NEW RESOURCES

ClassicCars Journal: FIVA launches online source for parts for vintage vehicles. “According to the…website, it lists more than 6 million parts for more than 17,000 historic vehicles with information and prices for original equipment and aftermarket parts and qualified experts. The website offers free access through January 31, 2020 if you visit a special… website.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Neowin: ProtonMail launches public beta of its fully encrypted calendar. “ProtonMail has announced that it has launched the public beta of ProtonCalendar, the firm’s fully encrypted calendar solution. Unlike alternative products, ProtonCalendar encrypts event titles, descriptions, locations, and participants; this makes it ‘impossible’ for others – including ProtonMail – to see your event details.”

Good E-Reader: KKR is turning into a library juggernaut. “KKR purchased Overdrive on Christmas Eve and now own the largest digital distributor for public libraries all over the world. They also own RB Digital, which is otherwise known as Recorded Books, a purchase they made in 2018. It looks like in 2020, KKR is dominating the library space and there are few competitors left.” If you want more details on KKR, Investopedia can help you out.

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

BBC: ‘We can give a lot of the power back to the fans’. “The BBC’s weekly The Boss series profiles different business leaders from around the world. This week we speak to Allen Lau, co-founder and chief executive of global storytelling website and app Wattpad.”

Ars Technica: Why the 2010s were the Facebook Decade. “Love it or hate it, then, Facebook is in arguably a major facet of life not just in the United States but worldwide as we head into the next roaring ’20s. But how on Earth did one social network, out of the many that launched and faded in the 2000s, end up taking over the world?”

The Verge: The 84 biggest flops, fails, and dead dreams of the decade in tech. “The world never changes quite the way you expect. But at The Verge, we’ve had a front-row seat while technology has permeated every aspect of our lives over the past decade. Some of the resulting moments — and gadgets — arguably defined the decade and the world we live in now. But others we ate up with popcorn in hand, marveling at just how incredibly hard they flopped.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Economic Times: Indian Navy bans smartphones, social media on bases, ships. “After the recent arrest of seven navy personnel for allegedly leaking sensitive information to an espionage racket with links to Pakistan, the Indian Navy has issued direction to ban the use of all smartphones and social networking platforms onboard ships and naval bases.”

TechCrunch: Wikimedia Foundation expresses deep concerns about India’s proposed intermediary liability rules. “Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit group that operates Wikipedia and a number of other projects, has urged the Indian government to rethink the proposed changes to the nation’s intermediary liability rules that would affect swathes of companies and the way more than half a billion people access information online.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Mashable: Here’s why you should finally #DeleteFacebook in 2020. “Yes, other major tech players — Google, Apple, Twitter, and Amazon — all have issues, but it seems Facebook is intrinsically linked to its flaws in a way those companies are not. YouTube is still a place to follow your favorite video creators despite problems with its recommendation algorithm; and Twitter is still the place to get your news, even though it gives Trump’s terms-breaking rhetoric a pass. Unlike Facebook, however, the utility these companies offer users outweighs most any shortcomings and public foibles.”

MIT Technology Review: Baidu has a new trick for teaching AI the meaning of language. “Earlier this month, a Chinese tech giant quietly dethroned Microsoft and Google in an ongoing competition in AI. The company was Baidu, China’s closest equivalent to Google, and the competition was the General Language Understanding Evaluation, otherwise known as GLUE.” Good evening, Internet…

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