david’s on vacation, and he foolishly left TWiW in my hands for the next two weeks! Don’t worry, it’s the same garden variety internet oddities you’ve come to know and love, just written by me, Lisa (the lmelegari that contributes all the time).
Pope Francis Turns to YouTubers To Promote Positive Influence
Brian Crecente, Polygon
So this is actually a bit old for news, but it’s deserving of some commentary. Religious affiliations aside, you have to admit that Pope Francis is really embracing modern technology and media. This meeting is the latest convergence of the modern world and old school religion, and one that sends a positive message anyone can get behind. The fact that the Pope focused on empowering these YouTube stars to keep up with their type of positive influence spoke volumes. In the past, a Pope given this opportunity to speak to an influential audience might have attempted to persuade them to promote religion rather than their own positive agendas.
Like it or not, YouTube celebrities are becoming a focal point of our culture. You can read more about the meeting from YouTube’s Official Blog.
The Aftermath of 2010’s Sexiest Hacks
Two of the biggest and sexiest hacking stories of the 2010’s thus far are the products of Ashley Madison and iCloud. The former involved over a million accounts on the adultery website having private data exposed, potentially ending thousands of marriages and causing a ton of public ridicule. But that’s not the end of the story, the parent company of AM, Avid Life Media, is now facing an FTC probe of currently unknown purpose. The FTC was already investigating claims of fake AI chatbots posing as female humans looking for adulterous companions. Several class action lawsuits are still in the works for the compromised details. Meanwhile, the company’s new executives are looking to revive the brand, potentially shifting the focus from infidelity to…something else? Puppies? Knitting? Who knows, but Rob Segal and James Millership have their work cut out for them.
Next, comes the tale of the celebrity nudes iCloud hacks of 2013 and 2014. Dubbed “The Fappening” by some, hackers gained access to over 300 iCloud accounts, many of them A-list celebrities with photo albums full of nudes. Once these hit 4chan, they spread like wildfire, causing many a red-faced Hollywood starlet. The second of the hackers, Edward Majerczyk, just had his day in court and signed a plea agreement for taking part in the “Celebgate” hack. Along with co-hacker Ryan Collins, who also signed a plea agreement, he’ll be serving jail time. Majerczyk faces up to five years jail time for violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act while Collins is looking at a recommended sentence of 18 months. If you can find any good in this story, it’s that following the leak; Apple beefed up its iCloud security with email alerts, two-factor authentication, and app-specific passwords.
UN Declares Unrestricted Access to the Internet is a Basic Human Right
Corey Mueller, Popular Science
You can add “unrestricted internet access” to the UN’s list of undeniable human rights. The global governing body has introduced a non-binding resolution to prevent governments from deliberately blocking or preventing their citizens from internet access. While this doesn’t mean the world wide web will be coming to every nook and cranny of the Earth anytime soon, it will help people in places such as China see the full scope of the internet and not just what their government wants to see.
Now if only this move will get the United States to do right by net neutrality and keep our internet as free as our country. ‘merica!
AI May Beat us at Chess, But it Won’t Remember Our Face
Siyi Chen, Quartz
With the world starting to anticipate the dawn of our robot overlord uprising, a story out of China serves to humble AI just a bit. At the “Facial Recognition Olympics” (so that’s a thing now), Wang Yuheng correctly matched photos of adult women with their childhood pictures, a feat his AI competitor “Mark” could not do as well. Of course, this is after Mark and Yuheng tied in the first two rounds. Mark is the AI of Alipay, the largest digital payment service in China. Yuheng is well known for his photographic memory whose feats include identifying a specific glass of water out of 520 other seemingly identical ones.
While this seems like a victory for humankind, it’s only a matter of time before Mark exceeds his 99.5% accuracy rate and knows each one of us in more ways than just looks. Soon we’ll have AIs doing all our banking, selling our deli meats, even writing our newsletters! (I’m not a robot, I swear) But will they ever love us? Probably not.
The Voice Behind the Internet of the 90’s
Great Big Story
If you’re a 90’s kid like me, you grew up with moments of glee when you heard the familiar “You’ve Got Mail” and “File’s Done” soundbites of the AOL dial-up software. Those words and that voice were a sign from the gods, you were finally connected to the internet after 20+ minutes of dialing and praying no one in your house picked up the phone. What many of us didn’t know was that voice belonged to a real man, Elwood Edwards, and the AOL gig may have ruined his voice acting career. Little did Elwood know that his iconic voice would reach millions, but net him nary a dollar for the efforts. His only other claim to fame was a brief voice-over on The Simpsons, but hey, that’s more than I can say about my acting career.
Pokemon Go Players are Walking into Trouble
It’s here. After over a year of hype, missed release dates, and more hype, Pokemon Go is available in the US. This game did what DDR and WiiSports couldn’tL it made me want to, CRAVE to exercise. All in the name of catching a Pokemon. But there are already safety concerns with the new app which uses augmented reality to put Pokemon in our environment in real time. For safety’s sake, I took my father on my walk into the wild (i.e. my crappy neighborhood) and yes, he did have to tell me once or twice to watch where I was going. But I’m not the only one walking into peril for the sake of nabbing a fantasy critter!
Reports from the Darwin Police Station in Australia (where the app launched first, probably coinciding with Japan’s time zones) say players are walking straight up into their station, which is unfortunately marked as a PokeStop (a place to get free items). USA Today has a slightly pissy article on the game, written from the perspective of a journalist who’s never had the thrill of catching a legendary bird after the 25th reset. The game’s loading splash screen (pictured above) has a comical rendering of what might happen if you’re not careful to look up. But remember kids, Gyarados can’t hurt you in real life, but a moving vehicle can.
Of course, there are already exaggerations of the dangers of the game. Fake news site Cartel Press reported on a Chicago teen getting mugged and stabbed for his iPhone after wandering into a “bad neighborhood” while tracking a Pokemon. Another (true) quirk of the game is that many of the PokeStops are located at churches, leading some fans to believe the game is trying to push religion. Personally, I think it’s just the most common, non-commercial landmark that’s almost guaranteed to be present in any semi-populated area. But fret not, I’m sure the McDonalds or Starbucks tie-in is coming soon. “You must buy at least one (1) more McFlurry to enter this Gym!” (props to mgoldstein of the IE Slack channel for that joke)
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