To certify or not to the certify: the building blocks of a blockchain career

It’s clear that tech pros in a variety of industries are examining the implications of blockchain. After all, the technology can be leveraged not only for cryptocurrency (i.e., Bitcoin), but everything from “smart” contracts to secure, distributed ledgers. Can developers prove that they have the skills to work with this technology?
Read more in Can You Obtain Certifications for a Blockchain Career?

Tech Takes Your Through Child's War Experience

Even before the invention of photography, artists sought to recreate the horrors of war in pictures. Now technology makes it possible to take that rendering a step further, immersing the viewer directly in the experience with the use of AR. 

Read more in AR for Empathy: The Devastation of War

Diversity in the Pipeline and Blockchain

Blockchain is expected to add over $3.1 billion in business value, according to research firm Gartner. But the value proposition could involve more than money: blockchain might lead to a more diverse pipeline of qualified employees.

That’s the mission of STEAMRole, which uses blockchain and its own cryptocurrency (called RoleCoin) for two purposes: providing STEAM-expert role models and a Diverse Talent Pipeline Platform (DTPP) for companies to use in tracking and hiring diverse talent.

Based in Palo Alto, California, STEAMRole connects role models with aspirants (called Steamers) particularly from groups that are underrepresented in STEM and the Arts (the “A” in the acronym). Both Steamers and role models are awarded RoleCoins for their activities, which not only incentivizes participation and achievement, but also records it on the system’s blockchain, a feature that could be applied to tracking the effectiveness of STEAM program funding.

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Can Blockchain Improve Tech’s Workplace Diversity?

Blocking the Blocker for Ads

Please disable your ad blocker.” 

If you try to keep some of your internet experience free of ads, you likely see this appear on a number of sites. Those site often prevent you from seeing their content until you comply with their request. But other sites don't bother with requests; they just circumvent your ad blocker. An academic study, "Measuring and Disrupting Anti-Ad Blockers Using Differential Execution Analysis," found that in fact, anti-ad blockers are used 52 times more than previously indicated. I contacted one of the leaders of the study, Zhiyun Quian, Assistant Professor at University of California, Riverside, to learn about the persistence of hidden anti-ad blockers.

I first asked what drew his attention to this area of research. He said that as an ad blocker user himself, he noticed the increasing disruption of ads on sites he visited. “To save my personal experience, and everyone else who uses ad blockers, I decided to look into this as a research project.”

Read more in The Ad Blocker Arms Race

AI-Powered Shop Windows

The Shop Window Opens a Portal of Possibilities

Many of us are window shoppers but online purchasers. That may be one of the factors in the widely reported decline of retail stores. To flip the situation around, it may be time to transform the shop window from static tableaux into AI-powered interactive displays that extract value from data.

This is the proposition offered by Outernets, a New York-based platform which enables window displays to transforms storefronts into responsive, personalized ad experiences.  I spoke with CEO and founder Omer Golan about what store windows have been, and what they could be in the future.

Read more in The Shop Window Opens a Portal of Possibilities

Big Data, Analytics, AI, etc.

As All Analytics was removed from the internet, UBM moved most of the articles I had written for it in the past few years to IW at hhttps://www.informationweek.com/author-bio.asp?author_id=4902 But I also have PDFs of it posted on my Contently portfolio at https://ariellabrown.contently.com/

Those of a certain age need not apply

We have laws that are meant to prevent discrimination in hiring. But in practice, employers can find ways to avoid hiring people above a set age threshold with the help of social media and demographic data.

A story that ProPublica copublished with the New York Times declared the dark side of social media targeting for job applicants -- age discrimination. Facebook is designed to give direct access to a precisely targeted population, including those within a specified age bracket. That means ads for employment may be directed only to potential candidates below a "certain age," and that could be both ethically and legally problematic.

(Image: Pixabay)

Facebook has been used as a successful recruiting tool for companies who seek to reach recent grads. The same type of "microtargeting," as ProPublica refers to it, can be used to reach whatever parameter the advertiser specifies, and that often translates into job ads, particularly those in tech, being directed to eyeballs under 40.

Declaring that the age targeting has had a discriminatory effect on workers over age 40, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) and three workers filed a class action lawsuit against T-Mobile, Amazon, and other companies that they say used the social media platform in that way.

That's not to say that Facebook has a monopoly on such practices. ProPublica tested out Google and LinkedIn and found that job ads designed to not be extended to people above 40 were allowed. It then contacted the companies and was told by Google that it had no problem with complying with the specified age range. LinkedIn told ProPublica that would make the necessary modification, as did a number of companies whose advertising strategy looked like an attempt to exclude older applicants.

Facebook defends itself against ProPublica's critique. Facebook's VP of Ads, Rob Goldman declared, "We have carefully reviewed their concerns -- and this time we disagree." Though he does not deny that job ads were intended for specified age groups, he argues that does not necessarily constitute age discrimination any more than advertising "in magazines and on TV shows targeted at younger or older people."

ProPublica doesn't buy that argument, though. It points out that the analogy fails because other forms of media may be aimed at particular age groups, but they do not restrict access to them. If a teen wants to look at AARP or if a middle-aged person picks up Seventeen, they will see the ads, too. "Online, however, people outside the targeted age groups can be excluded in ways they will never learn about," it points out.

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Targeted Advertising Triggers Age Discrimination Law Suit