otter

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/34636917

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/23019807

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/22813480

Release date: July 29 on Hulu.

TELL META: Don't Kill Your Crucial Transparency Tool, CrowdTangle!

Meta has announced it will be abandoning CrowdTangle, its industry leading transparency tool, this August - in the middle of the biggest election year on record.

CrowdTangle is used by thousands of researchers, journalists and advocates to monitor political disinformation and hate speech on Facebook and Instagram.

The decision to kill this crucial tool without an equivalent replacement couldn’t come at a worse time: Elections affecting approximately half of the world’s population are taking place this year. Meta’s irresponsible decision poses a direct threat to our ability to safeguard the integrity of these elections - but we can still stop it.

Sign the petition now to call on Meta to maintain CrowdTangle during this critical period of elections worldwide to protect election integrity in 2024 and beyond!

I'm asking for Android specifically, but I'm curious what else is out there.

For example, some apps work without internet but may use it if it's available. I might want to block that without having to turn off wifi, force stopping it, and wiping the cache/data.

Similarly, maybe I only want to use the app over a VPN and want to prevent accidentally opening it without first turning the VPN on.

Might be helpful for those that

• don't have access to hardware that can run things locally
• understand the benefits and limitations of generative AI

Link: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=DuckDuckGo&ia=chat

As a nice coincidence, one of the first results when I searched for a news update was this discussion:

https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/adding-a-new-category-about-ai-chatbots/17860/2

There are so many out there, with varying benefits, risks, and ethics. I'd like to know what to recommend when asked, and also what I could use for myself.

Some areas that could be good for discussion:

• Locally hosted models (both for low and high powered devices)
• Open source models (also calling out "open source" models that aren't actually open source)
• Privacy friendly tools/frontends (ex. DuckDuckGo's AI chat for anonymous use of some "free" models)
• Unified interfaces for multiple models, or 'pay as you go' platforms instead of paying for individual subscriptions

Try it and give feedback here:

https://beta-performance.cira.ca/

Relevant details about the tool (some from the link above, others from their newsletter):

Key Features

• Improved design: experience a more user-friendly and intuitive interface.
• Responsive and touch-screen friendly: easier to take tests with tablets and phones.
• Powerful testing capabilities: test your internet and access over 60 key performance metrics.

What is being done with the data

The data you create from each test will be anonymously aggregated with all the other performance tests done throughout Canada. These results help researchers understand and build a better internet for Canada. All the data is made available so researchers, governments and policy makers all have access to the information to base analysis and decisions on.

Help contribute to changing Canada’s internet for the better by running regular tests and providing valuable feedback at the end of each test.

What CIRA is:

the organization that manages the .ca country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Canada. [...] CIRA sets the policies and agendas that support Canada's internet community and Canada's involvement in international internet governance