1. Good Monday Morning

It’s November 29th. Chag Sameach. Hanukkah began at sundown last night.

Today’s Spotlight is 983 words — about a 3 1/2 minute read.

2. News To Know Now

Quoted: “This finding is very concerning as it could take days, if not longer, to deploy new security updates as they are released, while threat actors just need hours to exploit exposed services.” — Bleeding Computer’s coverage of a study where researchers reported that 80% of 320 test sites were compromised in under 24 hours.

a) Editing software maker Grammarly raised $200 million to drive new initiatives beyond “conciseness, consistency, and correctness.” Up next: editorial recommendations based on machine learning. Investors valued Grammarly at $13 billion, a massive increase from $1 billion just two years ago. (TechCrunch) 

b) Spotify’s Car View mode was “retired” during the long holiday weekend. Android Police found and confirmed the change while also alluding to Spotify’s new $80 hardware called Car Thing. The company has only said that they are “actively exploring a variety of new ways” to operate in a car, but the built in Car View mode is dead.

c) UArizona students can soon get credit for playing a commercial video game. The university’s history faculty has collaborated with Microsoft on its Age of Empires IV game. The school said that players who interact with the “enhanced experience” by learning history written by the professors can earn one academic credit from the school. 

3. Search Engine News — No Rich Markup for Republished Content

As more websites syndicate their content across multiple channels, only one site will be eligible for “rich markup” in the search results. Those are the non-text cues around a search result like stars, reviews, or other visual changes.

It’s a big deal because websites often republish reviews about their services or products after they were posted on another site like Yelp or Google. Those reviews can still appear in the results, but will not have extra visual cues even if the website’s marketers include them.

We also got data from eMarketer that showed year-over-year increases in retail advertising categories are substantial, even allowing for the pandemic’s arrival in 2020.

4. Spotlight Explainer — Amazon Payment Methods Changing

Amazon’s payment methods have outsize influence. Recent data shows that Amazon has 41% of retail e-commerce in the U.S. No other company holds 7%. The next 10 companies combined only account for 25% of the highly fragmented industry.

In just the last month, Amazon has taken on behemoths like Visa and PayPal while launching its own biometric system.

Visa is on Amazon’s naughty list

Visa credit cards won’t be accepted as an Amazon payment method in the UK beginning January 19, 2022. Visa stock was hammered more than 5% the day that it was announced. And Amazon wasn’t alone. Walmart, Kroger, and Sainsbury have all had beefs with Visa over merchant fees.

PayPal’s Venmo will be accepted next year

PayPal’s Venmo service will become an official Amazon payment method next year even as its parent company’s namesake service is not accepted. Amazon and PayPal weren’t partners for the longest time so this is a bit of an icebreaker.

Amazon One is looking to own the identity world

There are now 87 facilities that accept Amazon One payments that are activated by hovering the palm of a hand over a reader. Amazon desperately wants to be a player in the identity market, allowing its palm reading technology to unlock doors, pay bills, and act as an identity card. Have a look at the identity hegemony they foresee in this video from last year:

5. Did That Really Happen? — Amazon Does Not Chemically Treat Boxes

Just in time for more holiday shopping, here is another look at Snopes debunking a rumor that falsely claimed that chemicals Amazon uses on its boxes can harm pets. The false claim was unfortunately amplified by animal charities.

6. Following Up — Ransomware

We’ve written a lot about ransomware. Our media appetite is always focused on the initial crisis — the disruption of city services, food manufacturing, or energy. But there’s a big cost associated with cleanup and restoration. Anyone who has lost a home to a natural disaster or fire knows this painful concept.

Thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request by WYPR in Baltimore, we learned last week that Baltimore County Public Schools have paid nearly $10 million to restore their network  after a ransomware attack one year ago.

Despite the expensive lesson (only $2 million was covered by insurance), the teachers’ union reports that hundreds of employees have ongoing payroll issues and a consultant’s report alleges that the system is still vulnerable.

7. Protip — iOS Privacy Settings

This excellent explainer from The Washington Post this weekend tells how to block ad tracking or make your apps tattle less on your habits while using your iPad or iPhone.

8. Screening Room – Robin, the Delivery Drone

9. Science Fiction World — A Floating City 

Oceanix has signed an agreement with the city of Busan, South Korea to build a 185 acre enclave off the city that floats in the water. Have a look at the concept in Global Construction Review. The deadline is in 4 years, the UN is involved, and costs are expected to reach $200 million.

10. Coffee Break — The Searchable Museum

The National Museum of African American History & Culture has created one of the best interactive museum experiences I’ve ever seen. “Slavery and Freedom” is its first full exhibition and very worth of a visit.

11. Sign of The Times

1. Good Monday Morning

It’s November 15th. Austrians who have not received their COVID-19 vaccine entered a 10 day lockdown a few hours ago. There is also a partial lockdown in Holland, and the German government is considering at least a partial lockdown there.

Today’s Spotlight is 1,310 words — about a 5 minute read.

2. News To Know Now

Quoted:” People with disabilities deserve equal access to all areas of community life, including the private transportation services provided by companies like Uber.”— Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clark after the Department of Justice filed suit against Uber. DOJ says that the company’s practice of charging waiting time for passengers with disabilities violates the Americans with Disabilities Act. 

a) Elon Musk asked his Twitter followers to vote on whether he should sell 10% of his Tesla stock. The world’s wealthiest man then sold nearly $7 billion worth of stock, but the financial press quickly pointed out that Musk had already filed an SEC document two months earlier with a plan to sell the stock last week. Musk’s net worth is estimated at $270 billion and has grown 10-fold in only two years.

b) Google lost an appeal of an EU antitrust case after a European court upheld a $2.8 billion penalty against the company. The penalty was assessed in 2017 after European regulators said that the company’s search results favored its own shopping results over rivals’. EU Competition Commissioner Margreth Vestager has overseen $10 billion in fines assessed to Google parent Alphabet.

c) Microsoft is getting a little meta. The company continued its partnership with Facebook parent Meta and said that its Microsoft Teams collaborative platform will integrate with Meta’s Workplace. Teams will also soon integrate with the Meta Portal camera. (The Verge)

3. Search Engine News — Google My Business Changes Names, Company Will Test “Index Now”

Google Business Profile is the new name for Google My Business. The program has been integrated into Maps and Search for years, and now Google says that it wants you to manage profile information from those programs instead of a separate interface. There are also new phone features that allow you to know which phone calls came from Google search visitors.

Google also will test a new search protocol called “Index Now” that rolled out last month from Microsoft and Yandex, according to Search Engine Journal. The protocol notifies a search engine that the content on a website page has changed and should be indexed. Most search engines proactively index all publicly accessible websites, but doing so only to pages that are flagged as updated can save a huge amount of global bandwidth and energy.

4. Spotlight Explainer — Facebook Political Ad Limits

Facebook announced that it will limit the way that an advertiser can target audiences that would see a political or social advocacy ad. The new restrictions begin on January 19, 2022. 

A Facebook political ad posted after that will not be able to target keywords or affinities relating to “health, race or ethnicity, political affiliation, religion, or sexual orientation.” Here’s part of the example set Facebook used to demonstrate what will be blocked.

• Health causes (e.g., “Lung cancer awareness,” “World Diabetes Day,” “Chemotherapy”)
• Sexual orientation (e.g., “same-sex marriage” and “LGBT culture”)
• Religious practices and groups (e.g., “Catholic Church” and “Jewish holidays”)
• Political beliefs, social issues, causes, organizations, and figures

You don’t sound happy, George. What’s wrong with this?

There is a lot here that will hurt the advocacy groups that you care most about. Regardless of what side of the political spectrum you favor, your charities will have more difficulty finding its audience.

Here is one very simplistic example. Advertisers can’t target a Latino audience directly, but they can target fans of Univision and the 600 Spanish-language newspapers in the U.S. Then they can target people who are most like the people who responded. That’s only about a 2 on a 10 point scale of creative audience development.

Seems like they are trying to stop abuse.

They sure are, and that’s great, but a professional ad agency can target every one of those types of audiences that are shown in the example. We do this regularly for clients. For example, race and ethnicity related designations were halted last year, but it’s easy to develop an audience of Latinos in Louisiana or Sikhs in Chicago. It’s less efficient and therefore more costly for the charity.

So it’s window dressing?

Pretty much. It’s a hurdle that keeps nonprofessionals out of the market. Remember that Facebook political ads were previously cut off entirely. And Facebook has previously wrestled with its advertisers who ran employment or financial ads with age, gender, or race limitations so they very publicly removed for ads of that type. But professional advertisers already knew that it was illegal to advertise a job to people of specific ages or races. 

But this will protect me and my friends from being targeted.

Not really. It’s like we say about computer security. You’re trying to make it difficult for someone to guess that your bank password is password123 and drain your life savings, but most of us wouldn’t be able to stop a true hacker who targets us specifically. That’s why people with cool jobs have restrictive IT departments.

Will I see fewer ads?

Nope. In fact, advertisers can upload a customer list and then ask Facebook to find as many as 20 million Americans most like the people on that list. What you’ll probably see are ads that aren’t as finely targeted, but you’ll still see just as many.

5. Did That Really Happen? — The Plane Tantrum Video is Fake

Despite more than 60 million views on different social media platforms, the video purportedly showing an airline passenger arguing with a flight attendant regarding a passenger’s vaccination status is a hoax. There are indeed plenty of videos showing people behaving horribly. The Public Freakout subreddit has many, but in this case, CNN’s expert fact checker Daniel Dale explains what makes the airline video fake.

6. Following Up — Rivian & Zillow

We told you in October about the filing that showed Amazon owned 20% of EV maker Rivian and that the company was seeking an $80 billion valuation during its IPO. Rivian bounced all the way to $86 billion. Amazon added more stock, bringing its stake to 22% while Ford increased its stake to 12%. Rivian’s market cap is now roughly the size of General Motors’ although the company remains unprofitable and with very little revenue.

We also told you last week about Zillow trying to flip houses via its Zestimate algorithm. What was originally a $300 million loss ballooned to $500 million as Zillow announced last week that it had sold 2,000 of more than 17,000 homes it had contracted for. The company laid off 25% of its staff and said that it expects to lose between 5% and 7% on each house it owns.

7. Protip — Instagram Secrets

Ready to recover deleted posts or stop people from adding you to groups on Instagram? Lifehacker has you covered with these 12 best Instagram settings.

8. Screening Room – No, You’re Crying

9. Science Fiction World — Drag Race In Air Cars

Technically they’re called Alauda Mk3 Speeders although these look more like drones than the speeder Luke flew around the Ewok home planet. Still these puppies topped 90 mph in a short sprint in the Australian desert.

10. Coffee Break — Pet Portraits Matched With Fine Art

Remember when the pandemic first hit and Google’s Culture app let you snap a selfie and matched you to the closest art found in more than 200 museums? They’ve done it again… this time for pictures of your pet. Get the details here.

11. Sign of the Times

1. Good Monday Morning

It’s November 8th. Thursday is Veteran’s Day, and we have veteran Spotlighters covered with this huge list of free meals for you from Military.com.

Today’s Spotlight is 1,316 words — about a 5 minute read.

2. News To Know Now

Quoted:“Fake reviews and other forms of deceptive endorsements cheat consumers and undercut honest businesses. Advertisers will pay a price if they engage in these deceptive practices.” — Samuel Levine, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection after the agency notified hundreds of the world’s biggest brands that they were improperly posting testimonials and reviews online.

a)  The FTC also said that it will send almost $60 million to more than 140,000 Amazon drivers for tips the company illegally withheld between 2016 and 2019. Driver payments will average $422 each. One Amazon Flex driver is due more than $28,000. (FTC announcement)

b)  Real estate data company Zillow will lay off 25% of its employees after posting more than $380 million in losses in just three months. The company had begun purchasing homes based on its “Zestimate” of their value. And then suddenly the market became “unpredictable” in the words of CEO Rich Barton. The company still owns more than 7,000 homes worth nearly $3 billion. The Zestimate for my house is $75,000 more than the already inflated tax assessment value, but I missed out on that deal. (Bloomberg)


c) Snapchat has launched “Run for Office Mini”, a program to encourage its users to run for public office. The company says that Snapchat reaches 90% of 13-24 year olds in the U.S. and that only 6% of state legislators are under the age of 35. The company curates information on 75,000 upcoming elections and has partnered with a dozen candidate recruitment and training programs. JFK was elected to Congress before he turned 30, a 31 year old Bill Clinton was elected governor, and 12 members of the House of Representatives are under the age of 35. (Snap announcement)

3. Search Engine News — Google Shows How to Improve Job Posting Pages

Google published a recommendation last week that shows organizations how to more effectively recruit online. A company post shows that data contained in the rich markup description field is reproduced online. Google officially recommended including information about the job qualifications, skills, and benefits in that field.

It’s really important to note that this is the rich markup description field, not the meta description field.  Confused about the difference?  It’s hard enough to hire employees today. Make sure you use every option available to you. Talk with your web people or us, and we can help.

Google also said that the same core vital statistics it uses to assess visitor experience on mobile visits to a website will also apply to visits using desktop computers beginning in February.

4. Spotlight Explainer —  AI Healthcare Is A Thing

There are many good and positive things that result from AI Healthcare. This summer Deep Mind announced that it would release the structure of every protein found in twenty species, including humans. That came six months after the AI-based organization solved a 50 year old biology problem and then released all of the code to the public.

But there are problems with AI healthcare too. Privacy experts remain very concerned that computers enter a state of constant surveillance from which many things can be inferred. Carebots are a great  example of the intersection between healthcare and automation. They’re especially found in underserved communities revolving around care for older people or people with disabilities. A mix of cameras, wearable trackers, and risk models threaten privacy and autonomy. 

More information is coming to light about programs like NarxCare, a software product from a data company that manages state prescription databases. The system mixes their data with external data including how many pharmacies a patient has patronized and how far they travel for appointments. This is mixed with prescription data to form “Overdose Risk Scores” that impact patients and physicians in unintended ways. 

As Wired wrote earlier this year, “Nearly all Americans have the equivalent of a secret credit score that rates the risk of prescribing controlled substances to them. And doctors have authorities looking over their shoulders as they weigh their own responses to those scores.” 

You won’t be surprised to learn that the scores are unregulated, can’t be appealed, and adversely affect patients and physicians. Researchers point out the system’s flaws including skewed interpretations for women, non-whites, patients with complex medical histories that include multiple conditions, and even pet owners.

A study published in Nature earlier this year claims that algorithms can account for 43% of knee pain reported by some patients vs. 9% of a traditional assessment by radiologists, which is better, but also leaves much to be desired when outside forces regulate the patient or physician.

The NarxCare risk scores will soon have company. Google parent Alphabet recently signed a deal with HCA to create algorithms based on patient records. One troubling part of that announcement is that they could guide physician decisions. There are also new algorithms that predict schizophrenia and new features on smartphones and watches that detect arrhythmias, cognitive decline, or even depression.

One big issue with all of these is that many people are victims of a fallacy called false precision that provides an unrealistic sense of precision. This occurs because answers are provided without qualifying that the methods used to calculate the precise number rely on imprecise methods.

4. Spotlight Explainer —  AI Healthcare Is A Thing

There are many good and positive things that result from AI Healthcare. This summer Deep Mind announced that it would release the structure of every protein found in twenty species, including humans. That came six months after the AI-based organization solved a 50 year old biology problem and then released all of the code to the public.

But there are problems with AI healthcare too. Privacy experts remain very concerned that computers enter a state of constant surveillance from which many things can be inferred. Carebots are a great  example of the intersection between healthcare and automation. They’re especially found in underserved communities revolving around care for older people or people with disabilities. A mix of cameras, wearable trackers, and risk models threaten privacy and autonomy. 

More information is also coming to light about programs like NarxCare, a software product from a data company that manages state prescription databases. The system mixes their data with external data including how many pharmacies a patient has patronized and how far they travel for appointments. This is mixed with prescription data to form “Overdose Risk Scores” that impact patients and physicians in unintended ways. 

As Wired wrote earlier this year, “Nearly all Americans have the equivalent of a secret credit score that rates the risk of prescribing controlled substances to them. And doctors have authorities looking over their shoulders as they weigh their own responses to those scores.” 

You won’t be surprised to learn that the scores are unregulated, can’t be appealed, and adversely affect patients and physicians. Researchers point out the system’s flaws including skewed interpretations for women, non-whites, patients with complex medical histories that include multiple conditions, and even pet owners.

A study published in Nature earlier this year claims that algorithms can account for 43% of knee pain reported by some patients vs. 9% of a traditional assessment by radiologists, which is better, but also leaves much to be desired when outside forces regulate the patient or physician.

The NarxCare risk scores will soon have company. Google parent Alphabet recently signed a deal with HCA to create algorithms based on patient records from more than 2,000 facilities in 21 states. The troubling part of that announcement is that they could guide physician decisions. There are also new AI healthcare algorithms that predict schizophrenia and new features on smartphones and watches that detect arrhythmias, cognitive decline, or even depression.

One big issue with all of these is that many people are victims of a fallacy called false precision that provides an unrealistic sense of precision. This occurs because answers are provided without qualifying that the methods used to calculate the precise number rely on imprecise methods.

5. Did That Really Happen? — Did Train Passengers in Philadelphia Watch A Rape?

In a world quick to outrage, the idea that passengers did not intervene when a man raped a woman on a Philadelphia train outraged nearly everyone. Except now the prosecutor says that things didn’t happen quite the way they were initially portrayed. Catch up with the latest here.

6. Following Up — Developers Using AI Code Help More

There’s a bit of another misunderstanding echoing around news feeds regarding how much AI help is being used by software developers. The issue developed after Open AI said that 30% of the recent projects on GitHub were using software called Copilot to help write code. 

That’s true, but parse the sentence as “thirty percent of the projects used at least some help from this software”, not that 30% of software is now written by AI. It’s still pretty cool though and a lot easier than using a search engine to find the same information.

7. Protip — What Emojis May Mean in Other Countries

The good folks at the Rest of the World have some digital translation help that it’s worth your time to peruse if you spend any time communicating with people outside your own country.

8. Screening Room — Christmas With a Twist

9. Science Fiction World — McDonald’s, IBM & AI

IBM has purchased McDonald’s AI unit (everyone has AI departments) and will partner with the restaurant chain to automate the drive through experience, which is code for replacing employees. There is no word on whether the new robot overlords can fix the ice cream machines.

10. Coffee Break — Timelines & Stats About Your Age

You’re Getting Old is a fun website that shows you all sorts of statistics based on your age, including how many breaths you’ve taken, days you’ve aged, news, and a lot more. 

11. Sign of the Times