NEW RESOURCES

University of North Carolina: UNC researchers develop mapping tool to protect populations from environmental chemicals. “NC ENVIROSCAN, a new online interactive mapping tool, helps North Carolina communities increase awareness of key environmental and societal factors that can impact health. Developed through a collaboration between the UNC Superfund Research Program (UNC SRP) and the Institute for Environmental Health Solutions (IEHS) in partnership with the Renaissance Computing Institute (RENCI), this tool allows users to visualize trends across the state.”

: Launch of ICOM’s Online Library. “From the outset, the founders of ICOM wanted to create a resource centre specialising in museums and museology, with a twofold objective: to bring together all the documentation available on the subject and to make it available to museum professionals. Thanks to the contributions of ICOM members, the centre’s collections were rapidly expanded.”

The Eyeopener: Fashion Prof Creates Database For Black Designers In Canada. “The Black Fashion Database website is a virtual project that documents the successes of Black creators across Canada. From in-depth profiles with stylists, designers and professionals to historical photos of Black fashion in Canada, the link to the stand-alone site will reside on the community directory page of Fashion and Race database.”

Estes Park Trail Gazette: Estes Park Historian Laureate’s ‘From the Archives’ made available online. “From the Archives is a volume of essays on the early history of Rocky Mountain National Park and its adjacent community. The manuscript is based on documents from the National Archives in College Park Maryland, the Rocky Mountain National Park Research Facility, and other places, including the collections of the Estes Park Museum.”

Saskatchewan Polytechnic: Innovative digitization toolkit preserves Indigenous history. “When Chasity Berast, program head and instructor for the Saskatchewan Polytechnic Library & Information Technology program, was approached by Harry Lafond of Muskeg Lake Cree Nation to assist with creating a digital archive for their analog records, an idea was born. Rather than sending a student to archive Muskeg Lake Cree Nation’s records, Berast wanted to collaborate with the First Nation to create a digitization toolkit on best practices. Through this process Berast could test best practices while creating the toolkit and helping digitize Muskeg Lake Cree Nation’s archives.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

The Verge: Google will shut down Currents, the work-focused Google Plus replacement. “Google has announced that it’ll shut down Currents, which was introduced in 2019 as a replacement for Google Plus for G Suite. In a blog post, the company says it’s ‘planning to wind down’ Currents, and that it’ll push the people who were using it to Spaces, which is sort of like Google Chat’s version of a Slack channel or Discord room.”

Screen Rant: How To Find Concerts & Other Live Events On Snapchat. “Snapchat is a great app for chatting with friends and watching funny videos, but did you know it can also help you find concerts and other live events with the help of Ticketmaster? If there’s one certainty in the tech space, it’s that smartphone apps are constantly changing. In a neverending attempt to hold the attention of as many users as possible, it’s crucial for apps to keep the experience fresh and lively.”

AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD

Balkan Insight: Time Running Out for North Macedonia’s Priceless Video Archive. “Many of the video tapes stored in the archive of North Macedonia’s national broadcaster, Macedonian Television, MTV, could become useless in the next few years if they are not digitalised. Kiril Pancevski, who has been caring for the archives for some 40 years, told BIRN that some 15,000 hours of the archive have been digitalised. But, according to his estimate, another 33,000 hours, about two-thirds of the archive, must either be transferred into digital format or possibly lost forever.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

New York Times: Inside the Bitcoin Laundering Case That Confounded the Internet. “The arrests of Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan left the world of cryptocurrency incredulous: Could this goofy young couple have been Bitcoin’s Bonnie and Clyde?”

Washington Post: George Washington University apologizes for data project monitoring student and staff locations on campus. “George Washington University interim president Mark S. Wrighton apologized Friday to the campus community for the university’s failure to inform it in advance of a data analytics pilot program that monitored locations — though not individualized data — of students, faculty and staff last fall.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

City AM: Former Google boss launches $125m philanthropic fund to tackle AI issues. “Former Google boss Eric Schmidt has launched a $125m philanthropic fund to tackle so-called ‘hard problems’ in artificial intelligence including bias, harm and misuse, and conflict. The new fund, AI2050, will back reseach projects over the next five years, with the fuunds being offered to individual academics who specialise in the space.”

The Hindu: Ambedkar University launches centre for research on Indian languages. “The university said that CRA-ILIKS [Centre for Research and Archiving in Indian Languages and Indic Knowledge Systems] will have four components. It will build a Bhasha archive, a vast, multi-pronged and constantly growing digital collection propelled by a multilingual search engine and user-friendly interface on the web. It will be accompanied by a substantial programme of translation, transcription and curation. The multidisciplinary academic research and a publication programme will make the other two necessary components.” Good morning, Internet…

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