Mostly Fake

My limited coronavirus postings, which have nothing to do with coronavirus but everything to do with fake this and fake that:

WHO says fake coronavirus claims causing 'infodemic'
Feb 2020, BBC News

WHO says false information "spreading faster than the virus itself"

I mean, come on, it's immaterial; the noosphere knows not the limits of physical reality let alone biological contagion etc.

Scared and especially sick people are especially vulnerable to misinformation. Desperation will make you believe anything.

What's so bad about fake information?

Sure taking a handful of vitamin C isn't going to kill you, but drinking a glass of bleach might (sorry I drafted this before the thing happened). You never know which miracle cure is coming out of the bag. But what's also detrimental is that fake cures give people a fake sense of security, which is dangerous because when you think you're safe, you behave differently. You go out to the store, you don't wash your hands, you name it. And that makes you more likely to get sick, and more likely the virus will spread to others.

Those who spread misinformation aren't deliberately trying to hurt anyone, not necessarily. In fact, they don't even care about the virus. They just want to divert traffic, they want to snag all the clicks they can, and spinning the most popular thing at the moment is the best way to do that. Donald Trump is President? Donald Trump is an Alien! Banning Plastic Bags? Plastic Bags are made of Magical Alien Tongues! Got Problems? Doctors Hate Him!

alt article:
Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Situation Report 13
Feb 2020, WHO

The 2019-nCoV outbreak and response has been accompanied by a massive ‘infodemic’ - an over-abundance of information – some accurate and some not – that makes it hard for people to find trustworthy sources and reliable guidance when they need it.

Organization is working 24 hours a day to identify the most prevalent rumours that can potentially harm the public’s health, such as false prevention measures or cures. These myths are then refuted with evidence-based information. WHO is making public health information and advice on the 2019-nCoV, including myth busters, available on its social media channels and website.

Coronavirus - The seven types of people who start and spread viral misinformation
May 2020, BBC News

Great simple shortlist of the generators of fake news:

• The Joker - just kidding though
• The Scammer - everything can be commodified, including your gullability
• The Politician - also a business relationship
• Conspiracy Theorist - somewhere between entrepreneur, psychotic, teacher, preacher and scientist
• The Insider - likely a conspiracy theorist, and lying about their insider status
• Relatives - alarming things make people worry, and then they tell those they care about, including you
• Celebrities - they have huge platforms

Coronavirus - Far-right spreads Covid-19 'infodemic' on Facebook
May 2020, BBC News

It was "coordinated" now its "covert"; just keeping track:
The Epoch Times.com, a news site whose advertising was banned by Facebook, and which was accused of covert inauthentic activity by both Facebook and Twitter last year, received more than 48 million interactions

(Coronoavirus) Research links personality traits to toilet paper stockpiling
June 2020, phys.org

The most robust predictor of toilet paper stockpiling was the perceived threat posed by the pandemic; people who felt more threatened tended to stockpile more toilet paper. Partly, this effect was based on the personality factor of emotionality—people who generally tend to worry a lot and feel anxious are more likely to feel threatened and stockpile toilet paper.

The personality domain of conscientiousness—which includes traits of organization, diligence, perfectionism and prudence—was also a predictor of stockpiling (p = .048).

Other observations were that older people stockpiled more toilet paper than younger people and that Americans stockpiled more than Europeans.

The researchers pointed out that the variables studied explained only 12% of the variability in toilet paper stockpiling, which suggests that some psychological explanations and situational factors likely remain unaccounted for.

-image source: Nature

Post Script
Coronavirus - Already in Italy by December, waste water study finds
June 2020, BBC News

Municipal sewage screening - add big data to that and you've got a nice social monitoring system for drug use, hormone changes, diet phases, you name it. The data's been there the whole time.

Mimetic Security 101

I ran network address through this bias-checking site, and we're all good. Just kidding; it's too popular and I can't get in.

Fake News is really called misinformation, for those who are keeping track of these things. And people are pulling out all the stops trying to get a hold on it. And by 'pulling out all the stops' I mean 'making algorithms do that sh**'.

Data scientist Zach Estela trained a neural network to scan a webpage and determine the type of news it promulgates. He forms the code for his News Bias Classifier using a couple projects already in the business of sniffing out these different information types. One is called OpenSources, and it's curated by humans whose purpose is to squash the Dubiosity Monster that is our current infostream. They read articles and tag them.

These are their taglots:
Fake News, Satire, Extreme Bias, Conspiracy Theory, Rumor Mill, State News, Junk Science, Hate News, Clickbait, Proceed With Caution, Political, Credible*
*Check out their site for their definitions of these types

And check out their methods; Network Address (.blogspot) is a bit disheartened to see this particular method:
Step 1: Title/Domain Analysis.
If “.wordpress” “.com.co” appear in the title -- or any slight variation on a well known website-- this is usually a sign there is a problem.

But the Art teacher in me likes this:
Step 5: Aesthetic Analysis.
Like the style-guide, many fake and questionable news sites utilize very bad design. Are screens are cluttered and they use heavy-handed photo-shopping or born digital images?

Next source used for this fake news detector is a semantic analysis tool called Media Bias Fact Check dedicated to educating the public on media bias and deceptive news practices.

I was drawn to some of their terminology, well, the meta-terminology they use to check news/information sources on the web:

Loaded Language (Words): (also known as loaded terms or emotive language) is wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes. Such wording is also known as high-inference language or language persuasive techniques.
Purr Words:  words used to describe something that is favored or loved.
Snarl Words: words used when describing something that a person is against or hates.

Notes:
Sick of Seeing Spam on His Facebook so He Built a Fake News Detector
Mar 2017, VICE

Text Analysis
Sentiment Analysis at Textbox
Fake News Detector at Fakebox

And here's some corresponding references about language and persuasion, from the sentiment analysis page:
Bolinger, Dwight. Language-the loaded weapon: the use and abuse of language today. Routledge, 2014.
Matthews, Jack. “The effect of loaded language on audience comprehension of speeches.” Communications Monographs 14.1-2 (1947): 176-186.
S.I. Hayakawa, Alan Hayakawa. “Language in Thought and Action: Fifth Edition.” New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich,

Post Script
Where would we be without Teilhard de Chardin's Noosphere

Are The Feels Even Real

New Zealand gannet 'no mates Nigel' dies alongside fake partner
Feb 2018, BBC

Nigel "no mates", a lonely New Zealand gannet who lived his life on the edge of the cliffs of an uninhabited island, has been found dead alongside his partner - a concrete replica bird.

This is probably the saddest thing you'll ever read on this site.

Environmental scientists put 80 decoys all over this uninhabited island in the hopes that more gannets would move there (New Zealand).

There's a picture too sad to post, of Nigel posturing with his concrete partners. "Volunteers said they were touched after witnessing him carefully construct a nest from seaweed and twigs on the cliff edge in an apparent act of courtship in 2013."

But wait; the twist:

"Despite the arrival of the three other [real] gannets, Nigel apparently refused to be separated from his replica mate and his commitment was confirmed when he later died by its side."

Agamemnon's Mask

The Mask of Agamemnon represents one of the greatest discoveries of modern times, as it verified that the Trojan War recounted in the Iliad actually happened.

German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann found the mask in 1876. He was an amateur archaeologist fascinated with ancient times and convinced he knew where the city of Troy was located. He took his life's fortune made in the import/export business and set for Troy, and found it. And it turned the Troy of Homer's Iliad from legend into history.

Although the way the mask was found is a great story, the truth is always the best.

Science later found that the mask was 300 years older than previously thought.

The general public, or general population, was so overcome with elation at the discovery of all this that once the true owner of the mask was revealed (by science, years later) they simply decided, en masse, that they would continue to call it the mask of Agamemnon.


Despite the findings of science, the public continues to call it the Mask of Denial, I mean the Mask of Agamemnon.

It's Alive

AKA - The Selfish Meme grows legs

Network Address has been slacking on the Fake News front, simply because we tend to avoid anything on the front lines (since you're probably already getting that news from somewhere else) but this stuff is just too good...

As information bursts forth from the noosphere into the anthroposphere, from the inorganic to the organic, from the dematerialized idea to the materialized corpuscule, we see...

Cambridge scientists consider fake news 'vaccine'
Jan 2017, BBC

Researchers suggest "pre-emptively exposing" readers to a small "dose" of the misinformation can help organisations cancel out bogus claims. ...like a virus...contagion...


POST SCRIPT

But let us not forget - Charles Darwin used the taxonomy of Language to explain his theory of evolution.

Natural Selection X Artificial Intelligence
Network Address, 2012

Also check out The Extended Phenotype, Virus of the Mind, Thought Contagion, and memes, meta-, and memetics in general

Self-Numbing

Solar powered self-mowing lawnmowers are the most mind-numbing thing there is, when you think about it.

Second in line is the fact that we have had to build structures to keep the Alaskan pipeline from sinking into the  earth due to global warming.

Lastly, 'synthetic musk' is the thing in dryer sheets that make you want to make love to dryer sheets.

Value In-Transigence: Value In Transit

Now you see it; Now you don't

Ring of Bitcoins: Why Your Digital Wallet Belongs On Your Finger
Robert McMillan, Wired, 03.18.13

"physical Bitcoins — metal coins engraved with hidden, tamper-protected private keys that could be exchanged much like money."

-people trade the password used to get the money, not the money itself

"You see, Shrem — like many other Bitcoin traders — doesn’t trust digital copies of this most digital of currencies. “Even if all of your assets are in Bitcoins, you have to diversify them,” he says. “Twenty percent you should keep on your computer. The rest should be kept in cold storage.”

"Cold storage can mean an encrypted USB drive, a computer that is not connected to the internet, a piece of paper, or some other physical medium. Shrem puts his on a ring, but other Bitcoiners are using paper — or even physical coins."

"You can write your own key on piece of paper. Or engrave it on a ring. But you might lose your piece paper. Someone might take your ring. There’s always a security hole. The trick is to make it as small as possible."

---money is turned into information, literally, because the only actual value of the coin is not in its material worth, but in the password that is engraved into it. Just wait until we start using living organisms to hold encrypted data (remember the recent report on using DNA to store data?).


Musicians accused of 'buying virtual fans' on YouTube
Newsbeat reporters Chi Chi Izundu and Declan Harvey, BBC
18 March 2013

Facebook told Newsbeat that gaining "likes" from people who aren't interested in that page is "no good to anyone".

---but I wonder, can we distinctly articulate the difference between a like-seeker paying for likes versus the old-school style of subversive advertising, aggresive advertising, demographic targeting, (aka psychological manipulation)

In a world where attention itself has been shaken and shattered, it's only right that the old-school should have to now pay us for it.