Society's ChildS


Robot

Researchers: As many 15% of Twitter accounts aren't people

Michael Newberg
CNBC
Fri, 10 Mar 2017 14:54 UTC
Twitter
© CNBC
A big chunk of those "likes," "retweets," and "followers" lighting up your Twitteraccount may not be coming from human hands. According to new research from the University of Southern California and Indiana University, up to 15 percent of Twitter accounts are in fact bots rather than people.

The research could be troubling news for Twitter, which has struggled to grow its user base in the face of growing competition from Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and others.

Researchers at USC used more than one thousand features to identify bot accounts on Twitter, in categories including friends, tweet content and sentiment, and time between tweets. Using that framework, researchers wrote that "our estimates suggest that between 9% and 15% of active Twitter accounts are bots."

Since Twitter currently has 319 million monthly active users, that translates to nearly 48 million bot accounts, using USC's high-end estimate.

The report goes on to say that complex bots could have shown up as humans in their model, "making even the 15% figure a conservative estimate."

At 15 percent, the evaluation is far greater than Twitter's own estimates. In a filing with the SEC last month, Twitter said that up to 8.5 percent of all active accounts contacted Twitter's servers "...without any discernable additional user-initiated action."

Comment: Massive networks of fake accounts found on Twitter

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Eye 2

Swiss pedophile accused of sexually abusing 80 boys in Thailand and pushing some into prostitution


RT
Sat, 11 Mar 2017 13:10 UTC
Child behind door
© RinoCdZ / Gettyimages.ru
A Swiss man has been accused of abusing more than 80 boys in Thailand, some of whom were as young as nine, authorities said, adding that he had recruited the children to make pornographic photos, while molesting and pushing some into prostitution.

The man from Bulle municipality in the canton of Fribourg is "suspected of having sexually abused more than eighty boys in Thailand, some of them for several years, by recruiting them for making child pornographic photos," Fribourg authorities said, as cited by La Gruyere magazine.

He is also suspected of having sexually assaulted several of these children, as well as pushing some into prostitution.

"Some of the children who were allegedly abused were nine or ten years old, most of them were young adolescents," prosecutor Yvonne Gendre said on Friday.

The accused left Switzerland in 1991 to settle in Thailand, but returned to Switzerland in November of 2014.
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2 + 2 = 4

Iceland knows how to stop teen substance abuse - but the rest of the world isn't listening

Emma Young
ABC
Tue, 24 Jan 2017 12:40 UTC
Iceland teens
It's a little before three on a sunny Friday afternoon and Laugardalur Park, near central Reykjavik, looks practically deserted. There's an occasional adult with a pushchair, but the park's surrounded by apartment blocks and houses, and school's out - so where are all the kids?

Walking with me are Gudberg Jónsson, a local psychologist, and Harvey Milkman, an American psychology professor who teaches for part of the year at Reykjavik University. Twenty years ago, says Gudberg, Icelandic teens were among the heaviest-drinking youths in Europe. "You couldn't walk the streets in downtown Reykjavik on a Friday night because it felt unsafe," adds Milkman. "There were hordes of teenagers getting in-your-face drunk."

Comment:
What is the root cause of addiction, and how do you heal it?

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Cloud Lightning

How controversial U of T prof Jordan Peterson became a lightning rod

Tom Spears
Ottawa Citizen
Fri, 10 Mar 2017 12:23 UTC
Jordan Peterson says he never set out to be a centre of controversy. But when that controversy came, he also didn't turn away.

Jordan Peterson
© Michael Peake / Michael Peake/Toronto SunUniversity of Toronto professor Jordan Peterson.
The University of Toronto psychology professor has found himself at the centre of a firestorm involving, depending on whom you ask, gender identity and freedom of speech — the result of his now-famous/infamous declaration to only call students "he" and "she," and not "they" as some individuals in the transgender community prefer to be known. He also announced he was steadfastly opposed to Bill C-16, federal legislation that seeks to add gender identity and gender expression to the list of prohibited grounds of discrimination.

Comment:


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Rose

Oman's healing hand in Yemen draws praise

Khadija Alzadjali
Times of Oman
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 09:42 UTC
Yemeni children
© Unicef
More than 11,000 tonnes of mercy aid has been shipped to Yemen through Oman in the two years since fighting began, according to aid groups.

"There are over two million who are out of school right now. The long term impact is very worrying. There is one child that dies every ten minutes in Yemen because of preventable diseases. That child could have been saved if he was vaccinated in time. Over 50 per cent of health facilities in the country are non-functional right now. "It's clearly a crisis - a very serious crisis. At many times, it's been said that it's a catastrophe on the verge," said Rajat Madhok, Chief of Communication & Advocacy at Unicef in Yemen.

Between May and December, 2015, eight shipments were sent out to Yemen. In 2016, six shipments were sent.

Comment: Unfortunately, in most cases, shipments of humanitarian supplies have been blocked or delayed by Saudi Arabia:
Children have died as a result of Saudi Arabia delaying aid for Yemen by months, a children's rights group have warned.

Save the Children said shipments of aid are being delayed for months, denying hundreds of thousands of people access to urgently-needed medical aid.

In the first two months of the year, the Saudi-led coalition has prevented three of the charity's shipments of medical supplies from landing at the country's main group of Hodeida, the group said, forcing them to be rerouted and delaying their arrival by up to three months. [...]

Earlier this month, the UN said Saudi-led coalition air strikes on the Yemeni port of Hodeidah, which serves territory controlled by the Houthis, had hampered humanitarian operations to import vital food and fuel supplies.

Five cranes at the port have been destroyed, forcing dozens of ships to line up offshore because they cannot be unloaded.


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Handcuffs

Amish grandpa farmer found guilty on ALL counts involving his homemade salves - faces up to 48 years in prison

Erin Elizabeth
Health Nut News
Fri, 10 Mar 2017 18:15 UTC
horse_buggy
We are SHOCKED and saddened to report that on March 2nd, Amish farmer (and father and grandfather) Samuel Girod- who we have reported on before - was found guilty by a federal jury for making and distributing herbal products on his family farm. The FDA requires manufacturers of defined drugs to register their facility with them and the Girod farm is not registered. He will be sentenced by a judge on June 16 at 10 a.m.
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Info

Hamburg train attack: 2 suspects on the run after teargassing dozens of passengers, including child


RT
Sat, 11 Mar 2017 01:02 UTC
Hamburg spray attack
© Thomas Knoop / Twitter
At least six people, including a three-year-old girl, were treated for eye and respiratory irritation after two young attackers sprayed tear gas into a train car full of passengers. It comes less than a day after an attack at Dusseldorf train station.

Police in the northern German city of Hamburg have staged a manhunt for two youngsters, believed to be responsible for a Friday evening gas attack on the S-Bahn rapid transit train on its way from the city's main railway station toward the station of Sternschanze , Germany's dpa news agency reported. At the time of the incident, which happened at around 18:55 local time, the train's car was packed with some 50 passengers.

"The recordings of the surveillance cameras have been obtained. Investigations are continuing," police spokesman Rüdiger Carstens said, according to Bild.
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2 + 2 = 4

Controversial professor Jordan Peterson draws overflow crowd as well as protesters at sold-out auditorium lecture

Andrew Duffy
Ottawa Citizen
Fri, 10 Mar 2017 00:37 UTC
Jordan Peterson
© Veronica Henri / Postmedia
A controversial U of T professor filled the National Gallery of Canada's 400-seat auditorium for a lecture on the "psychology of creativity" Thursday night as protesters outside the glass atrium denounced the institution's decision to invite him to speak.

Another 300 people who lined up hoping to hear Prof. Jordan Peterson were turned away from the venue because it wasn't big enough for the overflow crowd, which featured artists, university students, free speech advocates and at least one Donald Trump supporter.

Peterson is one of the most galvanizing figures in Canadian academia today.

Last fall, in a series of videos posted online, the psychology professor criticized Bill C-16, legislation that seeks to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act by adding gender identity and gender expression to the list of prohibited grounds of discrimination.

Comment:
National Gallery of Canada urged to cancel talk by prof who refuses genderless pronouns

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Attention

Saudi airstrike on Yemen marketplace kills up to 20 civilians


RT
Fri, 10 Mar 2017 21:04 UTC
Yemen airstrike boy ruble
© Naif Rahma / Reuters
At least 17 people have been killed in a Saudi-led coalition airstrike on a marketplace in the town of Al Hudaydah in Yemen, medics told an RT stringer.

More than 12 people were injured, with the medics warning that the death toll may rise to over two dozen.

According to AFP, 26 people, including 20 civilians and 6 Houthi rebel fighters, were killed in the airstrike.

The militants allegedly fled to the market to escape the bombardment, but were still targeted by the warplanes.

A military source close to Saudi-backed President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi told AFP that the rebels used civilians as "human shields."

Al-Masirah TV channel, controlled by the Houthis, reported that 27 people were killed and dozens wounded in the attack.
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Red Flag

Role Reversal: Democrats now like the CIA more than Republicans

Michael Krieger
Liberty Blitzkrieg
Thu, 09 Mar 2017 14:18 UTC
CIA logo
© Carolyn Kaster/AP
Never mind decades of coups, mind-control programs, media infiltration, faulty intelligence and overseas election meddling, all it took was an embarrassing loss from Hillary Clinton to spark a furious love affair between Democrats and the CIA. It appears unaccountable intelligence agency worship is suddenly a "liberal" position. Who knew!

The following poll was taken two months ago, but many of you probably missed it back then. The shift is simply mind-boggling.

Comment:

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