afternoonbuzz

Tamil Agriculture, Women’s Marches, Solar Eclipse, More: Wednesday Afternoon Buzz, February 22, 2017

NEW RESOURCES

Outlook India: Digital archive of documents of Tamil agrarian history set up. “The documents recorded on paper, palm leaves and copper plates are a treasure as they provide a rare and unique opportunity to have a peep into various aspects of social history of village life in remote parts of the Tamil region at a time when a new power structure and social identities were being forged both with and against local traditional and feudal systems and British colonial legislations, it said.” This is for the region of Tamil Nadu, in India.

Georgia State University: Georgia State University Documents the Women’s Marches. “A concerted effort is underway to document the marches in every state, and Georgia State University’s Special Collections is committed to collecting materials from the Atlanta March for Social Justice and Women, the Women’s March on Washington, and any other march that Georgians attended. Already, more than 20 people have volunteered to conduct oral history interviews with marchers, and individuals have begun donating their photographs, audio and video files, ephemera and records.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Berkeley is gearing up to crowdsource images of the August 2017 solar eclipse. “The Eclipse Megamovie Project is seeking more than a thousand amateur astronomers and avid photographers to record the Aug. 21 total solar eclipse and upload their photos to be stitched together into a movie documenting the path of totality from landfall in Oregon until the moon’s shadow slips over the Atlantic Ocean off South Carolina.”

USEFUL STUFF

The University College London Press (UCL Press) has published a new book, available via open access, which sounds fascinating. It’s called Key Concepts in Public Archaeology. “This textbook provides a broad overview of the key concepts in public archaeology, research field that examines the relationship between archaeology and the public, in both theoretical and practical terms. While based on the long-standing programme of undergraduate and graduate teaching in public archaeology at UCL’s Institute of Archaeology, the book also takes into account the growth of scholarship from around the world and seeks to clarify what exactly ‘public archaeology’ is by promoting an inclusive, socially and politically engaged vision of the discipline.”

Handy reference from L&T: How to Embed Posts From 8 of the Most Popular Social Networks. “Whether you use them to increase engagement, extend your reach, or simply for their visual appeal, embedding social posts within your content can certainly be beneficial to your brand. But figuring out how to embed posts from each network may prove less than intuitive. Let us walk you through the process of embedding posts from the 8 most popular social networks.”

Social Media Examiner: How to Verify a Facebook Page for a Local Business. “Verifying a local business page adds a layer of legitimacy to your presence and can help customers feel more confident when they engage with you on Facebook. In this article, you’ll discover how to get your local Facebook page verified.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Media Policy Project: The hidden human labour behind search engine algorithms. “Everybody knows that search engines use algorithms, but few know how these work and who builds them. Paško Bilić, Research Associate at the Institute for Development and International Relations in Zagreb, Croatia, writes here about the layers of human labour behind Google’s algorithms and their implications for search neutrality. His post is based on a paper published in Big Data & Society titled ‘Search algorithms, hidden labour and information control.'”

SECURITY/LEGAL ISSUES

NBC News: Proposed Homeland Security Rule Asks Some Chinese Visitors for Social Media Accounts. “The Department of Homeland Security has suggested adding an optional question for some visa recipients from China that asks for social media handles before entering the United States. The proposed rule change, published in the Federal Register on Tuesday, would affect Chinese citizens who hold 10-year business (B-1) and visitor (B-2) visas.”

Krebs on Security: How to Bury a Major Breach Notification. “Amid the hustle and bustle of the RSA Security Conference in San Francisco last week, researchers at RSA released a startling report that received very little press coverage relative to its overall importance. The report detailed a malware campaign that piggybacked on a popular piece of software used by system administrators at some of the nation’s largest companies. Incredibly, the report did not name the affected software, and the vendor in question has apparently chosen to bury its breach disclosure. This post is an attempt to remedy that.”

RESEARCH AND OPINION

Medium: Can Your Doctor See the Cancer Research Reported in the News? Can you? “The issue of biomedical research in the news media highlights a weakness in the policy’s potential to mandate access to information in a timely manner for the benefit of the public. Currently, the 12-month embargo disenfranchises journalists working to make sense of new research while on deadline, physicians needing to stay up to date, and patients wanting to make timely informed decisions about their health alongside medical practitioners.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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