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Our Opinion: Public and police unite against a school threat These are the times we live in.On the same day a 15-year-old boy was charged with murder in a fatal shooting at Mount Tabor High School, an 18-year-old student was arrested in Jamestown after five Guilford County high schools had received violent threats on social media.In Winston-Salem, Maurice T. Evans Jr. appeared at a hearing in juvenile court Tuesday morning, where a judge denied a request by Evans’ attorney that he be released into the custody of his parents.Evans is accused of fatally shooting a Mount Tabor student, William Chavis Renard Miller Jr., outside a classroom on Sept. 1 and may be tried as an adult.The community remains shaken and unnerved by the incident, which we knew could happen anywhere but had hoped and prayed would not happen here.On Tuesday afternoon in High Point, a potential reprise of the tragedy at Mount Tabor was averted, thanks to quick responses by both the community and police.Acting on a variety of tips from parents, teachers, students and others, High Point police say they had identified a Southwest Guilford High School student, Kayshaun Williams, as the source of the threats by 11 p.m.…

Snapchat cut the payout amounts for creators’ viral videos in the Spotlight section because the program was producing too much “copycat content,” according to Snap CEO Evan Spiegel. Originally, Snapchat said it paid out more than $1 million per day to the top Spotlight contributors, allocated based on engagement with their content. Starting in June, the company reduced the amount it pays overall — to what the company characterized as millions of dollars per month — evidently leading some users to abandon Spotlight. According to Spiegel, speaking Wednesday at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia investor conference, one of the issues for Spotlight had been the homogeneity of the section’s videos: Users would see the winning content, he said, and “just make the same thing.” After changing the terms for the program to try to attract a greater diversity of content, Snap has seen record-high submissions to Spotlight, Spiegel claimed. The company is now focused on developing technology for “content understanding,” to determine at scale what makes a video compelling and to be able to recommend that to Snapchat users, Spiegel said. Spiegel said Spotlight, the TikTok-style user-contributed video section the app launched nearly a year ago, represents “the first time any…

TUSD Google Maps Tucson High School in Tucson, Ariz. Posted at 4:47 PM, Sep 22, 2021 and last updated 2021-09-22 21:36:43-04 TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — An investigation into a potential school threat at Tucson High Magnet School is underway.According to TUSD, the district is working alongside the Tucson Police Department to look into the threat that was posted on Snapchat.The photo appears to show writing on a bathroom wall claiming students should stay away from the school because there will be a shooting. TUSD officials tell KGUN 9 no threats were found written on the walls anywhere in the school. They say the school will have increased security on Thursday and Friday.Here's the full statement from the district: Tucson High has been working with TPD and TUSD School Safety to investigate a potential threat seen on Snapchat that was rumored to be coming from Tucson High Magnet School. At this time, there is no evidence to validate the threat, but the investigation remains in place. However, out of an abundance of caution, the Tucson High Administration has opted to have increased safety measures and a more visible presence of TUSD security on campus today and for the remainder of the…

The Laurens County School District said Tuesday that the sheriff’s office is now involved. DUBLIN, Ga. — A threat written on a bathroom wall in Laurens County has middle and high school parents concerned. According to parents, the threat said, “in three days, school shooting,” and a screenshot from Snapchat is making the rounds on social media. The Laurens County School District said Tuesday that the sheriff’s office is now involved. In a Facebook post, the district says they’re specifically looking at West Laurens Middle and High, but did not say which school had the message on the wall. Bethany Darden has a 15-year-old at the high school and she told 13MWAZ she’s keeping her daughter home and won’t be taking any chances. The school district is encouraging anyone with information to call the Laurens County Sheriff’s Office at 478-272-1522.

A Longview man arrested a charge of theft of a firearm is accused of posing with the gun on social media, according to court documents.Jaylon Jmikel Flamer, 18, was arrested this month on a warrant for theft of a firearm after an incident in July.According to court documents, police were dispatched July 19 to a residence on the 1200 block of H.G. Mosley Parkway for a call reporting a stolen firearm.A man reported that his Glock 22 pistol was stolen from his vehicle.“The victim stated that his 15-year-old son had friends over and that one of them stole the pistol,” court documents said. The son told police that Flamer had stolen the gun.“The victim’s son stated he had been showing (Flamer) the gun while they were standing around a truck in the driveway,” the arrest warrant said. “After handling the gun, (Flamer) put the gun in the driver door pocket and the victim’s son shut the door. The victim’s son walked into the house for a few moments, leaving the vehicle unlocked and unattended. While the victim’s son was in the house, (Flamer) opened the door to the truck and removed the firearm.”Flamer then left the residence, police said. When…

Photo by Matthew Modoono/Northeastern University News @ Northeastern Homepage Why does Instagram have a negative effect on teenagers’ mental health? 0% Rachel Rodgers is associate professor of applied psychology in the Bouvé College of Health Sciences at Northeastern. Photo by Adam Glanzman/Northeastern University Since at least March 2020, Facebook officials have known that Instagram—the photo-sharing app owned by Facebook, Inc.—has the power to make teenagers feel worse about their bodies, according to an internal report obtained by The Wall Street Journal. “Thirty-two percent of teen girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse,” Facebook researchers wrote in the presentation about the negative effects of Instagram, according to the Journal. The effect may have as much to do with the mechanics of the app itself as with its audience, says Rachel Rodgers, associate professor of applied psychology at Northeastern. The highly visual nature of social media platforms favored by younger people—TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram—put a social premium on appearance, says Rodgers, who studies sociocultural influences on body image and eating concerns. At the same time, the adolescents drawn to them are still developing their sense of identity. “It’s a bit like animals whose shells…

‘Your house is next’: Court hears footy star’s alleged Snapchat after stabbing A prominent Gympie sports star will stay behind bars indefinitely after failing to secure bail following the alleged violent stabbing of a prominent boxing coach at his family home There is more to this story But it’s a member-only story. Subscribe today to unlock it and more… ‘Your house is next’: Court hears footy star’s alleged Snapchat after stabbing A prominent Gympie sports star will stay behind bars indefinitely after failing to secure bail following the alleged violent stabbing of a prominent boxing coach at his family home Full Digital Access. $1 a week for the first 12 weeks. Min. cost $4. Conditions apply* Full Digital Access. $1 a week for the first 12 weeks. Min. cost $4. Conditions apply* Read every story on The Courier-Mail website and app Subscriber-only newsletters straight to your inbox The Rewards member benefits program App or digital edition only customer? To upgrade, call 1300 MY NEWS (696 397) Introductory Offer 12 Month Plan Full Digital Access Features Full Digital Access Features $1/WEEK For the first 12 weeks. $4 (min. cost) billed every 4 weeks. Then $28 billed every 4 weeks*. For the…

Facebook and Ray-Ban are now prime players in the smart glasses space. How do their glasses compare to Spectacles 3? Let's take a closer look. The Facebook / Ray-Ban Stories smart glasses have a lot of folks talking, but how do they compare to the very similar Spectacles 3 from Snapchat? The concept of smart glasses is still relatively young in the consumer tech space, though it's a niche that's quietly growing larger and larger with each day that passes. Amazon has the Echo Frames, Xiaomi's working on its own pair, and there are rumors of Apple diving into the market as well. Among all of them, Facebook and Snapchat stand out as two of the most interesting players. Snapchat's been dabbling with smart glasses ever since 2016 when it launched the original Spectacles. It refined its smart glasses a couple of years later in 2018 with Spectacles 2, followed by the most recent Spectacles 3 which launched in August 2019. By comparison, Facebook and Ray-Ban's Stories smart glasses are one of the most recent players in the field (officially launching in September 2021). There's been a lot of anticipation around Facebooks' first foray into smart glasses, so how well do they really compare…

| Zynga revealed this week they have a brand new mobile title on the way in partnership with Snapchat as we get a social deception game called ReVamp. This particular title is a vampire-themed game that will be the first social deception title on the social media platform, allowing Snapchatters their first chance to play a game tied to the growing genre. Right now the plan is to do a test release of the game in select markets to work out all the bugs, which they haven't revealed the list of markets just yet. But after that, the game will get a wider release for everyone to play. You can check out more info and the latest trailer below. Credit: Zynga ReVamp is a real-time multiplayer imposter game where players aim to reveal who the vampire player is among their group of friends while they renovate the rooms of an old mansion. In the game, human players must complete renovation tasks, such as demolition and building, to improve their chances of survival while identifying and defeating the vampire during the voting phase. Vampire players must avoid suspicion while picking off human players by completing a list of fake tasks throughout…

Instagram has had noticeable outages this year and we're not sure if it is because of the load created by the 1.386 billion users or the inadequate surveillance of such a hefty responsibility. A report from the Tool Tester confirmed users' suspicions. According to this report in the social media category, Instagram is ranking first in terms of the most outages.Tool Tester used data from Downdetector to find out the most internet outages. There were a lot of platforms subjected in this report with the main purpose of finding out which platform was on the top, and not to our surprise, it was Instagram. On the gaming front, we have Discord and Steam being on the top, even before Instagram.When looking at the number of outages, Instagram has suffered a total of 192 outages while Snapchat and Twitter are not even close. These outages were observed in the US as well as the UK. Snapchat observed a total of 48 outages while Twitter had 54 outages. While the rate should be even lower, it is better than the 192 on our favorite platform.It is quite astonishing how quickly Instagram managed to recover these without people noticing much or hindering the…