Category Archives: Science

August 14, 2020 · 05:52

Reflections

These are the days where a lot of people reflect on choices made and I am not any different. I was at the foundation of gaming, when gaming was young, when people thought that this was the sport of nerds and I did not care. I reviewed games for 13 years and I never regretted it. I was there when Commodore release the CBM64 and the Amiga 500. Sony released the PlayStation, I was there when Nintendo released the N64 and the GameCube. I had the Sony PlayStation 2 on day one, I saw with amazement when the SEGA Dreamcast was released. I saw an amazing range of games and systems, even now I think back to how great gaming was in those days. Even now we see how some makers misrepresent their games on how unique their game is whilst in the end it is merely another version of Candy Crush or Bejewelled. The hide behind quick animations and we see some Zombie game and the list goes on, they all need to make a game that is quick so that it is downloaded, their name depends on the amount of downloads, the sheep that play games follow the games that have a lot of downloads, yet they miss the larger stage. A game is something larger, it keeps you interested, it offers a larger stage and there is no denying that Microsoft Game Pass might actually entice people who call themselves gamers will actually end up playing actual games. Yet there is a danger there too. I personally believe that Microsoft is in it for the soft money, the micro transactions and it makes sense, micro transactions represents billions a year in revenue, and there mobile systems are the biggest source of micro transactions and that too is a reason why Microsoft wants Apple access. 

It is time that this stage changes and if there is one stage we want to protect then it is the gaming stage, that stage gives direct access to the younger players. Even as these ‘critics’ proclaim loot boxes are ‘gambling’, there is no status on games like Candy Crush and all others designed to drive gamers to spend money, the addiction of achievement. Yet we see a lot less on that part do we? I remember playing the very first Lemmings, from the first hour I saw just how addictive it was, I still have great memories on Magic Carpet, I saw amazing games from Mirrorsoft, Microprose, Psygnosis, Rare, Westwood, Bullfrog and too many others to mention. Even then the creativity outranked corporate types and the gamer won. That field has changed!

Even today, I remember playing games like Millennium 2.2, Lemmings, Covert Action, Ultima 3, 4, 5, Eye of the Beholder, and that was long before PC’s started to take gaming serious. One title I am leaving for last, In 1987 FTL (Faster than Light) created Dungeon Master, it changed the way people looked at RPG games. It was only surpassed by Dungeon Keeper because Dungeon Master paved the way and created the love of the RPG game, Dungeon Master became the best selling game of all time for the Atari ST, others would follow and Dungeon Keeper would push the love of RPG to even greater heights, in the end 700,000 copies would be sold and it is there where we see what we can gain, in those days 700,000 copies were sold, in this day it would be 10 to 50 times as much. And we overlook the playability of those games now, yes we see the hypes created (and the games EA screws up), yet they also had there share of successes and underestimations. Who remembers ShadowCaster and Black Crypt? Upgraded they would make interesting games and in that same setting EA has close to half a dozen games that could raise the setting for Google Stadia. So what happens when we tinker Magic Carpet to become larger and multiplayer? And that is only the tip of the iceberg, Microprose has even more titles and that is all before we look at the near future and see what else we can do to set a larger stage of games that people either cast aside or ignored in the first place. An excellent example of that is Microprose’s 1990 release of Knights of the Sky. I loved the game and many others did as well, but the larger group seemingly forgot about this game, a game that could be upgraded and work on a whole range of systems, including Google and Apple systems. We need to take another look at these games, games produced in the era spanning from 1985-2005 gives us close to 100 titles spread over half a dozen systems and we forgot about them. Why is that?

I get it, some people moved on, they moved on to other things and that is fine, but there is an entire generation of people that is limited in its view of games and it is limited to match three shapes. That is not really gaming and we need to make sure that this does not happen. For a system like the Google Stadia, it is the difference from being in the game and setting a goal towards being the 4th system in gaming, from there the sky is the limit. There are enough games, the question becomes where do they (or Apple) want to go, offering a system or committing to a system. It is a small but distinctive difference, one is seemingly going that way (it doesn’t matter who), yet it opens up a larger stage. A stage where people can optionally now play a larger and repaired Mass Effect Andromeda, a game that is game 1 and game 2 together. A stage that Google Stadia and Apple allows for and that is good, perhaps the others will catch on, but that is not a given and perhaps not even required. Hardwire gives options, but when did all systems need to offer everything? I believe that Nintendo and Sony can work side by side, I feel certain that either Google or Apple will be the third system, there is a chance that people will select EITHER the Google or the Apple system, but I cannot be certain of that at present. And it does not matter, like Android and iOS, people will make a choice giving Google an edge but at present not a given victory, time will make determination, yet in time and over time we need to revisit the old games, the fact that we see more and more remasters is because the old jewels remain jewels, some of them merely need to get dusted, others need polish, but they remain jewels and the sooner some see that, the better their hardware will fare. 

 

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August 13, 2020 · 22:20

The silent reason

We (all of us) are mostly driven by offered choices, so it took me a few seconds to consider “Here is every action adventure game on PS Now that scored 9+” a little movie by IGN. I have a lot of these games, not all, but a lot. When you consider that every games is a mere 2 seconds in view and the movie lasts 1:25, you know that you are about to get a long list of reasons to move to the PlayStation 5. I am definitely taking that road, and for those embracing the Xbox, do not fear, it is your right, you still have faith in Microsoft, I do not share your view, but you are entitled to yours. There is one side giving us ‘Xbox Series X neutralizes PS5 assault with console war-winning counter-attack’, I personally see this as the ‘promoted’ choice certain makers are making a view that suits their needs. Even as we are given “Microsoft has been very vocal about the fact that gamers won’t even have to buy an Xbox Series X to enjoy the console’s new titles, and that games can even be enjoyed on mobile devices starting next month as part of Xbox Game Pass”, so if the console is not needed, why bother the war anyway? The article gives more, but I see nothing that can be seen as reliable, especially when I see mentions like ‘Microsoft are ready to lowball Sony’, ‘apparently the game runs perfectly on Xbox X’, and ‘gamers won’t even have to buy an Xbox Series X to enjoy the console’s new titles’, just consider a console war where you do not have to buy the console, how is that? In opposition GamesRadar gives us something valuable. With ‘Xbox Game Pass is the next generation of Microsoft gaming, not Xbox Series X’ we see a Microsoft Ace, Game Pass was and is a really good idea. There is no denying this, but consider that Sony Plus decides to offers their 60 games with a 90% plus rating, the playing field becomes an equal one really fast. They also give us “from all the messaging we’ve had since the Xbox Series X was announced, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Microsoft isn’t viewing this as a new console generation. Instead, it is shifting its focus to a more malleable model, one that has far more in common with the annual release cycles so commonly associated with graphics cards and smartphones. And Xbox Game Pass is at the centre of it all”, it makes sense, yet my negativity filter gives us that those with a Microsoft console could be left out in the cold, so optionally the gamer that comes in from the cold will have to choose either Sony or Nintendo and that is given some visibility, and I am willing to concede here that I optionally might be wrong, yet the evidence is out there, I will let you decide.

I have personally seen too many events and a tick record of 8 years of Microsoft selling its gamers short, as such, I lost my faith in them. So whilst we see “Microsoft’s monthly gaming subscription service is as close to the industry’s coveted “Netflix of Gaming” moniker we’ve seen so far”, it makes sense, it also makes sense on how they are crying like little bitches because Apple will not let them near to their hardware. And the failure we see at present gives rise to the setting of the console war, when Microsoft does not care about consoles, but about the Game Pass, we see the stage. What happens when Game Pass takes off on mobiles and PC’s, how long until the issues creep into the flaws of the console? Let’s not forget that they did not fix the current console for almost 8 years, a stage that has been clearly visible since the Xbox X was released. So even as some see this as the silent reason, I do not.

I have seen the stage where Sony took 180 degrees on decisions when it angered gamers (no second hand issues) and also when the gamers loudly complained on ‘always online’ Sony adjusted, Microsoft did not and that is only the beginning, the 90% plus games is the silent reason, over time the console embraced gamers and continued it course, it continued embracing the needs of the gamers, that is why Sony will win and Microsoft will hided behind new terms equalling ‘the most powerful console’ whilst Nintendo surpassed it with the weakest console. And in the end, it seems that the next stage of Microsoft might be “gamers won’t even have to buy an Xbox Series X”, so why would any gamer invest in a console that is not an essential buy? With today’s news giving us ‘Microsoft Surface Duo phone goes on sale starting at $1950’, it might be the starting signal to a different console war, it might be about console gaming on mobiles, so in that trendy stage, where will the Xbox fit? I am not certain but it seems that Game Pass was a better idea, so I wonder when they will drop the console hardware, it might not be today or tomorrow, but by the time it is 2022 I can not be certain on when it will be, as I see it, I feel that the Sony PS5 is a much better and safer investment in my days of happiness whilst I game the games I love and Sony has so far never disappointed my needs. 

 

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August 12, 2020 · 02:35

The moneymakers

Corporate Earth loves moneymakers, they shelf their resources on what makes the most the fastest and that is how businesses run, but what happens when the ruling council is off the ‘Fake it till you make it’ category? That is the question that matters, because the people are now following whomever has the coolest look, whilst quality takes a second turn back. For the most this is nothing new, it happens all over the place. We now have Apple and Google adding up to the next gaming war, whilst Prime Gaming is starting to get noticed. All whilst Forbes gives us ‘There Is A Belong Gaming Area Coming To Your Town’, gaming has become the 100 billion annual industry and in this age everyone wants a bite. Even as we merely accept “Vindex bought Belong Gaming Arenas from London based GAME Digital. Vindex plans to open more than 500 Belong locations in hometowns across America, and another 1,000 locations outside of the U.S. over the next five years” then we get “Esports doesn’t act like a traditional sports business—game developers have a lot to say. In esport, the playing field is the intellectual property, and it’s owned by game developers”, yet how many people realise how powerful the data is that these gaming interfaces collect? It seems all a case of ‘conspiracy theory’, yet consider the following:

“Microsoft said it would be unable to launch its game streaming service on iOS due to the restrictions on gaming apps” and “Earlier this week, Microsoft said it would be launching its xCloud gaming service as part of a subscription service called Xbox Game Pass Ultimate on Sept. 15. But the app, which lets users jump into an Xbox game on their smartphone or tablet, will only be available on devices powered by Google’s Android mobile operating system, not Apple’s iOS”. A stage when Microsoft needs to get its own mess under control, they are screaming about making a mess somewhere else. The funding by larger brands is not merely about visibility, it is about getting the largest dat slice, as much as possible and as fast as possible. In an age where it is about branding, the two larger players are about “Microsoft and Facebook have lashed out at Apple for restrictive App Store policies”, there is a reason why people have lost faith in Microsoft and Facebook. I myself removed Facebook from my mobile, why would I want them to cater to my mobile gaming needs. Why would I allow other Facebook junk on my mobile, draining my battery? Similar issues exists with Microsoft, in January 2017 I wrote ‘Taking Xbox to Court?’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2017/01/30/taking-xbox-to-court/) and it was ignored by the bulk of people. It was all my imagination, yet the specified bill was not on their side. In 15 days close to 6GB was UPLOADED and the Microsoft Xbox support stated the this was with my provider, really? My Xbox uploads data without my permission and it is the internet provider? How much data is Microsoft about to get access to, how much data will Facebook capture under the seemingly innocent stage of cloud gaming? If data is the new currency gamers are the prime clusters to get, some gamers have a following of thousands and Microsoft and Facebook are screaming murder because they want into the game and a protective Apple is something they can do without. I am not proclaiming that Sony, Apple and Nintendo are innocent, but they are showing themselves to be less guilty, Nintendo and Sony are banking on the fair play approach towards gamers, they expect it to play out in their favour and I believe that this will be the true path. They expect data to be a by-product, not the direct goal, Microsoft and Facebook have (from my personal view) a more direct approach to the benefits of data. In all this Google is not innocent, but their approach was data from the very beginning, from search to linking and to other means, data became the currency that allowed people to have free services, but the truth is that nothing is free. Facebook made the same steps in the beginning, but data took over and now as we see that TikTok is actually getting into the face of Facebook and capturing the margins and more we now see ‘TikTok Begins Doling Out $1 Billion Bonuses To Top Creators As Facebook Tries To Lure Stars’ and it is about to be worse. Even as Google Stadia is in a position to grab a larger margin, Facebook is up in arms to create the larger benefit, because the reality is that cruise liner Facebook is losing more steam and propulsion, the waves of TikTok is adding up and Apple is not Data friendly to the likes of Facebook and Microsoft, in all this the voice of emotional gamers is all that is left to them because they are running out of time and there is a larger stage where Xbox series X will underperform just like its predecessor, and that is the fear Microsoft fears, they are in a stage where they could soon be regarded as powerful as in the age of their first Xbox, they threw that much away and a lack of trust is not helping them any. That is the stage we are looking at, but I have to be. honest, the fight over gamers is one that I never saw coming, not to this degree and even now as I have seen within me the IP of several games, I wonder what these game corporations are doing, because the evidence is all around them, they merely have to open their eyes. So why are they not doing that?

Even as we see that the current situation is not the greatest stage for any business, books, movies and games help in a lockdown, so why are others faltering? I personally see it because they see games as nothing more as a springboard to ‘real cash’, yet games should be about games and about the edge of what is new and innovative, that was proven in the days of the CBM64, CBM Amiga, Atari ST, PC, N-64, Gamecube, Wii, Nintendo Switch, Xbox, Xbox360,  PlayStation 1, 2, 3 and 4, and as Apple and Google enter this domain, we will get a new stage, now with 5 players and one would think that this would benefit the gaming dimension, but as I see it, Microsoft is more about Azure and data, making it a universe of 4 (which is fine too) but when gamers catch on, when the Marketing BS comes to a halt, Microsoft will only have themselves to congratulate. Anyone stating that the fight between apple and Google is over, is mistaken. I reckon that this fight will take until 2022 to settle and in the same time Sony and Nintendo will fight for larger domain of the gaming pie, but their worlds only partially overlap, so they will set another fight and they will coexist, in this Google and Apple will slice out a part and they will be more fiercely competitive than Sony and Nintendo ever was (well they were in the age of PlayStation 1 and Nintendo 64). The fight is far from over, but all the gamers out there need to realise that not all the moneymakers out there have the welfare of gamers in mind, merely the data they give rise to. And when the gamers figure that out, some lame excuse from some wannabe executive will no longer hold water, when that happens a lot more will be lost to them. I expect that to become a reality no later than the second half of 2021.

 

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August 9, 2020 · 19:16

This is boom, that is not

Yet, Beirut, the place where buildings get free air-conditioning through the application of 7.62mm ammunition, the place where something went boom and it enraged a whole lot of people, yet on August 5th I wrote in ‘Boom goes the dynamite’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/08/05/boom-goes-the-dynamite/), we see “It is speculation, but consider the blast, according to some the blast was noticed well over 100Km away. I do have a point of reference, the Fireworks blast in the Netherlands (Enschede) had a similar effect, but nowhere near the size, the video’s I saw told a different story, one car on the highway with a distance of around 2000 meters away got its windows blown out and the rear view mirrors got blown off the car, and that is one of a few video’s that show me that this was no ordinary blast” and it was merely the toppling of issues. We get to see a better picture when we consider “Ammonium nitrate does not burn on its own” (Source: American Scientific), it is merely the foundation. When we consider “For combustion to occur, oxygen must be present. Ammonium nitrate prills provide a much more concentrated supply of oxygen than the air around us. This is why it is effective in mining explosives, where it’s mixed with oil and other fuels. At high enough temperatures, however, ammonium nitrate can violently decompose on its own. This process creates gases including nitrogen oxides and water vapour. It is this rapid release of gases that causes an explosion” we need to look any the explosion again (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdSHRbSZkwc), it is one of many explosions, and as you see there was a fire in the vicinity, but the explosion is violent and complete. The stage is in two fold, in the first, Ammonium nitrate doesn’t burn well and to explode oil is used. The images we see could not be done if it was merely the ammonium nitrate. It is my view and I am not the expert (I did study chemistry), yet experts tell me ‘Ammonium nitrate does not burn on its own’, all the footage I have seen give implication that this was not merely ammonium nitrate, yet Scientific American also give us “It’s stable under normal conditions, but you can do things to it that will cause it to misbehave. The main trigger is an external heat source. Depending on how you want to count it, there have been probably somewhere between 20 and 30 major catastrophic explosions with ammonium nitrate since it came on the scene as a commercial product in the 1920s. And fire is a frequent trigger. It’s the heat of the fire that warms up the ammonium nitrate that can become a problem”, it seems that everyone is willing to give Hezbollah a pass on this event. I am not willing to do so, even if they merely blew up their own city, there is a stage where we need to consider what else was there and was it meant for pro-Houthi or anti-Israel actions? In an age where we see a whole range of analytics and geometric based analyses, in this the Guardian gives us ‘The explosion that devastated the city was no accident and anger is boiling over’, and then we see “It was so huge it was heard in Cyprus. It was so huge it shattered glass and ripped doors off their hinges kilometres away. It incinerated trees, tore the red roofs off centuries-old buildings and brought the blue sea inland. It left 5,000 injured and 154 dead – so far. There are many still missing under the rubble”, which leaves us with the setting that it all went up in one big explosion, consider the fact that it required (read: used) 2,750,000 Kg of ammonium nitrate, I get that there might be an explosion, but IT ALL exploded at once is the larger issue, the facts do not support it. And the fear of some is merely strengthening my view. With “We don’t really know how this ammonium nitrate, confiscated from a ship and stored in unsafe conditions in the middle of our city for six years, ignited. Because those who are responsible are actively rejecting an international investigation”, and in this I see their fear, international experts will bare out what I expect, there were explosives there and that contributed to the much larger explosion, not a fire, and that gets us to Hezbollah, it will feel the brunt of rage from the Lebanese people. Something it cannot afford at present. My initial speculation that Iran handed out of date materials beneath cost price is still on the table, as dynamite sweats nitroglycerine and in the heat in Lebanon it would fuse the ammonium nitrate as well. Yet some media is giving us ‘it requires a combination of things and that seems to have happened’, or something to that regard. They all avoid Iran and Hezbollah in all this, true there would be some speculation linked to it, but things that go boom to this degree requires much more investigation, I do not disagree with this, but blasé painting over the stage with paint of the colour ‘that seems to have happened’ is not the way to go. 

 

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August 5, 2020 · 19:26

Boom goes the dynamite

Yup, I got this from a trainee presenter in an American show, it stuck and now as we see the numbers come from Beirut and the devastating boom that the population in Beirut is facing, the term stuck again. I have waded through 4 hours of video, I read the articles and the sage does not  make sense. Yet, be aware that a lot of it is speculative, so do not take this as gospel, or as given facts, even as I try to go from some of the revealed facts, they too are up for reconsideration of optional inaccurate facts.

The Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/aug/04/beirut-explosion-huge-blast-port-lebanon-capital), gives us a lot of small facts, but some sources like CNN (and others) give us “2,750 metric tons of ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive material used in fertilizers and bombs, had been stored for six years at a port warehouse without safety measures, “endangering the safety of citizens,” according to a statement”, first of all the number comes down to 2,750,000 kilograms, which is not a lot, it is a massive amount to have. In a nation (with explosive needs or not), where there is a shortage of all things, that amount of fertiliser amounts to 125 40 foot containers, filled to the brink with fertiliser, and it was there for 6 years (according to some). When you realise the events can be seen in other light, the numbers do not add up, yet the explosion was real. 

Speculation
So why if there was more than fertiliser there? Consider Iran has been supplying Hezbollah with volatile goods for a long time, what happens when TNT (or dynamite) stats sweating? Now consider that we weren’t dealing with 125 containers, but with a mere 4 containers, but with TNT and it was kept in what some would consider the safest place, also consider that it had been there for a few months and sweating explosives tend to sweat nitro glycerine. Consider that Iran made a deal with surplus stuff and it backfired on its customer.

It is speculation, but consider the blast, according to some the blast was noticed well over 100Km away. I do have a point of reference, the Fireworks blast in the Netherlands (Enschede) had a similar effect, but nowhere near the size, the video’s I saw told a different story, one car on the highway with a distance of around 2000 meters away got its windows blown out and the rear view mirrors got blown off the car, and that is one of a few video’s that show me that this was no ordinary blast. Even as it is understandable that the real cause cannot be known yet, we see within 13 hours “2,750 tons of chemicals detonated”, the explanation is very much too soon. But I get the inkling of dire need to set a story out there, in light of the explosive nature of goods that Hezbollah relies on in Beirut. So when we consider “Over time, regardless of the sorbent used, sticks of dynamite will “weep” or “sweat” nitroglycerin, which can then pool in the bottom of the box or storage area. For that reason, explosive manuals recommend the repeated turning over of boxes of dynamite in storage”, and when we consider that and the supplier to Hezbollah, no matter where it would be stored, is my speculation so thin? Or is it a lot closer to the truth than you would imagine? And when we consider the shortage seem in Lebanon, consider 125 containers of goods untouched for 6 years, or 4 containers with Dynamite untouched (or partially touched) for 6 months, what is more likely? 

It is linked to a second speculation, what if Iran had to get rid of explosives that have a limited time left? Who would be appreciative of receiving explosives at below cost price? I feel certain that this is a direction that Iran did not anticipated, but it is what it is and remember, I am speculating here, yet in this case is it more likely than not is the question and yes, we need to await the real news, but as I see it, the media is accepting the 2,750,000 kilograms of Ammonium nitrate that was in folly stored for 6 years, and remember one small detail “Ammonium nitrate does not burn on its own”, and there was already a fire, I will also give you “Ammonium nitrate decomposition can be set off if an explosion occurs where it’s stored, if there is an intense fire nearby. The latter is what happened in the 2015 Tianjin explosion, which killed 173 people after flammable chemicals and ammonium nitrate were stored together at a chemicals factory in eastern China” The events seem to add up, but the amounts do not (as I personally see it), no matter how we see this, certain people have lost a lot, they will lose a lot more and Iran gets to be a supplier yet once again.

 

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August 5, 2020 · 05:26

What light is the limelight

We all wonder at times why certain matters are brought to attention, we now automatically assume that issues are revealed to seat the limelight, not merely TV and other media, the press is seen in that same way. It is not that we are bombarded with fake news, there is now the assumed feeling by many that the media is giving us fake news (they tend to call it direct and speculated views from experts). 

This view is supported (to a degree) by Al Jazeera who gave us “Long before “fake news” had a name, the BBC was a master of fake news, in fact fake news of the most dangerous, the most vicious consequences, casting nations, not just individuals, into direct calamities”, they did so in November 2018, they also give us “The role of BBC in the overthrow of Mosaddeq was not out of character or unusual. In a piece titled Why the taboo tale of the BBC’s wartime propaganda battle must be told published by The Guardian, David Boyle writes about characters like Noel Francis Newsome (1906-1976), who “as director of European broadcasts … led what is still the biggest broadcasting operation ever mounted, in 25 different languages for a total of just over 25 hours a day, across three wavelengths.””, in this the BBC does not stand alone, there are scores of producers that have had the ear of their governments. 

The problem now is that the media is flaunting the #Fakenews items and procrastinate on what they regard on what is fake news, yet they themselves have been heralding tweaked news and scores of misinformation through either omission or ‘non disclosed sources’ and the people have caught on, they have caught on for a while, so whilst they disregard newspapers, they embrace another level of debatable news that others publish on social media. 

And everyone is seeking the limelight, yet the most obvious question becomes slowly apparent to some, what sort of light is the limelight? And what sort of light was it supposed to be?

That is the question, in people like Freddy Mercury and David Bowie got to be exposed to the purest form that was discovered in 1837, at that point we had: “limelight was used for the first time to illuminate a stage, at London’s Covent Garden. During the second half of the 19th century, theaters regularly utilized this powerful form of light, which could be focused into a beam to spotlight specific actors or an area of the stage”, the stage was set to illuminate and give visibility to, in this case titans of music. In other forms we see the pink limelight, which in this case is not a version of ‘La vie en rose’, it is a version to make softer the harsh reality of a situation that we face, we see it whenever the limelight needs to be on Iran, we see it when bad news must be tempered for the good of that government or for the good of the political needs of THAT moment. In this stage we also need to see the omissions of news and I am not buying the usual ‘we ran out of space’ BS all whilst digital space costs nothing and any additional space implies more advertisement space too. Some might have noticed on the massive lack of reporting whilst Houthi forces (via Iran) were firing missiles on the Saudi government. To merely quote one of the (many) sources “When important news is omitted, we get a skewed or biased perspective”, as I see it, the Saudi example shows a few issues, as the larger lack of reporting was shown, right around the time several governments were setting the stage of no weapons to Saudi Arabia. And in all that mess, the lack of reporting on the actions of Iran take a larger view and we need to do that. We see a global stage that is changing, whilst a group of politic Ians are setting the stage based on their egotistical needs, and that group is getting too large, all whilst the political field of the US is dwindling down and European politics is getting a dangerous overhaul. In this stage of changes, some have figured out that a new way of setting the tone of news is not changing the story, it is adjusting the limelight. As I see it it will open differently across forms of media, but the readers will have a lot more issues to distinguish between news and fake news, you see, there will be news, adjusted news and fake news. The problem is that all have a professional looking character, yet the impact differs. It gets us back to the 90’s when the 256 greyscale solutions came, but the setting is an important distinguishing one. We cannot distinguish these 256 grey scales. Our eyes are not that good, and our brains are even less distinguishing, as the overlap between real, adjusted and fake messages increases, our ability to distinguish becomes a larger issue. In this a personal view is that there is a correlation between phishing and adjusted news. It becomes harder, if not close to impossible to see the difference. I almost fell for two phishing attacks, even as I knew what to look for, the message was indistinguishable from the real deal and news is going the same way, the media relying on ‘adjusted news’ is not helping any. The one clear part (from factcheck.org) is “Not all of the misinformation being passed along online is complete fiction”, the question is when does it become too hard to see the difference between a story that is not ‘all fiction’ and a story that is not ‘all true’. When can we no longer tell the difference? And as some come with the treated excuse ‘Is there not an AI solution?’, the stage becomes rather large, because AI does not exist, not yet at least. You see, the salespeople are selling AI, because it is marketed at all, just like the 80’s when printers had to be sold, they came up with Near Letter Quality. Wit AI we now have True AI: “True artificial intelligence is autonomous — it does not require human maintenance and works for you silently in the background” and there we see the problem, the identification is still done with human intervention, and the part in this that I did not report on is that AI, or perhaps more clearly stated True AI requires to be learning. That is not yet possible as it requires quantum computing with shallow circuits. IBM is close to getting it, but not completely there yet, only when that is ready, complete and true AI becomes achievable. So whilst that stage is still evading us, the issues of adjusted and fake news keep on going. Yet I am concerned with the question “What is the light they use as limelight?”, in this we consider it as we need to contemplate that news should not change when WE change the light, so real news will remain  the same whether it is rose or lime light, adjusted news will change slightly, but perhaps just enough for us to see the difference. It is speculative, but I believe that it is a future option.

 

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August 4, 2020 · 01:40

The station of choice

As we see that we have stations of choice, we also see that our choices were limited. We are overwhelmed with some flu version that has the name of a Mexican beer, we are overwhelmed with what the media calls ‘bad news’ and they are not playing a game with you (most are not), towards the stage where thousands of jobs are gone in any nation that has signs of Covid-19. And we haven’t even seen the main event in any of that. So whilst we see the BBC giving us “HSBC plans to speed up job cuts after interim profits plunged and the bank said bad loans linked to the coronavirus could reach $13bn (£9.8bn)”, OK, we get that, loans were all amassed and extended and then the people got sick, startup companies and existing companies, all got hit. But then we realise the headline and we need to consider the impact of ‘HSBC to speed up 35,000 job cuts as profits slump’, some choices were not choices at all, not for those 35,000 and not for the hundreds of thousands that also are losing their job. Some seem unavoidable, yet the stage of a bank needing to shed 35,000 jobs has another stage to consider, a stage where the bottom dollar and margins are the movement reasons in this particular time. Let’s be clear, it is a time that we have not seen for a little over 100 years. In Australia Victoria is now in a stage 4 lockdown, a second lockdown. There will be businesses hit, there will be consequences for a lot of people, yet when I saw last year in 2019 reporting 23% more profits, I find it a little distasteful to read about 35,000 jobs lost, all whilst banks have been filling their pockets for close to a decade, if there was one situation where loyalty is leaving the building the this is it. There is however an upside, if we consider that 2% of the American people has the Coronavirus and a percentage of that will not survive, we see that job openings are coming. Globally we are moving faster and faster towards 20,000,000 Coronavirus patients, we are almost there, almost 750,000 people were lost on some official places, yet there are loads of articles giving us that the number of deceased people is a lot higher, as such loyalty is not something bosses want to take chances on, but that is merely my view on the matter. Let’s be clear, a lot of them were retired, yet not all, so they need replacement and when the financial sector, after non stop massive profits is shedding its staff, there is nothing stopping a place like Saudi Arabia starting a new financial cornerstone, they are getting access to well over 100,000 people on a global setting. 100,000 people with knowledge of the sector and the clients. Now that they are not spending billions on Newcastle, they could set a corner in the financial sector and setting up shop, with staff needing a job it might not be the worst idea and they have the billions, a lot do not. The world market is soon to be about choice and a lot are handing over the options and opportunities they have to merely meet a short term bottom dollar. I get it, plenty of catering, bars and restaurants do not have the options, or the reserves, they are with their back to the wall and trying to survive, no blame there, but the Fortune 500 and banks shedding jobs, it makes no sense. A situation where they rely on governmental hand-outs whilst they went around making as much profit as they could whilst paying as little tax as they could (which is no crime mind you), but there is a stage where the feeling of insecurity becomes slightly distasteful. Even as we understand that there is a station of choice, yet we seemingly forgot that the station of choice is one with limited settings. It becomes a much larger setting when we consider the impact of 5G, no matter what choice we had, we now see ‘Experts say expanding 5G will boost regional economies during COVID-19’, yet we also see “Although the pandemic has brought uncertainty to our lives, the advantages of 5G infrastructure are increasingly clear. The outbreak has led to increased demand for ICT solutions specifically in areas like 5G amid a boost in network usage and 5G 2B innovations. Meeting that demand will require new forms of public-private partnerships based on open collaboration, supporting strong industry policies that will enable social value, economic development and provide enhanced service experiences to consumers across the region” So when we realise that ‘new forms of public-private partnerships’, some might get the idea that it means new jobs, but this is exactly the danger I had spoken about and this meeting of the SAMENA Telecommunications Council Leaders was in Dubai and Huawei was making enough noise to unite the 5G community in the Middle East towards Huawei, not just Huawei, but there is a clear station where they are coming out on top. It was the scenario I have described a few times and now that the view grows towards ‘new forms of public-private partnerships’ via Huawei, the stress levels go up, the US has a lot to lose and they will lose a fair share of it, in an age of loss of jobs, we get to slowly witness a market shift towards Huawei and the Middle East in almost EVERY segment of 5G and as western corporations fall short on innovation and lack of speed in their apps, we see the danger flexing in a few new directions, I saw several of them as the US is bullying others to drop Huawei, but so far has NEVER shown clear evidence of Chinese governmental dangers. Especially in light of the open dangers that Cisco is leaving out in the open (not intentionally mind you), I think that in the networking environment we have larger dangers that have been confirmed, also by the maker of the hardware. Even as we see the buyout of chipmakers, we see a dangerous setting, we could lose a lot and as I see it, most nations are blindly accepting the stage that America is feeing Europe and the Commonwealth, most are getting more and more aware that 5G is for some treasury coffers will be the last straw of one with coins and one with IOU notes and the stage we are approaching is now set that 5G will be lacking in speed and will be behind all with Huawei hardware. That is the stage we are moving forward to and a stage where job loyalty is at an all time low, a stage where others move in on fields they were never able to move in on and now 5G will move faster. Ericsson gives us “The frontrunners in 4G – largely in the US and China – became the big winners of the “app economy.” The same dynamic will play out with 5G but on a potentially massive scale”, consider that quote, consider the advantage that Huawei has and now consider that players from the Middle East will be entering a field with freedom of movement for well over a year and that stage has never existed before. Consider that in 2018 the stage was “US 4G leadership also resulted in more than $40 billion in additional app store revenue”, so that stage was a large benefit for the US, who is now losing that stage where Asia and the Middle East will get a much larger share than ever before, do you really think that app designers aren’t packing up ion a stage where nations lose more and more loyalty? If Google wants to stay in the race, they need to grow at least three more data centres in the next year alone, and that is merely Google, the others need to grow a much larger input into those regions to stay ahead of the game, the advantage that they had ib 4G is now gone, India was making waves and when they realise the losses they will get as Huawei is shown the door is staggering. In a stage of $40,000,000,000, we see the new economy rise an d Europe and the US will only be a smaller part towards it, the stations of choice are dwindling down and those who SHOULD do something about it are indecently silent. It worries me because it will impact the Common wealth for far too much, as America stops being a superpower, the Commonwealth will be alone taking up the baton of the free world, we will have to seek a partner and Europe is unlikely to make it, so how can this so called ‘free world’ be insured when the option for the Commonwealth becomes Russia or China? I don’t see it, do you? And even as there is no cold war, there is a new war coming, not with fighting units and out in the open bashing, but it will be a new war. The Digital war will be new, it will be massive and our team has thrown out the most important options from the get go. It worries me and it should worry you as well. 5G is too important a battle, and so far both Ericsson and Nokia are all making marketing claims, but are they showing equal or more advancement than Huawei? As far as I can tell no, and that is where Samena comes in. A council where we see STC, Batelco, Arabsat, Etisalat International, Mobily, Omantel, Orange, Sudatel, Zain Kuwait and of course Samena. A stage where there is a much larger stage for meetings that impact the Middle East as it becomes a larger stage for players like Huawei. So here’s hoping that the current US president is not getting this wrong as much as his stance on the Coronavirus, because the cost will be a lot higher this time around. A stage where the big players handed over revenue to Asia and the Middle East via a conscripted setting of ego, it will be a first, yet at present it iOS close to certain to become actuality.

 

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August 3, 2020 · 04:28

The old way in a new coat

There is a simmering in me, I have been working on a new IP and as I was settling on a path, I find another IP. This is based on an idea I had in the late 80’s. Even then, with my limited understanding of matters, I designed a way for dewdrops to work differently. I got the idea whilst reading John Le Carre’s ‘The Spy Who came in from the cold’, in that story we see British spy Alec Leamas and the events that followed. I got to the book after I had already seen the movie with Richard Burton years before. It is how I learned how certain people left messages, but I already saw the progress of technology. Dead drops would become inherently harder. So I came up with a simple idea. In those years there were BBS options, where we got free software, pictures of celebrities (adult and non adult) and as I saw how the half life of certain images went, I got the idea, to mess with the hue of an image, the offset would only be 1. Even as Luminescence is preserved, it would be relatively simple to hide

SJTRD SDHIT KLTHS NESKU WASHY
WEKHW EQOQW THUKI REELU QOOLL

And whilst everyone is focussing on CCTV, for 2 hours, one image in a BBS will be changed for 1-2 hours, the message is given and the storage box is returned to its original value, a BBS with hundreds of thousands of images, you can hide an entire dark web delivery system on items required that can not be found in a supermarket. The app would be simple and in the age of 4G+ it is close to impossible to check, especially when an image has a 1-2 hour window, now considers a stage where one site (one of several dozens) has well over 125,000,000 images, 2 hours just doesn’t work, now when every person has its own hue stage, they all have a separate item for checking. Even the average art exposition has thousands of images, and even if someone else downloaded that image, the naked eye will not see the hue approach, the stage requires an app and there is no stopping the message. With the app, the image can be downloaded, the app deciphers and the reader presses wipe to overwrite the image completely, not delete, first overwrite every bit with ‘EA’, change the image name and after that delete the image. And without the personal hue code, it cannot be regained. A stage from the cold war regained in the now, and with the US setting to regain the cold war, I thought of making an old idea public domain, have fun everyone!

In the mean time, I am getting back to setting up a new protocol for what might be 5G plus, or perhaps 6G, I never think that far ahead, I merely see a new stage of setting mobile phone privacy to unrevealed heights, and there is nothing stopping me from going outside my own comfort zone, is there? 

 

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August 2, 2020 · 02:58

Irritation or agitation?

So is it a state of feeling annoyed, or a state of nervous excitement? Sometimes the difference is so small we feel uncertain what we are. I got into this state time today, shortly after one another, which beckons the thought what is up? The first one was whilst one Netflix, it is not the fault of Netflix. I was browsing and I decided to watch ‘The Rain’. I got into the series for a whole 20 minutes and then after the annoyance, switched it off. It was not the cast, the cast performed as they should have. The idea of a killer rain is fine, but the father rushes home and gets into a traffic mess, but no worries, they can run towards to underground bunker in time (in the middle of nowhere mind you), then we get the kids, annoying, and for some reason they do not grasp the panic, so they are full of questions (whilst dad it driving way too dangerously), then when in the bunker someone bonks the door and of course the kids want to open the door. I got so annoyed with these two that I thought that killing them would be the best thing for all concerned. Just a simple bullet through the back of the head, switch them off like a light. 

It got me thinking, what if that was the stage for a new reality show ‘Honey, I murdered the kids’? What if that is a stage where we see four families and we test the premise of their acceptance levels? OK, it is a screwed up show, but this has become a screwed up world as well. It was merely a mind boggle. The second time was playing Jedi: Fallen order. I stayed away from this game, in the first I like Star Wars, but I am not huge fan, saw all the movies and so on, but it is not the greatest need, so when I was able to get the game second had for a mere $10, I was game to try it. The game had positive things, negative things, but the graphics are actually amazing, the three levels I played had two interesting ones. I like the creation of short cuts, the graphics are great, the story is great, but when I got to the level with ice slides and a few other slides (and ropes) the fun dwindled own a little too fast. Respawning, again and again, slipping over ice slide edges, it was too much like a Prince of Persia game. Yet it does look really good and $10 is a steal for a game this good looking (even at twice the price). There was more, the second world gives shortcuts, so that you can return and take the easy way, it was well made, or perhaps better stated, the levels were well designed, there are a few sides in the game that I questioned (like parts that can only be premium parts), but I gained a few other items soon enough, so it was merely a little matter. Health and Jedi power does not renew over time. Yet the two negative feelings (TV and game) happened within an hour and it made me wonder, what does it take to drive creativity into a dark hole? 

That is the question underneath the pressure within, you see even as we were treated to ‘DARPA plans 4 year open source 5G program to address US security fears’ 5 months ago, and we get “OPS-5G aims to lead to the development of a portable standards-compliant network stack for 5G mobile that is open source and secure by design. The “long-term objective is a US-friendly ecosystem” featuring a trillion networked devices, a broad agency announcement for the four-year project states”, which is fine, and even as it takes 4 years (so it will be ready after the 5G war has raged), they see that it might not be that useful. I am not stating that it is, I am speculating that it is. I came up with a new IP for 5G+, it works in 5G and whether it starts 5G+ or 6G is not for me to say. I tinkered the idea from something I remembered in the early 70’s and I wondered what happens when we change the approach to mobile telephony. There was a 3, a 5 and a 7 phase solution and it required a new approach to central routing, but if it works the privacy and safety on 5G will include up to 6 times more secure and there would be no way to unscramble it, except at the source. And that is where the two fields intersect, a signal can do many things, but I think they never tried the new approach before, so in that form any old fashioned system will be outdated from the start and the new systems can wield the old systems as well. I wonder if DARPA had thought if that little tinkering approach? There is no connection to the other IP I have, but there is a way how they both prosper from the initial stages of a multiple phased connection, the question becomes “When is a router not a router” and that is the path towards more new idea’s, some a little dark, but not all and still creativity wins, even when it is giving into darker ideas. And in all this, is irritation, or agitation the fuel for creativity in a darker view? Perhaps both are, I cannot tell at present, but as I have come up (so far) with new ideas for a new Far Cry, a new Watchdogs, a new Infamous and a new Elder Scrolls, and 2-3 5G IP’s, I do personally believe that my mind is set to a decent creative mode, and frightfully fast. I wonder what I will think of next.

 

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July 31, 2020 · 22:49

Innuendo on the aftermath

The BBC is giving us more, and more, and more. Now they give us “The coronavirus crisis might be causing widespread economic upheaval around the world, but the world’s biggest tech firms are thriving.” And why is that? Consider the simple truth, Apple, even though not completely innovative, does give us something lovely. A lot of people got access to their Super early because of the Coronavirus, we do not want to splash and splurge, but when you are in lockdown, you cannot escape yourself, you can stare down the walls, go insane, or do something else. Surf the web using a Apple iPhone, or a Google Pixar, read a book, play a game or watch a DVD that is ordered via Amazon, then there is the surfing and 2 billion visit Facebook, so yes ‘the world’s biggest tech firms are thriving’, shops would not have been a great offer, lockdowns do that, but the people can order things and some get the hardware to do this. When you have one day to live, the option to see in brilliance and astounding quality matters a great deal to that person. And in all this, the digital highway will be travelled a lot more than usual, people working from home, people being denied high resolution Netflix because the internet if congested, but the advertisements go through, and we all see them. Then we get “At a hearing in Washington on Wednesday, lawmakers grilled the companies about whether they were abusing their dominance to quash rivals, noting the sharp contrast between their fortunes and many other firms”, as I personally see it, they aren’t quashing rivals, they are using their expertise to gain faster and more. 

Beyond that there is “Republican congressman Jim Sensenbrenner asked Mark Zuckerberg why Twitter had removed a post by the US president’s son, Donald Trump Jr, discussing the efficacy of the drug hydroxychloroquine. Twitter is not owned by Facebook. “I think what you might be referring to happened on Twitter, so it’s hard for me to speak to that,” said Mr Zuckerberg.””it gives my earlier view on the stupidity of politicians, as Jim Sensenbrenner cannot tell who owns what and addresses the wrong person on the matter, we see the Cowboy show I expected to see, a waste of time, and poor entertainment at that. 

It becomes a larger issues when we see “Democratic congresswoman Pramila Jayapal asked Jeff Bezos for a “yes or no” answer: Did Amazon ever use seller data to make its own business decisions? This was a reference to reports that Amazon has used data gathered from businesses selling products via its site to design and price its own rival first-party goods – something the firm has previously suggested had been limited to a group of rogue employees. Mr Bezos responded that he couldn’t give an answer in such simple terms” That is part of the problem, the lack of knowledge, when we look at “Did Amazon ever use seller data to make its own business decisions?” What exactly is ‘seller data?’, is it a cookie that the users has agreed on, was it sales data from the application that was used, as such, what application data is in play? Was it a customer review? Three questions that rip out the threads of the conversation. As such, as we saw Democratic congresswoman Pramila Jayapal rip Attorney General William Barr to shreds, she should have known better from the start, and we go from cowboy act to dog and pony show. In all this there is also debate on ‘to make its own business decisions’, especially as APN partners have options to make choices and decisions, it was a poorly phrased question and a wrongly lit situation from the get go. And last but not least we see “Republican congressman Matt Gaetz claimed that Google collaborates with Chinese universities that take “millions upon millions of dollars from the Chinese military” and noted that tech investor Peter Thiel had previously accused the company of “treason””, so how stupid is Matt Gaetz and where does he have ANY evidence that Google was taking money from the ‘Chinese military’? It is these levels of stupidity that gets no results, mere innuendo, yet they ALL seems to agree that overhauling Tax laws and competition laws would be a larger need, especially that in light of 5G and optionally 5G plus (a new IP I am working out) the need to both would be essential in keeping the playing field level, but these politicians, but their own account they sealed their own lives. Even as we see: “But Cicilline goes on: “This is the tip of the iceberg. It’s not just about Covid. Facebook gets away with it because there is no competitor. It’s the only game in town.”” I still remember the setting in 1997, I saw so called bullet point executives having no clue on the digital highway, dismissing it of hand as some paths had no business purpose, the setting did not change before 5 years AFTER Facebook was created by people lacking innovative vision and trying to bleed off Facebook settings, and history is about to repeat itself in the 5G environment, the back-fall is that big and US Congress, seemingly ignorant of the digital dimension are making things worse by stopping the only 4 resources in the US who have a chance of c countering what comes next. So well done djotto’s! And it does not end there. Considering the lacking intelligence by these democrats, when the people realise just how far it lacked, we get to see that the upcoming election is not a given, not by a long shot. I keep on wondering what the hearing was about, when will we get to see these documents and so called evidence that they rely on? I wonder how many holes I get to shoot into that part of the equation. I talk about innuendo and here it is, proudly brought to you by the BBC. It was Republican Greg Steube who sets that in motion with the question “Do you believe the Chinese government is stealing technology from US companies?”, mind you that he tried to push for a yes-or-no answer in light of the simplistic minds that these members of Congress have. Yet consider that the most powerful tech bosses and owners of the IP stated “I don’t know of specific cases where we have been stolen from by the government” (Tim Cook), and that is the first part where we see the issue. Then there was “no first-hand knowledge of any information stolen from Google in this regard” (Sundar Pichai), “I haven’t seen that personally but I’ve heard many reports of it” (Jeff Bezos), in this we only have Mark Zuckerberg who gives us “I think it’s well documented that the Chinese government steals technology from US companies”, this issue here is in the first that it was narrow-minded to set a shallow question on a closed answer, all whilst Tim Cook gives us that he does not know the the Chinese government is stealing, but cheap knock off’s, especially when it is promoted by Kylie and Kendall Jenner (at https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-53596192) are getting promoted by people of no mind and a clever approach on what they can get away with, I think they are called criminals. Sundar supports the view, or basically leads in his own fairway that Google was not a victim of that approach. We get Jeff giving us that he has seen many reports, yet I wonder who wrote them, I hope he is not relying on FTI Consulting for more than one reason. Only Marky Mark remains, I cannot fault his view and perhaps he is right, but in light of the Bezos hacking view and the issue on Sony and North Korea, there are too many questions on who does what and so far too many issues have left us with too many questions on how short the comings of come of the US cyber divisions really are, and that is not all. The hand that could be feeding them is the hand they are biting whilst not adjusting for the laws to make a proper job, that is the setting that we are left with in the aftermath and the innuendo around us leaves us with questions on politicians seeking the limelight. And why was Microsoft not there?

It is a weird setting and it will get a lot weirder in 2021. 

 

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