A new report out of Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society shows that, during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, polarization in the media ecosystem was “distinctly asymmetric.”
Source: “The center-right…is the least represented portion of the media spectrum” » Nieman Journalism Lab
The Berkman Klein Center at Harvard has just released a new report of the role of online media in the 2016 election. Some of it is stuff we’ve seen before: for example, coverage of Hillary Clinton was massively weighted toward her emails and other “scandals,” while coverage of Trump was weighted toward the issues.
Source: Fake News: It’s Mostly a Right-Wing Phenomenon – Mother Jones
Jonathan Zittrain, Co-Founder of Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society“Internet-aware devices raise deep and novel security issues, with problems that could arise months or years after purchase, or spill over to people who aren’t the purchasers. This bill deftly uses the power of the Federal procurement market, rather than direct regulation, to encourage Internet- aware device makers to employ some basic security measures in their products. This will help everyone in the marketplace, including non- governmental purchasers and the vendors themselves, since they’ll be encouraged together to take steps to secure their products.”
Source: Spime Watch: the fact sheet for the Internet of Things Cybersecurity Improvement Act of 2017 | WIRED
The legislation was introduced Tuesday by the co-chairs of the Senate Cybersecurity Caucus, Mark Warner, Virginia Democrat, and Cory Gardner, Colorado Republican, along with Sens. Ron Wyden, Oregon Democrat, and Steve Daines, Montana Republican. It was drafted in consultation with experts from the Atlantic Council and the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, among others, and has already amassed the support of tech companies including Mozilla, Cloudflare and Symantec.
Source: Senators seek cybersecurity standards for federal ‘Internet-of-Things’ devices – Washington Times
“They just sort of throw out the kitchen sink of techniques,” said Nathan Freitas, a fellow at Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society, and a developer of a mobile Tor-based web browser for Android phones. “So China basically gave up trying to block all of these techniques and said, ‘Let’s just block the app, and Apple will do it for us.'”
“There’s nothing surprising here,” says Patrick Murck, a legal expert at Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center. “It’s very commonsensical.”
Source: Using a blockchain doesn’t exempt you from securities regulations | Ars Technica
In a discussion between Dominican priest Eric Salobir and Maria Zuber, moderated by Berkman Klein Center co-founder and Harvard Law Professor Jonathan Zittrain, Zuber said that “we should always be looking at what the data is telling us.
Source: Defiance: Disobedience for the good of all | MIT News
The top 10% of NIH grant winners (by total award) received about 37% of NIH funding in 2015—up from the 32% the top group got in 1985, but down a bit from a peak of 40% of total funding in 2010, according to an analysis published last week by researchers at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.
Source: Relatively few NIH grantees get lion’s share of agency’s funding | Science | AAAS
Meryl Alper, assistant professor of communication studies at Northeastern University and a faculty associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, said she believes the app could be useful, even for people who are not visually impaired. “What is obvious to one person can be invisible to another,” Alper told TechRepublic.
Source: Microsoft’s new AI app to assist the blind could be a ‘game changer’ in accessibility – TechRepublic
Google says it will release more tools like Facets in the future, and the company will set up new grants and residencies to sponsor research. Such research in AI is also being undertaken by other organisations like Ethics and Governance of Artificial Intelligence Fund by Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society and MIT Media Lab, as well as Elon Musk’s own OpenAI, to name a few.
Source: Google Announces PAIR, a Project Aimed at Improving AI and Machine Learning | Technology News