MIT Technology News: “When fighting the spread of misinformation, social media platforms typically place most users in the passenger seat. Platforms often use machine-learning algorithms or human fact-checkers to flag false or misinforming content for users. “Just because this is the status quo doesn’t mean it is the correct way or the only way to… Continue Reading
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Monthly Archives: November 2022
The Best Firefox Extensions Everyone Should Use
Lifehacker: “If you use Firefox, you can make it a better browser by installing add-ons. Yes, that’s what Mozilla calls them—they’re talking about what everyone else knows as “extensions.” Whatever you call them, there are good ones out there that can help you do everything from improving your privacy to getting around restrictions you’ll encounter… Continue Reading
USGS – New maps provide carbon stored in wetland soils across the country
USGS – “These datasets represent a revised national scale estimate of wetland soil carbon stock assessments by improving representation of soil organic carbon densities. Carbon storage in wetland soils can have physical influences on water flow, water retention, and biogeochemical cycles and thus are critical to water models that guide decisions that affect downstream users.… Continue Reading
Epic strikes back at Apple’s iOS “security” defense in appeals court
Ars Technica: “It has been over a year now since a US District Court ruled that Apple did not violate antitrust law by forcing iOS developers (like plaintiff and Fortnite-maker Epic Games) to use its App Store and in-app payments systems. But that doesn’t mean the case is settled, as both sides demonstrated Monday during… Continue Reading
The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy (Introduction)
Eisler, Jacob and Eisler, Jacob, The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy (Introduction) (November 10, 2022). Forthcoming Cambridge University Press, 2023, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4215441 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4215441 “The influence of the federal judiciary over democratic process raises a fundamental difficulty. Democracy has unique moral legitimacy as a mode of governance because it directly… Continue Reading
How Oil & Gas Funding Distorts Energy Research
Gizmodo: “Prominent energy centers at MIT, Stanford, and Columbia may be biased toward natural gas because of funding, a new study says Journalists like me often seek out academics for comment and insight on stories related to the energy transition, since these professors have often done in-depth research into various fuel sources and their impacts.… Continue Reading
AP Exclusive: Google tracks your movements, like it or not
“Google agreed to pay $391.5M to settle a lawsuit with 40 U.S. states over allegations that the tech giant was tracking user location data even when users had opted out. A 2018 Associated Press (AP) investigation found that the tracking issue affected as many as two billion people using Google Android devices and hundreds of millions… Continue Reading
The Myth of Online Privacy: Risks, Dangers, and Solutions
MakeUseOf: “Privacy these days means something completely different than it did even a decade ago. And the only things we have to blame for this are the internet and ourselves. In the age of the internet, we’re only as “private” as the tools we use allow us to be, which isn’t much. While you rejoice… Continue Reading
The value of owning more books than you can read
Big Think – “Many readers buy books with every intention of reading them only to let them linger on the shelf. Statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb believes surrounding ourselves with unread books enriches our lives as they remind us of all we don’t know. [we don’t know what we don’t know, until we learn it!] The… Continue Reading
Apple Is Tracking You Even When Its Own Privacy Settings Say It’s Not, New Research Says
Gizmodo: “An independent test suggests Apple collects data about you and your phone when its own settings promise to “disable the sharing of Device Analytics altogether. For all of Apple’s talk about how private your iPhone is, the company vacuums up a lot of data about you. iPhones do have a privacy setting that is… Continue Reading
Why Birds Are Anti-Aging Superstars
Audubon: “Wisdom the Laysan Albatross celebrated a big birthday last year, turning a whopping 70 years old. Flying for months at a time over the open sea, albatrosses’ bodies are built to last, and as far as we know, she is the oldest wild bird in the world. However, the reason for Wisdom’s extraordinarily long… Continue Reading
D.C. Council Is Set To Overhaul The Entire Criminal Code
dcist: “Here’s Everything You Need To Know – Later today the D.C. Council is set to cast a final vote on a monumental piece of legislation, a 450-page bill that would completely overhaul the city’s criminal laws. The full rewrite has been more than a decade in the making, spurred by the simple reality that… Continue Reading
