Read Thurgood Marshall and His Hometown Courthouse by By Martha S. Jones (We're History)
A 1935 photograph shows Thurgood Marshall, a young lawyer at the counsel table, in the Baltimore City Courthouse. Mid-argument, he stands with notes in one hand and the other outstretched to underscore a point. Marshall’s mentor, Charles Hamilton Houston, sits to his far left making notes. At Mars...
Bookmarked Hard Histories at Hopkins (Johns Hopkins University)
Launched in fall 2020, the Hard Histories at Hopkins Project examines the role that racism and discrimination have played at Johns Hopkins. Blending research, teaching, public engagement and the creative arts, Hard Histories aims to engage our broadest communities—at Johns Hopkins and in Baltimore—in a frank and informed exploration of how racism has been produced and permitted to persist as part of our structure and our practice.

Some great articles hiding here. Glad that Johns Hopkins is doing some research into it’s own history.

Bookmarked Coded Bias (CODED BIAS)
CODED BIAS explores the fallout of MIT Media Lab researcher Joy Buolamwini’s discovery that facial recognition does not see dark-skinned faces accurately, and her journey to push for the first-ever legislation in the U.S. to govern against bias in the algorithms that impact us all.

This looks like an interesting documentary.

Read “I started crying”: Inside Timnit Gebru’s last days at Google (MIT Technology Review)
Two weeks after her forced exit, the AI ethics researcher reflects on her time at Google and the state of the AI field.

It’s long past time to divest my personal data from Google. Reading this article on holiday reminds me that I’ve got time to start making the necessary changes.

Read How Trump Changed America by Clare Malone (fivethirtyeight.com)
At 10:37 p.m. on Tuesday, November 8, 2016, I wrote myself an email: “Nate [Silver] and Micah [Cohen] just told me Clinton is probably going to lose, that she’s an underdog … collapse in the Midwest.” I’d been watching the 2016 vote returns in our office. At 9:35 p.m. Donald Trump’s chance of winning the election was 26 percent according to our model; by 10:09 p.m. it had moved to 44 percent. At 10:31 p.m. a blog post of mine went up about the radical shifts among voters without a college education in Michigan. Still, it took someone saying it out loud to arrange all those particulate results and blog posts in a line that pointed in just one direction: Trump was going to win the election.
Watched "The West Wing" 365 Days from Netflix
Directed by Andrew Bernstein. With Stockard Channing, Dulé Hill, Allison Janney, Joshua Malina. Leo returns to the White House to help bolster the administration, which is suffering from the loss of Josh, Donna, Will, and the Vice President to the next election campaign. Leo's first day back follows President Bartlet's last State of the Union address, and unlike in previous years there appears to be little momentum on bold, large-scale initiatives. Amidst numerous distractions that dilute ...
Watched "The West Wing" Opposition Research from Netflix
Directed by Christopher Misiano. With Stockard Channing, Dulé Hill, Allison Janney, Joshua Malina. Josh and Santos visit New Hampshire to launch the presidential campaign. Josh has experience running national campaigns and has a clear idea about what candidates should and shouldn't do to get elected, but Santos's approach differs dramatically: he believes in talking about big ideas rather than saying whatever he needs to do in order to win votes. This difference in opinion combined with ...
Watched Die Hard (1988) from HBO Max
Directed by John McTiernan. With Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman, Bonnie Bedelia, Reginald VelJohnson. An NYPD officer tries to save his wife and several others taken hostage by German terrorists during a Christmas party at the Nakatomi Plaza in Los Angeles.

Rating: ★★★★½

Annual Christmas-time rewatching. Dozed off for 20 minutes in the middle because it was so late.

Listened to Say Something in Welsh: Old Course 1, Lesson 1 from saysomethingin.com

Vocabulary

I'm trying - dwi'n trio
I'm not trying - dwi ddim yn trio
To like - hoffi
To speak - siarad
Welsh - Cymraeg
To go - mynd
To stay - aros
To do - gwneud
To say - dweud
To be able - gallu
To know - gwybod
To want - moyn
You're speaking - ti'n siarad
Reviewing
Watched Wonder Woman 1984 (2020) from HBO Max
Directed by Patty Jenkins. With Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, Kristen Wiig, Pedro Pascal. Rewind to the 1980s as Wonder Woman's next big screen adventure finds her facing two all-new foes: Max Lord and The Cheetah.

Rating: ★★★  

Had to suspend a lot of disbelief. Entertaining watch, but nothing truly spectacular. This was released yesterday directly to streaming day-and-date with the theatrical release due to the pandemic.