Gizmodo: “We are all better off being more savvy consumers. When Amazon’s big shopping holiday, Prime Day, rolls around—now twice a year—we’re doubly incentivized to not fall for any bad deals. Prime Day is routinely subsumed with dishonest sales exacerbated thanks to a heavy dose of FOMO, or “fear of missing out.” Getting an honest… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: E-Commerce
How to Spot a Fake Review on Amazon
PCMag: “As wonderful as the internet can be, it also lies to us every day. Fake reviews—seemingly legitimate assessments created by a seller or someone paid by them—are becoming harder to spot. The online shopping boom has made them a big business, but they can end up costing you serious money. In 2021, it was… Continue Reading
5 Free Reverse Phone Lookup Sites to Find Out Who Called You
MakeUseOf: “Calls from unknown numbers are frustrating, especially when they don’t seem to stop. Using a reverse phone number lookup tool, you can take power back from anonymous callers. Here are some of the best free tools you can use to identify these callers.” Continue Reading
Why a ruling against the Internet Archive threatens the future of America’s libraries
MIT Technology Review – “The decision locks libraries into an ecosystem that is not in readers’ interests. Congress must act. I was raised in the 1980s and ’90s, and for my generation and generations before us, the public library was an equalizing force in every town, helping anyone move toward the American dream. In Chantilly,… Continue Reading
Executive Excess 2024
Institute for Policy Studies – The “Low Wage 100” corporations are enriching CEOs at the expense of workers and long-term investment. Introduction Key findings Recommendations Social Toolkit Download full report At a time of intense political divisions, Americans across the political spectrum share enormous common ground on at least one problem facing our nation: the… Continue Reading
YouTubers Are Almost Too Easy to Dupe
The Atlantic [unpaywalled]”Perhaps the most accurate cliché is that if a deal appears too good to be true, then it probably is. To wit: If a “private investor” of unknown origin approaches you through an intermediary, offering you $400,000 a month to make “four weekly videos” for a politically partisan website and YouTube page, you… Continue Reading
Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, September 7, 2024
Via LLRX – Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, September 7, 2024 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly… Continue Reading
Retailers Locked Up Their Products and Broke Shopping in America
Bloomberg no paywall: “…In retailers’ eyes it might be their best option, but it’s one that appears to be backfiring. Neil Saunders, managing director of the retail practice at the firm GlobalData, describes the locking up of merch as “a blunt instrument.” Several years into this experiment, the instrument’s outcomes are becoming clear: miserable workers,… Continue Reading
Where to Buy Cheap Books to Help With Your Studies
maketecheasier: “Buying textbooks is one of the biggest expenses as a student, but you can get great deals if you know where to look. If you’re wondering where to buy cheap books for your studies, this guide show you some of the best places.” Continue Reading
New web crawler launched by Meta last month is quietly scraping the internet for AI training data
Fortune [no paywall]: “Meta has quietly unleashed a new web crawler to scour the internet and collect data en masse to feed its AI model. The crawler, named the Meta External Agent, was launched last month according to three firms that track web scrapers and bots across the web. The automated bot essentially copies, or… Continue Reading
Invisible Rulers – What Really Drives Online Content
Mark Scott, Digital Bridge, Politico: “After years of tracking online disinformation, propaganda and other digital nastiness, Renée diResta sees patterns where others see chaos. In her new book, “Invisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies into Reality,” the former Stanford University researcher tries to parse together a theory about why, seemingly out of the blue,… Continue Reading
Your TV set has become a digital billboard
Ars Technica – TV software is getting loaded with ads, changing what it means to own a TV set: “The TV business isn’t just about selling TVs anymore. Companies are increasingly seeing viewers, not TV sets, as their most lucrative asset. Over the past few years, TV makers have seen rising financial success from TV… Continue Reading
