Walmart’s Cashing In on the Occupy Movement

For $52 you can own a poster of the Occupy Wall Street encampment, courtesy of Walmart; police officers in Texas can get search warrants based on a future crime they somehow foresee; meanwhile, a group of editors is trying to correct varied translations on Wikipedia. These discoveries and more below.

On a regular basis, Truthdig brings you the news items and odds and ends that have found their way to Larry Gross, director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. A specialist in media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies.

Walmart Trying To Profit From Occupy Movement Walmart has a gift idea for 99 percent of the people on your Christmas list: posters of Occupy Wall Street.

Great Thoughts of Alan Dershowitz Esteemed advocate Alan Dershowitz says that Israel should ignore international law when deciding how to deal with Iran.

Interrogating the Network: The Year in Social Media Research Do comment sections build a bias against expertise? Do people remember Facebook posts? How much does news drive search, and vice versa? These are some of the most noteworthy findings in academic research in 2013.

Association’s Academic Boycott of Israel Sparks Controversy The American Studies Association’s vote in favor of an academic boycott of Israeli universities in protest of the Palestinian situation has drawn criticism from pro-Israeli activists, other academic groups, and even a former ASA president.

Marc McCord on How Dallas Was Saved From Frac’ing On December 11, the Dallas City Council passed America’s most restrictive hydraulic fracturing ordinance.

A ‘Duh’ Moment: Economists Wake Up To Income Inequality’s Damage For many of us on the ground, this feels a bit like the people in the ivory towers finally beginning to figure out the obvious thing that’s troubling the ant-like creatures they see far below.

Texas Police Can Now Obtain Search Warrants Based On ‘Prediction Of A Future Crime’ An appeals court in Texas ruled that police may obtain a search warrant based on the prediction of a future crime, heightening public fears that we may be heading toward a ‘predictive policing’ era in which we see police powers rapidly growing at the cost of our constitutional rights.

How’d Seattle Do It? Is there something in the water in Seattle? The area has seen dramatic actions by and on behalf of workers in the past few months: defeat of concessions at major grocery chains, Boeing workers’ big “no” vote on concessions, a $15 minimum wage voted in for airport workers, and election of a socialist to city council—a candidate who made a city $15 minimum the centerpiece of her campaign.

Couple Fights To Grow Vegetables In Front Yard It happened in Quebec, we watched it play out in Orlando, and now in the town of Miami Shores, Florida a retired architect named Hermine Ricketts and her husband Tom are fighting city officials who said they couldn’t grow vegetables in their own front yard.

Study Shows Google’s Dominance of Online Advertising The mobile Web browsing of three million people reveals how pervasive ad tracking technology is and shows that Google’s is dominant.

Wikipedia’s Secret Multilingual Workforce Wikipedia’s various language editions often carry entirely different content. Now one researcher has identified a small band of multilingual editors who are working to change that.

Ego Te Absurdo: Francis Is Advocate’s ‘Person Of The Year’ Let’s pretend there’s a person who works for a religious organization that fights LGBT rights across the globe.

Netanyahu’s Racist Regime and Its Pallid Collaborators Even if the PM pretends to be on the verge of signing a framework agreement, he must not be rescued by the center-left. Not for a second.