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Category Archives: Social Media

Survey of Americans’ Online Security Top Concerns & Problematic Habits

US News – Data Privacy Paradox: “Americans are increasingly aware of the dangers lurking online and worry about the risks of data breaches, cyber attacks, ransomware, and more. The fears are well-founded. Already in the first months of 2024, a rash of data breaches has exposed potentially sensitive information of millions of people. One report… Continue Reading

Recovering locked Facebook accounts is a nightmare. That’s on purpose.

Washington Post: “…A quick Google search for “locked social media account” suggests plenty of people have already learned the hard way. Reddit threads, advice columns and emails to The Washington Post’s Help Desk show social media users are plagued by lost and hacked accounts and often driven to despair. Account recovery processes are frustrating and… Continue Reading

How Switching Behavior on Digital Media Makes People More Bored

“Fast-forward to boredom: How switching behavior on digital media makes people more bored,” Katy Y. Y. Tam, PhD, and Michael Inzlicht, PhD, University of Toronto, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, published online Aug. 19, 2024. “Boredom is unpleasant, with people going to great lengths to avoid it. One way to escape boredom and increase stimulation is to consume digital… Continue Reading

What Elected Officials Say and Do

Polarization Research Lab – America’s Political Pulse – Resources and data to understand and halt the growth of partisan animosity. What Elected Officials Say and Do – Explore data on the speech, effectiveness, and campaign support for elected U.S. legislators. Using AI to assess the rhetoric of all 535 legislators in the House and Senate.… Continue Reading

How Loophole in Privacy Law Makes Opting Out of Facebook Data Sharing Difficult

“A new report from Consumer Watchdog shows how thousands of companies share your data with Facebook, including financial companies and health care providers, and how a loophole in California’s premier privacy law makes opting out difficult and time consuming. The report details how the big three web browsers do not offer a global opt out… Continue Reading

Flipboard users can now follow anyone in the fediverse

TechCrunch: “Starting today, users of the social magazine app Flipboard can follow any federated accounts, meaning those that participate in the social network of interconnected servers known as the fediverse..this now includes Threads accounts in addition to Mastodon accounts and others. With the update, which deepens Flipboard’s connection with the ActivityPub social graph, any Flipboard… Continue Reading

De-Google your life: How to delete all photos from Google Photos

Proton Blog: “Using Google Photos to store and share your pictures means allowing the company to see, analyze, and process them. Many people concerned about their privacy have taken steps to move away from the Google ecosystem, despite the company’s efforts to hide its surveillance-based business model. Apart from privacy concerns, Google made promises about… Continue Reading

In November 2024, everything is at stake

“The cornerstone of democracy rests on the foundation of an educated electorate. That’s a quote from Thomas Jefferson, and it’s super-relevant to our situation today. Our schools aren’t doing enough to create an educated electorate, and most of our journalists are doing a terrible job. This is terrifying, because the 2024 elections could be the… Continue Reading

USNewsper.com is not American or News; It’s Lithuanian AI

NewsGuard Discovers AI-Driven Site from Lithuania Using AI to Spread Misinformation About U.S. Politics: “What could be better than getting your U.S. news from “reporting” produced by bots in Lithuania? What happened: NewsGuard has discovered a foreign-backed website using AI and fake followers on X to spread misinformation targeting Democrats after President Joe Biden’s withdrawal… Continue Reading

Laid-off California tech workers are sick to death of LinkedIn

SFGate – Tech workers hate the Bay Area company’s site. But more than ever, they need it: “…Over the past few years, folks online have repeatedly called the platform a “cesspool,” whether in a viral TikTok video’s caption, a popular Reddit post or even on LinkedIn itself. (In fact, “cesspool” has swung into fashion as… Continue Reading

Perplexity is cutting checks to publishers following plagiarism accusations

The Verge: “Perplexity is launching a program to share ad revenue with publishing partners following weeks of plagiarism accusations. Perplexity’s “Publishers’ Program” has recruited its first batch of partners, including prominent names like Time, Der Spiegel, Fortune, Entrepreneur, The Texas Tribune, and Automattic (with WordPress.com participating but not Tumblr). Under this program, when Perplexity features… Continue Reading