your story
/What will the world miss if you don’t tell your story? - Donald Miller
ideas that challenge / comfort / inspire
This is how to really get to know people
/If you want people to really know you, weekly meetings don’t cut it. You need deep dives with them in high-intensity situations. When I talked with a crew of astronauts who went to the International Space Station together, I found out that NASA prepared them by sending them into the wilderness for 11 days together. Their guides promptly let them get lost, and they said they came out of that experience knowing each other better than colleagues they’d worked with for years. At Morning Star, a leading tomato-paste plant that has operated successfully for decades without a single boss, I was stunned to discover that the founder often interviews job applicants at their own homes for three to five hours.
Adam Grant writing in The Atlantic
When people are free
/When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other. - Eric Hoffer
Orange Buttons are the Best
/An appeal to authority is a false claim that something must be true because an authority on the subject believes it to be true. It is possible for an expert to be wrong, we need to understand their reasoning or research before we appeal to their findings. In a design meeting you might hear something like this:
“Amazon is a successful website. Amazon has orange buttons. So orange buttons are the best.”
Feel free to switch out ‘Amazon’ and ‘orange buttons’ for anything you want; you get an equally week argument. We could argue back that Amazon is surviving on past success and that larger company are often hard to innovate so shouldn’t be used as a design influence. We could point out that Jeff Bezos has a reputation for micro-managing and ignoring the evidence provided by usability experts he has hired. As a result, we could point out that Amazon is possibly successful in spite of its design not because of it. But the words ‘often’, ‘reputation’ and ‘possibly’ make all these arguments equally week and full of fallacies.
When we counter any logical fallacy, we want to do it as cleanly as possible. In the above example, we only need to point out that many successful websites don’t have orange buttons and many unsuccessful sites do have orange buttons. Then we can move away from the matter entirely unless there is some research or reason available to explain the authorities decision.
Rob Sutcliffe writing in Prototypr
Articles of Interest - April 16
/***SOCIAL MEDIA
Vevo’s YouTube account hack hits popular music videos, causes biggest video ever to disappear The Verge
Facebook is offering a $40,000 bounty if you find the next Cambridge Analytica CNBC
The Book 'Videocracy' explores the power of YouTube MSNBC
One Way to Fight Digital Distraction Chronicle of Higher Ed
This Site Tracks How Wikipedia Is Being Edited in Real-Time Fast Company
***PRIVACY
Gmail.com redesign includes self-destructing emails Ars Technica
Should Social Media Companies Pay Us For Our Data? NPR
Facebook Crossed The Creepy Line And Can’t Go Back BuzzFeed News
As Zuckerberg Smiles to Congress, Facebook Fights State Privacy Laws WIRED
***PRODUCING MEDIA
The State of Video in 2018 Story Hunter
Everything You Need To Know About Video Production Costs Story Hunter
5 Media Publishers to Watch in 2018 Story Hunter
***INTERNET
YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals Bloomberg
US says Russia targets internet routers for espionage Associated Press
Supreme Court takes up internet sales tax case NBC News
***TECHNOLOGY
SenseTime: The billion-dollar, Alibaba-backed AI company that's quietly watching everyone in China Quartz
Microsoft launches a phishing attack simulator and other security tools TechCrunch
***JOURNALISM
Why Modern Newsrooms Should Mind the Generational Gap Hollywood Reporter
How the Assad Regime Tracked and Killed Marie Colvin for Reporting on War Crimes in Syria The Intercept
Journalists Documented a Massacre. Their Prize: a Prison Cell New York Times
The crisis in journalism has become a crisis of democracy Washington Post
Beyond “Live at Five”: What’s Next for Local TV News? Medium
The end of investigative journalism? Not yet Columbia Journalism Review
Former ProPublica journalists are launching a newsroom to cover the impact of technology on society Harvard’s Nieman Lab
Headlines editors probably wish they could take back Columbia Journalism Review
Pulitzer Prize Winners Associated Press
***THE BUSINESS OF JOURNALISM
TV news employment surpasses newspapers RTDNA
As a secretive hedge fund guts its newspapers, journalists are fighting back Washington Post
Journalism can profit from the nonprofit model OC Register
The staggering body count as California newspapers founder, and democracy loses LA Times
***TEACHING JOURNALISM
Missouri School of Journalism grapples with what to do about Sinclair Broadcasting Missourian
It Matters a Lot Who Teaches Introductory Courses: Here's Why Chronicle of Higher Ed
***FAKE NEWS
The Rise of the Crisis Actor Conspiracy Movement VICE
The bots beat: How not to get punked by automation Columbia Journalism Review
Can “Extreme Transparency” Fight Fake News and Create More Trust With Readers? Harvard’s Nieman Reports
***BIG DATA & AI
Working for the algorithm Machines will help employers overcome bias Economist
Really Random Numbers thanks to Quantum Physics NPR
Artificial intelligence in the supermarket produce aisles Tech Crunch
Automatic generation of data visualizations using sequence-to-sequence recurrent neural networks Toward Data Science
A dozen major big data analytics tools grouped by storage, cleaning, mining, visualization Datamation
***CODING & HTML
Building a Text Editor for a Digital-First Newsroom: An inside look at the inner workings of a technology you may take for granted New York Times
Best coding games and toys for kids 2018 Tech Advisor
***ART & DESIGN
This Optical Illusion Where Colors Disappear When You Stare At Them Is Breaking Our Brains Digg
Helvetica Is Now An Encryption Device Fast Company
***MUSIC
What Makes This Song Great? Ep. 1
Kendrick Lamar Wins Pulitzer Prize New York Times
***FILM
Netflix Pulls Out of Cannes Following Rule Change Variety
***THE BUSINESS OF MEDIA
Radio isn't dead yet, but its future isn’t exactly healthy cnet
***PERSONAL GROWTH
The Search for Unintended Consequences Becoming (my blog)
***WRITING & READING
Why American Students Haven't Gotten Better at Reading in 20 Years The Atlantic
Did the CIA fund creative writing in America? Chronicle of Higher Ed
***LANGUAGE
Much Ado About ‘Ado’ Chronicle of Higher Ed
Disappearing Languages Interactive
Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice As Much Language Learning Material Fast Company
***LITERATURE
5 Classic Literature Books You Need to Give Another Chance Study Breaks
A poetry professor Deals with a Racial Slur Washington Post
***GENDER
How #MeToo is inspiring a new era of feminist literature Standard
Ever wonder why you've never seen a woman making sushi? This female sushi chef explains why Mashable
***RACE & ETHNICITY ISSUES
Please Don’t Answer This 2020 Census Survey The New Yorker
***FREE SPEECH
Most College Presidents Worry That Speech Issues Could Trigger Violence Chronicle of Higher Ed
***LEGAL ISSUES
***RELIGION
Hybels steps down from Willow Creek following allegations of misconduct Chicago Tribune
Ken Ham Can’t Find Enough Creationist Employees, So He’s Loosening Restrictions Patheos
Why this former religion television reporter is considering divorcing her evangelical family Washington Post
***RELIGION IN COURT
North County pastor sentenced for molesting young relative Fox-5
Ex-Dolphins cheerleader claims NFL discriminated against her because of her faith CBS News
Houston Megachurch Pastor Pleading Not Guilty To Fraud Charges Houston Public Media
Man who cites opposition to abortion for not paying taxes wins Round 1 in court Oregon Lives
Mormon growth continues to slow, especially in the U.S. (opinion) Religion News
Trial of U.S. pastor facing up to 35 years in prison set to start in Turkey NBC News
***RELIGION & BOOKS
Two publishers suspend publication of books by megachurch pastor Hybels in wake of misconduct allegations Chicago Tribune
Tyndale Sued by Boy Who Didn’t Come Back from Heaven Christianity Today
Jimmy Carter, 93, talks about his new book: ‘Faith’ Religious News Service
***RELIGION AND POLITICS
Inside the White House Bible Study group BBC
California Bill would Outlaw Gay Conversion ‘Therapy’ San Jose Inside
US vice-president Mike Pence meets Southern Baptist megachurch pastors Christian Today
Who Is Reinhold Niebuhr And What Is His Connection To James Comey? NPR
Colombia’s Next President Could Be an Evangelical Woman Christianity Today
***STUDENT MEDIA
How Parkland student journalists covered the shooting they survived and friends they lost Washington Post
Legal Analysis: Getting the numbers on college censorship Student Press Law Center
Liberty president censors student newspaper over critics Richmond Free Press
University of Toledo newspaper in danger of closing Toledo Blade
***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT
Schools like Harvard Shouldn’t be Investigating Itself (opinion) The Crimson
Did These Women See #MeToo Coming New York Times
Head of Nobel literature prize panel quits over sex abuse scandal The Guardian
***BUSINESS
Gaslighting for Beginners (satire) Medium
***HEALTH
Lyme disease the first epidemic of climate change Aeon
The States Where People Die Young The Atlantic
Too much sitting may thin the part of your brain that's important for memory, study suggests LA Times
***FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS
These Maps Show the Average Cost of Childcare in Each State Fatherly.com
It Takes 90 Hours to Make a New Friend Life Hacker
California museum exhibit of awkward family photos Awkward Family Photos
***SCIENCE
Lights, cameras, science: Using video to engage broader audiences The Research Whisperer
Physicists set new record for quantum entanglement Univeristat Unnsbruck
***PSYCHOLOGY
This strange syndrome causes people to think their loved ones have been replaced by identical impostors Washington Post
***PRODUCTIVITY
10 Hidden URLs to Help You Rule the Web Field Guide
***RESEARCH
The ethics of scientific publishing Chemistry World
Researchers who actively push their papers on social media gain more citations, study finds Times Higher Ed
***HIGHER ED
College plays a powerful role in achieving the American dream (opinion) The Hill
Justice Department Investigating How Colleges Use Early-Decision Admissions NPR
***HUMANITIES & STEM
Can tech save the humanities? Boston Globe
Dear Humanities Profs: We Are the Problem Chronicle of Higher Ed
***TEACHING
Are 'Learning Styles' Real? The Atlantic
Forgetting makes us smarter. Use these tricks to remember what you need to NBC News
***ACADEMIC LIFE
How Much Did Professors Earn This Year? Barely Enough to Beat Inflation Chronicle of Higher Ed
***STUDENT LIFE
Student Loan Reform (opinion) New York Times
More colleges are saying yes to dogs and cats in dorms Washington Post
4 in 10 millennials don't know 6 million Jews were killed in Holocaust, study shows CBS News
Modest Advice for New Graduate Students Medium
First-generation students are disproportionately more unlikely to finish college National Center for Education Statistics
Millennials are the largest generation in the U.S. labor force Pew Research Center
Duke protesters disrupt president's speech to alumni News Observer
The Search for Unintended Consequences
/Any idiot can build a system. Any amateur can make it perform. Professionals think about how a system will fail. It’s very common for people to think about how a system will work if it is used the way they imagine. But they don’t think about how that system might work if it were used by a bad actor or a perfectly ordinary person who is just a little different from what the person designing it is like.
Companies need to be thinking about how each product could actually be used in the real world. If you build a product that works great for men and is going to lead to harassment of women, you have a problem. If you build a product that makes everyone’s address books 5 percent more efficient and then gets three people killed because it their personal information to their stalkers, that’s a problem.
What you need is a very diverse working group that can recognize a wide range of problems, that knows which questions to ask and has support inside the company and in the broader community to surface these issues and make sure they are taken seriously. If they’re in there from day one it makes a huge difference.
Former Google engineer Yonatan Zunger in an interview with NPR
What is love?
/What is love? Tell me through the story of your life. –Krista Tippett
Expand the pie
/What interests of your adversary overlap with your own? Expand the pie before you divide it.
rules against ourselves
/We set up harsh and unkind rules against ourselves. No one is born without faults. –Homer
Articles of interest - April 9, 2018
/***SOCIAL MEDIA
How to Check if Cambridge Analytica Could Access Your Facebook Data WIRED
An estimated two-thirds of tweeted links to popular websites are posted by automated accounts – not human beings Pew Research
How Twitter Bots Help Fuel Political Feuds Scientific American
Zuckerberg is Getting training on how to testify before Congress The New York Times
Facebook Imposes New Restrictions on Ads and Popular Pages WIRED
‘You Are the Product’: Targeted by Cambridge Analytica on Facebook New York Times
***PRIVACY
Financial Analyst Says Most Consumers Don't Realize How Their Data Is Used NPR
***CONSUMING MEDIA
You Are The Media You Eat Medium
How to Balance Your Media Diet Medium
***TECHNOLOGY
US suspects cellphone spying devices in DC Associated Press
A Long-Awaited IoT Crisis Is Here, and Many Devices Aren't Ready WIRED
***BIG DATA & AI
Some data sets for teaching data science Simply Statistics
***INTERNET
Best Mobile Browsers: Microsoft Edge, Firefox Focus, Google Chrome, and More WIRED
***PRODUCING MEDIA
True Crime, Fake Homicide: The Onion's 'A Very Fatal Murder' Podcast NPR
The Cohort: 'Pick the part of the media world you think most needs to exist and start making it' Poynter
Switching Every 19 Seconds: How Our Brains Multitask With New Media Forbes
***JOURNALISM
TV reporter prompts 911 call of ‘crazy lady’ talking to self Seattle Times
Homeland Security to Compile Database of Journalists, Bloggers Big Law Business
Trump's feud with Amazon is really about the Washington Post's success The Guardian
Push Notifications at the NYT New York Times
Unpaid internships and a culture of privilege are ruining journalism (opinion) The Guardian
How Trump thrives in ‘news deserts’ POLITICO
This Is What It Was Like Learning To Report Before Fake News Was The Biggest Problem In The World BuzzFeed
***JOURNALISM & TECHNOLOGY
A Startup Media Site Says AI Can Take Bias Out of News Motherboard
Automated fact-checking has come a long way. But it still faces significant challenges Poynter
Twitter, Facebook, Slack: Using Every Tool to Hear What Readers Think The New York Times
***JOURNALISM & SINCLAIR
KVAL co-anchors refuse to read controversial script Register Guard
I Quit Working For Sinclair And They Sued Me. Here's Why I'm Fighting Back Huffington Post
SPJ disappointed by Sinclair chairman's comments about print journalists Society of Professional Journalists
Sinclair Rescinds Donation Pledge to NPPA for Legal Advocacy NPPA
Sinclair is hiring for hundreds of open positions, amid ‘must-run’ script scandal ThinkProgress
Journalism-school Deans Send Letter to Sinclair: the company has "crossed a line" The Hill
***THE BUSINESS OF JOURNALISM
Local TV is doing way better than you’d think, a new report suggests Nieman Lab
Denver Post Finds Out Why Laying Off A Third Of Your Newsroom Is A Bad Idea Digg
Mapping the future of local news, together Poynter
Why do reporters take the risk to start a media business? These answers might surprise you Medium
Tariffs on Canadian Newsprint threatens American Newspapers (opinion) Chronicle of Higher Ed
Lobby State lawmakers to pass a bill barring non-compete clauses for broadcast journalists (opinion) Providence Journal
***FAKE NEWS
A new study suggests fake news might have won Donald Trump the 2016 election Washington Post
How A Teacher In France Is Trying To Help Her Students Spot Fake News NPR
A guide to the (many, similarly named) new efforts fighting for journalism Nieman Lab
The Man Who Spent $100K To Remove A Lie From Google NPR
Critics of Dan Rather’s tips about fake news brought up his past. But the points are still solid Washington Post
The Era of Fake Video Begins The Atlantic
Weaponized ‘fake news’ claims are now doing real damage RTDNA
Can “Extreme Transparency” Fight Fake News and Create More Trust With Readers? Nieman Reports
***STUDENT MEDIA
‘It Has to Be Perfect’: Putting Out a Yearbook After the Parkland Shooting The New York Times
SMU to take control of student newspaper Dallas News
WSU president approves cut to student newspaper, but offers other university funding The Wichita Eagle
A 21-year-old dropped out of college to rate dogs on the internet — and now he's making six figures Business Insider
Concern, condemnation after SFCC student newspaper reports on Pitcher scandal disappear Spokesman
***PERSONAL GROWTH
Sharing photos may subtly change how we remember Becoming (my blog)
Why We Like Things That Are Bad For Us Medium
7-Year Follow-Up Shows Lasting Cognitive Gains From Meditation UC Davis
The Gig Economy Celebrates Working Yourself to Death The New Yorker
***WRITING & READING
Expand Your Writing Potential with a Smart Notebook and Pen Chronicle of Higher Ed
Can You Identify a Lower Case G? “An intriguing way of looking at questions about the importance of writing for reading” Scholarly Kitchen
***LANGUAGE
The number of American college students studying foreign languages continues to fall Quartz
Scientists Probe an Enduring Question: Can Language Shape Perception? Undark
Trendy Suffixes, for Fun and Profit Chronicle of Higher Ed
The ‘g’ in Google’s Old Logo Is Really Weird The Atlantic
Think You Know a Word’s Origin? Think Again Chronicle of Higher Ed
***LITERATURE
How Trump Is Shaking Up the Book Industry POLITICO
10 Satirical Covers for the Terrible Books You Can’t Get Away From: Imaginary cover designs for the worst clichés in publishing Electric Literature
Copy Editing and Proofreading a Book: It Takes a Village Chronicle of Higher Ed
25 Amazing Books by Women You Need to Read Mental Floss
Why the literature of antiquity still matters Washington Post
***GENDER
Court: Employers Can’t Pay Women Less Because of their Salary History Washington Post
Female Medics Rushed to Help a Man Who Collapsed in a Sumo Ring. They Were Promptly Told to Leave TIME
Women file to run for US House seats in record numbers Associated Press
Feminist Health Guide 'Our Bodies, Ourselves' Will Stop Publishing NPR
Men are Concerned about what #MeToo is doing to men at work Washington Post
***RACE & ETHNICITY ISSUES
On Being Excluded: Testimonies by People of Color in Scholarly Publishing The Scholarly Kitchen
The Billion-Dollar Romance Fiction Industry Has A Diversity Problem NPR
Textbook Racism: How scholars sustained white supremacy Chronicle of Higher Ed
It's time to re-examine diversity and inclusion programs to make real progress The Hill
***LEGAL ISSUES
Has This Man Sued You? A "Copyright Troll" Takes on Hollywood Hollywood Reporter
Music Copyright After 'Blurred Lines': Experts Speak Out Rolling Stone
InfoWars sued by man Alex Jones falsely identified as Parkland gunman The Guardian
So to Speak podcast: Have you been defamed? The FIRE
Judge Judy's $47 Million Salary Isn't Too Much, Rules Real Judge Hollywood Reporter
***RELIGION
Can religion solve El Salvador’s gang problem? 1843 magazine
Bibles pulled from online stores as China increases control of religion CNN
Christian women in the U.S. more religious than their male counterparts Pew Research Center
Witches, Frog-Gods, and the Deepening Schism of Internet Religions WIRED
The most religious regions in the US Gallup
California Lawmakers Consider How To Regulate Homeschools After Abuse Discovery NPR
Texas pastor arrested for failing to report sexual assault Star-Telegram
Billy Graham's regrets, in his own words Christianity Today
***ART & DESIGN
The Inside Story of Reddit's Redesign WIRED
Googles in the Gallary: Mass Art Museums Venture into Virtual Reality The ARTery
***MUSIC
'Just As True': Johnny Cash's Poems Set To Music For New Album NPR
As Boomer Musicians Retire, Concert Industry Faces Uncertain Future Rolling Stone
***FILM
Great Movies About Faith Are Hard To Come By. Enter 'Blue Velvet' Vox
***STUDENT LIFE
Hunger And Homelessness Are Widespread Among College Students, Study Finds : The Two-Way NPR
Parkland highlights political potential of millennials. The question now is if they'll vote LA Times
Food, Housing Insecurity May Be Keeping College Students From Graduating NPR
What do students want most? To be treated with respect The Guardian
Why is the Drinking Age 21? Mental Floss
***SOCIAL ISSUES
Dangerous, growing, yet unnoticed: the rise of America's white gangs The Guaridan
Attack At YouTube Offices Brings Company's Content Policy Into Question NPR
Why Pure Reason Won’t End American Tribalism WIRED
***BUSINESS
2018 Airfare Study – The Best Time to Buy Flights, based on 917 million airfares Cheap Air
Customer service could start living up to its name: How AI can make businesses look more caring Economist
How Baby Boomers, Gen-Xers And Millennials Would Invest $10,000, Visualized Digg
***HEALTH
How To Play Video Games Without Messing Up Your Body Kotaku
Huge trove of unknown viruses found in fish, frogs and reptiles Nature
Fighting Bacterial Infection With…Viruses? Daily Jstor
Food allergy is linked to skin exposure and genetics Northwestern University
There’s no such thing as an ‘opioid-addicted’ newborn Washington Post
***FAMILY
Dishwashing causes more relationship distress than any other household task The Atlantic
'No One Meant To Be In My Office': A Divorce Lawyer's Tips On Staying Together NPR
***PSYCHOLOGY
The Psychology Behind False Confessions Daily Jstor
Many People Taking Antidepressants Discover They Cannot Quit New York Times
***NEUROSCIENCE
New Brain Maps With Unmatched Detail May Change Neuroscience WIRED
***PHILOSOPHY
Nietzsche on Truth, Lies, the Power and Peril of Metaphor, and How We Use Language to Reveal and Conceal Reality Brain Pickings
Frog and Toad Attend a Philosophy Class Daily Jstor
Want to raise the next Socrates? Teaching children philosophy is easier than you think Big Think
***RESEARCH
Is recycling Methods text from an old paper, to use in a new paper that applies the same techniques, efficient writing – or self-plagiarism? Scientist Sees Squirrel
NIH rejected study of alcohol advertising while pursuing industry funding Stat News
The Scientific Paper Is Obsolete. Here's What's Next The Atlantic
New study helps explain why so many results in animal studies don’t hold up in human trials Science Mag
***HIGHER ED
How Big Colleges Prey On Fan Loyalty To Fight Back Against Scandals Deadspin
Trump’s Man on Campus POLITICO
With Changing Students and Times, Colleges are Facing a Gloomy Picture, Forcing an overhaul of campuses New York Times
***CAMPUS & CRIME
17 Colleges Fell Short On Campus Safety, But The Education Department Didn’t Tell The Schools BuzzFeed
Current/Former faculty members say the Univ. of Chicago has historically has wielded deadly force against the community Chicago Maroon
***CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS
‘Gay on God’s Campus’ Inside Higher Ed
Christian colleges worry about losing federal funding due to policies affirming Biblical view of sexuality Christianity Today
Adjunct Faculty Stage Walkout at Jesuit University Washington Post
Liberty U’s Falwell ‘censors’ student newspaper coverage of event organized by critics Religious News
Shane Claiborne Says Liberty University Threatened to Arrest Him for Organizing Prayer Meeting Christian Headlines
***TEACHING
Building Skills Outside the Classroom with New Ways of Learning New York Times
***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT
News women blacklisted after speaking out about sexual harassment Columbia Journalist Review
An Arc of Outrage: Despite the clamor, the real conversation about campus sexual assault has hardly begun Chronicle of Higher Ed
Professor Whose Assault Case Prompted Policy Changes at U. of Texas Is Found Dead Fox-7
Piano Students at Utah State U. Endured Humiliation and Sexual Harassment, Report Says Chronicle of Higher Ed
A Candid Legal Debate on Hollywood and #MeToo: "Did the Law Fail Us?" Hollywood Reporter
Why Colleges Shouldn’t Be Handling Sexual-Assault Complaints Chronicle of Higher Ed
Vonda dyer's statement re: Chicago tribune and bill hybels Vonda Dyer’s Blog
***ACADEMIC LIFE
Professors Are Targets In Online Culture Wars; Some Fight Back NPR
A Professor's Testimonial: I Lived out of My Car at College Ozy
Departure of MassArt Professor Saul Levine Raises Academic Freedom Concerns National Coalition Against Censorship
incompatibility
/What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility. Tolstoy
striving and struggling
/What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him. -Victor Frankl
believe them
/When people show you who they are, believe them. -Maya Angelou
the details
/We think in generalities but live in detail. –Alfred North Whitehead
Articles of Interest - April 2, 2018
/***TECHNOLOGY
11 Tell-Tale Signs Your Accounts and Devices Have Been Hacked Field Guide
Technologies To Create Fake Audio And Video Are Quickly Evolving NPR
It's Time for an RSS Revival Wired
FCC approves SpaceX’s ambitious satellite internet plans The Verge
Can A Computer Predict The Pattern Of Your Life Based On The Past? NPR
Microsoft is launching a huge reorganization to focus on AI and the cloud MIT Technology Review
Meet The Companies Behind Facial Recognition Technology NPR
***SOCIAL MEDIA
How To Download Your Facebook Data and What To Look For in It Wired
Top Facebook Executive Defended Data Collection In 2016 Memo — And Warned That Facebook Could Get People Killed BuzzFeed News
Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook’s hardest year, and what comes next Vox
Snapchat May Risk Connecting Apps, Despite Facebook Uproar Tech News World
***PHONE ADDICTION
You Know Who's Really Addicted to Their Phones? The Olds. WIRED
The psychological design tricks websites like Facebook and Amazon use to keep you addicted Quartz
***PRIVACY
Apple CEO criticizes Facebook amid privacy scandal (video) MSNBC
How a data mining giant got me wrong Reuters
The Facebook Privacy Setting That Doesn’t Do Anything at All Wired
***THE BUSINESS OF MEDIA
How digital advertising became a total mess Axios
Radio's Big Challenge: Finding Its Way Forward In This New Digital World Forbes
What Makes a Great Magazine Editor? Business of Fashion
Technology has upended the world’s advertising giants Economist
***BIG DATA & AI
New tools that have begun to automate how data is prepared for analytics Inside Big Data
Should businesses be treating data like dangerous chemicals? Information Age
Helping CEOs make sense of the machine learning buzz words—a cheat sheet of definitions Chief Executive
Three examples of machine learning in the newsroom Medium
Google's G Suite activity dashboard for Google Docs/Sheets/Slides gives insight on who has viewed the document and when Tech Republic
***JOURNALISM
Tweets are the new vox populi Columbia Journalism Review
From journalism class, tragedy — and a new course Poynter
Facebook discusses accreditation of Journalists Columbia Journalism Review
Inside The Seattle Times’ newsletter strategy Lenfest Institute
5 Reasons to Go Mobile First with Vertical Video Video Strategist
News publishers are tracking plenty of data, too. Here's how to see what yours is looking at Poynter
***THE BUSINESS OF JOURNALISM
Sinclair Broadcast Group Slammed for Video Montage of Local Anchors Reading Anti-Media Script Hollywood Reporter
John Oliver Goes Off on Sinclair, Calls News Anchors ‘Members of a Brainwashed Cult’ The Daily Beast
Tampa Bay Times to be sold to GateHouse Media in $79M deal Florida Politics
Russian bots are rallying behind embattled Fox News host Laura Ingraham as advertisers dump her show Business Insider
7 Reasons Why News Startups Fail PBS Media Shift
***FAKE NEWS
The First Prank Calls Were Surprisingly Morbid Atlas Obscura
Why ‘Media Literacy’ Doesn’t Stand a Chance Chronicle of Higher Education
Fake News, Fake Porn, and AI Media Ethics Initiative
The fight against digital disinformation gets $10 million from the Hewlett Foundation Nieman Journalism Lab
She's an expert at spotting fake news: This is what she wants you to know Upworthy
Fake News, The Good Kind: No Joking (Okay, Some Joking) Media Post
The real problem with Sinclair’s ‘fake’ news script (opinion) Washington Post
***PERSONAL GROWTH
A Giant Source of Distraction: Just taking photos in general was enough to decrease scores on a memory test Becoming (my blog)
Why the ‘5 Second Rule’ Will Destroy Your Procrastination, According to Science Medium
***GRAMMAR
The rules of written English no longer apply to millennials on social media Mashable
***WRITING & READING
Why The Number Of Independent Bookstores Increased During The 'Retail Apocalypse' NPR
Grab Readers' Attention With These 13 Headline Writing Tips Forbes
***LANGUAGE
Language is the last frontier for Hollywood film-makers Economist
Do the words “Americans like me” separate people or join them? Chronicle of Higher Education
Most Hispanic parents speak Spanish to their children, but this is less the case in later immigrant generations Pew Research
How the French Are Celebrating Their Language Chronicle of Higher Education
***LITERATURE
Are You There God?' book redesign has Judy Blume fans in an uproar NBC’s Today Show
How a centuries old publishing house is making its mark on the digital CNBC age
The 1,700+ Words Invented by Shakespeare* Open Culture
'World Make Way': New Poems Paint Classic Pictures NPR
Patti Smith’s 40 Favorite Books Open Culture
In Children’s Books, How Much Reality is Too Much? Daily Jstor
***GENDER
The lives and deaths of transgender Latin Americans Economist
12 Stories Of Mansplaining That Will Make You Say "Man, The Things Women Have To Put Up With!" BuzzFeed News
India’s gender gap is closing in some respects, but remains vast Economist
American names that have become less gendered since 1920 The Atlantic
Student uses big data to examine global digital gender gap Phys.org
The Very Male Trump Administration The Atlantic
***RACE & ETHNICITY ISSUES
The Whitesplaining of History Is Over Chronicle of Higher Education
Police investigating racist email sent to students and staff at Colorado College KKTV
***LEGAL ISSUES
Password Sharing Is a Federal Crime, Appeals Court Rules MotherBoard
Immigration Courts (video) John Oliver
Copyright and Online Journalism: What’s Going On In New York? Electronic Frontier Foundation
Is it legal For Cops To Open iPhones With Dead People's Fingerprints Forbes
Judge Refuses to Dismiss Copyright Lawsuit Over LeBron James Tattoo in 'NBA 2K' Hollywood Reporter
Realistic Docudramas Don’t Violate California Publicity Rights–deHavilland v. FX Technology & Marketing Law Blog
***RELIGION
The Bible College hazing Experience: Jesus Camp & Suicide Hospital Stay (video)
Losing their religion: The number of ex-Muslims in America is rising Economist
Ice cream chain being boycotted for its 'totally offensive' Christianity-inspired name SF Gate
Evangelical Support for Trump & a New book on Pope Francis (video) MSNBC
Snoop Dogg answers haters of his new Gospel album: 'I thought Church was supposed to welcome sinners' Christian Today
Conservative Christian Singer Loses Costa Rica Presidential Race Christianity Today
At Easter, God didn’t give us the Messiah we wanted but the one we needed (Phillip Yancey) Washington Post
NPR Catches Hell Over Easter Mistake NPR
Supreme Court declines appeal over cross in Grand Haven Mlive
***RELIGIOUS & TV/FILM
Box Office: Henson And Perry's 'Acrimony' Opens To $17M, 'Gods Not Dead' Dies Forbes
People Are Saying This Christian Surfing Movie Is the Next 'The Room' Vice
NBC's 'Jesus Christ Superstar Live' shouldn't have worked. Here's why it did LA Times
***RELIGIOUS LEADERS IN TROUBLE
Houston megachurch pastor and spiritual adviser to President George W. Bush indicted ‑ Feds say he sold millions in worthless bonds Washington Post
Southern Baptist Leader Resigns over ‘Morally Inappropriate Relationship’ Christianity Today
New revelations about alleged sex cult leader accused of branding women CBS News
Bill Hybels Accused of Sexual Misconduct by Former Willow Creek Leaders Christianity Today
***RELIGION IN CHINA
As China tightens rules on religion, unregistered churches wince Economist
'This Is Making a Lot of Christians in China Very Nervous' The Atlantic
Baptist University students’ new suspensions called a warning to those opposing school policies South China Morning Post
***ART, DESIGN, & DATA VIZ
This map shows every inch of snow that fell on the lower 48 this year Washington Post
A Visualization as to what Daylight saving time would be like all year Tamp Bay Times
Visualizing Outliers Flowing Data
***MUSIC
Behold the MusicMap: The Ultimate Interactive Genealogy of Music Created Between 1870 and 2016 Open Culture
***FILM
Three faith-based movies are in theaters during Easter. How this Christian film critic assesses them LA Times
Martin Scorsese Create a List of 38 Essential Films About American Democracy Open Culture
***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT
College Volleyball Coach Accused of Body Shaming Courthouse News
***SOCIAL ISSUES
Do immigrants lead to crime? A recent study says no The Marshall Project
***BUSINESS
10 Years After: How the world has changed since the 2008 financial crisis in Graphs Wall Street Journal
The Two Traits of the Best Problem-Solving Teams Harvard Business Review
***HEALTH
What Are Screens Doing to Our Eyes—And Our Ability to See? WIRED
Here’s how an overdose shuts down your body: A Data Visualization Science News
One of Asia’s poorest countries is making huge progress against a persistent health scourge Economist
New 'organ' Discovered? EurekAlert! Science News
New Study: It doesn’t matter if you get your daily exercise all at once or in two minute breaks New York Times
Why Some Americans Are Risking It and Skipping Health Insurance Bloomberg
***FAMILIES & RELATIONSHIPS
One in three families can’t afford diapers. Why are they so expensive? Tampa Bay Times
How parents' arguments really affect their children BBC
What Happens When You Track Your Boyfriend on Strava WIRED
***SCIENCE
Are research papers less accurate and truthful than in the past? Economist
How (and Whether) to Teach Undergraduates About the Replication Crisis in Psychological Science Sage Journals
Keeping science honest Science Mag
***PSYCHOLOGY
Judges and examiners get laxer with practice Economist
How (and Whether) to Teach Undergraduates About the Replication Crisis in Psychological Science Sage Publishing
How and where growing numbers of Americans are taking their own lives Economist
***NEUROSCIENCE
'The Neuroscientist Who Lost Her Mind' Tells How A Brain Doctor Coped With Cancer NPR
***PHILOSOPHY
Marco Rubio admits he was wrong…about philosophy Quartz
***HISTORY
FBI investigated early LGBT organization for alleged Communist ties MuckRock
***ETHICS
Doctor-assisted suicide close to becoming law in Hawaii Associated Press
***RESEARCH
What is the impact of retractions in science? Elephant in the Lab
Congress Will Finally Make Its Research Reports Public Electronic Frontier Foundation
For Watchdog Scientists, Using Software to Fight Dubious Cancer Research Undark
***HIGHER ED
Regulations that the Dept of Ed may Change Politico
Trump in Ohio: ‘I don’t know what that means, a community college’ Boston Globe
Donald Trump Doesn't Understand what a Community College is The Atlantic
Most Colleges At Risk Of Phishing, Study Finds Media Post
***HIGHER ED FINANCES
For small, private colleges, fewer students means more worries Boston Globe
Michigan State spent $500K in January to monitor social media accounts of Nassar victims, others Lansing State Journal
Credit-rating agency Gives an upgrade to Final Four Team Loyola-Chicago The Bond Buyer
Howard University employees fired following investigation into stolen financial aid CNBC
***HIGHER ED & THE COURTS
California’s highest court ruled last week that a student who had been stabbed at UCLA could sue the university for negligence Chronicle of Higher Education
Grad students sue Colorado State University for skipping accreditation Business Den
***CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS
Study finds Christian colleges and universities add $60 billion each year to national economy Chicago Tribune
Largest Christian university opens 'sophisticated' gun range for students Fox News
**CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS & LGBT ISSUES
Christian Colleges That Oppose LGBT Rights Worried About Losing Funding Under Title VII NPR
Christian Colleges Are Tangled In Their Own LGBT Policies NPR
Christian Colleges Increasingly Facing Division over LGBT Issues Christian Headlines
***TEACHING
The benefits to faculty members of working to make their course materials more accessible Chronicle of Higher Education
Accessibility, Audio Texts, and the Persistence of Print Chronicle of Higher Education
How to Help Young People (and Adults) Unplug and Engage (video) Chronicle of Higher Ed
***STUDENT MEDIA
Washington Becomes the 14th state to extend free speech protections to student journalists Renton Reporter
***STUDENT LIFE
The Very Unnerving Existence of Teen Boss, a Magazine for Girls New Yorker
Eastern Michigan students walk out in protest of athletics, staff cuts Mlive
Investigation After Utah Student’s Death Finds Serious Issues Within Physics and Astronomy Department Daily Utah Chronicle
***ACADEMIC LIFE
Tenured professors at Kentucky's public colleges could be fired thanks to a new provision in the state’s budget bill Courier-Journal
University Paid Researcher $50,000 Believing He Was Working From Home. He Was Dead TIME
Hobart and William Smith Colleges Investigates Claims That Its President Plagiarized Dissertation Chronicle of Higher Education
Plagiarism: A Hidden Problem in Academic Medicine Council on Communications and Media Blog
Who’s Reading Your Email? Inside Higher Ed
A Giant Source of Distraction
/In study published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.. a few hundred participants took a self-guided tour through the Stanford Memorial Church. On the tour, the participants were supposed to take note of details like “the cruciform shape of the church” and make sure they checked out the bronze angels that “greet you from the massive entry doors.”
Some of these participants had iPods equipped with cameras and were instructed to take photos (either to print out later or to post on Facebook). Other participants went in empty-handed.
A week after the tour, the participants were given a surprise quiz, with questions about details they should have learned on the tour. In one arm of the study, those without a camera got around 7 out of 10 questions right. Those who had a camera scored closer to 6. That’s like going from a C to a D, a small but significant difference.
“Just taking photos in general was enough to decrease scores on a memory test,” says Emma Templeton, a Dartmouth psychological researcher who was a co-author of the study.
Why? The simple answer is that the camera is a distraction. “It could just be that we’re using these devices, distracting ourselves from the experience, and because of that distraction, we don’t remember the thing we’re supposed to be paying attention to,” says Templeton.
And because of the ubiquity of smartphones, “we’ve just inserted into our daily lives potentially a giant source of distraction.
Brian Resnick writing in Vox
the life that is waiting for us
/We must be willing to get rid of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.
-Joseph Campbell
Strengthen your Alliances
/The best way to engage with new people is not by cold calling or by "networking" with strangers at cocktail parties, but by working with the people you already know. Of the many types of professional relationships, among the most important are your close allies. Most professionals maintain five to 10 active alliances. What makes a relationship an alliance? First, an ally is someone you consult regularly for advice. Second, you proactively share and collaborate on opportunities together. You keep your antennae attuned to an ally's interests, and when it makes sense to pursue something jointly, you do. Third, you talk up an ally. You promote his or her brand. Finally, when an ally runs into conflict, you defend him and stand up for his reputation, and he does the same for you. An alliance is always an exchange, but not a transactional one. A transactional relationship is when your accountant files your tax returns and you pay him for his time.
An alliance is when a co-worker needs last-minute help on Sunday night preparing for a Monday morning presentation, and even though you're busy, you agree to go over to his house and help.
Reid Hoffman, The Start-Up of You
the clock and the calendar
/We must not allow the clock and the calendar to blind us to the fact that each moment of life is a miracle and mystery. - H. G. Wells
How to justify revoking a person's status as a human worthy of dignity
/The “No one to blame but themselves” rule “implies that once someone breaks a rule, you can do whatever you want to them and you cannot be blamed. We need that one mortal sin which will let us revoke a person's status as a human worthy of dignity, respect, empathy or anything else.” -David Wong