Committee on Oversight and Government Reform U.S. House of Representatives 114th Congress – Law Enforcement Use of Cell-Site Simulation Technologies: Privacy Concerns and Recommendations. Committee Staff Report. Hon. Jason Chaffetz, Chairman; Hon. Elijah E. Cummings, Ranking Member; Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. December 19, 2016. “…During the course of the investigation, it became clear… Continue Reading
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Monthly Archives: December 2016
Consumer Watchdog, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse File Complaint Over Google’s “Deceptive” Privacy Policy Change
News release: “Consumer Watchdog and Privacy Rights Clearinghouse have filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission charging that Google violated the law and an earlier consent agreement when it forced a change in its privacy policy on users in a highly deceptive manner, without meaningful notice and consent. The Internet giant’s action, taken on… Continue Reading
Magnitude of space junk is a legal, environmental and transportation issue
Our future is in ruins: the archaeology of space, satellites and orbital junk – James Purtill: “Next year will mark six decades of space travel. Orbiting above us are more than one hundred million pieces of debris from this age of exploration – everything from specks of paint and flecks of plastic, to the tool… Continue Reading
Research – social media and appearance-based social comparison
The impact of appearance comparisons made through social media, traditional media, and in person in women’s everyday lives [full text PDF]. Jasmine Fardoulya, Rebecca T. Pinkus,Lenny R. Vartanian. School of Psychology, UNSW Australia, Sydney, New South Wales 205; Australia School of Psychology, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia. Body Image 20 (2017)… Continue Reading
U.S. DOT Advances Deployment Of Connected Vehicle Technology To Prevent Hundreds Of Thousands Of Crashes
“Citing an enormous potential to reduce crashes on U.S. roadways, the U.S. Department of Transportation issued a proposed rule today that would advance the deployment of connected vehicle technologies throughout the U.S. light vehicle fleet. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking would enable vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication technology on all new light-duty vehicles, enabling a multitude of… Continue Reading
The Algorithm as a Human Artifact: Implications for Legal [Re]Search
Mart, Susan Nevelow, The Algorithm as a Human Artifact: Implications for Legal {Re}Search (October 26, 2016). Available for download at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2859720 “When legal researchers search in online databases for the information they need to solve a legal problem, they need to remember that the algorithms that are returning results to them were designed by… Continue Reading
Google Earth Timelapse
“Timelapse is a global, zoomable video that lets you see how the Earth has changed over the past 32 years. It is made from 33 cloud-free annual mosaics, one for each year from 1984 to 2016, which are made interactively explorable by Carnegie Mellon University CREATE Lab’s Time Machine library, a technology for creating and… Continue Reading
Pew – More voters will have access to non-English ballots in next election cycle
More voters will have access to non-English ballots in the next election cycle – by D’Vera CohnLeave, December 16, 2016. “The federal government has long required election ballots in some U.S. jurisdictions to be printed in languages other than English, based on the number of voting-age citizens who live in those communities and have limited… Continue Reading
McKinsey Report – The Age of Analytics – Competing in a Data-Driven World
The Age of Analytics – Competing in a Data-Driven World, December 2016 – Executive Summary; Full Report; Appendix (PDF) “Data and analytics capabilities have made a leap forward in recent years. The volume of available data has grown exponentially, more sophisticated algorithms have been developed, and computational power and storage have steadily improved. The convergence… Continue Reading
Data Science Central – Great list of resources: data science, visualization, machine learning, big data
Great list of resources: data science, visualization, machine learning, big data Posted by Vincent Granville on December 17, 2016. “Fantastic resource created by Andrea Motosi. I’ve only included the 5 categories that are the most relevant to our audience, though it has 31 categories total, including a few on distributed systems and Hadoop. Click here to view… Continue Reading
Google Maps enabling feature to identify certain locations are wheelchair accessible
BusinessInsider – “If you need a wheelchair to get around, the last thing you need to worry about is whether the restaurant, store, movie theater or other destination you’re heading to is accessible by wheelchair. But as is par for the course, Google Maps is here to bail us out. Actually, the idea came from… Continue Reading
Large German research consortium boycotts Elsevier journals seeking open source access
BoingBoing – “Germany’s DEAL project, which includes over 60 major research institutions, has announced that all of its members are canceling their subscriptions to all of Elsevier’s academic and scientific journals, effective January 1, 2017. The boycott is in response to Elsevier’s refusal to adopt “transparent business models” to “make publications more openly accessible.” No… Continue Reading
