Richardson, Rashida and Schultz, Jason and Crawford, Kate, Dirty Data, Bad Predictions: How Civil Rights Violations Impact Police Data, Predictive Policing Systems, and Justice (February 13, 2019). New York University Law Review Online, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN in PDF: “Law enforcement agencies are increasingly using algorithmic predictive policing systems to forecast criminal activity and allocate… Continue Reading
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Monthly Archives: February 2019
How badly is Google Books search broken, and why?
Via Sapping Attention blog: “I periodically write about Google Books here, so I thought I’d point out something that I’ve noticed recently that should be concerning to anyone accustomed to treating it as the largest collection of books: it appears that when you use a year constraint on book search, the search index has dramatically… Continue Reading
DeepFakes – how will AI impact our next election?
Axios: “Researchers have broadened the controversial technology called “deepfakes” — AI-generated media that experts fear could roil coming elections by convincingly depicting people saying or doing things they never did, Axios’ Kaveh Waddell reports. A new computer program, created at the San Francisco-based OpenAI lab, is the latest front in deepfakes, producing remarkably human-sounding prose that… Continue Reading
Google Translate is a manifestation of Wittgenstein’s theory of language
Quartz: “More than 60 years after philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein’s theories on language were published, the artificial intelligence behind Google Translate has provided a practical example of his hypotheses. Patrick Hebron, who works on machine learning in design at Adobe and studied philosophy with Wittgenstein expert Garry Hagberg for his bachelor’s degree at Bard College, notes… Continue Reading
Thousands of scientists run up against Elsevier’s paywall
Nautre – Researchers have been left without access to new papers as libraries and the major publisher fail to agree on subscription deals. “Researchers at German institutions that have let their Elsevier subscriptions lapse while negotiating a new deal are hitting the paywall for the publisher’s most recent articles around 10,000 times a day, according… Continue Reading
20 of the best social media monitoring tools
Social Media Explorer: “There’s enough social media monitoring tools on the market to get you absolutely confused. This list is here to help. Every tool on the list does what it claims to do (which is not universal among software and products in general) – it either focuses on social media monitoring exclusively or does… Continue Reading
A guide to anti-misinformation actions around the world
Poynter: “In mid-March, a European Commission high-level group published its final report on misinformation, drawing upon the input of experts from around the world who gathered over several weeks to help the European Union figure out what to do about misinformation. The report created by the high-level group — announced in November to help the EU craft policies to… Continue Reading
Privacy and security risks with genetic tests like 23andMe, Ancestry
Business Insider – After you spit into a tube for a DNA test like 23andMe, experts say you shouldn’t assume your data will stay private forever “It may be getting easier to link your private and anonymized DNA data to your identity. That means the genetic data you share with a testing company — which… Continue Reading
ISDA Publishes Guidelines for Smart Derivatives Contracts
Perkins Coie – “The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) has published the first in a series of guidelines for what it colloquially refers to as “smart derivatives contracts” (the Guidelines).* A smart derivatives contract is a derivative that incorporates software code to automate aspects of the derivative transaction and operates on a distributed ledger,… Continue Reading
How Brexit Is Creating New Political Factions
The Guardian Data Visualization – How Brexit has created four new political factions – Analysis of Commons voting patterns show how Europhobe and Europhile rebels from both main parties are forming new parliamentary blocs “Our study clusters MPs by the similarity of their voting patterns: if two MPs always vote the same way, the chart… Continue Reading
Inside the 18th-century contest to build the White House
National Geographic – In 1792, leading architects entered a competition to build the President’s House, George Washington judged it, and the winner built an American icon. “It may seem like Washington, D.C. was the perfect spot for the U.S. captial, but its selection was controversial. Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton and others wanted the… Continue Reading
The Secret History of Women in Coding
The New York Times Magazine – The Secret History of Women in Coding – Computer programming once had much better gender balance than it does today. What went wrong? by Clive Thompson (adapted from “Coders: The Making of a New Tribe and the Remaking of the World,” available March 26, 2019): “When digital computers finally… Continue Reading
