Digital Transformation Executive Orders, PrivaSeer, Oregon Public Investments, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, December 11, 2023

Digital Transformation Executive Orders, PrivaSeer, Oregon Public Investments, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, December 11, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

StateScoop: New website catalogs states’ digital-transformation executive orders. “The new website includes a data dashboard and database of executive orders. It compiles and analyzes executive orders spanning the last decade. Users can search the orders by group or filter them by state or territory, year of enactment or topic. The group also highlighted a handful of executive orders that represent bold action, such as Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s order creating the Commonwealth Office of Digital Experience.”

Future of Privacy Project: The PrivaSeer Project In 2023: Access To 1.4 Million Privacy Policies In One Searchable Body Of Documents. “In the summer of 2021, FPF announced our participation in a collaborative project with researchers from the Pennsylvania State University and the University of Michigan to develop and build a searchable database of privacy policies and other privacy-related documents, with the support of the National Science Foundation. This project, PrivaSeer, has since become an evolving, publicly available search engine of more than 1.4 million privacy policies.” I did mention this project a couple of years ago but it seems to have grown considerably since then.

KLCC: Oregon launches database to track public investments. “The Oregon Department of Treasury has launched a new tool to track how the state invests. The agency manages nearly $100 billion in public employee retirement funds. Around 400,000 public workers are beneficiaries. It means Oregon is a shareholder in publicly traded companies around the world. Previously, if you wanted details on how Oregon used its shareholder votes, you’d need to make a public records request. State Treasurer Tobias Read said now, all that is online.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Variety: Elon Musk Says Far-Right Firebrand Alex Jones Will Be Reinstated on X/Twitter. “Elon Musk, continuing his campaign to make X a ‘free speech’ refuge even to the detriment of the company’s business interests, said he is reinstating the account of far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.”

404 Media: Civitai and OctoML Introduce Radical New Measures to Stop Abuse After 404 Media Investigation. “Civitai, a text-to-image AI model sharing platform, is seeking a new cloud computing provider and instructing its millions of users to complain to its current provider, OctoML, after OctoML decided to end its business relationship with Civitai entirely, after a 404 Media investigation.”

Man of Many: GTA VI Trailer Breaks the Internet with Record-Shattering 24 Hours. “While it’s still a long, long road to Grand Theft Auto VI (set to release sometime in 2025), that hasn’t stopped Rockstar Games’ upcoming juggernaut from breaking records. The first trailer for GTA VI dropped recently, sending the whole of the internet into a frenzy, and according to Guinness World Records, the new trailer has already shattered three official world records. Within a mere 24 hours, the trailer had amassed a staggering 90.4 million views (currently sitting at 121 million), setting a new record for the most-watched video game trailer ever.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

The Guardian: Google profiting from sale of zombie knives in UK despite claims of ban. “Google is profiting from ads offering lethal weapons for sale to people in the UK – including 17in zombie knives, ‘military tactical’ blades and ‘zombie killer sword apocalypse machetes’ – despite claiming to ban them.”

The Verge: The quiet plan to make the internet feel faster. “Engineers and major companies are pushing a technology called L4S that they say could make the web feel dramatically faster. But how?”

Search Engine Journal: OpenAI Investigates ‘Lazy’ GPT-4 Complaints On Google Reviews, X. “OpenAI, the company that launched ChatGPT a little over a year ago, has recently taken to social media to address concerns regarding the ‘lazy’ performance of GPT-4 on social media and Google Reviews.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

WIRED: The Generative AI Copyright Fight Is Just Getting Started. “The biggest fight of the generative AI revolution is headed to the courtroom—and no, it’s not about the latest boardroom drama at OpenAI. Book authors, artists, and coders are challenging the practice of teaching AI models to replicate their skills using their own work as a training manual. The debate centers on the billions of works underpinning the impressive wordsmithery of tools like ChatGPT, the coding prowess of Github’s Copilot, and artistic flair of image generators like that of startup Midjourney.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

University of Michigan: Biases in large image-text AI model favor wealthier, Western perspectives. “AI model that pairs text, images performs poorly on lower-income or non-Western images, potentially increasing inequality in digital technology representation.”

University of Texas at Austin: Census Bureau’s Proposal Threatens Integrity of Race and Ethnicity Data. “As a demographer and former analyst with the bureau, I support the desire to achieve accurate data for these populations. But the combined question is riddled with too many ethical and methodological flaws to be considered a viable solution. As it stands, the question conflates race and ethnicity by making both concepts co-equal and relies on a coding infrastructure that forcibly reassigns people to race groups they did not initially identify with.” Good morning, Internet…

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December 11, 2023 at 06:31PM
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ICANN, Quiche Browser, GDPR-Compliant WordPress, More: Sunday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, December 10, 2023

ICANN, Quiche Browser, GDPR-Compliant WordPress, More: Sunday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, December 10, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Krebs on Security: ICANN Launches Service to Help With WHOIS Lookups. “More than five years after domain name registrars started redacting personal data from all public domain registration records, the non-profit organization overseeing the domain industry has introduced a centralized online service designed to make it easier for researchers, law enforcement and others to request the information directly from registrars.”

USEFUL STUFF

Lifehacker: You Can Create Your Own Custom iPhone Browser With Quiche. “Safari on the iPhone is fast, convenient—and, admittedly, a bit boring. There are plenty of third-party options on the App Store, but seeing as Apple forces them all to use WebKit, most are essentially Safari. However, that hasn’t stopped one indie developer from trying to make things interesting. Greg De J’s Quiche browser is unique, engaging, and fully customizable, down to every button and toolbar you see in the interface. You can take advantage of this to make the browser much more functional, like adding a button dedicated to private mode in the toolbar. Plus, it has many color and layout options to explore for truly fine-tuning your browsing experience.”

Noupe: How to make WordPress GDPR-compliant. “GDPR(General Data Protection Regulation) is a set of European regulations designed to protect your data. It gives you control over how your data is used and ensures that businesses handle it by stringent guidelines. Before using your data, they must obtain your consent and notify you in case of a data leak. Businesses that violate these regulations risk incurring hefty fines. These guidelines apply to any business, regardless of location, that handles information from individuals in Europe. Similar to a global norm, GDPR protects the privacy of your data.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Gulf News: The National Library and Archives launches Encyclopedia of UAE history project in Abu Dhabi. “The Encyclopedia of UAE history will initially be digitally issued consisting of seven sections focusing on the UAE’s geography, location, area, natural resources, physical features and much more. The encyclopedia is supervised by an advisory body including members from different emirates in the UAE. According to the project’s developed work-plan, the encyclopedia is expected to be completed within five years.”

ABC News (Australia): Social media ‘skinfluencers’ drive teen demand for high-end skincare, but costs can go far beyond hip pocket. “Part of Lilly Parker’s daily routine is spent pursuing the kind of ‘beautiful dewy skin’ she sees online…. Emerging from retailer Mecca Maxima, the 14-year-old can’t put her finger on what it is about the products sold inside that appeal to her. ‘It just looks cool,’ she says. For her mother, Sarah, the answer is clear-cut — clever marketing through social media influencers.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Deutsche Welle: Why Ukrainian archives must be protected. “The regional archives in Vysokopillya are just one of many examples that the looting and destruction of archives is part of Russian warfare. A report by the Arolsen Archives, an international center for Nazi persecution, reveals how dramatic the current situation is. Russian soldiers are said to have stolen millions of documents from the archives in Kherson, amounting to around half of the entire collection. These include computers and printers. And finally, they placed mines in the building. After the Russian troops withdrew, the mines were cleared, but recovering the remaining documents is a laborious process. There is a lack of scanners, computers, storage boxes, shelves and staff.”

Ars Technica: Verizon fell for fake “search warrant,” gave victim’s phone data to stalker. “Verizon Wireless gave a female victim’s address and phone logs to an alleged stalker who pretended to be a police officer, according to an affidavit filed by an FBI special agent. The man, Robert Michael Glauner, was later arrested near the victim’s home and found to be carrying a knife at the time, according to the affidavit submitted in court yesterday.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

University of California Davis: Google Weed View? Professor Trains Computer to Spot Invasive Weed. “Using photos from Google’s Street View database, UC Davis researchers have tracked down over 2,000 cases of johnsongrass in the Western United States for a fraction of the cost and time that it would take to do drive-by or other in-person surveys. They call their tool Google Weed View.”

Washington Post: Big Tech funds the very people who are supposed to hold it accountable. “Tech giants including Google and Facebook parent Meta have dramatically ramped up charitable giving to university campuses over the past several years — giving them influence over academics studying such critical topics as artificial intelligence, social media and disinformation.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

Boing Boing: Watch “Hardware Wars” in HD. “The description of this YouTube claims this HD transfer of the legendary Star Wars parody, Hardware Wars, was done under the supervision of director Ernie Fosselius! Hardware Wars was a film that every kid at my Elementary school heard about back in the late 1970s, but only one of us had seen.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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December 11, 2023 at 01:22AM
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Tulane University AI, Silicon Valley Startups, Stony Brook University, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, December 10, 2023

Tulane University AI, Silicon Valley Startups, Stony Brook University, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, December 10, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Tulane University: Tulane showcases AI expertise through new online hub. “The website also includes guidelines for ethical and responsible use of AI, a news section highlighting AI research at Tulane and a section where the Tulane community can learn about upcoming workshops and training opportunities. In the coming months, the site will feature Tulane’s latest findings on how artificial intelligence can better support its research and teaching missions as well as its students and faculty. It will also spotlight how documentation and proposals are prepared via AI and how data and other scholarly materials are accessed and organized.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

New York Times: From Unicorns to Zombies: Tech Start-Ups Run Out of Time and Money. “WeWork raised more than $11 billion in funding as a private company. Olive AI, a health care start-up, gathered $852 million. Convoy, a freight start-up, raised $900 million. And Veev, a home construction start-up, amassed $647 million. In the last six weeks, they all filed for bankruptcy or shut down. They are the most recent failures in a tech start-up collapse that investors say is only beginning.”

Stony Brook University: Stony Brook University Libraries Is Now A Member Of Hathitrust Digital Library!. “Stony Brook University Libraries is pleased to announce that we are a HathiTrust member library. We are now part of a group of 200+ libraries and institutions that comprise the HathiTrust community! HathiTrust provides access to more than 18 million digital items.”

Ars Technica: Google announces April 2024 shutdown date for Google Podcasts. “Google Podcasts has been sitting on Google’s death row for a few months now since the September announcement. Now, a new support article details Google’s plans to kill the product, with a shutdown coming in April 2024. Google Podcasts (2016–2024) is Google’s third attempt at a podcasting app after the Google Reader-powered Google Listen (2009–2012) and Google Play Music Podcasts (2016–2020). The product is being shut down in favor of podcast app No. 4, YouTube Podcasts, which launched in 2022.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Fortune: FabFitFun, a $1 billion subscription box startup, frantically backpedals after a profane, pro–Elon Musk ad bombs. “FabFitFun turned into a dumpster fire just in time for the holiday season. The millennial-favorite subscription box company went viral this week when it posted a controversial ad on Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter)—but it blew up for all the wrong reasons. The meltdown over what appeared to be a badly misjudged attempt to piggyback off a viral Musk moment reads as a case study in how not to approach internet marketing.”

NiemanLab: The press adopts a new level of transparency around images. “The press has often been light on contextual information and details about the images they use. Typically, publications only provide the reader with a tiny gray caption, perhaps with a name and maybe some context related to its use or production method or where it was found, such as ‘illustration,’ ‘archival photo,’ ‘photo,’ or ‘social media.’ … A newfound level of transparency around images could be vital in educating the press and the public about images and their credibility.”

TechCrunch: Early impressions of Google’s Gemini aren’t great. “This week, Google took the wraps off of Gemini, its new flagship generative AI model meant to power a range of products and services including Bard, Google’s ChatGPT competitor. In blog posts and press materials, Google touted Gemini’s superior architecture and capabilities, claiming that the model meets or exceeds the performance of other leading gen AI models like OpenAI’s GPT-4. But the anecdotal evidence suggests otherwise.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Bloomberg: Google Takes Aim at the EU’s ‘Flawed’ Ad Tech Break Up Threat. “Alphabet Inc.’s Google said that the European Union’s threat to break up its profitable ad tech arm was ‘flawed’ as it formally took aim at the bloc’s allegations of anticompetitive conduct.”

Tubefilter: Congress is putting off its plan to regulate TikTok until 2024 (but GOP hopefuls still have takes). “TikTok continues to face criticism from American politicians, but the Congressional plan to regulate the app is going on the back burner — at least until 2024. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), who heads the Senate Commerce Committee, told Reuters that Congress will not take up TikTok-oriented legislation until the calendar turns over to a new year.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Robb Knight: Please, Expose your RSS. “Earlier this week I had a need to manually find a bunch of people’s RSS feed links. It seemed simple enough: go to their website and look for an RSS/Subscribe link but I was surprised to find that a lot of people don’t have a link anywhere to their feed. Even if people only ever add your website into their feed reader and let the app find the RSS feed (see below for more info on this), showing an RSS link reminds people that RSS exists, a win for the open web.”

University of Missouri: Virtual reality simulations can help autistic people complete real-world tasks, MU study finds. “Many people associate virtual reality headsets with interactive video games, but a researcher at the University of Missouri is using them for something far more important — helping autistic people navigate public transportation on college campuses. MU researcher Noah Glaser — in collaboration with Matthew Schmidt, an associate professor at the University of Georgia, and others — partnered with a program at the University of Cincinnati on a pair of studies geared toward providing autistic people virtual training opportunities to practice using a public bus to get around town.”

Ohio State University: ChatGPT often won’t defend its answers – even when it is right. “A team at The Ohio State University challenged large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT to a variety of debate-like conversations in which a user pushed back when the chatbot presented a correct answer. Through experimenting with a broad range of reasoning puzzles including math, common sense and logic, the study found that when presented with a challenge, the model was often unable to defend its correct beliefs, and instead blindly believed invalid arguments made by the user.” Good morning, Internet…

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December 10, 2023 at 06:31PM
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Adler University, Tribal Federal Funding, Google Drive Missing Files, More: Saturday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, December 9, 2023

Adler University, Tribal Federal Funding, Google Drive Missing Files, More: Saturday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, December 9, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Adler University: Digitization project preserves archival videos of founders’ teachings, lectures. “The Adler University Library and the Center for Adlerian Practice and Scholarship are nearing the completion of digitizing over 260 archival videos featuring sessions and lectures of the University’s founding members…. Organized by topical playlists, the collection contains videos featuring founders and early instructors of the Institute of Adlerian Psychology.”

The Oklahoman: New executive order makes it easier for tribal nations to access federal funds. “The executive order also creates a ‘one-stop-shop’ for federal funding to be available to tribes and Native American businesses through a database called the Tribal Access to Capital Clearinghouse, which was launched at the Tribal Summit, the White House said.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

PC Magazine: Google Rolls Out Recovery Tool for Bug That Deleted Drive Files. “In late November, users started noticing missing Google Drive files. They’d log in and find everything missing, sometimes months or years’ worth of data. In some cases, older versions of the files might be present but not the latest version. Google now has a potential fix with a new recovery tool.”

Amnesty International: South Korea: Google fails to tackle online sexual abuse content despite complaints by survivors. “Google has failed to fix its flawed system for removing non-consensual sexually violative content from its searches despite a long-running campaign by South Korean women and girls targeted with digital sex crimes, Amnesty International said today – exactly one year after first highlighting the problem.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Otago Daily Times: Lost revenue blamed on mysterious Google caller. “The owners of a Dunedin cafe say they have lost significant business due to the carelessness of a mysterious caller claiming to work for Google.”

Florida Department of State: Secretary of State Cord Byrd Seeks Public Input on Proposed Florida Museum of Black History. “Today, Secretary of State Cord Byrd announced the release of a public survey to gather input for the legislatively created Florida Museum of Black History Task Force. The Department of State is distributing the survey on behalf of the Florida Museum of Black History Task Force, which was created by legislation signed into law by Governor Ron DeSantis on May 11, 2023.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Axios: 23andMe changes terms of service to prevent lawsuits after data breach. “Days after a data breach allowed hackers to steal 6.9 million 23andMe users’ personal details, the genetic testing company changed its terms of service to prevent customers from suing the firm or pursuing class-action lawsuits against it.”

Irish Times: Social media firms face fines of up to €20 million for breaches of Ireland’s first online safety code. “Ireland’s first online safety code will require social media and video-sharing platforms to protect children from harmful content or face the prospect of fines of up to €20 million. Coimisiún na Meán, Ireland’s new body for regulating broadcasters, on-demand services and online media, has today opened a public consultation on its draft online safety code for video-sharing platform services.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Defector: Elon Musk Is Grimly Determined To Let You Know He Is Funny. “Not to take the comedic semiotics of Elon Musk too-too seriously, but the most interesting facet of his dogged, ever-flopping quest to be thought of as a comedy genius as well as a success entrepreneur guy is the ways in which he is consistently five or more years behind the online comedy meta-game. For someone with a stupefying amount of resources and a bizarrely overcooked opinion of the importance of his dying app, he understands precious little about the modern forms of comedy.”

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign: Study shows challenges to protecting privacy of library users. “Librarians have historically taken a strong stand on protecting the privacy of their patrons. But how well they accomplish this varies widely with the size of a library, and technology has made it more difficult, according to the first study of privacy practices and challenges in public libraries.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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December 10, 2023 at 01:51AM
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Harry Shearer, Scottish Women’s Land Army, Utah Slavery, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, December 9, 2023

Harry Shearer, Scottish Women’s Land Army, Utah Slavery, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, December 9, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

American Archive of Public Broadcasting: The American Archive of Public Broadcasting Preserves 2,000 Le Show Programs for the Nation. “This December, to mark the fortieth anniversary of celebrated actor, author, director, musician, political satirist and broadcaster Harry Shearer’s weekly hour-long public radio series Le Show, the American Archive of Public Broadcasting, a collaboration between the Library of Congress and Boston public media producer GBH, is launching the Le Show Collection, a publicly accessible digital archive of more than 2,000 hours of broadcasts, stretching back over the past four decades.”

Last month and I missed it, from ScotlandsPeople: News Article: Scottish Women’s Land Army records released. “We are pleased to announce that the records of almost 10,000 women who served with the Scottish Women’s Land Army (SWLA) and Women’s Timber Corps (WTC) from 1939 to 1950 have been digitised and are now available online to search and view on ScotlandsPeople. These records are a valuable source for tracing an individual’s service and gaining a wider perspective on the work of the SWLA and WTC.”

University of Utah: 1852 Legislative Session: This Abominable Slavery. “During the 1852 Utah legislative session, a passionate debate ensued over voting rights for Black men. Legislator and Latter-day Saint apostle Orson Pratt argued that Black men should be allowed to vote, while territorial governor and Latter-day Saint president Brigham Young strongly disagreed. … This debate, along with other legislative battles and religious pronouncements can be examined in full in a new digital database called This Abominable Slavery.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Verge: YouTubers can now pause comments after Google moderation tweaks. “YouTube has introduced a new moderation tool for creators that allows them to pause comments, preventing any new comments from being added to videos while preserving those that have already been posted.”

Wine-Searcher: Flaviar Acquires Wine-Searcher. “Flaviar, Inc. has announced its acquisition of Wine-Searcher, the world’s largest database of product, price and availability information across the global beverage alcohol market.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

TechCrunch: Google’s best Gemini demo was faked. “Google’s new Gemini AI model is getting a mixed reception after its big debut yesterday, but users may have less confidence in the company’s tech or integrity after finding out that the most impressive demo of Gemini was pretty much faked.” I’m getting Google Duo vibes.

Amnesty International: Global: Amnesty International website launches on Tor network to help universal access . “Amnesty International has today launched its global website as an .onion site on the Tor network, giving users greater access to its ground-breaking work exposing and documenting human rights violations in areas where government censorship and digital surveillance are rife.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

404 Media: a16z Funded AI Platform Generated Images That “Could Be Categorized as Child Pornography,” Leaked Documents Show . “OctoML, a Seattle-based startup that helps companies optimize and deploy their machine learning models, debated internally whether it was ethical and legally risky for it to generate images for Civitai, an AI model sharing and image generating platform backed by venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, after it discovered Civitai generated content that OctoML co-founder Thierry Moreau said ‘could be categorized as child pornography,’ according to internal OctoML Slack messages and documents viewed by 404 Media.”

Billboard: Swiss Digital Licensing Org Targets Twitter for Copyright Infringement . “SUISA Digital Licensing is suing Twitter International in Munich District Court for copyright infringement on X, the online platform formerly known as Twitter. The suit alleges that music compositions controlled by SUISA Digital are found on the platform, and that the company has made no effort to license them or act promptly to remove the infringing content.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

The Conversation: Citizen science projects tend to attract white, affluent, well-educated volunteers − here’s how we recruited a more diverse group to identify lead pipes in homes. “Recruiting participants for a citizen science project produced a more diverse group when people were signed up through partner organizations, such as schools and faith-based organizations, than when they joined on their own. We used this approach to recruit volunteers for Crowd the Tap, a citizen science initiative that crowdsources the locations of lead plumbing in homes.”

North Carolina State University: New HS Curriculum Teaches Color Chemistry and AI Simultaneously. “North Carolina State University researchers have developed a weeklong high school curriculum that helps students quickly grasp concepts in both color chemistry and artificial intelligence – while sparking their curiosity about science and the world around them.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

La Trobe University: Unveiling the sacred Wiradjuri carved trees. “Led by a collaborative effort between Central Tablelands Local Land Services, Gaanha-bula Action Group, Orange Local Aboriginal Land Council, Yarrawula Ngullubul Men’s Corporation, La Trobe University, and the University of Denver in the USA, this project has brought together Wiradjuri traditional cultural knowledge and cutting-edge archaeological techniques of ground-penetrating radar and 3D modelling, to shed light on these sacred locations.” Good morning, Internet…

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December 9, 2023 at 06:31PM
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Fruits of Labor World Cultural Center, Measuring Wind Plant Generation, Russian Weapons Components, More: Friday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, December 8, 2023

Fruits of Labor World Cultural Center, Measuring Wind Plant Generation, Russian Weapons Components, More: Friday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, December 8, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Digital NC: Fruits of Labor World Cultural Center Shares Labor Organizing Materials. “Fruit of Labor World Cultural Center is located in Raleigh, NC but there work goes far beyond Raleigh. The digitized materials reflects the organizing efforts of national, local and sub-local chapters of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America labor union.”

Nature: A database of hourly wind speed and modeled generation for US wind plants based on three meteorological models. “PLUSWIND provides wind speeds and estimated generation on an hourly basis at almost all wind plants across the contiguous United States from 2018–2021. The repository contains wind speeds and generation based on three different meteorological models: ERA5, MERRA2, and HRRR. Data are publicly accessible in simple csv files. Modeled generation is compared to regional and plant records, which highlights model biases and errors and how they differ by model, across regions, and across time frames.”

Interfax-Ukraine: NACP launches open database of foreign components in Russian and Iranian weapons. “The National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NACP) is launching the world’s first open database of foreign components used by the Russian Federation and Iran in unmanned aerial vehicles, missiles, electronic warfare systems and other types of weapons and military equipment, the NACP website reported.” The site is available in Ukrainian, English, and Russian.

EVENTS

Internet Archive Blog: Weird Tales from the Public Domain: Freeing Culture from Corporate Captivity. “Join us for a virtual celebration at 10am PT / 1pm ET on January 25, 2024, with an amazing lineup of academics, librarians, musicians, artists and advocates coming together to help illuminate the significance of this new class of works entering the public domain!”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

VentureBeat: Runway ML is partnering with Getty Images on new AI video models for Hollywood and advertising. “Runway ML, the New York City video AI startup backed by Google and Nvidia, continues to entrench itself in the marketplace of the future. Today, the company announced it is partnering with Getty Images, one of the largest repositories of paid stock imagery and editorial imagery in the world, to develop a new generative AI video model: Runway Getty Images Model (RGM).”

Business Insider:

Elon Musk’s biggest fans on X love Community Notes — until it comes for them. “Some may argue that the fact that no X user, including Musk himself, is immune to a correction from Community Notes is a testament to the feature’s capability, but critics have repeatedly pointed out the flaws of the system behind the feature.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Reuters: Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications -US senator. “Unidentified governments are surveilling smartphone users via their apps’ push notifications, a U.S. senator warned on Wednesday. In a letter to the Department of Justice, Senator Ron Wyden said foreign officials were demanding the data from Alphabet’s Google and Apple. Although details were sparse, the letter lays out yet another path by which governments can track smartphones.”

TechCrunch: Millions of patient scans and health records spilling online thanks to decades-old protocol bug. “Thousands of exposed servers are spilling the medical records and personal health information of millions of patients due to security weaknesses in a decades-old industry standard designed for storing and sharing medical images, researchers have warned.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Cornell University: Newly released open-source platform cuts costs for running AI. “Cornell researchers have released a new, open-source platform called Cascade that can run artificial intelligence (AI) models in a way that slashes expenses and energy costs while dramatically improving performance. Cascade is designed for settings like smart traffic intersections, medical diagnostics, equipment servicing using augmented reality, digital agriculture, smart power grids and automatic product inspection during manufacturing – situations where AI models must react within a fraction of a second.”

University of Southern California: New report combines social work and artificial intelligence to address racial bias in housing for people experiencing homelessness. “Racial inequities and the impacts of systemic bias are starkly evident in the population of people experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles, but a new report details a proposed method of collaboration between human and technological systems that could eliminate racial bias in housing allocation.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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December 9, 2023 at 01:05AM
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Wikifunctions, Utah Rock Climbing, Mastodon, More: Friday ResearchBuzz, December 8, 2023

Wikifunctions, Utah Rock Climbing, Mastodon, More: Friday ResearchBuzz, December 8, 2023
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Wikimedia Foundation: Introducing Wikifunctions: first Wikimedia project to launch in a decade creates new forms of knowledge. “The project will enable volunteer editors to collaboratively create and maintain a library of functions to answer questions and enhance knowledge on Wikimedia projects and beyond. A ‘function’ is a sequence of programming instructions that makes a calculation based on data provided. Internet users most commonly encounter functions when entering queries on search engines, such as the time difference between two cities, the distance between two locations, or the volume of an object.”

University of Utah: Scrapbooks show climbing history of Utah in the 1960s. “The scrapbooks contain black-and-white photographs taken by Club members during their climbs, as well as clippings from local Salt Lake City newspapers and climbing magazines, typed reflections from club members about climbs, written descriptions and drawings of climbing routes, communications and agendas related to club activities, and other ephemera, including a cloth Alpenbock Club patch. The scrapbooks contain routes and reports from other climbing areas, including the Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming and the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Verge: The new Mammoth app is a much simpler take on Mastodon. “Mammoth won some fans earlier this year with a really nicely designed Mastodon client, and then added a ‘For You’ feed that makes Mammoth a little more automatically personalized. Now, with the launch of Mammoth 2 for Mac, iPhone, and iPad, the app is going even deeper into curation and personalization: it’s launching a series of ‘Smart Lists’ filled with good posts, a set of suggested people and accounts to follow, and more.”

Reuters: Elon Musk appeals dispute over SEC consent decree to US Supreme Court. “Billionaire businessman Elon Musk on Thursday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to consider whether the Securities and Exchange Commission overstepped its authority in enforcing a consent decree that he has called a ‘muzzle’ on his constitutional free speech rights, his lawyer said.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

New York Times: Russia’s Latest Disinformation Tactic Exploits American Celebrities. “The video was recorded on Cameo, the popular, though now struggling, app where users can pay for personalized messages from famous people — in Mr. [Elijah] Wood’s case, starting at $340. While a genuine video, it was repurposed as part of Russia’s efforts to falsely denigrate Mr. Zelensky as a drug-addled neo-Nazi. Beginning in July, according to a report released on Thursday by Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center, the video and others like it ricocheted through Russian social media and were ultimately featured by news organizations owned or controlled by the government.”

Korea Herald: More cultural assets to be digitized. “The Cultural Heritage Administration said Thursday it would push for concrete steps to grow the economy and digitize the way cultural assets are used and promoted, ahead of the enactment of a new law on heritage management. Nurturing cultural heritage-related startups while incentivizing ordinary Koreans to make more frequent visits to cultural sites are some of the priorities, the culture agency said in a press statement. Legislative support will be provided to make that happen, it added.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Axios: Ex-Twitter exec claims X fired him for raising security concerns. “Twitter’s former global head of information security accused X in a lawsuit Wednesday of wrongly firing him for raising concerns about Musk’s budget cuts following the Elon Musk-led takeover.”

Search Engine Journal: Critical WordPress Form Plugin Vulnerability Affects Up To +200,000 Installs. “Security researchers at Wordfence detailed a critical security flaw in the MW WP Form plugin, affecting versions 5.0.1 and earlier. The vulnerability allows unauthenticated threat actors to exploit the plugin by uploading arbitrary files, including potentially malicious PHP backdoors, with the ability to execute these files on the server.”

Boing Boing: Six months jail for YouTuber who filmed self bailing out of plane for the views. “Trevor Jacob, the YouTuber who bailed out of his own plane and later admitted that he did it for the views, is off to jail for six months over the November 2021 stunt. Jacobs earlier plead guilty to obstructing a federal investigation, having recovered and destroyed the wreckage himself to make sure the NTSB couldn’t get its hands on it.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

North Carolina State University: How Open Science Can Both Advance and Hinder Equity in Research. “In January 2023, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Science and Technology Council released an official definition of open science for use by the US government: ‘The principle and practice of making research products and processes available to all, while respecting diverse cultures, maintaining security and privacy, and fostering collaborations, reproducibility, and equity.’ While this definition promises equity, not all aspects of open science currently deliver.”

The Conversation: Disinformation is rampant on social media – a social psychologist explains the tactics used against you. “Foreign governments, internet trolls, domestic and international extremists, opportunistic profiteers and even paid disinformation agencies exploit the internet to spread questionable content. Periods of civil unrest, natural disasters, health crises and wars trigger anxiety and the hunt for information, which disinformation agents take advantage of. Certainly it’s worth watching for the warning signs for misinformation and dangerous speech, but there are additional tactics disinformation agents employ.”

RTÉ: Hate speech ads approved on social media, investigation finds. “Facebook, X, TikTok and YouTube have all approved adverts featuring extreme and violent misogynistic hate speech against women journalists in South Africa, according to a new investigation by Global Witness and the South African public interest law firm, Legal Resources Centre.” Good morning, Internet…

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December 8, 2023 at 06:31PM
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