Category Archives: IT

May 23, 2022 · 19:19

Increasingly Pretentious

Yes, that happens, and that is how some see others. The first group does that out of envy, they do not understand what they are confronted with and as such they ridicule it. Their belief is that their biggest asset is between their legs and the fact that their wives/partners disagree is lost on them, hence the adultery rates. The second group is different. They know they are looking at something new, but they cannot concur the percentages, or the revenue from these innovations. That group is more interesting. They can add to my ideas, they can add to my considerations, their objections are food for the soul and food for the evolution of IP. To ignore that group is beyond stupid, it is worse than pretentious, it is dangerous. The second group might not be right, but they come with their own wagons of experience and as such they should be listened to. Listening does not mean adhering. Listening does not mean (but could mean) changing the IP. A person that sets its IP blindly into concrete will loose a lot more than the IP. 

And that is where I find myself, three bundles of IP, one bundle holding media IP and I added to that last night, or better stated. I am still adding to this. There are a few items I discussed two days ago, but last night a new part started to be added to this. The problem is that I am all sixes and sevens (the other numbers are to be added later) whether this is a new game, or a new movie. It could go either way and there the fault comes into play, or so I think. You see they used to have very different stages and were not interchangeable and that is about to take another turn. The question becomes do you d one, the other or both? And there lies the setting. This is perhaps the first game that cannot be set to consoles. The solution becomes too large. It is also a setting where game IP and movie IP becomes close to indistinguishable. No matter how we want to twist and turn, how much some want to maximise money be keeping them apart. The streaming solutions are done with that greed driven stage, and there is every chance that this puts the Netflix solution a little ahead of the others, in this Amazon can fight back and keep its niche and overlap with Netflix, but it is anyones guess how the Google Stadia will take it. Not technologically, they are on par, but with games and movies the other two will have an advantage, no doubt about that. So what is the new IP?

Consider the stage of a game, almost any game. Now consider that this game has a cutscene. Now consider that the cutscene is not a cutscene, but a playable part of the game and as we go through the game, we can alter from ‘game play’ to cut scenes at the mere push of a button, anywhere in the game. Not only does it change the game, it changes the nature of gaming and weirdly enough, the one with the largest advantage here is Ubisoft. Yes, I have hit them more often than anyone else, but they also have had their moments and in this, the way they did their AC and Watchdogs games, they might just have the playing field here. This is an evolution that is waiting to happen. The nature of gaming evolves or we go under replaying the past again and again. Weirdly enough it were the Dutch that started this thought. You see the two Horizon games have something in common. They are utterly unique, the world they created had never been done before. With the additional thoughts I had on the Citadel as well as Mass Effect 4 and 5 game more and more of this IP to the forefront of my mind. Yet I am placing it here. Why? Because an innovation like this cannot be maintained by one person, no ones greed should allow for this and making it public domain in this blog opens the doors for all kinds of players to recede the waters of the old and create the waves of tomorrow. I would love that Sony and their PS5 would be on front of it all, but in the end this will most likely be a new frontier, one played by the streamers in the leading roles. A first setting where computers and consoles can no longer  keep up. We are reaching the age of the streamers and again there are three players (four if you consider Microsoft). This is not something that happens in a day, this will take the technology and IP of all players. And it is here where Ubisoft has the field advantage. 

So is this a set of Increasingly Pretentious idea’s? Is this innovation for a new day after tomorrow? Time will tell, but there is no holding back, I am not ridding this for a pretty penny, there is too much at stake, I merely hope that Netflix takes up the baton and take this future to heart and become one of the top three consoles (I am happy to see Microsoft in an eternal 4th position).

The largest systems will come at a larger stage and this step is essential for a few other sides that evolve from this. Evolution is essential, especially in gaming. In the 90’s technology evolved because gaming kept pushing. We need to return to those days and push the next two decades ahead, not when some business graduate tells you it is more effective that way. It reduces you to the iteration stage and the bosses of tomorrow are the ones pushing innovation. Should you doubt me, consider Horizon Zero Dawn with over 20,000,000 copies sold, a feat that its successor has not equalled because there are not enough PS5’s available, but they will get there, slamming pretty much every other game for the numbers. That is the impact of innovation in gaming and streaming will have its own innovation and that will require a national 5G, but more important we need to start now, if they start when the national 5G is out, it will be too late for those beginning then. Those who did prepare will become the rulers of gaming stream land. 

That is how I see it and there is every chance that I am wrong, yet the stage of innovation needs to be adhered to and respected. The dangerous setting of gaming that it is up to business people (those less likely to comprehend games) is folly to say the least. So will this lead to a new commodore 64, or another colecovision (1982)? I can make whatever claim I like, but that will not mean it is correct and I feel being correct is more important than anyones ego, even my own.

Leave a comment

Filed under Gaming, IT, Science

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 21, 2022 · 15:21

Feeling confused

Well, there are two things, the first is that I got a workable idea to a final twist in ‘Exhaurire vitam’ the mini series that predominantly plays in New Orleans. There are a few scenes in other places, but the bulk is there. There are a few more issues that I uncovered in ‘How to assassinate a politician’, as such I have it close to ready, a movie and a mini series. Then there was the series ‘Kenos Diastima’, I have been tossing and turning on that and I feel that leaving it (for now) with an open ending at season three is the best way to go. Then I got another idea, this one was initially for ‘Exhaurire vitam’, yet the new series (the one I talked about a few times), has more traction with it and it opens up a nice can of worms. You see, the gods are all over all places, so there much have been some dependency. So what happens when one of them is in debt, or better stated, what happens when the debt was opened to a new source? That was the setting I contemplated on the subway. As such the main character would be open to all kinds of other things. That was the setting my mind worked on. And as I contemplated what could be possible when Bastet is thrown in the mix, the equation changed and that has long repercussions, not bad ones, but unforeseen ones and that tends to be good, because the unforeseen brings more than a surprise or a plot twist, it gives the story a new direction and I am all about that. But in part I have no idea why the images are coming to me so rapidly and so directly, that is the part that has me confused. It is like your brain playing some year at Hogwarts and you create the setting, but you never created the stage. In this example we all know it is J.K. Rowling. But the stage I create is new, has never ben contemplated, or written about. I have no idea where it all is coming from, so for now I follow the thoughts and create more stories and optionally more scripts. And I have no idea where it all goes. Even as I seek the implementation of Saudi TV in the movie, I wonder where it will end. So whilst I get that “Bryan Fogel says Netflix, Amazon and others wouldn’t buy ‘The Dissident’ because they were scared of angering Saudi Arabia” my story does EXACTLY the opposite and as such might be loved there, what I do not get is why not more are considering that step. In the end, good business is where you find it and basically I found it. 3 TV series, one movie, a game, console settings and the evolution to another 50 million consoles and beyond that I reengineered several Ubisoft games and created several 5G IP. Not bad for one person in less than 5 years. So if you are wondering what stops others doing the same, I have no idea. But I do believe that they are all looking in the wrong direction and I feel that more and more of that is proven. But the confusion stays. What if this is all between my ears? I do not believe that this is so, but if you cannot look at it from opposition from a distance than it means you have gone bonkers, have gone round the bend. Oh, and I also designed a weapon to get rid of the Iranian navy, so there (and that part is already online). But the confusion stays. I have no idea what is driving this all. Perhaps a last knee jerk action by the brain before it stops? Your guess is as good as mine, I am honestly clueless.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Gaming, IT, Media, movies, Stories

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 18, 2022 · 23:31

Predicting Prospective Play

Yup, that happens and I broke the idea in the previous article, yet it does not take long until the MS-groupies have a go at me. Fair enough, I did set myself up as a target when I stated that Microsoft was a done deal, there is no deal because they are done. I reckon that they will be a shadow of what they are now by 2025-2028. They will lose ground, then they will lose support and after that the train goes off the rails. That is how I personally see it. But it is not about Microsoft. It is about gaming and in support of the previous article, there was one that had a decent statement. “It is not possible to make a map that big”. OK, it is his point of view and to some degree he was right. The PS4, Xbox One and the average PC cannot do it (at present). You see, in the next generation it will be possible and to some degree it is possible now. 

Land and its mass
In my example my game will be on an island and I am using the Indonesian islands as an example. So how is it possible today? Well, I could be clever, but someone beat me to it. Hello Games created the solution with ‘No Man’s Sky’. Even as they went in another direction by using parameters to create all these planets, but it is one direction. You see when you use the same parameters the planet will ALWAYS be the same. Now consider the parameters for the island and the more precise the parameters are the more precise the land becomes. And in this setting the IP of Hello Games becomes gold, literally game makers will pay through the nose to get this technology in that shape. The technology could be remade in the new setting, but it makes sense that Hello Games will set the technology up for sale, or for licensing. 

Now use that technology and look at the dozens of car navigators. You then get a navigator on a land that is virtual. The land stage is now close to complete, and most of the technology already exists, so the game makers can look towards massive maps in the streaming technology. 

Is it a tree?
The next IP is an idea I had, but it is depending on created IP (hence it cannot be mine), well perhaps you could (I am busy) because you might be able to get a patent that is “an improvement of an existing idea.” You see, in 1982 Adobe did something astounding, they created postscript. Even now 40 years later it is still close to perfect and unsurpassed, that is real innovation and they did a masterful job on this, there was one problem. It was slow, really slow when printing and over time Hewlett Packard created PCL, and it took HP 13 years to get to PCL6. It is good, but Postscript (by Adobe) was perfect. So where am I going with this? You see, the DNA of a tree is not small but is based on 12 chromosomes and 7 times more DNA. So what happens when someone figures out that setting to create a system that uses a hybrid version of PS and PCL to create the foundations of trees in gaming. It will (should) be the start of a concept that I like to call T2L (true to life), a setting that shows us an actual forest of unique or close to unique trees, no matter how large the terrain. I reckon that there will be some form of fractal idea embedded in that idea, but whomever works it out will have a new technology for gaming. And these two gives us the map and the forests, and more importantly, it will be identical EVERY time you load that game. A setting that people never considered, but streaming makes it possible and more important, it will allow for game maps based on actual maps and it allows for the beginning of a whole dimension of streaming games that have an entirely new point of view on what the size of a map in a game is. 

This does not solve all of it and even with all sails out, it still will take years to work out kinks and a few other parts, but we need to think and we need to focus on the games that will be made for release in 2024-2027, because that is when national 5G will be in decent abundance and whomever has the most original and most captivating game, will rule that market and by that time it will be well over $250,000,000,000 so consider where you want to be, replaying a game with the limits they had in 2012, or do you want to be on the edges of what is possible in 2025? 

Consider that during the next few days and see where you want to end up with your controller. I know where I want to be, in a console place no one has ever seen before.

Leave a comment

Filed under Gaming, IT, Science

May 18, 2022 · 18:54

Residual seeking

Yes, what is it? Well it connects to the game I am designing. You see, Any RPG has its sides and it needs to change, it needs to be a lot less Bethesda (their games are not bad), yet I seek originality and this all connects to ‘The stage of commerce’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2022/02/25/the-stage-of-commerce/) where I give a lot more and in previous articles (seek and thee shall find) where I give more of all this. Yet there is a side I forgot about. You see, we all expect coin, we all expect funds. But what happens when money had no value in a place where they have no lemonade caps? Well, we will have to make a gander towards older times. In this we need to set steady steps towards other parts, but what if the few gold coins we find have more value by making it into something else? Gold and silver have their uses, especially in the arcane, but when do we see that in gaming? That is the 10th (might be 14th) altering thing that other RPG games are not giving you. So what happens when the chest holds a broken sword? Pieces of chain and two coins? There is a need for nearly anything, you just need to adjust your view and lets be honest, what was the last RPG game you played where it was not about gold, credits, or caps? Any place can grow on commerce, but the driving force of commerce is not always gold based. Many places had other means, even in ancient roman times, the soldiers were paid in salt. Salt was more valuable than coins in some places and a return to that opens a whole new set of gaming parameters. Then we have the fact that the broken sword can be remade as a knife, or could be melted into iron and iron (if enough is obtained) gets you a plough, which means more land and more food for a town. All settings to adjust the view of the gamer and to be honest, I cannot find one game offering this alternative view. 

As I wrote in that previous article “because of the random factors the rainbow tables are dynamic and that creates a whole new environment. One where the game can live without you and you become a contributor, not the driving force of anything.” This is important as your play style changes, the dynamic setting remains to some degree and that can push you in other directions. A stage where you optionally have an island that is an evolving stage as we start the island at 18,040 km2 (Halmahera), but there is nothing stopping us to upgrade the island down the track to 138,794 km2 (Java), there is something awfully satisfying to that. It evolves playing and makes it about the game you play, not WHERE you are. And lets be honest, if you could play a game again a year later and that place is 600% larger? Not go from one island to the other, but end up in a similar island a lot bigger and in that setting when you play the generations, what more can you find? It might not be needed as 18,040 km2 is huge, but the option opens a new frontier for RPG gaming and that is what we want, new frontiers and in that only streaming systems would be able to do this, and as I stated very recently, the streamers differentiate themselves or they will become trivialised. There is nothing interesting in playing the same Ubisoft game on these two systems. Yet what happens when AC Brotherhood suddenly has Spain and France added to the game? It becomes a different game, you as a gamer would have to make choices, because you could never see it all. You see, replayability becomes infinitely more important for streaming systems, and as such to prepare the next level of RPG games for such a setting is becoming more and more important. It was one of the truths I realised when I designed Elder Scrolls VII: Restoration. Evolution is where gaming is and the current makers are too much about selling the same cookie to all the other systems, all whilst some can only store cookies, the others are capable of storing a whole apple pie. And when you can have the apple pie, are you really looking out the window for the next cookie dealer? Fair enough if you are hoping for Shannon Elizabeth in a girl scout outfit, but what are the chances? 

Consider how far the Stadia and Luna can take you and then look at the failures of Ubisoft, what are you waiting for? Now, in their case I will make an exception for AC Origin and some might like to play the others again, I get that, but do you really want a Ferrari to get your groceries, or do you want to see what is 2365 km of your current location? How will you get there? You might never see it all, and that is fine too. A game that still has more to offer is a game you will play for a much longer time and there is also the rub. Ubisoft and others have made us completionists, yet how much of your own nation have you ACTUALLY seen? Are you really that driven in gaming, or can you see that the story is bigger than you. Can you see that beyond the main story, beyond all the quests there is just more and we will never see it all? That is perhaps the only real flaw that Bethesda has in its games and we all fell for it. In previous systems it was a natural flow of what a system could hold and we get that, but the newest consoles (PS5) and streamers have broken that limit, so we need to use the new settings to offer more gaming, different gaming and we need to throw repetition out of the window. That is merely my view on the matter, and it starts by creating a new mould, one based on historic parts, but still offers more than we have gamed before. It is possible, it is out there. Grab it and make it yours.

Leave a comment

Filed under Gaming, IT, Science

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 17, 2022 · 20:17

Set Streaming Solution

Yes there are a few ways of doing this, but can we tell that anyone is right and the other one is wrong? That is actually a serious question, to go further, it is a lot more serious than anyone realises at present. You see Google and Amazon are taking different roads. 

Google
In February 2022 Will Nelson reported ‘Google Stadia focus reportedly shifted to licensing the streaming tech’ and of course there are interested parties there. And we were given “After launching in late 2019 the Google game streaming platform was met with some criticism regarding the quality of its streams, latency, and connection issues. After a slow roll out of major titles and news that the internal Stadia development studios would be shut down, all was looking lost for the game streaming platform.” This makes sense, but it is not a given, in addition we saw news that gamers had access to 50 games, whilst some sources claim that there are 200 games at present. The last one does not make sense to me. It does technically. There are all kinds of resource issues with streaming games and for the most they could be temporary, or merely in play until a full width of gamers is seen, it is better to open the tap a little further later on than finding out that the basement is now a swimming pool. All this makes sense to me, yet the gamers tend to lack patience. If you doubt that, ask Hello Games (No Man’s Sky) and CD Project Red (Cyberpunk 2077), they’ll tell you a few stories. But Google seems to go a path. 

Amazon
Amazon has another path, a more traditional gaming path with a reported number of games that surpass 80, a 60% limit above Google. For gamers this matters, and we need to realise that even as Amazon has a few other options to differentiate itself from Google, the question is will they? Then there is the number of games and kids will see two systems that can do pretty much the same, one has 50 games the other one 80. Which one do you think they chose? So yes Amazon has an advantage for now, but they have by their traditional approach a second one.

See the image, a gamer has to go from A to C, we assume that they will go via B, but Google shows us that they can get there via D as well. Now we get the tricky part. By focussing on licensing Google decided a path, in this we would assume that Amazon is more likely to be the success and I feel that this is correct. And here is where we need to realise that Amazon being a success, does not mean, or imply that the Google path will be a failure. Both can succeed and here we see the larger stage. Some designers will adhere to becoming a licensed technology owner, to set a larger path for THEIR game. This could be good, but for every version of Doom, we also see versions of Apex and Destiny, we see Battlefield 2042 and that list goes on a little longer, so how many failures will the Google Stadia house until it drowns the brand? I honestly do not know, but if you know gamers, you know what a fickle lot of hormones they can be and that is before we consider the new player Netflix, or whatever Tencent launches (I do not believe for one second that business decisions was a reason to stop), and with $200,000,000,000 on the line, Tencent remains a factor (for now). 

And all that whilst I gave articles where we see that the Amazon Luna has a lot more options and that is not including the 50,000,000 console solution (I gave hints in earlier articles). In all this I will see Netflix as an optional new player and I have written off Microsoft, they lost too much and they lost credibility with the gamers, it will take them years to overcome that and at that point Amazon will be the most likely new top 3 player in games town. Google is not disregarded, but with the path they chose, they are less likely to succeed, and that success will depend on the first half dozen AAA titles, if they remain absent, Google will no longer be a gamer or a player, but that cannot be decided now, it will take until December 2023 until we see that finalisation. There is a side in me wanting to tell others that Google is on the wrong path, but that is incorrect, the larger stage is that none of the others have decided to tae the path A,D,C, and that does not make it wrong. Even as I show it with a square, there is no clear information on the paths taken and whether one path is equal, longer, or shorter. Time will decide that and in that we will need to wait, but in case of marketing hypes, I will side with Amazon. Not because they are better, these two systems are a lot more on par than either is willing to admit to (that is how I personally see it), I saw several enhancements to the system that both can do, but with a licensing path Google is less likely to go there, then there are a few other paths and without development Google will also not go there. So Amazon has an advantage, will they take it? I cannot tell, I doubt anyone can tell for sure. But as I calculated it around 2 years ago, that market is close to $600,000,000 at nominal and that is a mere 0.3%, but with such numbers, do you know anyone ignoring such optional revenue? Especially when the system out now could run that solution? It is a mere thought that drives the solution, I wonder what is required to hold such greed to account.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Gaming, IT

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 14, 2022 · 18:06

The bird and the cat

Yes, who has not heard of that setting, Tweety and the cat Sylvester, in real life duplicated by Twitter and fat cat Elon Musk. And in that setting most people will group behind the little budgie, yet is that a correct step? Reuters gives us ‘Musk says $44 bln Twitter deal on hold over fake account data’, the article (at https://www.reuters.com/technology/musk-says-44-billion-twitter-deal-hold-2022-05-13/) gives us “Musk, the world’s richest person, decided to waive due diligence when he agreed to buy Twitter on April 25, in an effort to get the San Francisco-based company to accept his “best and final offer.” This could make it harder for him to argue that Twitter somehow misled him.” I have an issue here. Face accounts in Twitter have been the setting of conversation in many nations. 

Trolls, click farms, and many fake accounts, all thee to give people false impressions, to fake that some care about issues no one cares about and to create flames. The problem is that Twitter is (or should) be aware of this. The element that is overlooked is engagement, Some looked into a similar setting in Facebook and it seems nice that one can buy clicks, but when someone in Utah sees that they get 150,000 clicks and 65% are all in Sri Lanka (or some other vague location), who does it serve? The one buying the clicks, and the one facilitating the clicks and it has evolved in an actual economy. So when I see “This could make it harder for him to argue that Twitter somehow misled him”, I wonder just how delusional they are at Twitter. There is a larger need to have two books, one with all the numbers and one filtering for expected fake accounts and it is not some small issue, the numbers are deep in the double digits at present, and as far as I can tell, Twitter and its CEO Parag Agrawal should know better. And now that we see “The estimated number of spam accounts on the microblogging site has held steady below 5% since 2013, according to regulatory filings from Twitter, prompting some analysts to question why Musk was raising it now. “This 5% metric has been out for some time. He clearly would have already seen it … So it may well be more part of the strategy to lower the price,” said Susannah Streeter, an analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.” In this I wonder what (and how much) Susannah Streeter is getting paid for that view? I personally reckon that it has not been as low as 5% since 2 October 2018, when that columnist that no one gives a fuck about went missing, you know the one. And since the events Covid (2019) and The Russian invasion in Ukraine (2022) we are confronted with an even larger explosion of fake accounts. So when I see “The estimated number of spam accounts on the microblogging site has held steady below 5% since 2013”, my slightly less diplomatic view will be “Give me a fucking break please”. 

If there is one side where Parag Agrawal failed it will be to set a more realistic side to finding and creating a clear marker for fake accounts. Now, I get it, it will not be a simple setting, but I think we can agree that even Mother Goose will not tell the children in Digital Sleepy Town that 5% is realistic, no one is THAT delusional.

So when we see “prompting some analysts to question why Musk was raising it now”, the answer is rather simple, the analysts should have raised it themselves at any time since 2018 and who did? I reckon that list is rather short, perhaps non-existent.

So as some are willing to blame fat cat Sylvester, there are plenty of indications that Twitter is hiding behind some granny knowing that it was wrong from the very beginning. 

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Media, Science

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 13, 2022 · 21:42

Restoring Redacted Recognisance

I have been in a bit of a trance, wondering on a few items that were nagging me, that is until I saw some flamboyant article. The article is a little too Simpson tainted to be taken seriously, but there was a grain of possibility there. My What if procedures started to crush the options. It did not make me happy, because for the most, I hate the ‘What If’ statement, it is something in second grade salespeople and telemarketers. As such I tend to avoid using it, but in this case there is almost no avoiding it. In a stage where there is an optional stage of revenue that could be anywhere between $400,000,000 and $17,500,000,000 the players Amazon and Google stay away? In the first it is more tailored to Amazon, but the stages include 5G, as such Google would be equally chomping at the bit.
Now the stage is about to move to Saudi Arabia, and I do not object. In two settings they have an advantage over the other two, but that is only in two of the settings. So I was puzzled, but then a few items from LA Times to UK papers hit me and the ‘What If’ setting came back. 

What If
So what if Google and Amazon just no longer have the manpower and the seniority to see what is about to escape them, it seemed so far fetched, but there was supporting evidence (of a sort) and there is no way in hell I would let Microsoft anywhere near it, I would accept a 35% payment from Saudi Arabia before I would consider a 175% from Microsoft, I am that disappointed and angry with them. And as I refocus towards Saudi Arabia I see a larger stage, one that could fir them taking a larger stake in either Amazon Luna or the Google Stadia, even as the Amazon Luna is a better fit, either will do and that solution alone should be worth well over $350,000,000, as such there is some benefit in having one buyer. Of course the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia might see that different, but that is not a given and as they get more options to diversification.

So we have an alternative stage, but the idea that the resources and brainpower of both Amazon and Google had dwindled to that degree is a little baffling. This has nothing to do with Covid. It has nothing to do with abilities. It dwindles down to two powerhouses, not taking a much better inventory of what is possible and letting it slip again and again until it is too late. Could that be the case? To be honest, I cannot tell, in the first because Sundar Pichai and Andy Jassy did not call me updating me on their HR woe’s and sorrows (and I never expect them to do that). So I am in the dark, but some others should not be and we have not heard from them have we? 

So what gives? Why would either player ignore that much revenue after getting hit to such a degree? It does not make sense, but that was before we see that they face a lot of grievance in the UK, EU and US. The Republicans are willing to slice Disney whilst destroying up to 60,000 small business owners with the attacks on Disney and their IP, Google has a few issues of their own to deal with, so a holding pattern is not the weirdest idea, but in this case revenue could go to China, Saudi Arabia and other players, how does that help any of them in the US, EU or UK? And that is before someone takes a hard look at Canada, with the top 10 of wealth being occupied by banks, but that is the hidden trap, without powerful businesses these banks will falter, time has shown that again and again, so what will be left when the redaction of recognisance is takin its toll? Restoration is the one path left, but that is a window with a limited timespan, I wonder if the UK and Canada realise that there is a point of no return and the US waited too long and now when there is a stage of restoration, the republican party is having a go at one of the most powerful IP holder in history, Disney. A setting that can have only one ending and it is not a good one, as such when Disney loses its protection, the cheap solution bringers in India and China will bring their options cheaper, not better but cheaper and all whilst well over 40,000 small business owners are left with nothing, because the IP kept their business safe and that is about to change, so when that happens and other resources do not grasp the business, what do you think will happen to that $25,000,000,000,000 debt? The interest alone will pull the entire US economy under with absolutely no options to restore any option to breathe. A setting I saw coming a mile away 5 years ago when there was an option, so when the US also losses its IP and more important the two powerhouses that create IP because they no longer have resources, what happens then? 

There is no what if setting here, we can just watch it unfold and I will be watching as well, because to be honest, I never expected these two players to have the IP resource lack they are currently showing. I honestly was caught be surprise (you see, it is possible to surprise me).

I wonder what Sunday brings, a hail Mary and a ZX Spectrum?

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Science

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 12, 2022 · 21:49

Iconification

I have been involved in a program named Hubspot. It is a little big (well over a 1300 variables) so there will always be data gaps. Now, this is not necessarily a bad thing, data gaps happen everywhere, it is how we manage them that matters. But it is not about the data gaps. As I was working yesterday, I saw another missing part. You see, there is an overwhelming need for a better level of intelligence, especially in marketing applications. This has been a fact for years and for the most people think of it as cloak and dagger stuff, but they would be wrong. Intelligence in commerce is essential, they refer to it as Business Intelligence. But over the last 10 years the term no longer applies the way it once did. The umbrella is too large and as such it no longer fits the purpose. Like Military Intelligence it now has a few umbrella’s. They are 

GEOINT
Geographical Intelligence is a much larger field in commerce. For example, there is IBM who has the information of millions of global corporations. They can see where Unilever has activities in Europe, Asia and Africa. As such they can push new more made to measure solutions for a player like Unilever making them a nice fortune in the process. And none of this is ‘under the table’ it is up and out in front. A setting of where they all can go and where they all can unite profit margins. A player like Unilever might be the most visible one but they are not alone. Tech players, governments the EU as a whole, they get a much better serve because of the applied solutions that GEOINT has in commerce.

DIGINT

Digital Intelligence is pretty new, in military sides it is often part of open intelligence channels. In commerce it is still growing, they use the channels different, they seperate all sources (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn) these are the largest three but they are not alone. It is also the part that has the most issues. Fake identities, fake processes and fake information make DIGINT an essential part, but a more artistic hand is required. The golden rule of ‘Trust but verify’ is at the heart of this. The problem is two fold, not all intelligence is intentional, sometimes it is a simple miscommunication that starts it. But finding the golden strings tend to lead to options and that is why they are more and more essential. They could point to the person no other way would have revealed, if only one source had the proper name, the proper place and the proper event it worked out well, but that is the problem we do not always get all the puzzle pieces and we think we are creating an image. Yet what happens when the puzzle is kinetic? What happens when the puzzle is not an image but a 20 second movie looping non-stop until the puzzle is complete? It takes a different skill and that skill will be required by governments and by commerce on a global scale, especially when all commerce is trying to complete as much revenue as possible.

OSINT

Open Source Intelligence is a collection of all matters, it is the least trusted, but it is the collection of mails, letters and all kinds of information, here the source is the important part and vetting the source matters to all concerned. It could be an internal person who thinks fondly of IBM, has friends at IBM, and that matters. 

All these elements come together in marketing and now I notice that a place like Hubspot (et al) will need some kind of dashboard, not one dashboard, but numerous dashboards that can collect and display snippets of notes, call notes, response notes that can be used and combined to give new clarity on any client, no matter where they are. And the local intelligence analyst will need to make sense of it all, make sense of hundreds of warm calls, cold calls and other information to see where a larger gain can be made and in commerce that matters. I wonder if Palantir will connect to Hubspot, or if Hubspot will create its own intelligence dashboard system, but I feel decently certain that one of the two will happen, the way commerce is moving makes it close to impossible to ignore that part of commerce revenue.

 

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Science

May 9, 2022 · 22:46

Slippery slope

There are feelings of satisfaction to be heard, and you can hear them everywhere. The setting that ‘UK government sets out plans to rein in Big Tech’ but they are loud noises, having only negative impacts. The BBC reports (at https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-61342576) “The new Digital Markets Unit (DMU) will be given powers to clamp down on “predatory practices” of some firms. The regulator will also have the power to fine companies up to 10% of their global turnover if they fail to comply.” My problem is not the merely the statement, it is the clear definition of what constitutes ‘predatory practices’, you see it is nice to see “Google and Facebook”, but where is Microsoft in all this? Then we get the debatable setting of “Digital minister Chris Philp said the government wanted to “level the playing field” in the technology industry, in which a few American companies have been accused of abusing their market dominance.” I wonder how delusional Chris Philp really is. Levelling the playing field? How about the others learn a trade? How about the magpies of the tech industry grow a pair and actually set innovation in motion? Is that too much to ask for? And this short sightedness will cost the EU and the UK a lot more than they figure on. Whilst we see failure after failure by Microsoft. You remember them? The people who pushed Netscape out of business, where was the level playing field then? And in all this the setting of predatory practices is not explained, it is a mere emotional stage setting. I now have over half a dozen tech IP, you think I will share that with Microsoft morons? Do you think I will set it in the UK? Then we get “It added it wants news publishers to be paid fairly for their content – and will give the regulator power to resolve conflicts.” Did anyone consider that news agencies do not have to put their materials on Facebook? I have received all kinds of links. The Dutch Telegraaf, the Australian Courier Mail and when ever I open these messages that I never asked for I get (see image below). And they are not the only one. It is the news publishers way to advertise and who pays for that advertisement? 

It seems that we see a one sided story without too much investigations and explanations, so are we surprised that Apple, Google and Meta are not responding? 

Then we get the danger setting, we are given “It will also make it easier for people to switch between phone operating systems such as Apple iOS or Android and social media accounts, without losing data and messages.” Did anyone consider that it will be playing in the hands of organised crime? Did anyone investigate the claims of these so called critics? With complete disclosure of their identities and their educational skills? So when we are given “The UK government said its new rules could increase the “bargaining power” of national and regional newspapers.” I believe that these players are realising that they are no longer relevant and that some will vanish when Meta becomes a reality. And in that stage Chris Philp is reduced to a simple tool, a tool of the greedy who suddenly realise that before they get to the end of their lives, the well dried up. No one is setting the stage that Google Ads is the most fair and the most engaging form of advertising, it offered the advertiser value and choice, something they never had in the past. And Microsoft was nowhere to be seem and when they did come their product was just too mediocre. 

But that is not the big issue, the big issue is that it opens the stage for Chinese solutions that are nowhere in the UK and where the UK has no say over it and that stage is forgotten until it is too late. The internet is global and how long until the people go to a .cn location for their social interactions, their news and their ‘solutions’? How long until these same tech bitches start crying that the bulk of revenue is now going to China? The UK is embarking on one of the most slippery slopes and the news outlets no longer have credibility (with the exception of the Times and the Guardian), so how long until the people are smitten with Chinese glamour magazines? With Chinese news and with Chinese solutions? You think it is never going to happen? Think again, Tik Tok is a Chinese innovation, and they have a pipeline of innovations ready to deploy. So whilst the DMU and debatable ‘critics’ attack the practices of Google, Meta and Apple. Make sure you see the whole field. We do not want to switch between iOS and Android. I am an Android user and that is where I stay. I have nothing against Apple, I have their iPad Air and I am happy with it, after the 1st generation iPad this was a step up and I love it. But I have no intention to get the iPhone and I am not alone, just as there are iPhone users who have zero intentions to switch to Android, as such I see “It will also make it easier for people to switch between phone operating systems such as Apple iOS or Android” as a facilitation towards others, not users, as such the issues with this article stacks up and before I forget it, I can export my phone data to all kinds of solutions and Apple has the same, so who is Chris Philp catering to? In that stage I have a few additional questions for the writer James Clayton. We see a limited view on a stage that is kept partly in the dark, why is that? 

I will let you ponder that part of the equation.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Law, Media, Politics, Science

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

May 9, 2022 · 03:55

Useful unregistered IP

This is the stage I (and others) are at times set to. You see, I needed an alternative to keeping my IP in house, in house is data at rest and people will get to it, large companies have no scruples when it comes to profit and some are a lot more desperate than others. So I had to create a place where no one would look and I went to a place where EVERYONE looked. The safest place is often underfoot. This is not a place I created, someone created this setting for me. If I was a betting man, I would think it was the Russian Mafia and one of them was a photographing enthusiast. 

He (or she) was good enough to have it on the dark web under the eyes of the NSA for a long time. In the end I have no knowledge if he ever got caught, but the idea was really good, and I stumbled upon it by pure accident. That person, or someone connected to him made the error of placing the photoshop PSD online. If it had been a JPG file, I would never have been the wiser. But it was a photo of the Kremlin. I was looking for a different building and no matter how you set it, the Kremlin is a beautiful building, as is the grand mosque of Riyadh. It does not take an architect to admire the beauty of a building. One does not need to be from San Francisco to admire the Transamerica Pyramid. So there I was looking at the Kremlin in Photoshop. And I suddenly noticed something, in JPG I would have missed it. There was a second magenta level. One was #FF00FF, the second one was #FF02FF and that layer had morse code. 

Now consider a photo, 6720 × 4480 and morse is merely one pixel high. I can easily hide 60 lines in there without anything or anyone picking it up, the eyes cannot differentiate a pixel that is #ff02FF instead of #FF00FF, and if you have two layers. One in Magenta, One is Cyan #02FFFF added to #00FFFF and they end up in a JPG, you have a novel way of hiding a text, especially when it is morse and especially if the only way is to merge #FF02FF and #02FFFF into a combined layer. Consider that and consider

“.. -.     ….. –.     – …. . .-. .     .- .-. .     – .– —     -.. .. — . -. … .. — -. …     – …. .- –     .- .-. .     .. –. -. — .-. . -.. –..–     — . .-. . .-.. -.–     -… . -.-. .- ..- … .     – …. .     – . .-.. . -.-. — —     -.-. — — .–. .- -. .. . …     .. –. -. — .-. .     – …. .     -. . . -..     — ..-.     – …. .     -.-. — -. … ..- — . .-. … .-.-.-“, now consider that this line is one pixel high, I could add 120 lines on each picture and I am smart enough to only place the JPG in a place where 27,000,000 people roam, over all the boards, 3 sets of 4 dozen pictures does not even raise an eyebrow and as the images are not upsetting anyone, no one cares. I never uploaded them from anywhere I worked or lived. So good luck finding them, but on July 30th those images get a reduced limelight and that is the start of a race where some Americans are not invited. They had their chance and now lets see how some treat free IP, will they adhere and respect the consumer or will they make the same mistake? 

It was my way out, live or die, my IP will survive and it optionally will land in hands willing to keep the options open. Others had their options and were willing to make the bet that they could outthink me. But when you see where they would not look, because the margins were expected to remain low, how does that make them worthy of billions? You see, when you’ve never had that, you will never miss it and like others I have pride and I have ego and I find Microsoft unworthy, especially after they betrayed the gaming community (as I personally see it) after they got whipped by Nintendo in gaming (Nintendo Switch) after they got handed their guts with the Surface (Apple iPad) and soon after Adobe slaps them silly and take away their Powerpoint market. After Amazon removes their cloud presence in business and gaming. Why should they be allowed to live longer? They failed in 4 markets, isn’t that enough to ignore them?

Now I am making sure that they cannot claim any of my IP as I set it to an encrypted setting on the internet. And without those logs they remain clueless. I might never be rich, but I’ll have the last laugh and if Amazon catches on what Microsoft missed in META, they will be reduced to a third world IT company that will leave the top 10 of wealth players before 2030. There is only so much failure that they can adjust for, and we get it things go wrong “Uninstall Windows 11 KB5012643 if it crashes your apps”, I personally reckon that proper testing might have prevented a lot, but that might merely be me. We need to consider what we do and even as the US department of Defense trusts them, it does not mean that we need to make that same mistake. In all this, the useful unregistered IP was a way to keep my IP free from certain hassle and it was needed, especially as I find that time is running out and as more and more companies are getting weirdly nervous and greed driven to obtain more and more revenue. Microsoft is not alone, but it is the most visible one, partly due to all the corrections that Microsoft marketing needs to make on a global setting. So I rely on unregistered IP to keep mine decently safe and it is underfoot of a few players who never considered to look where everyone else was looking, they only needed the right pair of shades to see what needed to be seen. Are you catching on yet?

We need to change the way we think, or we become truly lost.

Leave a comment

Filed under IT, Military, Science, Stories

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , ,