NEW RESOURCES

Goshen College: Shetler’s lifelong research enters new stage: Mara Cultural Heritage Digital Library website goes live. “Jan Bender Shetler, director of global engagement and professor of history at Goshen College, has spent the past 40 years of her life conducting and analyzing oral history research on cultural memory in Tanzania. This summer, her research entered a new phase with the official public launch of the Mara Cultural Heritage Digital Library (MCHDL).”

Newswise: Free Online Course Focuses on Pediatric RSV Care. “A new online course from the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) and the Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) is available at no charge to help nurses and other clinicians care for the influx of pediatric patients with respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), influenza and other respiratory-related illnesses.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

CNET: Elon Musk Took Twitter from Troubled to Tanking. “With massive layoffs, users flocking to alternatives and advertisers pulling back spending on Twitter, Musk acquired an embattled platform and turned it into a collapsing circus for all of its 238 million users – and the rest of the world – to watch. ‘Twitter’s future is especially uncertain – and it doesn’t look good,’ said Mike Proulx, research director at Forrester.”

Ars Technica: Musk contradicts Twitter safety chief, disavows statement as “fake news” . “…increasingly, Twitter trust and safety chief Ella Irwin seems more willing to confirm or deny rumors to media outlets, a move that’s possibly irking Musk. Over the holiday weekend, Musk tweeted to directly contradict a statement Irwin provided to Reuters, causing even more confusion over what’s going on at Twitter—and whether there’s tension brewing between Musk and Irwin.”

USEFUL STUFF

WIRED: How to Use Your Smartphone to Cope With Vision Loss. “Whether you struggle to read distant signs or find yourself squinting to decipher small print, you probably have a gadget that can help. Too many of us ignore accessibility features, assuming they are only for the blind or severely vision-impaired, but they can also help folks with a wide range of vision loss issues.”

How-To Geek: How to Write an Awesome Stable Diffusion Prompt. “Stable Diffusion, a popular AI art generator, requires text prompts to make an image. Sometimes it does an amazing job and generates exactly what you want with a vague prompt. Other times, you get suboptimal outputs. Here are some tips and tricks to get ideal results.”

MakeUseOf: The Best Sites to Watch Movies for Free (Legally!). “Whether you’re looking for movies or TV shows, finding free videos to stream is totally feasible; it just requires that you know where to look. With that in mind, here are the best free online movie streaming sites to check out.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

Search Engine Land: Google algorithm updates 2022 in review: Core updates, product reviews, helpful content updates, spam updates and beyond. “This year had different stresses accompanying the Google algorithm updates, fewer pandemic stresses, and more recession-related stress. We had ten confirmed Google algorithm updates this year, the same number of confirmed algorithm updates we had in 2021. This year, we had a brand new ranking system named the helpful content update, and we had two of them.”

Jerusalem Post: Google fixes error after labeling ‘Jew’ as an offensive slur. “The word ‘Jew’ was listed on Google as a verb marked offensive, defined as ‘to bargain with someone in a miserly or petty way’ for most of the day on Tuesday”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Center for the Study of the Public Domain: January 1, 2023 is Public Domain Day: Works from 1927 are open to all!. “On January 1, 2023, copyrighted works from 1927 will enter the US public domain. They will be free for all to copy, share, and build upon. These include Virginia Woolf’s To The Lighthouse and the final Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, the German science-fiction film Metropolis and Alfred Hitchcock’s first thriller, compositions by Louis Armstrong and Fats Waller, and a novelty song about ice cream. Please note that this site is only about US law; the copyright terms in other countries are different.”

Ars Technica: No more TikTok on House of Representatives’ smartphones. “TikTok will no longer be allowed on any device managed by the US House of Representatives. On Tuesday, the House’s Chief Administrative Office announced the ban of the popular video-sharing app, a move that comes just a week after legislation that would bar TikTok from all federal devices was introduced.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Washington Post: Shadowbanning is real: Here’s how you end up muted by social media. “Two decades into the social media revolution, it’s now clear that moderating content is important to keep people safe and conversation civil. But we the users want our digital public squares to use moderation techniques that are transparent and give us a fair shot at being heard. Musk’s exposé may have cherry-picked examples to cast conservatives as victims, but he is right about this much: Companies need to tell us exactly when and why they’re suppressing our megaphones, and give us tools to appeal the decision.” This URL links to a gift version of this article; you should be able to read it without a paywall. Good morning, Internet…

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