No Deal: German Universities Prepare For Cut-Off From Elsevier Journals; Intellectual Property Watch, 12/16/16

Intellectual Property Watch; No Deal: German Universities Prepare For Cut-Off From Elsevier Journals:

"After licensing negotiations between German university libraries and Elsevier failed at the beginning of the month, over 60 university libraries in Germany are preparing to be cut off from hundreds of journals of the British publisher, after a standoff over pricing and access.

The university libraries organised in the DEAL initiative rejected an offer made by Elsevier earlier this month for a first nationwide licence, because of an aggressive pricing and flaws in the access models...

With the stop of the negotiations access to future journal editions be cut off on 1 January, when current licenses are expiring. But there will also be no access to archived editions of journals licensed under “individual e-packages for the economic sciences in particular,” according to the message."

Open Government Data Act set for progress in 2017 after Senate passage; FedScoop, 12/12/16

Samantha Ehlinger, FedScoop; Open Government Data Act set for progress in 2017 after Senate passage:

"A bill codifying and building on the president's executive order and the White House’s Open Data Policy passed the Senate unanimously early on Saturday morning, in a surprising last-minute effort to get the bill through the chamber before the holidays.

The OPEN Government Data Act, which sets in place a presumption that government data should be published in an open, machine-readable format, will likely not make it to President Barack Obama’s desk. But the bill could be reintroduced next year.

“Because transparency keeps Washington accountable to the people, government data should be made public unless an administration makes a compelling reason not to,” said Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., who introduced the legislation with Sen. Brian Schatz D-Hawaii, in a statement. “After passing the Senate with bipartisan support, we have momentum to carry this important work into the new year.”"

How to rethink what’s ‘top secret’ for the Internet age; Washington Post, 12/16/16

Dianne Feinstein, Washington Post; How to rethink what’s ‘top secret’ for the Internet age:

"Rooted in a paper-based era, the existing classification system has become so complex and distorted that it no longer serves its fundamental goals: sharing secrets with our allies and partners while safeguarding this information from adversaries who would do us harm...

We may never fully eliminate the tendency of reviewers to overclassify information. But by working to implement these solutions, we can begin to change the dynamic. At the heart of this issue are dedicated government employees who truly want to do the right thing, and there’s an obvious natural instinct to protect secrets. But classification should shield secrets, not bury them."

Don’t call it post-truth. There’s a simpler word: lies; Guardian, 12/16/16

Jonathan Freedland, Guardian; Don’t call it post-truth. There’s a simpler word: lies:

"We’ve been calling this “post-truth politics” but I now worry that the phrase is far too gentle, suggesting society has simply reached some new phase in its development. It lets off the guilty too lightly. What Trump is doing is not “engaging in post-truth politics”. He’s lying.

Worse still, Trump and those like him not only lie: they imply that the truth doesn’t matter, showing a blithe indifference to whether what they say is grounded in reality or evidence...

Only in the political realm have we somehow drifted into a world in which no one can be trusted, not on questions of judgment, nor even on questions of fact. But we cannot live in such a world. Evidence, facts and reason are the building blocks of civilisation. Without them we plunge into darkness."

Genetically engineered humans will arrive sooner than you think. And we're not ready.; Vox, 12/15/16

Sean Illing, Vox; Genetically engineered humans will arrive sooner than you think. And we're not ready. :

"Michael Bess is a historian of science at Vanderbilt University and the author of a fascinating new book, Our Grandchildren Redesigned: Life in a Bioengineered Society. Bess’s book offers a sweeping look at our genetically modified future, a future as terrifying as it is promising...

Sean Illing

I'm always amazed at how little technologists tend to think about the moral and political implications of their work. For example, it's hard to imagine how disruptive this kind of biotechnology will be to our sense of fairness and equity.

We should be very concerned about the societal risks that would emerge alongside these bioenhancement technologies. Because presumably, in the beginning at least, only rich people will have access to this technology, and I wonder what kind of disorder that could spawn.

Michael Bess

Well, let's put it this way: If only rich people have access to these technologies, then we have a very big problem, because it's going to take the kinds of inequalities that have been getting worse over recent decades, even in a rich country like ours, and make them much worse, and inscribe those inequalities into our very biology.

So it's going to be very hard for somebody to be born poor and bootstrap themselves up into a higher position in society when the upper echelons of society are not only enjoying the privileges of health and education and housing and all that, but are bioenhancing themselves to unprecedented levels of performance. That's going to render permanent and intractable the separation between rich and poor.

For me, then, one of the imperatives that's going to arise out of bioenhancement is we're going to have to, in a sense, become Sweden. We're going to have to find a way to socialize the benefits of these technologies and offer them, at least as an option, to all citizens.

Doing this in a rich country like ours is hard enough — the challenge of doing this on a planetary scale is far more daunting."

EFF to Supreme Court: Trademarks are Not Government Speech; Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), 12/16/16

Daniel Nazer, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF); EFF to Supreme Court: Trademarks are Not Government Speech:

"Today, together with the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Freedom of Expression, EFF submitted an amicus brief in Lee v. Tam. Our brief discusses an unusual but important question: are registered trademarks government expression? It is important to get the dividing line between government and private speech correct. This is because, while the government doesn’t get to control what you say, it does get to control what it says. As we argue in our brief, categorizing registered trademarks as government expression would threaten speech in many other areas.

The case involves a rock band from California called The Slants."

Larry Colburn, Who Helped Stop My Lai Massacre, Dies at 67; New York Times, 12/16/16

Sam Roberts, New York Times; Larry Colburn, Who Helped Stop My Lai Massacre, Dies at 67:

"Would Mr. Colburn have fired at his fellow Americans?

“How could I ever be prepared for something like that?” he replied years later. “Would I have? I guess that’s the $64,000 question, isn’t it?”

Seymour M. Hersh, the independent journalist who later uncovered the My Lai massacre, said of Mr. Colburn in a phone interview on Friday that “for a door gunner in Vietnam to point his machine gun at an American officer” under those circumstances “was in the greatest tradition of American integrity.”...

My Lai became a paradigm for unbridled brutality and an object lesson in battlefield ethics, but the crewmen whose audacious intervention prevented even more bloodshed were largely forgotten.

Their heroism was acknowledged with Bronze Stars, which they considered inappropriate recognition: The Bronze Star is awarded for bravery under enemy assault, they reasoned, and they had demonstrated courage in the face of friendly fire.

After the investigations and trial, Mr. Thompson and Mr. Colburn received something else, too: hate mail.

“One of the most infuriating things is being called a whistle-blower, as if we went and ratted someone out,” Mr. Colburn told Vietnam Magazine. “That is completely false; there was no back-stabbing going on. We were right in their face at My Lai. We were ready to confront those people then and there. And we did, the best we could.”"

Trump Family Tried To Auction Coffee With Ivanka, Raising Ethical Concerns; NPR, 12/16/16

Camila Domonoske, NPR; Trump Family Tried To Auction Coffee With Ivanka, Raising Ethical Concerns:

"Update at 10:55 a.m. ET: As this post was publishing, the auction for coffee with Ivanka Trump was pulled from the Charitybuzz website. The link now redirects to its home page, with no explanation.

Our previous post continues:...

The auction for coffee with President-elect Donald Trump's oldest daughter is a fundraiser for the Eric Trump Foundation, which says the proceeds will benefit St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.

The New York Times has reported on the auction and raised questions about the ethical implications of selling off face time with the future first family — especially given Ivanka Trump's perceived influence over her father."

How Google's search algorithm spreads false information with a rightwing bias; Guardian, 12/16/16

Olivia Solon and Sam Levin, Guardian; How Google's search algorithm spreads false information with a rightwing bias:

"Google’s search algorithm appears to be systematically promoting information that is either false or slanted with an extreme rightwing bias on subjects as varied as climate change and homosexuality.

Following a recent investigation by the Observer, which found that Google’s search engine prominently suggests neo-Nazi websites and antisemitic writing, the Guardian has uncovered a dozen additional examples of biased search results.

Google’s search algorithm and its autocomplete function prioritize websites that, for example, declare that climate change is a hoax, being gay is a sin, and the Sandy Hook mass shooting never happened."

Inside ‘The Man in the High Castle’ Season 2: A ‘Cautionary Tale’ for America; Daily Beast, 12/15/16

Matt Wilstein, Daily Beast; Inside ‘The Man in the High Castle’ Season 2: A ‘Cautionary Tale’ for America:

"The Man in the High Castle is a show about alternate realities. Its second season is arriving on Amazon at a time when many Americans feel like they might be living in one.

The show’s premise—what if the Allies lost World War II?—is only slightly more unnerving than our current reality: What if Donald Trump was elected president of the United States? But here we are. And here are the main characters of The Man in the High Castle, based on Philip K. Dick’s 1962 novel of the same name, struggling under the Greater Nazi Reich on the East Coast and the Japanese Pacific States on the West.

The renewed relevance of this under-the-radar streaming series is top of mind for the show’s producers and cast, who assembled together in Los Angeles just a few weeks after Trump’s unexpected electoral success. Collectively, they are grappling with the question of whether Americans will want to watch a show about Nazis ruling over the United States at a time when swastikas are popping up on storefronts and school buildings across the country."

Trudeau to be questioned by ethics watchdog over reports of cash for access; Guardian, 12/15/16

Ashifa Kassam, Guardian; Trudeau to be questioned by ethics watchdog over reports of cash for access:

"Justin Trudeau will be questioned by Canada’s ethics watchdog over reports of political fundraisers that allegedly offered privileged access to the prime minister and his cabinet ministers for a price.

The development marks the first time in a decade that the ethics commissioner has questioned a sitting prime minister and is a turning point for Trudeau who swept to a majority government last year on broad promises to run a transparent administration that would abide by the highest standards of ethics."

Did Facebook Just Kickstart the Real Infowar?; Daily Beast, 12/16/16

Gideon Resnick, Ben Collins, Daily Beast; Did Facebook Just Kickstart the Real Infowar? :

"Should Facebook’s fact-check initiative take off and result in censorship of propagandist sites, editors at websites like Infowars and alt-right leaders insist it will only reinforce the belief that certain ideas are being suppressed in favor of facts from mainstream outlets. One editor told The Daily Beast the Facebook plan proves that now the “‘Infowar’ isn’t a cliché, it’s perfectly apt.”"

US Finds Existing Copyright Law Suited For Software Embedded In Everyday Products; Intellectual Property Watch, 12/16/16

Intellectual Property Watch; US Finds Existing Copyright Law Suited For Software Embedded In Everyday Products:

"The United States Copyright Office has released a study that finds that existing copyright laws are sufficient to cover issues arising over software embedded in everyday consumer products. But it does call for some flexibility for consumers to tinker with their devices.

The report, which followed hearings and research in the field, is available here. The report was requested by Sens. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), the chair and ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee."

The right shuts down free speech, too; Washington Post, 12/15/16

Catherine Rampell, Washington Post; The right shuts down free speech, too:

"The good news: Both the left and the right have reached consensus that free speech is important.

The bad news: “Free speech” has apparently been redefined to mean “speech with which I agree.”"

"Are You a Hacker?"; robrogers.com, 12/16/16

Rob Rogers, robrogers.com; "Are You a Hacker?"

Trump's conflicts of interest: a visual guide; Guardian, 12/1/16

Nadja Popovich and Jan Diehm, Guardian; Trump's conflicts of interest: a visual guide

Ethics in the swamp: the rot of corruption; Huffington Post, 12/9/16

Katherine Marshall, Huffington Post; Ethics in the swamp: the rot of corruption:

"Corruption is a live topic today. Since 2005, international anti-corruption day has been “celebrated” on December 9, in hopes that a visible day marking the topic can raise awareness about corruption and bolster a sense that something can be done to combat and prevent it. The large biannual International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC17) in Panama City ended on December 4, where some 1300 very diverse participants addressed a multitude of issues, from green eyeshade detail, lawyerly discourse, to lofty principles such as trust. The meeting concluded with a commitment that: “Together we will strengthen our web of anti-corruption activists. Together, the public sector, business and civil society will hold the corrupt to account. It is Time for Justice, Equity, Security, and Trust.” The activists, many part of Transparency International, come from all over the world, widely different in ideology and approach, but they share a gutsy determination to hold leaders to account.

More tellingly, corruption is a leading topic in political discourse, from Washington to Manila to Kabul to Nairobi to Abuja. The belief that corruption is pervasive drives much of the anger that we see reflected in extremist movements, secular and religious. It fuels the populist surge and the sense of rot that discredits governments and politicians in widely different countries and cultures. America’s political campaign featured narratives about a Washington swamp with bloated, rotten bureaucracies wasting or diverting public resources. The narratives can be misleading, undermining courageous political leaders and public servants, but many see little beyond stories about corrupt practices...

The next International Anti-Corruption Conference will be in Denmark in 2018. It’s time to mix the oil and water. Fighting corruption is about more than exhortation: declaiming against those who steal and fail to honor their public responsibilities. Anti-corruption strategies and practices can work. But only when the passion of activists and moral leaders comes together with different parts of society, religious institutions included, to translate anger and a desire for good governance into reality. The fight against corruption, for decent governance and strong public service depends on public morality and a common commitment to ethical standards and priorities. Draining the swamp depends on linking the best of religious and civic teachings to the realities of political leadership and governance. That’s what it will take to achieve “Justice, Equity, Security, and Trust”."

"Danger", robrogers.com, 12/9/16

Rob Rogers, robrogers.com; "Danger"

Trump Fires Adviser’s Son From Transition for Spreading Fake News; New York Times, 12/6/16

Matthew Rosenberg, Maggie Haberman, and Eric Schmitt, New York Times; Trump Fires Adviser’s Son From Transition for Spreading Fake News:

"President-elect Donald J. Trump on Tuesday fired one of his transition team’s staff members, Michael G. Flynn, the son of Mr. Trump’s choice for national security adviser, for using Twitter to spread a fake news story about Hillary Clinton that led to an armed confrontation in a pizza restaurant in Washington.

The uproar over Mr. Flynn’s Twitter post cast a harsh spotlight on the views that he and his father, Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, aired on social media throughout the presidential campaign. Both men have shared fake news stories alleging that Mrs. Clinton committed felonies, and have posted their own Twitter messages that at times have crossed into Islamophobia.

But their social media musings apparently attracted little attention from Mr. Trump or his transition team before a North Carolina man fired a rifle on Sunday inside Comet Ping Pong, which was the subject of false stories tying it and the Clinton campaign to a child sex trafficking ring."

Radio Conspiracy Theorist Claims Ear Of Trump, Pushes 'Pizzagate' Fictions; NPR, 12/6/16

David Folkenflik, NPR; Radio Conspiracy Theorist Claims Ear Of Trump, Pushes 'Pizzagate' Fictions:

"Jones has claimed the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were an inside job, that the deadly shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School was a hoax, and that President Obama would round up people into concentration camps.

"He comes out of this kind of '90s fusion paranoia background where it's really more about opposition to the powers that be from any old direction," says Jesse Walker, author of The United States Of Paranoia. "It really is this idea of people's autonomy and freedom and health being threatened by this grand amorphous force that's within the big institutions of society but larger than them."

Walker contends Jones' all-encompassing assault on authority does not fall neatly along conservative or liberal lines.

That said, the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups, says his attacks inspire a strong following among racists."

‘We’re going to put a bullet in your head’: #PizzaGate threats terrorize D.C. shop owners; Washington Post, 12/6/16

John Woodrow Cox, Washington Post; ‘We’re going to put a bullet in your head’: #PizzaGate threats terrorize D.C. shop owners:

"Ousmaal first reported the harassment of her restaurant to D.C. police two weeks ago, but in emails she shared with The Post, an officer told her they couldn’t do anything to prevent free speech. He suggested she file a lawsuit.

She understands freedom of speech, Ousmaal replied in an email, but “derogatory libelous and hateful blogs and emails should not and cannot qualify.”"

Stop Calling Everything “Fake News”; Slate, 12/6/16

Will Oremus, Slate; Stop Calling Everything “Fake News” :

"Two months ago, almost no one was talking about fake news. A Google Trends search for the term shows that it barely registered before October. Now you can hardly turn on the real news without hearing it.

Fake news is a real, specific problem. But in all the furor around who’s making it, who’s sharing it, its impact, and how to stop it, it’s easy to lose sight of something more fundamental: what it is. The broader the definition, the less useful the concept becomes—and it’s already verging on counterproductive."

Setting a standard: The new city Ethics Board is a vital matter; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 12/4/16

Editorial Board, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; Setting a standard: The new city Ethics Board is a vital matter:

"The city’s reconstituted Ethics Hearing Board has the opportunity to set a standard for local government. Legislation passed by Pittsburgh City Council and signed by Mayor Bill Peduto appears to give the board real teeth to root out ethics violations and impose discipline. Just as important, however, will be the board’s work in fostering a climate where officials, employees and others involved in the city better understand the rules and diligently strive to comply with them... Board members must have taught law, been subject to ethics codes or otherwise have an “ethics background.”"

TV for the fake news generation: why Westworld is the defining show of 2016; Guardian, 12/7/16

Paul MacInnes, Guardian; TV for the fake news generation: why Westworld is the defining show of 2016:

"Westworld is a hit. Viewing figures released this week confirmed that the first season of HBO’s sci-fi western drama received a bigger audience than any other debut in the channel’s history...

The producers deliberately reached out to an audience that enjoys obsessing. They knew some fans would watch the show again and again on their laptops. They knew they would freeze-frame the screen and zoom in on details that would pass the casual viewer by. From there the fans would try to make connections, to unravel the mysteries, to find deeper meaning. Things were left uncertain enough that people could believe what they wanted. Whether a theory was “true” was less important than the fact that someone believed in it. Sound familiar?

I’m not calling HBO a purveyor of fake news, and neither am I suggesting that Westworld has been captured by the alt-right like Pepe the Frog. But the drama has certainly tapped into an audience of young people who love video games and cracking codes, and understands both technology and identity politics."

"Actual Troll Afraid To Post"; Frank & Ernest Comic Strip, GoComics, 12/7/16

Frank & Ernest Comic Strip, GoComics; "Actual Troll Afraid To Post"

Facebook, Twitter, Google and Microsoft team up to tackle extremist content; Guardian, 12/5/16

Olivia Solon, Guardian; Facebook, Twitter, Google and Microsoft team up to tackle extremist content:

"Google, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft have pledged to work together to identify and remove extremist content on their platforms through an information-sharing initiative.

The companies are to create a shared database of unique digital fingerprints – known as “hashes” – for images and videos that promote terrorism. This could include recruitment videos or violent terrorist imagery or memes. When one company identifies and removes such a piece of content, the others will be able to use the hash to identify and remove the same piece of content from their own network...

Because the companies have different policies on what constitutes terrorist content, they will start by sharing hashes of “the most extreme and egregious terrorist images and videos” as they are most likely to violate “all of our respective companies” content policies, they said."

The Future of Privacy; New York Times, 12/6/16

William Gibson, New York Times; The Future of Privacy:

"I’ve never been able to fit the concepts of privacy, history and encryption together in a satisfying way, though it continues to seem that I should. Each concept has to do with information; each can be considered to concern the public and the private; and each involves aspects of society, and perhaps particularly digital society. But experience has taught me that all I can hope to do with these three concepts is demonstrate the problems that considering them together causes."

In Trump’s America, ‘pizzagate’ could be the new normal; Washington Post, 12/5/16

Dana Milbank, Washington Post; In Trump’s America, ‘pizzagate’ could be the new normal:

"This would appear to be the new normal: Not only disagreeing with your opponent but accusing her of running a pedophilia ring, provoking such fury that somebody takes it upon himself to start shooting. Not only chafing when criticized in the press but stoking anti-media hysteria that leads some supporters to threaten to kill journalists.

After The Washington Post reported Sunday about the Comet gunman and the nonsense conspiracy theory that motivated him, the reporters received emails and tweets saying “I hope the next shooter targets you lying sacks of s--- in the media,” “God has a plan better than death,” and “it would also be a shame if someone took a gun to” The Post.

Trump is not directly responsible for every violent word or action of his followers. But he foments violence. As The Post’s executive editor, Marty Baron, has noted, when Trump refers to journalists as “the lowest form of life,” “scum” and the enemy, “it is no wonder that some members of our staff [at The Post] and at other news organizations received vile insults and threats of personal harm so worrisome that extra security was required.”"

N.C. man told police he went to D.C. pizzeria with assault rifle to ‘self-investigate’ election-related conspiracy theory; Washington Post, 12/5/16

Faiz Siddiqui and Susan Svrluga, Washington Post; N.C. man told police he went to D.C. pizzeria with assault rifle to ‘self-investigate’ election-related conspiracy theory:

[Kip Currier: In the wake of post-2016 Presidential Election revelations by fake news writers, research findings on fake news here and here and here, and efforts by tech giants over the past few weeks to rein in fake news dissemination and proliferation here in the U.S. and abroad, this story about a seemingly fake-news-weaponized assailant's dangerous "conspiracy theory reconnaissance" on Sunday at a popular pizza eatery in Chevy Chase, Maryland and his impact on other businesses and area residents is a chilling example of the potentially dire consequences that fake news and conspiracy theories can have. Thankfully no one was physically injured. But this is a wake-up call to all of us about the legitimate threat fake news poses to democratic values and democracy itself, as well as to personal liberty and public safety. I've not been to Comet Ping Pong yet but have enjoyed browsing the nearby Politics and Prose bookstore (which each month hosts an incredible array of authors for book talks nurturing the free flow of information, ideas, and speech!) and grabbing a delicious Fox BLT at The Little Red Fox on my way back to Pittsburgh.]

"The popular family restaurant, near Connecticut and Nebraska avenues NW in the Chevy Chase neighborhood, was swept up in the onslaught of fake news and conspiracy theories that were prevalent during the presidential campaign. The restaurant, its owner, staff and nearby businesses have been attacked on social media and received death threats...

The restaurant’s owner and employees were threatened on social media in the days before the election after fake news stories circulated claiming that then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and her campaign chief were running a child sex ring from the restaurant’s backrooms. Even Michael Flynn, a retired general whom President-elect Donald Trump has tapped to advise him on national security, shared stories about another anti-Clinton conspiracy theory involving pedophilia. None of them were true. But the fake stories and threats persisted, some even aimed at children of Comet Ping Pong employees and patrons. The restaurant’s owner was forced to contact the FBI, local police, Facebook and other social-media platforms in an effort to remove the articles.

Last month, citing its policy against posting the personal information of others, Reddit banned the “pizzagate” topic.

But it didn’t stop the harassment, and nearby businesses have received threats as well, according to police. On Sunday, Washington Post reporters involved in this article were the target of online threats shortly after it posted.

Matt Carr, the owner of the Little Red Fox market and coffee shop, said his business started getting threats last weekend...

Politics and Prose, the bookstore that has been a Washington institution and neighborhood fixture for more than 30 years, was in the middle of a book event when attendees and staff saw police converging on the block, said Bradley Graham, a store co-owner.

They, too, had received threats recently, Graham said, and were planning to meet with police Monday “because we had feared that what, up to now, had been simply despicable menacing verbal attacks online or on the phone might escalate.”"

SOLVING THE PROBLEM OF FAKE NEWS; New Yorker, 11/30/16

Nicholas Lemann, New Yorker; SOLVING THE PROBLEM OF FAKE NEWS:

"What we are now calling fake news—misinformation that people fall for—is nothing new. Thousands of years ago, in the Republic, Plato offered up a hellish vision of people who mistake shadows cast on a wall for reality. In the Iliad, the Trojans fell for a fake horse. Shakespeare loved misinformation: in “Twelfth Night,” Viola disguises herself as a man and wins the love of another woman; in “The Tempest,” Caliban mistakes Stephano for a god. And, in recent years, the Nobel committee has awarded several economics prizes to work on “information asymmetry,” “cognitive bias,” and other ways in which the human propensity toward misperception distorts the workings of the world.

What is new is the premise of the conversation about fake news that has blossomed since Election Day: that it’s realistic to expect our country to be a genuine mass democracy, in which people vote on the basis of facts and truth, as provided to them by the press."

Australian students recreate Martin Shkreli price-hike drug in school lab; Guardian, 11/30/16

Melissa Davey, Guardian; Australian students recreate Martin Shkreli price-hike drug in school lab:

"He said the open nature of the project demystified science and revealed the number of roadblocks the students had faced in coming up with the final product, which involved three complicated chemical steps.

“With science results you can be presented with a polished finished product that hides the false steps along the way,” he said. “The students’ real-time diary highlights their whole process, and is a very transparent way of doing things.”...

He said unfortunately the students would not be able to sell their drug to the US market. While the drug can be bought in Australia for about A$13 for a packet of 50, there are a number of complicated legal roadblocks in the way of producing and selling it in the US.

“Turing has the exclusive rights to sell it, even though the drug is no longer under patent,” Todd said. “The ridiculousness of this legal loophole means if we wanted to launch it as drug in the US we’d have to go through a whole new clinical trial because we would have to compare the Sydney Grammar stuff with the officially sanctioned stuff, and Turing would have to give us the drug to allow those comparisons to be made."

Social scientists set to decipher various shades of ethics; The Peninsula: Qatar's Daily Newspaper, 12/1/16

Irfan Bhukhari, The Peninsula: Qatar's Daily Newspaper; Social scientists set to decipher various shades of ethics:

"On the academic landscape of Qatar, an international ethics summit is set to appear which will cover dozens of topics having contemporary importance from corporate citizenship in global context to ethics revolving around gender, religion, business and conflict.

A three-day International Ethics Summit themed “Morality in the Global Era: Theory, Policy and Praxis” will start from December 4 at HBKU Students Centre at Education City.

The summit will be an international opportunity for scholars, academia and audiences representing various segments of society to explore and understand a number of issues such as: Ethical Leadership and Social Responsibility; Ethics in the Professions; Integrity in Business; Corporate Citizenship in a Global Context; Ethics and the Environment; Immigration and Moral Tragedy; Ethics and Technology in the Global Age; Ethics and Sports; Ethics and Gender among others according to university’s call-for-papers and leaflet pertaining to programme-details. The summit is being sposored by RasGas."

Donald Trump’s ‘Monster’s Ball’; New York Times, 12/1/16

Charles M. Blow, New York Times; Donald Trump’s ‘Monster’s Ball’ :

"Donald Trump was elected on a wave of fake news, fake minority outreach and an 11th-hour email head fake by James Comey...

Donald Trump is a fraud, and a dangerous one. This country is depending on morally principled patriots to never let that fact be shifted from center stage.

Trump rode to victory on a cloud of vapors and vapid promises, and now he is assembling a counsel of acolytes and opportunists. Now each of us must demonstrate our fortitude in vocal, steadfast resistance.

Trump must be made to know, in no uncertain terms, that he was elected president and not anointed emperor.

Not every battle can be won, but every battle must be waged. This is the proving ground. Are you prepared to stand your ground?"

Putin brings China's Great Firewall to Russia in cybersecurity pact; Guardian, 11/29/16

Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, Guardian; Putin brings China's Great Firewall to Russia in cybersecurity pact:

"Russia has been working on incorporating elements of China’s Great Firewall into the “Red Web”, the country’s system of internet filtering and control, after unprecedented cyber collaboration between the countries.

A decision earlier this month to block the networking site LinkedIn in Russia is the most visible in a series of measures to bring the internet under greater state control...

In the summer, a measure known as Yarovaya’s law was introduced, which requires Russia’s telecoms and internet providers to store users’ data for six months and metadata for three years...

On 7 November, China adopted a controversial cybersecurity law that revived international concerns about censorship in the country. In a sign that collaboration between the countries is mutually beneficial, the legislation echoes Russia’s rules on data localisation and requires “critical information infrastructure operators” to be stored domestically – the law LinkedIn fell foul of. It seems the exchange of ideas has already borne fruit."

China’s Great Leap Backward; The Atlantic, December 2016

James Fallows, The Atlantic; China’s Great Leap Backward:

"China’s internet, always censored and firewalled, is now even more strictly separated from the rest of the world’s than ever before, and becoming more so. China’s own internet companies (Baidu as a search engine rather than Google, WeChat for Twitter) are more heavily censored. Virtual private networks and other work-arounds, tolerated a decade ago—the academic who invented China’s “Great Firewall” system of censorship even bragged about the six VPNs he used to keep up on foreign developments—are now under governmental assault. When you find a network that works, you dare not mention its name on social media or on a website that could alert the government to its existence. “It’s an endless cat-and-mouse,” the founder of a California-based VPN company, which I’m deliberately not identifying, recently told me. “We figure out a new route or patch, and then they notice that people are using us and they figure out how to block it. Eventually they wear most users down.” On a multiweek visit to China early last year, I switched among three VPNs and was able to reach most international sites using my hotel-room Wi-Fi. On a several-day visit last December, the hassle of making connections was not worth it, and I just did without Western news sources.

China’s print and broadcast media have always been state-controlled and pro-government. But a decade ago I heard from academics and party officials that “reasonable” criticism from the press actually had an important safety-valve function, as did online commentary, in alerting the government to emerging problem spots.

Those days are gone. Every week or two the Chinese press carries warnings, more and more explicit, by President Xi Jinping and his colleagues that dissent is not permissible and the party’s interests come first."

How to solve Facebook's fake news problem: experts pitch their ideas; Guardian, 11/29/16

Nicky Woolf, Guardian; How to solve Facebook's fake news problem: experts pitch their ideas:

"...[A] growing cadre of technologists, academics and media experts are now beginning the quixotic process of trying to think up solutions to the problem, starting with a rambling 100+ page open Google document set up by Upworthy founder Eli Pariser...

“The biggest challenge is who wants to be the arbiter of truth and what truth is,” said Claire Wardle, research director for the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University. “The way that people receive information now is increasingly via social networks, so any solution that anybody comes up with, the social networks have to be on board.”...

Most of the solutions fall into three general categories: the hiring of human editors; crowdsourcing, and technological or algorithmic solutions."

Fake news and a 400-year-old problem: we need to resolve the ‘post-truth’ crisis; Guardian, 11/29/16

Luciano Floridi, Guardian; Fake news and a 400-year-old problem: we need to resolve the ‘post-truth’ crisis:

"In April 2016, the British government agreed with the recommendation of the House of Commons’ Science and Technology Committee that the government should establish a Council of Data Ethics. Such an open and independent advisory forum would bring all stakeholders together to participate in the dialogue, decision-making and implementation of solutions to common ethical problems brought about by the information revolution.

In September 2016, Amazon, DeepMind, Facebook, IBM, Microsoft and Google (whom I advised on the right to be forgotten) established a new ethical body called the Partnership on Artificial Intelligence to Benefit People and Society. The Royal Society, the British Academy and the Alan Turing Institute, the national institute for data science, are working on regulatory frameworks for managing personal data, and in May 2018, Europe’s new General Data Protection Regulation will come into effect, strengthening the rights of individuals and their personal information. All these initiatives show a growing interest in how online platforms can be held more responsible for the content they provide, not unlike newspapers.

We need to shape and guide the future of the digital, and stop making it up as we go along. It is time to work on an innovative blueprint for a better kind of infosphere."

In today’s world, the truth is losing; Washington Post, 11/29/16

David Ignatius, Washington Post; In today’s world, the truth is losing:

"How should citizens who want a fact-based world combat this assault on truth? Stengel has approved State Department programs that teach investigative reporting and empower truth-tellers, but he’s right that this isn’t really a job for Uncle Sam.

The best hope may be the global companies that have created the social-media platforms. “They see this information war as an existential threat,” says Stengel. The tech companies have made a start: He says Twitter has removed more than 400,000 accounts, and YouTube daily deletes extremist videos.

The real challenge for global tech giants is to restore the currency of truth. Perhaps “machine learning” can identify falsehoods and expose every argument that uses them. Perhaps someday, a human-machine process will create what Stengel describes as a “global ombudsman for information.”"

How Much Disclosure About an Op-Ed Author Is Required?; New York Times, 11/30/16

Liz Spayd, New York Times; How Much Disclosure About an Op-Ed Author Is Required? :

"Who is this woman brave enough to come forward in Facebook’s defense?

Lessin’s tagline identifies her as the founder of a technology website, The Information. And near the end of her piece, she mentions in passing that her husband briefly worked at Facebook.

What neither Lessin nor The Times’s opinion editors told readers is that Lessin and her husband, Sam, have close ties to Facebook and its founder, Mark Zuckerberg. Sam Lessin is a long-time friend of Zuckerberg since their days at Harvard. When young Zuckerberg was shopping for money to start his business, Sam took him around to meet investors. When Sam had a business of his own, Zuckerberg bought it, and then Sam went to work at Facebook. He became the social media giant’s vice president overseeing product, and one of a handful of top executives who reported directly to Zuckerberg. The Facebook founder was even reported to be in the wedding party when Sam and Jessica got married.

I wouldn’t expect Times editors to necessarily put all that information in a piece explaining Jessica Lessin’s connections to a company she’s writing about. But simply saying her husband “worked at Facebook for a brief period” doesn’t cut it."

Facebook Shouldn’t Fact-Check; New York Times, 11/29/16

Jessica Lessin, New York Times; Facebook Shouldn’t Fact-Check:

"If you don’t believe that Facebook’s policies could sway the news industry, you haven’t been paying attention over the past five years. Publications have been suckered into tweaking their content and their business models to try to live off the traffic Facebook sends them. They’ve favored Facebook clicks over their core readers, and are no closer to addressing plummeting print revenues. What would happen if the distribution of their articles on Facebook was tied to submitting data about their sources or conforming to some site-endorsed standards about what constitutes a trustworthy news source?

My fellow reporters and editors will argue that I am letting Facebook off too easy. While my husband did work there for a brief period, my position isn’t a defense of the company, which I have covered critically for years. I simply don’t trust Facebook, or any one company, with the responsibility for determining what is true."

Summer Project Turns Into Leukemia Testing Breakthrough; New York Times, 11/28/16

Donald G. McNeil Jr., New York Times; Summer Project Turns Into Leukemia Testing Breakthrough:

'Gleevec, which made almost $5 billion for Novartis last year, has been at the center of a long battle between pharmaceutical companies and activists fighting price increases. The drug cost about $26,000 per year in 2001, and Novartis repeatedly raised the price even as competitors emerged; early this year, it was more than $120,000.

Those who support broader access to medicines argue that poor countries should reject patents and make generic versions of leukemia drugs. In 2013, India’s highest court struck down Novartis’s patent application for Gleevec, opening the way for generics. They now cost about $400 a year in India and about $9,000 in Canada."

Facebook Runs Up Against German Hate Speech Laws; New York Times, 11/28/16

Mark Scott and Melissa Eddy, New York Times; Facebook Runs Up Against German Hate Speech Laws:

"In Germany, more than almost anywhere else in the West, lawmakers, including Chancellor Angela Merkel, are demanding that Facebook go further to police what is said on the social network — a platform that now has 1.8 billion users worldwide. The country’s lawmakers also want other American tech giants to meet similar standards.

The often-heated dispute has raised concerns over maintaining freedom of speech while protecting vulnerable minorities in a country where the legacy of World War II and decades under Communism still resonate.

It is occurring amid mounting criticism of Facebook in the United States after fake news reports were shared widely on the site before the presidential election. Facebook also has been accused of allowing similar false reports to spread during elections elsewhere."

What a Map of the Fake-News Ecosystem Says About the Problem; Fortune, 11/28/16

Matthew Ingram, Fortune; What a Map of the Fake-News Ecosystem Says About the Problem:

"As debate continues over the extent to which “fake news” helped Donald Trump win the presidential race, many have talked about a network of loosely-affiliated, right-wing sites that distributed this content through social media platforms. But few have tried to describe it in scientific terms.

Jonathan Albright, a professor at Elon University in North Carolina, is an expert in data journalism who has worked for both Google and Yahoo. He specializes in media analytics and social networks, and he has created a network map or topology that describes the landscape of the fake-news ecosystem...

More than anything, the impression one gets from looking at Albright’s network map is that there are some extremely powerful “nodes” or hubs that propel a lot of the traffic involving fake news. And it also shows an entire universe of sites that many people have probably never heard of...

With the landscape of the fake-news ecosystem outlined in terms of the connections between the various nodes, it may be easier for platforms like Google and Facebook—or even for other media outlets—to track the spread of the problem and come up with potential solutions."

Fake News and the Internet Shell Game; New York Times, 11/28/16

Michael P. Lynch, New York Times; Fake News and the Internet Shell Game:

"Almost everything that we encounter online is being presented to us by for-profit algorithms, and by us, post by post, tweet by tweet. That fact, even more than the spread of fake news, can be its own sort of shell game, one that we are pulling on ourselves.

As the late-19th-century mathematician W. K. Clifford noted in his famous essay, “The Ethics of Belief,” ambivalence about objective evidence is an attitude corrosive of democracy. Clifford ends the essay by imagining someone who has “no time for the long course of study” that would make him competent to judge many questions. Clifford’s response is withering: “Then he should have no time to believe.”

And we might add, tweet."

Campus Libraries See Increase in Discriminatory Incidents; Library Journal, 11/28/16

Lisa Peet, Library Journal; Campus Libraries See Increase in Discriminatory Incidents:

"Within the libraries, administrators have used these events to highlight ongoing issues such as how to spot and respond to fake news. On a wider scale, they have stepped up their mission to support various campus communities and interest groups, particularly when it comes to student welfare. Said Hutto, “We, like a lot of colleges, have been very proactive about increasing diversity on campus. I think especially for those students, they definitely… are thinking of Reed as being a safe place. And to find out that it’s kind of like any other place is not a pleasant thing for them. We’re really concerned about them.”

In a statement released by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), Chris Bourg, director of libraries at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and ARL Diversity and Inclusion Committee chair, stated, “While ARL libraries and archives work hard to be inclusive in their hiring, collections, services, and environments, the Association and its members will not claim neutrality in the face of discrimination, sexism, ableism, racism, homophobia, religious persecution, or other forms of oppression. We support freedom of speech and the open exchange of ideas and opinions, but we will not tolerate hate speech, silencing, inflammatory rhetoric, or any other speech or action that threatens the safety or dignity of any member of our community.”

Addressing the proactive role campus libraries can play post-election, Bourg wrote in a statement from MIT Libraries, “This election has highlighted the urgent need for open, enduring, and equitable access to credible sources of news, data, and knowledge. At the MIT Libraries we will redouble our efforts to provide not only credible sources of information to our communities, but also the expertise, services, collections, tools, and spaces that facilitate and promote the critical assessment of information. We will also continue to document and provide access to the ideas, knowledge, and perspectives of our communities, as we did by archiving the post-election posters containing the immediate reactions of MIT students and community members.”"

Congress May Hold Key to Handling Trump’s Conflicts of Interest; New York Times, 11/28/16

Peter J. Henning, New York Times; Congress May Hold Key to Handling Trump’s Conflicts of Interest:

"The key to dealing with conflicts — whether actual or potential — is transparency about any decision that could have an effect on Mr. Trump’s business interests if he decides not to divest his holdings or create a truly blind trust. Unlike the approach of many teenagers, who believe that it is easier to beg forgiveness than permission, in business the advance notice of a potential issue can lessen its impact.

The challenge is coming up with a mechanism for dealing with questions that might arise from Mr. Trump’s business interests rather than relying on the good faith of the parties involved or deflecting the issue with claims that any criticism is only political, especially in foreign countries in which the president-elect has investments, as The New York Times points out...

Some critics have pointed to potential problems Mr. Trump’s business interests could present under the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution. That obscure provision provides that “no person holding any office of profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince or foreign state.”"

Trump has already defeated the news media. And it’s unclear what we can do about it.; Washington Post, 11/28/16

Paul Waldman, Washington Post; Trump has already defeated the news media. And it’s unclear what we can do about it. :

"The entire sequence of events enables Trump to create a meta-message, which is that there’s no such thing as truth and no such thing as genuine authority. Think about it: the president-elect is claiming that an election that he won was beset by fraud, because he heard it from a lunatic radio host who thinks that the Sandy Hook massacre was staged using child actors and the 9/11 attacks were carried out by the U.S. government. At the same time, the conspiracy-theorist-in-chief is turning away the intelligence briefers who are prepared to deliver him daily updates on the world’s hotspots and potential dangers to the United States — what one might call the actual conspiracies we have to be worried about.

Trump has revealed that the entire journalistic system is based on the assumption that political actors will stay within certain parameters of truth and sanity. Some are more dishonest than others, but there’s a limit. “The President said this today” coverage can be problematic, but much of the time it’s perfectly reasonable, since he’s the most important person in the political world and his words and beliefs have a profound effect on what happens not just here but around the globe.

Trump realizes that when you step outside those limits, you can manipulate the media at will because their normal ways of doing things are inadequate to the task. You can take any idea, no matter how preposterous, and make half the country believe it. And when journalists push back, it’ll only make your supporters more firm in their loyalty.

This is part of a broader assault Trump is mounting on almost every institution of public life in America — the government, the media, the education system, even democracy itself. He’s been doing it from the beginning, not only spreading lies in a volume that had never been seen before, but continually arguing that established authority couldn’t be trusted."

Potential Conflicts Around the Globe for Trump, the Businessman President; New York Times, 11/26/16

Richard C. Paddock, Eric Lipton, Ellen Barry, Rod Nordland, Danny Hakim, and Simon Romero, New York Times; Potential Conflicts Around the Globe for Trump, the Businessman President:

"In an interview with The Times on Tuesday, Mr. Trump boasted again about the global reach of his business — and his family’s ability to keep it running after he takes office.

“I’ve built a very great company and it’s a big company and it’s all over the world,” Mr. Trump said, adding later: “I don’t care about my company. It doesn’t matter. My kids run it.”

In a written statement, his spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, said Mr. Trump and his family were committed to addressing any issues related to his financial holdings.

“Vetting of various structures and immediate transfer of the business remains a top priority for both President-elect Trump, his adult children and his executives,” she said.

But a review by The Times of these business dealings identified a menu of the kinds of complications that could create a running source of controversy for Mr. Trump, as well as tensions between his priorities as president and the needs and objectives of his companies."

Twitter Beats Back Lawsuit Over Killing of U.S. Contractors by ISIS; Inside Counsel, 11/28/16

Ross Todd, Inside Counsel; Twitter Beats Back Lawsuit Over Killing of U.S. Contractors by ISIS:

"In a ruling that should bolster a law giving social-media companies broad immunity from liability for user-generated content, Twitter Inc. on Friday beat back a lawsuit from families of two American contractors killed in an attack in Jordan inspired by the Islamic State group.

The decision from U.S. District Judge William Orrick III highlights the difficulty plaintiffs face when trying to hold social-media companies liable for allegedly providing material support to terrorists...

In a blog post on the decision published Monday, Eric Goldman, a professor at Santa Clara University School of Law, wrote that the decision bodes well for companies such as Facebook Inc. and Google Inc. that have faced a recent uptick in claims under the Anti-Terrorism Act raising allegations that they provided material support for terrorists."

An ethical double standard for Trump — and the GOP?; Washington Post, 11/27/16

E.J. Dionne, Washington Post; An ethical double standard for Trump — and the GOP? :

"Republicans did an extraordinary job raising doubts about Clinton — helped, we learned courtesy of The Post, by a Russian disinformation campaign. Does the GOP want to cast itself as a band of hypocrites who cared not at all about ethics and were simply trying to win an election?...

If Trump wasn’t ready to put his business life behind him, he should not have run for president. And if Republicans — after all of their ethical sermons about Clinton — do not now demand that the incoming president unequivocally cut all of his and his family’s ties to his companies, they will be fully implicated in any Trump scandal that results from a shameful and partisan double standard."