Today's Twitter threads! (a Twitter thread)
Inside: Kickstarter unionizes, Google ad extortion, 2000+ Mexican cookbooks 1789-2020, #MedicareForAll saves $450b/yr, turning dying malls into Meow Wolfs, Bloomberg tries to censor China criticism, VERY personalized apps and more!
1/
My first picture book is POESY THE MONSTER SLAYER, out July 14: a little girl turns her toys into field-expedient monster-killing weapons and hunts werewolves, beholders and vampires while her parents are trying to sleep!
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1228033537867014145
2/
Kickstarter workers form tech's first-ever white collar trade union!
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229853789789683712
3/
“Kickstarter workers vote to form first union in tech industry https://t.co/Suq3uD3eeK Congrats to the Kickstarter staff for blazing this incredible trail! "Workers voted 36 to 47 in favor of unionizing" They're the first "white-collar, full-time employee" union in tech. 1/”
Blackmailers know it's impossible to get your account reinstated if Google Ads kills it for clickfraud, so they threaten to use bots to click on publishers' ads if they don't get paid.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229852093260824576
4/
“Pay Up, Or We’ll Make Google Ban Your Ads https://t.co/mmgfcg25ez Extortionists know Google will kill a website's ads and claw back its money if they detect fraudulent clicks, and they know that it's impossible to get anyone at Google to answer the phone if this happens. 1/”
The University of Texas's Mexican Cookbook collection boasts over 2,000 titles from 1789-present day, including many digitized manuscripts -- handwritten cookbooks spanning the 20th century.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229849941532528640
5/
@SenSanders@twitter.com's #MedicareForAll will save Ameicans $450B/year and prevent 68,000 deaths/year, say Yale researchers who've published in The Lancet.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229848286753804288
6/
Mall owners are trying to halt the retail apocalypse by luring in Meow Wolf, archery tag, go-karts, and "pop-up museums." Someone should write a novel about this? #Makers
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229845432517283840
7/
My podcast interview with @FirewallDragons@twitter.com about #AdversarialInteroperability, #RightToRepair, and #DRM (part I/II).
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229842619380858885
8/
During Mike Bloomberg's mayoral tenure, Bloomberg News terrorized the wife of a reporter who was fired for being too critical of China.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229841593881874433
9/
The TV show "Dance India Dance" has retained Rightshero to take down infringing video, so Rightshero is sending takedowns to anything that includes the word "did," apparently unware that this is a common English word.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229836267237457921
10/
In 2011, Mike Bloomberg announced a jobs training program by saying that "black and Latino males...don't know how to behave in the workplace."
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229834784102240256
11/
The "Virtual Peephole" is an open source hardware art project that shows you a feed ganked from a different insecure online security camera every time you lift its cover.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229833824088940544
12/
Robin "Sourdough" Sloan recreated the core functionality of a beloved, defunct app for himself & 3 family members. "Learn to code" isn't just a shitty slogan for techbros; sometimes it's more like "learn to cook" (for your family)
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229831729843621888
13/
Ring claims that buying a surveillance doorbell will make you a crimefighter. Cops in towns with Ring partnerships say it's basically useless.
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229829367473139712
14/
Grifters offer terrible "products" and "services" via Twitter's promoted posts service, including human organs. Twitter can't (or, some people think, won't) police this, so what's the solution?
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229825627496124421
15/
Pranksters (?) claim they harvested leaders' DNA from discarded items at Davos. Will this spur the powerful to demand better genomic privacy laws? Or just establish a rule that lets the wealthy sue and leaves the rest of us out?
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1229820175957905408
16/
“Trump’s DNA Is Reportedly For Sale. Here’s What Someone Could Do With It. https://t.co/c4cOTMuLSU Artist/pranksters (?) The Earnest Project claim they recovered world leaders' DNA from discarded coffee cups, dining implements, cigarette butts, napkins, etc at Davos. 1/”
Hey, Hugo nominators, my novella Unauthorized Bread is up on Ars Technica!
(it's also shortlisted for Canada's national book prize, Canada Reads; it's being made into a TV show by Topic & a graphic novel with Firstsecond)
17/
Here's Friday's Twitter threads (I took the long weekend off!):
Candy hearts, Bloomberg wants NSA spying, cryptography vs safes, subprime credit cards, tomorrow's drowned cities, Apple v wage-theft, reality TV pitches & more!
https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1228383007054024705
/18
“Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread). Inside: AI candy hearts, Bloomberg demands NSA spying, cryptography vs safes, subprime credit card badness, tomorrow's drowned cities, romance, Nevada primary Ipads, Apple v wage-theft, reality TV pitches and my first kids' book! 1/”
doctorow