NEW RESOURCES

Wyoming Fish & Game Department: New interactive fishing guide lures anglers to new waters. “Want to catch a kokanee? Or how about a golden trout? It’s easy and inspiring to plan all your fishing pursuits with a new interactive fishing guide from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.”

National Equity Atlas: Rent Debt in America: Stabilizing Renters Is Key to Equitable Recovery. “Our new rent debt dashboard, produced in partnership with the Right to the City Alliance, equips policymakers and advocates with data on the extent and nature of rent debt in their communities to inform policies to eliminate debt and prevent the specter of mass eviction.”

PRNewswire: Clean Energy Ventures Launches Open Access Tool to Identify the Climate Technologies Worth Investor Attention (PRESS RELEASE). “Clean Energy Ventures announced today the launch of an open-access calculator to estimate a climate tech innovation’s potential impact on climate change. The Simple Emissions Reduction Calculator (SERC), which Clean Energy Ventures developed to help evaluate climate tech startups seeking funding, will be used by partners including Cleantech Open, Cleantech Scandinavia, and by any climate tech startups that are looking to validate their carbon emissions reduction potential.”

KHQ: DNR launches new website showcasing 100 of Washington’s best geological sites. “Waterfalls, glacier-fed lakes and pacific coastlines are just some of the stunning features Washington has to offer. In efforts to showcase some of the state’s marvels, the Washington State Department of Natural Resources created a website showing off 100 geological sites.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

9to5Google: Google Chrome prepares ‘Desktop Sharing Hub’ with copy link, QR code, other shortcuts. “The omnibox in Google Chrome is a very flexible and useful tool, and soon, it may add another useful menu. A new ‘Desktop Sharing Hub’ menu in Google Chrome could provide faster, easier access to shortcuts for copying links, generating QR codes, and more.”

USEFUL STUFF

University of Michigan: New website answers Michiganders’ questions about expanded Child Tax Credit. I skimmed this site and saw nothing that was Michigan-specific. It looks useful for anyone with questions about this credit. “The first step to receive the tax credit is to file taxes for 2020, and the tax filing deadline is extended to May 17 this year. Parents of children under 18 may be eligible to receive this money, even if they have not previously filed taxes and have low or no earnings. Visit the Child Tax Credit: What You Need to Know website to learn more about eligibility for the expanded tax credit and see answers to frequently asked questions.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

AP: Army of fake fans boosts China’s messaging on Twitter. “A seven-month investigation by the Associated Press and the Oxford Internet Institute, a department at Oxford University, found that China’s rise on Twitter has been powered by an army of fake accounts that have retweeted Chinese diplomats and state media tens of thousands of times, covertly amplifying propaganda that can reach hundreds of millions of people — often without disclosing the fact that the content is government-sponsored.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Reuters: UK unveils law to fine social media firms which fail to remove online abuse. “Britain said on Wednesday a planned new law would see social media companies fined up to 10% of turnover or 18 million pounds ($25 million) if they failed to stamp out online abuses such as racist hate crimes, while senior managers could also face criminal action.”

CarBuzz: Kids Have Stolen Hundreds Of Mazdas Because Of A Dumb Social Media Challenge. “Earlier this year, Mazda was named the best car brand of 2021, but we doubt that New Zealand citizens will feel quite so good about the Japanese automaker a year from now. See, the Australasian country, specifically the province of Taranaki, has been going through a strange phenomenon: the theft of older Mazda cars. Apparently, there’s some sort of social media challenge that is going viral, and this is causing teenagers to film themselves stealing cars that are easy to break into. Most of the cars being targeted are small Mazda runabouts, as they are perceived to be easy to get going with just a little hot-wiring.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Washington State University: Open source tool can help identify gerrymandering in voting maps. “In an article in the Harvard Data Science Review, the researchers describe the improved mathematical methodology of an open source tool called GerryChain. The tool can help observers detect gerrymandering in a voting district plan by creating a pool, or ensemble, of alternate maps that also meet legal voting criteria. This map ensemble can show if the proposed plan is an extreme outlier—one that is very unusual from the norm of plans generated without bias, and therefore, likely to be drawn with partisan goals in mind.” Good afternoon, Internet…

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