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How social media took us from Tahrir Square to Donald Trump

Zeynep Tufekci voor MIT Technology Review:

The problem is that when we encounter opposing views in the age and context of social media, it’s not like reading them in a newspaper while sitting alone. It’s like hearing them from the opposing team while sitting with our fellow fans in a football stadium. Online, we’re connected with our communities, and we seek approval from our like-minded peers. We bond with our team by yelling at the fans of the other one.

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Inside Twitter’s Struggle Over What Gets Banned

The New York Times mocht langsgaan bij een vergadering van Twitter…

For about an hour, the group tried to get a handle on what constituted dehumanizing speech. At one point, Mr. Dorsey wondered if there was a technology solution. There was no agreement on an answer.

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Why Facebook Wants to Give You the Benefit of the Doubt

Alexis Madrigal bij The Atlantic:

You don’t need to be a free-speech absolutist to imagine how this unprecedented, opaque, and increasingly sophisticated system could have unintended consequences or be used to (intentionally or not) squelch minority viewpoints. Everyone, Facebook included, wants to find a way out of the mess generated by every voice having a publishing platform. But what if there is no way out of it?

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Anatomy of Tik Tok: The viral video app from Bytedance

Factor Daily:

Tik Tok is a crazy place. Every time I open the app, time flies. Full of bite-sized videos, it is immensely entertaining.

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Arrogance Peaks in Silicon Valley

MG Siegler:

We need Silicon Valley — the people behind these companies — to wake up. We need everyone to act like human beings, not like rogue AI programs vomiting up delusions of grandeur.

I’m honestly not even sure that some individuals — people I know — could pass the Turing test at this point. Facebook is but a taste of what’s to come, I fear.

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A Faster and More Flexible Home Page that Delivers the News Readers Want

Heel interessante blik achter de schermen door het Open Team van The New York Times:

Our first round of prototypes were pretty crude: we built them quickly, with the intention of testing our assumptions and throwing most of them away after gathering data. We started out with simple paper prototypes. (Our favorite was a cardboard and paper iPhone we nicknamed “The pPhone.”)

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Why It Took Dunkin’ Donuts 10 Years to Build the Perfect New Cup

Schitterend verhaal bij Entrepeneur over hoe Dunkin’ Donuts hun iconische isomo-bekers al tien jaar probeert te vervangen:

They held focus groups about totally different topics during which they served hot coffee just to watch people interact with potential cups. Murphy became obsessed with the “cup management process,” which told him whether or not a cup was any good. “You’re holding the cup,” he says. “After a few seconds, it starts to get a little bit too hot. So you put it in your left hand while your right hand cools. Then you switch back. And then you end up doing the sort of Maui hang loose, where you put your thumb on the top of the lid and your pinky on the bottom of the cup.” Any test cup that resulted in a Maui hang loose did not go any further. Murphy did not want his customers to have to solve the problem of cups that were too hot to hold; he wanted them to have a cup they could hold with one hand the entire time.

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You are not original or creative on Instagram

Quartzy:

If it seems when you scroll through your feed that everything looks similar, that’s probably because it is. That artfully constructed shot of your latté and avocado toast brunch? The shot of your feet dangling over the edge of a waterfall? You in the back of a canoe?

It’s been done before. To death.

Few Instagram accounts make that more clear than @insta_repeat, which collects and displays groups of near-identically framed photos from across the photo-sharing social network.

Schitterend! Zie:

Of mijn versie…

Zalig. Dat internet.

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Bizarre “rogue planet” found lurking in Earth’s galactic neighborhood

Vreemdsoortig doch intrigerend nieuws op Salon.com:

The newly discovered planet was found drifting alone – no host star in sight – with a glowing aurora that has left scientists with questions.

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A 4-Day Workweek? A Test Run Shows a Surprising Result

Dit geloof ik echt keihard:

Their actual job performance didn’t change when doing it over four days instead of five.

Kunnen we dat niet gewoon invoeren?

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