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Jacob Ward

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Author: Jacob Ward

Technology correspondent for NBC News, Berggruen Fellow at Stanford's Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, and former Editor-in-Chief of Popular Science

The Megacities of 2050

February 1, 2016 Jacob Ward

A new breed of metropolis — population 10M+ — is about to become the dominant city type in the world.

 

Legal or Illegal? In America, the Line on Guns is Very Thin

January 6, 2016January 8, 2016 Jacob Ward

In California, home of the nation’s strictest firearms regulations, the parts of an illegal assault rifle are perfectly legal to own. Only putting them together is a crime, as one gun owner showed us in our San Francisco studios.

Tagged filmed, Video

A New Ice Drill Could Unlock Antarctica’s Secrets

December 18, 2015December 21, 2015 Jacob Ward

It used to take years to pull a single ice sample from Antarctica, but a new drill could reduce the process to days, and give us new historical insight into climate change, and a rapid 3-D model of the state of the ice sheets today. A three-way conversation with the designers — John Goodge of the University of Minnesota and Jeff Severinghaus of Scripps.

New Ships, New Prizes for Ocean Research

December 14, 2015December 21, 2015 Jacob Ward

The R/V Neil Armstrong and a new Ocean XPrize are rare bright spots at a dark time in ocean science.

http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/live-news/2015/12/aboard-the-neil-armstrong.html

Excerpt: Climate SOS

December 7, 2015December 21, 2015 Jacob Ward

A brief excerpt from our 30-minute special on climate change and the American West.

The ISIL Playbook: How the West Taught Media to a Terrorist Group

November 20, 2015December 21, 2015 Jacob Ward

A look at the singularly Western playbook of ISIL’s propaganda machine, complete with GoPro footage, fast cuts, and the filters and flourishes drawn from videogames and movies.

 

France’s New Laws Allow Almost Endless Surveillance

November 18, 2015 Jacob Ward

While the United States tries to back away from mass surveillance, at least publicly, France is moving in the opposite direction. As of July, the country has some of the most permissive surveillance laws in the Western world, allowing the state to collect citizens’ communications, break into homes, and watch anyone even remotely associated with a terror inquiry.

 

Tagged filmed, Video

Encryption and the Fantasy of a “Government Back Door” After the Paris Attacks

November 17, 2015December 21, 2015 Jacob Ward

Lawmakers worry that encrypted apps are making terrorist plots easier to conceal, but is it possible to provide a secure form of communication to the world while making those communications available to a few select authorities?

As Military Robots are Promoted, Humans Lose All but “Veto Power”

November 13, 2015 Jacob Ward

Robotic systems allow militaries around the world to operate faster and more efficiently than human soldiers possibly can. The result is that humans are losing their place in the “kill chain” — the sequence of decisions that leads to pulling a trigger. Now Human Rights Watch and other advocacy groups are trying to establish a Geneva Convention for robotic weaponry.

http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/live-news/2015/11/human-rights-watch-identifies-ethical-issues-with-military-killer-robots.html

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When the Levees Break

November 11, 2015 Jacob Ward

With the possibility of El Niño carrying epic storms here this winter, California is bracing for floods that could rage out of control, and coming to grips with the shortsighted construction and long-term decay of its levees and dams.

http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/live-news/2015/11/protecting-californias-levee-system.html

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We put aside the horrors of the world for a day and picked more apricots than we know what to do with, because it felt good. Went camping for the first time this season and discovered A) my beard is grey B) my wife is still really hot C) my Mom rips D) everyone suddenly has the skills to camp like whoa. Epic times. Working out with my Mom through the pandemic (first by Zoom with four other dudes, now in person at the gym) has been a fantastic thing for both of us - clarity, strength, perspective. Love you, Mom. Covering the SF recall election, a heavily funded effort to pull progressive DA Chesa Boudin out of office. This one gathered so much national attention on @todayshow and @morningjoe I found myself up at newly insane hours, a strange metric for a story’s visibility, but a reliable one. Deep respect for West Coast colleagues who do this on the regular. @todayshow this morning, with some analysis of what the Depp-Heard spectacle (and reports of coordinated hashtag work on social media) tells people who want to move public opinion about the future. Short version: it takes a dozen people and less than 100 accounts to move the needle and game the algorithm. Depp’s team denies paying for anything, but that doesn’t prevent firms from offering this sort of service, and experts say the PR industry will point to this trial as a landmark in their private conversations with clients in future. Tonight for the first time ever in my life I’m anchoring a news broadcast, filling in for the irreplaceable @nbcjoshua at 8pm ET on @nbcnewsnow. I’ve been handed an incredible team and the chance to go deep on topics I consider important: firearm violence, online gambling, crypto’s effect on marginalized communities. Please let me know how I do, not least because I have to do it again tomorrow.

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