Mammon category archive
“There’s One Now” 0
Dick Polman muses about how to spot a sociopath.
Russian Impulses 0
Shaun Mullen reports on Manifest Manafort Destiny while mincing no words. A snippet:
For openers, Manafort’s entire career has been one exercise in evil after another.
(snip)
The distance between circumstantial and provable can be substantial. But if the Russia scandal has taught us nothing else beyond the fact that virtually every key Trump player is a bad actor, it is that if something looks like a coincidence, it almost certainly is not.
Facebook Frolics, Phoning Home Dept. 0
Pap and Farron discuss how Facebook has “scraped” phone calls and contacts using its Android app.
A Troll under the Internet 0
In the Hartford Courant, Matthew Kauffman tells a fascinating tale of how he toyed with an internet fraudster for two weeks. From the opening of his article:
Give it a read.
The Pusher Men 0
Warning: Language.
The Skrelli Syndrone 0
Robert Reich notes a malignancy in our society, one exemplified by the “Pharma Bro, Martin Skrelly. A snippet:
He’s contemptuous of anyone who gets in his way — whether judges, prosecutors, members of Congress or journalists. He remains unapologetic for what he did. He is utterly shameless.
Sound familiar?
It’s All about the Algorithm 0
Zeynep Tufekci noticed that, when she started watching political videos, whether left- or right-leaning, YouTube’s recommendations for additional videos skewed more and more radical. She wonders why. Here’s a bit of her article:
What keeps people glued to YouTube? Its algorithm seems to have concluded that people are drawn to content that is more extreme than what they started with — or to incendiary content in general.
Follow the link for the rest, then stop following YouTube recommendations.
Responsible Fiscals 0
The Trump administration is indeed draining the swamp, but not of swamp creatures–they are thriving and, indeed, proliferating–but of our money.
It’s All about the Algorithm 0
In a court case in which Google is contesting the EU’s “right to be forgotten” law, Great Britain’s Information Commissioner contemns Google’s contention that its search results are somehow “journalism.” A snippet:
In plain English, humans (mostly) don’t decide what appears in search results so calling Google’s activities “journalism” is just plain wrong, according to the commissioner.