Troubled waters in Rolle
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – The young Yahoo! firm in Rolle, which will move into its specially-built offices in June, is reported by RTS, Swiss public broadcasting, to be laying off “one or two dozen” workers.
RTS cites the city manager of Rolle; the company itself confirmed that it has alerted the town to planned layoffs, but did not provide details.
The cutbacks are part of a larger restructuring by troubled Yahoo! in the US, which announced Tuesday that it is suing Facebook for infringing 10 copyright patents.
The company moved its European head office from London to Switzerland in 2009, bringing some 70 employees, part of a technology businesses boom that has taken Rolle’s population from 4,500 to 6,000 in 10 years.
Half of the population now foreigners, swissinfo reported a year ago.
Social media’s role having a huge impact on Red Cross work
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The International Red Cross working closely with the The Syrian Arab Red Crescent team, continue to provide first aid and medical care as well as food, blankets and hygiene items near the city of Homs, to residents and people who fled Baba Amr, while the worst hit areas remain off-limits. A senior Red Cross figure Tuesday evening confirmed to GenevaLunch that social media are playing an increasingly significant role in conflict areas, requiring more staff to deal with the stream of communication, which recently, for example, included French journalist Edith Bouvier using Twitter to contact the ICRC to ask for help.
Bouvier suffered leg injuries in the blast that killed two other reporters 22 February. She was able to escape Syria 2 March and go to Lebanon.
©2012 Chappatte, distributed by Globe Cartoon. More cartoons on Chappatte’s web site. Geneva-based Patrick Chappatte works for the International Herald Tribune, for Geneva newspaper Le Temps, and for NZZ am Sonntag. All cartoons reproduced with permission.
By William New
(republished with permission from Geneva-based Intellectual Property Watch)
In an unprecedented action suggesting intellectual property rights have bumped up against an access threshold, thousands of websites have gone “dark” today in protest against two draft anti-piracy and counterfeiting bills in the US Congress that the protestors say would harm freedoms online. The protest includes major technology firms like Google, Mozilla, Wikipedia, Flikr, Reddit, Vimeo and WordPress.
The website SOPA Strike lists dozens of participating sites.
US technology lobbying groups have joined as well, such as the Consumer Electronics Association, Center for Democracy and Technology, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Computer and Communications Industry Association, MoveOn.org, and the National Venture Capital Association. A range of others, such as environmental activist group Greenpeace, tech publication Wired, BoingBoing.net, the Internet Archive, internet anonymity site Tor Project, and software service Tucows joined in. A number of websites provided tools for reaching congressional representatives or to sign a petition. Facebook created a page raising concerns about the bills.
At issue are two bills in Congress: the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its Senate variant, the Protect IP Act (PIPA). Sponsors of the bills proposed changes in recent days (IPW, US Policy, 17 January 2012), but the protest proceeded to send its message.
Google put a black censorship block over its well-known image above the search mechanism box. It included a link to a page declaring “End Piracy Not Liberty”, and explaining: “Millions of Americans oppose SOPA and PIPA because these bills would censor the Internet and slow economic growth in the U.S. Two bills before Congress, known as the Protect IP Act (PIPA) in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House, would censor the Web and impose harmful regulations on American business. Millions of Internet users and entrepreneurs already oppose SOPA and PIPA.
The Senate will begin voting on January 24th. Please let them know how you feel. Sign this petition urging Congress to vote NO on PIPA and SOPA before it is too late,” Google said.
Google added:
Biggest impact may be on other social media: “sitting on a ton of personal information…doesn’t mean you can monetize it in any way you like”
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Facebook has indeed shared private information with advertisers, a practice it has staunchly denied, according to the US Federal Trade Commission, which has ended a long investigation into reported privacy abuses by the social network. The information came out Tuesday 29 November when the FTC published details of the settlement the two have reached. Facebook has agreed to an external audit of its privacy controls every two years for the next 20 years and in future it will not ask users to simply “opt out” of changes to settings, but will instead be required to first ask their permission to make the changes.
The settlement also has more far-ranging implications, particularly for other social media, notes industry media Mashable: “The effects of the settlement will likely have more to do with other social networks than the original one. The message from the FTC to social media is now clear: if you put the desires of advertisers before the privacy of users, you will be stopped. Just because you’re sitting on a ton of personal information that would make marketers drool, it doesn’t mean you can monetize it in any way you like.”
The settlement lists 7 complaints by the FTC against Facebook, but the US government body also salutes in its findings the social media group’s impact on society.
The impact on Facebook itself is widely expected by industry observers to be minimal, with the focus now turning to Facebook’s upcoming Initial Public Offering (IPO), as BrandChannel points out: “It’s only fitting that the world’s dominant social network will reportedly go public in the second quarter of 2012 in what could be the largest IPO by any technology or Internet company in history. Facebook hopes to raise $10 billion through a limited IPO that would value the company at an astounding $100 billion.”
Links to other sites: CTV Canada/AP, Economist, Guardian tech, HuffPost tech, Mashable
This editorial has been moved to the Editor’s Notepad blog, where it was originally intended to sit (apologies for the early morning confusion).
The role of social networking and Hollywood fantasies in a gruesome first-degree murder trial in Canada became apparent 30 and 31 March. Renee Waring, a personal dog trainer from Ohio in the US, testified by video conference on Wednesday March 30, 2011 that she had evidence on the accused, Mark Twitchell, from their Facebook correspondence, in which he told her he had “crossed the line… and liked it.”
Twitchell, from Canada, is on trial for having killed and dismembered Johnny Altinger in a rented garage 10 October 2008, after using an Internet dating service to set up a meeting. He is accused of then disposing of Altinger’s remains by burning them and throwing them into the sewers.
The trial opened 16 March.
Waring became Facebook friends with Twitchell, whose profile boasted the name “Dexter Morgan”, in September 2008. Dexter Morgan is the main character of the television show “Dexter”, a series about a serial killer named Dexter who kills other serial killers.
Waring and Twitchell corresponded via Facebook throughout the fall of 2008, during which time they shared “dark fantasies”. Waring told the accused that she wanted to kill her ex-husband’s new wife and he wrote back disapproving of her chosen methods.
“Although I appreciate your dark fantasy about skeletor, it is impractical,” Twitchell responded to Waring 3 October 2008. “It leaves behind way too much forensic evidence.”
Twitchell explained to Waring that she needed to “prepare a kill room, the same way Dex does”. He proceeded to give her detailed explanations on how to properly disable, kill, dismember, and dispose of a victim.
Soon after Twitchell was charged with Altinger’s murder, Waring turned in the written evidence to Edmonton police.
Twitchell’s lawyer confirmed to the jury that his client was the author of these emails.
Links to other sites: CTV, Toronto Sun, The Globe & Mail
Two of the key outlets for WikiLeaks fans to make contact and also make public their activities reportedly have been closed, with world media saying that Facebook and Twitter shut down pages that have been used to spread the WikiLeaks word. The Facebook page for Operation Payback was up and running at 22:25, however, as was the WikiLeaks page, although Facebook is reported to have said that the sites did not respect terms of agreement. Twitter has reportedly not given an explanation. YouTube continues to carry Anonymous support videos.
WikiLeaks claimed Thursday morning 9 December that it was mirrored on more than 1,300 sites worldwide, but the sites do not provide details for a community of potential hackers and activitists, which Facebook and Twitter have been doing.
Links to other sites: Mashable, Read, Write, Web, Ria Novosti,
Queen Elizabeth II, the British monarch, has joined the Facebook community with a page called the British Monarchy, it was announced 8 November. The page will “offer updates on Royal news and events”, mainly by putting the court circular online. The court circular is a daily summary of court events, first published by King George III, who was annoyed at the inaccuracies published by newspapers of the day.
At the time of writing, more than 47,000 people had “liked” the page which was launched at 8:00.
Links to other sites: AP, Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph
Beware those who film themselves speeding and post it on Facebook: police in Israel have charged a man and two friends who were passengers with speeding and reckless driving after he drove 260kph in a 90kph zone, on the Tel-Aviv-Haifa coastal road, with his friends commenting and pushing him to go faster. One friend offered the video to Channel 2, which aired it and asked the police to comment, reports CNN. According to the Jerusalem Post, one of the friends afterwards told the television station that it was a gag and the trio’s car was actually going much slower, but police and the court were apparently not convinced. It’s the first time anyone has been arrested in Israel for a Facebook post, according to the Israeli newspaper.
Channel 2′s report, showing the speeders being questioned by the station about their antics, is still available on Facebook.
Facebook users experienced about two-and-a-half hours of outage Thursday 23 September, and the social networking site apologized for what it called “the worst outage in four years”. Hundreds of thousands of users used Twitter, a micro-text messaging site, as an alternative.
Tongue-in-cheek tweets included news that productivity would rise, and that the US would climb out of recession; one tweet went: @Z100MoBounce Does that mean we have to actually…. Speak to real people?
Facebook explained that a change in its code caused a database cluster to be overwhelmed. In order to fix it, the decision was taken to close down the site temporarily.
Links to other sites: WebHost Industry Review, Wired, ZDNet
Residents of Christchurch, New Zealand are experiencing a series of aftershocks as they begin the difficult task of cleaning up after Sunday, 5 September’s massive 7.1 magnitude earthquake.
A group of students using social network site Facebook has organized groups of volunteers to help residents clear up debris. Sam Johnson, a 21 year-old law student at Canterbury University, says 300 people showed up within hours of setting up the group. The following day more than 1,900 people volunteered.
Links to other sites: AP, AFP, Student Volunteer base for Earthquake cleanup
Source: RT
A list of young people making the rounds on social networking site Facebook has authorities in southern Colombia worried after two young people were shot and killed 16 August in the southern department of Putumayo. Both young men were on the list, which has now increased to more than 100 names.
Desperate parents are trying to get their children out of the town of Puerto Asis, Putumayo, and municipal authorities have asked for help from the central government in Bogota.
Municipal authorities are saying that the list is a bad joke that got out of hand, compounded by bad luck. The two teenagers were shot while they were on their way on a motorcycle to another town. A few hours later, a list of nine people started to circulate giving those on the list three days to leave town. The two youths’ names were on this list.
The region is wracked by leftist guerrillas, who often target youths who refuse to join their ranks, and a criminal gang, called the Rastrojos.
Paul Ceglia has filed a suit in New York Supreme Court claiming 84 percent of Facebook, and 84 percent of its revenues since 2004. According to a contract he signed with Mark Zuckerberg, the founder and principal owner of Facebook, Ceglia agreed to design a website that would eventually become Facebook for a $1,000 fee plus a 50 percent stake of the resulting company. The agreement also stipulated that Zuckerberg would pay him one percent for each day until the website was completed, until 4 February 2004.
Facebook is expected to contest the charges. “We believe this suit is completely frivolous and we will fight it vigorously,” said a Facebook spokesman in a statement. Ceglia has had problems with the law before, having been accused of taking $200,000 in customers’ money and then not delivering promised wood-pellets fuel.
Legal experts believe the claim may run afoul of New York State’s statute of limitations on contracts, which is six years.
Links to other sites: CNet, Wall Street Journal
©2010 Chappatte, distributed by Globe Cartoon. More cartoons on Chappatte’s web site. Geneva-based Patrick Chappatte works for the International Herald Tribune, for Geneva newspaper Le Temps, and for NZZ am Sonntag. All cartoons reproduced with permission.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has told the world to stayed tuned to the company’s blog Wednesday 26 May when new and, he says, simpler privacy settings will be announced. The company has come under fire for its overly-complicated settings, and releasing data on its members to third parties starting in April, a face Zuckerberg admitted after prodded by journalists. The BBC notes that “Its current privacy policy has 50 different settings and 170 options.” In an interesting twist, the man running for California’s attorney general post is the former privacy chief at Facebook, who quit in March, and who insists he had nothing to do with the company’s about-face on privacy in April.
Links to other sites: BBC, Sydney Morning Herald (including video interview), Wall Street Journal, Wired
Olivier Glassey
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – “Our definition of privacy is fast-evolving right now and we don’t control it,” says Olivier Glassey, from the University of Lausanne. But don’t panic.
“I believe privacy is gone for good,” argues Christian Heller, a self-described “futurist” who relishes taking the debate a step further. Heller likes to remind his listeners that privacy was not a common notion in the Middle Ages, when people lived in small, tightly interwoven communities.
The two were part of a presentation on the redefinition of privacy at the Lift 2010 conference in Geneva Wednesday 5 May.
Teenagers understand privacy and they have their own definition, says Glassey, but a dilemma as the Facebook generation grows up and their elders catch up with them, is how to ensure forgetfulness. “One of the main challenges will be the long-term memory of privacy,” he points out.
Christian Heller
People use social networks like Facebook to recreate their lives, to record their biographies, and this role of social networking has not yet been sufficiently studied. “We need to build in social forgiveness.” Criminals but also the rest of us, who routinely commit small sins that we want to forget, and we want others to forget, should be allowed to fade away, but how do we do that digitally?
Heller reminded his audience that we tend to forget: the 20th century was a time when privacy replaced a more openly shared, more public life, and the shift has not always a positive thing: privacy can also mean loneliness and shame.
Ed. note: WRS radio carries an audio interview with Glassey and Anil de Mello
Facebook has, for the first time, garnered more traffic in a week in the US than Google, as the social networking company’s strong growth of the past year continues, Hitwise, an Internet analyst reports. “The social network accounted for 7.07 per cent of all US web traffic last week, compared to Google’s 7.03 per cent, according to web analysts Hitwise,” reports News.com.au.
Link to other sites: Experian Hitwise, News.com.au
The only exception: DFEA (Swiss foreign affairs) employees can still visit Facebook
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The second most visited web site in Swiss government offices, a January 2009 investigation showed, was the social network Facebook. Government employees were invited to show a bit of restraint in May and they did cut back somewhat, but Facebook remains the fourth most visited site at work – and the volume of downloads has increased in most departments.
To Facebook or not? That is the question in Payerne
Payerne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Several students of the Gymnase Intercantonal de la Broye (GYB), a secondary school in canton Vaud, thought when school re-opened last week that they had lost access to Facebook and Messenger while in school. Online chatting and access to social platforms is still alive and well for the 900 students at GYB, the principal says.
According to school principal Thierry Maire, the bans, reported 1 September by some Swiss media, is not quite what the school is implementing.
Social networking site Facebook has agreed to make changes that would bolster users’ online privacy, after pressure from Canada’s privacy commissioner, Jennifer Stoddart, to make the company comply with Canadian law. Critics said Facebook users’ personal details were too easily accessible to third-party developers, who provide games and quizzes to users. They argued that the social network had user-defined privacy settings that were too complicated. The changes will affect Facebook users everywhere, not just in Canada. Bloomberg, Globe&Mail, PCWorld
Social network giant Facebook says it will buy FriendFeed, an aggregator startup, for an undisclosed sum, the company announced 10 August. FriendFeed was started in late 2007 and allows users to compile and consolidate information across a broad range of media. Users can assemble updates from blogs, RSS feeds, Twitter alerts and Facebook updates in one place. Facebook says FriendFeed’s four founders, all alumni of Google, will continue to occupy key positions at the merged company. Industry observers note that this appears to be Facebook’s answer to Twitter’s rebuff when the social network tried to buy Twitter for a reported $500 million, according to Reuters. Facebook, Reuters
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Roger and Mirka Federer plus their new twins have just appeared on Federer’s Facebook page: a warm family photo taken by a proud grandfather Federer, says the tennis player.
Continual rapid news updates and social networking tools like Twitter can cause further indifference to human suffering, some studies show, reports CNN. The media give too little time for the brain to digest violence and suffering in one story before they bombard the viewer with the next and this can have implications on their morality, according to a University of Southern California study. Twitter sees itself as a solution to information overload because the viewer can step in and out of the information flow at will, according to CNN.
Donations: UNHCR site or Facebook
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Geneva’s city buses will offer riders a new and more worthy than usual distraction from 15 April to 30 June: Gimme Shelter, a 30-second film by a short film directed by Ben Affleck and filmed by John Toll, both Academy Award winners, will be shown on 200 TPG buses, trams and trolleys that have Innova screens.
Ben Affleck, filming at UNHCR refugee camp
The film is the centerpiece to a UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) campaign to raise money during 2009 for clean water and emergency humanitarian assistance kits for displaced persons in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
According to the UNHCR, “There are currently 1.3 million displaced people in the DRC. The effects of the conflict have claimed as many as 5.4 million lives in the last 10 years, with an estimated 1,000 people dying every day.
Refugee camp, DCR (image for UNHCR 2009 ©Zalmai, reproduced with permission)
“In some areas, two out of three women have been raped. Abductions persist in all brutal forms and children are forcefully recruited to fight. Outbreaks of cholera and other diseases have increased as the humanitarian situation deteriorates.”
Some of these stories, like that of the Russian woman who killed her drunken husband by closing their folding couch, do make it to the front pages:
A woman who returned three hours later to check on her unusually quiet husband discovered that she had in fact killed him when, angered by his drunken state, she closed their Murphy bed sofa into the wall with the man inside. Reuters
Dubai is cancelling New Year’s celebrations in solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, bombarded by Israeli forces. International Herald Tribune
Facebook is having a bad week in terms of pleasing the public, with Italians upset at the growing number of Mafia bosses’ pages fans, reports the New York Times based on an article in Italy’s La Republicca, while in the US but also elsewhere there is growing anger at the social network’s decision to remove some breastfeeding images, saying they don’t meed decency standards. Independent, UK
Nasa, the US space agency, has issued its final report on Columbia, the space shuttle that exploded in February 2003, killing the seven astronauts aboard, noting that they knew for about 40 seconds that they had lost control. CNN
A theft victim in New York offered to take his robber out to dinner in a new twist on giving the shirt off your own back to someone poorer. NPR
Hey, it’s 2009 in New Zealand as we hit the “publish” button here in Switzerland. New Year’s Eve is a very short night in New Zealand – check out the balmy weather there and forget about Swiss snow for a minute. New Zealand Herald
Zurich, Switzerland (20 Minutes, Fre) – According to 20 Minutes, several students who have used Facebook to write disparaging remarks about teachers are about to find themselves in trouble with the law in Zurich: a legal complaint has reportedly been filed, but it is not clear who has filed charges, and against whom.
