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LINK > https://www.vox.com/

Chart: The coronavirus pandemic, state by state

In cases, deaths, and tests per capita, here’s how each US state’s coronavirus situation compares.

By Dylan Scott and Rani Molla

How you can keep thousands of people from getting coronavirus, in one GIF

“It’s not about you, it’s about everybody else.”

By Sigal Samuel  Mar 26, 2020, 1:40pm EDT

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This story is part of a group of stories called

Finding the best ways to do good.

If you think you don’t have a huge role to play in how thecoronavirus outbreak plays out, think again. You have the potential to make this pandemic so much worse.

That’s because the coronavirus is both more contagious and more deadly than the common flu. One person can easily transmit it to other people without knowing it, and those people would then transmit it to even more people, creating a terrifying snowball effect.

The good news is, just as you can easily transmit the virus to other people, you can easilyavoid transmitting it — if you’re willing to stay home. That’s right: Simply by sitting on your couch, you can potentially save lives.

To see why, check out the visualization below. It shows how one person with the coronavirus, who passes on the virus to three other people (some experts say three is the average, though others estimate the infectiousness is a bit lower), can very quickly spawn a public health nightmare that afflicts thousands of people. But it also shows how one person can mitigate that effect through social distancing. By avoiding the office, the barbecue, the airport, and so on, an individual can deprive the virus of the opportunity to infect more people.

Courtesy of The Spinoff

Social distancing can’t last forever. Here’s what should come next.

Scientists know how to end this outbreak. Will leaders listen?

By Brian Resnick

Lockdowns work against coronavirus. But they take a few weeks to show they’re working.

Don’t get discouraged if you don’t see results right away.

By Kelsey Piper

The $2.2 trillion stimulus can’t be the last thing Congress does on coronavirus

It’s a great first start. But the battle is not over.

By Dylan Matthews

Amazon says it unintentionally hid some competitors’ faster delivery options

The company is working on a fix after Recode alerted it to the issue.

By Jason Del Rey

In his new memoir, Woody Allen maintains he really doesn’t have a thing for young girls

In Apropos of Nothing, Woody Allen continues to deny Dylan Farrow’s claims of abuse. He says he has no regrets.

By Constance Grady

How you can keep thousands of people from getting coronavirus, in one GIF

"It’s not about you, it’s about everybody else."

By Sigal Samuel

Deciding Who Will Live or Die >

This article was produced in partnership with the Arizona Daily Star, which is a member of the ProPublica Local Reporting Network.

People With Intellectual Disabilities May Be Denied Lifesaving Care Under These Plans as Coronavirus Spreads

Disaster preparedness plans in Washington and Alabama say people with cognitive issues are a lower priority for lifesaving treatment. Disability advocacy organizations have asked the federal government to clarify the plans.

by Amy Silverman, Arizona Daily Star

 March 27, 5 a.m. EDT

The Pied Piper | Fractured Fairy Tales | Rocky & Bullwinkle

9,720 views

•Mar 24, 2020

City Manager Chris Brady > 2-Hour Mesa City Council Study Session Thu 26 March 2020 @ 07:30 AM

Hizzoner John Giles has figured out how-to-use his Split-Screen! 

Note that some new rules for opportunities for the public to participate in their government have been put in place requiring access to a video teleconferencing platform - the City Council Chambers are closed.
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MULTI-SCREEN SIMULTANEOUS > Mesa City Council Meetings In Another Dimension

Practicing "social isolation" provides a new perspective for citizens and the public to get close-up and personal at-a-safe-distance with those elected to serve in city government. . . It is indeed an eye-opener.
"Emergency" or not - in two study sessions - the new video teleconference format opens more windows on the individuals elected.

Comments must be submitted online and you must indicate if you want to speak during the meeting using a live hook-up.

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NOTE: Changes to Mesa City Council Notice 

City Council Meeting Notice

To decrease COVID-19 exposure, the City Council Chambers is closed, but public participation and viewing will be available electronically.

Members of the City Council will appear electronically for this meeting, via a video conferencing platform, and the live meeting will be accessible via broadcast and telephonically.

Because of the current public health emergency, the City Council Chambers is closed for Council Meetings. However, the live meeting may be watched on local cable Mesa channel 11, online at Mesa11.com/live orwww.youtube.com/user/cityofmesa11/live, or listened to by calling 888-788-0099 or 877-853-5247 (toll free) using meeting ID 5301232921 and following the prompts.

Public participation will be available electronically.  

> If you want to provide a written comment or speak telephonically at the meeting, please submit an online comment card at least 1 hour prior to the start of the meeting.  

> If you want to speak at the meeting, you will need to indicate on the comment card that you would like to speak during the meeting, and you will need to call 888-788-0099 or 877-853-5247 (toll free) using meeting ID 5301232921 and following the prompts, prior to the start of the meeting.  

You will be able to listen to the meeting; and when the item you have indicated that you want to speak on is before Council, your line will be taken off mute and you will be given an opportunity to speak.

Applicants and their representatives that have items on the Council agenda and who want to be able to comment on their item or be able to answer questions should fill out this online comment card at least 1 hour prior to the start of the meeting and call 888-788-0099 or 877-853-5247 (toll free) using meeting ID 5301232921 and following the prompts, prior to the start of the meeting.  You will be able to listen to the meeting; and when the item you have indicated that you want to speak on is before Council, your line will be taken off mute and you will be given an opportunity to speak.

For help with the online comment card, or for any other technical difficulties, please call 480-644-2099.

Link to the source  > https://www.mesaaz.gov/city-hall

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Here's the streaming video uploaded to YouTube

The City of Mesa Use of Predictive Policing : New Results From TechDirt

The point of Sanchez's testimony [PDF] on TechDirt today  is this: 
1 We can't trust the data being fed to these systems. . .Therefore, we definitely can't trust the predictions being produced by them. 
2. Dirty cops create dirty data.
Back in August 2016 there was this post on this blog

21 August 2016

PredPol: What Is It?

Official Police Business: Does predictive policing actually work?    

Crime forecasting tools are taking off, but good data is hard to find
By Matt Stroud on May 4, 2016 12:04 pm  @MattStroud

Official Police Business is a weekly column and newsletter by reporter Matt Stroud about new developments in police technology, and the ways technology is changing law enforcement — think body cameras, cell-site simulators, surveillance systems, and electroshock weapons. Sign up to receive OPB in your email every Wednesday at officialpolicebusiness.com, or check for it here at The Verge.
Hunchlab's predictive policing, explained 
Video >>  https://volume.vox-cdn.com/embed/ae6a05d46?placement=article&tracking=article%3Amiddle&player_type=null&start_time=null#ooid=VsM3FtMDE6nBxlgrY9L3T-H8BJkYGv4m

Predictive policing is everywhere . . . private company PredPol is supposedly helping police to identify where property crimes and robberies might occur. As those cities’ predictive programs have gotten more and more attention, police chiefs have done their best to get in on the action. . . 
But does predictive policing actually work? 

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EU Parliament Told Predictive Policing Software Relies On Dirty Data Generated By Corrupt Cops

(Mis)Uses of Technology

from the junk-data,-garbage-outcomes dept

Thu, Mar 26th 2020 3:49am — Tim Cushing

Predictive policing efforts continue to expand around the world. Fortunately, so has the criticism. The data witchcraft that expects a bunch of crap data created by biased policing to coalesce into actionable info continues to be touted by those least likely to be negatively affected by it: namely, law enforcement agencies and the government officials that love them.

The theory that people should be treated like criminals because someone else did some crimes in the area in the past is pretty specious, but as long as it results in temporary drops in criminal activity, fans of unreasonable suspicion will continue to use these tools that still have no long-term proven track record.

It's not just a US problem. It's a problem everywhere. The European Parliament has been asking for feedback on predictive policing efforts, which is more than most agencies in the US are willing to do. The Executive Director of the AI Now Institute, Andrea Nill Sanchez, recently testified during a public hearing on the issue, using the Institute's 2019 report on predictive policing to highlight everything that's wrong with turning law enforcement over to modeling algorithms. (via The Next Web)

The point of Sanchez's testimony [PDF] is this: we can't trust the data being fed to these systems. Therefore, we definitely can't trust the predictions being produced by them. Dirty cops create dirty data. . . 

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Back in November 2016 there was this post on this blog

PredPol: Predictive Policing Software Purchased by City of Mesa

Over the next three years, Mesa will spend nearly $200,000 to implement a state-of-the-art crime-predicting software. Data-Driven Policing Still Problematic

Now Being Used By Government Agencies For Revenue Generation
Source >> TechDirt
Data, even lots of it, can be useful. But it also leads to erroneous conclusions and questionable correlations.
Ever been baffled by the content of a "targeted" ad? Just imagine the fun you'll have when "lol 'targeted' ad" is replaced with nearly-incessant "interactions" with law enforcement
Back on August 21st your MesaZona blogger uploaded three posts about this software purchase that was approved by the Mesa City Council ... those ignored issues are here now.

predWhen even the companies gathering the data are concerned about the implications, there's a problem. (One issue being: why don't they stop?) Anything that can be obtained (preferably in bulk) without a warrant will be. And it gets funneled into predictive policing software that attempts to mold disparate info into a usable whole. Lost in the shuffle are the individuals now represented by data points and algorithms. A data point located in the "wrong" neighborhood could result in surveillance backed by nothing resembling reasonable, articulable suspicion. 

It's not all bad, though. There are uses for aggregate data that don't create privacy concerns or fears of ever more biased policing . . .
On the other hand, the desire to obtain any data available without a warrant is resulting in some very twisted uses of third-party records. . . 

Maria Polletta posted this article in the Arizona Republic on October 21, 2016 - two months after the Mesa City Council approved contracts, addressing lingering issues that few people are aware of . . .