Ben Smith: How Zeynep Tufekci Keeps Getting the Big Things Right (NYT)
Many tech journalists, entranced by the internet-fueled movements sweeping the globe, were slow to spot the ways they might fail, or how social media could be used against them. Dr. Tufekci, though, had “seen movement after movement falter because of a lack of organizational depth and experience, of tools or culture for collective decision making, and strategic, long-term action,” she wrote in her 2017 book, “Twitter and Tear Gas.”
That is, the same social-media savvy that hastened their rise sometimes left them “unable to engage in the tactical and decision-making maneuvers all movements must master to survive,” she wrote.
That’s a lesson many social movements have learned since those days, and this summer’s Black Lives Matter protests locked in some immediate political gains.
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An area where she might be ahead of the pack is the effects of social media on society. It’s a debate she views as worryingly binary, detached from plausible solutions, with journalists homing in on the personal morality of tech heads like Mark Zuckerberg as they assume the role of mall cops for the platforms they cover.
“The real question is not whether Zuck is doing what I like or not,” she said. “The real question is why he’s getting to decide what hate speech is.”
She also suggested that we may get it wrong when we focus on individuals — on chief executives, on social media activists like her. The probable answer to a media environment that amplifies false reports and hate speech, she believes, is the return of functional governments, along with the birth of a new framework, however imperfect, that will hold the digital platforms responsible for what they host.
Let's face it. We are all stuck indoors.
And it's going to be a while till we travel again.
Window Swap is here to fill that deep void in our wanderlust hearts by allowing us to look through someone else's window, somewhere in the world, for a while.
A place on the internet where all we travel hungry fools share our 'window views' to help each other feel a little bit better till we can (responsibly) explore our beautiful planet again.
Use these instructions to get up and running with helping your community!
Kick off your city's relief efforts as we all learn to cope with COVID-19 with this starter powered by Gatsby, Airtable, and community efforts.
This project is aims to make it as easy as possible to launch and manage an index of resources in your city during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Stay up to date on tools, resources, and supports made necessary during this time. #WhileAtHome is a clearinghouse for credible information and action steps.
In cases of emergency, many organizations need a quick way to publish critical information. But existing (CMS) websites are often unable to handle sudden spikes in traffic.
Like so many others, I’m currently in voluntary quarantine at home - and I used some time this weekend to put a small boilerplate together for this exact usecase.
Here’s the main idea:
• generate a static site with Eleventy
• minimal markup, inlined CSS
• aim to transmit everything in the first connection roundtrip (~14KB)
• progressively enable offline-support w/ Service Worker
• set up Netlify CMS for easy content editing
• one-click deployment via Netlify
The site contains only the bare minimum - no webfonts, no tracking, no unnecessary images. The entire thing should fit in a single HTTP request. It’s basically just a small, ultra-lean blog focused on maximum resilience and accessibility. The Service Worker takes it a step further from there so if you’ve visited the site once, the information is still accessible even if you lose network coverage.
The end result is just a set of static files that can be easily hosted on cloud infrastructure and put on a CDN. Netlify does this out of the box, but other providers or privately owned servers are possible as well.
Drew Millard: Time for some completely unhelpful game theory (The Outline)
Historical precedents and doomsday projections serve their purpose, but focusing on the worst-case scenario is a great way to make yourself sick with anxiety right now.
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Reading about the worst-case scenarios at a time like this is about as helpful as licking the handle of a shopping cart.
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I’m not saying that we should not be concerned about coronavirus. We most undoubtedly should be. But at a time like this, worst-case scenarios are not your friend, unless you like being friends with things that give you nightmares. It can be easy to catastrophize, to let your mind wander into doom and gloom, to feel like you have no control over events shaping your life, when you’re stuck inside seemingly watching the world crumble around you. It’s important to remember, though, that just as the coronavirus has enjoyed such a rapid spread because we live in such a physically connected world, our digitally connected world may just mitigate it.
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Just stay inside, stay safe, and stay away from that really scary coronavirus story, and the next one, and the one after that.
A big Google Document full of helpful tips for online meetings, classes, and events.
Friends, as we scramble to move our offline interactions online, this is an emerging initial place to share, curate and organize resources. It could really use the loving attention of a great curator!