Headline May 10, 2018/ ''' STUDENTS -*!WOW!*- SHINNINGS '''

''' STUDENTS -*!WOW!*- SHINNINGS '''

WHAT TO DO AND SEE - organizing yourself  to push for change isn't just a viable option - it might be the only way out of every mess.......

SCAMMERS IMPERSONATE social media executives to prey on the vulnerable. Many, many of the Internet protocol addresses - of the fake accounts have been traced to Nigeria and Ghana.

AN EXAMINATION BY The New York Times found 205 accounts impersonating Mr. Zuckerberg  and Ms. Sandberg on Facebook and its photosharing site Instagram-

Not including fan pages or satire accounts, which are permitted under the company's rules.

At least 51 of the impostor accounts, including 43 on Instagram, were lottery scams like the one that fooled Mr. Bernhardt.

The fake Zuckerbergs and faux Sandbergs have have proliferated on Facebook and Instagram, despite the presence of  Facebook groups that track the scams and complaints about the trick dating to at least 2010.

A day after the The Times  informed  Facebook of its findings, the company removed all   96  impostor Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg accounts on its Facebook site.

There were 109 fakes on Instagram, which were removed.

''Thank you so much for reporting this,'' said Pete Voss, a Facebook spokesman.

He could not say why Facebook had not spotted the accounts posing as its top executives, including several that appeared to have existed for more than eight years.

''It's not easy,'' he said. ''We want to get better.''

[Dear Students], Dear tech workers: 

*A shortage of skilled workers at  technology companies has led to lucrative bidding wars, tipping the balance of power in workers favor*.

What if Facebook employees publicly took their executives to task for neglecting the real-world  violence their products are causing in places like Myanmar and Sri Lanka?

What if Google or Twitter employees threatened to walk unless their executives took major action against radical extremists and hate speech?

What if Apple employees insisted the company stop parking billions of dollars in offshore  tax-shelters, or Amazon engineers threatened to quit unless the company paid its warehouse workers higher wages?

And that's before we even get to the thorny ethical debates surrounding technologies like artificial intelligence, in which companies goals  -

Amass huge amounts of data to help train increasingly sophisticated machine learning models maybe be at odds with what's good for society.

There are few signs that Washington is capable of policing the use of emerging technologies.

And while companies like Google have formed their own A.I. ethics groups, those groups are ultimately powerless if executives decide to ignore their advice.

That leaves an opening for you.

''It's not clear where the pressure's going to come from otherwise,'' said Leslie Berlin, a Stanford historian who has studied  Silicon Valley's labor culture.

Some tech workers are already making noise about unionizing, and service workers at several tech companies have already joined unions.

But even if traditional labor unions don't take hold in Silicon Valley, there are still plenty of avenues for influence.

The Tech Workers Coalition, a group of concerned industry employees, has chapters in San Francisco, Seattle and San Jose, and a group called Tech Action began meeting New York this year.

The Center for Humane Technology, a group of ex-tech workers, has been pushing for ethical product development.

The groups are still small, and none has produced concrete results yet. But they are early signs that greater political consciousness is stirring in the industry.

In a tech dominated world, when the decisions made by handful of Silicon Valley executives have the ability to reshape the nations and transform billions of lives, there's no better time to stand up.

Together, you can encourage your employers to behave in ethical and humane ways, and blow the whistle publicly when they fall short.

Organizing yourself to push for change isn't just a viable option - it might be the only way out of this mess.

Godspeed,
Kevin. 

The Honor and Serving of the latest Operational Research and  original thinking on Technology and Society continues. The World Students Society thanks researchers and authors Jack Nicas and  Kevin Roose.

With respectful dedication to the Leaders, Technologists, Students, Professors and Teachers of the world.

See Ya all ''register'' on !WOW! - the World Students Society and Twitter - !E-WOW! - the Ecosystem 2011:

''' News & Surges '''

Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless

*PRESIDENT PUTIN SWORN IN*

VLADIMIR PUTIN was sworn in for another six-years as Russian president on Monday, buoyed by popular support but weighed down too by -

A costly confrontation with the West, a fragile economy and uncertainty about what happens when his term ends.

Standing in the ornately-decorated Andreyevsky Hall in the Grand Kremlin Palace, with his hands on a gold-embossed copy of the constitution, Putin swore to serve the Russian people, to safeguard rights and freedoms, and protect Russian sovereignty.

Putin's inauguration for a fourth term as Russian president came two months after more than 70 percent of voters backed him in an election in which he had no serious challengers.

His most dangerous opponent Alexei Navalny, was barred from running and on Saturday Navalny and hundreds of his supporters were detained by police while protesting over Putin's new term under the slogan: Putin is not our tsar.''

In a speech after the swearing in  ceremony, Putin said that in the next six years Russia would prove a strong, muscular player on the world stage, backed by a powerful military, while pushing hard to improve life for its citizens.

''Taking up this post, I feel a colossal sense of responsibility,'' Putin told his audience of Russian officials and foreign dignitaries, among them former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.

''The object of my life and my work will be to serve the people and the fatherland,'' he said.

For the short journey from his office to the inauguration ceremony, Putin traveled in a new Russian-made limousine.

From now the limousine will replace fleet of imported vehicles Putin uses, state television reported. With Putin sworn in, immediate attention will turn to whom Putin will nominate as his prime minister.

If he asks the current holder of post, his loyal lieutenant Dmitry Madvedev to stay on, that will signal continuity.

If he chooses someone new, that could presage a fresh approach on policy and will also trigger speculation that Putin is grooming a successor.

Once his term ends in 2024, the constitution bars him from running again.

*HUNGARY'S PM ORBAN VOWS*

VIKTOR ORBAN said on Monday the main task of his new government will be to preserve Hungary's security and Christian culture, sticking to his-

Nationalist policy to keep out migrants and fend off what he calls foreign meddling.

The right-wing prime minster, 54, was re-elected for a third straight term in an election last month after a strong anti-immigration message landed a landslide victory.

One of the most vociferous opponents of immigration into Europe by mainly Muslim people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa, Orban's campaign - helped by his party's media dominance - resonated with large swathes of the electorate, particularly in rural areas.

His Fidesz party now holds  133 of 199 seats in new parliament that will enable Fidesz to pass any laws, even those that require the support of two-thirds of the vote.

''The main task of the new government will be to preserve Hungary's security and Christian culture,'' Orban told a news conference after he was asked by the president to form a new government.

In a radio interview on Friday, Orban said his government was building a ''Christian democracy''.

Orban has accused non-governmental organizations funded by Budapest-born Billionaire George Soros of political meddling and actively supporting migration.

Soros has said the attacks against him were ''lies and distortions'' and were designed to create a false  external enemy.[Agencies]

*SINGAPORE ALL EXEMPLARY*

HALF A CENTURY ago when Singapore was granted its independence in 1965, no one could have predicted accurately that today-

It would be - ranked as the third-most competitive economy by the World Economic Forum and termed as a high-income economy with superior infrastructure and exemplary law and order.

Without any natural resources, small members of new immigrants and with a non-existent manufacturing sector at the time, the country's first prime minister, late Lee Kuan Yew, is credited with -

Deploying tactics and strategies to achieve this amazing transformation ''From Third World to First'' according to his memoirs.

After independence, a large number of its three million population was left unemployed as they were mainly employed by the military under the British colonialism.

Moreover, more than two-thirds of its people were living in slums,. There was poor sanitation, inadequate water, no natural resources and improper infrastructure.

In the wake of all these problems, Lee tried to seek help from international donors, but this produced no results, leaving no choice but to take charge of their problems themselves.

For Singapore, to grow it required industrialisation, and labour intensive industries.

However, it was not possible as Singapore had no history of being industry dependent and most of their population was employed in trade and services.

Looking at this, Lee decided to take advantage of the growing globalisation and actively pursued trade well beyond its neighboring countries.

The plan was to attract multinational companies and investors from around the world and especially the West to manufacture in Singapore.

To make the economy more attractive for the future investors, Singapore had to provide a safe, secure and politically stable environment along with a powerful infrastructure, low taxes, and a corruption free government.

This was achieved by deploying an autocratic strategy, involving and implementing drastic measures by the government.

The law was harsh, which led to corrupt or narcotic dealers receiving the death penalty.

Any individuals or groups which posed a hazard to the economy were immediately jailed without any delays, and  labour-unions were repressed and combined under the group called the  National Trade union Congress [NTUC].

All of these harsh investor friendly laws provided a safe haven for the businesses and combined with its accessible location and an already established port system from the colonial times, the economy already had the edge over its neighboring countries.

All of these measures led to the remarkable annual growth of about 13 percent of the GDP by 1972.

The Operational Publishing continues to Part 2. And !WOW! thanks author Umaima Imran.

VENEZUELA INFLATION HITS *13, 779* PERCENT

CARACAS : Venezuela's dizzying inflation rose 13,779 per cent in the past year, a study released on Monday by the opposition-dominated national Assembly has found.

The figure confirmed other estimates showing that Venezuela has by far the world's highest inflation rate.

The South American country is in partial default on its debt and suffers severe shortages of food and medicines and despite sitting atop the planet's biggest proven oil reserves.

The government of President Nicolas Maduro has been printing money as foreign reserves dwindle, and the national currency, the bolivar, has become nearly worthless.

The report by the Legislature's Finances and Economic Development Commission said  ''the annualised rate of inflation in April compared with April 2017 [is]  13,779 per cent.''

The International Monetary Fund projects that Venezuela's inflation will top 13,800 this year.

''We are in the country with the highest inflation in the world,'' the head of the legislature's commission told a news conference. [AFP]

*CAMPAIGN AGAINST ARMS TRADE*

LONDON : Court allows appeal against British arms sales to Saudi Arabia.

Campaigners who want to stop Britain from selling arms to Saudi Arabia as it could potentially use them in the deadly conflict in Yemen can appeal after losing their case at the  High Court  last year, a British court ruled last Friday.

Last July, the Campaign Against Arms Trade [CAAT] sought a High Cirt Order  to block export licenses for British made fighter jets, bombs and other munitions, which it said were being used by the Saudi-led military coalition fighting in Yemen's civil war.

But the  High Court  found that the granting of licenses for arms exports from the  UK to Saudi Arabia was not unlawful.

The case will now be heard in the  Courts of Appeal  in the coming months.

Andrew Smith of  CAAT  said his group believed the sales were immoral.

''The Saudi bombardment of Yemen has killed thousands of people and created one of the worst  humanitarian disasters  in the world.'' he said in a statement after Friday's judgment.

''Despite this, the Saudi regime has been armed and supported every step of the way by successive UK governments.

We believe that these arm sales are immoral, and are confident that the Court of Appeal will agree that they are unlawful.''

More than 10,000 people have died since Saudi Arabia's Western-backed alliance began its campaign to restore Yemen's internationally recognized government-

Launching thousands of air strikes to defeat the armed Houthi movement, which controls the area and much of northern Yemen.

Errant strikes have killed hundreds of civilians at hospitals, schools and markets. [Reuters]

*EGYPT'S RIDE-SHARING APPS*

CAIRO : Controversial bill on ride-sharing apps approved.

Egyptian lawmakers on Monday approved a bill regulating ride-hailing apps such as Uber and Careem, parliament said, leaving in two articles that allow security services to obtain customers data.

The legislation were passed despite concerns among some lawmakers, including the ''25:30''  grouping that has opposed several bills.

''We expressed our reservations on articles nine and 10. and asked that the text include obtaining the prosecution's permission before getting any of the customers' data,'' said Giaa al-Din-Dawoud, a member of ''25-30'' group.

Egypt's minister of parliamentary affairs reassured lawmakers that the bill will be implemented according to the criminal code, which includes regulation on obtaining private information, and the constitution, Dawoud said.

The bill stipulates that all ride-sharing companies must pay up to 30 million pounds [$1.7 million] to obtain a five year license, while the cabinet can approve payment in installments, according to the state-run AI-Ahram newspaper.

In March an Egyptian administrative court banned the  ride-sharing services following a lawsuit by a lawyer representing cab drivers.

But Uber and UAE-based Careem appealed the ban, and the following month the ruling was suspended pending a verdict from the higher administrative court.

Many Egyptians who complain about taxi services, including drivers who refuse to turn on their meters or their air conditioning during the summer heat, had switched to the ride-sharing apps. [AFP]