Tag Archive for: algorithmic politics

It’s the day belonging to Tiwes, the Norse god of single combat. What will we engage in battle about today? Looks like sketchy news coverage is a good reason, after taking a peek at Newsmap this morning to check global media coverage of the Panama Papers.

Very thin reporting, according to the results. Canada, come on — Bill Cosby is bigger news than global corruption?

Ditto for India, which covered the HSBC money laundering scandal exhaustively last year. Very little coverage in that country’s English language outlets.

Don’t get all peeved off about the U.S. media, which hasn’t done a particularly good job over the last 24 hours. It’s not just us; the lack of coverage may say something about media ownership around the world.

One possible example on shore here: the acquisition of the Las Vegas-Review Journal last year. Nevada happens to be the eighth most popular tax haven in the world, and Las Vegas is its heart. Was this paper acquired in order to influence reporting in and about this topic?

Mossack Fonseca has a subsidiary in Las Vegas, by the way.

Let’s take a look at science and technology news…

• No change yet to claims that Panama Papers were obtained by an attack on Mossack Fonseca’s email server (The Register-UK) — Of particular note, this observation by this tech news outlet:
  

  To date, The Register hasn’t seen a strong presence from the tech sector in the staged release of the documents, perhaps because the “Double Irish Dutch Sandwich” tactic favoured in this business works without hiding companies’ links to their international associates.

  The comments at that link are rather interesting, offering both a perspective from our overseas “cousins” as well as technical assessment about the leak.

• Are you ready for some Thursday night Twitter streaming? (WaPo) — NFL’s awarded a deal to Twitter for streaming some of its games. This is an interesting development, given how much co-watching TV Twitter users do.
• I’m afraid I can’t do THAT, Dave: humans aroused by touching robots special places (Phys.org) — Ewww. Don’t ask me to travel through the Uncanny Valley with you on this one.
• Revolv’s home automation hub now a casualty in the Internet of Things universe (BoingBoing) — Device fell out of the product plans for Google’s home automation subsidiary, Nest. Unfortunately, Revolv was sold with a lifetime subscription which will be defunct in May.
• “Routine management reshuffle” replaces three senior execs at China’s telecom manufacturer ZTE (Reuters) — coincidentally happens weeks after U.S. authorities revealed attempts by ZTE to circumvent sanctions against Iran.
• Name a non-Zika disease also transmitted by Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, facing a drastic vaccine shortage (Science) — You win if you said yellow fever, which has no cure and can be deadly.
• Article 27: Algorithmic Politics (Furtherfield) — Necrocapitalism. Wrap your head around that term. A thought-provoking essay about a world where algorithms are our political system.

That’s enough for your coffee break or lunch hour. Catch you here tomorrow morning!