Joe Biden elected as 46th POTUS – how were votes counted?

It has just been announced the Joe Biden will be elected as the 46th President of the United States beating Donald Trump.  Ever wonder how US election ballot counting works?  Check out this nice video by vox.com

 

 

NBA and fans together again via Microsoft Teams

NBA is back!  Despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, people still found way to restart the games and is utilizing technology to help bring a sense of normalcy.  22 teams in the NBA bubble won’t be playing with their fans live BUT they will be there video-conferencing via MS Teams.  With many on lockdown since March this year, workers were relegated to use virtual meetings such as Google Hangouts, Zoom, Skype, Facetime, Slack and MS Teams among others to connect.  Let’s see how this works when NBA officially starts!

The whole working-from-home thing — Apple

The COVID19 pandemic certainly redefined the way people work.  Good thing we now have better technology to efficiently ensure output while working from home.  This clip from Apple pretty much captured the craziness and how technology enables people to connect, collaborate, deliver outputs.  see more [setitgood.com]

(Source: youtube.com)

tech companies take a stand on #blacklivesmatter

We are certainly in dire times, but one good thing that came out of the recent protests over the death of George Floyd, is how technology and social media played its role to enforce awareness of police violence and the long-running systemic racism against black people in America.  This has also caught the eye of the world and lately, several tech companies showed where they stand.

Mark Zuckerberg – “Facebook also has more work to do to keep people safe and ensure our systems don’t amplify bias.“ However, he also declined to take down President Trump’s “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” message.

Jeff Bezos – “You’re the kind of customer I’m happy to lose” referring to a man who has hateful messages even using the n-word when Amazon last weekend showed “Black Lives Matter” banner on its site.  He further pledges $10M to organizations fighting systemic racism against black Americans.

Twitter, Reddit, Google, and Airbnb are among the other companies that have endorsed Black Lives Matter and committed to anti-racism (see more via axios.com)

Want to know more about how systemic racism works? See this video by act.tv

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg Faces Congress

Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg faced the senate judiciary and commerce committees today, in light of the recent data breach impacting over 87 million of its users.  

on march-21 addressing the cambridge analytica situation, “We have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can’t then we don’t deserve to serve you. I’ve been working to understand exactly what happened and how to make sure this doesn’t happen again. The good news is that the most important actions to prevent this from happening again today we have already taken years ago. But we also made mistakes, there’s more to do, and we need to step up and do it,” mark posted. 

here’s a background of events;

• as early as 2007 facebook envisioned that apps should be “social” enabling people to log into apps and share who their friends were and some of their information (birthdays, where they live, photos).  
• in 2013, a cambridge university researcher named aleksandr kogan created a personality quiz app and was installed by about 300k users, this enabled kogan access to the those who installed the app and their friends’ data. 
• in 2014 facebook required developers  to get approval first before they request information from people. 
• in 2015, facebook learned from the guardian that kogan had shared the data gathered from his app with cambridge analytica, and they were demanded to delete all their acquired data
• about same year, the guardian also reported that cambridge analytica was helping US presidential candidate, ted cruz, to use this as psychological data for its campaign against its political rivals
• in 2016, trump’s team was said to have invested heavily on facebook ads and involved help from cambridge analytica
• on march 2018, facebook CEO acknowledged that cambridge analytica may not have deleted all the data

the facebook breakup letter

dear facebook,

today marks our 10th year together, i must say it has been a sweet journey. unfortunately, time has come for me to walk away.

i had high hopes for us when we started, especially at the time when my heart still beat for… what was her name again? ahh friendster (may she rest in peace). but you were all smile and poised, a neatly uniformed college girl full of hopes and overflowing with excitement. you had me at one poke!

through you i bravely opened up my thoughts to the world. i was able to connect with old and new friends. you bridged time, the longitudes and the latitudes. i got found and new relatives were discovered. once a year you even make me famous sending out birthday reminders. with you, i was a kid in a playground, swiping up or down till the wee hours, unconditionally tagging anyone and gleefully enjoying your games.

know that i am glad to have witnessed you grow – your fun emojis, crazy virals, and live videos i will sorely miss. oh i always thought it’s cool you instantly recognized faces in photos (cool but creepy) and i thought its cute you knew what i’ve been searching and offering them up as ads on my wall (cute but creepy). but you’ve also shown great heart organizing fundraising events and ways for me to know my loved ones were safe during crisis.

but like others, you had moments of insecurities – you surely changed your wardrobe a lot! how many times i’ve seen you moved your timelines and feeds around (when i felt the last time looked fine)? you were understandably demanding asking me to always checkin and share photos/vids of where i’ve been. and oh, you just couldn’t forget things do you – old memories keep popping up!

as i’ve come to know you more, i’ve learned you carry baggages too. you were quite a nag, you’ve let everyone post just literally anything they wanted – things that’s sometimes need not be shared nor really mattered. instead of mature talk, you’ve let people berate others in a faceless wall! trolls and bullies abound. i hated the violent graphic posts, but i hated the spoilers most! you’ve let fake news take over the gullible. and just this week i learned data of your 87 million users have been breached! being with you have become sadly toxic.

i’ve tried to quit you many times before and wondered what’s with you that i keep going back? nope, not this time though. know that it’s not you, it’s me.. and my need to live in the moment and declutter my life.

so i guess this is it! my final post. this is where we part ways. i genuinely wish you the best. thank you and you will always have a piece of my heart (and data) forever.

sincerely logging off,
set.it.good

Research Show Online Bashers are Narcissists, Psychopaths, and Sadists…Woah!

Internet changed how people communicate with each other – distance is no longer a barrier and time did not matter.  no wonder when PINOYs discovered these communication options, they felt free; they flocked and thrived these social media sites.  unfortunately along the way, some have lost their manners.

according to psychologytoday.com, an Internet Troll (or locally referred to as Online Basher) is someone who comes into a discussion and posts comments designed to upset or disrupt the conversation. often, in fact, it seems like there is no real purpose behind their comments except to have fun or upset everyone else involved.  trolls will lie, exaggerate, and bash (offend) to get a response. 

a Canadian research found evidences that linked bashing with the “Dark Tetrad” of personality traits: narcissism, machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism. 

• Narcissism – is characterized by grandiosity (pagka-engrande), pride (kayabangan), and a lack of empathy (walang pakialam)
• Machiavellianism – is characterized by manipulation and exploitation of others (mapansamantala), and a focus on self-interest and deception (makasarili at mapanlinlang)
• Psychopathy – is characterized by enduring antisocial behavior (mapag-sarili), impulsivity (di pinag-iisipan ang ginagawa), selfishness (maramot), and remorselessness (walang awa).

PINOYs being one of the top social media users in the world, actively take part in what is popular and trending (uso). since the Internet offers anonymity, it is so easy to express oneself with reckless disregard.

several PINOY personalities have responded to online bashing, and when faced with one, remember:

• they find pleasure in your suffering 
• choose your battles, bashers are difficult people to deal with
• the best thing you can do is pause, pray, and ignore them 

MANNERS MAKETH MAN.

Periscope Rises during Mayweather-Pacquiao Fight

billed as the fight of the century, the Mayweather-Pacquiao live stream was undoubtedly the most searched words last May 2. the fight distributors however actively sought illegal live streams on that day, good thing there was Periscope.

Periscope is a mobile app which allows users do live streams. their goal was to discover the world through someone else’s eyes. learn more:

oh! our Pacman may have lost (sad day indeed), he’s still the people’s champ!

Pacquiao vs Mayweather

AT LAST!!! The much-awaited fight between two boxing greats will finally happen!!!  It’s Manny Pacquiao vs Floyd Mayweather Jr!

like in the past, PILIPINAS.IT once again shows full support to our PINOY-pride Manny Pacquiao.

can the 8-Division Champ solve the Floyd puzzle and put a dent on his unblemished 0-loss record? the odds are against the Filipino pride this time, but this is a new Manny Pacquiao – fighting for God’s glory with a renewed spirit and backed up by a country that has survived a lot. we can only hope and pray for good things on May 2.  

kapit mga PINOYs!!!!

Facebook – Tille Death and Beyond

ever wondered what happens to your Facebook profile when you (heaven forbid) pass away? Facebook aims to retain your “virtual social legacy” by letting you assign your “Legacy Contact.”

1. Go to Settings > Security > Legacy Contact
2. Specify a name as Legacy Contact (you have the option to send them a message to let them know, or they will be notified when Facebook becomes aware of your passing).
3. Select whether you like you to have data archiving or if you prefer your account be deleted.