NEW RESOURCES

New-to-me: I have pointed before to Instagram being used as a digital archive. Yesterday I read about another Instagram feed which crowdsources pictures of Latina women from the 1990s and before with the intention of preserving and celebrating their heritage and culture. “The account, which has more than 57 thousand followers, is supported predominately by users, who submit photos of themselves and their crews from the ‘90s or earlier. ”

TWEAKS & UPDATES

Quartz has opened up its chart/data platform, Quartz, to everybody. (And the chart-making tools, too!) “We are opening up Atlas to chart creators around the world, from researchers to analysts to fellow journalists and anyone else who regularly works with data. You can create an Atlas account starting now. We’ll be giving people access to make charts—slowly, at first, and then more rapidly as the platform evolves.” It’s invitation-only at the moment but access will expand over time.

Wait, what? YouTube is getting a messaging feature? “Starting today, so-called native sharing will go live for a small percentage of YouTube users. They can then spread the feature to their friends by inviting them into conversation threads. Friends can chat about the shared video right inside YouTube’s mobile app. They can also reply with another video. The message threads reside within a new tab on YouTube’s mobile app so groups can dip in and out of conversations and catch up on what they missed or add new videos of their own.” We can all message each other about how bad the search feature is.

Microsoft is shutting down MSN China. “The announcement was made as a notification on the MSN China site, stating that it will close on June 7. As in other markets, the MSN site offers news and lifestyle content there, along with links to some of the company’s most popular products, such as Outlook.com and Office.”

USEFUL STUFF

MakeUseOf rounds up seven alternatives to PowerPoint. Can’t have enough alternatives to PowerPoint.

ProPublica: How to background your Tinder dates. Of course, backgrounding your Tinder dates may be useful. I’m linking to it here because it looks at how to take scraps of information and get more scraps, and perhaps hopefully make a full picture.

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Who blocks the blockers of ad blocking users? It might be a subreddit. “In a post published on Sunday, a moderator named creq said the /r/technology moderators are considering banning links to websites that block adblockers or keep content behind a paywall, and asked the community to offer feedback.”

Is Google working on an Echo killer? “A product team at Google is working on a hardware device that would integrate Google’s search and voice assistant technology, akin to the Amazon Echo, Recode has learned. Google’s device will resemble its OnHub wireless router, according to several sources. We don’t know if it has a name yet, but internally the project goes by ‘Chirp.'”

SECURITY/LEGAL ISSUES

The FTC is looking at Google again. “Senior antitrust officials at the FTC have discussed the matter in recent months with representatives of a major U.S. company that objects to Google’s practices, according to sources with the company. While the inquiry appears to be in the early, information-gathering stage, it signals renewed agency interest in the kind of search case it examined — but ultimately closed without charges — in 2013.”

A Russian watchdog has put off — again — deciding if Google would be fined for anticompetitive practices.. “FAS, the watchdog, had been expected to discuss the fine on Wednesday after postponing a decision in April but again put off the decision following a request from the company, RIA quoted a FAS official as saying.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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