Author Archives: jeremy

Facebook’s ‘Locality of Friendship’

This visualization by Facebook intern Paul Butler illustrates what he calls the locality of friendship. I was interested in seeing how geography and political borders affected where people lived relative to their friends. I wanted a visualization that would show which cities had a lot of friendships between them. It’s a magnificent effort and scores… Read More »

Podcast: Truthiness

The BBC World Service Business Daily version of my piece on Truthiness.  (The Business Daily podcast is here.)   Loose Wireless 101208 To listen to Business Daily on the radio, tune into BBC World Service at the following times, or click here. Australasia: Mon-Fri 0141*, 0741  East Asia: Mon-Fri 0041, 1441  South Asia: Tue-Fri 0141*, Mon-Fri 0741  East Africa: Mon-Fri… Read More »

Data, WikiLeaks and War

I’m not going to get into the rights and wrongs of the WikiLeaks thing. Nor am I going to look at the bigger implications for the balance of power between governed and governing, and between the U.S. and its allies and foes. Others have written much better than I can on these topics. I want… Read More »

Singapore Details ‘Waves’ of Cyberattacks

Officials and delegates from APEC economies were targeted ahead of last year’s Singapore meeting with malware-laden emails faked so they appeared to have been sent by Singapore government officials on the Organising Committee. Singapore officials have said the attacks were not the first on the country. Although Singapore regularly highlights threats to national security—including Islamic… Read More »

Social Media and Politics: Truthiness and Astroturfing

(This is a longer version of my syndicated newspaper column) By Jeremy Wagstaff Just how social is social media? By which I mean: Can we trust it as a measure of what people think, what they may buy, how they may vote? Or is it as easy a place to manipulate as the real world?… Read More »