the westminster news
Published by the students of Westminster School
By James Beit ’22
It is a well-known fact that companies care most about their profits. It is the jungle law of the free market that directly encourages companies when left alone to monetize as much as their business as possible. Here, in the world of Big Tech, we see its consequence with the monetization of data to sell advertisements. There exist spreadsheets reported by some to contain your address, consumer preferences, job, and sexual orientation. All of this can be sold for pennies, usually to potential advertisers, however this data is valuable and if in the wrong hands can be used for much more sinister purposes. While it may be scary companies are the not only ones who track and keep this data. The National Security Agency (NSA) keeps massive logs and various blacklists of potential threats the scale of which we have only with Edward Snowden’s testimony about P.R.I.S.M By Alice Liu ’23
(Image Credit: Daily Express) A few weeks ago, WhatsApp announced an update for its terms of service and privacy policy. The new policy stated that users would have to allow Facebook and other businesses to collect their WhatsApp data, including users’ phone numbers, locations, and more. The policy would go into effect Feb. 8, 2021. Users would have to either accept the policy by then or opt-out of the platform. By Serin Lee ’22
Many of you may have heard of autoimmune diseases. Autoimmune diseases happen when your immune system overreacts and begins to attack your own body. Such instances as this include lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, and multiple sclerosis, among others. There is a class of immune diseases known as autoinflammatory diseases, which differs from the typical autoimmune diseases in that they are a malfunction of the innate immune system. For reference, the body’s immune system is divided into the innate and the adaptive immune systems, and the adaptive (a.k.a. acquired) immune system ‘learns’ the pathogens it should attack and produces antibodies for specific targeting. On the other hand, the innate immune system is more primitive and uses white blood cells and inflammation as its weapons. By Grace Yuan ’23
(Image Credit: The Economist Intelligence Unit.gif) The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic led to adverse global economic impacts (Huang et al. 2020). The outbreak greatly decreased the global demand for goods and affected supply chains, transportation, international trade, and tourism. How Taiwan dealt with the economic impact of COVID-19 is particularly striking. Taiwan primarily relies on tourism and manufacturing industries for its economy. Initial predictions classified the country as high-risk due to its geographic proximity to the pandemic’s epicenter, alluding to a high likelihood of economic instability. Yet, Taiwan’s economy has been resilient despite the economic constraints. By Sung Min Cho ‘22
It’s almost the end of Aquarius season, and at Westminster, the academic year is at its halfway point. The final stretch of the year poses exciting and challenging perennial traditions: exams, the Lawn Ceremony and Commencement; however, it is also the point at which students feel fully acclimated and involved in the workings of the Westminster community. As such, I sat down with Jaden Goodsell '23, a new Martlet, and fellow Memorial Hall resident, for a quick and “low-key” chat about his time at the school, especially with the changes posed by the pandemic. By Catie McGuigan ’23
(Image Credit: Seshu Photography) Through the second quarantine at Westminster, students entered the dorms with great hope for the upcoming Winter Trimester. By Aleyna Baki ’21
During the summer, every piece of news about the development of COVID-19 vaccines gave birth to seeds of hope. Nov. 9, 2020, there was finally hope when Pfizer/BioNTech — a partnership between a small German firm led by first-generation Turkish immigrants and an American multinational firm headed by a Greek CEO — made history by presenting data showing that their vaccine was 95 percent effective. When it came to buying and distributing these vaccines, it became obvious that hope was only a luxury of the rich world. By Keegan Bankoff ’22 and Ben Mihailovich ’22
(Image Credit: georgia.gov/Georgia's State Capitol in Downtown Atlanta) Several weeks ago, the United States Capitol was under attack by an angry mob of pro-Trump extremists. On that same day, Jan. 6, while Confederate flags and shirts that read 6MWE (6 Million Wasn’t Enough) were making their way through a sacred symbol of American democracy, an African-American and a Jewish man were elected to the senate. These newly appointed Senators, Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, will bring very unique traits to the Senate Chamber. By Sydney Schuster ’21
(Image Credits: businesstraveller.com, mymodernmet.com) Paris’ Champs-Elysées, best known for its towering Arc de Triomphe, and its massive Nike, Adidas, and Abecrombie stores, has been a place of celebration for Parisians for centuries: from France’s annual Bastille day to World Cup viewing parties. However, many Parisians and tourists alike have recently noted that the once sprawling promenade has been, to put it simply, “loved to death.” This remarkably wide street, originally built for the French royal family under, is today described by locals as ‘crowded,’ ‘dirty’ and ‘overarchingly unpleasant.’ By Catherine Rodrigues ’23
In recent news, Elon Musk, the establisher of Tesla and SpaceX, has surpassed Amazon’s CEO, Jeff Bezos as the world's richest person with an approximate net worth of $185 billion according to a BBC article titled, "Elon Musk becomes world's richest person as wealth tops $185bn". Jan. 7, Musk tweeted out to his supporters, asking for ways to "donate money that really makes a difference." Since then, he followed up with a tweet on Thursday that said, "Am donating $100M towards a prize for best carbon capture technology." |