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QAnon goes European

QAnon goes European

https://www.politico.eu/article/qanon-europe-coronavirus-protests/

In France, the Yellow Jacket movement has embraced the American movement. In Italy, backers hail from the anti-vaccine community. In Britain, adherents draw from Brexit followers.

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What’s behind the rise of QAnon in the UK?

https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-54065470

The FFTCUK Facebook group has now amassed more than 13,000 members.

People were dressed in QAnon shirts or ones displaying the slogan “WWG1WGA”. Short for “Where we go one we go all”, it is the best-known rallying cry for QAnon believers.

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How QAnon Went Global

https://slate.com/technology/2020/09/qanon-europe-germany-lockdown-protests.html

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QAnon Gains Traction in Russia

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/11/30/qanon-gains-traction-in-russia-a72180

Alexandra Arkhipova, an anthropologist at the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration who tracks the spread of online conspiracy theories, has found that while there are fewer explicit references to QAnon on Russian-language social media than Covid-19 denialism and 5G fears, its prevalence is spreading.

Data gathered by Arkhipova since August reveals thousands of Russian-language social media posts about QAnon. On VKontakte and Telegram — an encrypted messaging service popular in Russia – groups dedicated to spreading the conspiracy theory in Russia have grown to include tens of thousands of members.

 

4year schools and adult learners

Report: It’s Time for 4-Year Schools to Welcome Adult Learners

https://campustechnology.com/articles/2021/01/25/report-its-time-for-4-year-schools-to-welcome-adult-learners.aspx

New Horizons: American Universities and the Case for Lifelong Learning” was produced by the Longevity Project, whose lead content collaborator is the Stanford Center on Longevity, among other nonprofits, think tanks and media organizations.

The big challenges schools will have to tackle in pursuit of this goal are twofold:

  • Faculty “intransigence” for adopting new methods of teaching and learning; and
  • The need to sort out how to make various credentials “portable and ‘stackable.'”

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more on microcredentials in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=microcredential

nVivo workshops at the U

Introduction to NVivo on Mac

Friday, January 29 | 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. | Online
NVivo is a qualitative data management, coding and markup tool, that facilitates powerful querying and exploration of source materials for both mixed methods and qualitative analysis. It integrates well with tools that assist in data collection and can handle a wide variety of source materials. This workshop introduces the basic functions of NVivo, with no prior experience necessary. Learn more and register for Introduction to NVivo on Mac.

Introduction to NVivo on Windows

Friday, February 5 | 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. | Online
NVivo is a qualitative data management, coding and markup tool, that facilitates powerful querying and exploration of source materials for both mixed methods and qualitative analysis. It integrates well with tools that assist in data collection and can handle a wide variety of source materials. This workshop introduces the basic functions of NVivo, with no prior experience necessary. Learn more and register for Introduction to NVivo on Windows.

History: Egypt book of the dead scroll

Archaeologists Unearth Egyptian Queen’s Tomb, 13-Foot ‘Book of the Dead’ Scroll

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/archaeologists-unearth-50-more-sarcophagi-saqqara-necropolis-180976794/

The team also discovered dozens of sarcophagi, wooden masks and ancient board games

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more on history in this IMS blog:
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=history

iLRN 2021

CALL FOR PAPERS AND PROPOSALS
iLRN 2021: 7th International Conference of the Immersive Learning Research Network
May 17 to June 10, 2021, on iLRN Virtual Campus, powered by Virbela
… and across the Metaverse!
Technically co-sponsored by the IEEE Education Society,
with proceedings to be submitted for inclusion in IEEE Xplore(r)
Conference theme: “TRANSCEND: Accelerating Learner Engagement in XR across Time, Place, and Imagination”
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Conference website: https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimmersivelrn.org%2Filrn2021%2F&data=04%7C01%7Cpmiltenoff%40STCLOUDSTATE.EDU%7C24d0f76661804eca489508d8a66c7801%7C5011c7c60ab446ab9ef4fae74a921a7f%7C0%7C0%7C637442332084340933%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000&sdata=6d614jJWaou4vQMNioW4ZGdiHIm2mCD5uRqaZ276VVw%3D&reserved=0
PDF version of this CFP available at: https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F3qnFYRu&data=04%7C01%7Cpmiltenoff%40STCLOUDSTATE.EDU%7C24d0f76661804eca489508d8a66c7801%7C5011c7c60ab446ab9ef4fae74a921a7f%7C0%7C0%7C637442332084340933%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000&sdata=Ksq0YFtUxHI9EM0%2Fa7OyYTeb7ObhOy3JdVquCRvvH54%3D&reserved=0
The 7th International Conference of the Immersive Learning Research Network (iLRN 2021) will be an innovative and interactive virtual gathering for a strengthening global network of researchers and practitioners collaborating to develop the scientific, technical, and applied potential of immersive learning. It is the premier scholarly event focusing on advances in the use of virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR), and other extended reality (XR) technologies to support learners across the full span of learning–from K-12 through higher education to work-based, informal, and lifelong learning contexts.
Following the success of iLRN 2020, our first fully online and in-VR conference, this year’s conference will once again be based on the iLRN Virtual Campus, powered by VirBELA, but with a range of activities taking place on various other XR simulation, gaming, and other platforms. Scholars and professionals working from informal and formal education settings as well as those representing diverse industry sectors are invited to participate in the conference, where they may share their research findings, experiences, and insights; network and establish partnerships to envision and shape the future of XR and immersive technologies for learning; and contribute to the emerging scholarly knowledge base on how these technologies can be used to create experiences that educate, engage, and excite learners.
Note: Last year’s iLRN conference drew over 3,600 attendees from across the globe, making the scheduling of sessions a challenge. This year’s conference activities will be spread over a four-week period so as to give attendees more opportunities to participate at times that are conducive to their local time zones.
##### TOPIC AREAS #####
XR and immersive learning in/for:
Serious Games • 3D Collaboration • eSports • AI & Machine Learning • Robotics • Digital Twins • Embodied Pedagogical Agents • Medical & Healthcare Education • Workforce & Industry • Cultural Heritage • Language Learning • K-12 STEM • Higher Ed & Workforce STEM  • Museums & Libraries • Informal Learning • Community & Civic Engagement  • Special Education • Geosciences • Data Visualization and Analytics • Assessment & Evaluation
##### SUBMISSION STREAMS & CATEGORIES #####
ACADEMIC STREAM (Refereed paper published in proceedings):
– Full (6-8 pages) paper for oral presentation
– Short paper (4-5 pages) for oral presentation
– Work-in-progress paper (2-3 pages) for poster presentation
– Doctoral colloquium paper (2-3 pages)
PRACTITIONER STREAM (Refereed paper published in proceedings):
– Oral presentation
– Poster presentation
– Guided virtual adventures
– Immersive learning project showcase
NONTRADITIONAL SESSION STREAM (1-2 page extended abstract describing session published in proceedings):
– Workshop
– Special session
– Panel session
##### SESSION TYPES & SESSION FORMATS #####
– Oral Presentation: Pre-recorded video + 60-minute live in-world discussion with
others presenting on similar/related topics (groupings of presenters into sessions determined by Program Committee)
– Poster Presentation: Live poster session in 3D virtual exhibition hall; pre-recorded video optional
– Doctoral Colloquium: 60-minute live in-world discussion with other doctoral researchers; pre-recorded video optional
– Guided Virtual Adventures: 60-minute small-group guided tours of to various social and collaborative XR/immersive environments and platforms
– Immersive Learning Project Showcase: WebXR space to assemble a collection of virtual artifacts, accessible to attendees throughout the conference
– Workshop: 1- or 2-hour live hands-on session
– Special Session: 30- or 60-minute live interactive session held in world; may optionally be linked to one or more papers
– Panel Session: 60-minute live in-world discussion with a self-formed group of 3-5 panelists (including a lead panelist who serves as a moderator)
Please see the conference website for templates and guidelines.
##### PROGRAM TRACKS #####
Papers and proposals may be submitted to one of 10 program tracks, the first nine of which correspond to the iLRN Houses of application, and the tenth of which is intended for papers making knowledge contributions to the learning sciences, computer science, and/or game studies that are not linked to any particular application area:
Track 1. Assessment and Evaluation (A&E)
Track 2. Early Childhood Development & Learning (ECDL)
Track 3. Galleries, Libraries, Archives, & Museums (GLAM)
Track 4. Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Access, & Social Justice (IDEAS)
Track 5. K-12 STEM Education
Track 6. Language, Culture, & Heritage (LCH)
Track 7. Medical & Healthcare Education (MHE)
Track 8. Nature & Environmental Sciences (NES)
Track 9. Workforce Development & Industry Training (WDIT)
Track 10. Basic Research and Theory in Immersive Learning (not linked to any particular application area)
##### PAPER/PROPOSAL SUBMISSION & REVIEW #####
Papers for the Academic Stream and extended-abstract proposals for the Nontraditional Session Stream must be prepared in standard IEEE double-column US Letter format using Microsoft Word or LaTeX, and will be accepted only via the online submission system, accessible via the conference website (from which guidelines and templates are also available).
Proposals for the Practitioner Stream are to be submitted via an online form, also accessible from the conference website.
A blind peer-review process will be used to evaluate all submissions.
##### IMPORTANT DATES #####
– Main round submission deadline – all submission types welcome: 2021-01-15
– Notification of review outcomes from main submission round: 2021-04-01
– Late round submission deadline – Work-in-progress papers, practitioner presentations, and nontraditional sessions only: 2021-04-08
– Camera-ready papers for proceedings due – Full and short papers: 2021-04-15
– Presenter registration deadline – Full and short papers (also deadline for early-bird registration rates): 2021-04-15
– Notification of review outcomes from late submission round: 2021-04-19
– Camera-ready work-in-progress papers and nontraditional session extended abstracts for proceedings due; final practitioner abstracts for conference program due: 2021-05-03
– Presenter registration deadline – Work-in-progress papers, practitioner presentations, and nontraditional sessions: 2021-05-03
– Deadline for uploading presentation materials (videos, slides for oral presentations, posters for poster presentations): 2021-05-10
– Conference opening: 2021-05-17
– Conference closing: 2021-06-10
*Full and short papers can only be submitted in the main round.
##### PUBLICATION & INDEXING #####
All accepted and registered papers in the Academic Stream that are presented at iLRN 2021 and all extended abstracts describing the Nontraditional Sessions presented at the conference will be published in the conference proceedings and submitted to the IEEE Xplore(r) digital library.
Content loaded into Xplore is made available by IEEE to its abstracting and indexing partners, including Elsevier (Scopus, EiCompendex), Clarivate Analytics (CPCI–part of Web of Science) and others, for potential inclusion in their respective databases. In addition, the authors of selected papers may be invited to submit revised and expanded versions of their papers for possible publication in the IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies (2019 JCR Impact Factor: 2.714), the Journal of Universal Computer Science (2019 JCR Impact Factor: 0.91), or another Scopus and/or Web of Science-indexed journal, subject to the relevant journal’s regular editorial and peer-review policies and procedures.
##### CONTACT #####
Inquiries regarding the iLRN 2020 conference should be directed to the Conference Secretariat at conference@immersivelrn.org.
General inquiries about iLRN may be sent to info@immersivelrn.org.

More on Virbela in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=virbela

Embedded Librarian in Active Learning Environment

Creating a Role for Embedded Librarians Within an Active Learning Environment

https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/561a2f7b-b7a8-395f-90c5-8855b830b939/

In 2013, the librarians at a small academic health sciences library reevaluated their mission, vision, and strategic plan to expand their roles. The school was transitioning to a new pedagogical culture and a new building designed to emphasize interprofessional education and active learning methodologies. Subsequent efforts to implement the new strategic plan resulted in the librarians joining curriculum committees and other institutional initiatives, such as an Active Learning Task Force, and participating in faculty development workshops. This participation has increased visibility and led to new roles and opportunities for librarians.

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Reflections on an Embedded Librarianship Approach: The Challenge of Developing Disciplinary Expertise in a New Subject Area

https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/805a60fc-08d5-383f-9ddc-4cac92262650/

https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/212696811.pdf

Embedded librarianship has emerged as a user-centred approach to academic library services, requiring an in-depth understanding of the education and research priorities of students and staff. User-centred approaches require the development of disciplinary expertise and engagement with the research culture of a particular subject area. This paper details the author’s experiences in situating his practice within the discipline of pharmacy and discusses some of the challenges around the scale and sustainability of such specialised support. Regardless of the extent to which a librarian is ‘embedded’, they must see themselves as learners, too, as they develop their understanding of the disciplines they support through an ongoing process of experiencing, reflecting, conceptualising and testing in their practice.

definition:
Embedded librarianship differs from traditional librarian roles in its focus on working in partnership with clients, rather than simply providing a support service (Carlson & Kneale, 2011).
In this sense, embedded librarianship is user-centred rather than library-centred and requires the librarian to develop a holistic understanding of the environment in which their client groups operate.

most training materials followed a one-size-fits-all approach, where students would be taken from locating background information and textbook chapters all the way to searching for primary evidence in a bibliographic database within the same hour. Most sessions ran over time and were overloaded with content. In some instances, students complained that they had already covered this content in their previous year.

While information literacy as a construct is valued by librarians, the term’s use remains
largely restricted to the library and information science (LIS) field and might even be labelled
undiscovered country for academics (McGuinness, 2006, p. 580). Academics often consider
IL instruction as a service provided by the library and do not see librarians as partners, nor
do they see the value in integrating course-specific IL training (Derakhshan & Singh, 2010).

a spectrum of embeddedness with 5 levels (2008, p. 442), from ‘entry level’, where the librarian might collaborate on assignment development and deliver a standalone IL session, to ‘co-teaching’, where the librarian co-teaches and develops discipline-specific course materials, lectures, assessment designs and grading in collaboration with academic staff. Their findings suggest that student performance is positively related to the level of librarian involvement

phenomenographic interview methodology, where the librarian is positioned as a ‘curricular
consultant’

My note (sarcastic): whoa, what a novelty; it is repeated for two decades at SCSU, but “hot water still not invented” and the ATT still does not have neither a faculty, nor ID, but the only Ph.D. in ID just got laid off.
Hallam, Thomas and Beach illustrate that the library is not singularly responsible for developing information and digital literacies, and therefore, a collaborative approach involving a range of stakeholders including academic staff, learning designers, educational  technologists and others is required

 

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more on embedded librarianship in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=embedded+librarian

Hamlet on the HoloDeck

Murray, J. H. (1997). Hamlet on the holodeck: The future of narrative in cyberspace. Free Press.
https://mnpals-scs.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01MNPALS_SCS/qoo6di/alma990011592830104318
Since 1992 I have been teaching a course on how to write electronics section. My students include freshman, writing majors, and media lab graduate students.
As I watch the yearly growth in ingenuity among my students, I find myself anticipating a new kind of storyteller, one who is half hacker, half bard. The spirit of the hacker is one of the great creative wellspring Safari time, causing the in animate circuits to sync with ever more individualized and quirky voices; the spirit of the bard is eternal and irreplaceable, telling us what we are doing here in about we mean to one another.
p. 12 A New Medium of Storytelling
p. 18 Aldous Huxley Brave New World
(more on it here https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=huxley)
Set 600 years from now, describes a society that science has dehumanized by eliminating love, parenthood, and the family in favor of generating engineering, test tube delivery, and state indoctrination. Books are banned, and science has come up with a substitute form of storytelling to delete the masses.
p. 20 Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451
p. 22 this accounts of a digital dystopia but eroticize and demonize the computer. Cyberpunks surfers are like Cowboys on the new frontier motorcycle hoodlums with a joystick in their hand instead of a motorcycle between their legs. They are outlaw pirates on an endless voyage of exploration throughout the virtual world riding and plundering among the invisible data hoards of the world in many states by the stronger pirate parents who reach in and reprogram their minds.
p. 22 William Gibson Neurmancer
p. 28 The Harbinger on the the Holodeck
The technical in economic cultivation of this freestyle new medium of communication has led to several new varieties of narrative entertainment. This new storytelling formats very from the shoot them up video game in the virtual dungeons of Internet role-playing games to the post modern literary hypertext. This wide range of narrative art holds the promise of a new medium of expression that is S varied SD printed book or the movie picture.
Books printed before 1501 or cold incunabula; the word is derived from the Latin for swaddling clothes and is used to indicate that this books are the work of a technology still in its infancy.
The garish video games in tangled websites of the current digital environment or part of a similar period of technical evolution, part of a similar struggle for the conventions of coherent communication.
p. 29 now, in the incunabular days of the narrative computer. We can see how 20th century novels, films, and please have been steadily pushing against the boundaries of linear storytelling. We therefore have to start our survey of the harbingers of the holiday back with a look at multiform stories, that is, linear narrative straining against the boundary of pre-digital media like a two dimensional picture trying to burst of its frame.
p. 30 The multiform story
Frank Capra’s It’s a wonderful life
p. 34 Robert Zemeskis Back to the Future
p. 35 Harold Ramis’s Groundhog Day
Multi forms stories often reflect different points of view of the same event.  p. 37 Kurosawa Rashomon, the same crime is narrated by four different people: a rape victim; her husband, who is murdered; the bandit who attacked them; and a bystander.
p. 37 Milorad Pavic’s Dictionary of the Khazars
p. 37 Multi form narrative attempts to give a simultaneous form to this possibilities, to allow us to hold in our minds at the same time multiple contradictory alternatives.
p. 38  active audience
When the writer expands the story to include multiple possibilities, the reader assumes a more active role.
p. 40 although television viewers have long been accused of being less active engaged in readers or theatergoers, research on thin culture provides considerable evidence that viewers actively appropriate the stories of their favorite series. In addition to sharing critical commentary and gossip, fans create their own stories by taking characters and situations from the series and developing them in ways closer to their own concerns.
p. 42 role playing games or theatrical in a non-traditional but thrilling way. Players are both actors and audience for one another, and events the purple tree often have the media seat of personal experience.
p. 43 Live theater has been incorporating the same qualities of spontaneity and audience involvement for some time.
p. 43 MUDs have allowed distant players on the Internet to share a common virtual space in which they can chat with one another in real time. A the social psychologist Sherry Turkle has persuasively demonstrated, mods are intensely “evocative” environments for fantasy play that allow people to create and sustain elaborate fictional personas.
p. 44 movies three dimensions
p. 51 dramatic storytelling in electronic games
p. 55 story webs
p. 59 computer scientist as storytellers
p. 65 Chapter 3 From Additive to Expressive Form
beyond multimedia
Sept 28, 1895 Arrival of the Train at La Ciotat Station
p. 66 photoplays
p. 67 one of the lessons we can learn from the history of film is that additive formulations like photo play or the contemporary catshall ‘multimedia” or a sign that the medium is in an early stage of development and it is still depending on the format derived from earlier technologies instead of exploiting its own expressive power. Today the derivative mindset is apparent in the conception of cyber space is the place to view “pages” of print or “clips” of moving video end of cedar rooms is offering “extended books.”
p. 60 ELIZA, 1966 Joseph Weizenbaum
p. 71 the four essential properties of digital environments
Digital environments are procedural
Digital environments are participatory
Digital environments are spacial
Digital environments are encyclopedic
p. 90 Digital structures of complexity
p. 95 part to the aesthetics of the medium
chapter 4 immersion
definition
The experience of being transported to an elaborate please simulator please it’s pleasurable in itself regarding of the fantasy contact. we Refer to this experience as immersion. Immersion is a metaphorical term derived from the physical experience of being submerged in water. We seek the same feeling from a psychologically immersive experience that we do from a plunge in the ocean or swimming pool: the sensation of being surrounded by a completely other reality, as different is water is from air, that takes over all of our attention, our whole perceptual apparatus.
p/ 99 entering the enchanted place
my note: ghost in the machine
The computer itself, even without any fantasy content, is an enchanted object. Sometimes it can act like an autonomous, animate being, sensing it’s environment in carrying out internally generated processes, yet it can also seem like an extension of our own consciousness, capturing our words through the keyboard in displaying them on the screen as fast as we can thank them.
p. 110 the active creation of belief
In digital environments we have new opportunities to practice this active creation of belief. For instance, in an interactive video program set in Paris that may research group designed in the 1980s for language learners, we included a working telephone, represented by a photograph of a phone who’s keypad could be clicked on .
p. 112 structuring participation with a mask .
p. 119 regulating arousal According to Winnicott, “the pleasurable element in playing Carris whit eight employee Kasian that the instructional a razzle is not excessive”; that is, the object of the imaginary world should not be too enticing, scary, or real let the immersive trance be broken. This is true in any medium. If a horror movie is too frightening, we cover our eyes or turn away from the screen.
p. 126 chapter Agency
Agency is the satisfying power to take meaningful action and see the results of our decisions and choices. We expect to feel agency on the computer when we double click on a file and seat open before us or when we enter numbers in a spreadsheet and see the totals readjust. However, we do not usually expect to experience agency within a narrative environment.
p. 129 the pleasures of navigation
One form of agency not dependent on the game structure yet characteristic of digital environment is spatial navigation. The ability to move through virtual landscapes can be pleasurable in itself, independent of the content of the spaces.
p. 130 the story of the maze
the adventure maze embodies a classic fair-tale narrative of danger and salvation. as a format for electronic narrative, the maze is a more active version of the immersive visit (chapter 4).
p. 134 Giving Shape to Anxiety
p. 137 The Journey Story and the Pleasure of Problem Solving
p. 140 Games into Stories
p. 142 Games as Symbolic Dramas

Information Overload Fake News Social Media

Information Overload Helps Fake News Spread, and Social Media Knows It

Understanding how algorithm manipulators exploit our cognitive vulnerabilities empowers us to fight back

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/information-overload-helps-fake-news-spread-and-social-media-knows-it/

a minefield of cognitive biases.

People who behaved in accordance with them—for example, by staying away from the overgrown pond bank where someone said there was a viper—were more likely to survive than those who did not.

Compounding the problem is the proliferation of online information. Viewing and producing blogs, videos, tweets and other units of information called memes has become so cheap and easy that the information marketplace is inundated. My note: folksonomy in its worst.

At the University of Warwick in England and at Indiana University Bloomington’s Observatory on Social Media (OSoMe, pronounced “awesome”), our teams are using cognitive experiments, simulations, data mining and artificial intelligence to comprehend the cognitive vulnerabilities of social media users.
developing analytical and machine-learning aids to fight social media manipulation.

As Nobel Prize–winning economist and psychologist Herbert A. Simon noted, “What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients.”

attention economy

Nodal diagrams representing 3 social media networks show that more memes correlate with higher load and lower quality of information shared

 Our models revealed that even when we want to see and share high-quality information, our inability to view everything in our news feeds inevitably leads us to share things that are partly or completely untrue.

Frederic Bartlett
Cognitive biases greatly worsen the problem.

We now know that our minds do this all the time: they adjust our understanding of new information so that it fits in with what we already know. One consequence of this so-called confirmation bias is that people often seek out, recall and understand information that best confirms what they already believe.
This tendency is extremely difficult to correct.

Making matters worse, search engines and social media platforms provide personalized recommendations based on the vast amounts of data they have about users’ past preferences.

pollution by bots

Nodal diagrams representing 2 social media networks show that when more than 1% of real users follow bots, low-quality information prevails

Social Herding

social groups create a pressure toward conformity so powerful that it can overcome individual preferences, and by amplifying random early differences, it can cause segregated groups to diverge to extremes.

Social media follows a similar dynamic. We confuse popularity with quality and end up copying the behavior we observe.
information is transmitted via “complex contagion”: when we are repeatedly exposed to an idea, typically from many sources, we are more likely to adopt and reshare it.

Twitter users with extreme political views are more likely than moderate users to share information from low credibility sources

In addition to showing us items that conform with our views, social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram place popular content at the top of our screens and show us how many people have liked and shared something. Few of us realize that these cues do not provide independent assessments of quality.

programmers who design the algorithms for ranking memes on social media assume that the “wisdom of crowds” will quickly identify high-quality items; they use popularity as a proxy for quality. My note: again, ill-conceived folksonomy.

Echo Chambers
the political echo chambers on Twitter are so extreme that individual users’ political leanings can be predicted with high accuracy: you have the same opinions as the majority of your connections. This chambered structure efficiently spreads information within a community while insulating that community from other groups.

socially shared information not only bolsters our biases but also becomes more resilient to correction.

machine-learning algorithms to detect social bots. One of these, Botometer, is a public tool that extracts 1,200 features from a given Twitter account to characterize its profile, friends, social network structure, temporal activity patterns, language and other features. The program compares these characteristics with those of tens of thousands of previously identified bots to give the Twitter account a score for its likely use of automation.

Some manipulators play both sides of a divide through separate fake news sites and bots, driving political polarization or monetization by ads.
recently uncovered a network of inauthentic accounts on Twitter that were all coordinated by the same entity. Some pretended to be pro-Trump supporters of the Make America Great Again campaign, whereas others posed as Trump “resisters”; all asked for political donations.

a mobile app called Fakey that helps users learn how to spot misinformation. The game simulates a social media news feed, showing actual articles from low- and high-credibility sources. Users must decide what they can or should not share and what to fact-check. Analysis of data from Fakey confirms the prevalence of online social herding: users are more likely to share low-credibility articles when they believe that many other people have shared them.

Hoaxy, shows how any extant meme spreads through Twitter. In this visualization, nodes represent actual Twitter accounts, and links depict how retweets, quotes, mentions and replies propagate the meme from account to account.

Free communication is not free. By decreasing the cost of information, we have decreased its value and invited its adulteration. 

Parler

https://www.npr.org/2020/11/14/934833214/conservatives-flock-to-mercer-funded-parler-claim-censorship-on-facebook-and-twi

Parler, founded in 2018, touts itself as “the world’s premier free speech platform.” On Saturday, CEO and co-founder John Matze said one of the privately owned company’s early investors is Rebekah Mercer, who along with her father, hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer, has been a backer of President Trump and is also a major donor to conservative causes, including Breitbart News and former White House strategist Steve Bannon.

It has hit 10 million members — more than double the 4.5 million it had last week, according to Jeffrey Wernick, the company’s chief operating officer.
Still, that is just a tiny fraction of Twitter’s 187 million daily users and Facebook’s nearly 2 billion.

Experts say “free speech” approach lets false claims flourish
Gab, an alternative social network that has become notorious for hosting anti-Semitic and white nationalist content. It was used by the accused 2018 shooter at a Pittsburgh synagogue.

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more on echo chambers in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=echo+chamber

Unreal Engine for students learning

Real-time technology like Epic Games’ Unreal Engine has emerged as a successful tool and resource to implement this type of teaching and learning.

Storytelling is a major component of so many professions.

use digital portfolios and our critique process by viewing a StoryMap I made using Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

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more on Unreal Engine in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=unreal+engine

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