Category Archives: Military

January 4, 2019 · 13:33

Diànhuà X2 (Xīnchē xíng)

This is not a name, it is not a brand and it is not a weapon system, Diànhuà is Chinese for ‘telephone’ plain and simple. The issue is that we need to start learning words that we normally never would have learned. Anyone who has spent time in a dojo in Eastern China (aka Japan) or perhaps in Thailand or in Indonesia knows this. You see when you start your path in Karate you learn the word ‘構え’, and you think, ‘I am learning the secrets of the universe‘ and that is how it feels, yet in Japanese it merely means ‘stance’ and that is what you did. In Pencak Silat, we learn the word ‘Pukul’, which translated Indonesian comes over as ‘Hit it’, which is exactly what you did; you punched it/him/her.

Simplicity is key here and what we might consider to be gibberish actually makes sense soon after we take more than 10 minutes of effort to see what information we are confronted with. When we start looking closer at the Huawei issues we see a lot to be concerned about. Not unlike Jeffrey Sachs, I had my issues with the Huaweian executive arrested in Canada. Apart from the fact that the United States does not get to set policy for other nations, the fact that China has economic ties to some degree with Iran also implies that Huawei would have had optional business with Iran.

Oh, and before you think that the US has its ducks in a row, you might want to look at the business partners (read: personal friends) of Vagit Alekperov (LUKoil) and look at their whereabouts in the last 5 months. Also wonder on how many were not arrested whilst in the US (or Canada for that matter), so whilst we all consider on how the US is doing business, we need to consider that more than one of them was roughly 13270 metres from a local FBI office there, we could ask the FBI, but they are currently closed, they will open at 08:15 with a fresh smile and optional free coffee, the coffee is there is apparently quite decent.

Yet back to what matters, you see, Huawei is not merely in the race, it is showing to make headway making 5G locations a lot better. We see the news in Poland, Spain and Italy, all this whilst surpassing the impressive achievement that Ericsson had. It surpassed the annual $100 billion revenue and as it stands, there is every indication that with certain projects in an ongoing state in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and optionally Egypt, Huawei could move towards 30% growth from the $100 billion last year. To a much larger extent it is also due to their mobiles Nova 3i, Mate 20 and the upcoming Nova 4i and Mate 30, it is not merely the excellence of their mobile; it is the sharp and competitive prices that will optionally allow Huawei to chip away the market share that Apple falsely believes to have secured. I believe that certain quotes, like: “Apple’s World Smartphone Market Share Above 50% For the first time ever Apple Inc. (AAPL) has garnered more than 50% of the global smartphone market during the fourth quarter, thanks to its high-end iPhone X“, in light of certain production places shutting down and earlier agreement with other providers should be considered as debatable, there is a definite drop in Apple choice. From my point of view, the people wanted a Golden delicious and they ended up with a Granny Smith. I personally love the sour taste of the Granny Smith, other do not. They objected to the iPad Pro ‘Bendy’, massive quality control problems, and not to forget the Extreme Tech quote: “Apple decided to actually make people’s products slower without telling them it had done so. It took this step after failures in its own manufacturing process caused damage to its batteries“. I am willing to go with the alternative path that the BS sold by Tim Cook where we see “but Cook states that all of the decline is attributable to Apple iPhone sales and that most of those sales (didn’t) occur in China“, all this whilst some sources still hang onto that 50% market share, a stage that is incorrect on more than one level, especially when we consider that the bulk of the people on this planet (roughly 80% plus) cannot afford some bloated new phone model that was close to 40% more expensive than a decent alternative, in this age the difference between $2369 and $1299 is too much for many households, it was the clear shot across the bow we all saw coming, but many remain in denial. In addition, the lawsuit files last month where we see: “plaintiffs Christian Sponchiado and Courtney Davis, alleges that Apple’s marketing claims about the iPhone X, iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max are misleading“. If that case is ruled against Apple the impact will be massive. On the upside, Apple can buy into my IP with the entry price of $25 million upfront and get the optional 90% share of the patents linked to those (in case Google turns me down of course, they get first dibs (they have the reliability and credibility that I prefer).

In addition, as Apple lost $106 billion in value (almost 10%) a few hours ago, shows that the trillion dollar mark was merely a first step to become critically ill, optionally dead on arrival at the Wall Street hospital, more precisely the NYU Langone Health on Wall Street, Tim Cook might take a look at https://nyulangone.org/conditions, where he will learn that Bad Management choices is not a treatable ailment, yet Mental and behavioural Health is actually taken care of, although I am not certain that there is a cure for embossed ego and blindly following greed is not really a diagnosed behavioural health condition, he might be better off looking at Traditional Chinese medicine at that point, there he has an option to get advice from his friend Ren Zhengfei, if Tim forgot the number, Ren Zhengfei can be reached at +86-755-2878-0808.

What was THAT about?

When you consider the sidestep, it was not really a sidestep, when we see the European standards accepted in three countries and four optional additions, whilst the stage is now moving forward faster and faster in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt, in a stage where 25 commercial contracts have been signed and all of them are moving forward, we see the initial failing in the US, Apple is a clear visibility, the lacking evidence of national security risks is out there louder and louder and now we see increased volumed voices in Commonwealth nations to reverse on the Huawei 5G ban. The fact that too many of the opposition have been in a stage of pussyfooting, micro stepping and calling these actions innovation and leaping ahead is where we see the failing of a larger group of Telecom players, at any stage, when (not if) those 5G standards are not met, it merely makes the case for other governments to either side towards a Huawei driven solution or fail in their 5G needs completely, and at this point, those who are not there at the beginning will merely lose millions of business opportunities every day. That is the clear setting and that is what we will see unfold. Players like AT&T might be the most visible ones, but they are not the only ones. Even when we look at current 4G abilities of Vodafone in France, good luck on finding ‘national coverage’ at that point, I have heard from more than one source that the map looks nice, but reality is nothing like their so called coverage map. And in the stage of once bitten twice shy, these players are putting it all one the table, betting everything they have to make a 5G turnaround whilst there is more than one indicating chance that this will falter. That is the gambling stage and all this is done without realising that Huawei does not need to bet, they merely have to deliver what they are promising making the others fold, losing it all over hardware that they cannot provide, or even better are already failing to manufacture. you see, the Wall Street Journal gave us a mere 4 days ago: “Major European wireless providers—big customers of all three—say Nokia and Ericsson have been slow to release equipment that is as advanced as Huawei’s“, the article (at https://www.wsj.com/articles/huawei-rivals-nokia-and-ericsson-struggle-to-capitalize-on-u-s-scrutiny-11546252247) gives us the parts that I mentioned weeks ago, I saw this coming a mile away and now that this is showing to be just as I said it would be, we now see the upcoming failures in a few countries, all of them ‘eager to be the number one‘, now soon to be trailing BEHIND what they call is a technological third world nation (Saudi Arabia), whilst Saudi Arabia is seemingly still speeding ahead and Huawei wants to be completely successful there as it almost guarantees them Middle Eastern 5G Supremacy.

The other players are in a deeper pool of trouble when we consider: “Both Nokia and Ericsson fear that if they are seen trying to take advantage, Beijing could retaliate by cutting off access to the massive Chinese market, people familiar with the matter said“, this is not news, this was always going to happen, you might want to pick up a decent history book and reread the British Telecom phase in the UK around 3 decades ago, it is not as comfortable to face these scrutinies when you are receiving the damage, not dishing it out, is it?

As I personally see it the US is due a few setbacks, these setbacks could cost Wall Street, the DJI and the NASDAQ in larger ways than I can foresee at present. What will happen to claimants when the delivery is not met and those 5G wannabe’s all make legal claims on goods and speeds not delivered? I do not need to remind the readers of the Trumped ego of nations when promises are not kept, do I?

These are not merely obstacles or pitfalls; the entire setting was bogus on a few levels. Whenever I see the Huawei ban mention on TV, my mind races back and remembers the US Secretary of State Colin Powell in clownish fashion running around with a silver briefcase showing it off at closed sessions with WMD events, you do remember how that ended, do you not? As I personally see it, the entire 5G debacle will be the same, but now the nations adhering to that alliance will face a lot more backwash from their own local political parties when it all falls down, and I feel 80% certain that this is exactly what will happen down the road. As I stated more than once, in the UK Alex Younger was at least in the proper stage where he did not claim National security risk, he merely stated that such infrastructure must be held national, not international hands. It is not a great decision, but at least it made sense, yet there too Huawei has economic options by investing in training the Bright Cambridge, London Poly tech and Oxford people in creating excellent 5G devices, optionally merely funding it and gaining huge windfalls over the upcoming decade. It would be a so called scenario of all the gains without the optional pains.

Interesting that we see nothing on such an optional solution in the media, do we? So as the new modelled 5G pushes forward there is no doubt that in the immediate time it will be ruled by Huawei, the others were (as I personally see it) too short-sighted for too long and that is the Tim Cookie we all forgot about, so whilst we see new Cookie policies, we merely see a collection of cyber analysts all gathered around some jar and not around the place of true innovation, the memo they received was in the end not that clear on the matter (Go Figure).

If you were up to speed to certain events and got the previous reference, my congratulations to you; if you missed it, no worries. Merely look (at http://scientists4wiredtech.com/2018/03/4g-5g-wireless-is-the-new-bait-and-switch-scandal/) and do not go on faith with: “4G/5G Wireless antennas require a fiber optic wire to be attached to each cell site, every block or two. No private company is going to roll out fiber to lots of new areas. The FCC rarely, if ever, mentions that 4G/5G densification requires fiber optic wires. Commissioner Carr’s 5G statement never mentions the terms “fiber” or “state utility”“, and when you add: “AT&T just changed its mind about deploying fixed wireless. The operator has been touting its plans to deploy a mobile 5G network in 12 markets in the United States this year using millimeter wave (mmWave) spectrum in the 28 GHz and 39 GHz bands. And while it still plans to move forward with those deployment plans, it announced today that it will deploy fixed wireless in late 2019 using the unlicensed Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) spectrum. It will initially deploy LTE but then migrate to 5G. The company did not say how many markets it would deploy” (from another source) and consider the two statements we see an optional shift in a few direction, more important all the places where AT&T will not reach (beside the difference in range that the two very different standards have), so at that point, how much subsidy will never ever be in favour of the American people and in addition to that, their created ALEC group (American Legislative Exchange Council), at that point when these documents and legislative agreement are scanned and we end up seeing some version of: “grants LICENSEE and its AFFILIATES, a nonexclusive right to USE the 5G hardware provided with these license terms (hereinafter the “HARDWARE”) for its intended purpose, as defined below. USE means the right to enable the HARDWARE in the manner and for the purpose for which it was intended by the manufacturer“, at what point will the people realise that ‘intended by the manufacturer‘ will end up being massively ambiguous and that in the end no rights will remain with the user when it end up not being up to the expected scrap? It is not even a slippery slope; it is a slippery slope not being able to support part of the weight it was supposed to support.

The worst part of it all is that it was not even a surprise to me that this was going to happen, so as others claim to be so much more intelligent to me, is that true intelligence, or is that intelligence that enabled them to fill their pockets? You tell me, I am not presuming any answers here, I am merely pointing out the facts that are actually available in a whole range of sources, several of them respectable; they merely did not bother to connect the highlighted dots, which is also a matter of concern at some point soon enough.

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Tagged as 5G, Alex Younger, American Legislative Exchange Council, Apple, AT&T, Cambridge, Canada, CBRS, Christian Sponchiado, Citizens Broadband Radio Service, Colin Powell, Courtney Davis, Egypt, Ericsson, FBI, Houston, Huawei, Indonesia, iPhone X, Italy, Japan, Jeffrey Sachs, LTE, LUKoil, MI6, Middle East, NASDAQ, Nokia, NYU, NYU Langone Health, Oxford, Poland, Qatar, Ren Zhengfei, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Tim Cook, UAE, UK, US, Vagit Alekperov, Wall Street, Wall Street Journal, World Smartphone Market Share

December 24, 2018 · 11:10

Shutdown to death

Time for the last article of the year.

In America the news is all about the shutdown, the government is in a stage of what some call ‘democratic’ application of force, some will call it a serious hoax against the American people and many think it is an atrocity, merely in play because of a wall someone wants. In that regards, it worked in China, not many Chinese left the country via the wall route, did they?

The Washington Post gives us that it is now probable that the shutdown will continue until January 3rd, when the new congress convenes. Some might consider the issue of “deny Trump any new wall money, keeping the Department of Homeland Security’s border-security funding at the current level of $1.3 billion“, yet the issue is a lot larger. It is transgressing borders (quite literally). I see it as the impact of a nation now bankrupt. As they approach a debt of twenty two trillion, or $22,000,000,000,000 we need to realise that even at a mere 0.1%, the US government has to hand over $22,000,000,000 in interest every year. Now we see the impact of the non-taxation of the FAANG group, not to mention all those Wall Street individuals and corporations that are able to have a career plan in tax avoidance (which is actually legal), tax evasion is not. So consider that no one pays a mere 0.1%, so the interest is a lot higher than that. Now consider the 22 billion and the fact that there are 325 million Americans. This would imply $67 for every American. Now consider that 12.3% is in poverty, so lucky for them no taxation and it amounts to 40 million people, this gives us an initial $2.7 billion short. Then we get the 10% group. It gets to be worse when we consider the 2016 numbers. There we see: “An estimated 45.3% of American households — roughly 77.5 million — will pay no federal individual income tax“, in addition those in the lowest 20% paid -$620, which implies no taxation and money from the government, and the picture does not get to be any better beyond that. So the US has a massive budget problem and as I see it, it is bankrupt. In this economist Laurence Kotlikoff actually agrees with me, he came to this conclusion in October, whilst I predicted the setting 3 years ago, the world economies have been in denial for that long. These people might hide behind some fictive ‘wealth of America‘, yet that group of people represents less than 1 million people, and they cannot fork over what the government needs and the picture is merely sliding from bad to worse and this is part of the entire shutdown issue, there is simply no money left.

And those behind “There is frankly no path towards him getting $5 billion in American taxpayer money to meet his campaign promise of a big, beautiful wall with Mexico,” Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) said Sunday on CBS’s ‘Face the Nation’“, you see, how strong will this wall be? How long until that wall gets ‘punctured’ with a few shots from a M72 LAW or RPG7? Perhaps more efficient is drilling a few holes and fill it with Dynamite. So, how long until that wall is nothing more than a leaky billboard supporter? How much costs will there be in repairing that damage, a wall 2,400 miles long? How much concrete, how many holes, how many troopers will be required? One could argue that the cure is a lot more expensive than the disease ever was. All that in an economy where a government could never ever correctly deal with a minus 22 trillion invoice? That is before we consider the damage to nature, Big Bend National park, Buenos Aires National Wildlife refuge, Kino Springs, Organ Pipe Cactus national Monument, the impact on Yuma looks disastrous, the outskirts of Mexicali, and the space between San Diego and Tijuana is a foregone conclusion as lost forever. All elements that can be presented around, but there is the real impact of a dozen complications, none with a solution that does anything but drive the price of the wall sky high, merely leaving the US to ridicule (by China) with the notion that their wall was nine times longer, completed and functional 375 years earlier. Yes, these are matters that you will see in the news soon enough. I have no doubt that there is some benefit of having a wall, yet at $5 billion and a lot more afterwards, is that really the way you want to squander cash when you are bankrupt?

A wall that will prove to be detrimental to the funding option of 2019, that and the fact that federal workers are now either growing hungry or mandatory taking vacation days, so that impact will be seen all over 2019 as well. And this is not the first, as the Washington Post tells us: “making this the third partial government shutdown of 2018“. Who signed off on this? So when I see: “Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.) dismissed it as “really much ado about very little.”“, I wonder how many people on minimum wage were affected and would he be so kind to pay these people out of his own pocket? I wonder how trivial the matter remains at that point. And even as Senator Lisa Murkowski from Alaska gives us: “The votes are clearly not present in the Senate to provide $5 billion for the border wall“, I wonder if that is the full truth, I wonder if the actuality of the opposition is: “There are no funds left for such an outrageous symbol of discrimination“. I get there as terrorists and criminals will find a way around that wall, or under it, so there is that notion and that will happen, it happened, in Berlin, it happened in Colditz, it is still happening in Gaza, and as such it will also happen at the Mexican border.

It gets to be worse, especially in light of the earliest promise that this wall would be on the Mexican dime (never realistic), we see: “There is no mechanism for direct payments from Mexico’s government to the U.S. government for a wall in the trade agreement. And a number of Republicans have been greatly frustrated by Trump’s intransigence“. In light of that, why was $5 billion pushed for in American budgets? Although in this setting, the application was never made so artistically poetic by replacing ‘stubborn mule attitude‘ with intransigence, the Washington Post gets bonus points on that one.

An additional short update

I made mention of it in my article ‘That did not take long‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2018/12/22/that-did-not-take-long-2/). there I stated: “because AT&T is going to start pretending its most advanced 4G LTE tech is 5G” and even as we were exposed to: “T-Mobile CTO Neville Ray wrote that AT&T was “duping customers into thinking they’re getting something they’re not.” The “E” is easy to miss, too, judging by a mockup AT&T sent out“, and it was the Washington Post (at https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/12/21/was-year-g-hype-g-reality-is-yet-come/) who gave us pretty much at the very same time: “We’ll make sure America wins the global 5G race,” John Legere vowed. “5G will unlock capabilities that will fuel job creation and innovation well beyond what we have seen so far“, as well as “AT&T said it too had switched on its 5G service, announcing it is the “first and only company in the U.S. to offer a mobile 5G device over a commercial, standards-based mobile 5G network” the catch? Access is limited for now to a select group of businesses and consumers in a dozen cities, and it requires the use of a mobile hotspot“, so is this real 5G, or is that the mentioned 5G evolution? In light of this article in the Washington Post, does this constitute deceptive conduct, or merely a missed communication between the WP editor and AT&T executives? And as we are treated to “As for when we will see the first 5G-capable smartphone? Industry analysts say the consensus appears to be the first quarter of 2019“, we see the completion of a stage of intransigence, I merely wonder who is not clear enough to see the sea of disagreement here. the fact that whatever comes is to be with an estimated price of US$1800 for the complete edition should also consider that this one item could max out the average credit card on the spot and that is without additional warranty and protection. So as 5G goes, it is seemingly merely for the rich (for now), so as such, is it truly an American first, or even a stage where America ends in a fictive first place? Perhaps it is perception on steroids, you can be the first in space, even if you send a monkey, it is in that light we get to see 5G soon enough. You merely have to contemplate who is remembered to be first in space, Yuri Gagarin on the 12^th April 1961 or the monkey?

I wonder how soon we see the update on how trivial the difference is between 5GE and 5G, and how soon people realise that they are merely getting a new double priced contract whilst true 5G is not delivered, it might end up being a lovely day for contract lawyers in the US.

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Tagged as Alaska, AT&T, Buenos Aires National Wildlife refuge, Christopher A. Coons, FAANG group, ig Bend National park, John Legere, Kino Springs, Laurence Kotlikoff, Lisa Murkowski, Mexicali, Neville Ray, Organ Pipe Cactus national Monument, San Diego, Sen. Patrick J. Toomey, Senator Lisa Murkowski, T-Mobile, Tujuana, Wall Street, Washington Post, Yuma, Yuri Gagarin

December 21, 2018 · 11:41

Early morning puzzle

I am waking up to coffee and the Guardian giving us ‘Tens of thousands of passengers stranded by Gatwick airport drones‘. The article (at https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/20/tens-of-thousands-of-passengers-stranded-by-gatwick-airport-drones) gives us how some silly wanker is stranding tens of thousands of passengers. Now I get that this is done for the good of the safety of the people. My initial reaction was (like many others), shoot down that bloody drone and be done with it. Now, I get that things are alas not that simple and I started to get educated on what is currently being used.

As I learned more, we are given: “Michigan Technological University, for instance, has demonstrated an “octocopter” armed with a gun that fires a net to trap and carry off rogue drones. Not only does that approach work at altitude, it also protects the captured drone from plummeting to the ground, potentially causing injury or destroying evidence.”

Hence I reengineered the net, the initial solution that the Skywall has (at https://openworksengineering.com), when we combine it with the Octocopter, gives us the first part. Now we merely add a small cylinder and an ejectable cartridge that activates 3-5 seconds after firing. The ejectable cartridge is filled with high pressure helium that inflates a balloon, one that is similar to the airbag in a car, most likely larger. The cylinder also has a small beacon, which will be active. We have now achieved two parts. The first is that whatever is captured is now being slowed by the balloon on helium, also preventing full speed crashing, and limiting damage. The beacon will guide the people to where an industrial grade drone will go. This now gives us two parts, the operator takes his/her losses, or finds out that the drone is giving away their location, making an arrest a lot more likely and easy. The second part is that no matter how the drone works, it works on physical principles and drag is a bitch; ask any sailor or para-glide enthusiastic. Not only will the drone be less likely to make it back, it will hinder whatever comes next, an alternative solution that merely took 34 seconds to figure out, whether it is an actual solution requires a little bit of scrutiny; if we add a paint or glue device to the cylinder that once the cable is out sets it off? The impact on the rotors as its rotational ability is lowered by a lot might also down it, whilst the impact is diminished by the deployed helium balloon.

The second solution is brought by Defense News (at https://www.defensenews.com/digital-show-dailies/navy-league/2018/04/10/this-gun-shoots-drones-out-of-the-sky/). Here we see: “The IXI Dronekiller is the first and only hand-held counter-drone technology employing the use of software defined radio, according to IXI Technology representatives at the Sea-Air-Space Exposition in Washington, D.C., this week“, we are also treated to: “The IXI Dronekiller will be able to target all Type I and Type II commercial drones, which are exactly the type you’d see non-state, and even some state, actors employ on battlefields like Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan“, an interesting solution. Yet the Guardian gives us: “more sophisticated drones know to automatically return to their operator if they lose signal“, so what if there is a binary signal? What if the first one does what it is already doing, yet the second part ends up being more like the precursor to the laser. What if we take MASER (Microwave Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation) to a new level and fry the circuitry at the same time (if that is possible over the range)? We would not have solved the damage by crashing, yet over airfields, the damage will be at the most a landing strip and if it can survive the wheels of a Boeing, it can take the impact of a drone, no question. Another option is tagging, if the perpetrator cannot be stopped, perhaps the drone can be tagged, making it a much larger issue for anyone to get it back. In addition to all this, industrial drones are not cheap, so after this person losses their second drone, the impact will be financially felt, these babies go for $8,000 each and the first serial number will aid towards getting the claim for 800 delayed flights started.

All this took merely minutes to contemplate, implying that there is plenty of progress to be found in the anti-drone field. Still when this happens right before Christmas weekend, the victims will remain the airport passengers and that sucks. I have been in a heavily delayed flight before (twice actually) and even as the airport was not at fault either way, the lack of options at airports for those stranded still sucks.

Let’s hope that these people at Gatwick Airport will make it to their destination without any further issues

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Tagged as Defense News, Drones, Gatwick Airport, IXI Dronekiller, MASER, Michigan Technological University, octocopter, Sea-Air-Space Exposition, skywall, the Guardian

December 18, 2018 · 13:12

How Americans lose wars

There is a clear setting of war; the Americans have their articles of war in this. Yet is that enough?

Some stare at Article 10 of this, which gives us:

Every non-commissioned officer or soldier, who shall himself in the service of the United States, shall, at the time of his so enlisting, or within six days afterward have the Articles for the government of the armies of the United States read to him, and shall, by the officer who enlisted him, or by the commanding officer of the troop or company into which he was enlisted, be taken before the next justice of the peace, or chief magistrate of any city or town corporate, not being an officer of the army or where recourse cannot be had to the civil magistrate, before the judge advocate, and in his presence shall take the following oath or affirmation: “I, A.B., do solemnly swear or affirm (as the case may be) that I will bear true allegiance to the United States of America, and that I will serve them honestly and faithfully against all their enemies or opposers whatsoever, and observe and obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to the Rules and Articles for the government of the armies of the United States.” Which justice, magistrate or judge advocate is to give to the officer a certificate, signifying that the man enlisted did take the said oath or affirmation. (* By Section 111 of Chapter 42 August 3, 1861, the oath of enlistment and re-enlistment may be administered by any commissioned officer of the army.)

Yet is that enough?

You see, this article was the first one that came to mind when I was confronted with the Washington Post who gives us (at https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/former-special-forces-soldier-once-lauded-as-a-hero-faces-murder-charge/2018/12/13/bb4a11ee-ff10-11e8-ad40-cdfd0e0dd65a_story.html) the headline ‘Former Special Forces soldier, once lauded as a hero, faces murder charge‘. Here we see the mention of U.S Army Capt. Mathew Golsteyn. The article gives us in several cases “the suspected bomb maker“. The question is not merely regarding that captain, it is regarding the political cloud over a theatre of war. When we are confronted with: “The suspected bomb maker was not on a list of targets that U.S. forces had been cleared to kill, according to Army documents” when we place this next to “found materials needed to make bombs like the one that had killed the Marines. Golsteyn said that they brought the suspected bomb maker back to their base“. When we see the clear state where US troops are in a stage with an enemy of their nation and forces, we get to go to the articles of war “I will bear true allegiance to the United States of America, and that I will serve them honestly and faithfully against all their enemies or opposers whatsoever“, from my point of view, a point of view shared by many, we get the condition that a bomb maker is that, we also get that this was a clear enemy, even if there is a setting of “was not on a list of targets that U.S. forces had been cleared to kill“, we have the clear setting of an enemy and when the strategical status changes where the existence of the bomb maker can upset a much larger territorial field, it is my personal belief that killing the target is not merely warranted, it had become essential. One would expect that an Army Captain has the rank to clearly set that field. We might argue that optionally that those who managed the “list of targets” could have been inadvertently asleep at the wheel.

It also makes me oppose the state of “demonstrating conduct unbecoming of an officer“, if anything he showed the balls (an element most flaccid US politicians are lacking) to do something essential. In this war, we have been confronted with a shifting of values by the enemies attacking America and as such, other considerations should be made in all this.

It becomes merely an administrative exercise when we were offered “found materials needed to make bombs like the one that had killed the Marines”, which alone would have been sufficient to take actions that might have resulted in enemy fatalities, optionally disregarding the circumstance.

When we are confronted with this stage we see the setting on why American forces might end up losing. I do not argue that there has been a clear path of transgressions by others as we are exposed to: “another officer, former 1st Lt. Clint Lorance, who was convicted of second-degree murder in 2013 for ordering his soldiers to open fire on village elders in Afghanistan who were approaching his unit while they were on patrol. Several member of Lorance’s platoon testified against him after being offered immunity.” In the case of Army Captain Mathew L. Golsteyn we see a very different stage and here we see a failing; a failing by the army, a failing by the American politicians and the quote by Rep. Duncan D. Hunter (R.-Calif.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee giving us: “Matt Golsteyn is an American hero. Matt Golsteyn does for the American people what we ask him to do, and the Army is screwing him again, and they ought to be embarrassed“, which seems to fit the bill in all this.

We also see another part; at the end of the linked article we are given: “A senior Army official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said a request for information on the Army’s handling of the case has been filed with the Defense Department Inspector General. Until that is resolved, the official said, the case is on hold“. I can only partially accept that. From my point of view a clear documented path should be presented to the people showing what the soldiers fighting for America have to go through. When I see “the Army’s handling of the case“, I see the need that there needs to be more clarity for these people in war time conditions and whilst in a stage where they can be part of a live fire exercise at any given moment. As I have the ability to kill anything within 800 meters (with the proper rifle), considering the damage I could do, knowing that there were plenty of people in Afghanistan imparting such damage on American troops, does the Pentagon or the political engine have any clue that any holier than though stage is not merely dangerous, it has the danger of losing an enormous amount of additional troops killed by leaving them in such a dangerous stage of uncertainty?

There is every case for the prosecution of former 1st Lt. Clint Lorance, yet is there any clear stage of transgression against then Army Captain Mathew L. Golsteyn? The fact that this entire matter has been going on for 5 years gives clear voice that some people are seeking something else; that conclusion comes to me when I see that the finding in 2014 was that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute. Yet that too leaves us with questions. Because we need to recognise the difference between ‘insufficient evidence to prosecute‘ versus ‘cleared as no wrongdoing was found‘.

We might be able to agree that the stage of Army Captain Mathew L. Golsteyn is one that required scrutiny, yet the fact that the finding of 2014 should have been accepted (even though I have an optional issue regarding the stripping of his Silver Star, however as I am unaware of the findings or the reasons on exactly why he was stripped, we need to keep that part in the air. If we consider the phrase ‘conduct unbecoming an officer’ we need to consider that “He launched an 80-man mission to hunt the shooter down, slogging through a muddy field under fire to help a wounded Afghan soldier“. One case is not another and in this the uncertainty that American troops are implied to be exposed to is also a much more dangerous setting, not merely in morale, but in the dangerous stage that until clear documented orders are given to soldiers on a battlefield, they might not act in fear of prosecution and that is deadly dangerous, which is a clear setting of defeat!

When we see in the official document: “CPT GOLSTEYN related he trusted Mr. [REDACTED]’s intelligence and had always given him credible information which saved lives and prevented attacks“, my mind would have been made up and clear. So whoever has been stretching and reactivating this investigation for 5 years needs to (in my most diplomatic posture and voice): “Fuck off and become a barber, hairdresser or taxi driver“, so there!

I admit that I might spend a day checking the validity of the report, yet it took 10 seconds to make up my mind in all this. War is war, it does not change; it does not compromise or play nice. For a lot of people the contemplation of wars changed. It was initially on the 9^th of August 2001 at a place called Sbarro in Jerusalem. A month later we got two buildings in New York on September 11^th (you might remember that) as well as the earlier bombings on four apartment blocks in the Russian cities of Buynaksk, Moscow and Volgodonsk between September 4^th and September 16^th 1999. It changed the stage of war. It was an intentional war against civilians, a war that should have been made unacceptable from day one.

From my personal point of view, the direct killing of a terrorist should be unconditional and non-prosecutable. We might argue that not all those wearing explosive vests do so of their own accord, yet at that point we need to avoid optional additional deaths a kill shot might be required. Yes, at that point we need to investigate if avoiding collateral damage can be proven to have been avoided and that is exactly what then Captain Golsteyn did.

I think that the US (as well as other nations) has ventured too much towards the facilitation of terrorists with the visible exception of France who knows just what to do with those unpleasant individuals (aka ‘fuckers’).

I also found the additional information (at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2015/05/19/see-document-excerpts-in-the-armys-war-crimes-case-against-a-green-beret-war-hero/) interesting here is the additional: “In December 2011, a special agent contacted Bing West, a bestselling author who spent time with Golsteyn’s unit around the time of the alleged killing. He said he wouldn’t assist investigators unless he was subpoenaed, and had never seen them do anything inappropriate.” This too is interesting for a few reasons. There is ample evidence that the media and the news steered around the events to the largest degree, those without knowledge, voices and with degrees in journalism have millions of words on Jamal Khashoggi, even if there is no evidence, yet when it comes to the work and dedication of Golsteyn, they all remain silent, this too is a level of hypocrisy I find hard to swallow. I do not run away from the issue and my findings on what I have been able to ascertain. So when I see ‘leaked report’ I have questions, questions that those leakers will not like (like the need for their identity) and the need to hold these people to account or their actions. So when I am treated to “Golsteyn “was not remorseful as he had solid intelligence and his actions protected the safety of his fellow teammates,” it said“, I merely see it as the required consequence of war. I also feel the need to make clear to feel my urge to make the not entirely proven claim that most likely someone at the CIA leaked it, to state to Director Gina Haspel (who was not in charge at that point): “Gina clean up your house, or I will do it for you and I won’t be nice about it!”

OK, that was a little over the top, yet am I wrong? We see all kinds of leaked reports left right and centre, yet when it comes to Jamal Khashoggi we get no leaked tapes, we get no leaked reports or photographs, we merely get 57,000,000 search results, most of them misinformation, repeated unsubstantiated rumours and debatable facts that are anything but confirmed facts. When we look for Matt Golsteyn, we merely see less than 190,000 results and most repeat each other and also hiding behind “suspected Taliban bomb maker” (which is not completely unacceptable) , so how much effort did Sam’s uncle show to check the validity of that part and the parts found? It seems to me that a mere confirmation of that would have resulted in a dismissal of all charges, or am I making the challenge too simple for the Pentagon (and/or) the CIA?

Before you all consider that it was a complex issue, I can give you the rough estimated 98.43356% certainty that it was not rocket science. We now see that President Trump is looking into the matter and that is a good thing, although in opposition, I personally believe that it should never have reached his desk, it should have been solved within the Pentagon walls in 2014, and it did (the outcome remaining partially debatable as I personally see it).

In the end, this is merely one case and there have been plenty, I will also admit that in many cases the US did not show to have its finest hour or that the actions of a few have been acceptable, yet in the case of then Captain Golsteyn, I would have done the same thing again, and again and again, no matter how the aftermath outcome was. The now Major Golsteyn response: “he couldn’t have lived with himself if [the suspected bomb maker] killed another Soldier or Marine“, he had the proper mindset to keep himself and his brothers in arms away from harm. So let us all hope that the House Armed Services Committee has more people like Duncan D. Hunter and less people who go ‘miaow’ day and night, because as I see it the people of a feline distinction will cower when it comes to the light of day and plead for a compromising solution with whomever achieves victory over America and in light of certain events that is not an unrealistic future that America is moving towards.

When we see people like Maria Butina having (via the NRA) sway over politicians and attempting to set an alleged Russian agenda, allegedly advocating the needs of Alexander Torshin, how much more important is it now to set the stage for a strong and committed defence force (and optional a strong intelligence force). Do you really think that the events surrounding Matt Golsteyn will get America there?

I very much doubt it!

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Tagged as Afghanistan, Alexander Torshin, Bing West, Buynaksk, CIA, Duncan D. Hunter, Gina Haspel, House Armed Services Committee, Jamal Khashoggi, Jerusalem, Maria Butina, Mathew L. Golsteyn, Matt Golsteyn, Moscow, NRA, pentagon, R.-Calif., Volgodonsk, Washington Post

December 14, 2018 · 13:07

Fight the Future

Mark Bergen gives us a Bloomberg article. The Sydney Morning Herald took it on (at https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/inside-huawei-s-secret-hq-china-is-shaping-the-future-20181213-p50m0o.html). Of course the arrest of Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of Huawei Technologies is the introduction here. We then get the staging of: “inside Huawei’s Shenzhen headquarters, a secretive group of engineers toil away heedless to such risks. They are working on what’s next – a raft of artificial intelligence, cloud-computing and chip technology crucial to China’s national priorities and Huawei’s future” with a much larger emphasis on “China’s government has pushed to create an industry that is less dependent on cutting-edge US semiconductors and software“, the matters are not wrong, yet they are debatable. When I see ‘China’s national priorities‘ and ‘Huawei’s future‘ we must ask ourselves, are they the same? They might be on the same course and trajectory, but they are not the same. In the end Huawei needs to show commercial power and growth, adhering to China’s national needs are not completely in line with that, merely largely so.

Then we something that is a lot more debatable, when we get: “That means the business would lap $US100 billion in 2025, the year China’s government has set to reach independence in technological production” and by my reckoning, China could optionally reach that in 2021-2022, these three years are important, more important than you realise. Neom in Saudi Arabia, optionally three projects in London, two in Paris, two in Amsterdam and optionally projects in Singapore, Dubai and Bangkok. Tokyo would be perfect, yet they are fiercely competitive and the Japanese feel nationalistic on Japanese and at times more important, driven towards non-Chinese goods. In the end, Huawei would need to give in too much per inch of market share, not worth it I reckon, yet the options that Huawei has available might also include growing the tourist fields where they can grow market share through data service options, especially if the can Google to become part of this (in some places). In the end, the stage is still valid to see Huawei become the biggest 5G player in the field.

Then we get the first part of the main event. With: “It started working on customised chips to handle complex algorithms on hardware before the cloud companies did. Research firm Alliance Bernstein estimates that HiSilicon is on pace for $US7.6 billion in sales this year, more than doubling its size since 2015. “Huawei was way ahead of the curve,” said Richard, the analyst.” we see something that I have tried to make clear to the audience for some time.

June 2018: ‘Telstra, NATO and the USA‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2018/06/20/telstra-nato-and-the-usa/) with: “A failing on more than one level and by the time we are all up to speed, the others (read: Huawei) passed us by because they remained on the ball towards the required goal.”

September 2018: ‘One thousand solutions‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2018/09/26/one-thousand-solutions/) with: “we got shown 6 months ago: “Huawei filed 2,398 patent applications with the European Patent Office in 2017 out of a total of 166,000 for the year“, basically 1.44% of ALL files European patents were from that one company.”

Merely two of several articles that show us the momentum that Huawei has been creating by stepping away from the iterative mobile business model and leaping technologically ahead one model after the other. If you look at the history of the last few years, Huawei went from P7, Mate 10, Nova 3i and Mate 20 Pro. These 4 models in a lifecycle timeline have been instrumental for them and showing the others that there is fierce competition. The P7, a mere equal to the Samsung Galaxy 4 in its day, yet 43% cheaper for the consumer, and now they are at the Mate 20 Pro, which is 20% cheaper than the Samsung Galaxy Note9 and regarded as better in a few ways. In 4 cycles Huawei moved from optionally a choice to best in the field and still cheaper than most. That is the effect of leaping forward and they are in a place where they can do the same in the 5G field.

We are confronted with the drive with the statement: “Huawei is throwing everything into its cloud package. It recently debuted a set of AI software tools and in October released a new specialised chip, called the Ascend. “No other chip set has this kind of capability of processing,” Qiu said.” This viewed advantage is still a loaded part because there is the fact that China is driven towards growing the AI field, where they, for now have a temporary disadvantage. We might see this as a hindrance, yet that field is only visible in the governmental high end usage that there is and consumers like you and me will not notice this, those who claim it and create some elaborate ‘presentation’ into making the water look muddy. When your life is about Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook, you will never notice it. In the high end usage, where AI is an issue, they are given the cloud advantage that others cannot offer to the degree that is available to non-governmental players (well, that is what it looks like and that is technologically under consideration, yet it does look really nice).

When we look towards the future of Huawei we clearly see the advantages of the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia, UAE and optionally Qatar if they play their cards right. Latin America is an option, especially if they start in Argentina, where they could optionally add Uruguay overnight, branching out towards Chile and Paraguay will be next leaving the growth towards Brazil. Yet in that same strategy add Venezuela and Colombia first would enable several paths. The business issue remains, yet being the first to have an additional appeal and if it pisses off the Americans Venezuela gets on board fast often enough. The issue is more than technological. The US still has to prove to the audience that there is a 5G place for them all and the infrastructure does not really allow for it at present, merely the metropolitan areas where the money is, driving inequality in the USA even further.

If visibility is the drive than Huawei is very much on the right track and they are speeding that digital super highway along nicely. Yet in opposition to all this is the final paragraph in the SMH. When we see: ““As long as they stick to the game plan, they still have a lot of room to grow,” he said. “Unless the US manages to get their allies to stop buying them.”” This is a truth and also a reassurance. You see the claim ‘Unless the US manages to get their allies to stop buying them‘, gets us to an American standard. It was given to us by the X-Files in the movie with the same name, or perhaps better stated Chris Carter gave it to us all. The end he gives us: “He is but one man. One man alone cannot fight the future“, it equally applies to governments too, they might try to fight the future, yet in the end, any nation is built from the foundation of people, stupid or not, bright or less so, the larger group can do arithmetic and when we are confronted with a Huawei at $450, or an Apple iPhone at $2350, how many of you are desperately rich enough to waste $1900 more on the same functionality? Even when we add games to the larger three (Facebook, LinkedIn & Twitter), most phones will merely have an optional edge and at $1900? Would you pay for the small 10% difference that 1-3 games optionally offer? And let’s not forget that you will have to add that difference again in 2 years when you think that you need a new phone. The mere contemplation of optimised playing free games at $77 a month makes total sense doesn’t it? So there we see the growth plan of Huawei, offering the top of the mountain at the base price and those in denial making these unsubstantiated ‘security risk’ claims will at some point need to see the issue as Verizon is the most expensive provider in the US, So when I see $110 per month for 24 GB of shared data, whilst I am getting 200GB for $50, I really have to take an effort not to laugh out loud. That is the 5G world, the US faces and whilst there was an option for competitive players in the US, the Huawei block is making sure that some players will rake in the large cash mountain for much longer and there others are making fun of my predictions, and now that I am proven to be correct, they are suddenly incommunicado and extremely silent.

As such, when I predicted that the US is now entering a setting where they end up trailing a field that they once led, we will see a lot of growth of Chinese interests. In all this, do you really think that it will stop at a mere 5G walkie talkie? No, with 5G automation and deeper learning, we will see a larger field of dash boarding, information and facilitation to the people and Huawei will optionally rule that field soon enough, with a few non Americans nipping at their heels for dominance because that is the nature of the beast as well. Progress is a game for the hungry and some players (specifically the US) have forgotten what it was like to be hungry. Australian Telstra made similar mistakes and moved their Share price of $6.49 to $3.08 in the stage of 3 years, a 52% loss of value, and when (not if) Huawei pushed the borders all over the place, those people with a Verizon Protective State of Mind will end up seeing Verizon going in a similar setting, because that is also the consequence of adhering to what I would consider to be a form of nationalistic nepotism. The UK already had its ducks in a row for the longest of times (and that island has less ground to cover, which is a distinct advantage), so there BT has options for now and over time they might adhere to some of their policies as is required, the US is not in that good a position and Huawei merely needs to flash a medium purse of cash to show the people in the US that a place like Buenos Aires can offer the masses more and faster than those on better incomes in the US, because the pricing model allows for such a shift.

In this the problem is not a short term one, even as US giants are supposed to have the advantage, we also see that the workforce is not properly adhered to, the US (and the UK) have a massive, not a large, but a massive disadvantage when it comes to STEM students, a disadvantage that China does not have. The AI field is not something that is solved over the next 3 years, so as those with educations in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics is dwindling to some degree in commonwealth nations and America, China can move full steam as the next generation is pushed into high end ambition and careers. As such the entire AI shortfall against America can be overcome much easier by places like China and India at present. It is not merely the stage of more graduated students; it is about groups of graduated students agreeing on paths towards breakthrough solutions. No matter how savant one student is, a group is always more likely to see the threat and weakness of a certain path and that is where the best solution is found faster.

Will we ‘Fight the Future’?

The issue is not the American polarised view, it is the correctly filtered view that Alex Younger gave us initially, it is not incorrect to have a nationalistic protective view and Alex gave the correct stage on having a national product to use, which is different from the Canadian and Australian path proclaimed. We agree that it is in a national required state to have something this critical solved in a national way (when possible that is), in this the path to have a Huawei 5G stage and then reengineer what is required is not wrong, yet it is optionally with a certain risk and when that path is small enough, it is a solution. The UK is largely absolved as it had BT with the foundations of the paths required, just as Australia has Telstra, yet some countries (like Australia) become too complacent, BT was less complacent and they have knowledge, yet is it advanced enough? We agree that they can get up to speed faster, yet will it be fast enough? I actually do not know, I have no data proving the path in one direction or the other. What is clear is that a race with equal horses provides the best growth against one another, the competitiveness and technological breakthroughs that we have seen for the longest time. That path has largely been made redundant in the US and Australia (I cannot say for certain how that is in Canada).

Even as Huawei is gaining speed and being ahead of it all is still a race by one player, the drive to stay ahead is only visible on the global field, and it is an uncertain path, even if they have all the elements in their favour, what is clear is that this advantage will remain so for the next 5 years and unless certain nations make way for budgets growing the STEM pool by well over 200% their long term disadvantage remains in place.

The versusians

In this stage we need to look in the pro and con Huawei field. In the pro field, as Huawei set the stage for global user growth, which they are seemingly doing, they have the upper hand and they will grow to a user base that grows from servicing a third of the internet users to close to 50%, that path is set with some certainty and as such their advantage grows. In the opposition of that, players like need to step away from the political empty headed failure of enabling the one champion stage of Verizon and Telstra, diversity would give the competitive drive and now it is merely Telstra versus Vodafone/TPG, is means that there will be a technological compromise stage where none of the two surges ahead giving players like Huawei a much larger advantage to fuel growth,

How wrong am I likely to be?

So far I have been close to the mark months in advance compared to the big newspapers only giving partial facts long after I saw it coming, so I feel that I remain on the right track here. The question is not merely who has the 5G stage first, it will be who will facilitate 5G usage more complete and earlier than the others, because that is where the big number of switchers will be found and players like TPG and Vodafone have seen the impact of switchers more than once, so they know that they must be better and more complete than the other brand. Huawei knows it too, they saw that part and are still seeing the impact that goes all the way back to the P7, and that is where Apple also sees more losses, We were informed a mere 9 hours ago: “Piper Jaffray cuts its Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) price target from $250 to $222 saying that recent supplier guidance cuts suggest “global unit uptake has not met expectations.”” another hit of a loss to face, optionally a mere 11.2% yet in light of the recent losses, they faced, we see what I personally feel was the impact of the ridiculous stage of handing the audience a phone of $2369, optionally 30% more expensive than the choice after that one, even if the number two is not that much less in its ability. The stage where marketeers decide on what the people need, when they all need something affordable. It personally feels like the iMac Pro move, a $20K solution that less than 0.3% of the desktop users would ever need, and most cannot even afford. That is driving the value of Apple down and Huawei knows that this egocentric stage is one that Apple et al will lose, making Huawei the optional winner in many more places after the first 5G hurdles are faced by all.

Do you still think that Apple is doing great? A company that went from a trillion to 700 billion in less than 10 weeks, which is an opportunity for the IOS doubters to now consider Huawei and Samsung, even as Huawei will statistically never get them all, they will get a chunk and the first move is that these users moved away from IOS, and as Android users they are more easily captured towards user hungry players like Huawei by its marketing, that is the field that has changed in the first degree and as people feel comfortable with Huawei, they will not consider getting more Huawei parts (like routers for the internet at home) and that continues as people start moving into the 5G field. You see, we can agree that it is mere marketing (for now), yet Huawei already has its 5G Customer-premises Equipment (as per March 2018). this implies that with: “compatible with 4G and 5G networks, and has proven measured download speeds of up to 2Gbps – 20 times that of 100 Mbps fiber“, that they can buy their router now, remain on 4G and when their local telecom is finally ready, 5G will kick in when the subscription is correct. It is as far as I can tell the first time that government telecom procedures are vastly behind the availability to the consumer (an alleged speculation from my side).

Do you think that gamers and Netflix people will not select this option if made available? That is what is ahead of the coming options and that is the Future that some are fighting. It is like watching a government on a mule trying to do battle with a windmill, the stage seems that ridiculous and as we move along, we will soon see the stage being ‘represented’ by some to state on the dangers that cannot (or are ignored) to be proven.

The moment other devices are set towards the 5G stage, that is when more and more people will demand answers from industrial politicians making certain claims and that is when we see the roller-coaster of clowns and jesters get the full spotlight. This is already happening in Canada (at https://www.citynews1130.com/2018/12/13/huawei-and-5g-experts-clash-on-the-risk-to-canadas-national-security/), where City News (Ottawa) gives us: “I can’t see many circumstances, other than very extreme ones, in which the Chinese government would actually risk Huawei’s standing globally as a company in order to conduct some kind of surveillance campaign“, something I claimed weeks ago, so nice for the Canadian press to catch up here, in addition when we are given: ““This can be used for a lot of things, for manipulation of businesses to harvesting of intellectual property,” Tobok said. “On a national security level, they can know who is where at any given time. They can use that as leverage to jump into other operations of the government.” those people knowingly, willingly and intentionally ignore the fact that Apps can do that and some are doing it already. The iPhone in 2011 did this already. We were given: “Privacy fears raised as researchers reveal file on iPhone that stores location coordinates and timestamps of owner’s movements“, so when exactly was the iPhone banned as a national security hazard? Or does that not apply to any Commonwealth nation when it is America doing it? Or perhaps more recent (January 2018), when Wired gave us: “the San Francisco-based Strava announced a huge update to its global heat map of user activity that displays 1 billion activities—including running and cycling routes—undertaken by exercise enthusiasts wearing Fitbits or other wearable fitness trackers. Some Strava users appear to work for certain militaries or various intelligence agencies, given that knowledgeable security experts quickly connected the dots between user activity and the known bases or locations of US military or intelligence operations.” So when Lt. Walksalot was mapping out that secret black site whilst his Fitbit was mapping that base location every morning job, was the Fitbit banned? Already proven incursions on National security mind you, yet Huawei with no shown transgressions is the bad one. Yes, that all made perfect sense. I will give Wesley Wark, a security and intelligence specialist who teaches at the University of Ottawa a pass when he gives us: “Still, Canada can’t afford to be shut out of the Five Eyes or play a diminished role in the alliance, and if Britain decides to forbid Huawei from taking part in its 5G networks, Canada could not be the lone member to embrace the company“, OK that is about governmental policy, not unlike Alex Younger there is a claim to be made in that case, not for the risk that they are or might be, but the setting that no government should have a foreign risk in place. This is all fine and good, but so far the most transgressions were American ones and that part is kept between the sheets (like catering to IBM for decades), or leaving the matter largely trivialised.

It is pointless to fight the future, you can merely adhere to swaying the direction it optionally faces and the sad part is that this sway has forever been with those needing to remain in power, or to remain in the false serenity that status quo brings (or better stated never brings). True innovation is prevented from taking grasp and giving directional drive and much better speeds and that too is something to consider, merely because innovation drives IP, the true currency of the future and when we deny ourselves that currency we merely devaluate ourselves as a whole. In this we should agree that denying innovation has never ever resulted in a positive direction, history cannot give us one example when this worked out for the best of all.

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Tagged as 4G, 5G, AI, Alex Younger, America, Android, Apple, Argentina, Bangkok, bloomberg, BT, Canada, City News, Dubai, Fitbit, google, HiSilicon, Huawei, IOS, IP, London, Mark Bergen, Meng Wanzhou, NEOM, Piper Jaffray, Qatar, Samsung Galaxy Note9, Saudi Arabia, Shenzhen headquarters, Singapore, SMH, Sydney Morning Herald, Telstra, Tobok, Tokyo, TPG, UAE, UK, University of Ottawa, Uruguay, USA, Vodafone, Wesley Wark

December 11, 2018 · 12:50

The assumption of right

This happens, it happens almost every day and we all (including me) see that happen. My view was that oil prices would go up. It is a logic set to demand and supply, a basic principle. As OPEC cut production by 1.2 million barrels a day, we would have expected a rise, maybe not directly, but overall when you get less of a product, the prices rise. It is the basic foundation of commerce; shortage tends to drive prices up. Yet a Forbes article proves me wrong (at https://www.forbes.com/sites/gauravsharma/2018/12/10/opecs-output-cut-not-enough-to-provide-short-term-70-oil-price-floor/#668312a8d58d).

This is fine, I never proclaimed to have all the answers, yet it does seem odd that less oil still drops the price from $80 to $51 in one month, and the logic is gone at my end of the table, yet I also know that oil prices are a little more complex, so I took this moment to learn a little. Gaurav Sharma gives us: “oil price is not just a story of supply; it is also a story of demand“. That part makes sense, yet this part only gives rise to changes if demand dampens and dampens by a whole lot. We see that with: “It cannot be ignored that Eurozone growth continues to disappoint, global trade is decelerating and China’s slowdown is a visible fact, and not just a forecast. We haven’t even mentioned the words “trade wars” and a prospect of further U.S. interest rate hikes“. Yes, so far I am on board, yet does that dampen the need for oil to THAT degree? This is precisely the setting when we consider: “If anything OPEC’s move provides U.S. drillers with a further incentive to pump more, and they already are, having made America the world’s largest producer of crude oil.” This implies that the need is changing; America needs less as they become self-reliant more. This explains the setting in the short term, yet it also gives rise to other dilemmas. As the US is using its own stock to keep cheap oil, we also see the change in the dynamics. Less money in the treasury through cheap oil, more costs (and optionally more jobs mind you), yet the budget and shortages of America (like $21 trillion debt) now has another not so nice tail. The interest on 21 trillion can no longer be fuelled with fuel. With a downwards economy, the debt will rise a little faster and there will not be anything left for infrastructure. Now, in this case none of this is the fault of the US Administration, or the current administration to be a little more precise. There is a lot wrong as the Clinton administration left the nation with surplus. I am not ignoring that 9/11 changed the game, yet the Obama administration had a clear directive to do something and that was not done. We can argue whether they had the options or not, we know that the war on terror has had a long-lasting impact. And the downward fuel price does not help. Yet cheap fuel is good for all the non-petrochemical industries and the people requiring cheap oil for heating.

The writer also gives us: “As things stand, a sustainable $70 oil price doesn’t look certain at all for 2019“. OK, I can only support that for as long as the US can keep up with the reductions that OPEC and Russia implement, when that stops working prices will go up, just how fast is unknown. It depends on the current storage and demand and I am not certain that this will not bite in 2019. I cannot academically argue with Gaurav Sharma and his 20 years of experience. His point might be valid, yet the Economic Times gives us: “WTI is forming Doji candlestick pattern and also near its long term Fibonacci retracement. Both are positive signs for crude oil prices“, If this happens within the next two weeks, my predicted increase of 15% comes true. Yet how is that chance? Focussing on merely my point of view tends to be delusional, which is why I liked the view by Gaurav Sharma. He gave me something to think about. It is Mike Terwilliger, portfolio manager, at Resource Liquid Alternatives, in New York who gave us (last week): “It’s a stunning market backdrop where everything from the adjectives used by the Fed chairman to whom is appointed head of trade negotiations can roil the markets. While the macro backdrop remains firm, with strong earnings and historically low unemployment, sentiment is unquestionably vulnerable. That would, in my view, fit the definition of an opportunity – a disconnect between the underlying and perception.” (at https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/stocks/news/us-wall-st-tumbles-growth-trade-unnerve-investors/articleshow/66946928.cms)

I have always considered and known about ‘the underlying‘ and or versus ‘perception‘, no mystery there, yet are there factors we see to forget about? Part we get from the Guardian (May 2018) when we were given: “Demand is expected to average 99.2mb/d this year.” I am adding the part where that demand is not going to diminish over at least part of 2019. Even as we see more and more drive towards sustainable energy, most players are still all about presenting and not completely in the realm of achieving, hence oil demand remains stable (as far as stable tends to be), in addition we need to look at the oil futures. S&P global (at https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/oil/121018-crude-oil-futures-stable-to-higher-on-opec-production-cuts) gives us: “risk sentiment remained heightened after US Trade Representative Robert Lighthize Sunday said that he considers March 1 to be a hard deadline for a trade deal to be reached with China and that tariffs will be imposed otherwise“. So basically the futures are rolling towards the up side making me correct, yet as long as the US can keep up with demand and as long as we see this continue, oil will remain stable and not push beyond $60 per barrel in the short term. MatketWatch is actually more optimistic towards the consumers of fuel. With: “Oil futures fell Monday to settle at their lowest in about a week on growing concerns surrounding a slowdown in energy demand“.

Why do we care?

We care because the drop in demand as projected and given by several sources is also the economic indicator that not all is well. This is seen in several sources. Goldman Sachs, via CNBC gives us: “We expect the U.S. to slow down to less than 2 percent by the end of next year and as a result of that you could see the market getting quite scared“, yet would be an overly optimistic view. We saw last week that the US Economy gained 43,000 jobs less than last year giving us a much less optimistic view on that part of the equation. Apple is falling down, tension on the Economy (specifically the US economy) is on the rise, some might say sharply on the rise. In addition, the Financial Post gives us: “Wall Street ignored trouble signs for months. Now it sees risks everywhere Markets face stomach-churning swings as economic uncertainty grows“. Even when we stick to the headlines, it was nothing really breathtaking. The US trade deal with China, the growth fears in the EU, they all link into a negative setting of the economy. Not recession, yet a negative impact due to no growth (too little growth is more accurate) and the events in France do not help either. In addition, there is now a realistic chance that Italy is entering recession territory. Even as it is possible to avert it, it will means that the Italian economy will end at a standstill (which is not a recession), yet in all this, with the Two large EU economies at 0 (France and Italy), it falls to Germany to bring home the bacon and sausages, implying that they are all eager and desperate to sink any notion of Brexit as soon as possible. As we see the jesters giving us that the UK can exit Brexit, that whilst they are seemingly unable to get a handle on the ECB and their everlasting lack of transparency, so whilst we see (at https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/news/ecb-chief-rejects-chance-to-adopt-eus-transparency-register/) the unsettling part “The European Central Bank’s President Mario Draghi has rejected calls from European lawmakers to have financiers who give advice and feedback to the ECB register as lobbyists, saying they merely provide “information”.” I merely see an extended reason to pursue Brexit stronger. I actually am in a state of mind to demand the right for targeted killing these so called ‘informers’, which is a massive overreaction, yet the need to get these information givers listed next to the lobbyists is becoming more and more essential. If any nepotism, or if any under the table deal is found within the EU, their exposure is essential. I believe that this will flush greed out into the open rather fast, but then I am merely one voice in all this.

It connects

You see, the QE is supposed to come to an end this Thursday, or at least the formal announcement to end it at the end of this month. However, when we consider Reuters: “the economy weakening, trade tensions darkening the outlook and headwinds still on the horizon in the shape of Italy and Brexit, financial markets are looking ahead to next year and just how the ECB will protect the bloc from a severe downturn“, not only does the rejection to officially end QE have an impact, it also means that suddenly demand for things like oil will suddenly spike, that means that reserves go down, oil prices go up and there the cost of living will impact harshly on Europe in winter and as such on American soil the need for a price hike will not really be one that people will cherish, and when we add to that the part that Germany also has a depressed economy to look forward to, we see the three great economic players all in a diminished form, implying that the economy will tank on the low side not merely in this year, it will have a depressed form of growth in 2019 as well. There will be all kinds of lessened good news, whilst the good news is not that great to begin with. It gives rise to the point that I might be wrong on the oil price as I expected it to grow by 15%, it might still go up yet not that much and it will come at a really high cost this time around.

Right or Wrong?

It does not matter in this case; the issues seen are openly visible and heralded throughout the net, magazines and newspapers. The issue of ‘the underlying‘ and or versus ‘perception‘ is at the heart of the matter. Even as energy and oil prices show certain paths in all of this, it does not make it a correct view (which is neither right not wrong), what we perceive in opposition to the underlying elements connected, that is the bigger picture of impact. It is also a new stage. As the politicians are fighting over the carcasses of opportunity and bonus structures, we see that Germany has a few other elements in play. It is not merely the manufacturing part of it all, it is infrastructure as well and that is where we get my earlier statement, a statement I gave 3 days ago in ‘Behind the facade‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2018/12/08/behind-the-facade/), if Huawei (minus one arrested exec) shows their value in Germany with the given quote, which came well over a day after my article (at https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/12/09/germany-is-soft-on-chinese-spying/), where we see: “In the terms of reference published last week by the German Federal Network Agency for its 5G auction, security was not even included in the conditions for awarding the contract. In October, the government announced: “A concrete legal basis for the complete or partial exclusion of particular suppliers of 5G infrastructure in Germany does not exist and is not planned.”“, as well as “For Deutsche Telekom and other network operators, the situation is clear: Huawei offers innovative and reliable products at highly competitive prices. Legally, Deutsche Telekom does not bear any liability for the security risks associated with Huawei technology. And the company does not care about the fact that Huawei’s price advantage is the result of a highly skewed playing field in China. In the world’s largest market, domestic providers control 75 percent of the market, giving them unbeatable economies of scale“, we see the hidden trap that some people related to Mr S. Tupid are now in hot waters (optionally with the exception of Alex Younger). Not only have they not given any evidence regarding the security risk that Huawei is supposed to be. Foreign Policy also gives us: “Given the massive cybersecurity and national security risks, the only responsible decision is for Berlin to follow the Australian, New Zealand, and U.S. lead and ban Chinese providers from the German 5G network“, yet there is no evidence, that was always the problem and so far there is more and more indicators (especially in Australia) that the claim “In none of these three countries will domestic suppliers be the primary beneficiaries“, which I regard to be false, on paper it does not impact ‘primary beneficiaries’, but it does harshly (in Australia at least) negatively impacts the competitors of Telstra, which amounts to the same thing (TPG, Vodafone, Vodafail et al). And when we go back to my writing in ‘Behind the facade‘, where I give the reader: “You see, Huawei can afford to wait to some degree, as we see the perpetuated non truths of devices being pushed forward, the replacements better do a whole lot better and they are unlikely to do so. When we see another failure in 5G start and we see transgressions and those screaming that ‘Huawei’ was a danger, the moment they cannot prove it and their ‘friends’ give us a device that is malicious, the blowback will be enormous. There is already cause for concern if we go by CNBC. They give us a few points that show the additional fear that America has on Huawei“, when the intrusions are not proven and Huawei shows to be a strength for consumers and businesses, heads will roll, there will be a demand for blood by the people, which means that politicians will suddenly hide and become ‘on the principle of the matter‘ and transform their perspectives into in all kinds of lethargic versions of denial.

That too is impacting the economy, because those on track to start pushing out new innovations on 5G will have a clear advantage over the other players and that pushes for success even more, will it come to pass? I cannot tell as there are too many elements in motion and the policies now in place are off course under optional revised in the future as Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer will replace Angela Merkel if her party is re-elected as the biggest one.

We are seeing a few versions in the assumption of right, and we need to realise that the assumption of right and speculative version of what will happen overlaps one another, but they are not the same thing. States of delusion tends to be an impacting factor. Am I delusional to think that big business gives away greed? Am I delusional to consider that Huawei is not a danger? If we go by ‘the underlying‘ and or versus ‘perception‘ I am correct. You see, would China endanger the true power of economy where Huawei would become the biggest brand on internet and 5G requirement, using it for espionage when there are dozens of other methods to get that data (including Facebook policies implemented by Mr S. Tupid and Mrs M. Oronic). As this sifting of data exists on many levels in several ways, not in the least that the overly abundance of TCP/IP layer 8 transgressions happening on a daily basis and at least twice on Sunday), when we realise that, why would any Chinese governmental (namely Chen Wenqing) endanger a Chinese technological powerhouse? The logic is absent in all this. This gives us the light of Alex Younger opposing the others. He gave a policy setting of national need, whilst the others merely voiced all this ‘national security‘ banter on risks that do not even exist yet. Especially when we saw the Australian version of: ”5G will carry communications we “rely on every day, from our health systems … to self-driving cars and through to the operation of our power and water supply.”” Perhaps anyone can tell me how many self-driving cars there are at present or within the next 10 years?

And none of these клоуны (or is that Sarmenti scurrae) considered the step to start with Huawei 5G and replace them at the earliest convenience whilst you work out the bugs of your currently incomplete 5G solutions, the few that are out there for now, a simple business decision that is at the heart of any daily event, including military ones. A nice example there is the ugliest dinghy in US history (aka the Zumwalt class) where we see: “Zumwalt-class destroyers are armed with 80 missiles in vertical-launch tubes and two 155-caliber long-range guns“, which is an awesome replacement from the previous version that was regarded as a Ammo less Gun edition, in the face of continuing budget shortfalls, personnel problems and of course the fact that the previous edition was $1 million per shell, for its smart (GPS) capability. The mere elements that some sources gave out that shooting straight was an ability it naturally acquired as well as the fact that a $440 million ship was not given the budget to get its unique, 155-millimeter-diameter cannon that can shoot GPS-guided shells as far as 60 miles the 600 rounds of ammo at a total cost of $600,000,000. And that is apart from the $10 billion the Navy spent on research and development for the class. So perhaps people still have questions why I considered this monstrosity to be regarded as a ‘sink on the spot‘ project. The fact that The Drive gave us a year ago: “the Navy has steadily hacked away at various requirements, stripping planned systems from the design, in no small part to try and control any further cost overruns and delays. Close-in protection, ballistic and air defense capabilities, and various other associated systems are no longer part of the base design, something The War Zone’s own Tyler Rogoway explained in detail in a past feature, leaving it with limited utility despite its size and cost” (and apart from some minor issue regarding stability and stealthablity which we shall ignore for now) in that light the entire 5G redeployment after the fact and the ability are acquired, tested and evaluated, at that point re-engineering away the advantage that Huawei had built, did that not make sense within 10 seconds?

It is common business practice in IT, and has been for over 2 decades, that is why ASUS and not IBM rules the lay of the desktop land nowadays. so getting even would not have been the dumbest idea either, but no, we see all kinds of unfounded accusations and that is where those people are most likely to lose and out in the sunlight, when they cannot prove that claim, that is when we see on how some elements will soon be disregarded. In this Huawei has a nice advantage in Germany and Saudi Arabia. When they prove the elements there, we will see a large driven technology shift and those making the claims at recent days better have their stories straight.

Yet again, I might be wrong, my assumption of right might get sunk on false premise and nepotism, I do recognise that this has happened before and will happen again.

The assumption of right is at times hindered on delusional thoughts, as well as the need that the other players are straight shooter, and that definitely applies to all politicians, does it not?

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Tagged as 5G UK, Alex Younger, Angela Merkel, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, Asus, Australia, Australian, Brexit, Chen Wenqing, China, CNBC, Deutsche Telekom, Eu, European Central Bank, Eurozone, Forbes, France, Gaurav Sharma, German Federal Network Agency, Goldman Sachs, Huawei, IBM, Italy, Mario Draghi, Mike Terwilliger, New Zealand, Oil, oil price, OPEC, Resource Liquid Alternatives, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Telstra, The Drive, the Guardian, TPG, Tyler Rogoway, US, US Defense, US navy, Vodafone, WTI

December 8, 2018 · 12:56

Behind the facade

There is a question, there are several questions and for the most we have been ignorant of these questions because we give more unruly validity to the populist masses. ABC questioned it yesterday evening with: ‘Why is Huawei so controversial and being targeted by foreign governments?‘, the article (at https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-07/why-is-chinese-tech-company-huawei-being-targeted/10593156) is an excellent piece by both Ian Burrows and Jack Kilbride, and it is brilliant that for the most we see questions, we see questions that are important. In equal measure we see answers and points made. Points that most of the media shunned from, it all starts with: “The dramatic arrest in Canada of a top Chinese technology executive for possible extradition to the United States has sent stock markets plummeting and cast doubt on a recent US-China trade truce“. We see the shot across the bow with: “Reports say Ms Meng is facing extradition to the US on suspicion she violated US sanctions against Iran“. So there we have that they are not giving us the fact that they have evidence, merely that they have suspicions and that is why the extradition had been started. A woman in high office and that is the one you arrest, right? The fact that Meng Wanzhou is the daughter of company founder Ren Zhengfei might merely be icing on the American cake. As I personally see it, it has nothing to do with any of that, it is not about any option that involves Iran, if so dozens of Indian nationals and Russians would have been in a similar state, yet they are not. America is not acting there are they? No, America is afraid, it has been for a long time and for the longest of times they were looking in the wrong direction. As the cowards they have shown themselves to be 4 times over, they got played and Huawei, especially Ren Zhengfei knows how to play this game and brokered deal after deal. Facilitating towards fintech, but not facilitating to fintech, two very different stages. And now we get: “It says it operates in more than 170 countries, has 180,000 employees and serves more than a third of the world’s population“, that is the fear, because if wealth is set to the currency of data, American businesses don’t really hold a candle anymore do they? I have the goods on $2 billion in value, yet I do not trust anyone, especially the American corporations that hide behind ‘misunderstanding’, ‘miscommunication’ and inflated or deflated values as their need for greed requires. That is why people go directly towards places like Google and Huawei as they tend to cater (more) correctly, as long as their corporate targets are met. The fear of no longer being regarded as an entity that matters is the new fear of America. And with 1/3 of the population catered by a Chinese conglomerate and well over 40% by others moves America from the number one players to a player in the top 6. And you know Americans, they only respect number one, and the idea that this is a Chinese company is just too offensive to them.

The article has more. When we revisit “New Zealand’s international spy agency also followed Australia’s lead, banning the use of Huawei equipment in its planned 5G upgrade, saying it posed a “significant network security risk”“, we are introduced to more lies, lies propagated by America. It was an utter step of stupidity. At present no evidence has ever been submitted that Huawei was a risk and the idea that they serve a third of the population is a debilitating fear that America is unable to deal with, it is like anti-communism on steroids, a new cold war where America is optionally not in pole position. You see, this is in opposition to MI6 chief Alex Younger, he never claimed this. He stated that the British government (or any government for that matter) should never be at risk and should never hand out such levels of infrastructure risk to others. That is perfectly valid, it is a policy choice and the United Kingdom would be well off to take that step. Now we do get that it makes things harder for others, yet in an age of data to not have your own technology in place is ludicrous. That is a fair point to have, and that is valid, very valid. Yet the simpletons under us give us unwarranted and invalidated ‘significant network security risk‘, so please feel free to explain to me when stupidity was a good idea in any setting of data or security?

Concerns

There are concerns when ANY company growths to the size of Huawei, we cannot deny that, you merely have to look at the stupidity Facebook has shown in the last 61 weeks, three days and 6 hours to realise that part of the equation. And the article gets us to a statement that matters, so when we see: “There has long been concern that Huawei is not that separated from some of the Chinese security apparatus and there are suggestions its equipment could be used for spying“. OK, the concern is valid, yet is it happening? Is there a cause for concern, for genuine concern? Optionally there is and it merely gives empowerment to the statement that Alex Younger gave us, not the dozen of Punch and Judy characters claiming the unproven ‘significant network security risk‘. There is a difference you know.

We can argue that there is another part that matters. I remember reading a paper form Shanghai University (2010) who made the setting that there is a theoretical part in AES256 that makes it viable to unnerve the encryption (I did not say hack it). It requires quantum computing skills, but still there was an interesting part in the paper that reminded me of another stage (I will not go deeper into it now).

Going back to the concerns, we see a part by Fergus Hanson, that is valid, yet is it a real concern? He gave us: “The biggest concern is, whether they want to do it or not, they can be compelled by the Chinese Communist Party to spy and conduct espionage on the Chinese Communist Party’s behalf“, I am not sure whether it is valid. It should not be ignored, yet in this age of economy and revenue (and profit) would you want to endanger the goose with its golden eggs when a third of a population is using your products? When you get people by the billion handing data to Facebook and a league of other sources, when that data is already accessible, why push further at present? That is the stage Chinese intelligence is in, and even as we cannot ignore that danger, do you think anyone in the Chinese intelligence chair (namely Chen Wenqing) would be allowed to keep his seat if he directly endangered Chinese economy to that degree?

And how did China react? When the opportunity came up to bash President Trump and his personal iPhone, we see: “Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying dismissed the claims and suggested that “if they are really very worried about Apple phones being bugged, then they can change to using Huawei,” instead“, in one shot, brilliant!

When China is that proud of its devices, would they want to be proven wrong? Would they want to? And whilst we consider how to hack the phone, we forget that there is another way: Kaspersky (at https://www.kaspersky.com/blog/hacking-cellular-networks/10633/) gave us all the way back in 2015: “It was last year when a new method of attack on cellular networks was discovered. It requires neither costly radio scanners nor PC powerhouses and is available to virtually anyone. Besides, carriers have no practical means of protecting against this type of attack“, everybody is crying over the milk being stolen whilst criminals are getting direct access to all the cows in the land, how did that make sense, like ever?

And the hacking gets to be worse. One source giving us: “Interestingly enough, the 3GPP, the organization in charge of setting mobile data network standards and enforcing them, also acknowledged the issue in 2006 but chose to do nothing about it. Researchers brought up this vulnerability to the world in 2015 in a paper titled: Practical attacks against privacy and availability in 4G/LTE mobile communication systems. That same year, the ACLU managed to obtain documents that described the stingray surveillance device had identical functionalities. In the following year, Zhang Wanqiao of Qihoo 360 extended the practical attack described by the initial researchers and presented on it at DEFCON 24 in August of 2016. Now, at Ruxcon in October of 2016, the attack has been demonstrated and been proven to work on all LTE networks with readily available gear“, and in all this Huawei was never part of this, yet that is where the focus remains and whilst this push goes through, we see a short sighted approach. I am not worried on the risk via Huawei, there is enough evidence out there that the concern is not ‘Is Huawei the danger’, it is whether these so called politicians playing with their Punch puppets are setting the stage that hacking becomes increasingly easy for others to hack it.

So here we are, in a stage where America is already facing energy hikes, hikes that started at a mere 5% hours ago as they agreed ‘to cut global oil production by 1.2 million barrels a day‘, something I saw coming two weeks ago. Now we get a new stage, not merely a technological one, it will be a field of what I call ‘techno-facilitation‘, As the 5G pressure changes, places like Huawei are pushing not for the parts they are rejected from, but the consumer parts, the smart devices that are added to more and more non smart devices on a daily basis. Some might have seen the ‘Samsung Family Hub 2.0 Smart Fridge‘. To oversimplify it, it is a fridge with a tablet on the front door (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaKh5qJrTKQ), as we see more applications towards smart devices, these solutions all require interfaces and there Huawei has options and already an advantage. You see, the chance of a players like Gorenje, Hoover, Beko or AEG taking their own department into 5G technology of get a Huawei package is another matter. Soon enough we will see that Huawei will merely spread out, perhaps not allowed be part of the 5G infrastructure, yet as Huawei has shown to be economically terrific towards the consumer, they will get more and more options, and every delay and disappointment the others are making will quickly infuriate the consumers and tax payers to a larger extent.

The bigger worry is not the one; it is the other (nice and cryptic). You see, Huawei can afford to wait to some degree, as we see the perpetuated non truths of devices being pushed forward, the replacements better do a whole lot better and they are unlikely to do so. When we see another failure in 5G start and we see transgressions and those screaming that ‘Huawei’ was a danger, the moment they cannot prove it and their ‘friends’ give us a device that is malicious, the blowback will be enormous. There is already cause for concern if we go by CNBC. They give us a few points that show the additional fear that America has on Huawei.

We get: ‘T-Mobile says a nationwide network will launch in 2020‘, optional a year AFTER Huawei is ready to launch 5G, and then we get: “most people won’t be able to access them since they’ll only be available in a small number of markets next year. Plus, the way we use phones today won’t really require the faster data speeds 5G will offer. Today’s 4G LTE networks are more than fast enough for all the video and music streaming you want to do on your phone“, is it not interesting that something as fragile as 4G LTE is to hacking, which has been known for the longest of times is still the pushed solution? And I personally interpreted “won’t really require the faster data speeds 5G will offer“, is more like a way to state, ‘we cannot offer it’ versus ‘You do not need it’, you merely have to watch Netflix on a tablet in 4K to see that need prop up overnight. All these excuses and intentional phrased denials in a stage without Huawei is why there is such a large issue. I get where Alex Younger is coming from, the rest is merely trying to avoid panic of no longer being a person that matters in the mobile industry, the fact that Huawei grew so fast and so large is the biggest fear that they have because whatever they win, Wall Street optionally loses. Screens behind mirrors, facades behind facades and they are all in fear of being considered redundant in a technological age that is still not slowing down.

And I am not alone here. The New York Times (at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/07/opinion/huawei-meng-wanzhou-china-arrest.html gives us: “This week, the White House released a five-year plan around STEM education — science, technology, engineering and math — that is not nearly robust enough to make the Chinese even slightly nervous that we can keep up with their decidedly more aggressive efforts to train their work force for the next era of computing“, the short and sweet part is that America is not ready to take any lead anywhere for the next 15 years. In addition we see: “I am perplexed about why the Trump administration has been such an embarrassment when it comes to the kind of actual leadership and vision needed to keep the United States at the forefront of the tech race“. This is where he is wrong, you see this is not on President Trump, this is a failing that goes back to the Bush era, the era before President Obama. What had to be done then was not done and now the impact is a lot larger than it could have been. So when we see the quote “everyone would feel a lot more confident if the government was also focused on investing more in American innovation and if the crackdown looked less chaotic“, we see the fear from the US, it is not ready, it has failed innovation and the mistakes made are optionally debilitating the next 15 years of innovation. Chine is primed and ready and that is where we see the fear. American is pushing itself towards becoming a third world nation, they did this all by themselves, and it goes further than merely technology. The US has shown a lack of insight for a much longer time. As we see US Defense giving us: “The Navy is asking Congress to fund a conversion of its 600-foot stealth destroyers from primarily a land attack ship to an anti-surface, offensive strike platform, according to budget documents released Feb. 12“. It was earlier this year. It matters as we see merely 2 weeks ago: “The destroyer Zumwalt’s big guns don’t have any ammo, and the Navy may ditch them entirely because they don’t even work right“, so we are confronted with ‘a request for $89.7 million’ to make it better, that thing costed billions in research, it took half a billion to make, it is useless (decently ugly) and in 4 hours I had a $3.5 million concept solution to sink it. In all honesty I have to admit that my idea was designed to sink the Iranian fleet, but this vessel is just slightly too insulting for comfort. The Digital Journal did some of the legwork form me with: ‘Can’t fire its guns due to massive $1 million per round cost‘, ‘May lose stealth due to redesign limitations‘ and ‘Cuts to stealth capacity add up to many more risks in combat‘. The article (at http://www.digitaljournal.com/tech-and-science/technology/op-ed-accountancy-vs-usazumwalt-a-stupid-story/article/538102) has a lot more and my mere $3.5 million solution, which is a simple redesign from something made in the 70’s. I saw it as a way to turn Iranian cruisers into submarines (with air-conditioning). It is murder on the lungs, but good for non-Iranian morale and as such it was a great idea. It could be easily adjusted to park the USS Zumwalt at 18°38’18.9″S 147°10’15.3″E and help it grow coral for the Great Barrier Reef, all problems solved.

My issue links it as we see the problem, they are linked because we failed the STEM education path for well over a decade, so there is a massive shortage. There is a reason why the larger players like Salini Impregilo are looking at Universities all over the world seeking quality Engineers and they are not alone, the shortage is close to global and there we see the growing advantage that China is now showing to have. The fact that America is showing such levels of non-vision, even within their own navy results is exactly what they are shouting in fear.

I would go one step further in the proclamation that America is not afraid of what China can do, they have no one left to show them and explain to them what the Chinese capabilities are and that is a lot more fearful than anything else. That is how I see it (and I might per 100% wrong), yet consider the failings we have seen in the last year alone, the emotional push in places where logic require to prevail, the inability to counter what should not have been a threat. The Mabna Institute in March: “The DOJ says the hackers stole 31 terabytes of data, estimated to be worth $3 billion in intellectual property. The attacks used carefully crafted spearphishing emails to trick professors and other university affiliates into clicking on malicious links and entering their network login credentials” (source: Wired). Not the fact that it happened, the stage that it took forever to find and do something is equally part in all this. June gave us: “marketing and data aggregation firm Exactis, which left about 340 million records exposed on a publicly accessible server. The trove didn’t include Social Security numbers or credit card numbers, but it did comprise 2 terabytes of very personal information about hundreds of millions of US adults” and important here is that these are the so called clever people. Those with fat incomes and nice additional perks, if they cannot contain the issue, the underpaid, undervalued and overworked IT people at the US government truly have no chance at all, do they?

The facades behind the facades are shining through 10 windows all without curtains or coding (at https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/12/06/windows_10_security_questions_remotely_defined_answers/) and it gets to be a lot worse in 2021 when 5G hits full force everywhere, it is a cyber criminals dream coming true. Huawei is in all this merely the smallest blip on the radar and that realisation should hit us fast and quick, because at present, the only way to keep your data safe is to educate yourself, no one else will, they do not know how.

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December 5, 2018 · 12:41

The Saint’s parcel

Today it is December 5^th, in the Netherlands that means it is St Nicholas day. It is the Dutch version of Santa Claus, but with a difference. The story goes back to the Greek bishop of Myra, what is now known as Turkey (270-340 AD). Saint Nicholas is the patron Saint of children and the day preceding his birthday (6^th December) it is the evening of presents and all the kids (until a certain age) will receive a present.

As you might imagine the week before all this, things can get really hectic, especially in the toy stores, on a global scale when we see Thanksgiving, St. Nicholas and Christmas, the numbers given to us by power retail ‘Cyber Monday Breaks Record, Becomes “Biggest Sales Day Ever”‘, these numbers makes sense as moments like Black Friday, Cyber Monday and other deal moments with discount sales is what people look for globally so that they can show their kids that there are happy times, even if it is just for a day or two. Variety gives us (at https://variety.com/2018/gaming/news/nintendo-switch-sales-holiday-sales-figures-1203038569/) even more. With their headline ‘Nintendo Sold $250 Million in Products from Black Friday to Cyber Monday in U.S.‘, they are showing a setting that is awesome.

More important it is their e-commerce sales of games that is partially taking the cake with the statement: “The Nintendo Switch is now the best-selling Nintendo console in U.S. history for that five-day period, surpassing even Wii system sales, the company announced Wednesday.” Even as we see “Nintendo’s overall goal for the financial year of 38 million units sold, though analysts are still predicting it will fall just short, hitting about 35 million“, yet in all that the analysts are eager to avoid the one setting that matters, in under two years the Nintendo Switch is about to equal the lifetime sales of the Xbox One, a number that is very impressive as the Xbox One had 300% of the time frame to get to this point. And overall the entire Microsoft issue is expected to hit a few more bumps in the road. Software was the key in all this and Nintendo does comprehend quality software. The curve is changing for the better for Nintendo as their demo stations are all over game shops like EB Games. Parents can see how amazing it looks and as the kids are having a go at playing kart and playing Mario Odyssey, we see (as I saw) that the parents are getting a smile on their faces. It is a family friendly system, where violence is limited to a paint gun with a colour. And as we see the greats (Diablo 3) added to the Switch, we see an amazing list of games titles we see a system that is more and more overwhelming when it comes to quality gaming. A game setting where quality is not the silly notion of high level graphics, no! Quality gaming is the level of fun you get out of it and Nintendo is turning heads around and for the first time in history Sony is starting to get worried as the setting now is that this year Switch surpassed the Sony PlayStation. Now that does not means that Sony is number two, they have well over 250% in number of consoles in the field, yet the fact that Nintendo is closing the gap slightly and surpassing Microsoft has never been seen before in the age of gaming. I loved my GameCube (I still miss Mario Sunshine even today), I loved the games I had and when I saw that the Wii was backward compatible I did not hesitate, yet the Switch is showing to be up to the challenge of equalling this in quality gaming. In this we see that Nintendo is getting it right and even as I questioned the stupidity of analysts with their ‘predicting it will fall just short‘, I believe that their entire setting is bogus. Nintendo has the goods and is showing it has equaled the challenge gaining on the larger advantage that Sony has and surpassing what was once the great Microsoft console and the most powerful console? It might be, yet when it offers a mere 25% of the family fun, I wonder what some people choose.

Now, we do not state that the Xbox cannot deliver the goods, yet we have always known that Nintendo was a family and younger player system. Now that we can be on the road, play on TV (via dock) and have access to some of the most addictive games (Diablo 3, Mario Kart, Skyrim, Minecraft, Rocket league) and so many more titles we need to wonder what the others did wrong.

Well they didn’t!

They made a choice and they continued on that path, Microsoft thought what it had to compete with Sony and they did not end up doing that, they soured their own milk from the very beginning in policy and hardware, they refused to listen to their gamers and they are still losing traction in the process. Even as some corrections and some really good ideas have been launched (Game Pass), they have too much to catch on. Nintendo remained on the family fun and family friendly path and they merely gained speed, and within a year they pushed for a speed that would surpass Sony annual sales and they seemed to have done it in 2018 (the official numbers are not out yet). However the consoles and the quarter of a billion in online store sales in under a month is now showing to become the monster truck of revenue. So as I personally sneer at “Nintendo stock hit a five year high of $58.45 a share this year, only to shed more than 40 percent of its value this month, with a year-low of $33.90“, I see clear numbers that do not support the actions and recommendations of these analysts. The titles Super Mario Odyssey, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Splatoon 2 represent 40 million copies sold. This implies that every Nintendo Switch has at least one of these games and that is an amazing result. Now set this against a company like Ubisoft (as a mere example) with Assassin’s Creed, 100 million copies over 11 titles on 3+ systems, Far Cry, 25 million copies over 6 titles on 3+ systems and Watch Dogs with 2 titles on 3 systems, 10 million copies sold. These are all decent games and when compared to four titles on one system, we start seeing the first part where the others seem to be getting it wrong. That is the comparison that some analysts do not seem to grasp. In addition, the close to flawless results against other titles on other consoles show and we have not even started with the millions of players playing Pokemon on Nintendo handheld systems.

On the day of Saint Nicholas we look at these kids and we see the overwhelming need and desire for gaming, consoles and handhelds. For the next 4 weeks it will be about that group and I predict that Nintendo will be looking at another half a billion if the previous record is anything to go by. It is likely that Boxing Day sales will add to that revenue surpassing my prediction. Clever grandparents adding an optional $30 gift card for their grand-kids to get several games cheap on boxing day sales, adding even more to the Nintendo profit coffer.

Even Forbes gave me the thumbs up (virtually that is). They had the top purchase mention with Nintendo as one of the titles and the PS4 as the most talked about, no mention on Microsoft. Even as Apple got a few mentions, the words ‘Microsoft’, ‘Surface’ and ‘Xbox’ were absent in that view (at https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbes-finds/2018/11/12/5-best-headphones-under-100/#47cb25aa5239), in addition the aggressive discount that the Nintendo gives with their Switch plus Mario Kart in the Netherlands is seeing its own fair share of mentions. If the feast of Saint Nicholas has one drawback then I would think it is the longer absence of board games. Playing a game like monopoly whilst unwrapping a present whenever one player passes go was heaps fun. There was the tension which name was drawn and as present by present was opened; whilst we played monopoly and had hot chocolate milk (it is cold in the Netherlands in December) was a level of fun I still miss.

Yet, we must not forget the hardship either, and there is a lot of that and a lot more coming; in the last year over 50,000 children died in Yemen from hardship, disease and famine. I expect that in 2019 we will see that the 2018 numbers will surpass the passing of 100,000 children. The children are too young to face what other children have to go through in other places, yet we adults cannot afford to do that. If I had to forego my optional Nintendo Switch for one child in Yemen to have a decent meal, I will end up not playing a Nintendo Switch for some time to come, even as the child still dies and I merely prevented it from dying on an empty stomach, I would do so. Even as the peace talks are being held, I fear for the lack of progress, as this is not in the interest of Iran. It is still progressing on arming Houthi; it is still facilitating via Hezbollah and the children are merely in the way there. From my point of view Europe is enabling it as they want their nuclear accord, an accord that is not likely to be the value of printed paper, the Iranian missile tests can be considered proof in this. In this part Prince Khalid bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud is actually in a very dangerous place. Even as he is with an ally, as the Saudi Ambassador to the United States, we see that the danger is twofold. As more and more US politicians are seemingly ‘bashing’ Saudi Arabia, yet they seem to ignore the danger that Hezbollah is there, we see the start of imbalance, and as this imbalance continues, so do the events in Yemen killing even more children. The hollow words like ‘Iran has praised Yemeni peace talks scheduled to take place soon‘, they want their version in charge in Yemen, not the elected one and they are willing to let millions of kids die to get that done. So whilst the US gives us “The United States has displayed pieces of what it says were Iranian weapons deployed to militants in Yemen and Afghanistan“, whilst at the same time US politicians are unbalancing their allied commitment to Saudi Arabia, we see that in the end it is a political stalemate with the lives of all the Yemeni children in the balance and there is no reasonable chance that the children there will get a better deal out of it.

So as we see the independent giving us the goods and the stage of truth last week with: ‘US struggles to find footing on Yemen, as Iran increases influence‘, we see (at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/us-yemen-civil-war-iran-influence-saudi-arabia-bombing-trump-weapons-houthis-rebels-a8661546.html) that the US and mostly its politicians seem to have lost their perception on the larger game. the quote “The US Senate, angered in part by the White House response to the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, on Wednesday voted in a surprise move to advance a bill that would cut American participation in the Yemen conflict“, the emotions towards a previously unknown journalist (and ignoring all those imprisoned and dead journalists in Turkey) is setting the stage of enabling the Iran agenda. Vetoed or not, it will up the pressure on Saudi Arabia and in all this, the populist pressure is one that historically has turned anti Saudi more often than not, increasing the larger issues towards Prince Khalid bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud in other directions as well.

In all this does America even know who their allies and enemies are? The question is more important than you think, as we see on the feast of Saint Nicholas that millions of children in Yemen are abandoned. So what did this have to do with games?

When you watch your child play some Call of Duty game and you realise that it is not Battleground 5, it is not Call of Duty, or Fortnite, but it is the game ‘Holy Defense’, created by Hezbollah to let gamers and players kill ISIS members. When we are treated to: “Hezbollah has developed a 3-D computer game to capture the minds of its youth, while showing them a good time.” When you see your children play this free downloaded game in Europe and America, how much safer was the Nintendo Switch with their family values to begin with?

I agree that this is not a fair remark for Sony and Microsoft and they are not part of this in any way, but when it comes to First Person Shooters, can parents even tell the difference anymore? And when it is getting to close to the factual truth, can they even perceive how many children are getting killed in the process whilst Yemen is facing delay after delay? Should that not be the central issue on the day of the patron saint of children?

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Tagged as Afghanistan, Call of Duty, children, Diablo 3, Forbes, Greek bishop of Myra, Hezbollah, Iran, Mario Kart, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Minecraft, Nintendo, Nintendo Switch, Prince Khalid, Prince Khalid bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Rocket league, Saint Nicholas, Saudi Arabia, Sinterklaas, Skyrim, Splatoon 2, Super Mario Odyssey, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Ubisoft, United States, US Senate, USA, Variety, Video games, Xbox One, Yemen

December 4, 2018 · 11:23

Those we needlessly fear

All others pay cash! Yes, that was direct, was it not? We have seen millions of articles fly by, all given the very same announcement: ‘Fear Saudi Arabia‘, as well as ‘MBS is a monster‘. Yet, what evidence was given? What actual evidence did we get?

Turkey played its innuendo game, we can also accept that the US is playing a protective game for Saudi Arabia and that too should be highlighted, yet NO ONE has taken an academic look at those so called tapes as have given the audience the rundown, what was there, what was proven. Is there even enough evidence that Jamal Khashoggi is on the tapes? Journalists are in their own corrupt little world of satisfying the shareholders, the stake holders and the advertisers and they all want Saudi Arabia to look like they are all guilty, all to the very top. In addition we see the G20 Argentina game that France played with their ‘confrontation’, conveniently enough staged to be caught on CNN. He was not that amateur like when he had to have a few words with someone high up at Crédit Agricole, was he? Where have they got that leaked conversation?

I see it as a simple operational premise to counter the fear that they have. It gets worse, at present the vultures are circling and we get to see more fallout. News dot com dot au are giving us (at https://www.news.com.au/world/middle-east/saudi-friend-of-jamal-khashoggi-sues-israeli-surveillance-firm/news-story/b0bf9d501332df9ad31bede7de904b6c) ‘Saudi friend of Jamal Khashoggi sues Israeli surveillance firm‘ gives us ‘A Saudi dissident‘, as well as ‘Omar Abdulaziz, said he was friends with Khashoggi‘. Now people make all kinds of claims, I can make the claim that I am the lover of Scarlett Johansson; she just does not know it yet. Anyone in the media can contact frukan Johansson and verify that fact (or prove it to be wrong), we can’t in the case of Khashoggi, can we? Was there corroborating evidence that they were actual friends? If so, why was that not added? The news site makes no real effort to substantiate that friendship and that is not what this is about. You see, it is the claim ‘a lawsuit against an Israeli surveillance company, claiming its sophisticated spyware targeted him and helped lead to the killing of his friend‘. We have two problems here. In the first, is there any evidence to back that up? In the second, Jamal Khashoggi was an unknown person to 93% of the planet, yet he was a journalist for the Washington Post, and as such he was a lot more visible than most others. Also, the entire filing matter in Istanbul gave rise that plenty of people knew where he was, so the spyware seems redundant. If there was quality spyware in place he could have been killed anywhere and leave the optional involvement of Saudi Arabia almost completely out of it. Does that not make sense?

The last paragraph is the killer here: “citing news reports and other sources claiming that NSO Group sold Saudi Arabia the technology in 2017 for $US55 million ($A75 million)“. The first thing here is to look at those news reports; I wonder how much innuendo is in there. Then we get the stage that technology worth $55 million was bought when JK was very much alone, giving rise to the reason of purchase, last by not least is the investigation on the NSO group and their software and that is what I believe was the foundation, it does not matter where and how the NSO group software was used. I believe that Omar Abdulaziz got wind of a 2016 article not unlike those on Vice (at https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/3da5qj/government-hackers-iphone-hacking-jailbreak-nso-group), and saw ‘Government Hackers Caught Using Unprecedented iPhone Spy Tool‘. so when we see (or saw) “Ahmed Mansoor, a 46-year-old human rights activist from the United Arab Emirates, received a strange text message from a number he did not recognize on his iPhone“, the brain of Omar Abdulaziz optionally went ‘ka-chink‘ and his pupils turned to dollar signs, It was optionally his opportunity of a lifetime.

So who is right?

I am telling you right now that all I am writing from my opposition is pure speculation, yet is it less of more believable? Is the NSO group real? Yes they are and they have something that every nation on the planet with a decent technology level requires. Any government have people they want to keep tabs on, and that is what this solution optionally provides for. It is not a killing tool, and at $55 million it is not some tool you use for simply ending someone’s life, there are more convenient and more elegant ways to facilitate to punch out someone time clock of life. When you stage a $55 million solution when $50K in an account does it, that solution does not make sense.

Still, we cannot ignore the NSO group software and it might have been used to keep tabs on JK, that is optionally a reality we face, yet we all face that optional for a number of reasons and there we have the crux, knowing where a person is does not mean that their life has to be ended, the fact that we have tools, does not imply that we have to use other tools. The audience factor is trying to give us that idea, an emotional driven premise of events to set the stage of intentional international execution. There has been, and unlikely will be any evidence showing that. Not by some eager frog (an unnamed France governmental executive) stating to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ‘I am really worried!‘ worried about what? Conversations eagerly and ‘unintentionally’ leaked right in full view of the CNN camera, are people truly stupid enough to go for that bait?

Then we get claims in papers like the Sydney Morning Herald trying to up their game, yet at present I am not certain if the Saudi government would lose if a defamation case was brought to court and that is me merely contemplating two of the JK articles that I have read in the last two days.

In addition, the article has the claim ‘and helped lead to the killing of his friend‘, which is actually very clever as in this way stated we have a problem, or do we? Is there any evidence that the solution was or was not used? If there is a way to check the usage of that software then Omar Abdulaziz opened an interesting door. You see at that point, under the US freedom of information act, close to two dozen claims can be made regarding the NSA (the San Antonio location) on how they have been keeping tabs on people. In the January case of Sherretta Shaunte Washington, her attorney might optionally (with properly applied intelligence) be able to overturn any given sentence against her. There has been the rumour that the NSA assisted in keeping tabs on a dozen burner phones. You see, it is not the sim card; it is the mobile imei number on EVERY phone that is the issue. The NSO group seemingly figured out the algorithm to take this to the races and that advantage is worth well over $55 million. That is exactly why the Mexicans wanted the solution too. Most Mexicans are still believing that without the sim it is nothing, yet one call gave away the imei number and that number is a lot more useful than most consider.

And in the end it is Forbes who gives us the missing diamond going all the way back to August 2016. Here we are treated to: “looking at the domains registered by NSO, they determined Pegasus could have been used across Turkey, Israel, Thailand, Qatar, Kenya, Uzbekistan, Mozambique, Morocco, Yemen, Hungary, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, and Bahrain, though there was no clear evidence“, in all this the one logical step, the one thought that no one has been willing to voice for a number of reasons. Turkey is on that list. So what if this was Turkey all along from beginning to end? Turkey, who had the solution to keep tabs on thousands of journalists, reporters and bloggers, and jailing hundreds of journalists, do you actually think that they are beyond killing a journalist? I mentioned a few yesterday, so you there is evidence all over the field and so far no actual and factual evidence has been given on any involvement of the Saudi Royal family, yet everyone is playing that card as often as possible.

I am not in denial, I am not stating that they are innocent, I am merely looking and hoping to see real evidence, and so far the absence of that investigation has been astounding. There is enough evidence on the involvement of Saudi’s in all this, yet the proper vetting of Turkish evidence by the media has seemingly been lacking. The press (and the media as a whole) merely pushed that same button again and again and it makes me wonder on the premise in which other ways we are (seemingly) being deceived. That is the clear consequence of orchestration, it makes us all doubt all the other evidence, and in light of the USA playing their silver briefcase WMD game in regards to Iraq, that has made us distrust a lot of other evidence, evidence that might have been valid, but we are in a stage where we no longer trust the messengers in all that and as the media and newspapers lose more and more credibility, we have started to treat most news as fake news.

That is the price of orchestration and the players remain in denial that it is happening. That is the part we see form a source called Foreign Policy dot com. The article (at https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/12/03/how-an-internet-impostor-exposed-the-underbelly-of-the-czech-media/), gives us: ‘How an Internet Impostor Exposed the Underbelly of the Czech Media. When politicians own the press, trolls have the last laugh‘, the article by Tim Gosling gives us: “Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis—and expose just how easily disinformation can slip into the mainstream press, especially when politicians control it.” It is a mere introduction to: “In September, the Czech broadsheet Lidove Noviny published an op-ed by Horakova expressing support for Babis’s refusal to offer asylum to 50 Syrian orphans, as was proposed by an opposition member of parliament. Playing up to his populist pledge not to allow “a single refugee” into the Czech Republic, the prime minister said the country had its own orphans to care for“. It merely gives us parts to ponder, the amount of pondering increases with: “In tapes released by unknown sources onto the internet last year, for instance, he was heard discussing stories damaging to his political rivals with a reporter from Mlada fronta Dnes, which alongside Lidove Noviny is controlled by Agrofert—the agrochemicals conglomerate that is the centerpiece of Babis’s business empire.”

I have written again and again against the media facilitation for the shareholders, the stakeholders and the advertisers, here we see the impact when the media and the shareholder are one and the same. That article from a freelance reporter who seemingly contributed to Foreign Policy, The Telegraph, Politico Europe, Deutsche Welle, World Politics et al. He shows that there is a much larger issue and that the difference between those bringing the news and fake news bringers is almost indistinguishable. We might give passage to the LA Times, the Washington Post, New York Times, the Times, the Guardian and several others, yet after that the mess becomes no longer trusted, mostly because the source is too unknown to us. The media did this to themselves through facilitation and until that changes fake news will have too many options to gain traction with the people influencing a populist political nation on a near global scale.

It is one of the reasons why I refuse to merely accept the view of people blaming Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for it all. There are too many intelligence gaps, too many parts of merely insinuated conjecture whilst the intelligence was not properly vetted and it happened for the most in Turkey (the consulate is Saudi ground). We might never ever get the answer of what truly happened, and to a very large extent it is because of the games that the media played from the very beginning. A game staged in innuendo, unnamed sources and people talking on the promise of anonymity. It is not the fact that these elements exist, it is because to a much larger extent too many of them were used at the same time, pressing the same directional button, most of it not scrutinised to the degree that was essential, and when contra dictionary evidence was found, those issues were ignored by the largest extent by all the media, that too is the foundation of fake news, we merely chose to ignore it, it is our emotional side and that is the bigger issue. People are no longer adhering to innocent until guilty, the media has become a ‘guilty until proven innocent machine‘ and that drives the populist agenda more than anything else, so I oppose them all by stating: ‘The Saudi government is one we needlessly fear, until we have conclusive evidence of their action that is the only way we should be‘. We have become puppets in a world where tyrants (Robert Mugabe), alleged mass murderers (Slobodan Milošević), criminals (shooters who were granted indemnity from prosecution) and paedophiles (Catholic clergy) get more consideration than any Muslim ever had, how sad has our world become?

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November 28, 2018 · 12:53

Hammering Facebook

The Guardian has another story, which was updated a mere 6 hours ago. To be honest, I am a little ticked off. I get that the Guardian is giving us this and it makes perfect sense, it is news. Yet when I see ‘Fake news inquiry: Facebook questioned by MPs from around the world – as it happened‘ (at https://www.theguardian.com/technology/live/2018/nov/27/fake-news-inquiry-facebook-to-face-mps-from-around-the-world-mark-zuckerberg-live-updates), whilst in the same setting we see newspapers ‘hiding’ behind ‘from an unnamed source’, when we get blasted by well over 64 million results in Google Search on the death of a journalist that close to nobody gives a hoot about, the entire ‘fake news‘ seems to be nothing more than a targeted sham to me. Not the element of fake news, I get that, but some of the players are a little too hypocrite to my liking.

So let’s take a look at a few of these issues we see (at https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/nov/27/facebook-fake-news-inquiry-the-countries-demanding-answers).

Ireland: “The Irish government is reviewing proposed legislation to promote online safety amid an outcry that tech companies are unable or unwilling to tackle harmful content. The move jars with Dublin’s normally effusive support for tech companies with an Irish base. Facebook has its European headquarters in Dublin and falls under the remit of Irish data protection authorities“. The first thing to do is look at the definition. The European commission gives us: “Harmful content, is authorized material subject to distribution restrictions (adults only, for example) or material which some users may find offensive even if, on the grounds of freedom of speech, there are no restrictions on publication.” First of all, the Pornhub site is freely available to every man, woman and child. In addition there is a porn version of YouTube that is also freely available, from that we can see that Ireland has a lot of other worries and these two are not available through Facebook. When we look at Ireland we see a nation that given in to big business through tax laws at the drop of any hat and they have harmful content issues? In addition the Times gave us on November 6^th: “Google and Facebook will call on the government today to define exactly what kind of content a proposed digital safety commissioner would have the power to remove online.” It becomes a lot more entertaining when we see in Fine Gael last week: “Fine Gael TD Hildegarde Naughton will travel to Westminster next Tuesday (November 27th) for a meeting of the International Grand Committee on Communications”, as well as ““Social media companies cannot hide from the genuine concerns of national parliaments from around the globe, it is imperative they engage with us in a meaningful way. “This document sets out a blueprint for how that can be done.” It is entertaining as she seemingly has a document whilst this entire setting has been going on for years (even before Cambridge Analytics). That entire meeting is in my personal opinion as hollow as it sounds. All trying to look important, yet where is that so called document from Hildegarde Naughton? It does not seem to be on the HN site (at http://www.hildegarde.ie), so where is it? When we are told: ‘This document builds upon the work done by the Oireachtas Communications Committee‘, we should be able to read and scrutinise it. You see, the Irish Law Reform Commission has a 2016 document (at https://www.lawreform.ie/_fileupload/Reports/Full%20Colour%20Cover%20Report%20on%20Harmful%20Communications%20and%20Digital%20Safety.pdf), it is merely that or a continuance of that? And this document is important, especially on page 165 where we see: “The definition of “communication” implements the recommendation in paragraph 2.53 that the proposed legislation on harmful communications should apply to all forms of communication, whether offline or online, analogue or digital, and therefore the definition includes communication by speech, by letter, by camera, by telephone (including SMS text message), by smart phone, by any digital or online communication (including the internet, a search engine, a social media platform, a social media site or the world wide web), or by any other telecommunications system.”

This now implies that art is now no longer merely in the eyes of the beholder, basically if any art is regarded as harmful content, is comes under scrutiny (read: censoring) A massive part from Facebook is relying on art to propagate via digital medium, digital art is still in its infancy and it seems that this offends Ireland in the broader view it has, it is in that view that my message to Hildegarde Naughton is seen (at https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/courts/priest-who-sexually-assaulted-girl-6-during-first-confession-avoids-jail-due-to-old-age-and-health-problems-36840577.html). When we contemplate that when you have health issues and you are old, it seems fine to rape a six year old. It is all in the nuance, is it not? So, what will you do when you consider this Grigor Malinov painting to be harmful content? Add a Jade Swim bikini with a brush and a fashionable colour? In light of what certain people get away with, the entire harmful content is not a joke, yet hammer Facebook with it, whilst there are other players openly in the field is too weird as I personally see it.

Then we get a Turkish advertisement variant with ‘MPs do not intend to publish Six4Three documents today, Collins says‘, either you have the documents and you inform the public, or you go home and polish your silverware! You scream fake news and leave the audience in innuendo and what I personally perceive as intentional miscommunication, and haven’t we seen enough of that?

Blame Canada

I can’t resist, whenever I see a Canadian flag, a Canuck or anything Canadian I think of that South Park song. It’s nothing negative, I think that Canada is awesome in hockey, it seems to have great people (several attended UTS with me) and it seems to have a healthy life. I’d take a job in Canada any day if possible (as well as the opportunity to watch Hockey almost every night), I might even be good enough to be a goalie for one of their NHL teams, even though I am nowhere near Martin Jones as a goalie (I merely wish I was). So Canada gives us: ‘Facebook inflated video viewing times for two years‘, I actually see an issue here, the Guardian gives us “only counting views lasting more than 3 seconds, the time a video must be seen to count as a view“, yet with YouTube the skip moment is 5 seconds an now as some people get 100% more ads with many of them not with the option to be skipped we see a shifted trend. This might be YouTube, yet there is no chance that this does not affect Facebook, giving rise that Canada has as optional a valid issue. Richard Allan (Facebook) gives us: ““it depends on the problem we’re trying to solve”“, something that might be valid, yet in the question by Charlie Angus we see: “Facebook has inflated video metrics, overstated for two years. “I would consider that corporate fraud, on a massive scale,” he says, “and the best fix is anti-trust. The simplest form of regulation would be to break facebook up, or treat it as a utility, so that we can all be sure that we’re counting metrics that are accurate or true.” I see his failure as a setting as there is a large intertwined part of Facebook, Vines, YouTube and a few other medium adding fuel to the video metrics, no matter if all hosted on Facebook. You would have to set the stage for all and to merely have Facebook here is a faulty stage, we get pushed into an assumption pool of no facts and biased metrics making matters merely worse. I feel certain that Charlie Angus should have and probably did know this making the issue a tainted one on more than one level.

Finally, let’s go out with a bang and add Latvia to the stage. When we get Latvia’s Inese Lībiņa-Egnere, we get the question: “how Facebook can help countries like Latvia, that face specific threats from Russia“. It took me around three minutes to stop laughing, I should be serious, but I cannot hold my straight face. You see, that is not the job of Facebook. I will go one step further, by stating: “Dear Inese, have you considered adding digital responsibility to both the Drošības policija and the Militārās izlūkošanas un drošības dienests?” There is an unconfirmed rumour that one of your routers is still set to ‘Passw0rd‘ and another one to ‘Cisco123‘, can you please confirm that? In light of the fact that ‘https://www.zs.mil.lv/lv/kontakti‘ directly links to Facebook pages, one might see how the Latvian military (as well as Latvian intelligence) could get phished in several ways, especially when there is the chance that some alleged under dressed biker chick would have been looking for ‘adventurous officers’. It gets to be even more fun when that alleged woman look a lot like a vogue model. You should introduce them to: (https://heimdalsecurity.com/blog/fake-facebook-scams/), to have Common Cyber Sense is a government’s responsibility. Getting Facebook to do free consultancy via a hearing is just not Cricket.

I will end this with Brazil, I really liked his question: ‘He asks what Facebook is doing to prevent improper manipulation of its algorithms to prevent illegal manipulation of elections‘. It is a good and important question. I think the newspapers, especially the tech columns should spend space on this and let Facebook show them what is being done, what the impact is, how those metrics were generated and how its validity was checked. I think that the problem is a lot larger than we imagine. I would set a line towards American soft money. It has never been regulated and it still is not. We talk about fake news and political influence, whilst soft money is doing that in the US from the day after a president is elected all the way up to the next presidential election (or the senate, or congress). It is basically shouting at one, whilst the other element is ignored. The difference is that digital campaigns give anyone all the soft money they need, taking the rich out of the equation, the fact that I have not seen anything towards these lines gives a larger implied weight on all media. All those newspapers with ‘from an unnamed source‘ and that is where the blockage begins. There is a setting that it is not the ability or Russia, but the failing of others not correctly countering digital media that is the problem and that was never a Facebook problem, it merely shows the incompetence of others and in an age of advanced nepotism it is a much harder pill to swallow.

In all this, I never claimed that Facebook is innocent, merely that there is a lack of the proper questions making it to the table and even as a few nations were addressed, the issue is a lot larger and needs addressing, preferably before the 5G tap opens which allows the digital media providers to deliver 500% more than it is delivering now.

I wonder how many players have considered the impact of that game changer.

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Tagged as Brazil, Canada, Charlie Angus, Common Cyber Sense, Drošības policija, Facebook, Fine Gael, Hildegarde Naughton, Inese Lībiņa-Egnere, Ireland, Latvia, Militārās izlūkošanas un drošības dienests, Oireachtas Communications Committee, South Park, the Guardian, UK, Vines, Westminster, Youtube

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