Leaders in the technology community have every right to talk about how immigration reform will benefit their businesses. But instead, FWD.us has chosen a strategy that’s condescending to voters and counterproductive to the cause of reform.Former Sen. Russ Feingold • In a statement given to Politico, offering an explanation for why Progressives United, MoveOn.org, and other left-leaning organizations have decided to stop advertising on Facebook for at least two weeks. The advertising boycott is in response to several televised ads from FWD.us, the Mark Zuckerberg-founded advocacy organization which is supposedly focused on immigration reform, that support construction of the Keystone XL pipeline and attack “Obamacare.” source
SendGrid Fires Company Evangelist After Twitter Fracas
Trigger Warning: Rape, Physical Assault
My heart and my support go out to Adria.
Also, my righteous anger.
Here’s the gist of what happened. Adria was at PyCon, a developer conference, and noticed that two men behind her were making lude sexual jokes. She snapped a photo, tweeted it, brought up the behavior to PyCon officials (since they did have a code of conduct for their conference), and the situation was “handled”.
What’s happened after that is a prime example of why women and people of color (and women of color, of course) are few and far between in the world of tech.
One of the men making the jokes, who was there representing his employer, got fired for his actions. Adria’s website starts getting DDoS attacks, as does her employer’s website. People are leaving her nasty comments and she’s been getting death threats and rape threats tweeted to her since yesterday.
Today, SendGrid fired Adria. And they didn’t just fire her, but they announced it on Twitter and on Facebook so people could spread the word and comment on it. The Facebook comments are particularly vile, including one where a man details a particularly gruesome threat against Adria, concluded with the words “Make her pay. Make her obey.”
All of this for speaking up about something which made her uncomfortable.
To say that this is problematic would be an understatement, and it’s particularly troubling in a week when we’ve already seen two high-profile (and altogether disturbing) responses to sexual assault cases capture media headlines. We can’t figure out what possible justification SendGrid thinks they have for terminating Adria — and don’t even get us started on how they handled it — but if you’re as curious as we are then here’s SendGrid’s contact information.
A system (and method) for device-independent point to multipoint communication is disclosed. The system is configured to receive a message addressed to one or more destination users, the message type being, for example, Short Message Service (SMS), Instant Messaging (IM), E-mail, web form input, or Application Program Interface (API) function call. The system also is configured to determine information about the destination users, the information comprising preferred devices and interfaces for receiving messages, the information further comprising message receiving preferences. The system applies rules to the message based on destination user information to determine the message endpoints, the message endpoints being, for example, Short Message Service (SMS), Instant Messaging (IM), E-mail, web page output, or Application Program Interface (API) function call. The system translates the message based on the destination user information and message endpoints and transmits the message to each endpoint of the message.
In the past, Twitter has promised only to use patent lawsuits for defensive reasons. So let’s hope that holds up.
Another Facebook Redesign: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled the site’s redesigned News Feed on Thursday morning, revealing an even greater emphasis on photos and check-ins than before. While the changes are likely to be met with the same criticism that accompanies most social network redesigns these days, we have to admit we’re fans of the new-look photo captions. We’re still not going to check-in anytime we manage to sneak away from work/home for a few minutes though. (Photo via AllThingsD) source
Unsurprisingly, major telecom providers like AT&T and Verizon aren’t big on having to compete with the government for customers who don’t actually need the overpriced services being offered by their companies. Some GOP members have suggested that it would be more fiscally responsible for the FCC to sell the broadcast spectrum, allowing the government to raise billions in new revenue. What say you, dear reader? source
We thought the case was reasonably handled and we would not have done things differently. We’re going to continue doing the work of the office and of following our mission.Christina DiIorio-Sterling, spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz • Commenting on what effect, or lack thereof, Aaron Swartz’s suicide will have on the office going forward. In response to the statement, Swartz’s girlfriend reportedly told the Boston Herald that she was sad to see Ortiz not “taking this moment to reflect on the role of proportionality and judgment in the pursuit of justice.” source
In her last days, my mother occasionally became confused....
”The reporter...
I can’t add much to what’s already been (and will be) ...
One of the perks of being an early employee...
Over the last 90 days, the Digg...
#FMMDI (at 30 Rockefeller Plaza)
Microsoft hires designer who presented bold revamp of the company’s brand
Last summer designer Andrew Kim’s vision for “The Next Microsoft” got a lot of traction online — including on The Verge — for its aggressively minimal rebranding of the company across platforms. The next month Microsoft unveiled its actual new logo, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t take note — Kim just announced that he’s been hired by the company, which got in touch after seeing his designs.
That’s right. An unsolicited redesign can get you a job with the company you’re pitching — at least sometimes.
Man shot dead after posting on Facebook: ‘im about to get shot’
(Photo: Facebook)
It appears that one of the last things Eric L. Ramsey did before he was shot and killed by police Thursday was to let his friends and family know on Facebook that he was about to die.
“Well folkes im about to get shot. Peace” Ramsey posted on the social network at 3:15 a.m. Jan. 17 using his mobile phone.
What this description doesn’t tell you is that, before this recent parolee got shot, he kidnapped and allegedly raped a woman, and when that woman successfully escaped to a nearby home, he tried setting the home on fire. Just a word of warning regarding this story. This FB message may be novel, but nothing else about this story is.
CBS has nothing but the highest regard for the editors and writers at CNET, and has managed that business with respect as part of its CBS Interactive division since it was acquired in 2008. This has been an isolated and unique incident in which a product that has been challenged as illegal, was removed from consideration for an award. The product in question is not only the subject of a lawsuit between Dish and CBS, but between Dish and nearly every other major media company as well. CBS has been consistent on this situation from the beginning, and, in terms of covering actual news, CNET maintains 100% editorial independence, and always will. We look forward to the site building on its reputation of good journalism in the years to come.A statement from CBS Interactive • Given to Ad Age following the news that reporter Greg Sandoval resigned from CNET after the publication was forced to retract an award nomination for Dish Network’s “Hopper,” which allows end users to skip commercials easily. (CBS and Dish are embroiled in a lawsuit over the device.) Anybody else more than a little concerned by the fact that CBS doesn’t seem to understand why this cast a negative light on the journalistic integrity of CNET? source
Apparently the team responsible for the Jeopardy-playing supercomputer Watson had to do some clean-up work after IBM’s AI learned the contents of Urban Dictionary. The Watson devs thought their AI could benefit from seeing the ways in which humans experiment with and redefine various words, though it apparently just confused Watson on the politeness of a few choice words. While the team may not have been fans of the supercomputer’s penchant for swearing, we’re just glad to see humanity one step closer to bringing Bender Bending Rodriguez into the real world. (Photo via CharlieCurve, ht The Atlantic) source
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