NEW RESOURCES

Now available: Populations Past, a map and analysis of Victorian and Edwardian population. From the about page: “The second half of the nineteenth century was a period of major change in the dynamics of the British population. This was a time of transformation from a relatively ‘high pressure’ demographic regime characterised by medium to high birth and death rates to a ‘low pressure’ regime of low birth and death rates, a transformation known as the ‘demographic transition’. This transition was not uniform across England and Wales: certain places and social groups appear to have led the declines while others lagged behind. Exploring these geographical patterns can provide insights into the process of change and the influence of economic and geographical factors. This website allows users to create and view maps of different demographic measures and related socio-economic indicators every 10 years between 1851 and 1911. These include fertility, childhood mortality, marriage, migration status, household compositions, age-structure, occupational status and population density. Brief explanations of each measure are included, indicating how they are calculated and explaining how they relate to other measures.”

Newsday: Environmental group unveils website for threatened species. “Working to raise awareness about hundreds of threatened species across Long Island and the state, an environmental group has announced an initiative to make the State Wildlife Action Plan available live online. Developed by the Group for the East End with state data and original content, the site… brings up-to-date information from the action plan about the status of 597 species statewide and 366 considered of ‘greatest conservation need.'”

Dallas News: Holocaust Museum project debunks myth that Americans weren’t aware of the plight of Jews in Nazi Germany. “Two years ago, in preparation for the exhibition, the museum launched a crowd-sourcing project, ‘History Unfolded.’ Museum staff asked students, teachers, librarians and history buffs across the country to research their local newspapers and determine what kind of information their communities could have read or heard about Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. With the help of hundreds of students and dedicated volunteers, the museum built an extensive online archive of American newspaper coverage of key Holocaust events, including more than 12,000 articles from every U.S. state. Each submission is important historical evidence.”

Journal of Blacks in Higher Education: University of Montana’s New Online Archive of Black Criminal Justice History in the State. “The University of Montana has debuted a new online historical timeline that documents the history of African Americans in Montana relating to state law and the criminal justice system. The timeline, which includes entries from 1864 to 2018, includes archival photos, interpretive commentary and hundreds of individuals and events.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Elite Daily: Here’s How To Play “Snappable” Snapchat Games Using Your Facial Expressions. “If you spent hours during Easter weekend trying to complete the Snapchat Egg Hunt, you’re in for a real treat. The beloved social media app has just introduced Snappables, which are cool new virtual reality (VR) games. However, they’re unique to the VR gaming world because you control them with your face. So if you think you have some strong AF facial muscles, here’s how to play ‘Snappable’ Snapchat games. Say goodbye to all productivity, and forget about being shy in public.”

CNET: YouTube Kids gets new parental-control features. “YouTube Kids unveiled on Wednesday new features meant to give parents more control over what their children watch, following an outcry late last year over disturbing videos that landed on the app.”

Neowin: Twitter announces privacy policy and transparency overhaul. “Twitter has announced that it will be increasing the platform’s privacy and transparency settings starting this month; as an initial step it has launched its new, easier to read privacy policy, that gives users better control over their information. Twitter has helpfully added in hyperlinks into its privacy policy allowing users to easily jump to the parts of their account settings which they’d like to change.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

WABC-TV: How a research scientist became Insta-famous New York City photographer. “Noel Y. Calingasan, Neuroscience researcher, came to New York City from the Philippines in 2001. He got himself a camera to start documenting his experiences in New York City so he could share his photographs with family and friends back home. When he started uploading his photos to a photography blog, a friend suggested he create an Instagram account to share his photos with New Yorkers and other photographers, and his following took off!” The photography in the article is terrific. Even if you don’t want to follow his Instagram just peek at the pix in the article.

Wired: What Happens When Science Just Disappears? . “KAY DICKERSIN KNEW she was leaping to the front lines of scholarly publication when she joined The Online Journal of Current Clinical Trials. Scientific print-publishing was—and still is—slow and cumbersome, and reading its results sometimes required researchers to go to the library. But as associate editor at this electronic peer-reviewed journal—one of the very first, launched in the summer of 1992—Dickersin was poised to help bring scientists into the new digital age.”

BuzzFeed: YouTube Hosted Graphic Images Of Bestiality For Months. “There is bestiality on YouTube, and it’s surprisingly easy to find. It’s also surprisingly prevalent, but not in videos — in video thumbnails, some of which have racked up millions of views.” It’s rare that I cover something in ResearchBuzz that makes me want to throw up….

SECURITY & LEGAL

Engadget: Investigators used online DNA databases to hunt Golden State Killer. “Yesterday several police departments in California announced the arrest of the ‘Golden State Killer,’ who killed a dozen people between 1978 and 1986 and has been accused of over 50 rapes. At the time, investigators said DNA played a role in identifying former Auburn, CA police officer Joseph James DeAngelo, and today went a step further with the explanation.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Internet Archive: Addressing Recent Claims of “Manipulated” Blog Posts in the Wayback Machine. “Some recent press stories (1, 2) have discussed archived blog posts of a prominent journalist, Joy Ann Reid, in the Wayback Machine and her claims that some of these posts were ‘manipulated’ by an ‘unknown, external party’. This past December, Reid’s lawyers contacted us, asking to have archives of the blog (blog.reidreport.com) taken down, stating that ‘fraudulent’ posts were ‘inserted into legitimate content’ in our archives of the blog. Her attorneys stated that they didn’t know if the alleged insertion happened on the original site or with our archives (the point at which the manipulation is to have occurred, according to Reid, is still unclear to us).” Good morning, Internet…

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