Ideaforge

In November, Facebook announced a new plan that would revamp how the company makes content policy decisions on its social network — it will begin to pass off to an independent review board some of the more contested decisions. The board will serve as the final level of escalation for appeals around reported content, acting something like a Facebook Supreme Court. Today, Facebook is sharing (PDF) more detail about how this board will be structured, and how the review process will work.

Facebook earlier explained that the review board wouldn’t be making the first — or even the second — decision on reported content. Instead, when someone reports content on Facebook, the first two appeals will still be handled by Facebook’s own internal review systems. But if someone isn’t happy with Facebook’s decision, the case can make its way to the new review board to consider.

However, the board may not decide to take on every case that’s pushed up the chain. Instead, it will focus on those it thinks are the most important, the company had said.

Today, Facebook explains in more detail how the board will be staffed and how its decisions will be handled.

In a draft charter, the company says that the board will include experts with experience in “content, privacy, free expression, human rights, journalism, civil rights, safety, and other relevant disciplines.” The member list will also be public, and the board will be supported by a full-time staff that will ensure its decisions are properly implemented.

While decisions around the board makeup haven’t been made, Facebook is today suggesting the board should have 40 members. These will be chosen by Facebook after it publicly announces the required qualifications for joining, and says it will offer special consideration to factors like “geographical and cultural background,” and a “diversity of backgrounds and perspectives.”

The board will also not include former or current Facebook employees, contingent workers of Facebook or government officials.

Once this board is launched, it will be responsible for the future selection of members after members’ own terms are up.

Facebook believes the ideal term length is three years, with the term automatically renewable one time, for those who want to continue their participation. The board members will serve “part-time,” as well — a necessary consideration as many will likely have other roles outside of policing Facebook content.

Facebook will ultimately allow the board to have final say. It can reverse Facebook’s own decisions, when necessary. The company may then choose to incorporate some of the final rulings into its own policy development. Facebook may also seek policy advice from the board, at times, even when a decision is not pressing.

The board will be referred cases both through the user appeals process, as well as directly from Facebook. For the latter, Facebook will likely hand off the more controversial or hotly debated decisions, or those where existing policy seems to conflict with Facebook’s own values.

To further guide board members, Facebook will publish a final charter that includes a statement of its values.

The board will not decide cases where doing so would violate the law, however.

Cases will be heard by smaller panels that consist of a rotating, odd number of board members. Decisions will be attributed to the review board, but the names of the actual board members who decided an individual case will not be attached to the decision — that’s likely something that could protect them from directed threats and harassment.

The board’s decisions will be made public, though it will not compromise user privacy in its explanations. After a decision is issued, the board will have two weeks to publish its decision and explanation. In the case of non-unanimous decisions, a dissenting member may opt to publish their perspective along with the final decision.

Like a higher court would, the board will reference its prior opinions before finalizing its decision on a new case.

After deciding their slate of cases, the members of the first panel will choose a slate of cases to be heard by the next panel. That panel will then pick the third slate of cases, and so on. A majority of members on a panel will have to agree that a case should be heard for it to be added to the docket.

Because 40 people can’t reasonably represent the entirety of the planet, nor Facebook’s 2+ billion users, the board will rely on consultants and experts, as required, in order to gather together the necessary “linguistic, cultural and sociopolitical expertise” to make its decisions, Facebook says.

To keep the board impartial, Facebook plans to spell out guidelines around recusals for when a conflict of interest develops, and it will not allow the board to be lobbied or accept incentives. However, the board will be paid — a standardized, fixed salary in advance of their term.

None of these announced plans are final, just Facebook’s initial proposals.

Facebook is issuing them in draft format to gather feedback and says it will open up a way for outside stakeholders to submit their own proposals in the weeks ahead.

The company also plans to host a series of workshops around the world over the next six months, where it will get various experts together to talk about issues like free speech and technology, democracy, procedural fairness and human rights. The workshops will be held in Singapore, Delhi, Nairobi, Berlin, New York, Mexico City and other cities yet to be announced.

Facebook has been criticized for its handling of issues like the calls to violence that led to genocide in Myanmar and riots in Sri Lanka; election meddling from state-backed actors from Russia, Iran and elsewhere; its failure to remove child abuse posts in India; the weaponization of Facebook by the government in the Philippines to silence its critics; Facebook’s approach to handling Holocaust denials or conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones; and much more.

Some may say Facebook is now offloading its responsibility by referring the tough decisions to an outside board. This, after all, could potentially save the company itself from being held accountable for war crimes and the like. But on the other hand, Facebook has not shown itself capable of making reasonable policy decisions related to things like hate speech and propaganda. It may be time for it to bring in the experts, and let someone else make the decisions.

Source: Tech Crunch

Apple is kicking off the Entrepreneur Camp in Cupertino. Eleven female-founded app development companies have been invited to Cupertino for multiple workshops and meetings with Apple employees, and Apple used that opportunity to share a new number when it comes to App Store revenue.

Since the creation of the App Store, Apple has given back $120 billion in revenue to App Store developers. It means that the App Store has generated more revenue than that in total. But if you remove Apple’s cut, $120 billion have been wired to developers.

App Store revenue is still growing rapidly, as more than $30 billion of developer revenue has been generated in the last 12 months alone. Apple reported $100 billion in developer revenue at WWDC back in June 2018.

Apple only counts direct App Store revenue, such as paid downloads, in-app purchases and subscriptions. Developers also could have generated more revenue through ads and subscriptions on a website, for instance.

If you’re curious about the Entrepreneur Camp, Apple has invited the developers of Bites, Camille, CUCO: Lembrete de Medicamentos, Deepr, D’efekt, Hopscotch, LactApp, Pureple, Statues of the La Paz Malecón, WeParent and Seneca Connect. There will be a new session every quarter.

Source: Tech Crunch

iOS is easily one of the best things AirPods have going for them. Flip open the cap and, boom, there are the headphones and case, each sporting their respective battery levels. Pairing AirPods to your desktop has been doable as well, albeit markedly less convenient.

Guilherme Rambo of 9 to 5 Mac has a convenient new solution, however, beating Apple to the punch in the process. Now available through Gumroad (for a suggested donation of $5+), AirBuddy brings the same convenient iOS experience to desktops running Mojave (10.14) or later.

Once installed, opening the AirPod case next to a Mac will pop up the familiar floating AirPods icon, letting you know what’s left of your battery (or how much time you’ve got left to charge). There’s also a nice added feature here, “A simple click and you’re connected and playing your Mac’s audio to AirPods,” the developer writes. Oh, it also makes sure the audio input of your Mac is NOT switched to the AirPods so you can get the best possible quality.”

The system requires Bluetooth LE to work. It should also work for other nearby Apple devices that have connected via Wi-Fi, including iPhones, iPads and Beats headphones sporting the W1 chip.

Source: Tech Crunch

Sapphire Ventures, formerly the corporate venture capital arm of SAP, has lassoed $115 million from new limited partners (LPs) to invest at the intersection of tech, sports, media and entertainment.

A majority of the LPs for the new fund, called Sapphire Sport, have ties to the sports industry, from City Football Group, which owns English Premier League team Manchester City, to Adidas, the owners of the Indiana Pacers, New York Jets, San Jose Sharks and Tampa Bay Lightning, among others.

The firm plans to do five to six investments per year, sized between $3 million and $7 million. So far, they’ve deployed capital to five startups: at-home fitness system Tonal, live soccer streaming platform mycujoo, digital sports network Overtime, ticketing and events platform Fevo and gaming studio Phoenix Labs. Sapphire began backing tech startups in 2008; in 2016, the firm closed on $1 billion for its third flagship venture fund.

Sapphire managing director and co-founder Doug Higgins is leading the effort alongside newly tapped partner Michael Spirito, who joined from 21st Century Fox, where he focused on business development and digital media for the Fox Sports-owned Yankees Entertainment and Sports (YES) Network, in September.

Higgins was an investment manager at Intel Capital for four years prior to co-launching Sapphire. Throughout his career, he’s managed the firm’s investments in LinkedIn, DocuSign, Square and more.

“We invest in anything that tech is disrupting,” Higgins told TechCrunch. “We were early investors in Fitbit, so we saw the beginning of digital fitness and how tech can impact the lives of anyone, not just high-performance athletes … We are also investors in Square, TicketFly and Paytm and what we’ve been seeing — the dream as a VC — is these massive markets in the sports, media and digital health world that are getting disrupted by tech.”

Sapphire is betting its traditional and well-established venture platform, coupled with the expertise of leading sports entities on board as LPs, will give it a competitive edge as it targets some of the best emerging sports tech companies.

“We see a lot of FOMO happening in this world, where everyone wants to have a play, but to make the best investment you need to have the widest perspective,” Higgins said. “So if you’re a team owner of a particular football team you are going to make better decisions if you are able to share perspectives with owners of other teams.”

“The best entrepreneurs, the ones we all want to invest in, there’s not a draft, they have to select you,” he added.

Investment in esports and gaming has skyrocketed, surpassing a total of $2.5 billion in VC funding in 2018. According to PitchBook, a handful of startups have already raised a total of $65 million in VC backing this year, including a $10.8 million financing for ReKTGlobal, a provider of esports infrastructure services.

“You can’t ignore the numbers on esports,” Higgins added. “They just continue to grow massively and people who have teenage kids, like myself, [those kids] want to grow up to be the next ninja, not the next Tom Brady .”

Source: Tech Crunch

Samsung Electronics said Sunday it will replace plastic packaging used for its bevy of products from mobile phones and tablets to home appliances and wearables with paper and other environmentally sustainable materials like recycled/bio-based plastics.

Samsung will start making the switch in the first half of the year. The company aims to only use paper packaging materials certified by forestry initiatives by next year. By 2030, Samsung says it plans to use 500,000 tons of recycled plastics and collect 7.5 million tons of discarded products (both cumulative from 2009).

The company said it’s formed an internal task force to come up with innovative packaging ideas that avoid plastic.

For instance, the plastic trays used to hold mobile phones and tablets will be replaced with ones made from pulp. Samsung said it will also alter the phone charger design, swapping the glossy exterior with a matte finish and eliminating plastic protection films, reducing the use of plastics.

Plastic bags used to protect the surface of home appliances such as TVs, refrigerators, air conditioners and washing machines as well as other kitchen appliances will also be replaced with bags containing recycled materials and bioplastics. Bioplastics are made from plastic wastes and non-fossil fuel materials like starch or sugar cane.

The company also committed to only using fiber materials certified by global environmental organizations like the Forest Stewardship Council, Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification Scheme and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative for packaging and manuals by 2020.

The company will adopt more environmentally sustainable materials even if it means an increase in cost,” Gyeong-bin Jeon, head of Samsung’s Global Customer Satisfaction Center, said in a statement.

Source: Tech Crunch

Urgently, the roadside assistance startup that connects car owners who need help with tow truck and other services, has raised $21 million in a Series B round that includes the venture arms of BMW, Porsche and Jaguar Land Rover.

BMW has also signed Urgently as a vendor partner for its own roadside assistance platform (known as BMW Assist) to provide roadside assistance and extended mobility services to owners of all four of its brands in the U.S, including BMW, BMW Motorrad, MINI and Rolls-Royce Motor Cars.

Urgently, founded by Chris Spanos, Surendra Goel, and Luke Kathol, doesn’t charge annual membership fees like AAA or other auto clubs. Instead, the app works a lot like Uber of Lyft . Users can request help like getting a jump start, a tow or tire change via the app, which connects them with available services nearby. At that time, the user is shown what the towing or other service fee will be. Payments are handled within the app.

The potential for Urgently goes beyond connecting with traditional car owners. The platform is scalable, making it attractive for companies that have large fleets too. And as more electric vehicles come to market, there may be more demand for roadside assistance services like mobile charging.

“The old model of roadside assistance must make way for a modern, more digital approach,” Kasper Sage, a partner at BMW i Ventures said. “Urgent.ly will allow OEMs around the world to provide their customers the kind of real-time and connected digital experience they now expect in everything from food delivery to ride-sharing.”

Source: Tech Crunch

You see it first on Facebook or Twitter. Something contemptible: an image, or a video, or a tweet. One accompanied by a furious, snarky caption, highlighting just how awful and unacceptable it is, a dunk fueled by rage. The outrage rises within you. How can it not? You’re primed for outrage. We all are, now. Outrage grenades just waiting for our pins to be pulled.

Usually, if you dig down behind the outrage to its fuel, it’s because our most cherished beliefs, the ones with which we most strongly identify, are – maybe implicitly, maybe implicitly – being attacked.

It was a noise that set one’s teeth on edge and bristled the hair at the back of one’s neck. The Hate had started […] delivering his usual venomous attack upon the doctrines of the Party — an attack so exaggerated and perverse that a child should have been able to see through it, and yet just plausible enough to fill one with an alarmed feeling that other people, less level-headed than oneself, might be taken in by it.

It’s important to point out that this outrage is not caused by fake news. Sometimes, maybe, but not usually. The assholes out there are very real, and often their behavior is indeed hateful. Maybe they’re teenagers; maybe they’re politicians; maybe they’re celebrities; maybe they’re just randos catapulted into notoriety by today’s algorithmic tsunami.

Sure, you don’t have all the context. You never have all the context. But sometimes you don’t need all the context, and sometimes even when you have it, it only reinforces the cries of outrage and hate you see flying in from all sides, from your friends, from your acquaintances, endlessly retweeted and shared.

Before the Hate had proceeded for thirty seconds, uncontrollable exclamations of rage were breaking out from half the people in the room […] In its second minute the Hate rose to a frenzy. People were leaping up and down in their places and shouting at the tops of their voices in an effort to drown the maddening bleating voice […] The dark-haired girl behind Winston had begun crying out ‘Swine! Swine! Swine!’ and suddenly she picked up a heavy Newspeak dictionary and flung it at the screen.

Are these ephemerally prominent assholes truly the worst people on earth? Of course not. The worst people on earth tend to do their work quietly, or in remote corners of the planet, away from cameras. What matters about these assholes is that they’re emblematic. They become convenient representations of everything we despise. And because emblems aren’t human, they’re just 2-D cardboard cutouts, there’s no risk of any compassion undercutting our hate.

I’m not saying sympathy. Of course you shouldn’t sympathize with assholes. But sympathy and compassion are two very different things. Compassion is the aching recognition that everyone is as human as you, including people who do awful, hateful things, and that their lives too were dictated mostly by forces beyond their control.

But the dark magic of social media is that it strips all compassion from our outrage, as casually and automatically as it strips videos of context or images of EXIF data.

The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but, on the contrary, that it was impossible to avoid joining in. Within thirty seconds any pretense was always unnecessary. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge-hammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current, turning one even against one’s will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic. And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp.

Each wave of outrage is a little easier than the last, as the pathways of hate in our brain become greased, become smoothed, become automatic like muscle memory. Soon the assholes become unpersons, axiomatically and automatically unworthy of compassion. When you participate in the hate, you become a more hateful person yourself. Of course you don’t intend to. Of course you think yourself better than that, more righteous.

But there’s no disjoint between being more righteous and more hateful. On the contrary. Those two things are very closely correlated. In fact they feed back on one another in a virtuous cycle that grows into a tornado.

On the sixth day of Hate Week, after the processions, the speeches, the shouting, the singing, the banners, the posters, the films, the waxworks, the rolling of drums and squealing of trumpets, the tramp of marching feet, the grinding of the caterpillars of tanks, the roar of massed planes, the booming of guns–after six days of this, when the great orgasm was quivering to its climax […] at just this moment it had been announced that Oceania was not after all at war with Eurasia. Oceania was at war with Eastasia. Eurasia was an ally.

There was, of course, no admission that any change had taken place. Merely it became known, with extreme suddenness and everywhere at once, that Eastasia and not Eurasia was the enemy. […] At every few moments the fury of the crowd boiled over and the voice of the speaker was drowned by a wild beast-like roaring that rose uncontrollably from thousands of throats. The most savage yells of all came from the schoolchildren. […] The Hate continued exactly as before, except that the target had been changed.

I’m not suggesting that these tsunamis of online outrage are bad because their targets are invalid. Sometimes they are, but that’s not my point. My point is that participation in them is harmful — to you, and to us all — even though, maybe even especially when, its targets are completely valid.

It’s a weird and crazy and utopian notion, I know, but here’s an odd proposal. Maybe it’s too much to ask that you stop tweeting snd sharing your outrage and hate. But how about this: if you do participate, then for every ejaculation of fury, add another one, a balancing tweet, a quick thoughtful Facebook post, wherein you express some compassion — again, not sympathy, not agreement, but compassion — for someone with whom you bitterly disagree. You never know. It might become a habit.

Source: Tech Crunch