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Stories, videos, podcasts, and more from our community of staff, fellows, faculty associates, and affiliates

Medium

Can algorithms themselves be biased?

The short answer is, “yes, but it doesn’t really matter when compared to the choice to use machine learning.”

Apr 24, 2019
Wired

Forget about artificial intelligence, extended intelligence is the future

We should challenge the cult of Singularity. AI won't take over the world

Apr 23, 2019
The Texas Tribune

Texas bill would allow state to sue social media companies like Facebook and Twitter over free speech

The proposal aims to protect users on social media platforms from censorship if a site advertises itself as impartial. Critics say the bill is too restrictive.

Apr 23, 2019
New York Times

Jonny Sun’s Work Diary

Correct Spellign Optoinal, Creativity Mandatory

The author-illustrator behind ‘everyone’s a aliebn when ur a aliebn too’ is writing for TV and film, plus pursuing a Ph.D. at M.I.T.

Apr 22, 2019
Wired

How Recommendation Algorithms Run the World

What should you watch? What should you read? What's news? What's trending? Wherever you go online, companies have come up with very particular, imperfect ways of answering these…

Apr 22, 2019
The New York Times

Think You’re Discreet Online? Think Again

Thanks to “data inference” technology, companies know more about you than you disclose.

Apr 21, 2019
The Guardian

Facebook teams with rightwing Daily Caller in factchecking program

Site co-founded by Fox News host Tucker Carlson has promoted misinformation and is known for pro-Trump content

Apr 17, 2019
Medium

What Do We Owe to the Internet’s “First Responders?”

Experts share perspectives on the ethics and legality of how social platforms moderate content

Until AI catches up, tens of thousands of human content moderators all around the world will continue to ingest thousands of posts of potentially toxic posts on social media,…

Apr 17, 2019
Crossroads

Facial recognition is the plutonium of AI

"It's dangerous, racializing, and has few legitimate uses; facial recognition needs regulation and control on par with nuclear waste."

Apr 17, 2019
Boston Globe

Can predictive policing help stamp out racial profiling?

Some algorithms assume crime in one location leads to others nearby. Others identify specific people most likely to be involved in violence. Both can lead to discrimination.

Apr 17, 2019
Wired

15 Months of Fresh Hell Inside Facebook

Scandals. Backstabbing. Resignations. Record profits. Time Bombs. In early 2018, Mark Zuckerberg set out to fix Facebook. Here's how that turned out.

Apr 16, 2019
The Christian Science Monitor

Is America’s media divide destroying democracy?

Fox News in the Trump Era has been labeled “state TV.” Conservatives have complained about liberal media bias for decades. Separate media spheres have created separate realities –…

Apr 16, 2019
Inside Good ID

Governments, public services and Good ID

How can governments effectively harness the potential of digital identities? Will they be used in delivering better public services?

Apr 16, 2019
Medium

The Far-Right and its Vicious Cycle of Extremism

Contemporary transformations in radical forms

How the internet can contribute to individual and group radicalization.

Apr 15, 2019
Medium

Machine Learning Widens the Gap Between Knowledge and Understanding

“We’re beginning to accept that the true complexity of the world far outstrips the laws and models we devise to explain it.”

Apr 15, 2019
arXiv

Towards Formalizing the GDPR's Notion of Singling Out

Defining predicate singling out, a new type of privacy attack intended to capture the concept of singling out appearing in the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Apr 15, 2019
The New Yorker

What’s New About Conspiracy Theories?

Outsiders have always had a weakness for paranoid fantasies. Now our leaders are conspiracists, too.

Apr 15, 2019
Redtail

A Talk with Smart City Skeptic, Ben Green

Ben Green's work as a data scientist in city governments informed his critical view of the "smart city" tech that could influence city life and society for decades to come.

Apr 14, 2019
StateScoop

'Smart city' technology alone cannot solve social problems, author argues

Ben Green argues that cities are adopting “smart” technology without thinking through the political ramifications of the technology.

Apr 12, 2019
The Guardian

Julian Assange's charges are a direct assault on press freedom, experts warn

Academics and campaigners condemned large chunks of the indictment that they said went head-to-head with basic activities of journalism protected by the first amendment of the US…

Apr 12, 2019