Tag: Facebook

You thought they knew everything about you?

“Short of wearing a burka, we may all one day become Tom Cruise at the mall, because marketers who track us as we shop online and send us ads, want to do that as we shop in the real world.”

Did you see 60 Minutes recently or read the story ‘Say goodbye to anonymity’?

Lesley Stahl, CBS News 60 Minutes: Facial recognition is already in some of our home appliances like TVs. In our mobile devices, PINs and passwords are giving way to faceprints. And the technology can single us out in real-time as we go about our daily business, often without us ever knowing.

Joseph Atick, one of the first scientists to develop facial recognition software: What’s unique about face recognition is the fact that you can do it surreptitiously, from a distance, and continually.

Alessandro Acquisti is a professor at Carnegie Mellon who does research on how technology impacts privacy. “He says that smartphones may make ‘facial searches’ as common as Google searches and he did an experiment to show how easy it could be… He ran pictures [of random students] through a facial recognition program he downloaded for free that sifted through Facebook profiles and other websites. And he was able not only to identify many of them instantly, he also got their personal data, including in some cases, their social security numbers.

“Short of wearing a burka, we may all one day become Tom Cruise at the mall, because marketers who track us as we shop online and send us ads, want to do that as we shop in the real world.” That reference was to the 2002 Cruise film Minority Report. I’m somewhat horrified by this.

I’m happy that with their relationship on the rocks, Chris (Lefty) and Kelly Brown found a marriage counselor in their Xbox, but I wonder how much of privacy is given up to prove that new Xbox experience that’s being launched.

I can’t quite explain why, but this future automotive device weirds me out.

And it’s primarily commercial entities doing this, from the info we give out ourselves. I suppose I should unplug everything on social media and hide in my cave. But I won’t (yet).

As Tom the Mayor wrote on Facebook: “You know, You can’t ‘friend’ an Amish person on Facebook!”

Shooting Parrots wants to give Google the finger because “corporate giants like Amazon, Starbucks and Google [and Apple!] who have taken to biting the hands that feed them by avoiding paying tax where their customers live,” while, I would add, using the info we give them to get ever richer. SP is using DuckDuckGo.com in lieu of Google; its motto on the page: “Search anonymously. Find instantly.” It may lessen the “Google experience,” but it is a reasonable tradeoff, I think.
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Some kid’s in jail for something he wrote on Facebook.

Not to be replaced by Facebook

Facebook is really good for snark.

Not replacing blogging, for me

When I noted that I’ll be doing less blogging someday, I should have made it clear that I won’t be filling up that time using Facebook. I mention this specifically because many of my original blogging buddies from 2005 and 2006 have done just that.

I suppose if one is just posting cartoons and videos, then Facebook might be the right venue. I know columnists from my local newspaper and reporters from TV stations and indeed TV networks use it to pose questions to get a sense of the “pulse of the people.” Said content often shows up in their newscasts/broadcasts.

But if one wants to say something more, I still am a fan of the blog. Of course, I realize I’m an old-fashioned guy who STILL hates the designated hitter rule in baseball.

Facebook is really good for snark, some pithy comments in response to a cartoon someone has posted. I’ve been known to engage in it from time to time myself; once I did it on the wrong person’s timeline, and it turned out better than I would have expected. And I do make use of the reminders about people’s birthdays.

Moreover, Facebook can be a useful tool for research. “Does anybody know” where something can be purchased or when some event took place; something to be said for collective wisdom.

For some people, such as my nieces, it’s the only way I know what’s going on in their lives. For others, it’s the only way I can get ahold of them; if they have e-mail, they don’t check it, and I can only reach them if I instant message them when they are online.

However, I get more spam that gets posted onto my timeline. Actually, it’s the same one: “Hey, check this out!” I don’t know how to stop it, and I’m unaware it’s there until/unless someone points it out to me.

Facebook: useful tool which I will not use to replace blogging, in case you were wondering.

 

January Rambling: Rapturous Research and Sour Apples

My favorite first ABC Wednesday post in a while.

QUESTION OF THE MONTH: Who are the four music artists to have won an Academy Award for an ACTING role and achieving a #1 album in the U.S.? (This excludes people such as Bruce Springsteen and Elton John, who won MUSIC Oscars.)

Arrgh! – the idiots who are the Newtown truthers. Other fools are harassing the guy who took in six children after the Newtown shootings. The Hitler gun control lie. Related: Run, Hide, Fight: Alabama’s video response to mass shootings. Also, Amy’s poem – “If Jesus had had a gun in Gethsamane, would he have taken aim at the guards?”

Gandhi and gambling.

Idle No More 101. What it’s NOT: “An extended Native American Heritage Month, where non-Natives have to act like they’re fascinated by Native culture.”

The power of the Mouse.

Talk about class warfare.

Steve Bissette makes the case for boycotting DragonCon. I’ve never been, but if you have, you will want to read this.

The future king of the Netherlands had visited Albany in 2009.

A video of 15-year-old Noah St. John, winner of the 2012 ‘NPR Snap Judgment Performance of the Year.’ “It’s part performance art, part dramatic monologue, part spoken poetry — ‘storytelling with a beat.'”

I have research rapture, and have had it for a LONG time! “You may pity me if you wish, but my compulsion is relatively mild… I am addicted to looking things up.”

Cognitive biases that prevent you from being rational. One can nitpick over the examples, but it’s still interesting.

The derivation of the phrase to give someone the third degree.

Untangle and disentangle.

Advice on giving advice, especially to teens and tweens.

CLUES FOR QUESTION OF THE MONTH:
One performed one of the most popular singles of all time.
One won the Sour Apple Award for Least Cooperative Actor three times but got the Golden Apple Award as Male Star of the Year subsequently.
One is a woman, and possibly the most obvious choice.
One is in a movie that was nominated for the 2012 Academy Awards, though he was not.

Restoring your faith in humanity.

I went to see the touring company of Million Dollar Quartet last week and enjoyed the talk afterward quite a bit.

Cheri’s Facebook rules. They are all commonsensical, and if I cared enough about FB, I’d post them on my Facebook page as well. I still may. And “like” Arthur on Facebook, or don’t; he doesn’t much care.

Aspiring actress Melanie Boudwin. My favorite premiere ABC Wednesday post in a while.

Steve loves reading.

TV weather when the computers are down.

Musicians, beware the rehearsal police.

Before Planet of the Apes; a strange Twilight Zone comic book.

Movie ratings through the years – in video form.

Orson Welles: young, old, drunk, sober…

I never saw any of the 10 Decent Movies That Were Doomed by Unfair Memes, though I wanted to see Scott Pilgrim, and just never got the chance when it was in theaters. But how does John Carter get released without mentioning the Mars angle?

Cookie Monster and Grover take on ‘The Avengers,’ ‘The Hunger Games,’ and more…in song!

Rubber Duckie: the Story Behind Sesame Street’s Iconic Bath Time Tune. But Grover is bitter.

The Doors’ ”Riders On The Storm” in a major key?

Short video background on the Batman TV show.

Please help my friend’s cat to become an LOL cat.

5000 ducks go for a walk.

QUESTION OF THE MONTH ANSWERS: Bing Crosby (who gets mentioned in a blog post next month), Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, and Jamie Foxx.

November Rambling: Legacy of fools, and Facebook rejection

Please move the deer crossing. I had heard this one some time ago, but I thought it was a prank.

I have a friend who actually is in great pain much of the time. But she doesn’t “look” sick, or injured, and people dismiss her level of discomfort. So this graphic is for her.

Troy, who participates in ABC Wednesday, and has designed the last several logos for the rounds, and his wife Diann, have undergone a terrible family ordeal, which they describe in painful detail. Then Troy explains that injustice runs in the judge’s family.

The Unmitigated Disaster Known As Project ORCA, which was “a massive undertaking – the Republican Party’s newest, unprecedented and most technologically advanced plan to win the 2012 presidential election.”

Letter to a future Republican strategist regarding white people. “My name is Eric Arnold Garland and I am a White Man.”

Marriage equality legal precedents.

Paul Rapp believes we’re missing the most important story in the David Petraus case. Also, An interesting letter, which may or may not relate to Petraeus affair; the second letter.

I could list Amy Barlow Liberatore’s Sharp Little Pencil just about every month. Her poem Interview With Sgt. Davis, Kabul, 2012 addresses what we are fighting for, while Bitter Silence is a more personal reflection.

Ken Levine wrote about Social Network Rejection when two or three people unsubscribe from your Twitter page or someone unfriends you on Facebook. I realize that this is a real issue for some people. It just isn’t for me. I did sign up for something that tells me when someone has unfriended me. A couple were people discontinuing Facebook altogether, and the other two were friends of friends I didn’t know personally anyway. I suppose I should care, but I just don’t. Of course, I don’t even go on Twitter anymore unless there is a weather emergency or some other urgent item I feel needs to be posted. The only other things I put there are the automatic posts from my blog. See also this piece.

Levine talked with Warren Littlefield, who was the NBC President of Entertainment during the ’90s and was Brandon Tartikoff’s key lieutenant in the ’80s. Part 1; Part 2.

Levine’s lovely story about Shari Lewis, who I AM old enough to remember.

The grandfather of the Planet of the Apes.

Why People Think Christians Are Crazy.

One Shade of Grey.

Advice to so-called “aspiring” writers.

Chuck Miller: It was a “I thought it would last forever” relationship, and I thought this new prospect would work out. And it did at first. It worked out better than I could have ever imagined, ever in my wildest dreams.

From Y’all To Youse, 8 English Ways to Make “You” Plural, a topic which I touched on almost two years ago. Yinz?

Please move the deer crossing. I had heard this one some time ago, but I thought it was a prank. The woman later admitted she didn’t understand who was being directed by the signs.

The first result for YouTube search of scream of frustration.

Debbie Harry explains how to pogo.

ABBA v. Van Halen

From Annette Funicello to Johnny Carson, via Paul Anka.

EGOT winner Rita Moreno

What if Marilyn Monroe had survived?

Twinkies in the Movies. A couple are NSFW.

Chuck McCann has a joke for you. It’s the one about the guy carrying the crate…

Alan David Doane’s year in review. My only objection is that we’ve still got another month. Unless the Mayans were right.

Dustbury gets older.

R.I.P. Spain Rodriguez, truly a “pillar of the early underground community.”

Basil Wolverton Superhero Comics.

Canvas Sneakers: Cheaper Than A Security Guard

FROM MY OTHER BLOGS, plus

My life: the plan, and the reality

One six-year Presidential term? More snollygosters

Three Myths about Copyright Law and Where to Start to Fix It.

Our church choir performed a concert this month. Here are some pictures; I’m in a couple of them.

GOOGLE ALERTS

Statistics | Roger Green and Associates, Inc. – Significance Testing: What Happens If We are Wrong? It is a critical question in risk assessment. A wrong decision has implications, sometimes small and inconsequential, sometimes …

Sera Cahoone knows what it’s like to have Thom Yorke hold your hands and sing to you
By the time she was in middle school, she was playing drums for gigging bands, and in the early ’90s, she formed the experimental rock band Idle Mind with her friend Roger Green. Although one of the more promising local acts of the time, the pair split …

Angmering family’s fright over Hallowe-en candle bag fire. By Roger Green
Hallowe’en began with a frightening experience for an Angmering family when a candle bag left on a bedroom window sill started a …

Dogs that are lifeguards By Roger Green.

Graphics stolen from Facebook, the latter from George Takei.

Hurricane Sandy and incredibly silly people

My ire was predicated by the very real devastation the storm brought to a whole lot of OTHER people.

First off, I should note that I’m fine, we’re fine, in Albany. 150 miles north of New York City, we got a little wind and a little rain, but nothing substantial. They closed our public schools in the city for two days due to an abundance of caution; the new superintendent is from New Jersey and I think she was taking her lead from the mayor, who had proclaimed a state of emergency for a day or more.

And because it wasn’t a big weather event HERE, I’ve heard people calling it a “dud”, that they were “cheated”, which frankly ENRAGED me. (I referred to such people as “idiots” on Facebook; maybe I should stay off Facebook. Someone else called them “callous douchebags”, which I suppose is worse.) I wonder if it’s the result of the infotainment quality of big weather event reportage, alluded to by both Cheri and Mark Evanier?

My ire, though, was predicated by the very real devastation the storm brought to a whole lot of OTHER people, starting in Haiti, Cuba, and Jamaica, then much of New Jersey, Connecticut, and southern New York State, specifically NYC and Long Island. Over 80 dead, at least 33 in the US:
Millions without power
Oyster Creek, New Jersey on “Alert” as Sandy Threatens Nuclear Facilities
NYC flights still grounded by Sandy, and major train disruption as well. LaGuardia airport, in particular, is a mess.

One of my best friends wrote on Tuesday morning: “NYC and the surrounding area are a mess. The transit authority said this was the most devastating storm in the city’s history… The seven subway tubes underneath the East River connecting Manhattan and Brooklyn are Queens are flooded. The subway stations in lower Manhattan are flooded. Depots in all 5 boroughs where trains and buses were parked are underwater… This is the worst storm recorded in the city’s history. A buoy in NY harbor recorded a wave of 32.5 feet, the highest ever recorded. Seawalls in Queens and New Jersey recorded the ocean surging over 13 feet, the highest ever recorded. The creek did rise.”

Meanwhile, in the theater of the absurd, George W. Bush’s FEMA Director During Katrina Criticizes Obama For Responding To Sandy Too Quickly. As opposed to Michael Brown’s more…casual pace in dealing with the 2005 disaster. Also, some anti-gay preacher blamed Hurricane Sandy on “homosexuality and marriage equality”; these clowns seem to pop up every disaster. They should go send money to the American Red Cross, and, as another friend of mine used to say, “zip their traps.”
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What to do after a hurricane – US-specific, though some useful messages about preparation for all.

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