About The times. (Gainesville, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 26, 2018)
She Srtncs gainesvilletimes com Monday, November 26, 2018 Nick Bowman Features Editor | 770-718-3426 | life@gainesvilletimes.com Photo courtesy of Dale Jaeger. The holly tree at the corner of Academy and Green streets in Gainesville is lit each year at Christmas on Green Street. Rotary, city work to bring holly to light AUSTIN STEELE I The Times BY AMBER TYNER atyner@gainesvilletimes.com Every year, Christmas on Green Street concludes with the lighting of a big tree in downtown Gainesville. The tree at the fork of Academy and Green streets isn’t the type you’d expect for a Christmas cel ebration. It’s not a spruce, a fir or a pine — it’s a native American holly tree. While the age of the tree is unknown, Dale Jaeger, landscape architect, said it’s been around for a long time. “It’s an extremely slow-growing tree,” she said. “So when you look at that trunk, you know because of the diameter that that’s a very old holly tree.” Jaeger is also a member of the Rotary Club of Gainesville, the organization that, along with the city, gets the tree ready for Christmas. “The city and the Rotary work together to get the lights put up,” she said, explaining that Rotary furnishes the lights while the city provides assistance with decorating. The tree is strung with multi colored LED lights each year and decorated with a star. “It’s an all-day thing, but they usually get it done in one day,” she said. “They try to get it done as quick as they can.” The Rotary Club also helps with officially lighting the tree, which it has done each year since the first ceremony in December 1982. “It’s just a tradition,” Jaeger said, explaining the group tries to involve the community at the event. She said the mayor of Gaines ville is always invited to light the tree. “They will count down from 10 to zero and then light the tree,” she said. “And then we also sing carols.” Rotary helps with the tree more than just at Christmas. They take care of it year-round and ensure it’s properly pruned. Christmas on Green Street When: 4:30-7:15 p.m. Dec. 2, with tree lighting at 7 Where: Green Street, Gainesville “We’re on a two-year schedule now with it,” she said about the pruning. “We prune it basically in the dead of winter, which is the best time.” She said they got on a regular maintenance schedule after the tree caught fire in 2009. “During the summer, one whole side of the tree burned,” she said. “Thank goodness they were able to put it out. But the tree, for that rea son, had lost its form and had been damaged. I’m a landscape archi tect, and when I realized the tree had had that damage, I suggested to the Rotary Club that we... have a more defined management, main tenance program for it.” Since then, the holly tree has been pruned five times, and the Rotary is planning for a sixth time this coming winter. “We got on that maintenance schedule just to keep it more healthy,” she said. “We use a woman who has a company called Fine Pruning, and her name is Anna Hauser. “Pruning is an art. You can’t just take a set of shears and go out there and whack at a tree. You have to think about where each cut is and how that cut is made in terms of the branch and the health of the tree.” And while the tree probably gets the most attention at Christ mas, Jaeger said it’s used for other causes throughout the year, too. “There are times during the year that various ribbons are put on the tree to recognize different community causes,” she said. Instagram takes the ax to fake likes and followers BY REX CRUM The Mercury News If you’re on Instagram, and you get a kick out of seeing new “likes” of your posts and getting new fol lowers you’ve never heard of, get ready to be disappointed. Those numbers may soon drop. As part of its ongoing efforts to secure its platform, Instagram says it has begun to remove what it calls “inauthentic” likes, followers and comments from the accounts of users that use third-party apps as a means of raising the popularity of their posts. The company said it was taking such steps in order to ensure the security of its commu nity guidelines and usage terms. “Every day people come to Ins tagram to have real experiences, including genuine interactions,” the company said. “It is our respon sibility to ensure these experiences aren’t disrupted by inauthentic activity.” Instagram said it is employing machine learning tools—artificial intelligence technology that lets computers “learn” from the data they receive without having to be reprogrammed — to identify and remove suspicious accounts. Any accounts that Instagram identifies as using the improper third-party apps will receive an in-app message telling them the inauthentic likes, follows and comments have been removed, then ask those users to secure their account by changing their password. Instagram’s move comes as its owner, Facebook, continues to deal with negative attention over how its platform has been used by political groups and other organi zations in order to influence public opinion on a variety of issues. Recently, Facebook said it removed 85 Instagram accounts it deemed to be engaged in “coordi nated inauthentic behavior” ahead of the Nov. 6 midterm elections.
