New researches

Monday, June 27, 2022

California Heatwaves, WWII Facial Recognition, Archive File Formats, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, June 27, 2022

California Heatwaves, WWII Facial Recognition, Archive File Formats, More: Monday ResearchBuzz, June 27, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

UCLA: New Online Mapping Tool Helps California Prepare for Extreme Heat. “The online mapping tool developed by UCLA and the Public Health Alliance of Southern California allows users to find information about temperature extremes, explore vulnerable populations, understand community health situations and seek out state resources such as air conditioners for low-income households.”

Times of Israel: Google engineer identifies anonymous faces in WWII photos with AI facial recognition. “Walking past the countless photos of Holocaust survivors and victims at Warsaw’s POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in 2016, New York-native Daniel Patt was haunted by the possibility that he was passing the faces of his own relatives without even knowing it…. he set to work creating and developing From Numbers to Names (N2N), an artificial intelligence-driven facial recognition platform that can scan through photos from prewar Europe and the Holocaust, linking them to people living today.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Chrome Unboxed: ChromeOS can now open 7z, ISO, RAR and many other newly supported archival formats. “Most notably among the above newly supported formats are ISO and 7z. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve already received 7-zip folders from others or transferred them myself (RAR is a thing of the past for me), and simply couldn’t open them. I think the more users see that ChromeOS can do what Windows can – at least for the basics, the more they will be willing to invest in it or integrate it as a part of their workflow.”

USEFUL STUFF

Mashable: Stardust is the first period tracker app to offer end to end encryption. “…period tracking app Stardust, which combines traditional menstruation tracking with the movements of our moon and the planets, has come out ahead of many others by announcing itself as the first recognized app to offer end-to-end encryption for all users.”

MakeUseOf: Identify Bird Sounds With BirdNET-Pi on Raspberry Pi. “You may well have seen various bird species in your backyard or garden, but there may well be many more roosting nearby that you have only heard. To identify them, you don’t need to be an expert in ornithology, however: all that’s required is a Raspberry Pi equipped with a mic and the BirdNET-Pi software.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

New York Times: Challenges of the Future Confront the Art World. “Should the British Museum return the ancient sculptures known as the Parthenon Marbles to Greece? Is the art world contributing to global warming? Is the hot market for digital art known as NFTs over? These are among the most vexing challenges facing the art world today, especially the question of how — or even whether — to return what many view as plundered art, like the Parthenon Marbles, to their rightful owners.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

TorrentFreak: Digital Trails: How Bungie Identified a Mass Sender of Fake DMCA Notices. “In response to persons unknown sending large numbers of fake DMCA notices to YouTube while impersonating its anti-piracy partner, Bungie filed a lawsuit in the US seeking millions in damages. At the time the name of the ‘Doe’ defendant was unknown. This is how a Bungie investigation followed digital breadcrumbs to track down and identify that person by name and physical address.”

Bleeping Computer: LGBTQ+ community warned of extortionists abusing dating apps. “According to the FTC, the criminals pose as potential romantic partners on LGBTQ+ dating apps, sending explicit photos to their targets and asking them to reciprocate. If they fall for it, the victims get blackmailed into paying a ransom, usually in untraceable gift cards, under the threat of having sexual imagery they shared with the scammers leaked to their family, friends, or employers.”

Reuters: Exclusive: Google Hit With Antitrust Complaint by Danish Job Search Rival. “Google was hit with an antitrust complaint on Monday after a Danish online job-search rival took its grievance to EU regulators, alleging the Alphabet unit had unfairly favoured its own job search service. The complaint could accelerate EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager’s scrutiny of the service, Google for Jobs, three years after it first came under her microscope.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

World Bank: 70% of 10-Year-Olds now in Learning Poverty, Unable to Read and Understand a Simple Text. “As a result of the worst shock to education and learning in recorded history, learning poverty has increased by a third in low- and middle-income countries, with an estimated 70% of 10-year-olds unable to understand a simple written text, according to a new report published today by the World Bank, UNESCO, UNICEF, UK government Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), USAID, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.”

TechRadar Pro: Why this chess grandmaster left Google behind. “When [Tal] Shaked arrived at Google in 2004, the company had just 3,000 employees and looked nothing like the sprawling megacorporation it is today. He was brought on as a junior engineer to work on Google Search. At the time, Google’s search rankings were not powered by any form of intelligence. Instead, a dedicated team of engineers was tasked with managing a complex rule-based system designed to serve up the best and most relevant results to users.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

Dalhousie University: ‘It takes a village to build a whale’: Dal’s Blue Whale Project set to soar this fall. “Since 2017, Dalhousie’s Blue Whale Project has left a big impression on everyone who’s encountered it, from students and faculty to community members and volunteers. Now, just months away from the blue whale arriving at its final resting place in Dal’s Steele Ocean Sciences Building, there is a buzz of excitement around the university.” Good morning, Internet…

Do you like ResearchBuzz? Does it help you out? Please consider supporting it on Patreon. Not interested in commitment? Perhaps you’d buy me an iced tea. I love your comments, I love your site suggestions, and I love you. Feel free to comment on the blog, or @ResearchBuzz on Twitter. Thanks!

June 27, 2022 at 05:31PM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/XTEadtL

Sunday, June 26, 2022

Brendan O’Regan, Repurposing Old Smartphones, Downloading Movies, More: Sunday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, June 26, 2022

Brendan O’Regan, Repurposing Old Smartphones, Downloading Movies, More: Sunday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, June 26, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Clare Herald: New website showcases life of Brendan O’Regan. “Brendan O’Regan’s many achievements include setting up the world’s first duty-free airport retail outlet at Shannon Airport. In economic terms, he initiated Ireland’s first programme of foreign direct investment in manufacturing, based on a favourable enterprise climate. Internationally, he is acknowledged as the father of the €70 billion a year airport duty-free business.”

USEFUL STUFF

CNET: Turn Your Android Into a Wireless Mouse and More. Here’s How. “If your phone’s too old to command a high trade-in value, or you’re looking to save some money on a webcam, a Google Home, a wireless mouse, or you just like to tinker, there are some pretty ingenious ways to repurpose your old device and turn it into something you’ll actually want to use.”

MakeUseOf: How to Legally Download Movies to Watch Offline for Free. “Almost all of us now use streaming services to catch the hottest new movies and TV shows. However, streaming still has one major flaw… you need an internet connection. Which means they aren’t all that convenient when you’re traveling. Fortunately, many of the best streaming services now allow you to download movies to watch offline; and all for free, as part of your normal account. So, in this article, we’ll show you how to download movies to watch offline, free and legally.”

How-To Geek: The Best Raspberry Pi 4 Alternatives. “A semiconductor shortage combined with a surge in popularity has led to a significant supply shortage of Pi 4s. Manufacturers say the device won’t be back in stock until April next year, and in the meantime, the few that are around tend to be priced at a premium — up to 400% more than its intended retail price. But alternatives are available. Some may be slightly expensive, and others may not have the power a Pi 4 has, but they are all in stock and ready to go straight into your next project.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Wall Street Journal: The Surprising Reason Your Amazon Searches Are Returning More Confusing Results than Ever. “If you want to be reminded just how tiny you are, you could travel to a remote part of the world and behold the night sky, or stand atop a mountain and contemplate its immensity, or you could try to find the best garlic press on Amazon… Granted, there are many more stars in the night sky than the 300 or so garlic presses visible on Amazon’s U.S. site. But wading through page after page of those listings, for items with tens of thousands of collective reviews, is, like many searches on Amazon, increasingly an exercise in frustration, despair and confusion.”

Input Magazine: Inside the subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters. “Because others don’t understand the thrill of busting shoplifters, people like [Alex] McLeod are increasingly turning to Reddit to find people who do. He’s one of the many shoplifting-prevention staff employed by corporations across North America who’s joined r/LossPrevention, a 55,000-member hub for corporate employees battling crime.”

WIRED: Charity TikTok Videos Put an Uncomfortable Spin on Morality. “The hashtag #honestytest has 51.5 million views on the platform—among other tests, creators drop bundles of cash in front of people as a ‘social experiment,’ filming them to see if they’ll pocket the money (some of these people are experiencing homelessness; many of these videos are clearly staged). Ultimately, ‘dishonest’ people are embarrassed in front of millions of viewers, while ‘honest’ people are rewarded financially.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

The Verge: Google says attackers worked with ISPs to deploy Hermit spyware on Android and iOS. “A sophisticated spyware campaign is getting the help of internet service providers (ISPs) to trick users into downloading malicious apps, according to research published by Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) (via TechCrunch). This corroborates earlier findings from security research group Lookout, which has linked the spyware, dubbed Hermit, to Italian spyware vendor RCS Labs.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

BBC Sport: Homophobia large portion of online abuse aimed at footballers and basketballers – study. “Homophobia is responsible for a large portion of abuse aimed at footballers and basketballers in the men’s and women’s game, according to a new report. Of more than 1,500 abusive posts included in the report, homophobic abuse was 40% of posts targeted at male footballers, 27% of that sent to female football players, 46% of the abuse aimed at male basketballers and 19% of that posted to female basketball players.”

Phys .org: A quest to digitize 1 million plant specimens. “The Australian National Herbarium in Canberra is imaging nearly a million plant specimens using an automated system developed by Netherlands company Picturae. CSIRO Group Leader for Digitization & Informatics, Pete Thrall, who oversees digital assets at the National Research Collections Australia, managed by CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency, said the project would help inform bushfire recovery and biosecurity.” Good afternoon, Internet…

June 27, 2022 at 12:26AM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/KgS9BtG

British Coatings Federation, Chromebooks, CodeWhisperer, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, June 26, 2022

British Coatings Federation, Chromebooks, CodeWhisperer, More: Sunday ResearchBuzz, June 26, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Coatings World: British Coatings Federation Launches Online History. “This year marks the 110th year since the inaugural meeting of The National Federation of Associated Paint, Colour and Varnish Manufacturers of the United Kingdom in 1912. As part of the celebrations, the British Coatings Federation (BCF) has created an online resource of the history archives of the many different associations that make up the BCF’s long history.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Google Blog: Your Chromebook now works better with your other devices. “During CES and I/O this year, we announced a few new Android and Chromebook features designed to help your phone and laptop work better together. Soon you’ll see some of those features roll out to your Chromebooks so you can try them yourself.”

TechCrunch: Amazon launches CodeWhisperer, a GitHub Copilot-like AI pair programming tool. “At its re:Mars conference, Amazon today announced the launch of CodeWhisperer, an AI pair programming tool similar to GitHub’s Copilot that can autocomplete entire functions based on only a comment or a few keystrokes. The company trained the system, which currently supports Java, JavaScript and Python, on billions of lines of publicly available open source code and its own codebase, as well as publicly available documentation and code on public forums.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

The Verge: Khaby Lame is now the most-followed TikToker in the world. “TikTok has a new reigning champion. Khaby Lame, a 22-year-old Senegalese-born creator, became the most-followed person on TikTok last night, surpassing American TikTok star Charli D’Amelio, who formerly had the distinction. Lame now has more than 142.7 million followers compared to D’Amelio’s 142.3 million.”

Gizmodo: Elon Tells Twitter He Needs Moar Data, Twitter Gives It to Him. “Earlier this month, Twitter finally succumbed to Musk’s better-late-than never complaints around bot proliferation on the platform and provided him with a ‘firehose’ of data. Apparently, that wasn’t enough to assuage Musk’s concerns, and now Twitter will reportedly sent the billionaire even more user data.”

BuzzFeed News: WeChat Became The Platform For Shanghai Residents To Speak Out About China’s Zero-COVID Policy. “A six-minute video posted on Chinese social media platform WeChat painted a harrowing timeline of what was happening inside Shanghai during the city’s latest strict COVID lockdown. After the video went viral, it was taken down by government censors. It got reposted, then taken down again. And again, and again.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

WIRED: Google Warns of New Spyware Targeting iOS and Android Users. “IN HEARINGS THIS week, the notorious spyware vendor NSO group told European legislators that at least five EU countries have used its powerful Pegasus surveillance malware. But as ever more comes to light about the reality of how NSO’s products have been abused around the world, researchers are also working to raise awareness that the surveillance-for-hire industry goes far beyond one company.”

Vice: Dad Learns His Photos Are Being Used to Sell ‘Happy Ending’ Massages on Grindr. “Over the past two years, [Dr. Scott] Liptzin has been made aware of seven different accounts of erotic masseurs using his photos. He said some of the Instagram accounts using his pics have more likes and views than his original posts do.”

Bloomberg: Pinterest must face suit by Oakland woman who says she helped create it. “Pinterest Inc. must face a lawsuit from a digital marketing strategist who says she helped conceive the social media platform, but not one of its founders, a California judge ruled. Late on Thursday, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Richard Seabolt denied the company’s motion to dismiss the suit, but he eliminated co-founder Paul Sciarra as a defendant because he left Pinterest a decade ago.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

CNET: Google’s Parti Generator Relies on 20 Billion Inputs to Create Photorealistic Images. “Pathways Autoregressive Text-to-Image, or Parti, studies sets of images, which Google calls ‘image tokens,’ using them to construct new images, the search giant said on a research website. Parti’s images become more realistic when it has more parameters — tokens and other training material — to review. The model studies 20 billion parameters before generating a final image.”

The Atlantic: How to Fix Twitter and Facebook. “Can we govern ourselves? Can we trust strangers? These questions go to the heart of a functioning civic society. No answer is preordained, but getting to a good one requires building distributed architectures, online and off, to foster cooperation among the many and to contend with the few who want to wreck it.”

KnowTechie: IKEA’s app digitally removes your furniture and replaces it with theirs. “IKEA just launched a new design tool meant to help you envision its furniture right in your living room. Ikea Kreativ’s Scene Scanner lets you scan a room with your phone and place furniture how you see fit. You can ‘erase’ your own first, and then start placing Ikea-branded products like you’re arranging a home in Animal Crossing.” Good morning, Internet…

June 26, 2022 at 05:34PM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/yQMmae0

Saturday, June 25, 2022

Coronavirus in Boston, Slack, WeChat, More: Saturday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, June 25, 2022

Coronavirus in Boston, Slack, WeChat, More: Saturday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, June 25, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

News@Northeastern: Want To Understand The Impact Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On Boston? Northeastern Researchers Have Built A Database. “Sudden disruptions to society were immediately apparent: School closures, business shutdowns, new—and in some cases, unprecedented—public health policies. But other pandemic impacts remain hidden, locked away in datasets and public records not yet meaningfully analyzed. The determination to uncover that data—and make it widely available—led a group of Northeastern researchers to construct a ‘data-support system’ from multiple information sources in and around the city of Boston that, when combined, paint a portrait of how communities and neighborhoods were impacted by the pandemic, with particular emphasis on communities and neighborhoods of color.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

WIRED: The Future of Slack Looks a Lot Like Zoom. “Last June, the popular workplace chat app Slack introduced Huddles, an audio-only feature designed to replicate the real-life thing. It was an immediate hang space, launched easily from within a Slack channel or a direct message. And it has been, according to Slack, a hit.”

CryptoPotato: WeChat Bans All Crypto-Related Content Following ToS Update. “Some form of digitally-related research is still underway in China, notably around CBDCs [Central Bank Digital Currency]. However, in an update to its ToS, WeChat – the largest social network in the country, with over 1.1 billion users – has decided to ban all content believed to be promoting digital assets.”

USEFUL STUFF

MakeUseOf: 5 Apps for Spending Time Outside and Connecting With Nature. “If you want to spend more time in nature but need a little nudge to get out there, then look to your smartphone or tablet for help. Whether you want to spend more time hiking and camping or simply take a lap around the block occasionally, this collection of apps can help you make the most of your time in nature.” I had no idea this category of app existed.

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Mashable: 5 interactive tools for learning about abortion access in your state . “Despite the ruling, a network of activists and professionals have spent decades preparing for and fighting against this now-reality. Reproductive rights organizations, legal institutions, and news organizations have created numerous resources to help guide people through the new restrictions, including many interactive maps and infographics about nationwide policies and access.”

Poynter: YouTube takes flak on the third day of GlobalFact. “YouTube came under fire in Oslo on Friday during a ‘fireside chat’ at GlobalFact 9, a large fact-checking conference hosted by the International Fact-Checking Network. During the Q&A, multiple fact-checkers in the audience criticized the tech giant for a failure to enforce quality standards, a general lack of communication and an alleged failure to act on mis- and disinformation on its platform.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Reuters: U.S. Tech Industry Frets About Handing Data to States Prosecuting Abortion . “The technology industry is bracing for the uncomfortable possibility of having to hand over pregnancy-related data to law enforcement, in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on Friday to overturn the Roe v. Wade precedent that for decades guaranteed a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion.”

Comparitech: Ransomware attacks on US schools and colleges cost $3.56bn in 2021. “In 2021, 67 individual ransomware attacks affected 954 schools and colleges, potentially impacting 950,129 students. We estimate that these attacks cost education institutions $3.56 billion in downtime alone. Most schools will have also faced astronomical recovery costs as they tried to restore computers, recover data, and shore up their systems to prevent future attacks.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Lidar Magazine: Bodie Heritage Kept Alive With 3D Digital Archive. “Scientists from the University of California (UC) Merced have digitally mapped the fragile remains of the once-flourishing gold rush ‘ghost’ town of Bodie, California, as part of the Bodie 3D Project.”

Euronews: Russia’s Yandex opens public access to AI large language model. “Russian technology company Yandex said on Thursday it had made a large language model for artificial intelligence research open to the public, hoping to spawn faster and deeper development of certain AI technologies.” Good afternoon, Internet…

June 26, 2022 at 12:27AM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/LqcXI4e

British Library Endangered Archives, Maternal Health Resources, Google Docs, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, June 25, 2022

British Library Endangered Archives, Maternal Health Resources, Google Docs, More: Saturday ResearchBuzz, June 25, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

British Library Endangered Archives Blog: New online – June 2022. “We have another 4 new projects online to bring to your attention. This time from Indonesia, Iran, India, and West Africa.”

National Library of Medicine: Birthing a Capstone: A Prenatal and Postpartum Health Toolkit for Public Librarians. “Using PubMed and MedlinePlus as well as curating more online resources, this new toolkit gives librarians a ready-made, customizable bank of resources so that they can distribute pre-prepared resources or customize our resources templates to suit their specific library’s needs and ensures that librarians have access to high-quality, evidence-based information about prenatal, expecting, and postpartum needs to distribute to patrons, with the option to tailor it to suit their patrons’ needs.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

WIRED: How to Use Markdown in Google Docs . “Google Docs can convert markdown to its native formatting in real time, but only a small subset of what’s called Markdown is supported. Still, it’s the fastest way to bold and italicize text, and add links, in Google Docs. If you don’t know what Markdown is, you’re not going to be interested in this feature, but if you (like me) find yourself using it reflexively, you will want to enable it. Here’s how it works.”

Reuters: Google News re-opens in Spain after eight-year shutdown. “Alphabet… reopened Google News in Spain on Wednesday, eight years after it shut down the service because of a Spanish rule forcing the company and other news aggregators to pay publishers for using snippets of their news.”

USEFUL STUFF

Computerworld: The business user’s guide to Google Voice. “Google Voice is one of Google’s most complex, confusing, and poorly promoted services. But it’s also one of its most powerful — if you take the time to figure out exactly what it does and how it can work for you.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Book Riot: How To Start A BookTok. “TikTok is here to stay, and, as in most corners of the internet, the bookish world has carved out its own niche there. Authors, bookstores, and bookfluencers all have accounts, and the publishing industry is increasingly taking notice and tapping into the power of the platform to sell books and spread enthusiasm about reading. So how do you get started on BookTok?”

I feel like it’s a shade too early for this sort of thing, but just to give you a peek at the horizon, from Search Engine Land: Virtual environment optimization (VEO) is coming. Ready for it?. “VEO is the task of working within a virtual environment and utilizing the resources available to best position the clients’ products and services within an alternative reality.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CNET: Cybercriminals Steal $100 Million in Cryptocurrency. “Cybercriminals made off with $100 million in cryptocurrency after hacking Horizon, a so-called blockchain bridge, the company said. Harmony, the blockchain startup behind Horizon, tweeted late Thursday that that it had discovered the theft and was working with forensic specialists and law enforcement in hopes of tracking down those responsible.”

City of Chicago: City of Chicago Launches Data Dashboard to Support Crisis Assistance Response and Engagement Program. “Mayor Lori E. Lightfoot, the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH), the Office of Emergency Communication and Management (OEMC), the Chicago Fire Department (CFD), and the Chicago Police Department (CPD) launched the Data Dashboard. The new resource will provide information on the City’s Crisis Assistance Response and Engagement (CARE) Program. The primary goal of the CARE program is to improve outcomes for individuals experiencing a behavioral health crisis requiring an emergency response.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Reuters: Chinese authority launches probe into Chinese academic database CNKI. “China’s internet security authority has launched an investigation into the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), about a month after the market regulator targeted the online academic database with an antitrust probe.”

Heriot Watt University: AI algorithm to help tackle ‘epidemic’ of gender-based online abuse. “Researchers at the National Robotarium, hosted by Heriot-Watt University and the University of Edinburgh, are developing advanced ‘machine learning’ algorithms that will significantly improve the detection, intervention and prevention of online gender-based abuse.”

University of Manchester: Digital psychosis monitoring system trial launches. “A groundbreaking smartphone app for remote digital data collection which aims to predict if an individual will relapse into psychosis is to be trialled across the UK in a £12.5 million study. Led by University of Manchester researchers, the system will be tested across six Higher Education Institutions and their partnering NHS Trusts in England, Wales and Scotland. The work is also being conducted in partnership with The McPin Foundation.” Good morning, Internet…

June 25, 2022 at 05:32PM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/wSdifJA

Friday, June 24, 2022

Los Angeles County Small Businesses, Open Access Plays India, Architizer, More: Friday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, June 24, 2022

Los Angeles County Small Businesses, Open Access Plays India, Architizer, More: Friday Afternoon ResearchBuzz, June 24, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Business Wire: LA Business Council Institute and USC Sol Price School of Public Policy Center for Economic Development Launch Groundbreaking Database of Over 31,000 Small Businesses in LA County (PRESS RELEASE). “Developed in collaboration with the University of Southern California Sol Price School of Public Policy’s Center for Economic Development, Compete4LA aims to help level the playing field for local businesses seeking to support the region’s major sports, entertainment, and cultural events, as well as major public infrastructure projects. The online database will host and maintain over 31,000 publicly accessible, verified business profiles for Los Angeles County businesses, featuring small firms under $1 million in annual sales and fewer than 20 employees, and other refining criteria.”

News Nine: Bhasha Centre’s new digital library aims to engage with theatre community, further collaborations between playwrights. “The Drama Library is a free-for-all, open-access digital library of ‘unpublished’ Indian plays from English to Hindi, Kannada, Marathi, Bengali, Urdu, Gujarati, Tamil, Arabic, Sindhi and Dakhni Arabic.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Architectural Digest: Material Bank Inks a Deal With Architizer, Continuing Its Acquisition Spree. “Less than two months ago, Material Bank completed a $175 million round of Series D funding, increasing its valuation to $1.9 billion. Now, the architectural, design, and construction materials marketplace is poised to incorporate a leading source of design ideas into its arsenal. This week, Material bank announced its acquisition of Architizer, bringing the industry’s biggest database of architectural projects into the fold. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.”

TechCrunch: Twitter to expand into long-form content with upcoming Twitter Notes feature. “In what could be one of Twitter’s more significant changes since doubling the character count from 140 to 280 characters, the company is preparing to launch a new feature that would support the direct publishing of long-form content on its platform.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Newsradio 1040: Iowa Hall of Pride Museum to Close, Transition to Online Platform. “The Iowa Hall of Pride is closing its physical location in downtown Des Moines and moving online. The Iowa High School Athletic Association says the Hall of Pride’s physical museum’s last day open to the public will be June 30th, after which its content will become exclusively available online.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

BBC: Japanese man loses USB stick with entire city’s personal details. “For many, after-work drinks are a common way of relaxing after a busy week. But one worker in Japan could be nursing a protracted hangover after he lost a USB memory stick following a night out with colleagues. Why? It contained the personal details of nearly half a million people.”

Euractiv: Italian data protection authority strikes another major blow to Google Analytics. “The decision is the last in a row against Google Analytics, which data protection authorities accuse of illegally transferring data to the United States, a country that is considered not to have an adequate level of data protection since the landmark Schrems II ruling of the EU Court of Justice in July 2020.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Brown University: “Shadow Plays: Virtual Realities in an Analog World,” Brown Library’s Digital Publications Initiative’s Second Born-Digital Scholarly Monograph, Published by Stanford University Press. “Shadow Plays: Virtual Realities in an Analog World, by Professor of Italian Studies Massimo Riva, explores popular forms of entertainment used in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to transport viewers to a new world, foreshadowing present-day virtual, augmented, and extended reality experiences (VR, AR, XR). Published by Stanford University Press, Shadow Plays examines themes of virtual travel, social surveillance, and utopian imagination through six case histories and eight interactive simulations.”

NewsWise: Rensselaer Announces Institute for Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Computing. “The goal of the Institute is to become the primary academic center in the country for advancing new computational paradigms, including those that are a hybrid of conventional, neuromorphic, and quantum computing — combining bits, neurons, and qubits, which will make it possible to solve problems that current computing systems cannot. The new institute will allow Rensselaer to innovate using quantum computing and edge computing for networks and cyber-physical systems, and hacker-proof quantum communications.”

Harvard Business School: All Those Zoom Meetings May Boost Connection and Curb Loneliness. “Americans are lonelier than ever—a problem the COVID-19 pandemic may have exacerbated. Could interactions on platforms like Zoom and Twitch come close to replicating the real-life contact people crave? New research suggests that’s more likely to happen if the virtual experiences truly engage people on screen.” Good afternoon, Internet…

June 25, 2022 at 01:05AM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/DQPWt0s

Ohio Department of Natural Resources, A Space Of Their Own, Cancer InFocus: Kentucky, More: Friday ResearchBuzz, June 24, 2022

Ohio Department of Natural Resources, A Space Of Their Own, Cancer InFocus: Kentucky, More: Friday ResearchBuzz, June 24, 2022
By ResearchBuzz

NEW RESOURCES

Port Clinton News Herald: ODNR artifacts showcased in new online museum. “For many, the Ohio Department of Natural Resources brings thoughts of rippling streams, thick forests, and quiet deer. But the mission of the ODNR also steps out of the woods and into a museum as it focuses on preserving history as passionately as it preserves land. Inspired by that focus, ODNR Director Mary Mertz has unveiled the Cardinal Collection, an online museum highlighting ODNR artifacts.”

Indiana Daily Student: Eskenazi Museum of Art announces ‘A Space of their Own’ research project celebrating female artists. “The IU Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art announced the launch of ‘A Space of Their Own,’ an online research database celebrating the contributions of female artists, on June 13. ‘A Space of Their Own’ catalogs work by various female artists, particularly those represented in the museums’ collections. The launch includes artwork, essays, individual records and timelines accounting the work of several European and American women artists between the 16th and 19th centuries, according to the database’s webpage.”

University of Kentucky: Markey Cancer Data Portal Provides Digital Footprint of Cancer in Kentucky. “The University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center’s Community Impact Office recently launched Cancer InFocus: Kentucky – a new, online data mapping application that allows users to explore cancer incidence and mortality data alongside population demographics, social determinants of health and behavioral risk factors at various geographic levels across the Commonwealth.”

Catholic News Agency: Records of Jews who sought Vatican help during Holocaust to go public. “Relatives of Holocaust survivors and victims can now look through the files of more than 2,700 Jews who sought help through Vatican channels to escape Nazi persecution before and during the Second World War. The archives have gone public on the internet at the request of Pope Francis.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

TechCrunch: Google News launches a new desktop design with topic customization. “Google News is refreshing its desktop site with a new design that allows you to track global and local news on one screen. The redesign puts Your Briefing, Local news, and Top Picks section on a single page in different columns so it’s easier to catch up with news on topics and regions you care about.”

Engadget: Twitter revives its developer conference after a seven-year hiatus. “After a seven-year hiatus, Twitter is once again hosting an in-person developer conference. The company is bringing back Chirp, which will take place in San Francisco on November 16th. Chirp was the name of Twitter’s first-ever developer conference back in 2010, though the event was canceled in subsequent years. The last time the company hosted a live developer conference was Twitter Flight in 2015.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

ZDNet: You. com is taking on Google with AI, apps, privacy, and personalization. “It’s not that Google is the only game in town. Besides Baidu and Yandex, the likes of Microsoft and Yahoo have tried their luck too, with Bing and the eponymous search engine, respectively. The privacy-focused DuckDuckGo is another option. Yet, none of those has a market share of over 3% worldwide. Can a new entry do better than so many others before it? Richard Socher thinks so.”

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Missouri Botanical Garden’s plant collection is going digital. “The Missouri Botanical Garden, in the middle of a multiyear effort to digitize hundreds of thousands of dried plant specimens, is now on the edge of further expanding its work. The Garden is hopeful it will soon land a grant from the National Science Foundation to digitally catalogue more than half a million specimens in its Africa collection to an online database for researchers around the world.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

CNET: Microsoft Restricts Its Facial Recognition Tools, Citing the Need for ‘Responsible AI’. “Microsoft is restricting access to its facial recognition tools, citing risks to society that the artificial intelligence systems could pose. The tech company released a 27-page ‘Responsible AI Standard’ on Tuesday that details the company’s goals toward equitable and trustworthy AI.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

MIT News: Mining social media data for social good. “Erin Walk, a PhD student in social and engineering systems, studies the impact of social media on the Syrian conflict.”

North Carolina State University: Volunteers Who Help Gather Data for Science Are Committed, But Not Diverse. “In a new study, North Carolina State University researchers found that while many volunteers who sign up to help crowdsource scientific findings are extremely motivated and committed, these projects aren’t attracting a diverse pool of volunteers. The findings could help researchers design and structure future projects, as well as point to priorities for volunteer recruitment.”

OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL

Hackaday: Machine Learning Does Its Civic Duty By Spotting Roadside Litter. “If there’s one thing that never seems to suffer from supply chain problems, it’s litter. It’s everywhere, easy to spot and — you’d think — pick up. Sadly, most of us seem to treat litter as somebody else’s problem, but with something like this machine vision litter mapper, you can at least be part of the solution.” Good morning, Internet…

June 24, 2022 at 05:32PM
via ResearchBuzz https://ift.tt/9K8Zwu2