Weekly Roundup 9/14/18
Last week, the 172-year-old Associated Press (AP) announced a collaboration with the little over twelve-month-old Civil Media Company, a blockchain-based news organization. The partnership will provide Civil with content, as well as offer new use-cases for the technology, from establishing ownership rights to tracking readership. Outside of AP, organizations like the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) and Splice, in addition to a cohort of established media figures, have joined the startup.
With blockchain, Civil aims to develop a decentralized marketplace of newsrooms where readers are incentivized to reward high-quality publications with special CVL tokens. Outside of Civil, DNN and Publiq have also taken blockchain-based approaches to journalism to distribute content that cannot be altered or manipulated.
Open data
- Apolitical gathers the best free resources for digital government
- Google releases new search engine for datasets
- Sunlight Foundation launches Open Data Policy Hub for legislators
Misinformation
- Bots may have generated viral misinformation maps
- How FireEye identifies misinformation
- Facebook uses AI to combat hate speech in Myanmar
ICT4D
- USAID publishes guide for using AI and ML in international development
- GMSA releases toolkit to help researchers study digital gender divide
Open internet
- Uganda’s social media tax squeezes economy
- Benin passes decree to tax internet and social media usage
- Egypt ratifies harsh Cybercrime Law