NEW RESOURCES

FOSS Force: IBM Unveils ‘Open Source Cloud Guide’ at All Things Open. “One of the announcements made at this year’s All Things Open conference in Raleigh came on Monday when IBM unveiled an Open Source Cloud Guide, which offers a vendor and cloud agnostic view of open source developer tools.”

Inside the Games: IMMAF launches athletes database and alumni records page. “The International Mixed Martial Arts Federation (IMMAF) has launched two interactive databases featuring the organisation’s current athletes and alumni. The Athletes Database features approximately 2,200 IMMAF fighters across senior, junior and youth categories and lists the accolades of all medallists.”

BusinessWire: Esri Partners with The Ray to Map Solar Energy Hot Spots (PRESS RELEASE). “Research published by the Webber Energy Group (WEG) at the University of Texas at Austin, and by The Ray, a nonprofit studying technologies that can transform the transportation sector for a Vision Zero future, documented the efficiency and economic, societal, and environmental benefits of installing solar arrays on interstate right-of-way (ROW) land. The findings revealed that solar panels at these exits could generate up to 36 terawatt hours (TWh) a year—enough to power 12 million passenger electric vehicles—with the value of the energy generated by roadside solar panels estimated at $4 billion per year.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Popular Science: Google’s new data guidance takes a page from Apple’s privacy playbook. “Google launched a new “Data safety section” in its Google Play Store on Monday for app developers, building on a pledge the company made in May to increase transparency around how apps hosted on its platforms utilize user data. A video released along with the announcement shows this information will be prominently featured in a set of bullet points when users click on an app to install or update it, though it won’t be publicly available until next year.”

CNBC: PayPal is in late-stage talks to acquire Pinterest. “PayPal is in late-stage talks to buy social media company Pinterest, a source familiar with the matter told CNBC. Shares of Pinterest soared Wednesday after Bloomberg first reported that PayPal may acquire the social media company.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

The Verge: Facebook is planning to rebrand the company with a new name. “The coming name change, which CEO Mark Zuckerberg plans to talk about at the company’s annual Connect conference on October 28th, but could unveil sooner, is meant to signal the tech giant’s ambition to be known for more than social media and all the ills that entail.” It’s not the name that’s the problem, of course…

Daily Beast: The Bizarre and Unsettling Rise of True-Crime Makeup Videos on YouTube and TikTok. “TikTok user @fatalfaye delicately brushes a hot pink eyeshadow in the shade ‘Emoji’ onto their eyelid. Over the primping plays an audio clip, crackling with feedback. ‘I just killed my mom and my sister,’ a teenager confesses. The combination of the jarring 911 call and an otherwise normal makeup video may seem bizarre, but the incongruous pairing belongs to a trend of true crime makeup videos that has been growing in popularity across social media platforms like YouTube and TikTok. Welcome to the weird world of true crime makeup videos.”

Paste Magazine: The Vibrant Online Community of College Football Videogames. “There’s hardly ever a reason to play an old sports game unless you’re pained with deep nostalgia. Yet it turns out nostalgia is easy to come by if they stop improving the game, or stop making a series altogether. The thirst and hunger created by the unfilled hole in the market sparks innovation among enthusiasts. Modding games is a pretty common process across genres, but the fans around NCAA Football have given the defunct franchise something most sports games don’t get: longevity.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Wired: How Hackers Hijacked Thousands of High-Profile YouTube Accounts. “SINCE AT LEAST 2019, hackers have been hijacking high-profile YouTube channels. Sometimes they broadcast cryptocurrency scams, sometimes they simply auction off access to the account. Now, Google has detailed the technique that hackers-for-hire used to compromise thousands of YouTube creators in just the past couple of years.”

SecurityWeek: Banks Informed U.S. Treasury of $590 Million in Ransomware Payments. “The United States Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has identified a total of 177 cryptocurrency wallets associated with the top 10 most commonly reported ransomware variants during the first half of the year.”

New York Times: Mark Zuckerberg will be added to a Facebook privacy lawsuit.. ” The attorney general for the District of Columbia plans to add Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, to a consumer protection lawsuit, in one of the first efforts by a regulator to expose him personally to potential financial and other penalties. The attorney general, Karl Racine, said on Tuesday that continuing interviews and reviews of internal documents for the case had revealed that Mr. Zuckerberg played a much more active role in key decisions than prosecutors had known.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

The Conversation: The easy way to rein in Facebook and Google: stop them gobbling up competitors. “Their future is largely in our hands. For big tech companies able to use the weight of their networks (and only for those companies) we could ‘just say no’ to takeovers. It’s hard to think of a reason for one to proceed. If needed, we could change the law to make ‘no’ the default.” Good morning, Internet…

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