NEW RESOURCES

In development: a Korean database of overseas cultural heritage. (Read on, it’ll make sense.) “Hanyang University announced Monday that it had completed the first year of a project to create a database for overseas cultural heritage in Korea. Led by anthropology professor Bae Ki-dong, the team’s endeavor took off in September 2015 for a three-year investigation under the support of the National Research Foundation of Korea. Roughly 20,000 artifacts from 100 museums across the country will be subject to the study, he said, 11,099 (from 40 museums) of which are now part of the database.”

The state of Tennessee has released a database of business grants given by the state. “Since 2011, the state’s analysis shows, officials have funded 973 projects where companies promised to create more than 125,000 new jobs. But the transparency is limited; the database doesn’t include the actual number of jobs created.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Pocket is looking for new ways to monetize. “Pocket has been dabbling in recommendations since last year, but only as a way to help active bookmarkers find related articles. As of this week, it’s opening up those recommendations to a larger audience. Visit the Pocket website (and, in the coming months, the Pocket app), and you can browse through topics like Technology, Food, and Fitness. To stock each section, Pocket looks at how many people have saved each link, and how engaged they’ve been with the text.”

The original set of emoji has gone to MoMA. “New York’s Museum of Modern Art said Wednesday that it has acquired the original set of 176 emojis. They were a gift to the museum from the phone company, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone.”

That sponsored content (marked as such or possibly not) that’s all over Instagram is coming to Facebook. “The social network is now extending its rules about how verified profiles can share branded posts, officially letting stars and influential personalities monetize their Facebook audiences — something that was already happening but wasn’t allowed.” Of course, if your page’s organic reach is 2% of your fans, you’ll have to put at least some of your earnings into boosting your posts…

There still isn’t a lot of information about what was going on with the Yahoo e-mail scanning. “Four weeks on, the world still does not know exactly what legal basis the US government used to obtain a secret court order requiring Yahoo! to scan all of its users’ incoming e-mails for a string of characters the government said was associated with a terrorist group. While sources have suggested that the court issued its order under a certain provision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the government has refused to confirm this publicly. Additionally – despite a plea from Yahoo! – the government has so far refused to declassify the order, a stance it reiterated to Reuters this week.”

USEFUL STUFF

A bit tongue in cheek but a useful warning against relying on something like Google Trends exclusively: How to use Google Trends to win any argument. “Google Trends is a neat way to compare relative popularity. But we don’t care about that. As with most statistics, Trends is putty in your hands; a tool to help you prove just about anything you want.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Is Microsoft developing its own Slack competitor? “Slack took workplace conversation by storm, and after Facebook just released its take on the concept, now Microsoft is looking to for its own piece of the market. A report by MSPoweruser suggests that the company is set to unveil “’Microsoft Teams’ next week.”

SECURITY/LEGAL ISSUES

Are you running iOS 10? Upgrade to 10.1 ASAP. “A beta of iOS 10 was released back in June following its release in September to the general public, and sometime after, miscreants managed to hijack users devices, simply by viewing manipulated JPEG or PDF files. Apple released iOS 10.1 yesterday, however users who have not, or are waiting to update are advised to do so as soon as possible.”

Oracle just won’t let its case against Google go. “It was only a matter of time until this happened, but Oracle has officially appealed its fair use Java API loss to the Federal Circuit (CAFC). As you recall, after a years-long process, including the (correct) ruling that APIs are not covered by copyright being ridiculously overturned by CAFC, a new trial found that even if APIs are copyright-eligible, Google’s use was covered by fair use.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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