Basant ???? on Twitter: “The bridge was built to last. Then the river changed course. https://t.co/zYSVEpBWzQ” / TwitterThere’s a message in here somewhere. China’s Artificial Intelligence Surveillance State Goes Global – The AtlanticThe nanny apps work in tandem with the police, who spot-check phones at checkpoints, scrolling through recent calls and texts. Even an innocent digital association—being in a group text with a recent mosque attendee, for instance—could result in detention. Staying off social media altogether is no solution, because digital inactivity itself can raise suspicions. The police are required to note when Uighurs deviate from any of their normal behavior patterns. Their database wants to know if Uighurs start leaving their home through the back door instead of the front. It wants to know if they spend less time talking to neighbors than they used to. Electricity use is monitored by an algorithm for unusual use, which could indicate an unregistered resident. What the SAT’s Adversity Score Means for Its Racist Past – The Atlantic The original Scholastic Aptitude Test was invented in 1926 by Carl Brigham, a Princeton alumnus and avowed eugenicist who created the test to uphold a racial caste system. He advanced this theory of standardized testing as a means of upholding racial purity in his book A Study of American Intelligence. Conversation Piece – Futility […]

Gobo Sign up for Gobo, link it to your other social media profiles, and you can take control of your feed. Want to read news you aren’t otherwise seeing? Use our “Echo Chamber” filter to see what we call “wider” news. Want a better balance of men and women in your feed? Use our “gender” filter to rebalance it. Want to take a lunch break and just see popular funny videos you friends are sharing? Use our “virality” filter to pick only the most shared content. With Gogo you’re in charge of the algorithmic filters that control what you see on social media. We’ve built a bunch of filters like these already, are building more, and have made it possible for other developers to add filters too. Sign up, try it out, and see if it changes how you think about how social media should work. Lunar Conversations – C82: Works of Nicholas Rougeux Watch neural networks see only what they’ve been trained to see / Boing Boing confirmation bias meets potentials for art This School Has Been Arming Classrooms With 5-Gallon Buckets Of Rocks In The Event Of A School Shooting David Helsel, superintendent of the Blue Mountain School District in Schuylkill County, made the announcement at a state House Education Committee hearing on school safety March 15. “If […]