Turkish security forces on Tuesday detained dozens more people nationwide on accusations of spreading propaganda for "terror" groups, in a major clampdown as Ankara presses its new offensive inside Syria.

Ninety-one people were detained in 13 provinces ranging from Izmir on the Aegean to Van in the east over their postings on social media.

Twenty-four people had been detained in other cities on Monday in raids that have raised new concerns among rights groups over freedom of expression in the country.

Among those taken into custody were five journalists, including writer and activist Nurcan Baysal, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said.

The detentions come as Turkey pressed ahead with its military incursion in northern Syria against the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia.

Ankara views the YPG as "terrorists" linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) waging a three-decade long insurgency in Turkey.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for national unity over the operation and warned those responding to calls for protests would pay a "heavy price".

Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin urged the "public, and especially the media, to be wary of lying, fake, distortive and provocative news, images and gossip".

Kalin said in a statement that the authorities were watching the "disinformation activities closely" and would "quickly and resolutely" act within the framework of the law if necessary.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim added: "We are watching the provocations being spread on social media very closely."

- 'Making propaganda' -

Twenty-three suspects were detained in the Aegean province of Izmir, the agency said. Six of the suspects had been planning a protest in a park, the agency said.

The Izmir provincial chairman of Turkey's main pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) was reportedly also detained.

The authorities are responding to what they see as deliberate disinformation, including the use of images that some Turkish media said had been "manipulated" or simply taken from other conflicts but presented as from the current offensive.

Yildirim hit out at those using images of children and civilians to blame Turkey for violence against innocent parties. "Social media is not unaccountable media," he said.

Other arrests took place in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir, the capital Ankara, the southern city of Mersin and Mus and Van in the east.

Two reporters for the pro-Kurdish news agency Mezopotamya, Hayri Demir and Seda Taskin, were detained late Monday in Ankara, RSF said.

- 'Intolerance of criticism' -

The head of RSF's Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk Johann Bihr said the "increase in the witchhunt against critics" and the lack of debate over the offensive highlighted "the degree to which pluralism has collapsed in Turkey".

He added: "The government is now trying to assert complete control over everything that the media report, at the risk of undermining public trust and fuelling tension."

After the arrests on Monday, Human Rights Watch (HRW) Turkey researcher Emma Sinclair-Webb hit out at Ankara's "intolerance of criticism".

Meanwhile, controversy rumbled over the vandalising by protesters of the offices of a newspaper in the Turkish Cypriot breakaway statelet -- recognised only by Ankara -- that had called the operation an "occupation".

Hundreds had demonstrated outside the offices of the daily Afrika newspaper in Nicosia on Monday, apparently responding to a call by Erdogan who had criticised the paper.

"Intimidating journalists is unacceptable. The European Parliament will always defend media freedom, the cornerstone of democracy," wrote the President of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani on Twitter, as he condemned the attacks on the newspaper.

Source: AFP

Facebook acknowledged Monday that widespread use of social media can be harmful to democracy, while pledging to work to minimize these risks.

The world's biggest social network's comments were the latest response to persistent criticism for its role in allowing the spread of misinformation, reinforcing "filter bubbles" and facilitating harassment of dissidents and activists.

"Now, we're as determined as ever to fight the negative influences and ensure that our platform is unquestionably a source for democratic good," said Katie Harbath, Facebook's head of global politics and government outreach, in a statement.

Facebook civic engagement chief Samidh Chakrabarti said in a blog post the social network was "far too slow to recognize how bad actors were abusing our platform" and that the company is now "working diligently to neutralize these risks."

The "hard questions" blog post was part of an effort by Facebook to reboot its image after last week's announcement indicating it would call on its users to "rank" the trustworthiness of sources as part of an effort to stem the flow of false news.

"While I'm an optimist at heart, I'm not blind to the damage that the internet can do to even a well-functioning democracy," Chakrabati said.

He added that Facebook is constantly working to balance the value of openness and transparency with efforts to stop manipulation.

"Many human rights organizations commonly use Facebook to spread educational messages around the world," he said. "The wrong kind of transparency could put these activists in real danger in many countries."

Chakrabarti added that Facebook is also struggling with "hate speech," and limiting the spread of violent propaganda while remaining an open platform.

"Policing this content at a global scale is an open research problem since it is hard for machines to understand the cultural nuances of political intimidation," he said.

"And while we are hiring over 10,000 more people this year to work on safety and security, this is likely to remain a challenge."

In an accompanying guest blog post, Harvard professor Cass Sunstein said one of the difficult questions for social media and democracy is how news feeds are personalized.

"What social media platforms do is to make certain kinds of targeting and certain kinds of self-sorting, and especially self-sorting among hundreds, thousands, or millions of strangers a lot easier -- easier than it has ever been," Sunstein wrote.

"The good news is that social media platforms are hardly a finished fact to be categorically assessed. They are very much a work in progress."

Source: AFP

Facebook should pay media companies for providing trusted news content that appears on the social network, media mogul Rupert Murdoch said Monday.

His remarks follow Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's announcement Friday that the world's largest social network would prioritize which news organizations' articles and videos users were more likely to see in their Facebook feeds, based on user surveys about trustworthiness of news sites. That followed a plan by Facebook to revamp the News Feed so that users would see more posts from friends and family, and fewer articles and videos.

Both of the moves are responses to criticism that Facebook did not do enough to prevent the spread of disinformation and divisive posts from Russian operatives during the 2016 presidential campaign.

If Zuckerberg wanted to do right by news sites, he would have Facebook pay news sites just as pay-TV systems pay broadcasters and cable channels, Murdoch said Monday in a statement posted on NewsCorp.com. "The publishers are obviously enhancing the value and integrity of Facebook through their news and content but are not being adequately rewarded for those services," Murdoch said.

"Carriage payments would have a minor impact on Facebook’s profits but a major impact on the prospects for publishers and journalists.” Carriage payments refer to the fees cable companies pay to a broadcaster or pay TV channel. 

Murdoch's criticism went beyond Facebook to include Google, saying that both online destinations "have popularized scurrilous news sources through algorithms that are profitable for these platforms but inherently unreliable. Recognition of a problem is one step on the pathway to cure, but the remedial measures that both companies have so far proposed are inadequate, commercially, socially and journalistically."

Murdoch is executive chairman of News Corp., which includes The Wall Street Journal, and New York Post, as well as U.K.-newspapers The Sun, The Times and The Sunday Times, plus The Australian.

Also the executive chairman of 21st Century Fox, Murdoch controls that company with his sons James and Lachlan. Fox recently agreed to sell some of its assets including the 20th Century Fox film and TV studios to Disney for $52.4 billion.

Murdoch's concerns about Google's use of news sources are nothing new. Back in 2009, he threatened to pull his news outlets from the search engine.

His current complaint boils down to pretty much the same gripes he had back then: a lack of compensation for the cost of news production.

"There has been much discussion about subscription models but I have yet to see a proposal that truly recognizes the investment in and the social value of professional journalism," Murdoch said in his statement. "We will closely follow the latest shift in Facebook’s strategy, and I have no doubt that Mark Zuckerberg is a sincere person, but there is still a serious lack of transparency that should concern publishers and those wary of political bias at these powerful platforms."

Source: AFP

Hundreds of protesters Monday demonstrated outside the offices of a Turkish Cypriot newspaper that aroused the ire of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan by slamming Ankara's operation inside Syria as an "occupation".

The Afrika newspaper -- which is often anti-Ankara and staunchly critical of Erdogan -- wrote on its front page Sunday: "One more occupation from Turkey."

This was an ironic reference to the 1974 Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus which is regarded in Turkey as a "peace operation" but, in the eyes of the international community, led to Turkish troops occupying the northern third of the island.

Around 500 protesters, waving Turkish flags and the flag of the breakaway Turkish Cypriot statelet, gathered outside the offices of the paper, throwing eggs, water bottles and stones which smashed the building's windows.

"Allahu Akbar! (God is Greatest!)", they shouted. Some unfurled banners saying: "Afrika newspaper must be shut down immediately." Others carried a huge banner of Erdogan.

A group climbed a flagpole outside and dismantled the newspaper's main sign on the building's balcony. Police refrained from taking action, an AFP journalist reported.

Mehmet Demirci, the Turkish ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) representative in northern Cyprus, said the newspaper had exceeded the limits of criticism.

"We condemn those who put such headlines in the Afrika newspaper and who dare to make politics over this headline," he was quoted as saying by the Anadolu news agency.

- 'Immoral'-

At the weekend, Erdogan had personally taken aim at the newspaper, criticising its headline as "immoral".

"They say the Turkish army is carrying out another 'occupation' after Cyprus. How immoral it is, how shameless it is!" he seethed.

Erdogan called on the Turkish Cypriots not to remain silent over the newspaper's controversial headline, in what some saw as encouraging the protest.

The foreign ministry of the internationally recognised Cypriot government expressed "grave concern" over the events in the north and condemned Erdogan's comments as "incitement to violence."

It "is yet another proof of Mr Erdogan's policy to consolidate Turkey's authoritarian policies in the Turkish occupied part of Cyprus, including restrictions on freedom of expression and freedom of the press," it said.

Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci defended the paper's right to freedom of speech, saying he had often been the target of criticism by Afrika but had never told the paper to be silent.

"It is not possible to correct wrong ideas with wrong actions," he said, in reference to the protests, warning against provocations.

OSCE representative for media freedom Harlem Desir said on Twitter he condemned "the attack vandalising" the offices of Afrika adding that "media freedom must be protected and respected."

The eastern Mediterranean island has been divided since 1974 when Turkish troops invaded the northern third in response to an Athens-inspired coup seeking union between Greece and Cyprus.

The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) is recognised only by Ankara.

Turkey on Saturday launched its operation with Ankara-backed Syrian rebels to root out the Syrian Kurdish Peoples' Protection Units (YPG) militia from Afrin.

Turkey views the YPG militia as "terrorists" linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, which has fought against the Turkish state since 1984 and is designated as a terror group by Ankara and its Western allies.

Erdogan has urged national solidarity over the operation and the government has reached out to leaders of the main nationalist and secular opposition parties.

But Erdogan warned those who respond to calls for protests in Turkey will have to pay a "heavy price". The authorities on Monday detained 24 people on suspicion of disseminating "terror propaganda" on social media.

Source: AFP

Online giant Amazon on Monday plans to open a convenience store in Seattle where hungry customers will be able to grab sandwiches and go, without having to wait in line or use a checkout.

The American group unveiled the concept for its cashierless "Amazon Go" shop just over a year ago, saying the 1,800 square feet (170 square meters) store would initially offer grocery products to its own employees before being opened to the public.

Early testing however revealed bugs, leading to a delay.

In a message Sunday on its website, Amazon said it had created "the world's most advanced shopping technology so you never have to wait in line."

But if the rollout has taken some time, it's now ready to Go.

People armed with the app are able to pick up items as they roam the store and place them directly in their bags -- without the need for shopping carts or baskets.

Instead, items are automatically added onto a customer's online account when they're removed from a shelf, or taken off if the item is put back.

The system relies on a mix of cameras, sensors and artificial intelligence, according to Amazon.

Source: AFP

JPR Media Group has been appointed to handle the press and publicity for the events company and fashion brand, Candypants. JPR has been instructed to raise brand awareness for the events, the fashion brand and attract profile press for founder Ray Chan.

Source:diarydirectory.

JPR Media Group has been appointed to handle the press and publicity for the events company and fashion brand, Candypants. JPR has been instructed to raise brand awareness for the events, the fashion brand and attract profile press for founder Ray Chan.

Source:diarydirectory.

Laura Heffernan, previously editorial assistant at Inside Soap, has been appointed entertainment journalist at WENN. Laura will be working for Cover Media / WENN as an online news writer, creating content focused on beauty, fashion, lifestyle and entertainment news.

Source:diarydirectory.

Twitter on Friday said the number of Russia-linked accounts firing off tweets evidently aimed at the US election in 2016 was more widespread than initially determined.

The social media company found, and shuttered, an additional 1,062 accounts associated with the Internet Research Agency, considered a "troll farm" connected to the Russian government, Twitter said in an update posted online.

Along with Google and Facebook, Twitter has been criticized for allowing the spread of bogus news -- some of which was directed by Russia -- ahead of the 2016 US election and in other countries.

Twitter also said it is emailing notifications to almost 670,000 people in the US who followed, retweeted, or "liked" posts from any of those suspect accounts during the election period.

"Any such activity represents a challenge to democratic societies everywhere, and we're committed to continuing to work on this important issue," Twitter said in the update.

For the 10-week time span investigated prior to the November, 2016 election, Twitter identified a total of 3,814 Internet Research Agency-linked accounts, according to the San Francisco-based company.

Those accounts posted 175,993 tweets, approximately 8.4 percent of which were election related, Twitter said.

The analysis at Twitter also found an additional 13,512 automated accounts identified as "Russia-linked" and tweeting election-related content during that period, bringing the total to 50,258 accounts.

Twitter said it is sharing information about the accounts with Congress, where testimony late last year by Twitter, Facebook and Google revealed startling new data showing many more millions of Americans were exposed to the fake news than previously thought.

The companies said they were taking necessary steps to rid their platforms of disinformation, propaganda and provocation.

US legislators have been investigating whether President Donald Trump's campaign colluded with Russia in its bid to influence the 2016 US elections.

Source: AFP

Facebook announced Friday it will ask its two billion users to rank their trust in news sources, in its latest attempt to combat the spread of misinformation on the social network.

The change comes as the online giant seeks to address charges that it has failed -- along with Google and Twitter -- to prevent the spread of bogus news, most strikingly ahead of the 2016 US presidential election.

In a Facebook post, co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said the network would seek to "prioritize news that is trustworthy, informative, and local."

"There's too much sensationalism, misinformation and polarization in the world today," Zuckerberg said. "Social media enables people to spread information faster than ever before, and if we don't specifically tackle these problems, then we end up amplifying them."

The new "trusted sources" ranking, which starts next week, would aim to "make sure the news you see is high quality" and "helps build a sense of common ground" rather than sow division, Zuckerberg said.

To do so, he said, Facebook decided to rely on member surveys as the most "objective" way to rank trust in news sources.

"We could try to make that decision ourselves, but that's not something we're comfortable with," Zuckerberg said. "We considered asking outside experts, which would take the decision out of our hands but would likely not solve the objectivity problem."

The new ranking system, he said, would hopefully separate news organizations that are only trusted by their readers or watchers, from ones that are broadly trusted across society.

"This update will not change the amount of news you see on Facebook," he said. "It will only shift the balance of news you see towards sources that are determined to be trusted by the community."

- Friends get priority -

The latest move comes a week after Facebook announced a major update to its user feed that highlights what friends and family share on the network, over advertisements, celebrity and media posts.

The company cast the change as part of a refocus on "community" -- prioritizing social interactions and relationships -- while acknowledging it would likely result in people spending less time on the platform.

"For some time, we have argued that Facebook should give priority to news from trusted sources," David Chavern, head of industry group News Media Alliance, said in a statement.

"This would be positive for consumers, as well as help to address 'fake news' issues."

The group will watch how the Facebook ranking changes are implemented and whether they deliver on the social network's stated goals, according to Chavern.

"My hope is that this update about trusted news and last week's update about meaningful interactions will help make time on Facebook time well spent," Zuckerberg said.

Known for annual personal goals ranging from killing his own food to learning Chinese, Zuckerberg's stated mission for this year is to "fix" the social network.

He plans to target abuse and hate, and interference by nation states.

- Brexit vote -

Meanwhile, British lawmakers probing possible Russian interference in the Brexit referendum revealed this week that Facebook agreed to broaden its own investigation into fake news around the vote, after the social media platform's initial efforts drew criticism.

The House of Commons' Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee said Simon Milner, the tech titan's head of policy in Britain, had vowed the company would now search for "clusters engaged in coordinated activity around the Brexit referendum" that appeared to have originated in Russia.

Milner said it may take several weeks to produce results.

The commitment follows demands from MPs for Facebook and Twitter to provide further information on alleged Russian social media meddling in the run-up to the June 2016 referendum.

Executives from the platforms, as well as from Google, are due to give evidence to the parliamentary inquiry in February, when MPs will visit America for the occasion.

Source: AFP

Online giant Amazon on Friday hiked the price of its Prime service for US monthly subscribers which includes access to streaming video and other perks.

The new fee will be $12.99 a month, up from $10.99, but customers may also opt for an annual membership of $99, which is unchanged.

Prime, a major growth driver for Amazon, includes its growing video service but also offers free delivery for many items as well as music streaming, photo storage and other benefits.

For US customers only seeking Amazon video, the cost will be $8.99 a month.

Amazon launched Prime in 2016, with the video service competing against rivals like Netflix, which recently raised its basic prime by one dollar to $10.99 a month.

Hulu, the number three streaming video provider in the United States, costs $7.99 a month, with an ad-free option at $11.99.

Amazon has not revealed details on the number of Prime subscribers but a report by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) estimated it had 90 million in the United States as of September.

Amazon has also been expanding Prime, called Premium in some countries, to other markets around the world.

Source: AFP

Mobile phone access was partially restored in war-torn eastern Ukraine on Friday after it was lost more than a week ago, the last major Ukrainian provider in the area said.

Almost two million people lost mobile connection in the devastated region after a Vodafone Ukraine fibre optic line was cut on January 11 as a result of fighting.

The provider sought to restore service after its workers had received security assurances from the warring parties in a conflict that has claimed more than 10,000 lives in nearly four years.

"Repair work on the restoration of communications... is completed. In the Lugansk region, communication services are provided in full," Vodafone Ukraine said in its statement, referring to the smaller of two breakaway provinces.

Meanwhile, the insurgent-controlled parts of the bigger Donetsk region still remain without a mobile connection.

"In the Donetsk region, the network does not work for reasons unknown to us. There is a possibility that the equipment is out of order or there is no power supply," Vodafone added.

The separatist authorities of the self-proclaimed Lugansk republic confirmed the restoration of mobile phone access as Donetsk leaders declared no changes in the area under their control.

The outage all but severed communication between family members living on opposite sides of the frontline splitting eastern Ukraine.

Russian-backed operator Pheonix, now the sole provider in Donetsk, only this week introduced a service that is theoretically able to place calls to Kiev-controlled regions at international rates.

The departure of Ukraine's KyivStar in 2015 and Lifecell last year left Vodafone as the only major provider in the region of some 3.5 million people.

This has left Phoenix filling the void in Donetsk, but it has only 600,000 subscribers and is already operating at full capacity.

The self-declared "communications minister" of Donetsk, Viktor Yashchenko, told the separatist DAN news agency earlier this week that 80,000 people had joined Phoenix since Vodafone went down.

Source: AFP

An espionage campaign using malware-infected messaging apps has been stealing smartphone data from activists, soldiers, lawyers, journalists and others in more than 20 countries, researchers said in a report Thursday.

A report authored by digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation and mobile security firm Lookout detailed discovery of "a prolific actor" with nation-state capabilities "exploiting targets globally across multiple platforms."

Desktop computers were also targeted, but getting into data-rich mobile devices was a primary objective, according to the report.

With fake versions of secure messaging services like WhatsApp and Signal, the scheme has enabled attackers to take pictures, capture audio, pinpoint locations, and mine handsets for private data.

EFF and Lookout researchers dubbed the threat "Dark Caracal."

People in the US, Canada, Germany, Lebanon, and France have been hit by Dark Caracal, according to EFF director of cybersecurity Eva Galperin.

"This is a very large, global campaign, focused on mobile devices," Galperin said.

"Mobile is the future of spying, because phones are full of so much data about a person's day-to-day life."

Hundreds of gigabytes of data have been taken from thousands of victims in more than 21 countries, according to Lookout and the EFF.

There were indications that Dark Caracal might be an infrastructure hosting a number of widespread, global cyberespionage campaigns, some of which date back years, the report said.

Because the apps fool people into thinking they are legitimate, users give them access to cameras, microphones and data.

"All Dark Caracal needed was application permissions that users themselves granted when they downloaded the apps, not realizing that they contained malware," said EFF staff technologist Cooper Quintin.

"This research shows it's not difficult to create a strategy allowing people and governments spy to on targets around the world."

Researchers reported that they tracked Dark Caracal to a building in Beirut belonging to the Lebanese General Security Directorate.

Analysis showed that devices of military personnel, businesses, journalists, lawyers, educators, and medical professionals have been compromised, according to the report.

"Not only was Dark Caracal able to cast its net wide, it was also able to gain deep insight into each of the victim's lives," the report concluded.

Cyber security professionals consistently warn people to be wary when downloading software, avoiding programs shared through links or email and instead relying on trusted sources.

Source: AFP

The revered head of Taiwan's semiconductor giant said cryptocurrencies would be a key driver for growth despite a bitcoin slump due to the threat of stricter regulations.

Morris Chang's Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) produces chips that power Apple's iPhones and, more recently, that enable new businesses like artificial intelligence and digital currency mining.

TSMC -- which is the world's biggest microchip producer by contracts -- announced its fourth-quarter results Thursday, saying revenue grew 5.9 percent to Tw$277.6 billion ($9.4 billion), citing new phone launches and cryptocurrency mining as key factors.

Some analysts estimate TSMC sales from producing chips used in digital currency mining could double this year to five to 10 percent of its total revenue, according to Bloomberg.

Chang warned "the price of cryptocurrency is very volatile" and said for that reason TSMC would not invest in new manufacturing capacity specifically for cryptocurrencies, but that the sector would be covered by the firm's wider high-performance computing platform.

He named high-performance computing including cryptocurrency mining as one of the drivers for future revenue growth, alongside artificial intelligence, the "internet of things" and automotives.

Chang's remarks come a day after bitcoin, the dominant virtual currency, crashed below $10,000 for the first time in six weeks following concerns of tightening regulations.

China is preparing for a new crackdown on cryptocurrency, according to the nation's state media, while South Korea's Justice Minister Park Sang-Ki indicated Seoul was preparing a bill to shut down virtual coin exchanges.

But TSMC forecast the sector would remain resilient as long as miners still make positive returns.

"The demand... has been very strong and we expect it to continue to be strong," Chang told analysts and investors at a briefing in Taipei.

TSMC is optimistic for overall growth in 2018, expecting revenue to increase by 10 to 15 percent -- more than the 9.1 percent increase in 2017 in US dollar terms.

Chang, 86, -- who is known as the "godfather" of Taiwan's semiconductor industry -- is set to retire in early June after his company's annual shareholders' meeting.

He built up the company over four decades to be come a multi-billion dollar powerhouse.

A maverick senator from Donald Trump's own Republican party launched a stinging attack on the president on Wednesday, accusing him of employing Stalinist language to attack and undermine the free press.

Arizona lawmaker Jeff Flake levelled the broadside in an address from the Senate floor, timed to coincide with the expected announcement of controversial "Fake News Awards" by Trump's administration.

Flake -- an outspoken critic of the president who is not seeking re-election this year -- hit out at what he called Trump's disregard for the truth, and his repeated designation of the news media as an "enemy."

"The 'enemy of the people' was how the president of the United States called the free press in 2017," Flake told lawmakers.

"Mr. President, it is a testament to the condition of our democracy that our own president uses words infamously spoken by Joseph Stalin to describe his enemies," he said.

"So fraught with malice was the phrase 'enemy of the people,' that even Nikita Khrushchev forbade its use."

Flake accused Trump's White House of a "daily assault" on the constitutionally protected right to free speech, calling it "as unprecedented as it is unwarranted."

And he accused Trump of committing "moral vandalism" against the truth, from his longtime questioning of Barack Obama's birth certificate to his dismissal of Russian meddling in the 2016 election as a "hoax" -- and warned he was emboldening authoritarian regimes around the world to persecute the press.

"2017 was a year which saw the truth -- objective, empirical, evidence-based truth more battered and abused than any time in the history of our country, at the hands of the biggest figure in our government," Flake said.

"Without truth and a principled fidelity to truth and to shared facts, Mr President, our democracy will not last," he warned.

Trump tweeted last week that he would be awarding "Fake News Awards" to the "most corrupt & biased of the Mainstream Media" this Wednesday -- but the White House has remained evasive on whether the controversial event, already once delayed, would take place.

Source: AFP

YouTube on Tuesday announced ramped-up rules regarding when it will run ads with videos as it scrambled to quell concerns by brands about being paired with troublesome content.

"There's no denying 2017 was a difficult year, with several issues affecting our community and our advertising partners," YouTube vice president of display, video and analytics Paul Muret said in a blog post.

"The challenges we faced in 2017 have helped us make tough but necessary changes in 2018."

Channels at YouTube will need to have at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time within the past year to be eligible for ads, according to Muret.

Previously, channels could be eligible for ads as part of a YouTube Partner Program by racking up 10,000 views or more.

"We want to take channel size, audience engagement, and creator behavior into consideration to determine eligibility for ads," Muret said.

YouTube will closely watch for spam, abuse flags and other signals to make sure channels are remaining within the Google-owned video-sharing platforms policies regarding content, according to the post.

Muret said that manual reviews of video will be added to a Google Preferred system that brands use to place ads with popular YouTube content to better vet videos.

YouTube is also providing advertisers simpler controls regarding where ads appear and transparency including safety checks by outside parties, according to Muret.

The changes were expected to affect "a significant number" of YouTube channels eligible to run ads.

YouTube late last year pulled 150,000 videos of children after lewd comments about them were posted by viewers and went public with a vow to greatly increase the ranks of workers focused on rooting out content violating its policies.

The moves came as YouTube strived to assure companies their ads would not appear with offensive or inappropriate videos.

"We are passionate about protecting our users, advertisers and creators and making sure YouTube is not a place that can be co-opted by bad actors," Muret said.

"While we took several steps last year to protect advertisers from inappropriate content, we know we need to do more to ensure that their ads run alongside content that reflects their values."

Source: AFP

Roger Federer has urged his fellow professionals to act themselves and not as robots during media interviews to keep tennis interesting for the sporting public.

The Swiss star is a consummate media performer and regularly conducts his post-match interviews in multiple languages for the large global press contingent that hang on his every word.

The 19-time Grand Slam champion says some of his fellow players struggle with their media obligations, fearful of being misinterpreted.

"I feel they're fearful of you guys (media) just because they feel they have been misinterpreted in the past," he told reporters after his straight sets opening round win over Aljaz Bedene at the Australian Open on Tuesday.

"The power of the microphone is a funny thing. Some players I think struggle with it.

"I would like to see more players just being really themselves in front of the press, being more relaxed about it, not worrying so much about making mistakes.

"You'd rather see that than robots left, right and centre.

"I feel like sometimes some players have gotten a little bit too robot-like. I wish they would let loose and be themselves. I try to always do that. It's not always easy, but I try hard."

Federer said he was conscious of trying to "give it a little bit something extra" during his media interviews to keep the public interested and reporters happy.

"I've maybe said a few too many things sometimes, but I try to be honest. For the most part it's served me well," he said.

"I've always tried to remain myself as well. It's always been a challenge not to change over time but adapt to the new situation of being higher ranked, being asked interesting questions over the years.

"I know you guys have a job to do. I also have to do it. I felt like sometimes we overdo it."

Source: AFP

An Israeli military court on Monday ordered a Palestinian teenager arrested after a viral video showed her hitting two Israeli soldiers held in custody for at least another two days.

Ahed Tamimi, 16, was ordered to be detained until Wednesday to allow the court time to decide whether she should be allowed out on bail ahead of her trial.

Prosecutors are seeking to have her kept in custody until her trial ends.

Tamimi's lawyer Gaby Lasky argued in court that her continued detention violates international conventions since she is a minor.

The teenager has been hailed as a hero by Palestinians who see her as bravely standing up to Israel's occupation of the West Bank.

Israelis accuse her family of using her as a pawn in staged provocations.

Tamimi has been charged with 12 counts including assault and could face a lengthy jail term if convicted.

The charges relate to events in the video and five other incidents. They include stone-throwing, incitement and making threats.

Her mother Nariman has also been arrested over the incident, as has her cousin Nour Tamimi, 20.

Nour Tamimi was released on bail on January 5 while Nariman Tamimi remains in custody.

Ahed Tamimi's family says the December 15 incident that led to the arrests occurred in the yard of their home in Nabi Saleh, near Ramallah in the West Bank.

Israel's military said the soldiers were in the area to prevent Palestinians from throwing stones at Israeli motorists.

A video shows the cousins approaching two soldiers and telling them to leave before shoving, kicking and slapping them.

Ahed Tamimi is the most aggressive of the two in the video.

The heavily armed soldiers do not respond in the face of what appears to be an attempt to provoke rather than seriously harm them.

They then move backwards after Nariman Tamimi becomes involved.

The scuffle took place amid clashes and protests against US President Donald Trump's controversial recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Relatives say that a member of the Tamimi family was wounded in the head by a rubber bullet fired during those protests.

Seventeen Palestinians have been killed since Trump's declaration on December 6, most of them in clashes with Israeli forces. One Israeli has been shot dead since then.

Ahed Tamimi, arrested in the early hours of December 19, has been involved in a series of previous incidents, with older pictures of her confronting soldiers widely published.

She has become something of an icon for Palestinians who have flooded social media with praise and support.

Rights group Amnesty International called on Israel to release her immediately.

"Ahed Tamimi's ensuing arrest and military trial exposes the Israeli authorities' discriminatory treatment of Palestinian children who dare to stand up to ongoing, often brutal, repression by occupying forces," the London-based watchdog said in a statement.

Source: AFP

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov repeatedly attacked the US at his annual press conference Monday, accusing Washington of issuing ultimatums and failing to recognise "the reality of the emerging multipolar world".

Lavrov said the past year had not been easy from a foreign policy perspective as he took questions on Syria, Ukraine, the Korean peninsula and other global issues, in a diplomatic round-up of 2017.

"Unfortunately, our American colleagues and their allies still want to do business solely on the basis of issuing ultimatums and do not want to listen to the views of other centres of world politics," he said when asked about US President Donald Trump's position on the Iran nuclear deal.

"In fact they do not want to recognise the reality of the emerging multipolar world," Lavrov said at the press conference where relations with the United States proved to be the dominant topic.

Trump last week said that Washington would not reimpose nuclear sanctions on Iran for now, but would withdraw from the deal this year unless its terms were changed.

"(The Americans) resort to methods that are, largely, questionable and unscrupulous, in order to contain their competitors," Lavrov said.

"They use a number of these methods, from deploying a global missile defence system to unilateral sanctions, to the extraterritorial use of their own legislation or threats to resolve any international problems solely according to their own scenario."

- 'More assertive' -

Lavrov also said threats coming from Washington in 2017 had "seriously aggravated" tensions in different parts of the world, including in North Korea.

As Trump prepares to mark a year in power, Lavrov said the actions of the current US administration were in some cases "more assertive" than under Barack Obama, "despite Trump's line during the election campaign".

And Lavrov said Moscow could understand the anger of Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas, who has denounced White House peace efforts as the "slap of the century."

Last month Abbas sent delegations to Russia and China to ask them to take on a greater role in the peace process with Israel, as Trump controversially recognised Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Palestinians want the annexed eastern sector of the city as the capital of their future state and president Abbas has said Trump's stance means the US can no longer be the mediator in peace talks with Israel.

The United States was afraid of fair competition in various areas, including energy and the supply of gas to Europe, Lavrov said, adding that Washington was failing to contribute to the resolution of the conflict in Syria.

Russia launched a military intervention in Syria in 2015, propping up President Bashar al-Assad's regime after a popular revolt was crushed by a brutal crackdown.

Source: AFP

A freelance writer working with a regional magazine seeks men’s and ladies white, pink and rose gold clothes and accessories (including footwear, bags, watches, backpacks) as well as home items for multiple Valentine's Day features. Please send all relevant information to the contact by 17 January. 

The media and advertising industry has a unique opportunity to assert its role in influencing and regulating the type of content that appears on our screens. 
Advertising played a crucial role in building entertainment media during the 20th century. This was pioneered by P&G’s use of daytime soap operas, which expanded to cover all broadcast media with the privatization of state television in the West. Advertising continues to bankroll the traditional and credible media as well as many of the less valuable, less transparent digital and social media. 
Advertisers, agencies and regulators must come together to reduce the harmful effect of social media on our youth and our societies. Given the ad and media industry’s massive arsenal of creative talent and lobbying power — with more than $500 billion of ad spending in 2017 — this alliance is too powerful for the tech and social media giants to ignore. 
Historically, advertisers have been selective as to where they place adverts. Most brands have boycotted programs and media that carried violent or sexual content, promoted hatred, or were culturally and religiously offensive. In the past couple of years, P&G and Unilever were among the first to start acting responsibly by cutting ad spend on social media platforms by an estimated $100 million or more. 
The moves by P&G, Unilever and other multinationals must be elevated into a coordinated effort by the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), ad agencies, media and regulators. It should become the trigger for a global campaign to fight the invasion of social media platforms into our lives. We must develop new regulations that will push tech companies to eliminate the addictive features of social media apps. 
This must become part of global brands’ corporate social responsibility policies. Over the past few years, other industries have adopted more humane and socially responsible policies. For example, restaurants are providing natural ingredients options, others are providing fully recyclable packaging, and so on. 
Data from most sources suggest that daily consumption of social media is close to three hours, depending on social and age brackets. More critically, total media consumption exceeds five hours daily and some stats estimate total media usage among teenagers at around eight hours per day! As a father, I can confirm that my kids during this holiday season were consuming more than seven hours of media a day. 
Herbert Simon, who holds a Nobel prize in economics, was once asked, “If humans consume information, what do information consume?” 
He answered: “What information consumes is rather obvious: It consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.” 
As we spend more time on social media, refreshing news feeds, the two most important foundations of human life are being eroded: Physical and emotional health. 
The French government decision to ban mobile phones from schools must be adopted worldwide. Advertisers can also help by stopping all advertising during school hours, which will make these time segments commercially inefficient to the media owners. 
The business community is also suffering from lower productivity due to shorter attention spans. In a recent article titled “Your smartphone is making you stupid, antisocial and unhealthy. So why can’t you put it down?” The Globe and Mail newspaper quoted the Bank of England analyst Dan Nixon as saying, “Workers who got distracted by smartphones needed an average of 25 minutes to get back on task after an interruption.” All that distraction adds up to a loss of raw brain power. Workers at one British company who multitasked on electronic media — a decent proxy for frequent smartphone use — were found in a 2014 study to lose about the same quantity of IQ as people who had smoked cannabis or lost a night’s sleep.
Many stats confirm that improved productivity of connectivity and information flow (which in the case of social media is information that adds little, if any, value to our lives), do not justify the disadvantages of shorter attention spans, weaker social ties, less family time and less physical activity.
In sum, regulators and the ad industry should not delay pulling the breaks on the “antisocial” media epidemic. It took them more than four decades to ban tobacco ads, communicate the negative effects of growth hormones and antibiotics in livestock, or ozone-damaging CFC, and so on. We should not wait another three decades to regulate social media. The advertising industry leadership and creative minds have a unique opportunity to regain relevance by partnering with clients, media owners and regulators to protect the precious moments of our family life on behalf of our children and all future generations. 

Aspiring Saudi journalists are learning the ways of financial news via a training scheme set up by the Bloomberg news and information group in partnership with the MiSK Foundation, the Kingdom’s youth education and leadership body.

The training course — designed to advance financial literacy in Saudi Arabia — began at the Bloomberg Middle East headquarters in Dubai on Sunday, where some 30 undergraduates started a week-long intensive course to master Bloomberg’s brand of data-driven journalism.

The course is being run by Matthew Winkler, who cofounded Bloomberg News with Michael Bloomberg in 1990.

The Saudi students are comprised of 22 women and eight men, who major in journalism, English, marketing and finance at universities in the Kingdom, selected by MiSK from a large number of applicants.

Winkler, now editor-in-chief emeritus of the New York based organization, said: “We want to inspire in them an aspiration to pursue a career in financial businesses and news organizations. When Bloomberg began 28 years ago, we had no lineage and no pedigree, but we wanted to be the best, so it was essential we had a method as well as an aspiration,”

The course is based on the “Bloomberg Way,” the guide for interns and journalists at the news organization, drawn up by Winkler, and emphasizing what he calls the “five Fs” of journalism: First word, factual word, fastest word, final word and future word.

“It’s very detailed, specific and rigorous. We are exposing these young bright lights to the same process that our interns at Bloomberg experience anywhere in the world,” he added.

Most of the students were educated in Saudi Arabia, and are in their final years of degree level courses there, with an average age of 23. All are interested in exploring a career in financial journalism, Bloomberg said.

Winkler said that there were “common denominators” in financial and business news in the US, Europe, and the Middle East and elsewhere, in that it sought to provide the most reliable and transparent information to enable stakeholders to make business decisions.

“In the 21st century, Saudi Arabia is an important country that wants to participate in global markets, and Bloomberg can provide access to data points for markets and companies. Very soon, Saudi Aramco will want to be assessed in terms of its relative value to its peers around the world, and that is all about transparency,” he added.

Winkler said that the large number of women on the course was “very consistent with global demography. Women are advancing everywhere.”

Bloomberg has run similar courses in Africa, India and China, but this is the first time it has been run in the Middle East.

Bloomberg has been in partnership with MiSK since 2016, in a series of collaborations designed to “develop and deliver cross-disciplinary education and training programs focused on business, economics, finance and journalism to enhance the skills and knowledge of young finance and media professionals in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” a Bloomberg statement said.

Source: arabnews

The British government is keeping a "very close eye" on construction and outsourcing group Carillion, a senior minister said Sunday, amid reports it could go into administration within days and critics questioning the government's own role in the crisis.

"Hopefully they will be able to work with their partners to get the working capital they need to continue providing important services," Brandon Lewis, the chairman of Prime Minister Theresa May's Conservative party, told the BBC.

"This is a business that is a going concern... Of course ministers and my colleague the secretary state of business is keeping a very close eye on it."

Carillion is a major government contractor involved in everything from schools to the multi-billion-pound High Speed Two (HS2) rail project, and employs 19,500 people in Britain.

But it has been struggling for some time and in July last year issued the first of several profit warnings.

Despite the red flags the government has continued to award the company major public contracts, including on the flagship HS2 project, leading to criticism Sunday.

Andrew Adonis, an opposition Labour peer who resigned as head of a government-backed infrastructure commission last month, said Carillion's possible collapse "raises big questions" for transport minister Chris Grayling.

Meanwhile Vince Cable, the leader of the Liberal Democrat party, called on the government not to bail out the company.

"Can't have privatisation of profit and nationalisation of losses," he tweeted.

On Friday, Carillion confirmed it was seeking ways to reduce its debt.

The BBC and Financial Times newspaper reported that the firm was holding crunch talks with government figures on Sunday.

The FT said Carillion's bankers have indicated they will only provide new funding if the government directly intervenes.

But ministers are expected to refuse, "making it increasingly likely that it could fall into administration as early as Monday", the business daily said.

The BBC cited unnamed sources saying the firm has a "matter of days" to reach an agreement with creditors.

Neither Carillion nor the government would confirm the talks Sunday.

Carillion has a wide range of public sector contracts, including providing support services for almost 900 schools and around 50,000 homes for military personnel.

The company, which also operates in Canada and the Middle East with a global workforce of 43,000, had revenues of £5.2 billion ($7.1 billion, 5.9 billion euros) last year.

In January, Britain's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), a watchdog, launched an investigation into its market updates.

"Carillion is a major supplier to government so we are continuing to carefully monitor the situation while working to ensure our contingency plans are robust," a government spokeswoman said Sunday.

"The company has kept us informed of the steps it is taking to restructure the business."

In an update to the London Stock Exchange on Friday, Carillion said it had met with representatives of its creditor groups to present a business plan.

It denied media reports the plan had been rejected, saying it was "too early to predict the outcome of these discussions".

"Carillion continues to engage in constructive discussions with a range of financial and other stakeholders regarding options to reduce debt and strengthen the group's balance sheet," it said.

Any deal is "likely to involve the raising of new capital and the conversion of existing financial indebtedness to equity".

Source: AFP