Are emoji becoming too abstruse – and yet also too specific? CC-licensed photo by Forsaken Fotos on Flickr.
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A selection of 10 links for you. Use them wisely. I’m @charlesarthur on Twitter. On Threads: charles_arthur. On Mastodon: https://newsie.social/@charlesarthur. Observations and links welcome.
That Olympic breakdancer everyone laughed at? She just became the world No.1 • WSJ
Joshua Robinson and Andrew Beaton:
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Rachael Gunn, as it says on her passport, was the break dancer whose performance launched a thousand memes and earned her exactly zero votes from the judges the whole time she was in Paris.
But it also paved the way for something else. A month after the Games, Raygun is now the No. 1 breaker in the world.
This might seem like an egregious mistake to anybody who actually watched breaking’s Olympic debut—or to the millions who didn’t but caught the clips that set the internet on fire. Raygun, a college lecturer in Sydney who focuses on “the cultural politics of breaking,” lost her three dance-offs, or battles, by a combined score of 54-0.
Except this isn’t some kind of prank. Instead, her rise to the top is explained by the esoteric rules of the little-known World DanceSport Federation, which felt compelled to issue a lengthy statement this week explaining how Raygun really became the top-ranked breaker.
According to the WDSF’s Breaking Rules and Regulations Manual, the standings are based on athletes’ top four performances over the previous 12 months. And last October, Raygun earned a whole raft of points when she claimed first place at the Oceania Continental Championships.
Since then, those points have only become more valuable. That’s because there haven’t been any chances for breakers to accumulate them for most of the past year. From the start of 2024 through the Paris Olympics, the WDSF intentionally stopped holding ranking events so that the breakers could “focus solely on the last part of their Olympic qualification without the added pressure.” Neither qualifying nor the Olympics had points on offer either because of the limited athlete quotas.
Once the Olympics ended, many of the results included in the rankings simply expired, the WDSF said. That left plenty of breakers with just one event’s worth of ranking points.
That’s how Raygun’s lone first-place finish propelled her into a points tie with another “B-Girl” named Riko from Japan. Raygun won the No. 1 slot over Riko in the end based on Article 5.1.1 of the bylaws, which settles ties based on the level of the competition where the points were earned.
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You do need something today to tell people to amaze them. And this is it.
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New feature alert: access archived webpages directly through Google Search • Internet Archive Blogs
Chris Freeland:
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In a significant step forward for digital preservation, Google Search is now making it easier than ever to access the past. Starting today, users everywhere can view archived versions of webpages directly through Google Search, with a simple link to the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine.
To access this new feature, conduct a search on Google as usual. Next to each search result, you’ll find three dots—clicking on these will bring up the “About this Result” panel. Within this panel, select “More About This Page” to reveal a link to the Wayback Machine page for that website.
Through this direct link, you’ll be able to view previous versions of a webpage via the Wayback Machine, offering a snapshot of how it appeared at different points in time.
At the Internet Archive, our mission is to provide, “Universal Access to All Knowledge.” The Wayback Machine, one of our best-known services, provides access to billions of archived webpages, ensuring that the digital record remains accessible for future generations.
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That mission statement is quite similar to Google’s. This is certainly a useful thing. Are other search engines going to get it too?
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9/11 memes have taken over the internet • Rolling Stone
David Mack:
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Olivia, a 21-year-old college student, was sitting in an English class at her Minnesota school last week when her professor began talking about the challenges in writing about traumatic events. But when he used 9/11 as an example, and described to the class how hectic things seemed that day, she realized just how she felt — or rather, didn’t feel — about the attacks. “Being terminally online is wild [because] someone mentioned 9/11 in my class today and I genuinely forgot that not everyone thinks it’s funny now,” she subsequently wrote in a post on X (formerly Twitter), favourited more than 10,000 times.
“I had this moment of realization within myself that this should be having an impact on me and it weirdly isn’t,” Olivia recalled to Rolling Stone, asking that her last name not be used due to the sensitivities around 9/11. (She has since taken down the tweet.) “I think it’s been watered down a lot for our generation. It’s a moment of levity, this very heavy moment. For our generation, it’s very almost casual.”
Olivia is not alone. To be on social media in 2024 is to be swimming in jokes and memes about 9/11. Things that might once have been whispered among friends are now shared by meme accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers. On TikTok, videos contrasting the year 2024 with 2001 (often ending with someone reacting to the planes hitting towers) frequently went viral. While on X, a famous photo of President George W. Bush being informed by his chief of staff that the U.S. was under attack is now frequently used to mock everything from Ozempic to J.D. Vance to the Drake/Kendrick Lamar beef. Want to be overly dramatic about a minor event in your life? Why not use a video or GIF of Caitlyn Jenner standing in a sea of American Flags, solemnly saying, “9/11”? Or you could keep things simple and just say, “This was my 9/11.”
As the world marks 23 years since the attacks, the ways in which people talk — and joke — about the tragedy have evolved dramatically, especially on the internet.
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It’s not surprising, though, that people for whom the events lie outside living memory won’t be able to grasp how serious it felt at the time. In the days after the attacks, the US public mood wanted to bomb the culprits into their constituent atoms.
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AI voice analysis for diabetes screening shows promise • Medscape
Marilynn Larkin:
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An artificial intelligence (AI)–driven voice algorithm showed “excellent agreement” with the American Diabetes Association (ADA) risk test in detecting adults with type 2 diabetes (T2D), research presented at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) 2024 Annual Meeting revealed.
The AI model detected T2D with 66% accuracy among women and 71% in men, and there was 93% agreement with the questionnaire-based ADA risk score, demonstrating comparable performance between voice analysis and an accepted screening tool.
…The AI algorithm analyzed various vocal features, such as changes in pitch, intensity, and tone, from a total of 607 recordings to identify differences between individuals with and without diabetes. This was done using two techniques: One that captured up to 6000 detailed vocal characteristics, and a deep learning approach that focused on a refined set of 1024 key features.
The voice-based algorithm achieved good overall predictive capacity (AUC = 75% for men, 71% for women) and correctly predicted 71% men and 66% of women with T2D. The model performed even better in women aged 60 years or older (AUC = 74%) and in those with hypertension for both men and women (AUC = 75%).
“This study represents a first step toward using voice analysis as a first-line, highly scalable T2D screening strategy,” the authors concluded.
“The next studies will have to demonstrate the robustness of our approach in diverse populations and also include people living with prediabetes,” Fagherazzi said. “If proven reliable, we expect such technology to be available in the next 5-10 years. Then, it could be deployed easily at scale in millions of smartphones worldwide and reduce undiagnosed diabetes cases.”
…The reasoning behind this is “due to Hooke’s law, in which changes in the tension, mass, or length of the vocal folds,” mediated by different glucose levels, “may result in an alteration in their vibrational frequency,” [Dr Gianluca Iacobellis of the University of Miami Hospital Diabetes Service] explained.
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Amazing finding. (Hooke’s Law originally related to springs, but seems to work for vocal folds too.)
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Waymo cites possible ‘intentional contact’ by a bicyclist in SF • San Francisco Chronicle
Jordan Parker:
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A cyclist may have made intentional contact with a Waymo robotaxi during an alleged crash in San Francisco in July, according to documents provided to the California Department of Motor Vehicles by the robotaxi company.
The alleged collision between the cyclist and Waymo vehicle occurred just before 1 p.m. on July 6 at a parking garage exit on Mission Street between 7th and 8th Streets, according to documents. As the Waymo robotaxi was exiting the parking garage, it stopped for the cyclist, who was approaching the vehicle from the left side.While the robotaxi was stopped, the cyclist passed in front of it and appeared to dismount, according to the documents. “The cyclist then reached out a hand and made contact with the front passenger side of the stationary Waymo AV (autonomous vehicle), backed the bicycle up slightly, dropped the bicycle, then fell to the ground,” the documents said.
The cyclist received medical treatment at the scene and was transported to the hospital, according to the documents. The Waymo vehicle was not damaged during the incident.
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Absolutely hilarious. What the cyclist seems to have overlooked is that there was a human in the driver’s seat of the Waymo car at the time, and no doubt there will have been cameras running on the car too. Sadly the document sent to the DMV doesn’t include them, but they’re going to be fun to look at. (Thanks Gregory for the link.)
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The real problem with emoji • The Atlantic
Ian Bogost:
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Emoji ought to be as broadly expressive as possible. Guns—and swimming, and much more—would be most fruitfully emojified in the most generic, abstract way possible. Yet emoji seem to be evolving in the opposite direction. Unicode approves more new icons every year, with more specific and narrow intended meanings—a lime or a mythical phoenix, say. New emoji this year even include variants that specify which direction the picture faces—a person running to the right rather than to the left—a choice that only further plunges emoji-life into the murk of particulars.
This year, Apple also announced Genmoji, a forthcoming feature that uses AI to allow individual users to spawn what seems like any concept imaginable. The feature is meant to “match any moment perfectly,” according to Apple. An example shown in a marketing video turned the prompt “smiley relaxing wearing cucumbers” into, well, a yellow emoji head wearing cucumbers, spa-style; “lox bagel” produced a convincing rendition of that preparation. Users will also be able to create Genmoji that resemble real people in your photo albums—presumably adjusting them for specific situations.
That sounds fun but also doomed. Will Genmoji allow you to depict your mother holding a firearm? Apple didn’t respond when I asked what guardrails it might apply to user-created Genmoji. But some people will be bothered, no matter how the feature works. Consider a less charged but still controversial matter: Apple’s demo depicted a lox bagel eaten as a sandwich rather than open-faced, as some purists insist it should be eaten.
Whether textual or visual, languages are powerful because they allow an infinity of complex expression. And languages work because the communities that use them develop a shared understanding of their meaning. For years, emoji have been transforming from a sophisticated, powerful visual language capable of diverse expression into just a format for sending pictures that conform to the emoji visual style. To which I say, 🚮
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Bogost seems to be complaining about a language gaining more dialects. Isn’t that a sign of a vibrant language, though?
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VR headset used to train Ukranian pilots to fly F-16s • UploadVR
David Heaney:
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A simulator with a Varjo XR-3 headset is being used to train Ukrainian pilots to fly the F-16 fighter jets the country recently received.
Ukraine started receiving the first F-16s in August, intended to boost the country’s ability to repel attacks by Russian aircraft on its cities and infrastructure. Around 65 F-16s have been pledged to the country by NATO countries including the Netherlands and Denmark.
But Ukraine’s President Zelensky has publicly said that the limiting factor in utilizing these F-16s is the lack of pilots trained to fly them. Until now Ukraine’s air force has been using Soviet jets, which have significant differences.
To help make this F-16 training program faster, more convenient, and lower cost, Czech startup Dogfight Boss says it delivered to the Ukrainian Air Force a simulator that uses a Varjo XR-3 mixed reality headset alongside a replica F-16C cockpit.
Dogfight Boss says it spent almost a year fine-tuning the simulator with the help of European F-16 pilot instructors, and shared the following statement it says came from the Ukrainian Air Force: “Our pilots and cadets were deeply impressed by the advanced and realistic features of the F-16C Viper simulator. These features are essential for pilot training, providing an effective environment to practice with sophisticated flight systems, fine-tune their strategies, and prepare for future missions.”
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Proof is in the pudding, of course, but even so, must save a lot of flying time, and hence valuable fuel and costly wear on the plane.
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Bluesky catches up to X with native support for video • TechCrunch
Sarah Perez:
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Bluesky, the social networking startup now nearing 10 million users thanks to X’s ban in Brazil, will now allow users to share videos of up to 60 seconds in length on its platform, the company announced on Wednesday.
Designed as a decentralized version of X (formerly Twitter), Bluesky allows users to post text and images, reply and repost, and message users. However, unlike X, Bluesky lets users set up their own servers if they choose, pick their own algorithm, and decide how much or little they want their content moderated by subscribing to independent moderation services.
With native video support, the network will be able to better compete with other X rivals, including Instagram Threads and the decentralized service Mastodon, among others.
The company notes that videos will autoplay by default, but this can be turned off in the settings.
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Every social network eventually turns into a video repository. I’m sure Elon won’t be worried: as long as Bluesky doesn’t introduce banking, it’s all fine. Both networks may be losing money at similar rates, unless Bluesky is staffed very thinly.
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Ex-Google exec said goal was to ‘crush’ competition, trial evidence shows • Reuters
Jody Godoy:
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On the third day of the [Google Adtech] trial, prosecutors began to introduce evidence of how Google employees thought about the company’s products at the time when the government alleges it set out to dominate the ad tech market.
“We’ll be able to crush the other networks and that’s our goal,” David Rosenblatt, Google’s former president of display advertising, said of the company’s strategy in late 2008 or early 2009, according to notes shown in court.
Google denies the allegations, saying it faces fierce competition from rival digital advertising companies.
Rosenblatt came to Google in 2008 when it acquired his former ad tech company, DoubleClick, and left the following year. The notes of his talk showed him discussing the advantages of owning technology on both sides and the middle of the market.“We’re both Goldman and NYSE,” he said, he said, according to the notes, referring to one of the world’s biggest stock exchanges at the time and one of its biggest market makers. “Google has created what’s comparable to the NYSE or London Stock Exchange; in other words, we’ll do to display what Google did to search,” Rosenblatt said.
By owning publisher ad servers, the advertiser ad network would have a “first look” at available spots for ads, he said according to the notes. He also said it was a “nightmare” for publishers to switch platforms. “It takes an act of God to do it,” he said, according to the notes.
Rosenblatt, now CEO of online luxury marketplace 1stDibs, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Brad Bender, another former DoubleClick executive, who worked at Google until 2022, testified at trial that he forwarded the notes to his team, calling them a “worthwhile read” at the time.
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In retrospect, the DoubleClick acquisition should at least have had some sort of guardrails to ensure competitiveness. Instead, Google acquired an overwhelming share of the market via its search dominance.
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2021: Silencing the competition: inside the fight against America’s hearing aid cartel • The Big Newsletter
Matt Stoller, writing in 2021:
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For decades, buying a hearing aid in the U.S. has been an experience in humiliation. Hearing loss is pervasive, with two thirds of people over the age of 70 experiencing some form of it. Despite that, only 20% of people who have hearing loss actually use hearing aids, and one of the big reasons is price. The average cost of such devices is $4700 per pair, for what is essentially a highly advanced adjustable microphone. With 40 million Americans suffering from some form of hearing loss, which can lead to dementia, a lot of people go without and just suffer, or don’t replace hearing aids when they break, because of this high price.
The reason for this excess cost is pure profit margin for the manufacturers. We know this because independent audiologists pay between three to four times as much as Costco does for the same device. So why are hearing aids so expensive? One reason is that the Food and Drug Administration requires a prescription to get one, making it hard to bring cheaper and more innovative devices to market. Hearing aids had traditionally required lots of adjustment and fitting from a specialist, and while specialists offer critical help, a hearing aid is basically just a microphone in your ear. That technology is much easier for individuals to set up with smartphones and other innovations in consumer electronics over the last ten years. “It just seems crazy that hearing aids haven’t become much less expensive, much like every other type of digital technology, and much more user friendly,” said Christine Cassel, the former CEO of the American Board of Internal Medicine.
Since 1993, advocates have been calling for the FDA to loosen these tight regulations, and the calls got louder over the years. In 2015, the President’s Council on Science and Technology issued a report seeking to make these devices more widely available. The next year, the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine issued a similar report.
Finally, in 2017, Congress acted.
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Stoller draws a direct line between those 2017 actions and the Apple announcement earlier this week that AirPods Pro will have hearing aid functionality. (Via John Naughton.)
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| • Why do social networks drive us a little mad? • Why does angry content seem to dominate what we see? • How much of a role do algorithms play in affecting what we see and do online? • What can we do about it? • Did Facebook have any inkling of what was coming in Myanmar in 2016? Read Social Warming, my latest book, and find answers – and more. |
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The Overspill: when there's more that I want to say 