.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

WIRED: Why Velma Is the Internet’s New Punching Bag . “HBO MAX’S LATEST entry into the Scooby-Doo canon, Velma, has the kind of pedigree that usually signals hit. Executive produced by veteran TV auteur Mindy Kaling, who also voices the animated series’ title character, it’s a show about one of pop culture’s most beloved nerds. Like Riverdale before it, Velma also takes a kids’ entertainment staple and gives it a new, winkingly adult twist. Yet, with all of that going for it, the show has still become the internet’s new favorite punching bag.”

New York Times: His Boating App Needed a Boost. His Daughter’s TikTok Audience Came Through.. “Mr. Foulk, who calls himself Captain Jeff, loves his app so much, he even has a shirt that reads, ‘Warning: I will tell you about my app.’ So when Mr. Foulk’s daughter, Megan, tagged along to a boat show in Chicago in January and saw that some attendees were bypassing her father’s booth as he tried to tell them about Argo, she decided to turn to one of the apps on her phone: TikTok.” Come for the inspiring story, stay for the “Whiz Khalifa” correction at the bottom.

SECURITY & LEGAL

The Verge: Google services to offer more accurate information in compliance with EU. “Many of Google’s offerings will soon be updated to provide clear and accurate information in compliance with consumer protection laws in the EU. Announced by the European Commission on Thursday, the Alphabet-owned company has agreed to introduce changes to Google Store, Google Play Store, Google Hotels, and Google Flights following discussions with the Consumer Protection Cooperation Network (CPC) in 2021.”

National Security Archive: Inter-American Court Orders Opening of Military Archives. “On Friday, January 20, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights set a new legal precedent for access to human rights information when it ordered the government of Bolivia to open historical military archives concerning a case of assassination and forced disappearance.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Slate: It’s the Perfect Time to Break Up Google’s Ad-Tech Monopoly. “It may seem contradictory, but an economic downturn is actually the perfect time to enforce antitrust laws in the ad-tech industry. First of all, Google is fine. It generated $54.5 billion in ad revenue from July through September 2022 alone, an increase of 2.5 percent from the same quarter in 2021…. The real casualties of any pending financial crisis will be the much smaller players that also depend on digital advertisements—newspapers, magazines, and local businesses—and that directly suffer from Google’s dominant position in the market.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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January 31, 2023 at 01:53AM
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Congressional District Health Dashboard, Alexander the Great Manuscripts, Free COVID-19 Test Sites, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, January 30, 2023

Congressional District Health Dashboard, Alexander the Great Manuscripts, Free COVID-19 Test Sites, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, January 30, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Health IT Analytics: New Tool Provides Population Health Insights in US Congressional Districts. “Researchers from New York University (NYU) Grossman School of Medicine and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) unveiled the Congressional District Health Dashboard (CDHD), an online data tool that provides health data for all 435 US congressional districts and the District of Columbia.”

British Library Blog: Three Alexander the Great manuscripts newly digitised. “In preparation for the exhibition, we have digitised three more of our illustrated Alexander manuscripts, so that, in addition to the pages on display in the exhibition, all the images and accompanying text can be viewed online. One of the newly-digitised items is an early collection of Latin works; the others are French versions of Alexander’s life story, as told by the Roman historian, Quintus Curtius Rufus.”

CDC: CDC launches website to help consumers find free COVID-19 testing sites . “Tests offered may include laboratory-based nucleic acid amplification tests (NAATs), including polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, and rapid antigen point-of-care (POC) testing. Results are typically provided within 24–48 hours. Testing is available at pharmacies, commercial laboratory sites, community sites, and retail locations.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

TED Blog: TED launches “Good Sport,” new sports podcast with Jody Avirgan . “Hosted by veteran sports producer Jody Avirgan in conversation with superstar athletes, journalists, sports psychologists and more, Good Sport is a show that uses sports as a lens to explore big ideas around work, leadership, psychology and science.”

Bleeping Computer: Yandex denies hack, blames source code leak on former employee. “A Yandex source code repository allegedly stolen by a former employee of the Russian technology company has been leaked as a Torrent on a popular hacking forum.”

CNN: Plagued with errors: A news outlet’s decision to write stories with AI backfires. “News outlet CNET said Wednesday it has issued corrections on a number of articles, including some that it described as ‘substantial,’ after using an artificial intelligence-powered tool to help write dozens of stories. The outlet has since hit pause on using the AI tool to generate stories, CNET’s editor-in-chief Connie Guglielmo said in an editorial on Wednesday.” I have removed CNET completely from my RSS reader and will do my best to avoid including them in ResearchBuzz from now on. In the almost 25 years of doing RB this is only the second time I’ve banned a publication completely. I hope you’ll call me out on it if I slip up and you see CNET here.

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Associated Press: UN: Parts of internet becoming `toxic waste dumps’ for hate. “The U.N. chief warned on the day to remember victims of the Holocaust that ‘many parts of the internet are becoming toxic waste dumps for hate and vicious lies,’ and urgently appealed for guardrails against hate speech. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Friday that anti-Semitism is everywhere, and it’s increasing in intensity.”

Mother Jones: “Lies Have Short Legs”: Inside the Brazilian WhatsApp Group Exposing George Santos. “[Adriana] Parizzi is one of the members of the highly active Brazilian WhatsApp group, aptly titled in Portuguese ‘mentira tem pernas curtas,’ or ‘lies have short legs.’ Participants include former roommates and friends—some of whom live in the United States—and they compare notes, exchange theories, and work together to get the word out about the ‘true story’ of Santos.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

PC Magazine: Bitwarden Warns of Scam Ads on Google Posing as the Password Manager. “If you rely on Bitwarden, be careful using a search engine to look up the password manager. That’s because scammers have been spotted creating fake ads on Google to lure unsuspecting users to malicious Bitwarden sites.”

KHOU: Katy ISD students will no longer have access to Twitter via the district’s Wi-Fi. “Starting Friday at 5 p.m., Katy ISD students will no longer have access to Twitter via the district’s Wi-Fi. This change comes after issues were brought to the district’s attention about students being able to access inappropriate websites through Twitter via the district’s ‘BeTheLegacy’ Wi-Fi, Katy ISD said.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

University of Toronto: Researchers find a daily dose of politics leads to stress – but avoiding it can hinder civic engagement . “From 24-hour news cycles to social media posts from your angry uncle, it’s almost impossible not to get a daily dose of politics. But new research finds that daily exposure to politics can cause chronic stress. Disconnecting from the hectic news cycle has its own repercussions, however – strategies aimed at avoiding those negative emotions might result in becoming less politically engaged.”

Wall Street Journal: TikTok Is Bad, but WeChat Is Worse. “Congress banned the use of TikTok on government devices recently, and the Biden administration is reportedly seeking to go further by, for instance, limiting access to user data to mitigate the app’s dangers. Given the zeal to address threats emanating from a Chinese app, why is WeChat being ignored?” Good morning, Internet…

January 30, 2023 at 06:32PM
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Sunday, January 29, 2023

West Virginia Grants, Library of Congress, Google Business, More: Sunday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 29, 2023

West Virginia Grants, Library of Congress, Google Business, More: Sunday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 29, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

WDTV: New websites launch to distribute grants, infrastructure funds in W.Va.. “Gov. Jim Justice announced the launch of two new websites to improve the state’s distribution of grants and infrastructure funding. The new website for grants distribution is a one-stop-shop for personal and business-based grant funding opportunities in West Virginia.”

Library of Congress: What’s new online at the Library of Congress – January 2023. “The Signal shares semi-regular updates of new additions to publicly available digital collections and we love showing off all the hard work of our colleagues from across the Library. Read on for a sample of what’s been added recently and some of our favorite highlights. Click here for previous updates.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Search Engine Land: Google rolling out cars for sale in Google Business Profiles. “Google is opening access to the local car inventory beta feature to all US dealerships using the cars for sale feature in Google Business Profiles. Greg Gifford reports that Google has opened this beta feature now to all US-based dealerships.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Hackaday: You Can Help Build A Resin Printer Review Database. “Even for advanced users, it is a chore to stay on top of all the goings-on within the world of resin printers. This is why [VOG] (VOGMan, formerly VegOilGuy) has started a resin printer review site that asks for feedback from the community.”

NextGov: OPM Previews Its New Cyber Workforce Dashboard. “The Office of Personnel Management plans to launch a federal cyber workforce dashboard to provide agencies with a better tool to address workforce needs, according to a demo of the proposed dashboard held during a National Institute of Standards and Technology webinar on Tuesday.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Balkan Transitional Justice: Montenegro’s Attempt to Create Database of Wartime Paramilitaries Fails. “The state prosecution said it failed to create a database of Montenegrin citizens who were members of paramilitary units during the 1990s wars because of a lack of cooperation from other former Yugoslav countries.”

WIRED: China Is the World’s Biggest Face Recognition Dealer. “EARLY LAST YEAR, the government of Bangladesh began weighing an offer from an unnamed Chinese company to build a smart city on the Bay of Bengal with infrastructure enhanced by artificial intelligence. Construction of the high-tech metropolis has yet to begin, but if it proceeds it may include face recognition software that can use public cameras to identify missing persons or track criminals in a crowd—capabilities already standard in many Chinese cities.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Europeana Pro: Discover how the J-Ark project connects data aggregation with preservation. “The J-Ark project aims to explore how aggregation of cultural heritage content can be connected with its long-term preservation. Find out more about the project’s work, discover how its insights are relevant to data spaces, and join an upcoming event which explores this topic.”

Center for American Progress: The Dangers of a Twitter Bankruptcy or Acquisition. “One of the ironies of the Musk takeover is that Twitter — a mismanaged company with great tech and a captive, influential user base — was probably a pretty good candidate for a competent leveraged buyout operation. Musk, egged on by his friends and their weird psychodrama about ‘blue checks,’ has now eliminated any possibility that his takeover will be smooth and inexpensive.”

Stanford University: Designing Ethical Self-Driving Cars. “Ford has a corporate policy that says: Always follow the law. And this project grew out of a few simple questions: Does that policy apply to automated driving? And when, if ever, is it ethical for an AV to violate the traffic laws? As we researched these questions, we realized that in addition to the traffic code, there are appellate decisions and jury instructions that help flesh out the social contract that has developed during the hundred-plus years we’ve been driving cars.” Good afternoon, Internet…

January 30, 2023 at 01:40AM
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Scientific Text Reuse Dataset, Zillow, Making YouTube Videos, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, January 29, 2023

Scientific Text Reuse Dataset, Zillow, Making YouTube Videos, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, January 29, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Nature: A large dataset of scientific text reuse in Open-Access publications. “We present the Webis-STEREO-21 dataset, a massive collection of Scientific Text Reuse in Open-access publications. It contains 91 million cases of reused text passages found in 4.2 million unique open-access publications. Cases range from overlap of as few as eight words to near-duplicate publications and include a variety of reuse types, ranging from boilerplate text to verbatim copying to quotations and paraphrases.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

PR Newswire: Zillow’s new AI-powered natural-language search is a first in real estate (PRESS RELEASE.) “Now home shoppers can enter phrases like ‘$700K homes in Charlotte with a backyard’ or ‘open house near me with four bedrooms’ directly into the Zillow search bar, rather than starting with a location and having to filter their way to the homes they want. They can also save their searches and have Zillow notify them when new qualifying listings come online.”

USEFUL STUFF

Backstage: How to Make a YouTube Video. “With a user base of over 2 billion, YouTube is one of the best social media sites to post content if you’re looking to reach a wide audience. It’s particularly helpful for creators, actors, and performers who can use the platform to grow their careers. Making a YouTube video is a matter of making your own channel, creating unique and engaging content, and uploading videos to the platform.” This is a ridiculous outline. It’s REALLY good. When you’re ready to learn about making YouTube videos, print out this article, then take each step and search it for more in-depth guidance. Terrific work by Dacy Lim.

WIRED: How to Encrypt any File, Folder, or Drive on Your System. “How the most popular operating systems have handled encryption has changed over the years, and there are third-party tools that give you more encryption options to choose from. We’ll guide you through everything you need to know about these options to help you pick the right one.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

The Guardian: Elon Musk ‘doesn’t seem like’ right person to own Twitter, says co-founder. “Elon Musk ‘doesn’t seem like’ the right person to own Twitter, the social media platform’s co-founder has said, adding that improvements to morale and content policies at the business have been reversed under its new proprietor. In an interview with the Guardian, Biz Stone said positive changes he had helped oversee in recent years had been unwound by the Tesla chief executive.”

New York Public Library: The New York Public Library Acquires Archive of Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne. “The New York Public Library has acquired the archives of Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne. The dual collection comprises the couple’s literary and personal papers and stands as a rich testament to two of the most successful and important writers in postwar America.”

Bloomberg: Twitter’s trust and safety head ditches protocol for Elon Musk’s whims. “Twitter’s decisions are often later probed by politicians and regulators, and so they are typically made with careful documentation pointing to specific policy justifications for the action, the current and former employees say. But now, internal documentation shows a decision-making process amounting to little more than unilateral directives issued by Twitter’s new owner. In late November, an account belonging to the leftist activist Chad Loder was banned from the platform. In Twitter’s internal system, a note read, ‘Suspension: direct request from Elon Musk,’ according to a screenshot viewed by Bloomberg.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Associated Press: Ukraine’s Odesa city put on UNESCO heritage in danger list. “The United Nations’ cultural agency decided Wednesday to add the historic center of Ukraine’s Black Sea port city of Odesa to its list of endangered World Heritage sites, recognizing ‘the outstanding universal value of the site and the duty of all humanity to protect it.’ The decision was made at an extraordinary session of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee in Paris.”

Hartford City News-Times: Indiana lawmaker wants to tax social media apps to stop bullying, suicides. “The purpose of the bill is two-fold. Any social media platform with more than 1 million active account holders in Indiana, generates at least $1 million in ad revenue from the state and gains financially from the data created by Hoosier users would be taxed. The tax would be based on the app’s calendar year ad revenues, multiplied by 7%. The apps would also pay $1 for each active account in the state.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

The Conversation: What happens to our data when we no longer use a social media network or publishing platform?. “My peers and I built personal websites on GeoCities, blogged on LiveJournal, made friends on MySpace and hung out on Nexopia. Many of these earlier platforms and social spaces occupy large parts of youth memories. For that reason, the web has become a complex entanglement of attachment and connection. My doctoral research looks at how we have become ‘databound’ — attached to the data we have produced throughout our lives in ways we both can and cannot control. What happens to our data when we abandon a platform? What should become of it? Would you want a say?”

University of Central Florida: UCF Researchers Help Restore the Lost History of Indigenous Prisoners in St. Augustine. “During the Plains Wars of the mid-1800s, thousands of indigenous peoples were forced from their homelands. Dozens of their leaders and warriors were imprisoned over a thousand miles away from home in Fort Marion (now known as the Castillo de San Marcos) in St. Augustine, Florida. Today, UCF researchers are collaborating with the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes of Oklahoma, the National Park Service, the Florida National Guard and Flagler College to help restore the lost prisoners’ experiences for their descendants and the public.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

University of Texas at Dallas: New Carbon Nanotube Yarn Harvests Mechanical Energy. “Nanotechnology researchers at The University of Texas at Dallas have made novel carbon nanotube yarns that convert mechanical movement into electricity more effectively than other material-based energy harvesters… UT Dallas researchers and their collaborators describe improvements to high-tech yarns they invented called ‘twistrons,’ which generate electricity when stretched or twisted.” Good morning, Internet…

January 29, 2023 at 06:31PM
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Saturday, January 28, 2023

AI Writing Check, DoNotPay, Wearable Tech, More: Saturday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 28, 2023

AI Writing Check, DoNotPay, Wearable Tech, More: Saturday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 28, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Fast Company: Nonprofits release free tool to detect AI-written student work. “The tool, called AI Writing Check, was developed by the writing nonprofits Quill and CommonLit using an open-source AI model designed to detect the output of ChatGPT and related systems. It enables teachers (or anyone else) to copy and paste text and within a few seconds receive a determination on whether the work in question was written by ChatGPT.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Engadget: Jail threats stop AI ‘robot lawyer’ from making its debut in court. “Joshua Browder, the CEO of New York startup DoNotPay, recently announced that his company’s bot will represent a defendant fighting a traffic ticket in the courtroom on February 22nd…. a few days later, Browder announced that DoNotPay is postponing its court case after reportedly receiving jail threats from state bar prosecutors if he was to go through with his plan.”

USEFUL STUFF

The Verge: How to use wearable tech if you’ve got tattoos. “The bad news is that tattoos and wearables aren’t always compatible. It’s a known issue among wearable makers but isn’t apparent to many consumers. You can still occasionally stumble upon social media posts where tattooed folks strap on a new smartwatch only to find that the device doesn’t work well — if it works at all. In the case of the Apple Watch, for example, tattoos can interfere with wrist detection, making the device unable to recognize that you’re actually wearing it.”

Fast Company: How to start fresh by resetting algorithms for YouTube, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and more. “You can kill your algorithms very easily with many of the most-popular streaming-video services. Others require more finagling. Here’s a quick guide to resetting recommendations on the web and your phone (typically the same for Android and iOS) for YouTube, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+, Disney+, Hulu, HBO Max, Peacock, and Paramount+.”

Six Colors: New tool generates more useful Mastodon link previews in Messages. “Just the other day, I was lamenting one of my big frustations with Mastodon—that links to posts, unlike tweets, don’t display nicely in Messages. Instead you get a preview that shows the poster’s profile image and their name, rather than the actual text or image of the post itself…. Well, the ball may be in Apple’s court, but not everybody’s waiting for them to return the serve. iOS developer Tyler Hillman has come up with a workaround: a web service that can provide the necessary metadata to show post content in Messages.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Context News: Wikipedia Middle East editors ban shows risks for creators. “Rights groups have accused the Saudi Arabian government of ‘infiltrating’ and seeking to control Wikipedia, after the Wikimedia Foundation banned 16 users for engaging in ‘conflict of interest editing’ in the Middle East and North Africa.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Washington Post: Archives weighs asking past presidents, VPs to look for classified items . “The National Archives is weighing whether to ask living former presidents and vice presidents to review their personal records to verify that no classified materials are inadvertently outstanding, according to two people familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail private conversations.”

Politico: Avoid TikTok for government work, Dutch officials told. “Public authorities in the Netherlands are being told to steer clear of TikTok amid growing concerns across the EU and U.S. that the Chinese-owned video-sharing platform poses privacy risks. Dutch ministries and agencies are mostly following a recommendation to shun TikTok accounts and stop government communication and advertising on the platform, two government officials told POLITICO.”

Cybernews: Yandex source code leaked on a hacking forum . “Someone has uploaded an archive on a popular hacking forum with over 44GB of data, revealing Yandex source code. The attacker claims to have downloaded the data in July 2022. According to Arseniy Shestakov, a researcher who claims to have investigated leaked data, the archive contains the content of a repository without any additional data. Shestakov says that all files are dated to February 24, 2022, the day on which Russian forces invaded Ukraine.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Clemson News: Clemson Libraries receives $1.2 million to develop free textbooks for advanced manufacturing classes . “The Collaborative Development of Robotics Education and Advanced Manufacturing Open Educational Resources (Co-DREAM OER) project received $760,000 last year to develop three openly licensed textbooks and other digital educational materials on robotics — one at the technical college level, one at the bachelor’s degree level and one at the graduate education level. The latest round of funding will allow for the development of six more textbooks in the areas of advanced manufacturing and mechatronics, subjects that were chosen because they support the growing advanced manufacturing industry in South Carolina and other parts of the country.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

Vanderbilt University: New technique unlocks ancient history of climate and wildfires recorded in California cave rocks. “Jessica Oster, associate professor of Earth and environmental sciences, worked with scientists at Johannes-Gutenberg University of Mainz, Germany to develop and apply a new technique that allows researchers to reconstruct fire activity above caves based on chemicals trapped in stalagmites as they grow from water dripping from the soil and rocks above. With this new advancement, scientists can now measure unique chemicals in stalagmites to reveal fire activity from tens to hundreds of thousands of years ago.” Good afternoon, Internet…

January 29, 2023 at 01:33AM
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PIRATE Act Enforcement, Solitary Confinement Legislation, LGBTQ+ Arizona, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, January 28, 2023

PIRATE Act Enforcement, Solitary Confinement Legislation, LGBTQ+ Arizona, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, January 28, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Radio World: FCC Publishes Pirate Enforcement Database. “The PIRATE Act became law three years ago. But thanks to the pandemic and delays in funding, the Federal Communications Commission has been slow in carrying out several of the law’s requirements. Now the FCC has published a database listing the people against whom it has taken pirate radio enforcement actions. It has posted field agent openings, begun sweeps of major markets and planned the purchase of a half-dozen specialized vehicles.”

Solitary Watch: New Report And Public Database Track Legislation To Limit Or End Solitary Confinement . “The first-of-its-kind report utilizes new data made available through the Unlock The Box Legislation Tracker, an interactive database of solitary confinement bills from 2009 to present day. Justice advocates, government officials and policy makers, and public citizens can freely access the Legislation Tracker to review state by state proposals and actions, as well as trend-based data visualizations.”

New-to-me, from The State Press: Asu’s BJ Bud Archives Works To Preserve LGBTQ+ History. “Phoenix Pride and Marshall Shore, Hip Historian, responded to the reality of vanishing queer history by launching a project called the Arizona LGBTQ+ History Project with the intent to preserve the under-documented history of the state’s LGBTQ community. They found a natural partner with ASU’s Bj Bud Archives, the largest LGBTQ+ collection in Arizona.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Hill: Nick Fuentes Twitter account suspended less than 24 hours after reinstatement. “Twitter has suspended the account of white supremacist and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes less than 24 hours after his reinstatement on the platform.”

TechCrunch: Google to make changes to Android business terms in India after antitrust blow. “Google is revising its business agreements with phonemakers and other partners in India and making a series of other changes in the South Asian market to comply with the local antitrust watchdog’s directions in a major shift that could invite regulators in other regions to make similar suggestions.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

PA Media: Trump baby blimp inflated again to establish ‘how best to preserve it’. “The return of the Donald Trump baby blimp, the huge inflatable depicting the former US president in a nappy and clutching a mobile phone, has begun with a test inflation by the Museum of London. A conservation analysis of the blimp has led staff at the museum, its ‘final resting place’ after it took to the skies above Parliament Square during protests over Mr Trump’s state visit to the UK in June 2019, to blow the balloon up once again.”

San Diego Union-Tribune: Bram Dijkstra’s $2.3 million collection of rare albums, once bound for SDSU, is headed to Stanford University . “Stanford University has acquired the $2.3 million vinyl record collection of San Diegan Bram Dijkstra, just 11 months after a signed 2020 agreement for the one-of-a-kind collection to go to SDSU’s Love Library imploded. Numbering more than 8,000 jazz, blues, gospel, soul and reggae discs that span nearly a century, The Dijkstra Black Music Collection will be housed at Stanford’s Archive of Recorded Sound.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

ProPublica: What to Know About TurboTax Before You File Your Taxes This Year. “Under the Free File agreement, Americans who make less than $73,000 per year should be able to file their taxes for free with one of the tax preparation companies that partners with the IRS. But this program has been historically underutilized, with just 4% of eligible Americans filing for free in 2021. The story of the Free File program is long and twisting, and it can seem more like a fight against free tax filing than a fight for it. One of the biggest players is Intuit, the maker of TurboTax, one of the largest tax preparation software companies in the country.”

Ars Technica: Ransomware victims are refusing to pay, tanking attackers’ profits. “Two new studies suggest that ransomware isn’t the lucrative, enterprise-scale gotcha it used to be. Profits to attackers’ wallets, and the percentage of victims paying, fell dramatically in 2022, according to two separate reports.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Undark: Wanted (by Scientists): Dead Birds and Bats, Felled by Renewables. “[Todd] Katzner, [Mark] Davis, and other biologists are working with the renewable energy industry to create a nationwide repository of dead birds and bats killed at wind and solar facilities. The bodies hold clues about how the animals lived and died, and could help scientists and project operators understand how to reduce the environmental impact of clean energy installations, Davis said.”

The Verge: Elon Musk thinks Twitter is real life. “Apparently the steady growth of his own Twitter presence is all the evidence he needs that his tweets are right and good and his online antics are beyond reproach. No mention of the white supremacists he’s let back on the platform (and then kicked off again after they have reverted to type and said Nazi things) or the worrying rise in hate speech and harassment. No mention of his own declining reputation or the growing calls to ditch his post at Twitter and refocus on the company that actually matters, Tesla. Just look at that scoreboard.”

Washington State University: COVID-19 conspiracy theories that spread fastest focused on evil, secrecy. “In the early pandemic, conspiracy theories that were shared the most on Twitter highlighted malicious purposes and secretive actions of supposed bad actors behind the crisis, according to an analysis of nearly 400,000 posts.” Good morning, Internet…

January 28, 2023 at 06:27PM
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Friday, January 27, 2023

Animal Protein Professing Resource Database, Shutterstock, Custom iPhone Widgets, More: Friday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 27, 2023

Animal Protein Professing Resource Database, Shutterstock, Custom iPhone Widgets, More: Friday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, January 27, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Meat+Poultry: New database provides information hub for meat processors. “The launch of a new resource allows meat processors to find answers to common industry questions. On Jan. 24, the Agricultural Utilization Research Institute (AURI) announced the release of the Animal Protein Processing Resource Database. The digital database offers information on training and financial programs, which users can filter by topic, species and location.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

ReviewGeek: Now You Can Create Your Own AI Images with Shutterstock. “While some stock photography and image websites are fighting AI-generated content, others like Adobe and Shutterstock are embracing it. After partnering with DALLE-2 back in October, today Shutterstock released an AI-generation tool for its customers.”

USEFUL STUFF

Lifehacker: Explore the World of Custom iPhone Widgets. “You’ve probably seen iPhone Home Screens that just look cool, sporting dynamic text, fun images, and custom icons…but even with iOS 16’s new Lock Screen editor, there’s no way to use Apple’s built-in tools to make them. For that, you’ll need to look outward. Fortunately, there’s a simple way to turn a boring iPhone Home Screen into something interesting and fun, without getting into the whole ‘Home Screen aesthetic’ thing. All you need is a custom widget app like Widgy.”

How-To Geek: The 5 Best To-Do List Apps of 2023 . “Are you still writing your to-do list? If so, you may find that a to-do list app makes managing your tasks easier. However, with so many apps out there, which do you choose? Here’s our list of the best task management apps for 2023. This list of to-do list apps is in no particular order. Because each one offers the basic features you’d expect in a task management app, we’ll highlight notable features that make it stand out.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Daily Dot: What creators need to know about Logan Paul’s ‘CryptoZoo’ NFT scandal. “When an influencer promises an investment on their project will soar in value only to disappear with any capital, the Web3 community refers to it as a ‘rug pull’ scam. Accusations of rug pulls often fly, but it’s often unclear and difficult to prove if the founders of NFT projects did cash out for millions at the expense of their followers, and even if they did, if it was premeditated and intentionally malicious.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

NewsWise: “Flexible electronics” may one day secure classified documents. “Both President Biden and former President Trump have had issues with having classified government documents in their possession that they were not supposed to have. But there may soon be a relatively simple way to prevent situations like this, according to Paul Berger, professor of electrical and computer engineering at The Ohio State University. Flexible electronics enables the production of thin, flexible stickers, like the radio frequency identification tags one finds on some items in stores to prevent shoplifting.”

Bloomberg: FBI Examines Snapchat’s Role in Fentanyl Poisoning Deaths. “Federal agencies are questioning Snapchat’s role in the spread and sale of fentanyl-laced pills in the US as part of a broader probe into the deadly counterfeit drugs crisis.”

City & State Florida: Francis Suarez, un(block)chained . “Suarez’s championing of cryptocurrency outfits like FTX is emblematic of his tenure as Miami’s top elected official. Entering the second year of his second term, critics say Suarez, a Republican, is more concerned with elevating his national profile and fueling his presidential ambitions rather than tackling the city’s wealth gap, crumbling public infrastructure and affordable housing crisis.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

The Map Room: The Return of Paper Maps, Again. “… there’s always at least one thing the old tech did better that gets lost when you switch to the new. Compared to computers, typewriters encourage disciplined, distraction-free and linear writing. Vinyl encourages active, purposeful listening. And paper maps aren’t just used for immediate navigational needs: you browse them, you study them. Each of these technologies fulfil needs that haven’t gone away and haven’t been met by their replacements.”

Purdue University: Purdue launches new AI-based global forest mapping project. “[Jingjing] Liang is developing an artificial intelligence model that will combine information collected about billions of trees measured on-site with satellite and other geospatial data to map local forest growth rates throughout the global forest range.” Good afternoon, Internet…

January 28, 2023 at 01:12AM
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