Wait, Whats Going on With Netflix and Cuties? – Vulture

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A viral tweet claiming the film sexualizes a young Black girl has led to thousands of people calling for Netflix to dump the film and now, a Texas grand jury to indict the streaming platform. Photo: Netflix

This article was originally published on August 20 and has been updated multiple times to include information about Cuties release, including the most recent news that Texas state representative Matt Schaefer tweeted a filing for an indictment against Netflix for promoting lewd material in Cuties.

Before Cuties arrived on Netflix in the United States, the French-language film from writer-director Mamouna Doucour, about an 11-year-old Senegalese immigrant named Amy, garnered an unusual amount of attention. Although it received relatively positive reviews at Sundance earlier this year remember when we could go to movie theaters, much less whole film festivals? and took home the World Cinema Dramatic Directing Award, things took a turn months later when, uh actually, heres a tweet from our colleague, Vulture film critic Alison Willmore, that does a pretty good job of summing up what the hell happened to Cuties:

To back up, in August of 2020, Netflix started promoting the film. It used a picture of a young Senegalese Muslim character, Amy, along with the titular Cuties the dance crew of cool girls from her middle school in Paris in spandex dance costumes (short-shorts and metallic crop tops). The now-deleted description says Amy becomes fascinated with a twerking dance crew and that, in an attempt to join them, she starts to explore her femininity, defying her familys traditions. Netflix WTF IS THIS, reads a viral tweet from a thread calling out the platform for sexualizing minors. The fact that this is a black girl lead makes this even worse, reads another tweet in the thread. The Twitter user also posted a petition to have Cuties removed from Netflix. (Removed is perhaps the wrong word for an as-yet-unreleased film, but we have larger problems to address here.)

In the first week, over 40,000 people signed the petition. Now, that number is closer to 400,000. This movie/show is disgusting as it sexualizes an ELEVEN year old for the viewing pleasure of pedophiles and also negatively influences our children, reads the description. There is no need for this kind of content in that age group, especially when sex trafficking and pedophilia are so rampant! There is no excuse, this is dangerous content! A different petition titled I want Netflix to remove the new movie Cuties as it promotes child pornography had garnered over 60,000 signatures in the same time period; it now has over 600,000.

As the film had not yet been widely released in the United States at the time these petitions were created, it seems safe to say the scores of people signing them had not actually seen the film. Or even watched the trailer. If they had, they would have seen a very different movie than the one the petitions describe: a story about family, womanhood, growing up, and the clash between Amys Senegalese heritage and the freedom craved by anybody who was ever an 11-year-old girl. Writer and director Daniell Dash pointed all this out in her own viral thread in response to the Cuties uproar.

The costumes from the Netflix promo do appear briefly in the trailer, but, in context, you can see them for exactly what they are: costumes for a dance competition. The trailer also shows a scene of the girls laughing and running down the street clutching shopping bags, wearing bras and underwear over their clothing. A still from that scene was the films original release poster.

Netflix has since updated the promo image and description and issued an apology for the first iteration. The image for the film now shows just Amy looking over her shoulder in a pink top. (Its cropped from the still at the top of this post.) The description no longer mentions twerking and instead describes the movie as a story of an 11-year-old girl rebelling against her family after she meets a free-spirited dance crew.

This hasnt stopped people from negatively reviewing the movie which, again, most people who arent film critics had almost certainly not seen before September on platforms like IMDb. This movie is about children twerking. I really dont need to say anymore. It is unacceptable that they even thought this was a good idea. The active sexualization of children is all this movie is. Netflix should be ashamed of themselves, reads one early review. A new low for the entire cinema industry, the authors, Netflix, Sundance, parents of the actresses/dancers. And whoever claims that this is artwork should be jailed, reads another. A number of vocal conservatives, including alt-right troll Jack Posobiec, have also weighed in on Twitter.

Doucour told Deadline shes been the target of serious harassment as a result of the controversy. I received numerous attacks on my character from people who had not seen the film, who thought I was actually making a film that was apologetic about hypersexualiation of children, she said. I also received numerous death threats. Netflixs co-CEO, Ted Sarandos, called her personally to apologize. (Doucour is currently working on a new, unnamed project for the platform.)

The Cuties uproar only intensified following its September 3 premiere. After continued backlash and accusations of pedophilia from conservative social-media figures and media outlets, Texas House of Representatives member Matt Schaefer tweeted on September 10 that he had asked Texas Attorney General Paxtons office to investigate Cuties for possible violations of child exploitation and child pornography laws.

Furthermore, far-right media personality and conspiracy theorist Paul Joseph Watson shared an article on September 11 accusing Cuties of featuring communist propaganda in the form of hidden hammer-and-sickle imagery:

While many film critics have expressed bafflement and dismay at this conservative outrage over Cuties, certain bad-faith readings of the film and the campaign of harassment directed toward Doucour tracks with the increased platforming of QAnon-aligned conspiracy theories in right-wing media. The main conspiracy that QAnon pushes is that there is a global cabal of pedophiles and child sex traffickers controlling world governments and mainstream media, that the Democrats are complicit, and that Donald Trump is a Decker-style savior figure attempting to bring it down. Its an evolution/devolution of the conspiracy theory that led to Pizzagate, when Edgar Welch shot up Washington, D.C., restaurant Comet Pizza in 2016 because he believed Hillary Clinton was operating a child sex-trafficking ring out of its basement.

At this point, many people have pointed out that the sorts of junior dance teams depicted and commented upon in Paris-based Cuties have long been a part of American pop culture, in everything from Dance Moms to Toddlers & Tiaras. Alas, such an acknowledgment has done little to stymie the #CancelNetflix hashtag or the organized harassment of critics who positively reviewed the film.

In fact, on October 6, Texas state representative Matt Schaefer tweeted a filing for an indictment against Netflix by grand jury in Tyler County, Texas, for promoting material in Cuties film which depicts lewd exhibition of pubic area of a clothed or partially clothed child who was younger than 18 yrs of age which appeals to the prurient interest in sex. The indictment is dated September 23. The indictment states that Cuties has no serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value, a spurious charge which Netflix countered in a statement shared with TMZ: Cuties is a social commentary against the sexualization of young children. This charge is without merit and we stand by the film. According to Variety, the grand jury filed the indictment under a Texas state law that forbids the lewd exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of an unclothed, partially clothed, or clothed child.

The Tyler County district attorney who filed the indictment is Lucas Babin, who, Variety points out, played Spider in School of Rock. (And, yes, theyre right. The former male model and son of a Republican congressman is now a conservative DA who administers something called Man Church.)

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Wait, Whats Going on With Netflix and Cuties? - Vulture

With Pendley Toppled, the Alt-Right’s Public Land Agenda Starts to Crumble – CounterPunch

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Last Friday, a lawsuit brought by Governor Steve Bullock (D-MT) yielded a ruling that President Trumps interim appointment of William Perry Pendleys to head the BLM was illegal, and that the decisions made while Pendley was in charge are illegal too.

William Perry Pendley has long been a fringe activist affiliated with the alt-right movement to end public lands, and federal governments management of them. He wrote opinion pieces in the conservative National Review siding with the Bundys when they organized a heavily-armed mob, complete with snipers, that interfered with the federal roundup of Bundys illegally trespassing cattle, and another article calling for the sale of all federal public lands. His Twitter handle was even @Sagebrush_Rebel.

Pendley isnt the first public lands extremist, even in the Trump administration. Wyoming attorney Karen Budd-Falen actually represented Cliven Bundy himself in the appeal challenging the original closure of Bundys grazing leases on what would eventually become Gold Butte National Monument. At the same time the Bundy crew was taking over Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Budd-Falen was stirring up county governments in Oregon to adopt county plans that, ion a twisted legal theory, might be used to have counties dictate the contents of federal land-use plans, to the benefit of local extractive industries. Although Budd-Falen lobbied to be appointed BLM director, ultimately it became obvious that she would not survive Senate confirmation, and she was appointed instead to the lesser attorney post of Deputy Solicitor, which requires no Senate approval.

The history of alt-right attempts to stage takeovers of Americas public lands dates back to the 1940s, but cropped up more recently in the Reagan administration. Reagan himself famously proclaimed, I am a Sagebrush Rebel, and he appointed as his first Interior Secretary the notoriously anti-environmental James Watt, like Pendley a product of the Mountain States Legal Foundation. George W. Bush recapitulated Reagans alt-right lands agenda by appointing Gale Norton to helm Interior, herself a Mountain States protg of Watts. Thus, more often than not over the past four decades, Republican presidential administrations put a public lands extremist of the Bundy persuasion in charge of a major lands and wildlife agency.

During the first year of the Trump administration, long before Pendleys appointment , the alt-right agenda started gathering steam with a secret meeting that brought state and county proponents of extractive industries together with the BLM to plot a local government takeover of public lands. Several environmental groups were tipped off and listened in, and were able to bring to light efforts to put conservative counties and states in the drivers seat of public land decisionmaking, restrict environmental reviews, squelch Freedom of Information Act document availability, and otherwise dismantle federal public land protections. Trumps gutting of NEPA, the concept of outcomes-based grazing to put ranchers in charge of managing public-land grazing leases, and a dismantling of grazing regulations are the anti-environmental fruits of this poisonous tree.

William Perry Pendley was appointed to the Trumped-up BLM position of Deputy Director serving in the capacity of the Director, a dodge to avoid a Senate confirmation process likely to deny Pendley the leadership position and embarrass the Trump administration. Selecting an oil industry office complex in Grand Junction, Colorado as his new BLM headquarters, Pendley proceeded to threaten senior BLM staff with termination if they didnt relocate. It was a bald-faced scheme to put the agency firmly under the thumb of the minerals and livestock industries.

Things started to unravel for Pendley in the fall of 2019, when key Senators drafted a letter objecting to his leadership, and when Pendleys controversial remarks at a Colorado gathering of journalists scapegoated wild horses as an existential threat to public lands and the agencys top priority, even while horse impacts were dwarfed by the environmental destruction caused by federally-approved livestock, and myriad other BLM-permitted problems. Things got worse a month later, when Pendley directed BLM law-enforcement to defer to local sheriffs when enforcing the law on federal lands. Conservationists immediately exposed this as a sop to the Bundy-ally Constitutional Sheriffs, who seek to dismantle federal authority and environmental protections on public lands. As the year ended, 91 conservation groups demanded Pendleys ouster.

Ultimately, two conservation groups sued to remove Pendley, and later Governor Bullock launched a similar lawsuit of his own. Hoping to dodge the litigation, Trump finally nominated Pendley to head the BLM, but just as quickly withdrew the nomination when it became obvious that he wouldnt survive the confirmation process. This August, every Democratic Senator (plus the two Independents) demanded that he go. The Bullock lawsuit yielded a ruling finding Pendleys appointment illegal, and decisions made under his leadership illegal as well. We might well be witnessing the beginning of the end of the alt-rights last best chance to hijack Americas public lands. Not a moment too soon.

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With Pendley Toppled, the Alt-Right's Public Land Agenda Starts to Crumble - CounterPunch

George on Georgia – Hawaiian shirts and blood on the carpet – Decaturish.com

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Guys in Hawaiian shirts make my teeth itch even on a good day, unless theyre playing a ukulele. Better, when those shirts arent covered in Glocks. These days, I am paying much more attention to the sartorial choices of people picking fights, especially when theyre local. And Im not alone.

Sunday afternoon, a group of Black Lives Matter protesters in Savannah drew the attention of Fredrick James, 34, of greater Decatur. He rolled up to the protest as they were closing down an intersection in an act of civil disobedience. James was captured on video throwing what people learned later was a smoke bomb into the middle of the crowd laying in the street.

When people started pelting the truck with whatever was handy, he got out with a gun in his hand.

Weve seen this play before.

Their Boogaloo Boy uniform of choice, oddly enough, is the Hawaiian shirt. Its absurd. So much is absurd today. This is the one James was wearing.

James caught an aggravated assault charge. He has been denied bond. Police in Savannah arent offering much more than what is on their initial incident report.

Both I and the collective commentariat have their antennae raised high out of fear that the election will bring political violence. The chatter seems to be getting louder, and the incidents more frequent. But a few things about this strike me as particularly odd.

What was James doing in Savannah at all when he lives in a house in south DeKalb?

I can speculate: he wasnt just in Savannah on a lark. Did he go there deliberately looking for a Black Lives Matter protest to intimidate with armed violence?

James, it seems, probably should never have been legally allowed to have a weapon in the first place. His possession of a weapon at all if it even turns out to have been legally so speaks to the failures of the system.

You see, he changed his name in 2010. He used to be named Fred David Hendricks, according to the publication record of the Gwinnett Daily Post. The birthdays line up.

As a young man in Gwinnett, Fred Hendricks got into a lot of trouble. He has multiple convictions for weapons violations. The last conviction, for carrying a concealed weapon on school property in 2010, should have been a felony conviction. Prosecutors accepted a plea deal to reckless conduct.

A few hours after the attack, footage taken from a nearby building made its way to far right websites and Facebook groups, which seem to have been built recently with the intent of promoting this violence.

The Savannah Freedom Exchange described this as a male pick-up truck driver decided to toss harmless green smoke, common in emergency kits, into the middle of the cluster of concrete-lying individuals, and the guy with a gun as [i]n perfectly legal defensive posture, the owner of the vehicle warned the individuals to get away. They failed, so he exited the vehicle and drew his conceal-carry weapon.

This Facebook group didnt exist before April of this year. It is a propaganda page for the alt-right.

And the response to this act of violence is well, what we might expect at this point. Line after line calling for social justice protesters to be murdered in the street.

I should have something uplifting to say about how we will all come together after this is over, to repudiate the hatred in our midst. But I cannot help but notice how all of this is affecting me. Ive been just that much more ready to bite someones head off in a conversation about this stuff. Ignoring what is happening is what got us to this point; exposure to it slowly makes it easier to adopt the stridency of others. A willingness to fight wins attention, more than a desire to build bridges does.

Even now, I am giving air to the fire.

Four years ago, after I watched a clueless upper-middle class white woman from Candler Park pantomime at voter outreach with some black kids on the street, I wrote We have a country run by high-achievers who are both risk averse and hold the public in contempt. The result is an economy serving their interests well one that rewards extraordinary achievement while ignoring everyone else.

We have the politics we do because we are a people with very strong views who cant figure out how to talk to one another anymore, despite the most robust communications tools known to humanity. The politics we have reinforce strong views and bury moderating influences.

My great fear isnt that Joe Biden wont win. Hes probably going to win. Its that he will win and will be inadequate to the task. What conventional political biography prepares an American leader for a country ready to tear itself apart at the seams? For all my desire to see the grifters and incompetents of the Trump Administration replaced with wide-eyed workaholic 20-something Princeton graduates, I fear that too few of them will understand how to keep 500 Kyle Rittenhouses from tracking blood across Americas pavements.

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George on Georgia - Hawaiian shirts and blood on the carpet - Decaturish.com

What explains Europes love-hate relationship with the kebab? – TRT World

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Largely associated with Muslim-run takeout joints, the popular late night snack has also become an obsession for the far-right and politicians looking to win votes.

Amid the coronavirus pandemic, authorities in Austria have a new priority: Going after kebab vendors who serve on the streets of Vienna.

The countrys Ministry of Finance is warning owners of kebab stands to comply with government regulations on the sale of food.

While Austria is governed by a coalition led by the Austrian Peoples Party (OVP), in the capital it holds only seven out of a 100 municipal seats available, trailing way behind the 44 seats held by the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPO).

Curiously the OVPs lead candidate in the election scheduled for October 11 is Austrias Minister of Finance Gernot Blumel.

The timing of the advertisements has therefore led many in the Austrian media to question whether there is an electoral motivation.

Past precedent in neighbouring countries, as well as popular sentiment across Europe tilts towards the idea that kebabs are more than just a tasty but slightly greasy indulgence.

For many, there is a strong association between the late night staple and the presence of mainly Muslim migrant communities in Europe.

Some Austrian media outlets have made a direct link between the campaign against kebab vendors and unsubstantiated statements made by politicians about Turkish government influence in the country. The inference being that the campaign against the snack is one way of tapping into voter fears surrounding foreign and migrant influence in Austria.

A history of kebabophobia

Austria is by no means alone in its anxieties over the kebab. Variants of the dish, such as the Turkish-origin doner and Arab-origin shawarma, are sold across European cities.

Neither is hostility towards the dishes universal, either among politicians or the masses.

Former British Prime Minister David Cameron praised the entrepreneurial spirit of kebab vendors and stated: "Kebabs have become part of our food heritage, alongside fish and chips and curry."

For her part, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has had pictures of herself taken slicing meat off a doner spit.

A 2019 poll found that the kebab was the UKs seventh most popular takeaway, trailing classic options such as Fish and Chips and Burgers, but ahead of traditional English snacks, such as pies and sausages.

Germans have a similar love affair with Doner, with the Turkish kebab ranking highly on the countrys list of favourite takeout options.

But despite their popularity with customers of all backgrounds, the presence of kebab shops makes many uneasy.

In France, which has instituted bans and restrictions on a number of Islamic symbols, such as headscarves and face veils, the kebab shop has become a symbol of creeping Islamisation among the right.

In a 2014, a Reuters report about kebab-related tensions in France, one kebab shop owner said that debate around the snack had become a safe conduit to express anxieties over the presence of Muslims.

Criticism of the kebab was a way to speak ill of Muslims without speaking ill of Muslims, according to Parisian kebab vendor Damien Schmitz.

Noting anxieties surrounding the food, the far-right National Front had made combatting kebabisation a key campaign pledge.

Many cities in France and Italy have tried to ban or have succeeded in prohibiting the sale of kebabs in city centres, while leaving vendors of traditional snacks untouched.

Violent kebabophobia

Official prohibitions are just one expression of kebab anxiety, in a number of cases across Europe, kebab shops have found themselves the target as racial tensions simmer.

In October 2019, a German Neo-Nazi began an attempted massacre at synagogue by first attacking a kebab shop. The rampage resulted in two deaths.

Christchurch terrorist, Brenton Tarrant, described himself as a kebab remover before embarking on his massacre of worshippers in two New Zealand mosques.

The self-description was a reference to the remove Kebab meme in alt-right circles, which celebrates the Bosnian genocide, as well as other instances of Muslim populations being ethnically cleansed, such as during the 1948 expulsion of Palestinians from their homeland.

Serb forces used kebab as a racial slur and code for Muslims they would go onto massacre and todays far-right extremists use it to plan for similar ends.

By wrapping their hate of Islam and Muslims in the semi-humourous imagery of the humble kebab, the far-right masks their broader agenda of reestablishing a Europe free of Muslims.

In an opinion article for TRT World following the Christchurch massacre in 2019, the academic Ibrahim al Marashi wrote:

Gastronomic racism constitutes a narrative employed during the Bosnian civil war and kept alive today by far-right European political parties. Tarrant took this sentiment to an absurd and deadly conclusion.

Source: TRT World

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What explains Europes love-hate relationship with the kebab? - TRT World

Bay Area rapper Paris returns with fire tracks for the masses – East Bay Express

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Paris has been making politically charged hip-hop since he came on the scene, with The Devil Made Me Do It, in 1990. The title track addressed the country's systemic racism and was immediately banned by MTV for being "too controversial."

Since that auspicious debut, his ability to combine sleek, swinging grooves and densely packed, politically charged commentary has grown more powerful. His latest effort, Safe Space Invader, is another bracing collection, taking on the topics that are impacting Black life in the America of 2020police departments that are out of control, racism, gentrification, social and economic inequality, and white supremacy.

The first single, "Baby Man Hands," gets right to the heart of the matter, with a scathing putdown of the current occupant of the oval office that mixes caustic humor, biting realism and a hook "Baby Man Hands"sung by cartoon voices. The lyrics combine familiar catch phrases, such as "fine people on both sides" and "make America great," with a realistic look at the havoc the current president has created.

"There are plenty of quotes I could have used," Paris says. "When I was writing, they were just the most prominent examples. If you're a critic, he's the gift that keeps on giving. The sad part is, that while his words may be amusing for people unaffected by his inability to use correct sentence structure, his administration has put social progress and race relations back decades. He's like a 6-year-old with a lot of money. Nobody's ever told him, 'No!' He's a petulant child."

The record also includes "Nobody Move," a call for revolution that rides a thumping backbeat; "Somethin' Bout the West Coast," a look at the positive and negative sides of living a Black life in the San Francisco Bay Area, with a hint of Funkadelic in the hook; and "Press On," an uplifting tune that urges people to stay positive, despite the forces of oppression that can often seem overwhelming. The chorus takes flight with the help of Claytoven Richardson's harmony vocals and Katisse Buckingham's nimble flute.

Paris wrote, arranged, recorded and produced Safe Space Invader in his home studio, with the help of a few local artists. He started the album last summer, slowly creating all the beats and special musical effects.

"I was a studio rat for a long time. I've observed people working in studios since the late '80s. It was a trial-and-error apprenticeship. A lot of attention was paid to the music that came before me, and many early influences still impact my music. Funkadelic is a mainstay, as is Curtis Mayfield, Earth, Wind and Fire, and my hip-hop predecessors who actually rap. There are lots of people in hip-hop currently that don't actually rap; they chant and make noise. I don't look unfavorably on any of them, I just maintain my lane."

The record's music is always upbeat, with songs that pack decades of history and a lot of background information into lyrics that flow easily, without sounding pedantic. "If I want to get preached at, I go to a church," Paris says. "I always try to strike a conversational tone. That's what hip-hop isa conversation between the creator and the listener."

Paris begins the dialogue with the album title, a phrase that may seem to reference the current pandemic, although it has deeper, more troubling associations. "The alt-right has been using 'safe space invader' to insinuate that people concerned with social justice are fragile for years," Paris says. "My usage co-opts the phrase to dig at their fragility. Conservatives view people who really want to see social change as pussies, but conservatives are the biggest snowflakes in the world. They always reflexively protest anything we do and often collectively stand united, even against their best interest, simply to spite us. Using that phrase was a way for me to reappropriate it and use it to my advantage.

"The songs are a continuation of the thoughts I expressed on my last album, Pistol Politics. It was released in 2015, during an era where a lot of people were complacent, especially in the hip-hop community, because Obama was in office. This was despite the fact that he also furthered the ideals of imperialism. But right now, there's a clearly defined boogie man in the White House that adversely affects everybody that isn't rich, white and male. My message is easier to convey in 2020, but it's never changed."

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Bay Area rapper Paris returns with fire tracks for the masses - East Bay Express

Facebook and Instagram to remove all QAnon pages and groups – Metro.co.uk

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A man waves a QAnon conspiracy flag at a protest of coronavirus skeptics, right-wing extremists and others angry over coronavirus-related restrictions and government policy on August 29 in Berlin (Picture: Getty)

Facebook has announced that it will be removing any pages or groups representing conspiracy group QAnon.

The social media company, which also owns Instagram, said in a statement tonight: Starting today, we will remove any Facebook Pages, Groups and Instagram accounts representing QAnon, even if they contain no violent content.

This is an update from the initial policy in August that removed Pages, Groups and Instagram accounts associated with QAnon when they discussed potential violence while imposing a series of restrictions to limit the reach of other Pages, Groups and Instagram accounts associated with the movement.

QAnon is a wide-ranging conspiracy theory which claims that there is a cabal of Satan-worshipping paedophiles in government, business and the media, being fought by Donald Trump.

It has gained traction within the alt-right and is linked to anti-vaccine and 5G beliefs.

On August 19, Facebook announced new measures to curb the spread of QAnon posts, saying it would disrupt militarised social movements from operating on its platform.

Within a month they had removed over 1,500 pages and groups for QAnon containing discussions of potential violence, a spokesman said.

But we believe these efforts need to be strengthened when addressing QAnon, they added.

We are starting to enforce this updated policy today and are removing content accordingly, but this work will take time and need to continue in the coming days and weeks.

Our Dangerous Organizations Operations team will continue to enforce this policy and proactively detect content for removal instead of relying on user reports.

Weve been vigilant in enforcing our policy and studying its impact on the platform but weve seen several issues that led to todays update.

For example, while weve removed QAnon content that celebrates and supports violence, weve seen other QAnon content tied to different forms of real world harm, including recent claims that the west coast wildfires were started by certain groups, which diverted attention of local officials from fighting the fires and protecting the public.

Additionally, QAnon messaging changes very quickly and we see networks of supporters build an audience with one message and then quickly pivot to another. We aim to combat this more effectively with this update that strengthens and expands our enforcement against the conspiracy theory movement.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

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Facebook and Instagram to remove all QAnon pages and groups - Metro.co.uk

Does an Intellectual History of the Trump Era Exist? It Does Now – The New York Times

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People like McCusker, Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and the N.S.C. expert Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman are the sort of civil servants Michael Lewis celebrated in his book about Trumps assault on the bureaucracy, The Fifth Risk, another of Lozadas favorites. They do due diligence, they adhere to protocol. Their truth is not postmodern. They do their jobs without fanfare; they do not turn their work into self-aggrandizing performance art. Their rigor is what makes our federal government legitimate and credible, despite its flaws.

Impeachment was a hard case. Trumps shenanigans were illegal, and definitely unseemly, but they didnt rise to the level of bipartisan horror necessary for a successful conviction. In the end, the Democrats probably did themselves more harm than good. But what Trump on Trial makes clear is that the Republican response was an all-out assault on regular order, expertise, law, diplomacy and the quotidian chores of holding a democracy together. I had forgotten how blatant it was. Elements of the Civil Service have decided that they, not the president, are really in charge, said Devin Nunes, the California Republican. Matt Gaetz, the Florida Republican, paraphrased what he thought was the Democrats message: We the elite, we the permanent Washington, we the smart folks, have decided that this is not acceptable conduct. Or, as Trump told one of his rallies, Were dealing with people that dont respect you. The Michigan Democrat Elissa Slotkin, a former intelligence analyst and senior Defense Department official, saw herself in civil servants like Yovanovitch and Vindman: Their life was her life. It was an ethos shared by her friends, especially the ones who had sworn an oath in the military. Slotkin went back to the nations founding documents: The framers had warned against the danger of Americas leaders soliciting foreign interference in the countrys internal affairs. Hadnt this president admitted to doing exactly that?

There could not be a more obvious example of Yuval Levins dialectic. The Republicans were all about What do I want? The Democrats worried, How should I act? The parties had traded their traditional places. The counterculture never died, Lozada writes of the alt-right movement, summarizing the views of the journalist Angela Nagle. It just switched sides. Transgression now lives on the right, dogmatism on the left. The Democrats have become traditionalists. The Republicans, a most illiberal group of libertarians, tear down the pillars of the temple. The former Trump adviser Steve Bannons nihilism is the spiritual heir to Abbie Hoffmans jolly anarchy in the 1960s. What losers and suckers the traditionalists were! To read Trump on Trial in the context of What Were We Thinking is to be scalded. The pain is excruciating.

Carlos Lozada is a book critic, not a policy wonk. He doesnt propose specific solutions to our current state of disgrace, but he does offer a vision of American stability being eviscerated by the publics need to be entertained. This reminded me of the dichotomy that Machiavelli posited in The Discourses: the contest between virt and ozio. Virt is the quality that keeps a republic strong: It is rigor and responsibility and intellectual achievement, albeit with a distressing tinge of militarism. Ozio is indolence; it is the laziness that overtakes a republic when it is not at war or in crisis. In America, we experienced 70 years of unprecedented peace and prosperity, without a perceived existential threat, from 1946 to 2016, a bacchanal of ozio. In the process, far too many of us lost the habits of citizenship. Truth became malleable. Morality became relative. Achievement became pass-fail and, more recently, just showing up. Rigor was for chumps. You didnt have to do anything to become famous, except be an influencer. And to be an influencer, you didnt need to train or study, although plastic surgery branding certainly helped. You didnt have to serve or sacrifice; that was for chumps, too. This was the America that elected Donald Trump president. What were we thinking? We werent. Critical thinking was just too hard and another episode of Duck Dynasty or Keeping Up With the Kardashians always beckoned.

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Does an Intellectual History of the Trump Era Exist? It Does Now - The New York Times

Google is improving the Alt-Tab switcher in Chrome OS, here’s what you need to know – Android Police

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Alt-Tab is an often overlooked keyboard shortcut on Chrome OS that allows you to cycle recent applications without using a mouse. Despite the productivity potential, the Alt-Tab switcher is mediocre because it lacks interactivity. For example, you can't use the arrow keys or your cursor to select and launch recent applications, making them frustrating to access if they're placed towards the end. The developers at Google realize that the Alt-Tab experience can be better, so they tackled the interactivity issue head-on to help you quickly open your recent applications.

As spotted recently in the Dev channel, Chrome OS uses a combination of shortcuts and gestures to help you quickly launch recent applications in the Alt-Tab switcher. For instance, you can finally navigate using the left and right arrow keys or move your cursor to select and focus applications. Other small changes include adding a three-finger touchpad swipe to scrub applications and pressing the enter or space key to focus the application chosen. Here's how the new interactivity features work.

Selecting a recent application with your cursor is a notable addition that Chrome OS surprisingly didn't have until recently. While pressing the Alt and Tab keys and holding Alt down, you can move your cursor to any window you want to open and click it. It's incredibly useful if you're going to quickly select and focus an application without having to press buttons on your keyboard.

Did you know that Alt-Shift-Tab navigates the Alt-Tab switcher in reverse? I sure didn't. In contrast to Alt-Shift-Tab, the arrow keys are much easier to remember. The left arrow key navigates the switcher backward while the right arrow key moves the selection forward.

The Enter and Space keys aren't as handy as the other Alt-Tab improvements coming to Chrome OS, but they may help ease the learning curve. If you want to maximize a recent application you selected, you can either hit the Space or Enter key.

You can quickly scrub through running applications in the Alt-Tab switcher using three fingers on the trackpad, just like Chrome tabs. Three fingers to the left will move the selection backward while three fingers to the right will navigate forward. Despite the productivity potential, I feel that the trackpad gesture sensitivity is too weak to be practical. I often misselect windows when I try compensating for the lack of responsiveness. Also, there's a weird quirk where scrubbing windows with the trackpad gesture also affects Chrome tabs in the background, but I imagine this will be fixed in the future.

Adding interactivity to the Alt-Tab switcher makes a huge difference to my workflow. As a student, I often juggle through several Chrome windows at once while writing research documents for school. I was surprised I couldn't navigate the Alt-Tab switch using my cursor or the arrow keys like Windows. Because of the interactivity limitations, I never used this feature since it was not productive for my Chrome OS workflow.

There is still work that needs to be done for Alt-Tab to be a useful productivity tool. For example, I wish Chrome OS would offer a close button in the Alt-Tab switcher to close a recent application without focusing its window first. My Pixel Slate also struggles to maintain an acceptable framerate when I navigate several windows, especially when using the three-finger swipe gesture. But by far my biggest gripe with Alt-Tab on Chrome OS is the awful layout when more than three applications are opened.

It's a pain to cycle through multiple windows.

As you can see, the Alt-Tab switcher overflows past the right side of the screen. If you navigate past the third window, the switcher scrolls from the screen's right side. While it allows a larger window preview to be seen at a glance (thus making it easier to recognize), I cannot see my other windows, meaning I have to cycle through several applications before getting to the end. Google can easily fix this usability issue by exposing all of the active windows in the Alt-Tab switcher (similar to Windows).

I'm happy to see Google recognize the need to do something to improve the Alt-Tab switcher on Chrome OS. Despite their current shortcomings, these new interactive features are a solid improvement that will help speed up your window management workflow. They're currently live on the Chrome OS Dev channel and should soon roll out to the Beta and Stable channel.

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Google is improving the Alt-Tab switcher in Chrome OS, here's what you need to know - Android Police

Coronavirus And Conspiracies: How The Far Right Is Exploiting The Pandemic – StopFake.org

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By Blyth Crawford, for The Conversation

Just as the global death toll from COVID-19 reached 250,000 at the start of May this year, a short film emerged that hassince been calledthe first true hit conspiracy video of the COVID-19 era. Titled Plandemic, it featured a lengthy interview with thediscredited scientist Judy Mikovits, who falsely argued that the COVID death tolls were being exaggerated to pave the way for a large-scale vaccination programme.

Allegedly orchestrated by big pharma companies in conjunction with Bill Gates, this scheme would supposedly kill millions in the name of generating profit. The video was removed from Facebook and YouTube where it had been shared, but not before it was watched an estimated8 million times.

The perceived danger of an eventual vaccination programme has been one of the most concerning and far-reaching of coronavirus conspiracy narratives. But it has also been linked to attempts by the far right to exploit the pandemic to promote its extreme ideology.

Similar conspiracies are prevalent within far-right social media circles, but many of them degenerate intoovert antisemitism, with claims the virus is a hoax engineered by Jewish elites intent on implementing a vaccine either for profit or to eradicate the white race. Onejournalist warnedthat the Plandemic video may be the first step in introducing new audiences into the depths of the far-right abyss.

By playing on peoples health fears in such ways, the far right is hoping tonormalise its viewsand make those of the political mainstream seem inadequate when it comes to explaining or resolving the crisis. And its possible that the pandemic may be increasing public awareness of and even participation in extremist discourse.

Arecent reportfrom the United Nations Security Council warns that extreme right-wing groups and individuals in the US have sought to exploit the pandemic to radicalize, recruit, and inspire plots and attacks. This sentiment is echoed in anote from the Council of the European Union, which warns that it is highly likely right-wing extremists are now capitalising on the corona crisis more than on any other issue. It adds that this focus may have led to an expansion in target selection, with sites like hospitals being viewed as legitimate targets for large-scale attacks.

The far rights focus on coronavirus has been reflected across social media. Onerecent reportshowed that between January and April 2020, hundreds of thousands of far-right posts about coronavirus were made to public Facebook groups. Meanwhile, conspiratorial narratives relating to elites a staple of far-right discourse steadily increased from mid-March.

Similarly, far-right groups on the encrypted messaging app Telegram have set up a range of channels dedicated specifically to the discussion of coronavirus, often amplifying disinformation. In March, Telegram channels associated with white supremacy and racismattracted an influx of over 6,000 users, with one channel, dedicated to the discussion of coronavirus, growing its user base by 800%.

One of the key ways the far right is doing this is by taking advantage of the staggering extent of misinformation and conspiracy theories surrounding the virus. The plandemic narrative is one example, but there has also been asignificant risein social media activity relating to the QAnon conspiracy movement, which has alsoamplified misinformation about the pandemic.

A number of these conspiracies have also been influential within theReopen movement, which advocates for the lifting of lockdown restrictions. This momentum has been harnessed by some far-right actors, particularly the Proud Boys, an alt-right, pro-west fraternal organisation.

This group has historically attempted to market itself towards the Republican mainstream on platforms such as Facebook bydeliberately avoiding the use of overtly racist symbols. Now a number of Proud Boys have been spotted taking part in anti-lockdown protests, with the groups president, Enrique Tarrio, framing the Florida protests as the point where the battle for the 2020 election starts. This suggests he is using the protests as apropaganda opportunityfor his movement.

Indeed, the spirit of the protests accords closely with narratives being propagated by some more overtly extreme facets of the right, suggesting the Reopen movement has presented an opportunity to popularise extreme anti-state messaging. For example, one alt-right figure used his Telegram channel to paint the lockdown measures as a power grab by the state, and an orchestrated attempt to ensure citizens particularly men remain slaves to society and the government.

Perhaps one of the most concerning groups that appears to have been buoyed by similar narratives is theboogaloo movement, a loose online network of radical firearms activists that has been linked to several violent incidents across the US. It unites a widevariety of people, some of whom have attempted to associate with Black Lives Matter, and others with neo-Nazism, with a commitment to preserving their right to bear arms and a shared desire to incite a civil war in order to overthrow the government.

In place of a rigid political philosophy, the movements disparate followers are instead bound byin-jokes and memes. But some supporters have also demonstrated a propensity for violence, with several incidents this yearleading to arrests, and three alleged followers now facingterrorism charges.

This activity has been matched bynumerous online postsreferring to insurrectional violence relating to the coronavirus. And unrest related to pandemic restrictions appears to have significantly boosted the profile of the movement.

Researchhas shownthat the conspiracy theory that the US government is using the pandemic to restrict American citizens freedoms has been central in influencing calls for a civil war. Some Boogaloo supporters also believe that the pandemic and subsequent lockdown have helped raise awareness of their civil war narrative amongst wider populations.

The pandemic has certainly been fertile ground for far-right messaging, helping give new platforms to activists and movements. While it is impossible to predict the long-term effects of these events, the potential for the crisis to spread some elements of far-right ideology to more mainstream audiences cannot be ignored. Shifting those people away from these ideas may be as difficult as tackling the virus itself.

By Blyth Crawford, for The Conversation

Blyth Crawford PhD Candidate, Department of War Studies, Kings College London. Blyth Crawford is a Research Fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR) based in the Department of War Studies at Kings College London.

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Coronavirus and Constitutionalism The Oxford Student – Oxford Student

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Image description: Big Ben and the Palace of Westminster

Last Wednesday, following a deal at the eleventh hour, the governments latest renewal of the Coronavirus Act passed through the House of Commons. Pressure from backbench Conservative rebels forced Number 10 to make several concessions, including giving MPs a final vote on any new national lockdown. This was an important victory.

Many (rightly) criticise the government for its considerable missteps during the COVID crisis. However, we must also remain vigilant to ensure that, in meeting this momentous challenge, precedents are not set which put the health of a free and democratic society in jeopardy.

To be clear, before I garner accusations of Covidiocy, I am not suggesting a Lassiez-faire approach to the pandemic. It is right and proper that those in power take the necessary steps to protect public health. But in doing so, they must not be allowed to infringe on civil liberty any more than necessary.

We cannot sit idly by in the event the government uses this emergency to erase and undermine such checks and balances that exist on their power.

To do otherwise is to flirt with fascism. These concerns are, regrettably, founded in fact. It is already evident that our government is willing to play fast and loose with international law. Our prime minister has already been found by the Supreme Court to have misled the Queen into illegally proroguing parliament just last year. That such a man, and such a government, should now find themselves enjoying the awesome powers of the executive should raise alarm for all, regardless of party political preference.

In times of emergency, particularly on a scale such as this, it is natural that we expect our leaders to act. It is crucial though, that this action is subject to sufficient scrutiny. To allow this government to run rough-shot with legislation risks hard-won liberties. Obligations and expectations exist we much be upheld and respected regardless of circumstance. Of course, the greater discretionary powers now exercised by public authorities in England has been a necessary evil.

But in a country such as ours, which endows our leaders with the flexibility of an unwritten constitution, it is important to be fully aware of how these powers are obtained and exactly what their limitations are. For example, it is interesting, as LSE academic Andrew Blick points out, that the government chose not to rely on the statutory powers obtainable under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 when seeking to acquire regulatory authority.

Any increase to the presence or power of government is naturally controversial. A substantial degree of public trust is required, that those so empowered will exercise their new functions with diligence and responsibility, to prevent a breakdown of social order. Faced with an administration that has thus far spectacularly bungled and bodged their duties, it is all too easy to worry about how other abilities may be similarly misused.

Coming back to the issue of precedence, there is warranted concern over blurred lines between temporary and post-pandemic legislation. Giving evidence to the Constitution Committee, established to explore among other things the impact of the pandemic on the ability of parliament to scrutinise the government, Lord Ashton of Hyde raised exactly this point. The Conservative Chief Whip in the House of Lords commented: the lesson to be learned is that it is much better not to mix emergency and non-emergency provisions.

Clearly, there is a recognition in the Lords at least that long-term constitutional transformation inspired by pandemic necessities is intolerable. Once the committee concludes its evidence-gathering phase in November it will be most intriguing to learn what findings it reaches on these matters. Though an exact timescale will be dependent on observable medical realities, an expiry date to these powers must exist, at least in principle.

Backbench Conservative MPs, led by Sir Graham Brady, expressed concerns over a lack of accountability in the governments renewal of the Coronavirus Bill. These MPs, who allegedly numbered more than 80, were alarmed over the prospect of a parliament disenfranchised of the right to vote on key lockdown legislation. That so many were willing to rebels speaks to more than just Johnsons lack of control over an infamously disloyal Conservative party.

It exposes a distressing disinterest by this government in that same idealised parliamentary sovereignty that so many of its members had professed to champion. The deal reached between Brady and Leader of the Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg leaves much to be desired. One wonders whether such a stance will suffice. Faced with a second wave of rising cases, the renewal was undoubtedly necessary.

That it took a rebellion of this scale within the Conservative party to prevent what was essentially lockdown rule by decree raises the risk that civil liberty and the constitution might still be under threat.

A perspective of constitutional concern is by no means ideologically infallible.

One must always be mindful not to fall into an alt-right mindset of a ultra-libertarianism. This libert ou la mort attitude is both dangerous and dishonest. A challenge to lockdown rules brought by millionaire Simon Dolan for example, might not appear motivated by the best intentions to all. Importantly, the Supreme Court did not find in favour of this case. That such proceedings could be issued though is itself significant. Clearly, there is room to question in the context of the courtroom the legality of the measures our government has taken.

The proper process of law and order may serve to frustrate attempts by the executive to cease headlines with swift action, but it remains a necessary bulwark to authoritarianism. One does not need to slide into Farage-endorsed fantasy of COVID denialism to expect the government to respect and acknowledge constitutional restraints on its power. Abuses to original Coronavirus Act existed not just in theory.

As of July, over 50 people had been unlawfully prosecuted under this legislation, yet the government refused to even acknowledge the flaws in its emergency powers. Everyone wants to facilitate a quick end to this pandemic. The science is clear that doing this requires a sustained commitment across society to collective action that will mitigate contagion and reduce infection.

Absolutely, every government has a public responsibility to facilitate this. However, it remains right and proper that the essential components of a free democracy are upheld and defended throughout this crisis. No emergency should be abused by any government to fatally undermine civil liberties enshrined under constitutional law. We can but hope that recent rebellions give the government at least pause for thought before unleashing powers whose legacy may prove far more lasting than that of our current leadership.

Image credit: Parliament and Big Ben by Marcin Nowak

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In deep red HD 11, it’s the Proud Boys and QAnon versus Barack Obama and Nikki Fried – Florida Politics

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House District 11 is drawn as a Republican safe-path seat, but Republican incumbentCord Byrds side is keeping the stretch run newsy nonetheless.

Last week offered the latest example of how the incumbent, expected to waltz to reelection against Democrat Joshua Hicks, continues to flirt with the hard right.

Esther Byrd, the candidates wife who narrowly lost in a local race earlier this year, offered an unsolicited defense of the Proud Boys, a group of youngish men who bill themselves as western chauvinists.

PresidentDonald Trump, in a debate last week before his hospitalization over the weekend for COVID-19 complications, urged them to stand back and stand by when pressed to condemn the alt-right movement.

Mrs. Byrd, a staunch supporter of the President, claimed that many of them and their supporters have been thrown in FB Jail, a metaphorical lockdown preventing them from posting to Facebook for some period of time.

Why do you think Facebook is throwing people in FB Jail who share information about Proud Boys? (Side note: I must really have great friends cause a whole bunch have been locked up! ) I think its because theyve seen a drastic spike in searches and they are worried that people are educating themselves rather than blindly believing what MSM narrative. Anyone have a better theory?

The comments come months after Byrd made comments supportive of Q Anon after the couple was photographed on a boat flying a Q Anon flag. Mrs. Byrd asserted on Facebook that the Byrds were in the photograph.

Ironically, a day before Mrs. Byrd made her FB jail comments, the Hicks campaign called on Byrd to denounce both the Proud Boys and the Q Anon movement.

I condemn white supremacists and the QAnon conspiracy theory in the strongest of terms, and I call on Cord Byrd to do the same. Over the past five months, he has remained silent as the country has grappled with systemic racism, a rise in far-right extremist violence, and the spread of QAnon. That silence must end today.

Florida Politics reached out to Rep. Byrd and Mrs. Byrd over the weekend.

The legislator was mum while Mrs. Byrd would not address the matter on record, with the Byrds seemingly content with these associations with controversial entities of the right.

District 11 is a historically conservative redoubt in Northeast Florida, encompassing deep-red Nassau County and traditionally Republican beach communities in Duval.

It has been aneasy hold for the Republican Party, at least until now, with GOP voters comprising nearly 73,000 of the 137,000+ registered voters.

Byrd faced his toughest battle thus far in the 2016 GOP primary, defeating candidates who had more fundraising and establishment support, running to the right of what was a crowded field.

Since going to Tallahassee, he has burnished his right-wing bona fides, backing legislation banningsanctuary citiesand a version of anE-Verifyprogram, two movement conservative priorities.

While the demographics of the district play against Hicks, he has run a legitimate campaign, with fundraising and some endorsements that bode well for his future, if not in November, then the party at large.

Hicks, endorsed by former PresidentBarack Obama and current Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried last month, has raised nearly $75,000 through Sept. 18, according to records kept by the state Division of Elections. He had nearly $55,000 of that sum on hand at that time.

Byrd has roughly $88,000 in hard money, and another $27,000 in his 1845 political committee.

Byrd, despite having attained national visibility for policy moves, is ahead in the money race, but not by a margin consistent with the party registration edge.

Whether the election result reflects that or not is an open question. Neither side is circulating internal polling, and the district has not been publicly polled.

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Letters to the editor, Oct. 4 – The Star Press

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In support of re-election of Sue Errington as State Rep.

Sue Errington has a long history of public service, including board membership on various environmental, public policy, health, outreach, and womens organizations. She was elected to the Indiana House of Representatives in 2012, and previously served four years as an Indiana state senator.

I have found Sue Errington very responsive to my concerns for the children of this state, no matter how busy she was.

Childrens health initiatives, on which she collaborated, that were enacted into law included:

When Indiana privatized its welfare system, many people were initially denied necessary medical care and nutrition coverage. Sue Errington brought this to the attention of her colleagues, the governorand FSSA, and assisted constituents in navigating the system for resolution. When services for autism were not being reimbursed, and Riley, and St. Vincentsand private providers dropped autistic children on Medicaid, Sue took letters that my colleagues and I had written and used them to get action from the State Medicaid Department. Care was restored for these most vulnerable children.

For many years I have known Representative Errington as a person who genuinely cares about her constituents and the issues confronting their lives. She is a woman of integrity, who has dedicated her life to public service, and works hard for all of us in this community.

Anne Eliades

Muncie

Recently, a car drove slowly past our house, while the driver yelled, white lives matter.Weve overheard our neighbors talking (loudly) about the importance of white lives.I suspect both of these moments were prompted by our Black Lives Matter and Black Trans Lives Matter yard signs.

First, of course white lives matter.Im white and I matter to myself and a small group of lovely people.Most of my family is white and I love most of them.I also love Jane Austen, the supergroup Yes, and the show Letterkenny all super white.

I feel a topsy-turvy quality with this demand that I stand up for white lives. I dont see the president, despite his support from white lives folks, standing up for those lives. He mocks soldiers who died in war dont those lives matter?He ignores the bounty that Russia placed on (often white) U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. He "downplays"the dangers of COVID-19 dont those lives deserve protecting?He sues to end the Affordable Care Act, which gives healthcare to millions of whites.He sends teargassing troops against mostly white protestors; some of those white protestors have been killed.He ignores climate change, the biggest threat to white lives.

Police violence and systemic racism are part of our society; this breaks my heart and calls me to respond.Instead of being angry at my choices, consider who you support.If you support the president:why not value Black lives, and also: do you truly value white lives?

Jennifer Rice-Snow

Muncie

That Kevin Wingate ("Protesters are playing into Trump's hands") calls Trump the law and order" man aiding "local authorities in their efforts to stop the violence" is ironic, given Trumps corruption, fraud, adultery on an Olympian scale as well as his legitimizing right-wing violence through silence.

About those left-wing groups Wingate faults for street violence: Examine the pantheon of Trumps right-wing groups, fine people, in protests from Charlottesville to Kenosha Proud Boys, an anti-immigrant group;QAnon, a conspiracy-peddling group; Alt-Right; Boogaloo Boys; neo-Nazis; white supremacists; white Nationalists,all believing in racial superiority and brutal force governance.

I oppose the growing fascist authoritarianism of the Trump administration, mirroring that of Vlad and Xi. Perhaps Trumps fixation on and hate for a free press and the anti-fascists (Antifa) lies therein. Democracies die one law at a time. The Hatch Act, flouted by this administration, is one such law. Mussolini, a fascist, said, If you pluck a chicken one feather at a time, nobody notices. Let us not allow our democracy to be plucked by Trump.

Finally, my contempt for Trump isnt only his divisiveness and failure to demonstrate moral leadership, which are Olympian, but his serial lying and ignorance of geography, history, government, science, religion, the Constitution and more. He is unable even to read statements written for him: Yo-se-mites towering se-coy-as (Yosemites towering sequoias). Did you know that the 1917 flu ended WWII?

I welcome peaceful BLM demonstrations.Its time that police brutality against Black people be called out, dismantled.

Meanwhile, COVID-19 rages!

Julia K. Gouveia

Muncie

Letters to the Public Letter Box should be emailed to letters@muncie.gannett.com. You must include your name, address and a telephone number for verification. Letters that cannot be verified will not be used.

By submitting a letter, the writer grants The Star Press the right to publish, distribute, archive or use it in print, online or other format. Letters must be 250 words or fewer and will be edited for length, grammar, accuracy and clarity. Letters containing private solicitations; unfair criticism of private individuals, businesses or organizations; poetry or inappropriate language will not be used. Letters of more than 250 words may be rejected. In general, publication of letters from the same writer will be limited to once a quarter.

Anyone wishing to submit a guest column should contact Planning Editor Robin Gibson at rgibson@muncie.gannett.com at least a week in advance.

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‘The Haunting of Bly Manor’: TV Review – Hollywood Reporter

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Expect nearly every critic reviewing Netflix's The Haunting of Bly Manor to include an important caveat in their reviews: Mike Flanagan's follow-up to The Haunting of Hill House presents itself as a ghost story, but it's actually a love story. It's not that we're being collectively clever in our genre analysis; acharacter late in the series literally explains that it's a love story and not a ghost story, just one of several points at which Flanagan's confidence in his audience wavers.

Still a craftsman of the highest level and a sensitive observer of the underpinnings that make genre storytelling so resonant, Flanagan has taken one of the most elegantly simple and enigmatic of novellas and found a way to over-explain everything from plot mechanics to theme, producing a nine-episode season that's sensuous, spooky and evasive one moment and cumbersomely obvious the next. You may want to wallow in this evocative world, but probably not as much as Flanagan does, which ends up being a real problem for long stretches.

Credited as based on the work of Henry James, but much more specifically adapted from The Turn of the Screw, The Haunting of Bly Manor is constructed as a tale told after a night of drinking at a wedding rehearsal dinner.

The story takes us back to 1987 (because of Flanagan's interest in high-waisted denim and discomfort with cell phones, presumably), when Dani (Victoria Pedretti) goes to interview with British barrister Henry Wingrave (Henry Thomas) about a live-in job tutoring for his orphaned niece and nephew at his manor house in the country.

Henry wants to know the catch that would cause a young American to want to take on a glorified nanny gig far off the grid. Dani wants to know the catch that has caused Henry's job listing to be open for many months. She seems too good to be true. The job seems too good to be true. Don't worry, there are catches aplenty.

Driven by chef/valet/mustache-model Owen (Rahul Kohli), Dani arrives at the stately manor, one of those abodes that comes with a creepy rectory, a creepy pond and a creepy wing of the house that nobody's allowed into. She meets housekeeper Hannah (T'Nia Miller), gardener Jamie (Amelia Eve) and kids Miles (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth) and Flora (Amelie Bea Smith).

Miles, expelled from boarding school under mysterious circumstances, is generally creepy, but Flora hits some sort of brooding gothic trifecta: She's constantly talking to people who aren't there, she sleepwalks and she has an absurdly detailed dollhouse resembling Bly Manor and full of faceless poppets. Throw in that the kids' parents died under mysterious circumstances and their former nanny (Tahirah Sharif's Miss Jessel) died under even more mysterious circumstances and that's a lot of mysterious circumstances.

They don't even cover the lurking stranger (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) Dani keeps spotting on the property, the reasons why Henry won't visit the manor or the creepy creature with glowing eyes (straight out of Stephen King'sThe Outsider) that Dani keeps seeing in mirrors.

Flanagan's The Haunting of Hill House was one of the surprise pleasures of 2018, an expansion of Shirley Jackson's brief novel that somehow barely felt padded at 10 episodes. It was full of effective jump scares and marrow-rattling chills, anchored by a superb ensemble and a cleverly unfolding allegory about grief and addiction. Its peaks, especially the epic mid-season punch of "The Bent-Neck Lady" and "Two Storms," were almost unimaginably high.

The Haunting of Bly Manor achieves no comparable peaks plus Netflix prefers that we not discuss the season's standout, format-bending episode though the first few episodes establish their mood in methodical and involving fashion.

After directing the entirety of Hill House, Flanagan only starts Bly Manor behind the camera before passing off to a team of genre veterans including Ciaran Foy (Sinister 2), Yolanda Ramke & Ben Howling (Cargo) and E.L. Katz (Channel Zero). Flanagan establishes a familiar template of rich composition in which you can't take your eye off of any inch of the frame for fear that's the corner that might be passed through by a spectral figure or a subliminal flash of something malevolent.

The simmering mood is enhanced by the performances, especially Smith and Ainsworth, who are already doing mature variations on the familiar Spooky British Kid. And that's before the story evolves in a way that, as anybody who had to read the source material might still remember from junior high, becomes vastly more complicated. Smith is especially good, shifting between a chirpy child prone to pronouncing things "perfectly splendid!" and a figure haunted by events that emerge as the story progresses. (Flanagan and casting director Annie McCarthy also scored with the juvenile actors in Hill House.)

There are odd accent things going on with the older stars, from Henry Thomas and a familiar guest star Netflix oddly doesn't want spoiled going British to Jackson-Cohen's Shrek-adjacent brogue and even Pedretti, an American playing EXTRA American. But that doesn't mean the performances are bad.

Pedretti generates instant empathy, Kohli follows up his iZombie work with another likable turn, Jackson-Cohen gives off smoldering Big Bad Wolf vibes and Miller shines in the season's showcase acting episode, a fifth hour that kicks off an ultra-deliberate unfolding of who and what is haunting Bly Manor.

Flanagan and his writing team are working with the idea of possession, not just in the literal senses of ownership and demonic occupation, but in the sense that marriage is presented in romantic terms as the binding of souls. How much does falling in love mean surrendering your ideal of an individual self to become part of a collective couple and what is the line between that prospect being scary but exciting or just simply scary? And once you become committed to a future union, what happens to your solo past? What grounds you to who you are and what grounds places to their identities? How much is history rooted in facts and events and how much in memory, capricious as that might be?

There's a lot to chew on here and there would be even if Flanagan didn't spell everything out in exhausting detail over four exposition-heavy episodes. Part of why James' novella is still taught today is because almost everything that transpires is open to interpretation. So it can be as supernatural (or not) as you want, as rooted in Victorian Era sexual repression (or not) as you want, as nebulously unsettling or downright disturbing as you want.

Flanagan just comes right out and explains everything, including multiple episodes driven by flashback and backstory. As earnestly as the entire cast plays every beat, nothing is better for being over-explained. Even making a jumble of the timeline is a sorry substitute for leaving ambiguity in the text.

With four or five episodes of foundation-laying and four or five episodes of explanation, The Haunting of Bly Manor is a minimum of two or three episodes too long. For all its ramping up of tension, actual scares are almost completely absent. The performances and emotional stakes keep The Haunting of Bly Manor watchable despite that, but on those terms the season would have played better at six goosebump-filled episodes.

Cast: Victoria Pedretti, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Amelia Eve, T'Nia Miller, Rahul Kohli, Tahirah Sharif, Amelie Bea Smith, Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Henry ThomasCreator: Mike Flanagan, from the novella by Henry JamesPremieres Friday, Oct. 9 on Netflix.

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Mainstream media is the biggest amplifier of White House disinformation – MIT Technology Review

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Benklers teamjust published its study, which examinesthepresidents disinformation campaign against mail-in votes and detailsthemethodsand peoplehes using to accomplish his goals.Thefindings found that some ofthebiggest names in American mass media andthepolitical elite are primarily responsible, and that social media plays only a secondary role.Thefindings run contrary tothepopular idea that its foreign troll factories doingtheworst disinformation dirty work.

Thestudy examined 55,000 media stories, 5 million tweets, and 75,000 Facebook posts.Theconclusion, echoingtheir research from 2015 to 2018, is that Donald Trump and Fox News arethekey players in this crucial disinformation campaign, not Russian trolls.Theresearchers mappedthe campaign out, showing a clear and recurring culprit: Trump, whether on TV or Twitter or by close proxy.

Theres been a lot of alarm over Russian interference and clickbait factories on social media, says Benkler, but in 2016 and today, what we see is that mass media is much more important.

TheAmerican press amplifies this dramatically because outlets cannot resist giving attention totheWhite House. Calling his actions a disinformation campaign would be profoundly difficult for some journalists who are desperate to project balance as if it is equal to fairness.

But this has real consequences. Mail-in voting expands access to an election inthemiddle of a national health crisis, and lies are being used as justification to undercut or eliminate this accessa tactic clearly at play in Texas and other states.

There is a way forward, however.Theresearch argues thattheprimary cure is for these media outlets to more aggressively policethepresidents disinformation.

While many Americans are set in their beliefs on election fraud, there is still a substantial group of persuadables, says Benkler. They are unsure of the truth about election fraud, they watch network news, and they read local papers that aggregate journalism from outlets liketheAssociated Press.

That means theonly meaningful players arethenews editors andthe journalists at those outlets most often used for political news bytheleast attentive, least politically engaged people in society, Benkler says.

That includes tacklingthequestion ofthepresidents misinformation clearly and directly, and avoiding false balance. EventheNew York Times, whose readers are well informed onthereality of voter fraud, sometimes publishes credulous and noncritical journalism on this. One recent story about Texas shutting down ballot drop-off sites, for example, was headlined Citing security, Texas governor limits counties to one spot each for in-person ballot drop-offs, giving credence totheidea.Not untiltheseventh paragraph does the story mention, as a brief aside, that there is absolutely no evidence that mail-in voting causes fraud.

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Mainstream media is the biggest amplifier of White House disinformation - MIT Technology Review

Trumps antibody treatment was tested using cells originally derived from an abortion – MIT Technology Review

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This week, President Donald Trump extolled the cutting-edge coronavirus treatments he received as miracles coming down from God. If thats true, then God employs cell lines derived from human fetal tissue.

The emergency antibody that Trump received last week was developed with the use of a cell line originally derived from abortion tissue, according to Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, the company that developed the experimental drug.

The Trump administration has taken an increasingly firm line against medical research using fetal tissue from abortions. For example, when it moved in 2019 to curtail the ability of the National Institutes of Health to fund such research, supporters hailed a major pro-life victory and thanked Trump personally for taking decisive action against what they called the outrageous and disgusting practice of experimentation using baby body parts.

But when the president faced a deadly encounter with covid-19, his administration raised no objections over the fact that the new drugs also relied on fetal cells, and anti-abortion campaigners were silent too. Most likely, their hypocrisy was unwitting. Many types of medical and vaccine research employ supplies of cells originally acquired from abortion tissue. It would have taken an expert to realize that was the case with Trumps treatment.

Last Friday, as Trump developed worrisome symptoms of covid-19, the president received an emergency cocktail of anti-coronavirus antibodies made by Regeneron. These molecules are manufactured in cells from a hamsters ovary, so-called CHO cells, according to the companynot in human cells.

But cells originally derived from a fetus were used in another way. According to Regeneron, laboratory tests used to assess the potency of its antibodies employed a standardized supply of cells called HEK 293T, whose origin was kidney tissue from an abortion in the Netherlands in the 1970s.

Since then, the 293T cells have been immortalized, meaning they keep dividing in the lab, somewhat like a cancer, and have undergone other genetic changes and additions.

According to Regeneron, it and many other labs employ 293T cells to manufacture virus pseudoparticles, which are virus-like structures that contain the spike protein of the deadly coronavirus. It needs those to test how well different antibodies will neutralize the virus.

The two antibodies Regeneron eventually put forward as an experimental treatment, which may have saved Trumps life, would have been selected using exactly such tests. Because the 293T cells were acquired so long ago, and have lived so long in the laboratory, they are no longer thought of as involving abortion politics.

Its how you want to parse it, says Alexandra Bowie, a Regeneron spokesperson. But the 293T cell lines available today are not considered fetal tissue, and we did not otherwise use fetal tissue.

The Trump administration has sought to block or curtail research that requires tissue from recently performed abortions. In August, for example, a new board created by the Department of Health and Human Services, and stacked with figures opposed to abortion, voted to withhold funding from 13 of 14 proposals.

The rejections centered on research seeking fresh supplies of abortion tissue, rather than ongoing research involving older, well-established cell lines in use for many years, like the type Regeneron employed. However, one reason some scientists want to study abortion tissue is so they can create new and valuable cell lines.

Update: An earlier version of this story was headlined "Trumps antibody treatment was tested using cells from an abortion." The words "originally derived" were added to clarify that the cells are not from a recent abortion.

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Trumps antibody treatment was tested using cells originally derived from an abortion - MIT Technology Review

HITEC Recognizes the 100 Most Influential Hispanics in Technology – PRNewswire

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CHICAGO, Oct. 7, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --HITEC today announced the 100 most influential Hispanic leaders in technology for 2021 - the HITEC 100. Click here to view the full list of the HITEC 100.

For more than a decade, HITEC has highlighted the value that Hispanic leaders create in technology. This is part of the organization's mission to celebrate and increase Hispanic representation, building stronger technology and executive leaders in the diversity-challenged technology industry.

"2020 has been a year of challenges and unimaginable global change. During these times, our leaders have worked to change the conversation, using technology to innovate and working to create meaningful impact," saidHITEC Chairman, Guillermo Diaz, Jr., CEO of Kloudspot.

"It is because of these leaders and innovators that businesses and families around the world have been able to stay connected, functioning and forging a path forward. It is an extremely proud moment for the Hispanic community and the tech industry to recognize and celebrate these leaders," said Diaz.

Nominations for the HITEC 100 are solicited from HITEC members, partners and the general public. Awardees are evaluated on their accomplishments in the ever-changing global landscape of technology and for their mentoring and professional development activities.

"With each passing year, the HITEC 100 continues to strengthen in caliber and representation at the highest levels of the Hispanic talent in the technology industry. This year, HITEC received a record number of nominations, which shows the growth in visibility and impact that HITEC has in the community. We continue raising the bar in a more challenging selection process," saidHITEC Board Member and Chair of the Awards Committee, Juan Carlos Gutierrez, Head of Latam Solution Architecture and Customer Success, Amazon Web Services (AWS).

HITECis the premier global executive leadership organization of senior business and technology executives. HITEC 100 awardees will be recognized virtually during the HITEC Awards Ceremony on December 8, 2020.

SOURCE HITEC

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HITEC Recognizes the 100 Most Influential Hispanics in Technology - PRNewswire

Robotics is Making Alliance between Employees and Technology – Analytics Insight

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Traditionally, human beings design and construct robotics, and the use of machines to perform tasks. Robots are broadly used in industries such as automobile manufacturing to perform simple repetitive tasks. In such industries, work must be performed in ecosystems hazardous to humans.

Almost every aspect of robotics involve artificial intelligence (AI), robots may be equipped with the equivalent of human senses like vision, touch, and ability to sense temperature. Some of them are even capable of decision making. Todays research on robotics is geared toward devising robots with a degree of self-efficiency that will enable mobility and decision-making in an unstructured ecosystem. Current industrial robots do not resemble human beings.

Industries are using robots for stimulating manufacturing electric signals and designing biomedical equipments etc. Robotics requires a set of applications, including computer integrated manufacturing, mechanical engineering, biological mechanics, electrical engineering, and software engineering.

Nowadays, Automation and Robotics Engineering have been used to control systems and in information technology to reduce human work while producing goods and services.

Vice President, Product, Program, and UX Design forBrain Corp, Phil Duffy joined host Daniel Litwin to cover a broad critical topic in todays automated world. They are tackling how robotics is creating new bridges between employees and technology.

Brain Corp develops software forautonomous mobile robots(AMRs), designed for retailers and grocery stores around the world and counts several Fortune 500 customers among its client bases, such as Walmart, Kroger, Schnucks, Giant Eagle, and Simon Property Group.

Phil Duffy provided some essential insights from the front lines on how those customers and others are leveraging AMRs during the pandemic. He was trying to explore how the rapid growth of adoption of robotic solutions could continue into the new normal and beyond. He further emphasized the effect of robotics on daily operations during the coronavirus pandemic and into global reopening.

Duffy said, Weve known about robots in a warehouse and industrial setting for 20-odd years, but the robots that scale in open-to-public spaces are relatively a new thing.

He elaborated, Up until recently, customers have been nervous about the prospect of robots in open spaces. Whats happened during COVID-19 pandemic is that a lot of the customers we deal with in the robotics industry have recognized that theres an opportunity here to gain value.

That translates to robots potentially taking over dull and monotonous jobs, enabling human employees to take on cleaning of data and other important tasks during this unprecedented time of COVID-19.

The alliance between humans and machines will survive the global pandemic and set a new definition of work. Collaborating robots with employees can do physical work and provide real intelligence. Perception and ability of making decisions allow creation to grow in ecosystems that would be unsafe or unpleasant for human employees. Instead of being insecure, robotics is helping to build new bridges between employees and machines to get through the pandemic.

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Robotics is Making Alliance between Employees and Technology - Analytics Insight

I got irritated by my dads cluelessness with gadgets but maybe it is the technology thats to blame – The Guardian

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About 10 years ago, I moved into a fancy flat. I was looking forward to my dad coming to stay for the first time. He arrived at lunchtime, before I went off to present The One Show. He is really into music, so I enjoyed showing him the audio system, which could play more or less every radio station in the world and just about every piece of music ever made. I could even summon up a specialist jazz station in Los Angeles. Then there was the lighting, which could be selected to come on in different places at selected levels. Finally, there was the television and associated apparatus which, for convenience, could be operated by a single remote control sporting a little touchscreen. With a cheery wave, I bade him farewell, encouraging him to relax and enjoy himself.

It was eight oclock and night had fallen by the time I returned. The place was quiet and in darkness. I was terrified, frankly, that he had expired. Then I heard a tiny, tinny sound emanating from the big, open-plan living room. Dad? I switched on the light, selecting the brightest of the five available options, and there he was, sitting alone in the middle of the too-big sofa that could comfortably have seated 20 of him. On the coffee table in front of him was the small, battery-operated wireless he carried with him everywhere. On the television, an error message flitted around the screen. In his hand was a glass of wine. He looked resigned, but not unhappy. I tried, he said, but got nowhere with anything, so just gave up.

At the time, I was annoyed with him but, to be honest, 10 years on I am still grappling with the stupid lights, TV and sound system myself. In this and all things, my parents difficulties are becoming my own and I am furious with more or less everyone involved in the design of anything. Everything has become too complicated: cars, phones, computers, ovens, hobs, you name it. In the interest of greater functionality, everything is being overengineered to the point for many people of non-functionality.

This week, I was in my normal state of exasperation with my dad for not reading his gas and electricity meters, as asked to do by his supplier. I got on my hands and knees, only to find devices I didnt recognise. On them were tiny blank screens with a couple of buttons. I proceeded to do what I constantly berate my parents for doing: I pressed the buttons angrily and indiscriminately. Mysterious groups of numbers, letters and words appeared. I could just about read the tiny legend of the model number, so I looked up the instructions online and, I think, finally got a reading. I was later told by someone that the whole point of smart meters is that they send the data automatically. So why the request for readings? I emailed the company about this, but have had no reply.

The list goes on: Apple was very pleased with itself when it made the iPhone screen more touch sensitive, so you got one thing if you pressed lightly, and another if you pressed harder. For older people, whose drier digits dont work well with touchscreens, this exacerbates the problem. Getting nowhere with a light touch, my dad stabs harder, which then brings up something else, which, in turn, deepens his desperation. Voice activation and Siri are supposed to help him. To be fair, they might, but I may never know because, unable to understand them myself, I cannot be of any assistance.

Does the smart in smartphone and smart TV refer to the brilliance required of their users? Smart televisions are definitely the worst of all. My parents have a Virgin box, the remote for which has 45 buttons. The remote for the Samsung TV has 44. Eighty-nine buttons to worry about, when they need, at most, about five of them. To make matters worse, in order to squeeze so many buttons on to the thing, the writing on them has to be squintingly small. Press Guide, I holler.

Cant see it, they yell back.

It turns out that I can barely see it either. On the Virgin controller, the word measures 1.5mm by 5mm. Guide on Samsung comes in at a comparatively generous 2mm by 8mm. Even worse are the symbols they otherwise resort to. Of the 89 buttons I am looking at now, I am completely clueless as to the function of at least 20 of them.

And symbols for words are a problem everywhere. To access the start menu on Windows 10, you no longer click Start; you click on a symbol of a window. Why? To forward an email on Gmail, you now have to click on three vertical dots and find the option down there somewhere. These may seem obvious, and I appreciate the need to make things accessible to those who dont speak English. I also know many elderly people will be comfortable with all this, but many seniors as I am sure they call them in Silicon Valley find it all contributes to the confusion.

This is not merely another case of twas ever thus. Yes, we are always going to be somewhat confused by the world as old age comes around. But this tech trouble goes beyond that and seems to get forgotten among the many other challenges to be confronted welfare payments, pensions, social care and so on. All that stuff is vital, of course, but these endless, daily tests and trials set by the march of technology are real breakers of spirit and unwitting tools of exclusion. The biggest tragedy is that so much of it could be so helpful for many more older people if only they were able to use it easily. The hard of hearing are so much better off communicating by text. And television on demand is a gold mine of entertainment, if a barrage of buttons does not discourage you. Computers are an amazing window on the world, something that must be of greatest benefit to those less able to get out in that world.

Those who design this stuff are plainly doing so for people close in age to themselves. But surely no harm would come from them considering whether their parents or grandparents would have any chance of fathoming out whatever new consumer electronics they are working on. As with all things concerning the troubles of the twilight years, it will be well worth them remembering that, one day, their time will come. I hope, uncharitably, that the thousand-buttoned remote controls for their celestial screens will leave them as baffled as my parents are.

Adrian Chiles is a Guardian columnist

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I got irritated by my dads cluelessness with gadgets but maybe it is the technology thats to blame - The Guardian

TailorInsight Releases Report on ‘The AR+AI Interactive Video Technology of WIMI Promotes the Potential Power of the Hologram Industry’ -…

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HONG KONG, Oct. 07, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- TailorInsight, the fintech market research organization, recently released a research report 'The AR+AI Interactive Video Technology of WIMI Promotes the Potential Power of the Hologram Industry'. Obviously, the current content and efficiency of e-commerce live broadcasting cannot match the rapid growth of the new market needs of the live broadcasting industry. The live broadcasting market is in urgent need of a new technology that can reduce costs, improve efficiency, enrich content, and improve the live broadcasting data instantly to facilitate the iterative upgrading of the e-commerce industry.

This is the AR/VR virtual live broadcasting technology which is side-by-side with 5G technology and has experienced several verifications in the e-commerce live broadcasting industry. Indeed, in the 5G era, e-commerce live broadcasting will be more and more interesting. Because of the high-speed information transmission of 5G, the anchors on the platform can present consumers with high-definition and high-quality pictures anytime and anywhere.

In recent years, virtual AR live broadcasting technology has gradually appeared in some of the top events and banquets. The AR live broadcast solution, based on the deep learning and stereo vision algorithm software, is adopted by WIMI. Meanwhile, it represents that the Chinese artificial intelligence and visual algorithm software science and technology enterprise's technical level has reached the world's leading level. The software algorithm can realize the production of AR live broadcast effects, which greatly reduces the engineering difficulty and cost, and improves the implementation efficiency. This means that AR virtual live broadcasting can be more and more widely applied to other fields except for top events and banquets.

The advantages of WIMI's AR+ live broadcasting is obvious, which can simulate any scene in a real way and reflect the application of the product in different real environments. It can show more complex products, so that the audience can more intuitively understand the internal structure and product details of the product. Break through the personnel limit, and at the same time, it can target the crowd for live broadcasting and precise delivery, which has a wider publicity effect. Online interactivity is stronger, meanwhile, guests and fans can interact during the live broadcast. Their questions will be screened and answered in real time. In addition, the complete set of videos can be obtained at the end of the live broadcast. These videos can be used for publicity in the first time without the need for post-editing.

Based on its mature visual design team, WIMI Hologram has deeply excavated the AR live broadcast technology and officially launched the AR live broadcast business, enriching its business structure, providing more services to customers, solving customer problems, and covering multiple industries and fields.

The WIMI's AR+ live system, in simple terms, is through the AR holographic technology, allowing the audience to watch the holographic characters or scenes with the naked eyes. The user experience can be described as stunning. WIMI combines the holographic technology with entertainment mode, which enables the viewer to become a character in the movie/stage and involve in the movie/stage pre-made environment and plot. The viewer can feel like a part of the movie/stage, or even the main character of it, allowing the viewer to continues to interact with the movie/stage content.

In terms of video technology, in addition to regular live video broadcasts, WIMI AR has also begun to get involved in some more "future" fields. WIMI is optimistic about the prospect of ultra-low latency video interactive technology in many fields such as entertainment, games, sports, education, medical care, VR, and AR.

VR/AR has broad application prospects in many industries such as culture and sports, transportation, medical care, education, public safety, real estate, news media, and advertising and marketing. Over the past few years, VR/AR has been tepid, with many of them remaining in verification application or demonstration applications, and there were few large-scale commercial applications. However, it can be expected that the commercialization of 5G will accelerate gradually, and VR/AR will become the "number one player" of 5G applications, opening a huge space for commercial imagination.

About TailorInsight

Tailor Insight provides easy and quick solutions that allow customers to capture, monitor, and audit market data from a holistic view down to an individual task on market research and industry trend insights. For more information, please visit http://www.TailorInsight.com.

Media contactAlex Xie, Senior AnalystFintech Research Team, TailorInsight Researchinfo@TailorInsight.comhttp://www.TailorInsight.com

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Professors Embrace New Technology to Adapt to Online Instruction – Columbia University

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As an unprecedented fall semester progresses, Columbia faculty members have been busy figuring out the most effective ways to adapt their courses to online and hybrid/HyFlex formats. Professors are exploring how to use technology intentionally to produce the best learning experience for their students.

The individual and collaborative efforts of faculty have been remarkable. All of us who are teaching this semester have felt some anxiety about relying on a virtual medium, and that anxiety has been channeled into wonderfully productive conversations about teaching, said Lisa Hollibaugh, Dean of Academic Affairs at Columbia College.

Many instructors have engaged with Columbias Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL). Between May 1 and August 31, professors had more than1,000 consultations with the CTL, and over 1,200 of them participated in the CTLs new Hybrid & Online Teaching Institute, which shows users how to adapt courses to online or hybrid formats.

Instructors are committed to creating community and connections with their students in totally new ways in order to sustain the kind of engagement that is at the heart of teaching and learning at Columbia, said Catherine Ross, CTL executive director.

Here several faculty members from around campus share their experiences shifting to online teaching and offer suggestions:

Annie Pfeifer, Professor of Germanic Languages

Instead of trying to recreate the physical classroom experience, think about ways you can provide a different kind of experience by using the features of Zoom, CourseWorks, polls, and even the chat function over Zoom. For me, teaching online works best when I stop comparing it to the real thing in person, said Pfeifer. In the CTL workshops, I learned about the multiple functions of CourseWorks, which make it easier to grade and keep track of assignments. I am also using the collaboration feature on Courseworks for sharing notes with students.

In terms of asynchronous coursework, Pfeifer aimed to rethink and retool storytelling in her class, Grimms Fairy Tales: Power, Gender, and Narrative, by asking students to transcribe and record their own fairy tales and post them online to create a kind of virtual storytelling community, where they can listen and engage with each other.

During synchronous class sessions, she took advantage of polls (especially Poll Everywhere) to stimulate class discussion. Since the polls are usually anonymous, they allow quieter or less vocal students to voice their opinions about a text or question in a lower-stakes setting, said Pfeifer. Right now, it seems like we have more class discussion and participation over Zoom than I often do in an in-person class. The key seems to be providing students with different forums to participate: breakout rooms, the Zoom chat function, and a discussion board. I also asked students to submit a voluntary technology survey, which alerts me to the challenges they might be facing with remote learning. Their responses often contain practical suggestions and feedback that I try to incorporate into my classes.

Sailakshmi Ramgopal, Professor of History

Ramgopal created a new interactive online mapping project for her undergraduate seminar, Mobility and Identity in the Roman World. The course focuses on the relationships between the migratory patterns of marginalized populations of the Roman empire and Roman law, society, and culture. The mapping project provides students with a hands-on opportunity to plot data from inscriptions and other sources related to migratory phenomena, and to explore the questions that arise.

The shift to remote teaching motivated me to develop this project so that students can learn the work that historians do outside of reading assignments and classroom discussion, said Ramgopal. This project allows for creativity and spontaneous exploration, which are fundamental to writing compelling, thoughtful history.

Thomas A. DiPrete, Giddings Professor of Sociology

In his undergraduate sociology seminar, DiPrete implemented simple yet meaningful ways to help students feel included and heard in an online arena.

In the first class, we discussed how to create an open, welcoming environment, particularly involving class discussion, which is an important component of the course, DiPrete said.

He spoke with all the students individually outside of class, and discussed the pros and cons of the various ways of getting into class discussionsphysically waving ones hand, sending him a chat, doing an electronic hand wave, or just starting to talk, making DiPrete the gentle traffic cop to keep students from talking over each other. He also enters the Zoom room a few minutes before class begins in order to chat informally with students who have arrived early, and he stays online for a while after class has ended so that students have a chance to ask questions or share their thoughts with him.

Rym Bettaieb, Lecturer in Arabic Language, Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies

Over the summer, Bettaieb worked with the CTL to learn how to employ Courseworks and Zoom to transition her Arabic courses online.

Thanks to the CTL, I am able to upload teaching material for each day (handouts, videos, readings, homework assignments, quizzes, etc.) on my CourseWorks course page. I divide my time with students between Zoom on and Zoom off, said Bettaieb. During Zoom on, we go over class material together and correct drills they have worked on. During Zoom off, students study new material and prepare questions for Zoom on sessions. I always arrange for a short time between our Zoom on and Zoom off sessions in order to answer any student questions. I also hold an office hour with video that grants each student 10 minutes to meet with me individually.

The students were a bit nervous in the beginning of the course about the new online format and virtual mode of learning, said Bettaieb. However, they soon realized that they were not missing or skipping any aspect of learning a new language. All the skills (speaking, writing, reading, listening, and culture) were integrated into each class.

The online format also allows Rym to hold cultural events that would be difficult to organize in a physical classroom. Recently, her class hosted Farah Alhashim, a Kuwaiti-Lebanese movie director, after watching her movie, Breakfast in Beirut, on Zoom. Alhashim joined Bettaieb and her students from a small town in the South of France, where she was quarantined.

My students were very happy to interact with her, and felt close to her work and creative ideas despite the physical distance that separated us, said Bettaieb.

Laura K. Nicholas is communications and outreach manager at Columbia's Center for Teaching and Learning. Catherine Ross and Amanda Irvin assisted her with this story.

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Professors Embrace New Technology to Adapt to Online Instruction - Columbia University