NEW RESOURCES
The Paris Review has relaunched its Web site and launched a new digital archive. “Now you can read every short story and poem, every portfolio, every hastily doodled authorial self-portrait, and every introductory notice from the unassailable George Plimpton, who used to use the front of the magazine to brag about its ever-longer masthead. (‘It is extremely difficult to extricate oneself—rather like being stuck in a bramble bush.’)” As you might imagine, it’s not free.
The New York Police Department has put a database of traffic incidents online. “The site… which is updated every Tuesday, includes statistics on the number of citywide collisions, injuries related to motorists, pedestrians, passengers and bike riders and fatalities. The data can be viewed citywide, or broken down into police precincts and has a map that pinpoints the exact location of collisions.”
TWEAKS AND UPDATES
Larry Ferlazzo, who is terrific, has updated his list of December holiday resources.
Apple is working on the iCloud Calendar spam problem. “Over the past week, spammers have increasingly turned to Apple’s Calendar service instead of sending advertisements and other promotional content through email, effectively bypassing potential spam filters. Depending on system settings, iCloud Calendar invites are pushed out directly to connected iOS and Mac devices, which in turn trigger an onscreen notification that must be accepted or denied. Further, interacting with an iCloud Calendar invite automatically sends a response to the sender, meaning spammers can easily determine whether a particular account is active. ”
It’s December so I don’t feel too horribly guilty about reporting this one: Google’s Santa Tracker gets updated with Pokemon Go-type game. “Every year, when the air in the morning is at its crispest and all of the colorful autumn leaves have long-fallen off of the trees, Google updates its Santa-tracking app. No, really. It’s a holiday tradition.”
USEFUL STUFF
Oh boy, I feel weird linking to this because I’m not a fan of sponsored content that isn’t really clearly marked sponsored content. But it’s Social Media Examiner, which means it’s high quality, and it’s a good primer for finding influential local people, which could be good for journalists and community outreach. So here you go: How to Find Social Media Micro-influencers for Your Small Business.
AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD
The Drum: Dow Jones chief accuses Google and Facebook of ‘killing news’ (interesting headline font there, Drum.) “Seated in the dining room of a Belle Époque-era London hotel, the chief executive officer of Dow Jones & Company briefly draws attention to his new vegetable-based diet before launching into a spleen-venting explanation of why he has had an utter bellyful of the two great gatekeepers of the modern media age, Facebook and Google, and accusing them of ‘killing news’.”
SECURITY/LEGAL ISSUES
Bloomberg Quint: Google, Facebook Targeted by Indonesia in Push for More Tax. “Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati is seeking to squeeze more revenue out of an economy that’s been hit by weak commodity prices and subdued demand from China, Indonesia’s biggest trading partner. Halfway through a tax amnesty plan, the government has raised almost 100 trillion rupiah ($7.4 billion) in income from penalties and is now turning its focus to companies like Apple Inc., Twitter Inc. and Yahoo! Inc.”
RESEARCH AND OPINION
TVNewsCheck: Social Media Use By Local Advertisers. “The percentage of advertisers selecting social media as a leading source of new customers has more than doubled in five years, from 21% in 2011 to 44% in 2016, while the percentage of advertisers who believe that their company’s website is a significant source of new customers has slipped.”
OTHER STUFF I THINK IS COOL
About 1993 I had a PC and a monitor, and the monitor died. I couldn’t afford to replace it, so as I remember I ended up running the video signal out of the PC and into a VCR, and out the VCR and into an ancient black and white TV. I don’t remember precisely how it worked, but I do remember that this rig held together until I was able to save up enough for a new monitor. And that’s why I’m linking to the guy who built a Slack client for the Commodore 64. “Software engineer Jeff Harris managed to write a Slack client for the Commodore 64, a home computer released in 1982 that sported 64 kilobytes of memory. Harris wrote a Slack client in 6502 assembly, and he put the resulting code on Github. Getting the client to actually work took some special tricks. Using the Commodore 64’s Userport, Harris used a homemade adaptor to connect the computer to a Raspberry Pi.” Good afternoon, Internet…
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Thanks for writing about Social Media Examiner. I can assure you that Social Media Examiner has NEVER accepted sponsored content and that the article you are linking to is indeed contributed content like all of our other content. No strings attached, no money exchanged. Just another typical Social Media Examiner article :).
I am curious what made you think this was sponsored content.
Hi Mike, I think I have some explaining to do.
I do not and did not think that SME ever accepted sponsored content. In fact, I think when it comes to social media marketing you are consistently the best resource out there. I enjoy your articles and I’m glad when I can link to one from ResearchBuzz.
The concern I expressed about sponsored content was the way some businesses and Instgrammers are treating Instagram – people taking money for posts without being fully transparent about the fact that the post was to their financial gain. An unethical person could take your article as another incentive to perpetrate non-transparent advertising on Instagram. And, of course, I don’t support that.
I apologize if I gave you the impression that I was referring to your site when I referred to sponsored content – if that’s the case I did a poor job expressing my feelings. I apologize further if I offended you – the last thing I want to do is malign a consistently-excellent site.