Wednesday, July 02, 2014

The Information Streams of COP 24/7

Register for our Latinos in the Deep South Webinar Series
 

Re-Conceptualizing Immigration & Gay Marriage in Clinical Practice
 
Description:
 
Luis Alvarez, MSW and Attorney Jessica Oliva- Calderin from Georgia will be co-presenting on same gender loving undocumented couples and information for providers that work with them. The webinar will include information on the Defense of Marriage Ace, federal and immigration laws, and socio-cultural impacts that affect this community.
 
Objectives: 
  • Understand the nuances of immigration and marriage after the overturn of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)
  • Explore the meanings of marriage, same gender loving relationships, and identify in the Latino population
  • Identify the social and familial implications of the same gender loving marriage in Latino and bi-cultural couples
  • Learn how to clinically ponder and incorporate relationship factors in same gender loving couples
Date:
 
July 10, 2014 at 11AM EST/10AM CT
 
To Register:
 
 
 
 

The Future Internet Is Not So Free Or Open, In Pew's New Survey

 
 
A 1992 copy of the world's first Web page. British physicist Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1989.What we know as the World Wide Web — the main way by which most of us access the Internet — just turned 25 this year. Its existence has allowed for all kinds of learning and free expression, coding and making, rule-breaking and platform-making. One American researcher even links the Internet to a decline in religious affiliation.
An estimated 5 billion of us are expected to have Internet access in the next decade, but what will the Internet look like then? How easily will we be able to get, share and create with it?
The Pew Research Center reached out to more than 1,400 tech industry leaders and academics, asking about the basic way the Internet will function come 2025. In the Pew report, the threats they see are geopolitical, economic and socially relevant. A lot of the Internet's "future" is already expressed in the current. A few key themes:
1) Control means less freedom: Actions by nation-states to maintain security and political control will lead to more blocking, filtering, segmentation and balkanization of the Internet.
Already, China is known for its "Great Firewall," and social media crackdowns in Turkey and Pakistan lately show a global trend toward regulation of the Internet by certain regimes. And that's without mentioning stepped-up surveillance.
"Surveillance ... at the minimum chills communications and at the maximum facilitates industrial espionage[;] it does not have very much to do with security," said Christopher Wilkinson, a retired European Union official and board member for EURid.eu.
2) Trust is evaporating: "The next few years are going to be about control," said danah boyd, noted Internet thinker and a researcher at Microsoft. Survey respondents told Pew that trust in open communications technologies will continue to evaporate in the wake of revelations about government and corporate surveillance. We've reported on the U.S./China "Cool War" that reignited because of Chinese fears of American corporate surveillance; it's just one flashpoint in a larger theme.
3) The lure of money endangers openness: There's a serious worry that commercial pressures will affect everything from Internet architecture to the flow of information and more deeply endanger the open structure of online life.
This isn't limited to prioritization for some content over others, which is the debate over net neutrality. Experts also expect that commercial pressures that preserve copyrights and patents mean the free flow of information will suffer. Leah Lievrouw, a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, has a sense of hopelessness about it:
"There are too many institutional players interested in restricting, controlling, and directing 'ordinary' people's ability to make, access, and share knowledge and creative works online — intellectual property rights holders, law enforcement and security agencies, religious and cultural censors, political movements and parties, etc. For a long time I've felt that the utopianism, libertarianism, and sheer technological skill of both professional and amateur programmers and engineers would remain the strongest counterbalance to these restrictive institutional pressures, but I'm increasingly unsure as the technologists themselves and their skills are being increasingly restricted, marginalized, and even criminalized."
There is more in the full report, such as the respondents' take on what to do — and what companies will do — to help clear the clutter of content overload. (Hint: Some folks are concerned algorithms and other solutions will overcompensate ...) sourced from www.npr.org


Corporate America Go Rainbow PRIDE

 
In what could be a first for a global fast food outlet, Burger King is making a bold proclamation in support of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community with the launch of a specially packaged burger. Unfortunately although "whoppers" are available in Arkansas, they won't come wrapped in a rainbow wrapper.

The "Be Your Way" project was created at a Burger King franchise in San Francisco, where a limited edition "Proud Whopper" sandwich was added to the menu to coincide with the city's annual pride festivities. According to press materials, guests who ordered the "Proud Whopper" found that the sandwich was the same as a classic Whooper, but came wrapped in a rainbow-colored wrapper with the inscription, "We are all the same inside."
Take a look at the "Proud Whopper" below, then scroll down to keep reading:
proud whopper
The burger's release was documented in a short "Be Your Way" film, which was released on Burger King's YouTube page .

We are always looking to engage our guests on a local level and be part of regionally relevant events,” said Kelly Gomez, Director of West Coast Field Marketing, Burger King West Division, in an email statement. Given that a Burger King franchise was perfectly situated along the San Francisco Pride Parade route, she added, "It was a natural fit to be involved and celebrate by giving something back to the community.”

The "Proud Whopper" is available exclusively at the Burger King restaurant located at 1200 Market Street in San Francisco through July 3. Meanwhile, proceeds from the sales of the sandwich will be donated to the Burger King McLamore Foundation for scholarships benefiting LGBT college-bound high school students who graduate next year.

Last month, Baked by Melissa introduced a special Wildberry Pride cupcake to express their support for the LGBT community, while Charm City Cakes (made famous on "Ace of Cakes") designed a speciality T-shirt emblazoned with a rainbow logo.

Meanwhile, Starbucks marked the 40th anniversary of Seattle Pride by raising an enormous 800 square foot rainbow flag over its headquarters in the Evergreen State, while Lucky Charms and Levi's Jeans also introduced special LGBT-relevant campaigns in June.
 
 
 
 

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