organization:university of southern california

A new deepfake detection tool should keep world leaders safe—for now - MIT Technology Review
▻https://www.technologyreview.com/s/613846/a-new-deepfake-detection-tool-should-keep-world-leaders-safefor-no

https://cdn.technologyreview.com/i/images/deepfake_0.jpg?cx=13&cy=743&cw=3182&ch=1790&sw1200

An AI-produced video could show Donald Trump saying or doing something extremely outrageous and inflammatory. It would be only too believable, and in a worst-case scenario it might sway an election, trigger violence in the streets, or spark an international armed conflict.

Fortunately, a new digital forensics technique promises to protect President Trump, other world leaders, and celebrities against such deepfakes—for the time being, at least. The new method uses machine learning to analyze a specific individual’s style of speech and movement, what the researchers call a “softbiometric signature.”

The team then used machine learning to distinguish the head and face movements that characterize the real person. These subtle signals—the way Bernie Sanders nods while saying a particular word, perhaps, or the way Trump smirks after a comeback—are not currently modeled by deepfake algorithms.

In experiments the technique was at least 92% accurate in spotting several variations of deepfakes, including face swaps and ones in which an impersonator is using a digital puppet. It was also able to deal with artifacts in the files that come from recompressing a video, which can confuse other detection techniques. The researchers plan to improve the technique by accounting for characteristics of a person’s speech as well. The research, which was presented at a computer vision conference in California this week, was funded by Google and DARPA, a research wing of the Pentagon. DARPA is funding a program to devise better detection techniques.

The problem facing world leaders (and everyone else) is that it has become ridiculously simple to generate video forgeries with artificial intelligence. False news reports, bogus social-media accounts, and doctored videos have already undermined political news coverage and discourse. Politicians are especially concerned that fake media could be used to sow misinformation during the 2020 presidential election.

Some tools for catching deepfake videos have been produced already, but forgers have quickly adapted. For example, for a while it was possible to spot a deepfake by tracking the speaker’s eye movements, which tended to be unnatural in deepfakes. Shortly after this method was identified, however, deepfake algorithms were tweaked to include better blinking.

“We are witnessing an arms race between digital manipulations and the ability to detect those, and the advancements of AI-based algorithms are catalyzing both sides,” says Hao Li, a professor at the University of Southern California who helped develop the new technique. For this reason, his team has not yet released the code behind the method .

Li says it will be particularly difficult for deepfake-makers to adapt to the new technique, but he concedes that they probably will eventually. “The next step to go around this form of detection would be to synthesize motions and behaviors based on prior observations of this particular person,” he says.

Li also says that as deepfakes get easier to use and more powerful, it may become necessary for everyone to consider protecting themselves. “Celebrities and political figures have been the main targets so far,” he says. “But I would not be surprised if in a year or two, artificial humans that look indistinguishable from real ones can be synthesized by any end user.”

#fake_news #Deepfake #Video #Détection

Women Once Ruled Computers. When Did the Valley Become Brotopia? - Bloomberg
▻https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-02-01/women-once-ruled-computers-when-did-the-valley-become-brotopia

https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/ilUXAqrodTt4/v0/1200x630.jpg

Lena Söderberg started out as just another Playboy centerfold. The 21-year-old Swedish model left her native Stockholm for Chicago because, as she would later say, she’d been swept up in “America fever.” In November 1972, Playboy returned her enthusiasm by featuring her under the name Lenna Sjööblom, in its signature spread. If Söderberg had followed the path of her predecessors, her image would have been briefly famous before gathering dust under the beds of teenage boys. But that particular photo of Lena would not fade into obscurity. Instead, her face would become as famous and recognizable as Mona Lisa’s—at least to everyone studying computer science.

In engineering circles, some refer to Lena as “the first lady of the internet.” Others see her as the industry’s original sin, the first step in Silicon Valley’s exclusion of women. Both views stem from an event that took place in 1973 at a University of Southern California computer lab, where a team of researchers was trying to turn physical photographs into digital bits. Their work would serve as a precursor to the JPEG, a widely used compression standard that allows large image files to be efficiently transferred between devices. The USC team needed to test their algorithms on suitable photos, and their search for the ideal test photo led them to Lena.
0718P_FEATURE_BROTOPIA_01
Lena

According to William Pratt, the lab’s co-founder, the group chose Lena’s portrait from a copy of Playboy that a student had brought into the lab. Pratt, now 80, tells me he saw nothing out of the ordinary about having a soft porn magazine in a university computer lab in 1973. “I said, ‘There are some pretty nice-looking pictures in there,’ ” he says. “And the grad students picked the one that was in the centerfold.” Lena’s spread, which featured the model wearing boots, a boa, a feathered hat, and nothing else, was attractive from a technical perspective because the photo included, according to Pratt, “lots of high-frequency detail that is difficult to code.”

Over the course of several years, Pratt’s team amassed a library of digital images; not all of them, of course, were from Playboy. The data set also included photos of a brightly colored mandrill, a rainbow of bell peppers, and several photos, all titled “Girl,” of fully clothed women. But the Lena photo was the one that researchers most frequently used. Over the next 45 years, her face and bare shoulder would serve as a benchmark for image-processing quality for the teams working on Apple Inc.’s iPhone camera, Google Images, and pretty much every other tech product having anything to do with photos. To this day, some engineers joke that if you want your image compression algorithm to make the grade, it had better perform well on Lena.

“We didn’t even think about those things at all when we were doing this,” Pratt says. “It was not sexist.” After all, he continues, no one could have been offended because there were no women in the classroom at the time. And thus began a half-century’s worth of buck-passing in which powerful men in the tech industry defended or ignored the exclusion of women on the grounds that they were already excluded .

Based on data they had gathered from the same sample of mostly male programmers, Cannon and Perry decided that happy software engineers shared one striking characteristic: They “don’t like people.” In their final report they concluded that programmers “dislike activities involving close personal interaction; they are generally more interested in things than in people.” There’s little evidence to suggest that antisocial people are more adept at math or computers. Unfortunately, there’s a wealth of evidence to suggest that if you set out to hire antisocial nerds, you’ll wind up hiring a lot more men than women.

Cannon and Perry’s work, as well as other personality tests that seem, in retrospect, designed to favor men over women, were used in large companies for decades, helping to create the pop culture trope of the male nerd and ensuring that computers wound up in the boys’ side of the toy aisle. They influenced not just the way companies hired programmers but also who was allowed to become a programmer in the first place.

In 1984, Apple released its iconic Super Bowl commercial showing a heroic young woman taking a sledgehammer to a depressing and dystopian world. It was a grand statement of resistance and freedom. Her image is accompanied by a voice-over intoning, “And you’ll see why 1984 won’t be like 1984.” The creation of this mythical female heroine also coincided with an exodus of women from technology. In a sense, Apple’s vision was right: The technology industry would never be like 1984 again. That year was the high point for women earning degrees in computer science, which peaked at 37 percent. As the number of overall computer science degrees picked back up during the dot-com boom, far more men than women filled those coveted seats. The percentage of women in the field would dramatically decline for the next two and a half decades.

Despite having hired and empowered some of the most accomplished women in the industry, Google hasn’t turned out to be all that different from its peers when it comes to measures of equality—which is to say, it’s not very good at all. In July 2017 the search engine disclosed that women accounted for just 31 percent of employees, 25 percent of leadership roles, and 20 percent of technical roles. That makes Google depressingly average among tech companies.

Even so, exactly zero of the 13 Alphabet company heads are women. To top it off, representatives from several coding education and pipeline feeder groups have told me that Google’s efforts to improve diversity appear to be more about seeking good publicity than enacting change. One noted that Facebook has been successfully poaching Google’s female engineers because of an “increasingly chauvinistic environment.”

Last year, the personality tests that helped push women out of the technology industry in the first place were given a sort of reboot by a young Google engineer named James Damore. In a memo that was first distributed among Google employees and later leaked to the press, Damore claimed that Google’s tepid diversity efforts were in fact an overreach. He argued that “biological” reasons, rather than bias, had caused men to be more likely to be hired and promoted at Google than women.

#Féminisme #Informatique #Histoire_numérique

Norman Finkelstein, 2 jours avant le début des manifestations de Gaza:
►https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/hopeless-in-gaza-a-talk-with-scholar-norman-finkelstein

“The nadir of the Palestinian struggle is now,” says distinguished but controversial scholar Norman G. Finkelstein. He spoke on March 26 at the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. “Nothing is happening there in Palestine. There is no mass resistance.”

Aujourd’hui:
Something Is Happening in #Gaza! (Stay tuned) - Norman G. Finkelstein
▻http://normanfinkelstein.com/2018/04/05/something-is-happening-in-gaza-stay-tuned

Many to this website have wondered why I am missing in action. Rest assured, I’m not. I am working 24/7 to make this mass nonviolent resistance succeed.

The Princeton Review reveals the best schools in the world for game design
▻https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-03-13-the-princeton-review-reveals-the-best-schools-in-america-f

University of Southern California and the Southern Methodist University ranked top for the second year in a row

#Education

Antonio Damasio Tells Us Why Pain Is Necessary - Issue 56 : Perspective
▻http://nautil.us/issue/56/perspective/antonio-damasio-tells-us-why-pain-is-necessary

http://static.nautil.us/14067_f4cfab7920e9cb176ab3b4e324d85f63.png

Following Oliver Sacks, Antonio Damasio may be the neuroscientist whose popular books have done the most to inform readers about the biological machinery in our heads, how it generates thoughts and emotions, creates a self to cling to, and a sense of transcendence to escape by. But since he published Descartes’ Error in 1994, Damasio has been concerned that a central thesis in his books, that brains don’t define us, has been muted by research that states how much they do. To Damasio’s dismay, the view of the human brain as a computer, the command center of the body, has become lodged in popular culture. In his new book, The Strange Order of Things, Damasio, a professor of neuroscience and the director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California, mounts (...)

Reçu via la mailing-list geotamtam

Bâillonner les universitaires

Bonjour,
Dans l’affaire de #censure politique de Jacques Sapir par la coupole d’#OpenEdition, depuis le 26 septembre, le silence des universitaires et de leurs associations et syndicats, depuis trois semaines, est impressionnant. A quelques exceptions près : ▻http://libertescheries.blogspot.fr/2017/09/menace-sur-la-pensee-libre-le-blog-de.html
Dans l’affaire certes plus récente de censure, d’un autre type, mais tout aussi politique du colloque sur l’islamophobie à Lyon 2, les réactions de la communauté universitaire et de ses syndicats, sur le plan national, se fait encore cruellement attendre : ►https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/france/051017/un-colloque-universitaire-sur-l-islamophobie-annule-sous-la-pression
La somme des lâchetés individuelles risque de se payer collectivement... au prix fort !
Voici, la suite de l’histoire, au concret dans un établissement malheureusement toujours pionnier sur beaucoup de domaines : une procédure générale de subordination de toute expression publique des enseignants-chercheurs ainsi soumis au bon vouloir des services centraux de communication et du président de l’université de Strasbourg. Elle a fait, avant-hier, l’objet d’une lettre du président à l’ensemble de l’université que vous trouverez ci-dessous (après mon message) et d’un document de procédure que vous trouverez ci-joint (en PDF) ; lisez le, vraiment, c’est édifiant !
Naturellement, cette procédure porte atteinte à l’indépendance des enseignants-chercheurs et l’on retrouve la question que je viens de poser aux collègues membres du comité scientifique d’OpenEdition : ►http://rumor.hypotheses.org/4121/comment-page-1#comment-105984
« Chers membres du comité scientifique d’Openedition, que pensez-vous de ces « opinions » qui s’expriment à votre sujet dans nos textes normatifs et instances républicaines : la Convention européenne des droits l’homme prescrivant, selon la jurisprudence de la Cour, « la possibilité pour les universitaires d’exprimer librement leurs opinions, fussent-elles polémiques ou impopulaires, dans les domaines relevant de leurs recherches, de leur expertise professionnelle et de leur compétence » (CEDH 27 mai 2014 n°346/04 et 39779/04) ; les principes fondamentaux reconnus par les lois de la république, dont celui de l’indépendance des universitaires, selon la jurisprudence du Conseil Constitutionnel français (CC n° 83-165 DC du 20 janvier 1984 et n° 94-355 du 10 janvier 1995) ; l’article L.111-1/al. 4 du Code de la propriété intellectuelle qui déroge, pour les universitaires, au statut général de la fonction publique ; l’article L.411-3 du code de la recherche qui protège l’autonomie de la démarche scientifique ; les articles L.123-9, L.141-6, L.952-2 du code de l’éducation qui rappellent une norme d’indépendance et de liberté d’expression des enseignants, chercheurs et enseignants-chercheurs ? »
J’attends leur réponse en ligne... mais en attendant, il faut bien reconnaître que ce qui est arrivé à Strasbourg est le point d’aboutissement logique d’une histoire déjà longue... même en la considérant dans sa brève temporalité des derniers mois :
Février 2016 : procès contre Bernard Mezzadri, au motif de ce que l’on pourrait appeler un "crime de lèse-majesté", par raillerie, contre le premier ministre Valls ; le parquet et l’université d’Avignon, partie civile (sans autorisation du CA), sont déboutés (mais celui qui était président de l’université au moment des faits, 27 mai 2015, est nommé Recteur par le gouvernement Valls, en décembre 2015) : ►https://blogs.mediapart.fr/pascal-maillard/blog/180216/relaxe-de-bernard-mezzadri-reaction-de-l-universitaire-et-analyse-de
Décembre 2016 : déclarations de la présidente de la région d’Ile-de-France annonçant son refus de financer les études sur le genre, les inégalités et les discriminations ; comme le titre Libération : « Valérie Pécresse coupe les bourses aux études de genre », Libération, 15.12.2016 ; cette décision interrompt les finances des thèses de doctorats et des recherches professionnelles sur ce domaine du genre et plus largement de l’intersectionnalité (cf. ci-après) : ▻http://www.liberation.fr/direct/element/valerie-pecresse-coupe-les-bourses-aux-etudes-de-genre_54010
Janvier 2017 : décision politico-administrative de la direction de Science Po Paris d’interdire la conférence d’un chercheur sur la Russie de Poutine et ses relations avec les activités terroristes par crainte de retombées négatives pour l’établissement dans ses relations universitaires avec ce pays ; c’est précisément l’argument de "l’image de l’établissement" qui est aujourd’hui utilisé par les dirigeants de l’Université de Strasbourg ; cf. « Sciences Po annule une conférence sur la Russie de Poutine », Le Monde, 31.01.2017 : ▻http://www.lemonde.fr/campus/article/2017/02/01/sciences-po-annule-une-conference-sur-la-russie-de-poutine_5072473_4401467.h
Mai 2017 : menaces politiques contre un colloque en Ile de France sur l’intersectionnalité dans les recherches en éducation, intersectionnalité des imbrications classe/race/genre qui n’est plus bon chic bon genre depuis la décision de Valérie Pécresse : suivies de blocages administratifs rectoraux visant à l’annulation pour motifs de troubles à l’ordre public, puis contournement des blocages par réorganisation différente et restreinte du colloque sous haute protection policière ; voir à ce sujet l’analyse de Didier Fassin : ►http://bibliobs.nouvelobs.com/idees/20170518.OBS9602/comment-un-colloque-sur-l-intersectionnalite-a-failli-etre-censu
Septembre 2017 : censure politique de Jacques Sapir par la coupole d’OpenEdition, fermeture du blog, depuis le 26 septembre 2017 au motif, comme dans l’affaire Mezzadri, de ce que l’on peut appeler un "crime de lèse majesté" à l’encontre du président Macron, pour lui avoir donné leçon notamment sur le concept de laïcité (dernier billet avant censure du blog) et aussi de l’image très "scientifique" de la plateforme de blogs (!) un peu comme l’image de l’université à Strasbourg ; voir par exemple le débat en cours dans la blogosphère notamment ici : ►http://rumor.hypotheses.org/4121/comment-page-1#comment-105984 et là (surtout dans les commentaires après le mauvais billet) : ►http://affordance.typepad.com//mon_weblog/2017/09/hypothese-sapir-en-pire-.html
Octobre 2017 : fin de la procédure judiciaire dans le cadre d’une "procédure-baillon" intentée par l’entreprise Chimirec contre Denis Mazeaud, professeur de droit commentant dans une revue scientifique, une décision de justice... certes la justice lui donne raison, mais comme le remarque P.Robert-Diard (Le Monde) : "La vigilance des juges face à ce type de procédures ne rassure toutefois pas complètement les universitaires. Comme le soulignait le professeur de droit Denis Mazeaud en février 2017 dans la revue La Gazette du Palais au lendemain du jugement de relaxe deLaurent Neyret, « ce qui doit retenir l’attention, c’est le message subliminal adressé à tous les enseignants-chercheurs qui n’ont pas peur de déranger, de s’engager, de faire leur métier (...) et d’exprimer leurs opinions sans concession en toute liberté et en parfaite indépendance. Attention, leur est-il dit, il pourrait vous en coûter très cher et pas seulement en frais d’avocat ! »" : ▻http://sociologuesdusuperieur.org/article/procedures-baillons-la-cour-dappel-de-paris-au-soutien-de-la
Octobre 2017 : ... menaces politiques contre un colloque sur l’islamophobie à Lyon 2 ; sous la pression de l’extrême droite... là c’est plus simple : le colloque a été purement et simplement annulé : ►https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/france/051017/un-colloque-universitaire-sur-l-islamophobie-annule-sous-la-pression
5 Octobre 2017 : procédure générale de subordination de toute expression publique des enseignants-chercheurs de l’université de Strasbourg, ainsi soumis au bon vouloir des services centraux de communication et du président de l’université de Strasbourg. Elle a fait, ce 5 octobre, l’objet d’une lettre du président à l’ensemble de l’université (ci-dessous) et d’un document de procédure édifiant (ci-joint en PDF) ! Plus aucune communication avec les journalistes sans prévenir 10 jours avant le Service de la communication, le Directeur de la composante, le Correspondant communication de la composante et obtenir leurs accords ou à J-2 de la "date prévisionnelle" ! CQFD
S’agissante de l’analyse juridique de cette note de service à l’université de Strasbourg, je ne peux que dupliquer l’analyse faite sur une autre note de service, d’un autre établissement et à un autre sujet, mais équivalente sur le plan juridique, dans un article récent ( d’ailleurs hautement scientifique puisqu’il est publié sur OpenEdition ! ...dans Rfsic-11 : ▻http://rfsic.revues.org/3194#tocto2n4 )
"24 - Il s’agit d’une note de service qui, sur le plan juridique, comme le rappel le « Guide de légistique » publié par la Documentation Française et le site de Légifrance29, a la même valeur qu’une circulaire : « Sous des appellations diverses - circulaires, directives, notes de service, instructions, etc. - les administrations communiquent avec leurs agents et les usagers pour exposer les principes d’une politique, fixer les règles de fonctionnement des services et commenter ou orienter l’application des lois et règlements. Si le terme « circulaire » est le plus souvent employé, la dénomination de ces documents qui suivent un régime juridique principalement déterminé par leur contenu n’a par elle-même aucune incidence juridique : une « circulaire » n’a ni plus ni moins de valeur qu’une « note de service ». ».
25 - Or, ajoute le même guide « une circulaire peut être déférée au juge administratif, y compris lorsqu’elle se borne à interpréter la législation ou la réglementation, dès lors que les dispositions qu’elle comporte présentent un caractère impératif (CE, Sect., 18 décembre 2002, Mme Duvignères, n° 233618), ce qui est le plus fréquemment le cas. Le juge censure alors – c’est le motif le plus fréquent de censure – celles de ces dispositions que le ministre n’était pas compétent pour prendre, non seulement lorsque la circulaire comprend des instructions contraires au droit en vigueur, mais aussi lorsqu’elle ajoute des règles nouvelles. » (nous soulignons). Ce qui vaut pour un ministre valant pour un directeur d’établissement public, et le caractère impératif dans le cas de cette note étant explicite, la conclusion paraît évidente : la création d’une norme d’obligation dans cette note devrait être jugée illégale, mais l’illégalité ne pourra être constatée par le juge administratif que s’il est saisi…"
En faudra-t-il davantage pour que les universitaires renoncent individuellement et collectivement à la stratégie de la tortue ? ... que les sociétés savantes, les associations professionnelles, les syndicats du secteur, les revues scientifiques, les composantes d’universités s’expriment ?

La suite de l’histoire le dira...
Bien cordialement,
Jérôme Valluy
PS : ce message est public, merci de le retransmettre sur toutes les listes de diffusions, blogs et réseaux sociaux que vous souhaitez informer...
–----------------------------------------
De : <president@unistra.fr>
Objet : Nouvelle procédure pour les relations avec la presse de l’Université de Strasbourg
Date : 5 octobre 2017 11:15:09 UTC+2
À : <congresuniversite@unistra.fr>, <dir-comp@unistra.fr>, <dir-labo@unistra.fr>
Répondre à : <president@unistra.fr>

Chers et chères collègues,
Mesdames et Messieurs,

L’impact médiatique d’un événement, d’une action, d’une prise de position par un membre de la communauté universitaire dans la presse peut avoir des conséquences importantes sur l’image générale de l’université, positivement ou négativement.
C’est pourquoi le service communication a formalisé une procédure relative aux relations presse, que je vous adresse aujourd’hui. Cette démarche fait suite à l’une des recommandations de l’audit consacré à la fonction communication, qui préconise que le cabinet de la présidence et le service communication soient a minima informés de toute démarche en direction de la presse, ce qui permettra aussi de mieux suivre et repérer les retombées presse générées par ces actions.
Cette procédure explique très clairement, en fonction des situations, comment procéder et quelle aide le service communication est en mesure de vous apporter.
Merci d’accorder à cette nouvelle procédure toute l’attention nécessaire et d’informer vos collègues et collaborateurs de son existence et de la nécessité de la mettre en œuvre.
Très cordialement,
Michel Deneken
Président de l’Université de Strasbourg
Cabinet de la Présidence
4 rue Blaise Pascal
CS 90032
67081 Strasbourg Cedex
<▻http://www.unistra.fr>

#université #liberté_académique #liberté_d'expression

The one thing rich parents do for their kids that makes all the difference
▻https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/05/10/the-incredible-impact-of-rich-parents-fighting-to-live-by-the-very-b

Wealthy parents are famously pouring more and more into their children, widening the gap in who has access to piano lessons and math tutors and French language camp. The biggest investment the rich can make in their kids, though — one with equally profound consequences for the poor — has less to do with “enrichment” than real estate.

They can buy their children pricey homes in nice neighborhoods with good school districts.

“Forty to fifty years of social-science research tells us what an important context neighborhoods are, so buying a neighborhood is probably one of the most important things you can do for your kid,” says Ann Owens, a sociologist at the University of Southern California. “There’s mixed evidence on whether buying all this other stuff matters, to0. But buying a neighborhood basically provides huge advantages.”

Bridging the Gap Between Leadership and Management - gCaptain
▻https://gcaptain.com/bridging-gap-leadership-management

“Management is getting people to do what needs to be done. Leadership is getting people to want to do what needs to be done. Managers push. Leaders pull. Managers command. Leaders communicate.”
Warren Bennis, Professor of Business Administration at the University of Southern California.

Sometimes management becomes the overall focus for crewing. Management is an easier metric to track. Management fits into spreadsheets – meetings are held, deadlines are met, maintenance is done, schedules are followed. Management is clean, neat and easy.

Leadership is not so easy to track. It more difficult to rate how motivated the team is, how happy they are in their work, and how well they are getting along together.

There exists Leadership that lacks Management, and Management that lacks Leadership. Imagine working with a team where everyone is excited to be loading the first cargo, but the management is lacking… No one knows what needs to be done, or who is doing what first… nothing is organized, the equipment that was needed hadn’t been ordered…. This is a disaster of management.

On the other side exists the disaster of leadership – the team hates their jobs, and all the people they are working with… they undermine each other, don’t teach or care about each other – but at least they have a schedule to keep to – Neither situation is a good one.

Avec l’exemple mythique de #Shackelton

AARP and AARP Foundation Fraudulent Profile of Director Barbara O’Connor of California Emerging Technology Fund (TLR Note:AARP, CETF, McPeak, English, O’Connor, Lucas and others mislead by intentionally withholding O’Connor part of Lucas Public Affairs)

AARP Home » Foundation » About Us »Barbara O’Connor
Barbara O’Connor
AARP Affiliated Foundation board member

from: AARP Foundation | June 6, 2012

Barbara O’Connor, Ph.D., of Sacramento, Calif., was elected to the AARP Board in 2010. She serves on the Audit and Finance Committee and is on the Insurance Trust.

She is a former professor of communication studies and director of the Institute for the Study of Politics and Media, California State University, Sacramento. Previously, she was assistant director of debate, University of Southern California, a summer debate instructor, Georgetown University, and a design consultant, Cablevision Systems, New Jersey. She has been chairperson and founding board member of the Alliance for Public Technology; a board member and officer, California Emerging Technology Fund; a member of the Bellcore Advisory Board; and a member of the Federal Communication Commission’s Network Reliability Council. She chaired the California Educational Technology Commission, the California Public Broadcasting Commission, the CEO Task Force on Digital Literacy and the International Council on Information Communication Technology.

Source: ►http://www.aarp.org/aarp-foundation/about-us/info-06-2012/barbara-oconnor-board-member.html

AARP Leadership Profile:

Life Perspectives

"I grew up in West Texas, raised by a single mother. I was a first-generation college graduate. So I’ve lived through lots of what our members are living through.

"Communications and politics have really been my longstanding interests, including technology access and equity, disabled rights, communication strategies and social movement building. I have a political background, and I started a public radio station in Sacramento and ran it for a while. We now have six radio stations there, the Capital Public Radio Network.

"I have taught mostly technology policy and technology evolution — the hardware stuff. I also teach political communications and the impact of messaging on social movement formation.

"I was fortunate enough to go to the Annenberg School at the University of Southern California, which is very geeky, so I was able to keep up with technology as it evolved. I chaired the California Public Broadcasting Commission, and I’m now an officer and director of the California Emerging Technology Fund.

“AARP provides me an opportunity to do tele-health, to deal with issues of getting the 50-plus generation online. I get to help people who are unemployed at 50, using the Web. So being part of the AARP board is really a wonderful synergy of my interests and the organization’s interests….”

"It’s getting more and more difficult to find a center in American politics. Part of it is the media’s fault. The news hole, in both broadcast and in print, has really been reduced. The downsizing and the mergers and acquisitions that have gone on in the media world have really done a disservice to public policy discussion. It’s made the media more event- and scandal-chasing — the lowest common denominator.

"In political campaigns, it’s 30-second spots. So it’s no surprise that the public has fatigue about dealing with politicians. Every poll in America shows that they are held in very low esteem.

"We can’t return to retail politics because we have the technology and everyone is used to using it. But longer formats, discussions, call-ins, coherent talk would be welcome. Certainly, AARP’s members would welcome that to address their concerns about big things such as Social Security.

"AARP is nonpartisan, and ours is a trusted voice. We have to provide the voice of reason in these debates, so that it’s not a partisan political discussion, but really a rational, practical discussion.

"People really do care about the issues that we work on. They’re central to their lives. We have to find a coherent solution to intractable problems.

"We need to be very heavily data-driven. I think we do that, by the way. I think staff and our board are the best. And our volunteers are terrific. So I’m optimistic, actually.

"A big part of our job as board members is to listen. You don’t let your own biases govern what you do. I have to listen to what the data says and to what members are telling me.

“So if you’re data-driven and you really do listen to the members tell you what their issues are — and we have very good organs of information that help us with that, by the way, in the organization — then you can find consensus.”

Expertise

Politics, communications, debate, telecommunications policy, digital divide, senior health, tele-health, digital literacy, education technology.

Education

Ph.D., communications, University of Southern California, Annenberg School of Communications; M.A., communications, California State University, Northridge; B.A., communications, California State University, Northridge; A.A., history, Los Angeles Valley College.

Experience

Currently, professor of communication and director of the Institute for the Study of Politics and Media, California State University, Sacramento. Previously, assistant director of debate, University of Southern California; summer debate instructor, Georgetown University; design consultant, Cablevision Systems, New Jersey.

Volunteer experience

Boards: Serves on AARP Board’s Audit and Finance Committee and the AARP Insurance Trust. Formerly, chairperson and founding board member, The Alliance for Public Technology; board member and officer, California Emerging Technology Fund; member, Bellcore Advisory Board.

Other: Formerly, presidential debate judge, Washington Bureau, Associated Press; chair and commission member, California Public Broadcasting Commission (governor’s appointee); commission member, Federal Communication Commission, Network Reliability Council; chair, California Educational technology commission; chair, CEO Task Force on Digital Literacy; chair, International Council on Information Communication Technology; among many others.

Honors

Received a Lifetime Community Service Award, an outstanding teaching award, and the Alumni Association’s Distinguished Professor Award from California State University, Sacramento. Received a Technology Pioneer Award from the Alliance for Public Technology; a Technology Leadership Award from Computer Using Educators. Named among 50 for the Future by Newsweek magazine.

Source: ►http://www.aarp.org/about-aarp/leadership/info-2010/barbara_oconnor.html

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Lucas Public Affairs is a California-based strategic consulting, public relations, and communications firm. Located in Sacramento, C.A., Lucas Public Affairs was founded in 2006 by Donna Lucas, who is the firm’s CEO and President. The firm’s clients come from a myriad of industries including energy, sports and entertainment, transportation, natural resources, health care, business and finance, tourism and education.[2] The firm also offers services in the following practice areas: Strategic Communications, Crisis Communications, Issue & Reputation Management, Government Relations, Media, and Social Media

Source: ►http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucas_Public_Affairs

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June 15, 2011
Barbara O’Connor joins Lucas Public Affairs as senior counsel

Barbara O’Connor, a longtime Sacramento college professor and expert in political communications, has joined Lucas Public Affairs, the firm announced today.

O’Connor will provide strategic guidance for the Sacramento-based public relations firm, which serves clients in the fields of energy, sports, entertainment, insurance, local government, education, health care and other fields. Her title will be senior counsel.

“Barbara’s ongoing relationships with the California press corps, academic community, and national and statewide opinion leaders and policymakers make her a major asset to our team,” said Donna Lucas, president and chief executive officer, in a written statement.

O’Connor also released a statement, saying, “I’m excited about partnering with everyone at Lucas Public Affairs. The issues are interesting and challenging. I’m looking forward to adding to the mix. I know I’m going to learn a lot.”

Source: ►http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2011/06/barbara-oconnor-joins-lucas-pu.html

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SACRAMENTO, CA - Lucas Public Affairs, one of California’s top strategic communications firms, today announced the addition of Dr. Barbara O’Connor, Emeritus Professor at Sacramento State University, to its growing team.

"Dr. O’Connor will be serving as senior counsel to the firm, offering her experience and expertise on some of the firm’s top clients.

A nationally recognized expert in the field of political communications, Dr. O’Connor will provide strategic guidance on some of the most complex issues that Lucas Public Affairs’ clients face.

“I am thrilled that Barbara is joining our team. She is results-based and has a respected reputation – qualities that make her a perfect addition to the firm,” said Donna Lucas, CEO and President of Lucas Public Affairs. “Her years of experience and knowledge of California and her continued role in providing strategic counsel to many national organizations and media outlets will be of tremendous value as we help our clients navigate through challenges and achieve their business goals.”

O’Connor — formerly a professor at Sacramento State University and director of the university’s Institute for the Study of Politics and Media — has over 43 years of experience teaching and in research.

Besides Sacramento State, she has taught at Georgetown and USC where she was the assistant director of debate. She currently sits on the National Board of the American Association of Retired Persons. O’Connor has previously served as a consultant to McClatchy Newspapers, the Boston Globe Media Properties, the Tribune Company, the Washington Bureau of the Associated Press, the California Legislature, the United States Congress and the Federal Communications Commission.

“I’m excited about partnering with everyone at Lucas Public Affairs. The issues are interesting and challenging,” O’Connor said. “I’m looking forward to adding to the mix. I know I’m going to learn a lot.”

“Barbara’s ongoing relationships with the California press corps, academic community and national and statewide opinion leaders and policymakers make her a major asset to our team,” said Lucas.

Last year, the firm announced the promotions of Justin Knighten, Rachel Huberman and Annie Han and the addition of seasoned media strategist Beth Willon.

Led by Lucas, founder of the firm and one of the nation’s foremost public affairs strategists, Lucas Public Affairs’ existing team includes: public affairs experts Julie Marengo, Senior Vice President, and Jessica Spitz Biller, Vice President—who together have a combined 30+ years of experience managing complex and multi-faceted communications programs for a host of clients and issues; Beth Willon, Senior Account Supervisor & Media Specialist; Justin Knighten, Account Executive; Emilie Cameron, Account Coordinator; Rachel Huberman, Account Coordinator; and Annie Han, Executive Assistant.

Source: ►http://www.lucaspublicaffairs.com/lpa/index.cfm/news/dr-barbara-oe28099connor-joins-lucas-public-affairs

Read more here: ►http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2011/06/barbara-oconnor-joins-lucas-pu.html#storylink=cpy