Google | Chris Aldrich

👓 Google Sheets Blogging CMS, part 1 | John A. Stewart

Replied to Google Sheets Blogging CMS, part 1 by

This is the first post in a three part series on using Google Sheets as the database for a blogging CMS. In this post, I’ll explain the motivations for building the system. In the second post, I’ll walk you through the Google Sheet itself and the Google scripts (their version of js) that drive it. In the third post, I’ll share the website that displays the blog, and the code behind it. My guess is that interest in the three pieces will vary for different audiences, so I wanted to encapsulate the descriptions.

I generally like where John is taking this idea and the fact that he’s actively experimenting and documenting what he’s coming up with as potential solutions. While I do like some of the low-tech angle that he’s taking, I’m not sure, based on what he’s written, how some of it will come out within the broader spectrum of DoOO or IndieWeb-related technologies.

For example:

How easy/hard will it be for students to own/export their data after the class?
How might they interact if they’re already within the DoOO cohort or already self-hosting their own space?
What are the implications for students of maintaining multiple spaces with a variety of technologies and therefor overhead?
I’ve never had a lot of luck with Disqus, which I find to be heavy and often has problems with auto-marking all of my content as spam. I’ve definitely found it to be an issue with using for POSSE workflows. Worse, with the introduction of specifications like Webmention to the DoOO space, students could be writing their responses to classmates and teachers on their own sites and thereby owning all of that content too, but with Disqus, this just isn’t possible.

I’ll reserve judgement for once I’ve seen some of the code and further ideas in parts II and III as I suspect he’s likely taken some of these issues into account.

We’ve played with this concept of front-end blogging for a while now. Alan Levine has built an open sourced tool called TRU Writer that even provides this type of front end interface on a WordPress site. ❧

I’m curious if John, Alan Levine, or others have yet come across the concept of Micropub? It generalizes the idea of a posting client and interface so that it could work with almost any CMS-related back end. I could see people building custom micropub clients for the education space, or even using some of the pre-existing ones like Quill, InkStone, or Micropublish.net. Many of them also use JSON or form encoded data that they could also be using with platforms like the one John describes here. The other nice part about them is that they’re flexible and relatively open in more ways than one, so they don’t necessarily need to be rebuilt from scratch for each new CMS out there.

👓 Fortnite is putting users at risk, to prove a point about Google’s Android monopoly | CNet

Read Fortnite is putting users at risk, to prove a point about Google's Android monopoly (CNET)

Commentary: Fortnite gives Google the middle finger, but both are failing us to some degree.

30% is a pretty high tax, particularly for such a massively large platform versus the direct costs for maintaining it. One would think that at their scale the cost would be significantly lower.

🔖 Data Transfer Project https://datatransferproject.dev

Bookmarked Data Transfer Project (datatransferproject.dev)

The Data Transfer Project was formed in 2017 to create an open-source, service-to-service data portability platform so that all individuals across the web could easily move their data between online service providers whenever they want.

The contributors to the Data Transfer Project believe portability and interoperability are central to innovation. Making it easier for individuals to choose among services facilitates competition, empowers individuals to try new services and enables them to choose the offering that best suits their needs.

Current contributors include: Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter

🔖 The Data Transfer Project google/data-transfer-project

Bookmarked google/data-transfer-project (GitHub)

The Data Transfer Project makes it easy for people to transfer their data between online service providers. We are establishing a common framework, including data models and protocols, to enable direct transfer of data both into and out of participating online service providers. http://datatransferproject.dev

cross reference: https://boffosocko.com/2018/07/22/data-transfer-project/

👓 Google Chrome Has A Nasty Surprise | Forbes

Read Google Chrome Has A Nasty Surprise by Gordon Kelly (Forbes)

In a blog post, Google has admitted the newest version of Chrome rolling out to customers worldwide is going to consume up to 13% more of your system memory. For a browser whose biggest failing has long been its excessive memory consumption (1,2,3,4,5), this is the last thing users will want. Especially those with older systems and less RAM. Google also confirmed this is a cross-platform change and will apply to Chrome on Windows, Mac, Linux, and Chrome OS. The last of these could be particularly impacted as Chrome OS systems often ship with only 4-8GB of RAM.

Painfully bad clickbait headline to say that their browser will be slower to protect against Spectre.

👓 A Close Look at How Facebook’s Retreat From the News Has Hurt One Particular Website—Ours | Slate

Read A Close Look at How Facebook’s Retreat From the News Has Hurt One Particular Website—Ours by Will Oremus (Slate Magazine)

New data shows the impact of Facebook’s pullback from an industry it had dominated (and distorted).

(Roose, who has since deleted his tweet as part of a routine purge of tweets older than 30 days, told me it was intended simply as an observation, not a full analysis of the trends.)

Another example of someone regularly deleting their tweets at regular intervals. I’ve seem a few examples of this in academia.

It’s worth noting that there’s a difference between NewsWhip’s engagement stats, which are public, and referrals—that is, people actually clicking on stories and visiting publishers’ sites. The two have generally correlated, historically, and Facebook told me that its own data suggests that continues to be the case. But two social media professionals interviewed for this story, including one who consults for a number of different publications, told me that the engagement on Facebook posts has led to less relative traffic. This means publications could theoretically be seeing less ad revenue from Facebook even if their public engagement stats are holding steady.

From Slate’s perspective, a comment on a Slate story you see on Facebook is great, but it does nothing for the site’s bottom line.

(Remember when every news site published the piece, “What Time Is the Super Bowl?”)

This is a great instance for Google’s box that simply provides the factual answer instead of requiring a click through.

fickle audiences available on social platforms.

Here’s where feed readers without algorithms could provide more stability for news.

👓 Facebook and Google hit with $8.8 billion in lawsuits on day one of GDPR | The Verge

Read Facebook and Google hit with $8.8 billion in lawsuits on day one of GDPR by Russell Brandom (The Verge)

Time to regulate

📺 “60 Minutes” The Real Power of Google, The Theranos deception, The Spotted Pig | CBS

Watched "60 Minutes" The Real Power of Google, The Theranos deception, The Spotted Pig from cbsnews.com

How did Google get so big; then, the Theranos deception; and, Mario Batali and the Spotted Pig

👓 Google Removes ‘Don’t Be Evil’ Clause From Its Code of Conduct | Gizmodo

Read Google Removes 'Don't Be Evil' Clause From Its Code of Conduct (Gizmodo)

Google’s unofficial motto has long been the simple phrase “don’t be evil.” But that’s over, according to the code of conduct that Google distributes to its employees. The phrase was removed sometime in late April or early May, archives hosted by the Wayback Machine show.

A subtle, but interesting change. Most importantly does this portend a broad change in corporate philosophy?