Meta
Q and A with Nick Couldry and Ulises A Mejias on Data Grab
In this interview with Anna D’Alton (LSE Review of Books), Nick Couldry and Ulises A Mejias discuss their new book, Data Grab which explores how Big Tech ushered in an exploitative system of “data colonialism” and presents strategies on how we can resist it.
Nick Couldry and Ulises A Mejias will speak at a public LSE event to launch the book on Tuesday 14 May at 6.30pm. Find out more and Register.
Q: What is data colonialism and how does it relate to historical colonialism?
Data colonialism, as we define it, is an emerging social order based on a new attempt to seize the world’s resources for the benefit of elites. Like historical colonialism, it is based on the extraction and appropriation of a valuable resource. The old colonialism grabbed land, resources and human labour. The new one grabs us, the daily flow of our lives, in the abstract form of digital data. And, crucially, this new colonialism does not replace the old colonialism, which very much still continues in its effects. Instead, it adds to the historically enduring process of colonialism a new toolkit, a toolkit that involves collecting, processing, and applying data.
The old colonialism grabbed land, resources and human labour. The new one grabs us, the daily flow of our lives, in the abstract form of digital data.
We are not saying there is a one-to-one correspondence between the old colonialism and the new, expanded one. The contexts, the intensities, the modalities or colonialism have always varied, even though the function has remained the same: to extract, to dispossess. And violence continues to reverberate along the same inequalities created by colonialism. We personally may even benefit from the system. We might not mind giving up our data, because we are the ones using gig workers; we are not the gig workers themselves. We are the ones who don’t get to see violent videos on YouTube, because someone in the Philippines has done the traumatising work of flagging and getting those videos removed (while working for very low wages). These are not the same kinds of colonial brutalities of yesterday, but there is still a lot of violence in these new forms of exploitation and the whole emerging social order of data colonialism is being built on force, rather than choice.
Q: Why is it important to frame Big Tech’s extraction of data to form “data territories” as a colonial enterprise? How is data territorialised and extracted?
Something central to colonialism (and capitalism) is the drive to continue accumulating more territories. Colonisers are always looking for new “territories” or “frontiers” from which to extract value. Lenin once said something to the effect that imperialism is the most advanced form of capitalism: once you run out of people to exploit at home, you must colonise new zones of extraction that also become new markets for what you are selling. That is the strategy behind data colonialism, seen as the latest landgrab in a very long series of resource appropriation.
Once you run out of people to exploit at home, you must colonise new zones of extraction that also become new markets for what you are selling. That is the strategy behind data colonialism
Data colonialism is a system for making people easier to use by machines. Corporations have, in many cases, managed to monetise that data by using it to influence our commercial and political decisions, and by selling our lives back to us (the platform can “organise” your life for you and even track and predict your health and emotions). And even where data cannot be directly monetised, accumulated or anticipated data still generates value in terms of speculative investments that build stock market value.
We are not saying that all extracted data necessarily becomes a valuable commodity. Data markets are complex and still developing: much data retains greater value when kept and used inside corporations, rather than being sold between corporations. But value has been extracted all the same through the process of abstracting human life in the form of data.
Q: Data extractivism or “social quantification” is being embedded into our lives in sectors from health and education to farming and labour. How is it reshaping society?
When the internet was not yet controlled by a handful of corporations, we were told that it could be the ultimate tool for democratisation, because it allowed the sharing of information from many to many. Today, what we have is a monopsony, a market structure characterised by a handful of “buyers” (the platforms that “buy” our data or rather acquire it for free). So many-to-many communication cannot happen without first going through a many-to-one filter, concentrating power in a few hands.
In addition to this, the people who manage this system have become quite adept at fragmenting the public into communities that mistrust and hate each other (often called filter bubbles, or echo chambers, though some prefer to think in terms of wider forces of polarisation). The original intent was to make it easier to market to these individual communities, and to do so by targeting ever more personalised content which, because it is more personalised, is more likely to generate the response that advertisers desire. But the system has spiralled out of control because it rewards the circulation of sensationalist misinformation that appeals to base emotions and promotes an us-vs-them parochialism, all while also encouraging addiction and increasing time spent on the platforms.
Q: Have there been any meaningful attempts to regulate the extraction and commodification of data? What are the dangers in it going unchecked?
In terms of regulation, governments have until recently done very little to prevent or even regulate this. Partly because it took them a long time to understand what was going on, but also because most governments have actually pursued policies of media deregulation, interfering less and less in the “free market” and giving corporations more power to act unhindered. Let’s not forget that governments are often very happy to get access to the vast datasets that commercial corporations are amassing, as for example Edward Snowden revealed a decade ago. Many think that recent EU legislation (the 2018 General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), new legislation such as the Digital Services Act and the recently approved AI Act) provides counter-examples, but we have some doubts. The GDPR depends on the mechanism of consent, and our consent is often obtained through market pressures. Meanwhile the newer EU legislation, when it comes fully into force, while it will impose significant inconveniences for Big Tech companies, especially the largest, is not designed to challenge in a fundamental way the trend towards ever more data extraction and the expanding use of AI. Its goal rather is to help data and AI markets work more fairly, which is very different.
Unless we do something to stop its advances, the emerging social order will ensure that there is no living space which has not already been configured so as to optimise data extraction and the wider operation of business logics.
There is no doubt a role for regulation, but it is unlikely ever to be enough, because it does not think in terms of changing how we live, of reimagining a whole interlocking social and economic order that favours corporate over human interests. Unless we do something to stop its advances, the emerging social order will ensure that there is no living space which has not already been configured so as to optimise data extraction and the wider operation of business logics. As such, it will be just the latest stage in the ever-closer relations between colonialism and capitalism.
Q: What are the inequalities or power asymmetries that data exploitation introduces, and how do they connect to or reinforce existing inequalities?
Data colonialism entails a form of data extractivism that has one main purpose: the generation of value in a profoundly unequal and asymmetrical way whose negative impacts are more acutely felt by the traditional victims of colonialism, whether we define them in terms of race, class and gender, or the intersectional of those categories.
In traditional Marxist terms, we think of exploitation and expropriation as something happening to workers in the workplace. In data colonialism, exploitation happens everywhere and all the time
If we think in traditional Marxist terms, we think of exploitation and expropriation as something happening to workers in the workplace. In data colonialism, exploitation happens everywhere and all the time, because we don’t need to be working in order to contribute to this system. We can in fact be doing the opposite of working: relaxing and interacting with friends and family. But the extraction and the tracking are happening nonetheless.
The reason why increasingly fewer areas of life are outside the reach of this kind of exploitation is because the colonial mindset tells us that data, like nature and labour before it, are a cheap resource. Data is said to be abundant, just there for the taking, and without a real owner. In order for it to be processed, it needs to be refined with advanced technologies, just like previous colonial resources. So, our role is merely to produce it and surrender it to corporations, whom we are told are the only ones who can transform it into something useful and productive. The more data we surrender, for instance, the smarter AI can become, and the more capable of solving our problems. This premise is of course deeply flawed, because it is based on an extractivism model, and because it results in an unequal order where a few gain, and most of us lose. But it is a premise that is being installed increasingly into how the spaces of everyday life (from the home to the workplace, from education to agriculture) are being organised.
Q: Taking inspiration from existing movements, what strategies of resistance can citizens mobilise against Big Tech’s commercialised datafication?
In the final chapter of Data Grab, we discuss many examples of these kinds of movements. One such example is Los Deliveristas Unidos, a group of gig food delivery workers, mostly immigrants, who work in New York City. They successfully organised to demand better working conditions and a minimum wage. Not all their demands have been put into action, but their example demonstrates that people can confront platforms and push for reform.
The project of decolonising data must be able to formulate solutions that are not only technological but social, political, regulatory, cultural, scientific and educational.
Examples like this suggest that a decolonial vision of data is already being mobilised, and it requires encompassing not one mode of resistance, but many. The project of decolonising data must be able to formulate solutions that are not only technological but social, political, regulatory, cultural, scientific and educational. And it must be able to connect itself to struggles that seemingly have nothing to do with data, but that in reality are part of the same struggles for justice and dignity. That is why many creative responses to data colonialism are coming from feminist groups, from anti-racist groups, from indigenous groups: we can and must learn from these rich responses. And with the Mexican feminist scholar Paola Ricaurte we have set up a network, the Tierra Común network that aims to do just that.
We are hopeful, that decolonising data can become not a movement that is co-opted by certain parties and individuals for political gain, but a larger, pluriversal, global movement of solidarity where regular human beings can reclaim our digital data and transform it into a tool to act on the world, instead of a tool for corporations to act on us.
Note: This interview gives the views of the authors, and not the position of the LSE Review of Books blog, or of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Read an interview with Nick Couldry about the book, “Are we giving away too much online?” from March 2024 for LSE Research for the World.
Watch a short video, What is data colonialism? with Nick Couldry on LSE’s YouTube channel.
Main image credit: Andrey_Popov on Shutterstock.
Facebook designates Grayzone journalist Kit Klarenberg a ‘dangerous individual’
The notoriously intelligence-friendly social media network appears to have imposed a ban on posting a recent report by Kit Klarenberg, and is automatically restricting users who re-publish his work. Multiple Facebook users have reported being banned, or having their posts censored, after sharing an investigation by The Grayzone’s Kit Klarenberg into CIA and MI6 involvement in the creation of ISIS. Readers who post links to the piece on the social network find themselves frozen out of their accounts, on the […]
The post Facebook designates Grayzone journalist Kit Klarenberg a ‘dangerous individual’ first appeared on The Grayzone.
The post Facebook designates Grayzone journalist Kit Klarenberg a ‘dangerous individual’ appeared first on The Grayzone.
Facts For Peace: The Billionaire-Backed Campaign Attacking the Palestinian Cause
A week after Hamas launched its surprise attack on Israel, the social media page Facts For Peace was created with the message, “Get the facts on Hamas, Israel, and peace in the region.”
A few days later, the page began advertising its content. “Here is Hamas’ Founding Charter in Their Own Words,” one sponsored post reads alongside video clips of Hamas leaders speaking and snapshots of the document. The page has spent more than $945,000 on Facebook ads since the war began nearly four months ago, and according to POLITICO, was the single largest pro-Israel advertiser between November 2 and December 1, spending over $450,000 on Meta ads. The ads have mainly reached male-identifying Facebook users under the age of 35 in California, Texas, New York, and Florida.
Labeled as a media/news company on Facebook, now Meta, the page’s posts and its supporters appear less concerned with accurate reporting and more involved in shaping public opinion.
In November, news website Semafor reported real-estate billionaire Barry Sternlicht launched Facts For Peace and sought $1 million in donations each from some of the world’s wealthiest individuals. “This is just one of several behind-the-scenes efforts by business tycoons — many, though not all of them Jewish — to support Israel since the attack by Hamas,” Samafor reported.
“Public opinion will surely shift as scenes, real or fabricated by Hamas, of civilian Palestinian suffering will surely erode [Israel’s] current empathy in the world community,” Sternlicht wrote in an email, seen by Semafor, soliciting contributions from Wall Street, Hollywood, and tech moguls. “We must get ahead of the narrative.”
The main objective of the “Facts for Peace” media campaign is to blame Palestinian deaths & suffering on Hamas instead of on their occupier, Apartheid Israel. pic.twitter.com/TaEy7ZNcGJ
— MintPress News (@MintPressNews) November 13, 2023
Sternlicht wrote that he’s aiming to raise $50 million from the recipients and secure a matching donation from an unnamed Jewish charity. With the funds, Facts For Peace seeks to “define Hamas to the American people as a terrorist organization” and “not just the enemy of Israel but of the United States.”
According to Bloomberg and Forbes data, the recipients have a combined net worth of almost $500 billion and include media tycoon David Geffen, former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, Apollo CEO Marc Rowan, investors Michael Milke, Nelson Peltz, and Bill Ackman, and tech tycoons Eric Schmidt and Michael Dell. Facts For Peace did not respond to MintPress News inquiries about its campaign objectives.
Paying for Propaganda
Following its debut ad on the Hamas charter, Facts For Peace has gone on to publish hundreds of sponsored posts, with some conflating support for Palestine with support for Hamas or calling for the destruction of Israel. Only one ad was taken down since Facts For Peace’s launch for violating the platform’s advertising standards by not adding a paid for by disclaimer.
One ad, which hasn’t been active since Jan. 22, 2024, depicts a pro-Palestine march with participants chanting, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
“Does this sound like peace and freedom? No,” the ad reads, followed by stating the protest ballad is a call for “genocide.” The ad then tells the viewer this slogan is sung at nearly every pro-Palestine rally and immediately jumps into saying, “Hamas wants to destroy and take over the entire area where Israelis and Palestinians live.”
The ad then ends with, “Anyone who says these words…is calling for a world without Israel.”
In another advertised video, a man approaches pedestrians in New York City, asking them to sign “a quick petition to help Hamas free Palestine.” He then reads off the petition’s“terms and conditions,” which include, “You agree that every Jew, Christian, and non-Muslim in the world must be slaughtered,” “You believe Iran should use Palestinians as puppets to spread radical jihad and destroy the west,” and “You want a terrorist group that beheads babies and rapes girls to replace the only democracy in the Middle East.”
A similar video shows a man approaching pedestrians in Washington, D.C., asking them to sign the same petition. In this video, the “terms and conditions” outlined include agreeing “Hamas should keep enforcing anti-West values like murdering gay Palestinians,” and “You want Hamas to win the war so they can spread their death cult to the U.S. and massacre all non-Muslims.”
As a reminder, those demonstrating in support of Palestine are generally not siding with Hamas, and using the slogan, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” isn’t genocidal but rather expressing freedom from oppression across the historical land of Palestine.
While pro-Palestine activists have been condemned for this phrase, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not receive similar backlash when he called to take over the “area from the river to the sea.”
“Every area that we evacuate, we receive terrible terror against us. It happened in South Lebanon, in Gaza, and also in Judea and Samaria [the occupied West Bank], which we did it,” Netanyahu said earlier this month. “And therefore, I clarify that in any other arrangement, in the future, the state of Israel has to control the entire area from the river to the sea.”
Another now-inactive ad encourages viewers to take a quiz to determine “Who do you really support in the Middle East Conflict?” The ad then directs to a Facts For Peace online quiz asking questions related to democracy, human rights, and equality. If you answer positively, your results say, “your views are more in line with Israel’s.”
“It seems that Facts for Peace is another transparent effort to wrap up genocide propaganda in lies and push the public conversation in counterproductive directions,” rapper and activist Lowkey said.
Currently, the page is running two ads on Instagram. On January 28, Facts For Peace launched an ad with the caption, “The International Court of Justice [ICJ] just confirmed Israel’s right to self-defense.” In this video, Facts For Peace said because the ICJ didn’t call for an immediate ceasefire “establishes Israel’s military actions are a defensive response to the Oct 7 attacks.”
The page is also running an ad featuring a video interview with Abbey Onn, an American-Israeli who had five members of her family kidnapped by Hamas on October 7. The video was produced by Middle East Intel, yet the only record of this organization is a black-and-white webpage containing only its name in large font. Another website, Israel Palestine Chronicles, features the same design as Middle East Intel but links to accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube as well as noting that it is paid for by Facts For Peace LLC. These websites mirror Facts For Peace’s own website, which also dons a black-and-white theme and links to its social media pages.
Facts For Peace’s mission falls in line with the United States’ vast Israel lobby. American journalist and executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, Norman Solomon, explained the lobby’s current tactics since Israel’s war began.
“The Israel lobby extends far beyond literal lobbyists on Capitol Hill,” Solomon told MintPress.
Israel-can-do-no-wrong defenders have been in ongoing damage-control mode since October, and part of that effort is focused on smearing principled supporters of human rights like Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib and Cori Bush.”
Facts For Peace appears part of these damage-control efforts with its own media blitz. “The lobby’s influence is inclusive of, and perhaps mainly composed of, ferocious media offensives – now denying that Israel is engaged in the mass murder of civilians in Gaza and slandering the movement that demands an immediate and permanent ceasefire,” Solomon said.
Despite Facts For Peace’s continuous ad expenditure, Solomon doubts, however, that the campaign can make a real impact on public opinion, telling MintPress:
Its website is rudimentary and appears to be going through the motions. Not major players in the manipulative game of smearing people who advocate for human rights of Palestinian people.”
Who is behind Facts for Peace?
Facts For Peace’s website offers little transparency beyond giving a contact email address and social media links and stating it’s paid for by Facts For Peace LLC. Yet who manages the campaign isn’t listed. Facts For Peace was incorporated in New York on September 15, 2022, and was originally called Fulfill the Promise LLC. It changed its name to Change the Narrative Coalition LLC on October 13 before finally landing on Facts For Peace on October 16.
According to Semafor, Facts For Peace hired Josh Vlasto, a former aide to U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer and ex-New York governor Andrew Cuomo, to advise it. The number listed on Facts For Peace’s Meta Ad Library account is the same one for Vlasto’s public relations firm, Bamberger & Vlasto. The firm is run by Vlasto and Richard Bamberger, both former Cuomo aides who reportedly assisted Cuomo in his smear attempts against former aide Lindsey Boylan, who accused Cuomo of sexual harassment.
MintPress could not reach Vlasto’s firm for comment. However, Vlasto has already shared Facts For Peace’s content on his X profile. According to The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, Facts for Peace, Israel Palestine Chronicles, and Bamberger & Vlasto, websites all share the same IP addresses, suggesting they are hosted on the same server.
Semafor also reported that Sternlicht discussed Facts For Peace with CNN owner David Zaslav and that Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel agreed to coordinate the endeavor. However, neither Saslav nor Emanuel responded to MintPress inquiries on their involvement.
Facts For Peace’s known head, Sternlicht, has previously funded Birthright, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and the American Jewish Committee (AJC) through his foundation and according to the foundation’s 2022 tax filing, available on ProPublic’s Nonprofit Explorer database, it gave $20,000 to the American Jewish Committee’s “to support [its] pro-Israel media campaign.”
Barry Sternlicht, the individual heading Israel’s $50 million propaganda campaign, Facts for Peace, has previously funded Birthright, the ADL, and one of Israel’s national institutions, the UJIA.
— Lowkey (@Lowkey0nline) November 13, 2023
Lowkey stressed Sternlicht’s funding ventures should be cause for concern, telling MintPress that:
Sternlicht has a history of funding projects aimed at radicalizing young people and converting them to settler-colonists. Birthright offers free trips to occupied Palestine and the occupied Syrian Golan Heights to young Jews around the world.”
The ADL notoriously spied on thousands of Arab students and pro-Palestine and anti-apartheid activists, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and even sold that information to South African intelligence agents in the 1980s.
Another notable person linked to Facts For Peace is ex-Google CEO Schmidt, who co-founded the Israeli tech company Team8 in 2015 with Nadav Zafrir, former head of Israeli military intelligence Unit 8200, which is infamous for surveilling Palestinians. Schmidt has met with Netanyahu over the years, and during their last meeting in Sept. 2023, Schmidt agreed to join Netanyahu’s advisory forum on artificial intelligence.
Project Nimbus is the final phase of Google’s integration into the Israeli military.
Ten years ago, Google head Eric Schmidt held an intimate press conference with Israeli PM Netanyahu; not long after, Schmidt founded a tech hub with the former head of Israeli intelligence. pic.twitter.com/byLghBcBt0
— MintPress News (@MintPressNews) November 8, 2022
According to a MintPress investigation, at least 99 former agents of Unit 8200 are currently employed in significant roles at Google, including as Head of Strategy.
Other Facts For Peace’s email recipients have also expressed support for Israel as of late. Wall Street executives Ackman and Rowan criticized universities’ handling of pro-Palestinian demonstrations — calling to withhold their donations.
Facts For Peace’s ads are often stuffed with prominent voices like comedian Mikey Greenblatt, actors Nathaniel Buzolic and Zach Sage Fox, and Mosab Hassan Yousef, a Palestinian who worked undercover for the Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service and has strongly opposed calls for a ceasefire.
Despite this Rolodex of high-profile support, netizens have questioned the campaign and its agenda in a Reddit forum.
One user responded:
answer: It’s a Zionist propaganda group manufactured to try and counter, belittle, and discredit the organic anti Zionist sentiments on social media.
Edit: their increased presence is fueled by monetary investments by pro Zionist individuals and groups that dislike the fact that younger individuals are anti Zionist.
Jewish ≠ Zionist
Jewish ≠ Israeli
Anti Zionist ≠ Anti Semitic
Public opinion polls indicate that support for Israel is waning, with a November 2023 Reuters/Ipsos survey noting that around 68% of respondents in the U.S. agreed with the statement that “Israel should call a ceasefire and try to negotiate.” And with Israel charging forward with its unrelenting war on Gaza — killing more than 26,000 Palestinians so far in the assault — amid growing international pressure, sponsored social media ads may not be enough to return Israeli favor in the world’s eyes.
Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News
Jessica Buxbaum is a Jerusalem-based journalist for MintPress News covering Palestine, Israel, and Syria. Her work has been featured in Middle East Eye, The New Arab and Gulf News.
The post Facts For Peace: The Billionaire-Backed Campaign Attacking the Palestinian Cause appeared first on MintPress News.
Pelican Comment System
As previously posted I have added commenting to my site. I used the methodically named Pelican Comment System by Bernhard Scheirle. Bernard seems to have abandoned the project but luckily for me it is still working. There was a couple of glitches I ran into…
Pigeon post, not as fast as a Pelican Comment
The first one was listed as an issue, a simple fix, amending get_writer to _get_writer on line 89 of ../site-packages/pelican_comment_system/init.py
The next glitch was actually just my own brain not getting it. If a comment is not a direct reply to a previous comment then replyto is not a required value. Seems obvious now. A comment is basically the same as the rest of the posts, just a file. This is the bare minumum that’s needed:
date: 2021-1-21 15:00
author: Norman
Content of the comment.
Other values that can be used are as follows:
tag
description
email
the commentators email address
replyto
the id of the comment one is replying to
website
any website address given will be used to wrap the commenters name in a link
slug
the persistent uri of the comment, if not used it gets computed from the filename
χ
Where the arbritary string χ is parsed to be available in the theme as {{comment.χ}}
To do
- Modify the Identicons. Limit the colours used to fit my site style.
I also quite like these space invaderesque ones). - Custom Identicons for select authors
- Comments are few and far between on tregeagle.com, for a busier site it would be worthwhile to build upon Bernhard’s IMAP_Importer
- Use an inline form instead of relying on my visitors to send an email.
One of the barriers to this implementation of the Pelican Comment System is switching from the page you are browsing to your email window. We humans have the attention spans of gnats and most of us probably decide it’s not worth an email.
Thought Shepherd
I ditched the idea of comments on my website years ago. I did not want to be the shepherd of other peoples thoughts, it was none of my business.
John Constable’s thoughts often drifted to clouds
The years have rolled by and I have reconsidered… perhaps sometimes it is my business. I went so far as to add a mailto link for each of my posts. A slower pace than the usual website comments. Send an email and your comment will be added to the post when the site gets updated.
I have never liked the automated comments systems. I was drawn into an arms race with spammers, bots and trolls. Spam made up the majority of comments which was a bit depressing.
Happily the occaisonal thoughtful message got through and that is why I am switching comments back on. Over time, on a rainy day, I will reattach those old comments. If you are interested in the mechanics I’ll write it up in a separate post.
The comments I get from humans are always a gift so, please go ahead and share your thoughts.
Busy Planning
It just occurred to me after writing that last post how much of this blog is about thinking about what I’m going to do.
When I actually do stuff I don’t write it up on the blog because I’m busy doing it.
I suppose we can only hope I stop posting stuff soon then…
Word Stew
Feck me that last post was smug. I am embarrassed. Me at my dullest… old and worrying about money, sheesh.
… but er, this blog has always been full of posts I am ashamed of. I just leave them there to remind me to stop being such an idiot.
For a time I used to think of my blog as a dumping ground for all my angry and pissed off thoughts. I privately called it my shit & piss blog. Looking back I think the act of writing diffuses the frustration.
All that is left is this. Word stew.
Image Processing
As part of my usual life displacement activity I am again tinkering with the configuration of this blog. I tag all these posts #meta as a way to help avoid/find them later.
My intention has been to use the HTML attribute srcset to serve Responsive Images. I had hoped it would be pretty easy to throw something together but then I got side tracked by experimenting with image carousel’s. After the previous post I went down a rabbit hole of pulling apart the HTML/CSS used in Instagram to see how they did it. This bought me full circle to realising I needed to use srcset to finish the responsive images. The slideshow/carousel will have to come later.
I had previously looked at some Pelican Plugins and decided instead to build my own scripts to Keep It Simple… Ha.
My scripts rebuild all the images into multiple sizes from thumb-sized to large and converts them all into the webp format. I have also been rewriting all the
TL:DR - Replace my hacky scripts with Image Process
- sanitize all existing
- use Image Process to:
- process the existing and future images into sizes/resolutions
- process the existing and future
- go back to building a horizontal carousel for when I want to post multiple images
- consider also throwing video into the mix… (formats? CDNs?)
er… and that’s it for now. The summer sun has risen here in Broken Hill, so my brain will be cooked until it cools down.
Meanwhile, back to my day job tomorrow.
The <dfn> tag
This is sort of what my attempt at making the title appear on mobile looks like
In a previous post (pictured above) I wrote how I would like to enable mobile users to read the ‘title’ text in the tags and also with the tag.
Anyhoo… This is what I did.
First I edited my CSS to allow the tag itself to highlight the word so the user knows they can poke it:
dfn
{
cursor: help;
text-decoration: underline dotted;
position: inherit;
border: none;
}
Then I retrieved the ‘s title attribute and used the ::after pseudo element
to style it.
dfn::after
{
display: none;
padding: 1em;
border-radius: 2px;
opacity: 0;
color: var(--text); !important;
border: 1px solid var(--border);
border-radius: 8px;
background: var(--accent-bg);
text-align: center;
content: attr(title);
}
Then I styled some different aspects of the hover event so the user knows they’ve done something.
This code highlights the word being defined:
dfn:hover
{
color: black !important;
background: white;
}
Then I changed the pseudo-element from display: none; to display: block; the definition is displayed according to the styles here:
dfn:hover::after
{
opacity: 1;
display: block;
position: absolute;
float: left;
max-width:220px;
width: 50vw;
}
I am not happy with placement, it hangs off to the left. I played around with the position property with limited success. Ideally I would make it pop up above the word it is defining and not to the left beneath the users hand.
Some time down the track I think a better understanding of the CSS positioning and the pseudo-elements may help me work out the positioning problem. Unless you have any better ideas?
I’ve added an email comment link to my posts, go ahead and tell me where I can improve this.
Write thoughts
Like pretty much all the posts on this blog this one represents another unfinished thought. I am prompted to write this because I re-read my previous post, Showies. In it I began with my usual nostalgic claptrap before wending my way into my experience of the Silver City Show. I then clumsily fizzled out in a paragraph about Showies. I painted myself into a corner with my own thoughts. I was in the midst of trying to untangle my words and thoughts when I realised the day was ending.
I wanted to write about all the people out having fun on Saturday night. I ran out of time. It was Sunday night H needed some guidance with his homework and I wanted to keep Re company cooking dinner. So, I did that instead.
Here is a picture I was going to use on the Showies post to pointlessly illustrate something.
See… pointless
In other news I am thinking I would like to enable mobile users to read the text in the tags. If you are reading this before my future self has found a solution you may occaisonally notice an emphasised word. If you are on a computer and you hover your mouse cursor over that word a definition may appear. If you are on a phone or tablet that doesn’t happen. A twiddly detail I know but that right there is the kind of nerdly thing I tend to focus on here. I’ll let you know how I go.