NEW RESOURCES

Phys.org: Powerful new dataset reveals patterns of global ozone pollution. “Although ozone pollution is dropping across many parts of the United States, western Europe and Japan, many people living in those countries still experience more than a dozen days every year in which levels of the lung irritant exceed health-based standards. That’s one conclusion from a new health assessment based on the Tropospheric Ozone Assessment Report or TOAR, an effort by the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry Project to create the world’s most comprehensive database of surface ozone observations from all available ozone monitoring stations around the globe. The paper was published today in the journal Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene.”

LiveScience: Virtual Volterra: Ancient Amphitheaters and Temples Recorded in 3D. “The mountaintop town of Volterra in central Italy witnessed the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. Now, researchers are using the latest reality capture technology and software to preserve a 3D digital record of its ancient temples, theaters and other buildings for the future, and to gain new insights into how they were made…. Elements of the reality-capture project, including 3D models of the Etruscan arch and a stone pedestal from Volterra’s Roman theater, are also available to the public at a new website…”

PR Newswire: Take Control of Your Exposure to Common and Serious Illnesses (PRESS RELEASE). “Imagine a website and custom mobile health app that would allow you to see what common and potentially serious illnesses are going around where you are and where you’re going, using the latest reliable diagnostic data from almost one million doctors’ offices nationwide. Not only can you see the severity of 15 common illnesses right down to your GPS zip code or any zip code you choose, but you can break it down by 7 individual age groups, from infants and toddlers, to teenagers, college students and adult demographics.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

WordPress 4.9.3 is now available, but this does not look like a security release: “This maintenance release fixes 34 bugs in 4.9, including fixes for Customizer changesets, widgets, visual editor, and PHP 7.2 compatibility.”

Pratt Institute: School Of Information Students To Partner With New York Times For Digital Archive Project. “For Spring 2018, students from the School of Information are teaming up with the New York Times for a Pratt photography digitization and curation course titled Projects in Digital Archives, taught by School of Information Interim Dean Anthony Cocciolo. Students will digitize the analog photographs taken by George Tames, the ‘Photographer of Presidents,’ working with original camera negatives from the 1940s and 1950s, including images of President Harry S. Truman and his White House.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Hindustan Times: Delhi’s oral history: Now, government will archive your memories, traditions. “Museums and libraries in the city have stacks of its records — rich with tangible heritage, tales of rulers and their nobles. However, it does not have much to offer in terms of nuanced personal accounts of places in Delhi, past events and its citizenry. This ‘vacuum’ has captured the attention of the department of archives, which has planned to launch ‘oral history project’ to gather and record people’s memories and experiences.”

The Guardian: Hong Kong democracy activists urge UK to release unseen files. “The documents were transferred to the UK when Hong Kong returned to China in 1997 and include material on the region’s future after handover. Activists believe they could cast fresh light on current disputes and also fear that records on events that Beijing deems sensitive – such as deadly riots in 1967 – could otherwise be lost forever.”

Washington Post: This man collected 6,000 orphaned Polaroids. See what he’s doing to tell their stories.. “There is no mistaking the iconic white border and unique square shape of a Polaroid photograph. The gratification we enjoy today of seeing our photos instantly on our smartphones echoes the Polaroid experience of wildly shaking the image as chemicals slowly revealed the photograph before our eyes. Polaroids, most popular in the 1970s and 1980s, changed the way we thought about photography and made it easier than ever to take pictures. Over the last several years, Kyler Zeleny, a Canadian photographer-researcher and author, has collected lost Polaroid photographs. ”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Business Insider: Cryptocurrency scams on Twitter are so common, this guy built a tool to help detect fraudsters. “As members of the cryptocurrency community look to curb fraud and exploitation in the emerging community, Harry Denley has come up with a rather old-school solution: JavaScript.”

Boy Genius Report: This website looks identical to Reddit, but it will steal your password. “The next time you decide to visit Reddit to get your daily fill of world news, funny pictures and silly comment chains, be sure that you take your time when typing in the website address. A malicious site that looks identical to Reddit was discovered over the weekend, and if you’re not careful, you could have your login information stolen.” Still up at his writing.

Boing Boing: 139 pieces of (seemingly nonfunctional) malware that exploit Spectre and Meltdown are now circulating in the wild. “This week, AV-TEST’s census of samples of circulating malware that attempt to exploit the Meltdown and Spectre bugs hit 139, up from 77 on January 17. AV-TEST CEO Andreas Marx says that the different strains of malware mostly contain recompiled versions of the same proof-of-concept code released with the initial report on the bugs.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Techdirt: Study Suggests Shutting Down Filesharing Sites Would Hurt Music Industry, New Artists. “… there has been an update to a study first publicized as a work in progress several years ago run by the Information Economics and Policy Journal out of Queen’s University. Based on that study, it looks like attempts to shut down filesharing sites would not just be ineffectual, but disastrous for both the music industry as a whole and especially new and smaller-ticket artists. The most popular artists, on the other hand, tend to be more hurt by piracy than helped. That isn’t to be ignored, but we must keep in mind that the purpose of copyright law is to get more art created for the benefit of the public and it seems obvious that the public most benefits from a larger successful music ecosystem as opposed to simply getting more albums from the largest audiences.” Good morning, Internet…

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