The letter written by Richard Jacobs to senior management in Uber (leading to his job demotion and eventually leaving Uber) that delayed the current court case between Waymo (Google) and Uber when discovered. This document has now been (mostly) made public by the court. The complete document can be found on Scripted, some initial analysis can be found on Engadet, CNN and on Verge.
This gives an uncensored and scary insight of how corporate espionage and hacking seems the be a key part of Ubers business model and operations.
Tag: Social Media
Facebook’s shadow profiles
Facbook’s People You May Know algorithm has been of interest for security minded people for a while. A number of “weird” and inappropriate suggestions has led to Gizmodo digging deeper into the underlying systems and approaches. In fairness, most of the approach is clearly highlighted in the respective EULA’s, but how many users actually reads them?
Social Bots and the creation of fake news
An enlightening article in MIT’s Technology Review on the work done by Chengcheng Shao and colleges at Indiana University on the impact of Social Bot Nets focusing on the propagation of news from 122 identified fake news sites into social media. This was then weighted against 15.000 stories from accredited news sites for comparison and setting up platforms to keep real and bot users apart in the analysis. Interesting read.
Google puts another bid for Snapchat
You may remember that in 2011 Google offered to buy Snapchat for 3 Billion USD and was rejected. According to Techcruch Goggle are again proposing to acquire Snapchat, this time for 30 Billion USD, to pre-empt the pending Snapchat IPO. Thats 60% of the current market value of General Motors for a company that has yet to produce a profit. I get flashbacks to the AOL – Time Warner merger, and hope this one turns out better!
Reddit: Finally growing up?
For those that followed the 8Chan to 4Chan to Reddit debacle will know that Reddit has long struggled to achieve a good working relationship with it’s wide user base and how fundamental these users are against any and all changes in the experience. Shutting down Alt right sections, the normal issues with non PC content and petty crime hidden in /r, /x and so on. Now they have completed a USD 200 Mil seeding, and are looking at how to grow into a functioning commercial Company. Alphr has an extensive interview with the current Reddit CEO Steve Huffman on what to expect. Should be fun based on the previous attempts to implement changes. Hints of looking and feeling more like Facebook will give current users the shivers I am sure.