An engaging article about the ability of humans, rather than machines (eg. regular Google searches), to track down and then amplify interesting or especially incriminating finds. I have been trying to help introduce the concept of “human search engine” (actually “human flesh search engine” in the original Chinese) to the English-language discourse: it arose a few […]
What started as an unusual April Fool’s joke – a single button appeared a special sub-Reddit – has turned into a genuine social media phenomenon which may have implications for online collaboration in the development of public policy, software and numerous other areas. The button had a 60-second countdown counter which users could only push once and […]
Microsoft recently launched a new site called How-Old.net that went viral due to its use of fancy math algorithms to guess the ages of people in pictures you upload. (Full warning – Shea read some article on Facebook saying the site has fine print that Microsoft obtains rights to re-use your photos or something so […]
On the recommendation of a co-worker, Shea and I are working through “The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt”, a Netflix original series. (That link will go to Wikiwand.com – a site I recently discovered that presents Wikipedia pages in a more visually appealing, readable format.) Watching that series led me to this article which discusses how a company that’s […]
This TED talk has been making the rounds since being posted a week ago and is approaching one million views on YouTube. It’s very interesting for Lewinsky’s observations on being at the epi-centre of our now common social media world where everyone can voice opinions on the news of the day, often reaching huge audiences, […]
A visually impaired Liberian street musician named Weesay makes up a song about chips on the spot using a very unique guitar… After the video goes viral, he is given a real guitar from supporters in the US. Now there’s even an IndieGogo campaign to raise funds to fly him to the US for surgery to […]
Fittingly you can play the hugely popular independent party game on a site called Cards Against Originality.
The Washington Post picked up a recent Reddit thread which asked what do insanely poor people buy that ordinary people know nothing about? Absolutely heartbreaking stories.
Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, has started an online book club to help facilitate his annual resolution. Other years, he’s pledged to do everything from study Mandarin to wearing a tie every day to meeting one new person (who doesn’t work for Facebook) each day. This year, he’s aiming to read at least one book every […]
