Quickies
Skepchick Quickies 2.10
- Pinterest: a “shocking” example of women using the Internet – “Last week, the media discovered Pinterest…Tech journalists covering the site started using phrases like “female-centric” and “catnip for women,” in their articles. It’s a curious choice of words and not just because men founded the site.”
- Their so-called journalism, or what I saw at the women’s mags – “I know that there are amazing and talented editors at these magazines who would love to publish an expose on palm oil, or a profile of a 27-year-old breast cancer survivor who doesn’t look like a supermodel. But often their hands are tied—whether by advertisers or the institutional structure or the status quo.”From Mark.
- The bigoted, racist, anti-abortion search engine that powers Android’s Siri rival – “If you ask if humans come from monkeys, the answer will be “a part of Darwin’s Theory of Evolution is that human’s over time evolved from apes. Since it is a theory, it can’t be proven.”” From Brandon.
- The SCAR project: portraits of young breast cancer survivors – From the project’s site, “Dedicated to the more than 10,000 women under the age of 40 who will be diagnosed this year alone, The SCAR Project is an exercise in awareness, hope, reflection and healing. The mission is three-fold: raise public consciousness of early-onset breast cancer, raise funds for breast cancer research/outreach programs and help young survivors see their scars, faces, figures and experiences through a new, honest and ultimately empowering lens.”
- Cute Animal Friday! Orangutans use iPad video chat to “talk” with friends in other zoos, from nowoo. Bear cub and wolf pup playing, from Kyle. And the most blissed-out dog ever, Caspar the bath loving dog.
It’s not accurate to call Iris, Android’s Siri rival. It’s a product available for Android, that is not endorsed by Android or Google.
The images from the SCAR project are so powerful.
It’s funny; there’s so much “awareness” along the lines of breast cancer exists! Get a mammogram! Wear this pink ribbon! but so little awareness of what breast cancer patients actually go through. Well done to the photographer and especially all the women who posed. To expose yourself both physically and emotionally like that takes a lot of courage.
Yeah, so um.. Gizmodo is really, um.. on the cutting edge huh?
What’s next? Is my robot a racist?
Are A.I.s plotting against us?
If they need some suggestions I think my Roomba might be in love with my Persian rug.
Amanda,
I never knew that a phone could be bigoted or hold political views. My phone doesn’t say much. I guess he’s shy. : )
Iris seems to have been updated.
When asked “is noah’s ark real” it says:
“Noah’s arc is a biblical story. (…) Not much in the historical record supports this story. It seems more of an allegorical tale.”
When asked “But were adam and eve rio” it says:
“Interesting, I don’t know if they were.”
To “Where can I get an abortion” it gives me a Planned Parenthood in Oklahoma (I’m in Vermont).
“Did humans come from monkeys” gives a pro-evolution reply.
It seems they’ve done some major updates in response to the outcry?
maybe they updated it, maybe it never gave those replies. it’s always difficult to know about negative stories about google and android, ever since facebook was caught employing a pr company to smear google in blogs and forums.
Happy Birthday Skepchick!
I asked ChaCha “Does God really exist?” and the response was “If you believe that we exist, that there is reality, and that the matter of which we are made is real, then there is a God.”
Ridiculous, but literally minutes later my brother got a different answer.
From what I gather it uses a search engine so it’s results are based on that algorithm of deciding what a “good” result is. It seems easy/possible to exploit or skew if you know how it works.