NEW RESOURCES

The Drive: Waste the Workday Looking Through Ford’s New Online Heritage Vault. “The collection features various articles from Ford’s past, officially stated as spanning from 1903 to 2003. However, there’s plenty of more recent material available too. It includes model brochures, information sheets, and various other documents from Ford’s archives. The historical assets are being made available to the public as free downloads for personal use.”

Scientific Data: Lexibank, a public repository of standardized wordlists with computed phonological and lexical features . “Inspired by the GenBank database, where scholars can deposit nucleotide sequences publicly, we have created Lexibank, a collection of cross-linguistic datasets in standardized formats, which offers access to word forms, sound inventories, and lexical features for more than 2000 language varieties derived from 100 individual high-quality datasets. The Lexibank wordlist collection is a first attempt to integrate the wealth of language data assembled during the past centuries.”

Google Blog: Gilberto Gil: Our largest retrospective of a living artist. “Gilberto Gil, the Brazilian singer, songwriter and cultural icon, once said that ‘Brazil was, is, and will be in fashion.’… To celebrate Gil’s 80th birthday, Google Arts & Culture is launching the largest online retrospective dedicated to a living artist. In The Rhythm of Gil, you’ll find a wealth of unique material – including an album believed to be lost forever, over 140 stories, over 900 newly digitized videos and tapes, and exclusive illustrations by artist Raiana Britto.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

Engadget: Microsoft’s Defender online security tool is now available to consumers. “It took awhile, but Microsoft Defender is now generally available for all your personal devices, not just Windows PCs and businesses. The new Defender for individuals gives Microsoft 365 subscribers an online tool that bolsters the existing malware and phishing security measures you’re (hopefully) using.”

Daily Beast: ‘Techno-King’ Elon Musk Sounds Off on Aliens, Politics in Rambly Twitter Townhall. “Appearing via a crappy cell phone camera feed, Elon Musk addressed Twitter employees on Thursday for the first time since the company accepted his $44 billion buyout offer in April. In the meandering call, which lasted about an hour, Musk at times took bizarre tangents, including briefly discussing aliens and noting that he had dubbed himself the ‘techno-king’ of Tesla, according to a person who heard him speak.”

USEFUL STUFF

Smashing Magazine: Web Design Done Well: Delightful Data Visualization Examples. “All the data in the world won’t do anyone any good if we can’t make sense of it. Or better yet, make it sing. Here are some stunning examples of data visualization in the wild, and some pointers on how to start making your own.” Smashing Magazine with their usual good work.

Lifehacker: This App Is Like a Homing Device for Bluetooth Signals. “There are plenty of Bluetooth devices in your world that can go lost without a clear solution for finding them. Luckily, there are apps designed to help you track these items down, similar to how Apple’s U1 chip works, no matter what smartphone you happen to own.”

WordPress: 7 Best Security Plugins to Protect Your WordPress Site. “f your website is running on WordPress and you haven’t invested in a robust security plugin, your site could be next on the hit list. Thankfully, there are a number of reliable and highly adaptable plugins available for WordPress sites (you can browse a few of the options available at Envato) but how do you know which one is right for your business?”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Search Engine Journal: Has Google’s SEO Office Hours Lost Its Spark?. “Previously the SEO Office Hours format permitted live questions and answers. That’s gone now. What Google is presenting are pre-screened questions with pre-screened answers. The new format gives Mueller time to choose questions and research good answers ahead of time. The answer Mueller provided is good but it also highlights a downside of Google’s new Q&A format that feels scripted and safe to the point that the information closely mirrors Google’s official documentation.”

Slashgear: Why The Crypto Crash Is Great News For Gamers. “Crypto miners, who keep the blockchain going and receive cryptocurrency as a reward for their efforts, have also seen profits tank. Some of them are now making less than a dollar a day once costs are factored in, and may not see the point of continuing in the current climate … which is fantastic news for the PC gaming community.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

University of Massachusetts Amherst: Geoscientist Awarded $2.1m Grant To Create Global Open-source Software System For Tracking Water And Sediment In Earth’s Rivers Using NASA Satellite Data. “University of Massachusetts geoscientist and engineer Colin Gleason has received a $2.1 NASA million grant to work with computer science colleagues at UMass Amherst and the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., to create a cloud-based software system providing unprecedented public access to satellite data on Earth’s water quantity and quality.”

Concordia University: Women are making strides in artificial intelligence but are still underrepresented, according to new Concordia research. “Overall, the study shows, the number of women working in AI has increased since the beginning of the century, but in terms of percentage makeup, representation has remained roughly constant at around 27 per cent. However, a noticeable increase in female-male and female-female collaboration is encouraging, write the researchers.” Good morning, Internet…

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