Category: insights

Re:Brand online event: How to achieve better business outcomes through social contribution


Whether scrolling Instagram or browsing our email inboxes, the current crisis has us tuned in to what brands do and say. In stride, our personal values are running close to the surface: is that letter from the CEO out of touch, or appropriately optimistic? Marketing campaigns that don’t skip a beat while the world is rapidly changing can feel brash, and tone-deaf sentiments can quickly spur an unsubscribe. But it’s not all blunders and missteps! Brands that assert a strong mission and communications strategy can engender pride and loyalty in their communities, driving financial objectives in the longer term. While…

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How to play Dungeons & Dragons while you’re stuck in quarantine


Dungeons & Dragons is an ageless gaming classic that’s as relevant today as it was in 1974 when it was first released. The central themes of heroism, fantasy combat with evil monsters, and pretending to be someone else haven’t changed at all. Everything else, however, has. For starters, back in the mid 1970s you could go outside pretty much whenever you wanted and social distancing was just something people did when they didn’t like you. If you wanted to play D&D back in the day, you just invited your friends over and shared some snacks while you role-played as warriors…

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Amazon VP quits after ‘chickenshit’ management fires employee activists


Amazon‘s PR nightmare today intensified as one of the company’s VPs abruptly resigned after several employees were fired for questioning work policies related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Tim Bray, a VP and senior engineer at the company’s Amazon Web Services division, published a scathing take-down on his blog aimed squarely at senior Amazon leadership. His post opens: May 1st was my last day as a VP and Distinguished Engineer at Amazon Web Services, after five years and five months of rewarding fun. I quit in dismay at Amazon firing whistleblowers who were making noise about warehouse employees frightened of Covid-19.…

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Trump’s ‘disinfectant injections’ idea comes straight from internet conspiracy theories


US President Donald Trump yesterday sent the mainstream media and partisan social media into a Godzilla-sized tizzy after floating the idea of treating COVID-19 patients with UV lights and “disinfectants.” The president claimed he’d gotten his information during a briefing with medical experts and said it would be “interesting” for doctors to “check that.” But it’s painfully obvious that he’s conflating actual science with online conspiracy theories. Trump’s comments during the briefing provoked instant rebukes from the medical community at large and all but the most partisan right-wing pundits. Per the usual, the president’s defenders claimed those attacking his words were…

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Verizon gives customers 15GB of extra data for the month of May


Here’s a nice little surpise for Verizon customers: the company today announced it would be giving both regular customers and small businesses an extra 15GB of data for the period spanning May 1 through May 31. The freebie covers regular 4G LTE phone usage, hotpot usage, and Verizon’s ‘Jetpack’ dedicated hotspots. It’s not clear from the announcement whether customers with a fancy 5G phone should disable 5G for the additional benefit. I’d assume the phones would switch to 4G LTE should they hit their typical data alotment. Though Verizon offers unlimited data plans as well and capped ones, these come…

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AI isn’t going to save you from yourselves


Coronavirus in Context is a weekly newsletter where we bring you facts that matter about the COVID-19 pandemic and the technology trying to stop its spread. You can subscribe here. Hola pandemic pals, I want to start this week’s newsletter off with some good news: The curve appears to be flattening! That being said, we’re also at our most vulnerable point in the pandemic. How we respond over the next month will probably decide whether we get to stop social-distancing in 2020. Medical experts overwhelmingly agree prematurely ending social distancing efforts would most likely lead to a second-wave pandemic. But most think we could pull through…

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Google now lets retailers list products for free on its Shopping tab


In an effort to stimulate growth in the retail sector during the coronavirus pandemic, Google is making it free for all merchants to sell items in its Shopping tab. In a blog post, Google president of commerce Bill Ready said that starting next week all search results in the Shopping section will consist mostly of free product listings — whether a seller advertises on its platform or not. [Read: How to simplify your shopping routine with these handy apps] “With hundreds of millions of shopping searches on Google each day, we know that many retailers have the items people need in…

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New AI algorithm brings us closer than ever to controlling machines with our minds


Researchers from Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh today published research showing how they’d solved a frustrating problem for people who use a brain-computer interface (BCI) to control prosthetic devices with their thoughts. While the research itself is interesting – they created an algorithm that keeps the devices from constantly needing to be re-calibrated to handle the human brain’s fluctuating neuronal activity – the real takeaway here is how close we are to a universal BCI. BCIs have been around for decades in one form or another, but they’re costly to maintain and difficult to keep working properly. Currently…

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Jeff Lowe says ‘Tiger King’ Joe Exotic made sex tapes with zoo animals


Warning: Tiger King spoilers ahead. Jeff Lowe, a prominent figure in the “Tiger King” docu-series on Netflix, held an “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) session on Reddit yesterday and it went exactly how you’d expect. The internet tried to dunk on Lowe but he sloughed it off and dropped a bombshell accusation: Joe Exotic (the titular Tiger King) and his ex-husband John Finlay allegedly committed animal sexual assault. Jeff Lowe’s the supposedly-rich guy who took over The Greater Wynnewood Exotic Animal Park – the zoo made famous by Exotic. Lowe’s shut the zoo down since the docu-series aired (but only because…

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Send in the clowns


Coronavirus in Context is a weekly newsletter where we bring you facts that matter about the COVID-19 pandemic and the technology trying to stop its spread. You can subscribe here. Hola quarantine compadres! One of the most interesting things about this pandemic is seeing how different countries are handling the details. In Mexico, where I live, the army and the police are patrolling the beaches to make sure people don’t disobey the public gathering order. In the US, people have been arrested for congregating in groups and then jammed together in tiny holding cells as punishment – they’re an ironic people. And who could forget the…

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