New tests on hair from Beethoven show abnormally high levels of lead, which could have caused his deafness. CC-licensed photo by Eric E Castro on Flickr.
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It’s Friday, so there’s another post due at the Social Warming Substack at about 0845 UK time. It’s about splitting people.
A selection of 9 links for you. The fifth (of the week). I’m @charlesarthur on Twitter. On Threads: charles_arthur. On Mastodon: https://newsie.social/@charlesarthur. Observations and links welcome.
Benefit fraud squad snoops on pupil data under secret deal • Schools Week
Freddie Whittaker:
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Pupil data is being used to check for benefit fraud and pursue parents under a secret deal between the education and work and pensions departments, Schools Week has learned.
Leaders have warned the move may lead to parents “withdrawing their children from schools”, amid calls for transparency over the collection of children’s data.
The national pupil database holds information about everyone who has been through the school system since 2002. Sensitive data, including names and addresses, is kept for decades after students leave school.
Documents obtained by privacy campaigners Defend Digital Me show the Department for Education has received multiple requests for pupil data from investigators at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) since 2018. A data-sharing arrangement was formalised last autumn.
It will provide the DWP “with the confidence that the right amount of benefit is being paid to the right claimant, and that children included on the claim are benefitting from that award”.
This will “reduce the effort to verify information and potentially identify incorrect cases, enabling DWP to make improvements to processes, [and] pursue the recovery of overpayments back into the public purse. It will also allow DWP to identify and prevent fraud and error in the future.”
Jen Persson, director of Defend Digital Me, said pupil data should be used “for the purposes of their education and that alone”, not for the DWP to “hunt people down”. She said that more than 15 million people on the database today “have already left school”.
“Each time the DfE comes up with a new type of use for their personal data, they don’t tell them [the people on the list] and simply ignore the law.”
Pupil data has been shared with other public bodies for years. In 2012 the coalition government expanded data-sharing to include private companies.
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Meet AdVon, the AI-powered content monster infecting the media industry • Futurism
Maggie Harrison Dupré:
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Basically, AdVon engages in what Google calls “site reputation abuse”: it strikes deals with publishers in which it provides huge numbers of extremely low-quality product reviews — often for surprisingly prominent publications — intended to pull in traffic from people Googling things like “best ab roller.” The idea seems to be that these visitors will be fooled into thinking the recommendations were made by the publication’s actual journalists and click one of the articles’ affiliate links, kicking back a little money if they make a purchase.
It’s a practice that blurs the line between journalism and advertising to the breaking point, makes the web worse for everybody, and renders basic questions like “is this writer a real person?” fuzzier and fuzzier.
And sources say yes, the content is frequently produced using AI. “It’s completely AI-generated at this point,” a different AdVon insider told us, explaining that staff essentially “generate an AI-written article and polish it.”
Behind the scenes, AdVon responded to our reporting with a fusillade of denials and legal threats. At one point, its attorneys gave us seven days to issue a retraction on our Sports Illustrated story to avoid “protracted litigation” — but after the deadline came and went, no legal action materialized.
“Advon [sic] is proud to use AI responsibly in combination with human writers and editors for partners who want increased productivity and accuracy in their commerce departments,” the company wrote in a statement. “Sport Illustrated [sic] was not one of those AI partners. We always give explicit ethical control to our publishing partners to decide the level of AI tooling they want in the content creation process — including none if they so choose, which has been part of our business since founding.”
It’s possible this is true. Maybe AdVon used AI-generated headshots to create fictional writers and stopped there, only using the fake authors’ bylines to publish content produced by flesh-and-blood humans.
But looking at the evidence, it’s hard to believe.
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Slop! It’s coming for the media.
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What was Apple thinking with its new iPad commercial? • The Atlantic
Damon Beres and Charlie Warzel:
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Here is a nonexhaustive list of objects Apple recently pulverized with a menacing hydraulic crusher: a trumpet, a piano, a turntable, a sculpted bust, lots and lots of paint, video-game controllers.
These are all shown being demolished in the company’s new iPad commercial, a minute-long spot titled “Crush!” The items are arranged on a platform beneath a slowly descending enormous metal block, then trash-compactored out of existence in a violent symphony of crunching. Once the destruction is complete, the press lifts back up to reveal that the items have been replaced by a slender, shimmering iPad.
…But good Lord, Apple, read the room. In its swing for spectacle, the ad lacks so much self-awareness, it’s cringey, even depressing. This is May 2024: Humanity is in the early stages of a standoff with generative AI, which offers methods through which visual art, writing, music, and computer code can be created by a machine in seconds with the simplest of prompts. Apple is reportedly building its own large language model for its devices, and its CEO, Tim Cook, explicitly invoked AI in his comments about the new tablet—the iPad Pro features, he said, an “outrageously powerful chip for AI.”
Most of us are still in the sizing-up phase for generative AI, staring warily at a technology that’s been hyped as world-changing and job-disrupting (even, some proponents argue, potentially civilization-ending), and been foisted on the public in a very short period of time. It’s a weird, exhausting, exciting, even tense moment. Enter: THE CRUSHER.
…it’s hard to like what the company is showing us. People are angry. One commenter on X called the ad “heartbreaking.” Three reasons could explain why. First: Although watching things explode might be fun, it’s less fun when a multitrillion-dollar tech corporation is the one destroying tools, instruments, and other objects of human expression and creativity. Second, of course, is that this is a moment of great technological upheaval and angst, especially among artists, as tech companies build models trained on creative work with an ultimate goal of simulating those very people’s skilled output. It is easy to be offended at the ad’s implication, and it is easy to be aghast at the idea that AI will wipe out human creativity with cheap synthetic waste.
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And next, we have an offering from the “What a difference a day makes” department.
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Apple apologizes for iPad Pro ‘Crush’ ad: it ‘missed the mark’ • Ad Age
Tim Nudd:
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In an exclusive statement obtained by Ad Age, Apple apologized for the “Crush” spot and said it didn’t mean to cause offense among its creative audience.
“Creativity is in our DNA at Apple, and it’s incredibly important to us to design products that empower creatives all over the world,” said Tor Myhren, the company’s VP of marketing communications. “Our goal is to always celebrate the myriad of ways users express themselves and bring their ideas to life through iPad. We missed the mark with this video, and we’re sorry.”
The spot rolled out on Apple’s YouTube and CEO Tim Cook’s X account on Tuesday, but had not received any paid media. Plans for a TV run have now been scrapped.
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I wrote some more about this particular ad for this week’s Substack. Anyway, that’s it squashed.
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Baby born deaf can hear after breakthrough gene therapy • University of Cambridge
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A baby girl born deaf can hear unaided for the first time, after receiving gene therapy when she was 11 months old at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge.
Opal Sandy from Oxfordshire is the first patient treated in a global gene therapy trial, which shows ‘mind-blowing’ results. She is the first British patient in the world and the youngest child to receive this type of treatment.
Opal was born completely deaf because of a rare genetic condition, auditory neuropathy, caused by the disruption of nerve impulses travelling from the inner ear to the brain. Within four weeks of having the gene therapy infusion to her right ear, Opal responded to sound, even with the cochlear implant in her left ear switched off.
Clinicians noticed continuous improvement in Opal’s hearing in the weeks afterwards. At 24 weeks, they confirmed Opal had close to normal hearing levels for soft sounds, such as whispering, in her treated ear. Now 18 months old, Opal can respond to her parents’ voices and can communicate words such as “Dada” and “bye-bye.”
Opal’s mother, Jo Sandy, said: “When Opal could first hear us clapping unaided it was mind-blowing – we were so happy when the clinical team confirmed at 24 weeks that her hearing was also picking up softer sounds and speech. The phrase ‘near normal’ hearing was used and everyone was so excited such amazing results had been achieved.”
…Professor Manohar Bance from the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge and an ear surgeon at Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is chief investigator of the trial. He said:
“These results are spectacular and better than I expected. Gene therapy has been the future of otology and audiology for many years and I’m so excited that it is now finally here. This is hopefully the start of a new era for gene therapies for the inner ear and many types of hearing loss.”
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Gene therapy has been “just about to happen” for 20 years. Now it finally, finally seems to be here.
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Backward walking is the best workout you’re not doing • TIME
Angela Haupt:
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I’ve spent my whole life happily walking in one direction: forward. It was, I believed, the only way to go, so I dutifully logged dozens of miles a month looking like every other person out for a morning stroll.
No more. Thanks to TikTok, I discovered a new (to me, at least) spin on walking: backward walking, also known as “retro-walking.” Though it’s trending on social-media platforms right now, physical therapists and fitness trainers have been touting its benefits for years. It’s a low-impact way to burn calories, strengthen your legs, test your coordination, and even improve pain, experts say—all of which lured me onto my quiet, rural street one afternoon to give it a whirl.
After about 50 steps, I realized going in reverse was no walk in the park. It burned. I could feel the switch-up in my lower legs in a way I don’t with ordinary walking unless I’m powering up a hill. There was a mental challenge, too (beyond ignoring the strange looks from my neighbors). I had no idea what was behind me, so I had to engage all my senses to ensure I stayed upright and didn’t trip over any unexpected obstacles—including my walking partner, who was slightly faster and, therefore, a couple steps behind me.
When I told a handful of experts about my surprisingly fun retro-walking expedition, they agreed more people should make it part of their routine. Here’s a look at why.
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The following is passed on without comment: this exercise is popular among pickleball players, apparently.
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Lead in Beethoven’s hair offers new clues to mystery of his deafness • The New York Times
Gina Kolata:
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Kevin Brown, an Australian businessman with a passion for Beethoven, owned three of the locks [of Beethoven’s hair] and wanted to honour Beethoven’s request in 1802 that when he died doctors might attempt to figure out why he had been so ill. Mr. Brown sent two locks to a specialized lab at the Mayo Clinic that has the equipment and expertise to test for heavy metals.
The result, said Paul Jannetto, the lab director, was stunning. One of Beethoven’s locks had 258 micrograms of lead per gram of hair and the other had 380 micrograms. A normal level in hair is less than 4 micrograms of lead per gram.
“It definitely shows Beethoven was exposed to high concentrations of lead,” Dr. Jannetto said. “These are the highest values in hair I’ve ever seen,” he added. “We get samples from around the world and these values are an order of magnitude higher.”
Beethoven’s hair also had arsenic levels 13 times what is normal and mercury levels that were 4 times the normal amount. But the high amounts of lead, in particular, could have caused many of his ailments, Dr. Jannetto said.
The investigators, including Dr. Jannetto, Mr. Brown and Dr. Meredith, describe their findings in a letter published on Monday in the journal Clinical Chemistry.
The analysis updates a report from last year, when the same team said Beethoven did not have lead poisoning. Now with thorough testing they say that he had enough lead in his system to, at the very least, explain his deafness and illnesses.
David Eaton, a toxicologist and professor emeritus at the University of Washington who was not involved in the study, said that Beethoven’s gastrointestinal problems “are completely consistent with lead poisoning.” As for Beethoven’s deafness, he added, high doses of lead affect the nervous system, and could have destroyed his hearing.
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That’s quite the turnaround from “lead, what lead?” to “sixty times over normal”. What a loss, though.
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Chinese network behind one of world’s ‘largest online scams’ • The Guardian
Carmen Aguilar García, Sarah Marsh and Philip McMahon:
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More than 800,000 people in Europe and the US appear to have been duped into sharing card details and other sensitive personal data with a vast network of fake online designer shops apparently operated from China.
An international investigation by the Guardian, Die Zeit and Le Monde gives a rare inside look at the mechanics of what the UK’s Chartered Trading Standards Institute has described as one of the largest scams of its kind, with 76,000 fake websites created.
A trove of data examined by reporters and IT experts indicates the operation is highly organised, technically savvy – and ongoing.
Operating on an industrial scale, programmers have created tens of thousands of fake web shops offering discounted goods from Dior, Nike, Lacoste, Hugo Boss, Versace and Prada, as well as many other premium brands.
Published in multiple languages from English to German, French, Spanish, Swedish and Italian, the websites appear to have been set up to lure shoppers into parting with money and sensitive personal data. However, the sites have no connection to the brands they claim to sell and in most cases consumers who spoke about their experience said they received no items.
The first fake shops in the network appear to have been created in 2015. More than 1m “orders” have been processed in the past three years alone, according to analysis of the data. Not all payments were successfully processed, but analysis suggests the group may have attempted to take as much as €50m (£43m) over the period. Many shops have been abandoned, but a third of them – more than 22,500 – are still live.
So far, an estimated 800,000 people, almost all of them in Europe and the US, have shared email addresses, with 476,000 of them having shared debit and credit card details, including their three-digit security number. All of them also handed over their names, phone numbers, email and postal addresses to the network.
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“Industrial scale” is one of those worrying phrases, isn’t it. Though the credit cards might be dead, all the other information is still useful. “Discounted goods”, eh. Never a good thing.
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Should we be worried about bird flu? • The New Yorker
Dhruv Khullar:
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In the unlikely event of that emergency, we’re far better positioned than we were for covid. Influenza may be the world’s most familiar viral pathogen—its genome, virulence, and transmission patterns have been studied for decades. The US has a large stockpile of Tamiflu, which should work against bird flu, as it does for other influenza strains, and which could be given to an infected person’s contacts to mitigate spread. Health officials have also indicated that they could rapidly scale up testing and, if needed, shift the nation’s annual flu-vaccine production to shots that are tailored for H5N1.
But the ability to respond is not the same as responding. The country’s initial approach has had an unsettling resonance with the first months of covid. Because there is no widespread program to screen farm animals for H5N1, we have little sense of how many have been tested or what proportion of tests have been positive. It took a month after bird flu was detected in cattle for the Department of Agriculture to require that lactating cows be tested before crossing state lines, and the agency has since clarified that only 30 animals in a group must be tested, irrespective of how large the group is.
Last month, when the government released genetic sequences for scientists to study, it did not share information about where or when the samples were collected, making it difficult to track how the virus is spreading and evolving. Meanwhile, we haven’t conducted antibody studies of farmworkers that could determine the extent to which they are getting infected; we’ll know they’re sick if they show up in emergency rooms.
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Just a watching brief! (Thanks Karsten L for the link.)
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| • Why do social networks drive us a little mad? • Why does angry content seem to dominate what we see? • How much of a role do algorithms play in affecting what we see and do online? • What can we do about it? • Did Facebook have any inkling of what was coming in Myanmar in 2016? Read Social Warming, my latest book, and find answers – and more. |
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