Month: September 2017

📺 PBS NewsHour full episode Sept. 28, 2017

Watched PBS NewsHour full episode Sept. 28, 2017 from PBS

Thursday on the NewsHour, the wreckage of Hurricane Maria poses a logistical nightmare for those in need in Puerto Rico. Also: The technology Russia used in the 2016 election under scrutiny, Yemen's war-induced humanitarian crisis worsens, the influence of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, the woman who sparked debate about discrimination in Silicon Valley and a journalist's experience with miscarriage.

The Ellen Pao interview was quite interesting and germane to much of what has been a huge story over the past 6 or so months. It reminds me a lot of Valerie Alexander’s work, which I’ve highlighted before.

The miscarriage story was just heartbreaking. I really love this series of “brief but spectacular” stories they tag onto the end of episodes though. It really adds some interest and humanity to what can often otherwise be bleak stints of news coverage. Even when they’re not uplifting–like this one–they’re always unique and interesting.

👓 Ikea has bought TaskRabbit | Recode

Read Ikea has bought TaskRabbit (Recode)
Swedish home goods giant Ikea Group has bought TaskRabbit, according to sources close to the situation. The price of the deal could not be determined, but the contract labor marketplace company has raised about $50 million since it was founded nine years ago. Sources added that TaskRabbit will become an independent subsidiary within Ikea and that CEO Stacy Brown-Philpot and its staff would remain.

👓 How to Set a Default Fallback Image for WordPress Post Thumbnails | WP Beginner

Read How to Set a Default Fallback Image for WordPress Post Thumbnails (WP Beginner)
Do you want to set a default fallback image for WordPress post thumbnails? Featured images also known as post thumbnails are very useful in engaging users and making your articles more noticeable on social media. In this article, we will show you how to set a default fallback image for WordPress post thumbnails.
I probably ought to be doing something like this, particularly for some of the social stream posts which re-use the featured image in other places on the site.

🎧 This Week in Google: #416 Mr. Nutter Butter Has a Message for You | TWiT.TV

Listened to This Week in Google: #416 Mr. Nutter Butter Has a Message for You from TWIT.tv
US Digital Service - making government better. Alphabet Q2 earnings up, stocks down. Chrome's ad blocker is available to devs. Not everybody likes Google's plan to track offline sales. Is privacy a fad? Facebook hits 2 billion users. Bitcoin splits, and miners revolt. ACLU supports John Oliver. Millennials confused by discovery of broadcast TV. Jeff's Number: $600/head SV restaurant with gold-flecked steaks Matt Cutt's Thing: Hack the Pentagon! Kevin Marks' Stuff: IndieWeb.org, Liberty Foundation, extra thumb prosthetic

Awesome to see/hear Matt Cutts return to the show.

🎧 This Week in Google: #415 Sinkhole Ahead! | TWiT.TV

Listened to This Week in Google: #415 Sinkhole Ahead! from TWIT.tv
No more "OK Google" search on Chromebooks? Facebook profit spikes 71%, laws of Australia trump laws of mathematics? Waze is now on Android Auto, and more.

Interesting that all the growth in mobile ads has recently gone to Facebook and Google. I’m surprised that no one else is eating up even a small piece of the pie.

I also loved the story about the Australian prime minister, in a post-fact world, indicating that the laws of mathematics don’t take precedence over those of Australia.

🎧 This Week in Google: #414 Never a Freshman | TWiT.TV

Listened to This Week in Google: #414 Never a Freshman from TWIT.tv
Musical Podcasts. Google Glass for Enterprise. New Google Feed. Better Google Analytics. Facebook News Subscription. Amazon Meal Kits, Spark, Treasure Truck, and Outfit Compare. Samsung Bixby arrives in the US. Net Neutrality Day results.

Musical podcasts sound like an interesting proposition, but are likely better as a larger production stream. I’m curious what the budget was for the piece and how they’re monetizing it?

I’ve been wondering about Bixby on my Samsung 8, but somehow I’ve never really bothered to use it. It doesn’t seem as interesting or as easy to use as my Amazon Alexa. Perhaps it’s time to dig into it a bit? I have been enjoying some minor Alexa use on my phone recently. I’m curious how they compare now.

👓 Three Decades Later, We’re Getting a Coming To America Sequel | Vulture

Read 3 Decades Later, We’re Getting a Coming to America Sequel by Jordan Crucchiola (Vulture)
Jonathan Levine will direct and Kenya Barris will write a sequel to ‘Coming to America’, which is being developed with cooperation from Eddie Murphy.

👓 3 Ways To Read Sen. Bob Corker’s Retirement | FiveThirtyEight

Read 3 Ways To Read Sen. Bob Corker’s Retirement by Clare Malone (FiveThirtyEight)
It’s not unusual for a 65-year-old to announce his retirement, but a lot of people were caught by surprise when Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee did so on Tuesday. In a statement, the senator, who has found himself increasingly at odds with President Trump, said he he hadn’t planned to serve more than two terms in office. But is there more at work in the departure of this influential senator than simple adherence to a self-imposed term limit? What does it portend for the Republican Party establishment, Trump and the future of the party? There are a few ways to think about it.

Algebraic Geometry Lecture 1

For those who are still on the fence about taking Algebraic Geometry this quarter (or the follow on course next quarter), here’s a downloadable copy of the written notes with linked audio that will allow you to sample the class:

Algebraic Geometry-Lecture 1 notes [.pdf file with embedded and linked audio]

I’ve previously written some notes about how to best access and use these types of notes in the past. Of particular note, one must download the .pdf file and open in a recent version of Adobe Acrobat to take advantage of the linked/embedded audio file. (Trust me, it’s worth doing as it will be like you were there with the 20 of us who showed up last night!)

For those who prefer just the audio files separately, they can be listened to here, or downloaded.

Lecture 1 – Part 1

Lecture 1 – Part 2

Again, the recommended text is Elementary Algebraic Geometry by Klaus Hulek (AMS, 2003) ISBN: 0-8218-2952-1.

For those new to Dr. Miller’s classes, I’ve written up some hints/tips about them in the past as well.

👓 Ergodic | John D. Cook

Read Ergodic by John D. Cook (John D. Cook Consulting)
Roughly speaking, an ergodic system is one that mixes well. You get the same result whether you average its values over time or over space. This morning I ran across the etymology of the word ergodic.
I’d read this before, but had a nice reminder about it this morning.

👓 Technology preview: Private contact discovery for Signal | Signal

Read Technology preview: Private contact discovery for Signal by moxie0 (Signal)
At Signal, we’ve been thinking about the difficulty of private contact discovery for a long time. We’ve been working on strategies to improve our current design, and today we’ve published a new private contact discovery service. Using this service, Signal clients will be able to efficiently and scalably determine whether the contacts in their address book are Signal users without revealing the contacts in their address book to the Signal service.
There’s a lot of work involved here, but this is an intriguing proposition for doing contact discovery in social media while maintaining privacy. I can’t wait to see which silos follow suit, but I’m even more curious if any adventurous IndieWeb creators will travel down this road?

h/t cryptographer Matthew Green