Wednesday, August 01, 2018

Is “coordinated inauthentic behavior” a fancy way to say ‘spreading fake news?” What happens if they determine that the Democrats/Republicans are behind it?
Removing Bad Actors on Facebook
Today we removed 32 Pages and accounts from Facebook and Instagram because they were involved in coordinated inauthentic behavior. This kind of behavior is not allowed on Facebook because we don’t want people or organizations creating networks of accounts to mislead others about who they are, or what they’re doing.
We’re still in the very early stages of our investigation and don’t have all the facts — including who may be behind this.


(Related) Because he’s an American?
Why LeBron Can Say Whatever He Wants About Politics
LeBron James attended a Cleveland campaign rally for Hillary Clinton in 2016 even though she was likely to lose his home state of Ohio. After Donald Trump’s election, James repeatedly blasted the president. When Laura Ingraham said James should “shut up and dribble,” he rebutted the Fox News host by saying he had never heard of her before her remark. And now this: On Monday, James wouldn’t rule out running for president in 2020.
… But I don’t think James really has to worry about any backlash. The wall between the worlds of sports and politics has increasingly broken down, and James’s place in those worlds gives him extra protection.
1. His fans are mostly Democrats
2. His political tactics are quite mild, particularly considering the context
3. He’s not alone
4. James is really, really good at basketball




IF the NBA can do this for MGM, could Facebook use the same tech to eliminate Fake News?
NBA inks deal with MGM Resorts to provide data to bettors
The NBA and WNBA will now share official data with MGM Resorts International, a major win for the leagues as they prepare for the anticipated growth of sports betting across the country.
The Las Vegas-based casino giant will pay the NBA for that data to use in determining outcomes of various bets. The NBA's stance has been that getting accurate stats to bettors is critical so players know what they're betting on and so casinos will know when to pay out, and MGM Resorts is the first casino to make an arrangement with the league for those numbers.
… How MGM will get that data remains unclear.
NBA stat data is distributed globally by Sportradar, which sends it to media outlets, broadcasters and betting outlets outside the U.S. — but not inside this country, at least for now.
… MGM will be an official casino partner for the league, but will not have exclusive rights to the data. The NBA still can, and likely will, try to make deals with other casinos who will be offering sports betting in various states or through mobile apps.
The deal also won't stop other casino companies from offering wagers on NBA games, including prop bets that rely on results other than the final score.




Another “news” manipulation story. Do all reviews at TripAdvisor pass through the organization being reviewed? Seems made for manipulation.
Australian hotelier Meriton fined A$3m for manipulating TripAdvisor reviews
The Australian hotel operator owned by billionaire Harry Triguboff was fined A$3 million (S$3.03 million) on Tuesday for misleading customers, after it withheld unhappy guests' details from travel site TripAdvisor Inc to avoid bad reviews.
Between November 2014 and October 2015, Meriton Serviced Apartments falsified or held back the contact details of customers it thought might be critical at 13 properties, Australia's Federal Court found.
The company's booking software allowed staff to add letters to customers' email addresses to stop TripAdvisor from reaching them if they had made complaints during their stay. It also held back reviews during maintenance periods at the hotels.
… The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), which brought the proceedings against Meriton, had initially sought a A$20 million penalty.
"This case sends a strong message that businesses can expect ACCC enforcement action if they're caught manipulating feedback on third party review websites," ACCC Commissioner Sarah Court said in a statement.




What would an “ethical programming” class look like?
Liability and Risk in Programming Autonomous Vehicles
… We are about to undergo a paradigm shift from passive response-based systems in cars (such as cruise control, lane-change warning alarms, obstacle alarms and so on) to fully active systems. This is where an autonomous vehicle, having processed various inputs from multiple sensors, having (in some implementations) integrated those inputs with externally supplied data (for example from sensors transmitting from road signs or from the road itself), takes a decision on what to do – how much to accelerate or to brake, how to turn the wheel, etc.
… . This is the field of so-called ‘electro-ethics’. Electro-ethics is the intersection of technology, law and moral philosophy. To enable machines to perform sophisticated decision-making to complete complex tasks, software designers need to develop sets of rules that will underpin decisions made in any situation. It is impossible to program on a situational basis, so higher level guiding principles need to be programmed with clarity so any situation can be dealt with safely and properly.




Who knew our programming classes were “Pre-Law?”
Paper – Replacing Law with Computer Code
Micheler, Eva and Whaley, Anna, Regulatory Technology – Replacing Law with Computer Code (July 9, 2018). LSE Legal Studies Working Paper No. 14/2018. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3210962
“Recently both the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority have carried out experiments using new digital technology for regulatory purposes. The idea is to replace rules written in natural legal language with computer code and to use artificial intelligence for regulatory purposes. This new way of designing public law is in line with the government’s vision for the UK to become a global leader in digital technology. It is also reflected in the FCA’s business plan. The article reviews the technology and the advantages and disadvantages of combining the technology with regulatory law. It then informs the discussion from a broader public law perspective. It analyses regulatory technology through criteria developed in the mainstream regulatory discourse. It contributes to that discourse by anticipating problems that will arise as the technology evolves. In addition, the hope is to assist the government in avoiding mistakes that have occurred in the past and creating a better system from the start.”




Perspective. Who has the power here, Kroger or Visa. Would Amazon just issue its own card?
Report: Nation's largest grocery chain may ban Visa transactions
Grocery chain Kroger is reportedly considering banning all Visa card transactions at its locations throughout the United States due to a dispute on swipe fees, Bloomberg reported.
… According to the National Retail Federation, roughly 2 percent of all transactions go toward swipe fees.




Interesting. Great use of graphics!
Here’s How America Uses Its Land
Bloomberg: “There are many statistical measures that show how productive the U.S. is. Its economy is the largest in the world and grew at a rate of 4.1 percent last quarter, its fastest pace since 2014. The unemployment rate is near the lowest mark in a half century . What can be harder to decipher is how Americans use their land to create wealth. The 48 contiguous states alone are a 1.9 billion-acre jigsaw puzzle of cities, farms, forests and pastures that Americans use to feed themselves, power their economy and extract value for business and pleasure… Using surveys, satellite images and categorizations from various government agencies, the U.S. Department of Agriculture divides the U.S. into six major types of land. The data can’t be pinpointed to a city block—each square on the map represents 250,000 acres of land. But piecing the data together state-by-state can give a general sense of how U.S. land is used. Gathered together, cropland would take up more than a fifth of the 48 contiguous states. Pasture and rangeland would cover most of the Western U.S., and all of the country’s cities and towns would fit neatly in the Northeast…”




A note for my website students.




I’ve been tutoring the wrong things. No more Math and Computer Science for me!
Parents Hiring Fortnite Coaches to Improve Play, Help Children Level Up
On Tuesday, Sarah E. Needleman of the Wall Street Journal reported parents are throwing down between $10 and $20 per hour so their kids can level up and become better Fortnite players.
"There's pressure not to just play it but to be really good at it," Ally Hicks, who purchased four hours of lessons for her 10-year-old son, told the WSJ. "You can imagine what that was like for him at school."
… In some cases, it's paying off. Nick Mennen told the Wall Street Journal his 12-year-old son, Noble, struggled to win on the highly competitive Fortnite landscape.
"Now he'll throw down 10 to 20 wins," Mennen said.
The demand for coaches may continue to grow with the latest update from Epic in June placing the player count at 125 million.


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