The End of the Echo Chamber
Today, Facebook is publishing a study that disproves some hoary conventional wisdom about the Web. According to this new research, the online echo chamber doesn’t exist.
Facebook did a non-peer-reviewed study on its own network, that hinged heavily on its secret EdgeRank algorithm and — surprise — got results that are very good PR for Facebook. This is awfully familiar! Slate’s eating that shit up, without having seen the study, of course, with only a token mention of the obvious bias. I wish we were better at skepticism, people that read and report on technology.
"The only useful airport security measures since 9/11,” he says, “were locking and reinforcing the cockpit doors, so terrorists can’t break in, positive baggage matching”—ensuring that people can’t put luggage on planes, and then not board them —“and teaching the passengers to fight back. The rest is security theater."
- Bruce Schneier, Does Airport Security Really Make Us Safer? | Culture | Vanity Fair
A little late for Thanksgiving, but on John Smith, the Powhatans and cultural misunderstandings.
Simpsons/Breaking Bad mashup.
Cool beans
I’ve been listening to Kwaito and South African house lately. Good stuff.
Apple Steve Jobs The Crazy Ones - NEVER BEFORE AIRED 1997 (by dogtownmac)
Better than the Dreyfuss version. Not as clean.
