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How to Overcome a Gaffe: Two Contemporary Case Studies

There is a formula emerging for solving that most contemporary of political problems: when a silly gaffe - propelled and amplified by Twitter - distracts from the substantive message.

President Obama and Senator Marco Rubio of Florida have shown recently how to turn fodder for humorous gifs into political gifts.

Frustrated that he has been unable to forge an agreement with Congressional Republicans to prevent automatic budget cuts that take effect on Friday, Mr. Obama issued a mixed science fiction metaphor, saying he could not “somehow do a Jedi mind meld with these folks and convince them to do what’s right.”

Social media and the Web exploded, not with renewed concern about the effects of the so-called sequester or calls for compromise, but with a collective DUH: mind melds are a Vulcan thing, as in “Star Trek,” not a talent of the Jedi knights of “Star Wars.”

Sheesh.

But, ever fluent in both pop culture and social media, the White House posted a message to its Twitter feed containing an image that embraced themes from both sci-fi franchises - and a convenient U.R.L. that redirects to its sequester section of the White House Web site.

Mr. Rubio, the fast-rising Florida Republican whose rebuttal of the president’s State of the Union ad! dress was drowned out by mockery of his awkward sip of water, offers another case study over a longer period. Almost immediately after the speech, Mr. Rubio sent a picture of the infamous water bottle out to Twitter:

After the self-deprecation came the enrichment: Mr. Rubio’s PAC reportedly made well over $100,000 by selling water bottles to supporters. And just last week, Mr. Rubio had a water-bottle toast with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. What better way to show rapport with a figure so popular with the Republican base than a lighthearted “l’chaim” wth your trademark image



App Smart Extra: Starry Night

Stars, galaxies, meteors and satellites were the subject of App Smart this week as I tested out astronomy apps to help identify objects in the night sky. These apps typically use your phone or tablet’s sensors to display a view of what you’re pointing your device at in the sky in real time, helping you identify planets and constellations. Here are more apps like this to try out:

Star Walk â€" 5 Stars Astronomy Guide is a popular iOS app, costing $3. It has the same kind of dynamic star display as other apps in its class, and it’s easy to use. It’s also jam-packed with imagery and data on the 200,000 stars and planets in its database, and has a calendar so you can keep track of interesting celestial events. I particularly like the beautiful imagery it uses to show constellations and detail on the planets.

SkySafari 3 may be useful for more experienced star gzers. It has data on 120,000 stars and 220 star clusters, nebulae and galaxies, as well as detailed information pages written by professional astronomers. The basic version costs $3 on iOS, but there’s a Plus edition for $15 that has data on 2.5 million stars and can control some wired and wireless telescopes. The Pro edition is $40 and has many more stars and features but is aimed at the serious amateur astronomer.

Alternatively, and much more simply, there’s SkEye Astronomy, available as a free Android app. It has a businesslike feel, and is slightly sparing on user interface touches like icons. But it is powerful, and essentially works in much the same way as Star Walk or SkySafari does. There’s a $9 SkEye Pro version that has more stars in its database and can help you spot satellites too. But the free edition is fine for the casual astronomer. The app is not ideal you’re a complete beginner, however, as it lacks the kind of detailed background data on stars and so on that similar a! pps have.

The benefit to stargazing apps like these is that they also work during the day, or in a city that’s too light-polluted to let you see more than a handful of stars. This means you can turn them on at any time to learn more about astronomy.

Quick call: The Popular instant messaging app WhatsApp has been updated to a new version for Windows Phone 8. It has better support for Windows Live Tile displays and extras like a back-up system.



Q&A: Backing Up a Windows 8 System

Q.

Is the File History software in Windows 8 a full backup program for the whole computer, or do I need to buy additional backup software

A.

The File History utility included with Windows 8 does not fully back up all the files on the computer. It does automatically back up the files you probably care the most about, though, like photos, documents and other items in your Windows libraries, as well as your contacts, your browser favorites and SkyDrive files. With File History, you can get back previous versions of those files, including those that were accidentally deleted from the computer.

You can find File History in the Windows 8 control panel, or you can quickly search for it. To search the computer for the File History utility, press Windows + C on the keyboard or click the right corner of the screen to bring up the Windows 8 “Chrms” menu; on a touch-screen computer, put your finger on the right edge of the screen and slide it toward the middle. Select the Search icon on the Charms bar, type in “File History” and choose Settings. Select “File History” when it appears in the list to open the control panel.

Like most backup programs, you need another drive to store the File History archive. You can use an external USB drive or a network location, and Microsoft has instructions for setting up either method on its site.

Although File History has largely supplanted the older built-in Windows backup program, you can still find it on the computer. In the bottom left corner of the File History control panel, click the link for “Windows 7 File Recovery” to open the old Window! s backup utility. The Ars Technica site has a tutorial on creating a complete system image, but if you prefer less poking around inside Windows, you can always get a third-party backup program.



How to Beat Some Facebook Scammers

You’ve probably seen those wildly popular Facebook postings that entice you to share something â€" like a photo of a bear sneaking up on a man â€" with the instructions, “Press Like and type the number 1 and see what happens.” These posts often list hundreds of thousands of responses.

If you’ve tried it, here’s what you saw happen: nothing. Behind the scenes something is happening, though. With each click, a scammer gets a little closer to cashing in.

The most thorough explanation I’ve seen of how this deception works comes from Daylan Pearce, whose job title is Search Lead at Next Digital, described as Australia’s largest independent digital agency, in Melbourne.

Somewhat simplified, here’s how it works. There is a thriving business in selling Facebook pages. The idea is that a page builds an audience, then essentially sells that audience to someone else. It’s a practice Facebook opposes, but has limited control over.

If a company can buy that audience, its “ede rank” will increase. Edge rank â€" a term people like Mr. Pearce use, but which Facebook doesn’t officially acknowledge â€" measures how often someone’s posts show up in other people’s news feeds. “So,” Mr. Pearce said, “a page that has 50,000 likes will have greater exposure on people’s news feeds than a page with only 10,000.”

Edge rank is based on several factors, chief among them affinity, weight and decay, Mr. Pearce said. Affinity is largely based on the number of likes. Weight is based on what accompanies those likes. “A ‘like’ isn’t worth as much as a comment and a comment isn’t worth as much as a ‘share,’” he said.

Decay relates to the age of the post. More views, likes and shares over more time increases edge rank.

Facebook did not quarrel with the basics of Mr. Pearce’s explanation, but said it’s more complicated.

These scam posts are designed to do three things. Get you to like, comment and share the post. It’s a recipe to ! make it go viral, which takes care of decay.

To hook you, the posts make an intriguing promise, or ask you to support a worthy cause - “like this and share it if you know of someone who has suffered from cancer.”

While you can’t stop people from such postings, you can keep them off your page and reduce the potential profit. You lower their edge rank when you report or at least hide the post.

To do that, hold your cursor over the post and an arrow should appear in the upper right corner. Click it and a drop-down menu offers you the option of hiding or reporting the post.

The more often you report or hide these kinds of posts, the less often they will show up in your news feed.



The Early Word: Cutting Up

In Today’s Times:

The sequester, an $85 billion round of automatic spending cuts, is set to start kicking in on Friday after the White House and Congress failed to reach an agreement on taxes and spending. Jonathan Weisman writes that hope for compromises faded further on Thursday, when the Senate voted down competing House and Senate measures designed to replace the sequester. Congress has left for the weekend, but President Obama and Republican and Democratic leaders on the Hill are scheduled to meet Friday morning at the White House.

The sequester becomes law on Friday, but Michael D. Shear explains that it could take weeks for most Americans to feel the impact. Right now, though, the specifics of who will feel the cuts, and when, are quite murky.

The resolve Speaker John A. Boehner has shown n the latest round of fiscal talks has firmed up his support among House Republicans. Ashley Parker writes that rank-and-file Republicans are pleased with Mr. Boehner’s decision to stop negotiating with the White House and Congressional Democrats and instead give them an ultimatum: allow the sequester to take effect or put forth a viable Senate plan.

The Obama administration took a side in the legal battle over same-sex marriage in California on Thursday by appealing to the Supreme Court to overturn the state’s ban on such unions, John Schwartz and Adam Liptak report. The Justice Department argues that the ban violates the Constitution’s equal protection clause, but stops short of asking the court to overturn all such bans nationwide.

The president is set to sign legislation that wou! ld reauthorize and broaden the Violence Against Women Act, after the House approved a Senate-passed measure on Thursday. Ashley Parker writes that the measure’s passage “underscored the divide in the Republican Party as it struggles to regain its footing with women after its 2012 electoral drubbing among female voters.”

Charlie Savage explains how a Supreme Court decision to gut or strike down the centerpiece of the Voting Rights Act could affect oversight of voting law changes in states and localities. The court is expected to issue its ruling on a challenge to the law this summer.

Pfc. Bradley E. Manning awaits sentencing afte pleading guilty Thursday to handing over classified government files to the antisecrecy group WikiLeaks. Charlie Savage reports that Private Manning faces what could be a lengthy prison sentence for actions the soldier said were meant to “make the world a better place.”

Happening in Washington:
Economic reports expected Friday include personal spending and incomes for January at 8:30 a.m., and at 10 a.m., construction spending for January and the manufacturing index for February.



The Early Word: Cutting Up

In Today’s Times:

The sequester, an $85 billion round of automatic spending cuts, is set to start kicking in on Friday after the White House and Congress failed to reach an agreement on taxes and spending. Jonathan Weisman writes that hope for compromises faded further on Thursday, when the Senate voted down competing House and Senate measures designed to replace the sequester. Congress has left for the weekend, but President Obama and Republican and Democratic leaders on the Hill are scheduled to meet Friday morning at the White House.

The sequester becomes law on Friday, but Michael D. Shear explains that it could take weeks for most Americans to feel the impact. Right now, though, the specifics of who will feel the cuts, and when, are quite murky.

The resolve Speaker John A. Boehner has shown n the latest round of fiscal talks has firmed up his support among House Republicans. Ashley Parker writes that rank-and-file Republicans are pleased with Mr. Boehner’s decision to stop negotiating with the White House and Congressional Democrats and instead give them an ultimatum: allow the sequester to take effect or put forth a viable Senate plan.

The Obama administration took a side in the legal battle over same-sex marriage in California on Thursday by appealing to the Supreme Court to overturn the state’s ban on such unions, John Schwartz and Adam Liptak report. The Justice Department argues that the ban violates the Constitution’s equal protection clause, but stops short of asking the court to overturn all such bans nationwide.

The president is set to sign legislation that wou! ld reauthorize and broaden the Violence Against Women Act, after the House approved a Senate-passed measure on Thursday. Ashley Parker writes that the measure’s passage “underscored the divide in the Republican Party as it struggles to regain its footing with women after its 2012 electoral drubbing among female voters.”

Charlie Savage explains how a Supreme Court decision to gut or strike down the centerpiece of the Voting Rights Act could affect oversight of voting law changes in states and localities. The court is expected to issue its ruling on a challenge to the law this summer.

Pfc. Bradley E. Manning awaits sentencing afte pleading guilty Thursday to handing over classified government files to the antisecrecy group WikiLeaks. Charlie Savage reports that Private Manning faces what could be a lengthy prison sentence for actions the soldier said were meant to “make the world a better place.”

Happening in Washington:
Economic reports expected Friday include personal spending and incomes for January at 8:30 a.m., and at 10 a.m., construction spending for January and the manufacturing index for February.



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