NEW RESOURCES

Agenda Georgia: Illustrations of people and places of 19th century Caucasus now in National Archives of Georgia digital collection. “A series of 19th century illustrations of people and places of the South Caucasus, published in a French magazine around 150 years ago, can now be viewed by those interested in history and ethnography on the website of the National Archives of Georgia. Presenting city-dwellers and countryside folks of different ethnicities who lived and worked in cities, towns and villages, the works show Georgia and the wider region as it appeared to ethnographers and travellers between the 1840s and 1870s.”

University of Maine: Governor’s Office of Innovation, UMaine, DHHS launch Maine Drug Data Hub . “Maine Drug Data Hub links to data, reports and other dashboards related to drug problems and related Maine policies. It integrates data from public health, public safety, corrections and the judicial system using the 2021 Maine Opioid Response Strategic Plan as a framework. It also provides special ‘use-case’ portals for ease of use by policymakers, media and clinicians.”

Berkeley Linguistics: New online Iquito-English Dictionary. “This new dictionary is basically a digital version of the dictionary published by Abya-Yala press(link is external) in 2019, with an expanded grammar sketch and corrections of minor errors.” Iquito is a language of Peru.

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Bing Blogs: Easy set-up guide for Bing’s Content Submission API (Beta). “Bing already supports the ability for webmasters to notify Bing about URL changes via its Bing URL submission API (setup guide) but now (under Beta launch) also the ability to notify Bing directly about URL along with content changes via Bing Content Submission API. This will not only help webmasters to reach to more relevant users on Bing but also will reduce BingBot crawl load on their sites. This blog post will provide a generic overview along with step-by-step instruction on adopting the same.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

BuzzFeed News: Instagram Labeled One Of Islam’s Holiest Mosques A Terrorist Organization. “Instagram removed posts and blocked hashtags about one of Islam’s holiest mosques because its content moderation system mistakenly associated the site with a designation the company reserves for terrorist organizations, according to internal employee communications seen by BuzzFeed News.”

Jewish News: Google filter for antisemitism searches ‘not fit for purpose’. “Google’s SafeSearch function for filtering offensive images is ‘not fit for purpose’ a new report has claimed – after discovering that antisemitic images and ‘Jew jokes’ remain online. A report produced jointly by the Community Security Trust (CST) and Antisemitism Policy Trust, found the SafeSearch function had no impact on the amount of antisemitic images found in Google image searches.”

Discover: Meet The Activist Archivists Saving The Internet From The Digital Dustbin. “Websites die constantly. The sheer size of the internet makes it feel like a permanent fixture, but individual pages only live an estimated 90 days before they change or vanish. At the same time, every single page has potential historical value. Maybe a future scholar will want to read a local news article that disappeared when the paper redesigned its website, or a political candidate is purging troublesome old statements. Perhaps someone will just want to revisit a video that made them laugh decades ago. That anything (and everything) might someday prove valuable is why extensive internet archiving efforts exist.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Al Jazeera: Two plead guilty in case highlighting China’s online control. “Two amateur computer coders in China have pleaded guilty to ‘stirring up trouble and picking quarrels’ in a case that highlighted Beijing’s growing crackdown on online activity. Chen Mei, 28, and Cai Wei, 27, created an online archive that stored articles that had been censored from the Chinese internet and an accompanying forum that allowed people to discuss them anonymously.”

Reuters: Italy fines Google for excluding Enel e-car app from Android Auto. “Italy’s competition regulator has fined Google 102 million euros ($123 million) for excluding an e-mobility app developed by Enel from the U.S. tech giant’s Android system. For more than two years, Google has not allowed Enel’s JuicePass to operate on Android Auto – a system that allows apps to be used safely in cars – unfairly curtailing its use while favouring Google Maps, the regulator said on Thursday.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Journalist’s Resource: What’s peer review? 5 things you should know before covering research. “As scholars and other experts rush to release new research aimed at better understanding the coronavirus pandemic, newsrooms must be more careful than ever in vetting the biomedical studies they choose to cover. One of the first steps journalists should take to gauge the quality of all types of research is answering this important question: Has the paper undergone peer review?”

ScienceDaily: Brain computer interface turns mental handwriting into text on screen. “For the first time, researchers have deciphered the brain activity associated with trying to write letters by hand. Working with a participant with paralysis who has sensors implanted in his brain, the team used an algorithm to identify letters as he attempted to write them. Then, the system displayed the text on a screen — in real time.”

EurekAlert: Online museum exhibitions will be more prominent post COVID-19. “When Museums closed their doors in March 2020 for the first COVID-19 lockdown in the UK a majority moved their activities online to keep their audiences interested. Researchers from WMG, University of Warwick have worked with OUMNH, to analyse the success of the exhibitions, and say the way Museums operate will change forever.” Good morning, Internet…

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