May 18, 2023 · 12:11

The house wins

Yes, that has been the case since before WW1. In gambling the house wins and I got an interesting surprised served up by the BBC. It was the article (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-65610851) where we see ‘Cryptocurrency: Treat investing as gambling, MPs say’ OK, that was a little unexpected, but when you think of it not the weirdest step to make. We see this with “The risks posed by crypto were “typical of those that exist in traditional financial services and it’s financial services regulation – rather than gambling regulation – that has the track record in mitigating them”, a Treasury official told BBC News.” I can get behind that. Lets not forget that crypto has no gold backing like currency, so not only is it a gamble, but in many cases it is a long shot at best. There is however a consideration we need to have and it is seen with “Gambling helpline charity GamCare told the BBC that, in the past two years, it had heard from more than 300 people who said they were struggling with investing in cryptocurrency and other forms of online financial markets.” It is seen with ‘struggling with investing’. I personally wonder that if you are struggling with an investment, then why invest in it to begin with, but that might be me. 

The plot thickens when you see “He said he had lost about £150,000 investing in crypto, including money he had borrowed, and that checking his phone to see how the market had moved had become an obsession. “There was no break at all, I was just I was on my phone constantly watching it and just couldn’t sleep,” he recalled.” So one person borrows to invest? I would not do that to buy stock in reliable options like Tesla or IBM, as such I will never ever do it in something fleeting as digital dollars. That is an orgasm more fleeting than trying to get one from a hooker with aids. I do not now, not ever trust digital currency. I accept that there are moments that this is the one payment option, but it will only exists until I get to the nearest bank to convert it to something more reliable. As such there is a rather nasty breach here. I would never invest in it and I do get that some do. And to be honest if I had the money in 2010 I might have bought 5-10 Bitcoins and that would have set me right, but I do not trust any digital currency and I still see all these ads come past with the statement ‘How rich would you be now if you had bought even one bitcoin in 2010?’ Yet that ship sailed and when you consider the grifters and BS artists trying to get you on digital trades, the idea to treat it as gambling makes a lot of sense to me and with gambling comes a lot more oversight. 

In the end, I have no idea where this will go, but the idea that all these new ‘students of digital currency’, the idea that they are soon to be privy to gambling oversight does seem appealing to me. And I do get it, it might be me, I might be too old for this new currency. 

I will let you decide, have a great day. 

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May 17, 2023 · 14:32

The BS advertiser

Yup that was what links this. A game called something like the last outpost, it is a zombie apocalypse game and some moron in a beanie tells us that this is what the game looks like, all whilst the game looks nothing like this. The game is a linear game with massive limitations, a game trying to tell a story, all whilst the gamer wants what the advertisement shows and so far I have only seen three games do this and not drown us in advertisements regarding more BS games. This is how Apple and Android are getting rich whilst sleeping. The funny money paradox.

So here I was suddenly asleep and I see a weird setting, the roof of a building is like a bar, the proprietor is a serious shady character of seemingly Scottish origins. When I go down a floor I see some makeshift hospital, the weather was foul, so I did not see a whole much and there was a massive absence of electricity. The only thing I saw was a tag giving me FLIT. 

It was then that I woke up. Something rustled, but the setting wasn’t clear. Then I remembered that I thought in this direction before. For the same reason why I always loved Fallout Shelter (the BS game is relying on a huge Fallout vault door to get his visibility) and the other game I always loved were Dungeon Keeper one and two. Dungeon Keeper One came from Molyneux’s better days and two came from one. And that gave me the initial idea, but I thought too small.  Then my mind remembered that the US has four places named Italy. One in Florida, one in South Carolina, one in New York and one in Texas. So this was about Italy, FL. So what if we set the stage not t houses, but to buildings. Just like in Dungeon Keeper they all need a source of food (Kitchen) and a place to sleep (Hospital), but unlike in dungeon keeper, we cannot make rooms bigger, we need to work with the rooms we have. A hospital will have destined sleeping places, but a mall will not, we might find a smaller place with beds, making us rustle for more beds in the building. But in we need to make it safer (traps) and we need to defend (guard posts) and as we start a game we will have these two places (sleep and food) to build, but they open up to other rooms (alway in similar ways), but it is up to you how you fill in the location and stay alive. And as the game progresses there are more adversaries and more nights to survive. But you have most of the day to set up your traps. The downside is that food is an essential thing and as you have smaller or larger kitchens you have more dishes and more food. In the one pot kitchen you either have more recipes (which you need to find, together with resources), and as you have a larger kitchen you have more pots, as such people have choices (and 5% more energy), the one pot kitchen will leave you with 5% less every night, unless you have two days with different recipes. A large pot will also give you 50 food (like soup), but a stew will only give you 35 food. Yet the kitchen calls in people (who are all hungry), and here is where the game evolves. Some are guards and they defend the building. The engineer creates traps, like trapdoors that can only close for safe passage (or not) when there is a guard present. You need a plumber for heat and an electricians for power. So you need to protect these two as they are more rare to get and as the game progresses in the first level we get waitresses, tinkerers (creates weapons), scroungers (finding resources for weapons and traps) and so on. 

Yes, it feels a lot like a revamped Dungeon Keeper, but if we set aside a little brainpower, it can be enough different to create a new wave of gamers. Consider that this game is 24 (or 26) years old and there are literally tens of thousands still thinking of this game. There is a reason that this was a 90% plus game. Good games last a long time and in this age of instant and temporary satisfaction, we see people hurdling their idea towards the funny money paradox to get income, but they all forget that a good game needs only itself and there we have a setting where the new games could outlast a few items, although with the imminent collapse of the US (debt ceiling driven) it could alter right quick. This was why I was seeking the middle east solution for some of my IP. Better be wealthy in Dubai than bankrupt in New York and some might see that future soon enough. But the setting of gaming was always my number one. And in this case there is an entire culture of unexplored gaming options (and the billion consumers attached to it). 

This was only to wake you up and feel free to use this idea on Sony, Nintendo and Amazon Luna only. I do have standards and Microsoft has none, as such they are not a consideration. So whilst you wonder on why I was driven to move against that BS advertiser? He proclaims in his beanie that this game is how you see it and it is not, more importantly I saw a direction he is bragging about within an hour. Within in hour I surpassed his feeble attempt to surpass what he thinks we see towards what we could be seeing. 

Enjoy the day.

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May 16, 2023 · 15:51

Pregnancy optional

Yup, that happens apparently. Or so we can believe. You see, the story I saw at the BBC hours ago seemingly pried loose a few issues. The article (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-65556437) gives us ‘UK men offered £10K to pose as dads in visa scam, BBC investigation finds’ Here we re given “Scammers are using Facebook to tout for business and claim to have helped thousands of women in this way. Facebook says such content is banned by its rules.” Which got me two feathers rustled. Lets be clear this could be happening and it likely is. So where does the BBC get the word ‘thousands’? The article gives us “Thai, who didn’t advertise on Facebook, said he would concoct a convincing backstory in order to successfully dupe the authorities.” We are also given “Another agent, calling herself Thi Kim, claimed she had helped thousands of pregnant migrant women. She said she could provide a British man and it would cost “ten thousand for the dad”, with her fee being £300.” You see, this is an income track with a short lifespan, and she taking £300 whilst paying the man £10,000 rings untrue. £2,300 and £8,000 would sound more believable. The entire setting is one that comes across particularly nasty. So when we get to “However, last year 4,860 family visas were granted to “other dependents” – a category which includes those applying to stay in the UK as parents of British children. Deliberately giving false details on a birth certificate is a criminal offence.” It is at this point I wonder what the game of Patrick Clahane, Divya Talwar & Khue B Luu is about. Is it about what we shallowly read, or is one of their friends anti-immigration? You tell me, because this story could go either way. How were the thousands ‘found’ and the fact that scammers are using Facebook is nothing new, but in this case how many are on Facebook? Then we combine the ‘thousands’ again but now we look at where these women come from. Thousands and there is no top-line listing? The names are Thai and asian sounding, but how many are from South America or Russia? And the last quote was “The BBC could not estimate the scale of the fraud, as the Home Office was unable to provide data on the number of cases it had investigated.” Well, the numbers we do get gives us over 41% (thousands divided by 4860) and that is merely the top, there is too much inaccuracies. So are the BBC again biting at the steak of emotional baggage? I wonder what is actually true here and it is not the first time that the BBC is reporting in a questionable way. 

So what will be the next stage, vacations to dubious locations are offered free of charge so that you can impregnate (read: have sex) with a dozen women, all for free? If the article has any truth in it then it would be the part where we see “how desperate these women are”, mainly because for a lot of non-europeans the UK still represents a slice of golden future. That was never in question. The question becomes the BBC and what they consider making news. As I see it “has not responded to the BBC’s request for comment” is a mere approach to give validity to something that is not and I have a few questions on the article that lacks a whole range of validity. So how about Tim Davie? Will you improve the story quality and the numbers on this or are you destined to be the next Uber driver? They are taking resume’s at present.

Enjoy your non impregnating (or non impregnated) day today.

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May 15, 2023 · 17:03

Innovation in action

That is where we are, this happens and I end up being surprised, to a degree I had not expected. To see the full part of this, I need to take you back to 2022, where I wrote about a new version of racing game, a way to use Google Maps to create global race tracks. Some disagreed that this could ever work, but today I got the surprise of my life. 

I got to see innovation in action. The idea I had brought to light. Now, let’s be clear. This version has a different setting, but the same approach and I feel certain that Ollie Tyler has never heard of me, as such it is ALL him. This is how innovation works and that is why Microsoft will never amount to anything but through hype creation and spin. I personally hope that Ollie runs to Nintendo who has over 122 million Nintendo Switch units sold. At $2 per game that could end up being a massive amount of money for Ollie, he would be set for life. In addition he could offer it to Amazon Luna as they lack racing games. The part I love is that innovation will flourish with the people who embrace it, who at times use engineering to create art. As such I say Well done Ollie, well done.

So my day is ending on a high. I might not end up with anything, but this is one of several IP settings that come to light. Now that this is clearly in the open, it is time to talk to talk to Tencent Technologies, Mohamed Alabbar, Emaar Properties and Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. You see, when several IP parts connect these people will end up with billions (I will get a slice of that cake), but in the end these are solutions that Google and Amazon left lying on the floor all whilst they were all about contracting economies. And my side? Several IP sides that I wrote about a long tome before these IP parts became a reality. I am not a programmer, but I have vision and I see the vision evolve all around me and that is good, especially when Microsoft is not invited to the table. Let them hunger for scraps, it is all they deserve in light of their gaming wannabe perspectives. 

Enjoy your day.

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May 15, 2023 · 14:39

The paper tiger

There is a tiger is the fields, the people aren’t afraid, they aren’t worried because the tiger is a paper one. That is the setting and it came to me from the Guardian. The article (at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/14/more-than-300000-syrian-civilians-died-any-attempt-to-rehabilitate-assad-is-utterly-shameful) gives us ‘More than 300,000 Syrian civilians died. Any attempt to rehabilitate Assad is utterly shameful’, is that so? Well, it is a point of view, and Simon Tisdall is not completely wrong, actually he sort of is. I cannot fault him for anything but the reality is a lot less appealing and that is the problem, the less appealing truth behind this. You see no one ever cared about Syria. The west did not because Syria has no economic value, it has no oil, just like Yemen. And for all intents and purposes America is already broke and the EU and Japan are right next to America in this. So whilst we saw the Ghouta chemical attack and we saw the news of what happened on 21 August 2013, almost 10 years ago now. Was something done? A week later investigators looked around and The UN investigation team confirmed “clear and convincing evidence” of the use of sarin delivered by surface-to-surface rockets. Nothing was done. That is the reality and we need to take notice. You see at present Syria is one step away from becoming a Russian satellite state. Now with the Arab League back in the fold they will get some of the rebuilding revenue and it will not all go to Russia, I reckon a better setting. So even as I understand the setting of Simon, making Syria a pariah is a lot worse and that goes nowhere. In addition to all this is that the Yemen side is there too, nothing was done by any of us, only now that the Ukraine is under attack things are done, not enough and not fast enough, but something is done. Basically the world did 100% more in the case of the Ukraine then it did in case of Syria or Yemen. I feel that the west is only acting because the Ukraine with its 21st largest army was able to stop Russia with one of the three largest armies in the world and the losses are adding up for Russia

And these numbers are staggering that the Ukraine with the army and hardware they had were able to pull this off and now the west is starting to become aware that there is no aftermath for them. Germany had been for the longest time been pussyfooting on hardware delivery, only to see that Pro-Russian politicians in Germany were stoping this. American politicians were no better here. In Florida we get “Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla, a leader of a small but vocal wing of isolationist Republicans in the House, has introduced a “Ukraine Fatigue” resolution seeking to end “military and financial aid” to Ukraine.” And he is not alone in the US. America has (in my humble opinion) become a collection of pussies that were nice when they were nothing more than rich bullies, but that is now over, the wealth is gone and as such the field of superpowers is changing. It will soon evolve into a new setting with China (the force), Saudi Arabia (the bank) and India (the consumer), in that stage I want Russia to have as little options as possible and we might not like this, but it beats Russia having satellite nations making things globally worse. To prevent it actions were required, actions that remained absent in the west and that danger is still not over, because Iran is still a consideration and Russia likes a nation with so much anti-American sentiment. As such the evolution that the Arab League is making makes a lot of sense, I prefer these two listening to Saudi Arabia than taking snacks and ‘carefully considered actions’ from Russia, because that will surely make things a lot worse. 

And now as we see more and more technology interactions between Russia and the UAE, economic values will spread all over the Middle East, which is good. Yet they also fall away from American shores which is not that great, especially when you see that America remains one step short on defaulting on their loans. 

Yay, Monday!

Enjoy the day.

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May 14, 2023 · 15:10

James Gunn? Nope, not here.

This all started yesterday. There were two events that got me there. The first was Colin Jost making a reference to the Man of Steal, this of course made me wonder how much Scarlett Johansson has howling with laughter on the sofa watching Colin say things Michael Che was feeding him, with the Halloween event making Colin burst out “You’re evil” being an absolute number one. The second one was something I had heard before, somehow it got back into my mindset. “Which Superheroes could be black?” It was a questions I had heard around the relaunch of the Fantastic Four. I am a traditional kind of guy, I feel uneasy watching any hero switch race. This does work both ways. As such Lucas Cage could never be caucasian, neither could Cloak from cloak and dagger. It might be me, it might be to keep things how the cartoonist designed them to be. Yet, the question remains valid. As such my mind started to ponder. And in light of the animated series I think that the Green Lantern could be black, then two more ‘heroes’ entered the frame. The first one was Ghost Rider, the second one was a lot darker and based on what some would regard a farce. You see Blacula was a weird setting and I never saw it in the cinema, I saw it much later. Yet consider two creatures with links to the occult. Which reminded me of a print I saw decades ago. A Nazi high table that was investigating the occult. What if there was a story where these (however members there were) and we reconsidered the first Indiana Jones, as well as other supernatural items and we have two movies with links to each other, but not overlapping (in the beginning). The Ghost Rider we need to drop because it is not DC, but we still have Green Lantern, Deadman and optionally Blacula. Yet, now Blacula is not some joke. How about we make that vampire dark, I mean really dark so that we consider the House on haunted Hill a weak comedy. The darkest of dark with a matching storyline. This line will not appeal to all, I get that, but a movie that appeals to all will in the end be praised by no-one. And as the story unfolds and we see more of these very dark pages we introduce a horror group into the DC fold, and I am no James Gunn, as such I am entertaining the utterly bizarre. We see in the the comics that Yellow is the Kryptonite of the Green Lantern, as such sulphur would equally do and we could get a link to the realm of Mephistopheles (he sends his regards). A set of movies that are separate enough and only in the fifth movie we start seeing connections with the stage that the fifth is less watchable unless you saw at least one of the previous four. We lose out on Constantine and Ghost Rider as Marvel was ahead of its time, but there are other avenues to tap into and even DC has its rankings and not all are of the occult (and need not be), but what happens when Green Lantern, Blacula and Deadman connect? There are all kinds of issues and all kinds of twists that could make a good storyline. The story wasn’t too bad and the idea of a African prince Mamuwalde in modern times where we still have human trafficking and slave trade could make for an interesting twist, that is beside the stage that African Shaman magic has never been explored to the degree it could have which gives us more than merely the supernatural. The nice side here is that with the ancient African sides optional sides to Egypt and Mesopotamia open up. The same could be said for the other choices in other directions. All venues that Marvel never touched on and even as they have their own stallions in the stable, there is nothing against having another stable that make a black stable look mediocre bland. This is possible, remember Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) in no country for old man? Setting the stage of evil is merely a stage that makes the person darker the more we believe it is closer to reality. If that wasn’t true we would merely giggle at the side of Hannibal the Cannibal, but we do not, even as we realise that it is mostly the actor giving it live and we have plenty of non caucasian great actors (including Asians here). So consider a massively dark role and now we get a person like Jamie Foxx to put on the vampire shroud. How dark can the story become? As an alternative we could consider Chiwetel Ejiofor or Idris Elba both great actors in their own way, as such they will give a different spin to the character, optionally really great spins. As such it is clear that I am no James Gunn, I never intended to be a copy of him, but I reckon that I see the potential of great DC heroes or anti heroes and they could all be black, as such the question “Which Superheroes could be black” is answered, I still have some ‘conservative’ feels about it, as such my imagination doesn’t take me to the Man of Steal (sorry Michael Che), but there are plenty of options in the DC Universe and dare I say the Marvel Universe as well.

Enjoy the day, Monday is almost here.

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May 13, 2023 · 18:09

A weekend of revelations

Yup, this happens. However, before I go there, I need to take you on a little trip. It all started in January 2022. I set the design for a new Watchdogs game and I wrote about it in ‘Looky Looky’ which I published in February 2022 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2022/02/13/looky-looky/) it was the second time I made mention of it (I could not find the first one). Yet at times reality catches up with gaming. That much was clear when I saw ‘Google’s ‘translation glasses’ were actually at I/O 2023, and right in front of our eyes’ (at https://www.zdnet.com/article/googles-translation-glasses-were-actually-at-io-2023-and-right-in-front-of-our-eyes/), my gaming idea was ahead of reality by almost a year, which is not a bad marker to have. It also shows that I had a much better grasp of the IoT world than some proclaim I have (which is nice too). Here we are one step away from pictogram deciphering. So as we are given “unlike Google Glass, this new concept, which didn’t have a name at the time (and still doesn’t), demonstrated the practicality of digital overlays, promoting the idea of real-time language translation as you were conversing with another person.” The nice side effect is that my approach to Augmented Reality is now close to completion. Yes, Google might have the glasses, but I have at least three more options and they are all about to become Public Domain, which might not make me rich, but it shows I was right all along. In addition to this it will bump my other IP, as well as the 5G plus plans I had. Which is still wishful thinking, but with more and more of my early writings becoming reality, it shows I was on the right track all along.

The side effects are nothing to be sneered at. I get that, but a dozen greed driven fuckers poisoning the well aren’t nice either and I will turn all my IP public domain before I let some fat fuck come at me with the “let me help you matey”, that person has no idea what a ‘mate’ is, all greed driven, all bullet point driven and utterly clueless in nearly all IT manners.

So as we realise “Twelve months have passed and the popularity of AR has now been replaced by another acronym: AI, shifting most of Google and the tech industry’s focus more toward artificial intelligence and machine learning and further away from metaverses and, I guess, glasses that help you transcribe language in real time.” We see that at Google, there is an equal distorted sense. They might have mentioned AI 143 times as ZDNet counted, but AI is not real. AR on the other hand is here now and it could have much larger repercussions for retail and malls. I wrote about that a few times over and even as Gucci and partners are on track, a lot is not and that was the larger stage for Google. 144,000 malls with many well over 100 shops. And that was also the profit setting. Do once and distribute to well over 10,000 malls at a time. It does depend on the amount of malls a shop is in, but the message is clear. AR is the direct future and will have an evolution over a few other matters. 

The second revelation (for me) was given by something called the Verdict (at https://www.verdict.co.uk/sap-google-cloud-team-up/) there we see mention of SAP and Google teaming up. Unless you have larger BI involvement you might miss it. Yet the stage of these two working together is a much bigger hit then you think. With SAP Dashboard and Google statistics there is a new field growing and it is there for everyone, which is the start of decline for Microsoft. A company that is now the focal point of PHAAS, and as I saw today the howling laughter of people trying to install their Office365 only to learn that their subscription ended in 1968.

I initially thought it was a direct attack to a person I knew, but it is happening all over the place. Microsoft has serious issues and all whilst they are trying to acquire gaming firms for 68 billion more. Yes, that is the place to go! As such Google already had a clear advantage, but now with the SAP link all corporations that are above small businesses, Google will have something more to offer and SAP as well. A stage that was in the making and when Adobe joins that team the disaster moment for Microsoft is pretty much complete. I cannot tell how this unfolds, but the larger stage is Microsoft dropping the ball all over the place and now that we have Google and SAP picking it up, the losses for Microsoft will increase and within a year they will be massive and as such the small firms dumping Office365 and joining the Google family will pick up more and more. Now however it will not merely be Google, SAP solutions will be all over the place hindering IBM Watson growth as well. There was a large slice of the pie for whom IBM Watson was just too big, to cumbersome, but as I see it SAP has that under new management. And as IBM Watson goes, so do all the blue settings (Azure) that Microsoft was hoping for, it is almost pathetic how that translates into ‘wishful thinking of unrequited love’ (me howling with laughter now).

Yes this is quite the revelation weekend for me. I should consider another gaming IP for Amazon Luna and Sony. There is something rewarding to kicking a corporation when it is on its knees thinking it was too good for anyone else. The joy of being mean (not a synonym for average). 

Enjoy the weekend. I am, that much is a given today.

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May 12, 2023 · 19:43

Behind the eyelids

Two dreams got to me and they both happened on the same night. The first one is weird in all kinds of ways. I cannot tell whether it is the foundation of a game, a movie or something else. In this dream it is mostly about some new MMORPG. It has a scientific side. You see the premise is that in these games most people become like herd-people. They will cluster into tasks. There will always be the ‘hero’ and goes racing into enemy hands getting himself (or herself) killed. In this my mind reached back to the original Star Trek specifically the episode ‘Shore Leave’ there we learn “The more complex the mind, the greater the need for the simplicity of play.” That quote always meant something to me. Now consider the MMORPG and now we can monitor interactions, but not draining the game. In this two bird types are addd to the game. The Albatros, a bird that flies around the shores of a nation and it has the ability to carpet the fields collecting thoughts and observing interactions to groups of people and the second bird is the Hawk. That one focusses on smaller areas and can pick up one specific character. Now you think that there is not a lot more, but consider that these two can like the character to the actual person outside of the game. Now we have a way to tag people, the undesirable and the willing. You see, the more simplistic the setting (Roman, Greek, Carthaginians, Egyptian), the more basic the weapons, the more that person will embrace his character, the character will more and more be the real person. That also means that now those behind the screens can unite the both and find the willing, the dangerous and the unknown players. Without any real intrusion to that persons ‘privacy’ the people orchestrating the game can make a mould of groups and clusters of people. That was as far as I got. There are all kinds of ‘measurements’ in real life and for the most they are all marketing based, but what happens when games take them to the next stage? It is not out of the realm of possibilities and that could make for a nice game, or movie for that matter.

The second dream took me to Slovenia (never been there myself). In the dream it was a movie (of sorts) the main roles were a spymaster of the CIA being called to the issues in Slovenia where he spend his early years and he had fond memories of it. Slovenia was overrun by the Russians and it was a power-knot of Russian forces, the FSB and the GRU. Central in the story was a fort or castle where they were housed at. The spymaster was played by Brian Cox (the true love of Helen Mirren, R.E.D.) and his student and main protagonist Ryan Gosling (aka Barbie’s Ken). The story is that taking out the heads of the FSB and GRU will throw the entire setting in turmoil and there they have an edge. A electrician and sympathiser found a door leading to a secret exit. He closed the door and sealed the door claiming it has dangerous toxic fumes. The door doesn’t lead to anything as such it was accepted. And he leads the people through the secret exit into the castle. We see him rewire lights and rewire options and the exit leads to a small room with two connecting rooms. They smuggle in hardware, they smuggle in equipment and they are ready. They have to wait three days until that sumit starts and several Russian bigwigs are in attendance.  In the meantime Brian and Ryan are around town confirming what they can and as the buildup of Russian forces are visible they seem to be on the wining side. In the meantime the Slovenian resistance has their head people in the room as well, they all want a claim towards striking such a blow to Russia. It is whilst driving Brian notices something, He grabs a baby monitor (CIA edition) and quickly states “It’s a trap, get out, get out now”, they sit in the car surrounded by Russian trucks being as small a shadow as possible. He states to Ryan “How many Russian soldiers do you know reading the bible whilst on watch?” The electrician was FSB, this was a play from the beginning to capture the Slovenian resistance. And yes, the door opens and Russian forces come pouring in. They had set up some traps with Ammonia and bleach (creating Chlorine gas) but the two dozen soldiers are all wearing masks. The resistance is all captured. Ryan has an idea to get back in and complete the mission, but he has a trump card. He studied the plans and that room links to another place. That is where he placed some boobytrapped weapons and he gets there by stealth killing the Russian soldiers and placing MRUD’s (Slovenian claymore) on the stairwell. He then goes to the place he knew about and uses some clustered RPG on the dignitaries stand who were there to watch the resistance leaders die. He escapes as quickly as possible and we do never know how the resistance people fared. He hopes that the confusion gave them an escape option. He then aids Brian as he was suckered into this deal by finding a former CIA executive, who was a Russian double all along. 

Brian walks away from his friends corpse stating “Sometimes you bite the bear, when you do make sure you bite hard” and Ryan follows him. 

One night, optional watching two movies for free. Well, they don’t exist yet, so that is my creative mind on a binge in dreamland.

Have a great Friday, only 3 days until Monday.

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May 12, 2023 · 00:17

Spend, spend, spend

Yes, that can be seen as spending three times over. We are of course referring to the debilitating debt the US has and now it is about to cost them a lot, in the larger stage this has had my attention for some time, but today three articles brought it to the top (yet again). The first one comes from the CBC (at https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/debt-ceiling-us-scrap-1.6836090) where we see ‘The U.S. debt limit is again stoking fears across the globe. Why not just scrap the thing?’ There are of course several answers to that part, but it is ““I don’t think there’s any reason to have it exist anymore,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former director of the Congressional Budget Office, who is the current president of the right-wing think-tank American Action Forum.” I think that Douglas has been sniffing the alternative Gatorade. You see, if there was no reason to have credit limits, I would take out a $50M loan with my IP as collateral and move to Dubai. Have a nice one floor apartment and live of the rest with $300K a month at my disposal until the day I die. The reality is that we all have credit limits and most of us have a credit limit that is in the basement. As such nations and governments have limits as well. It is the idea that Americans think they do not have one, but that is a false assumption. It might have had a delusional ring of truth when they were a super power and when they had all the innovations, but they first off shored the knowledge they had because the board of directors had more bonus options, but they are now either retired or mostly dead. Now India has that power, now Saudi Arabia is the innovative player and now China is about to become the one true superpower. All negative things for the US, but this is what they wanted and they shunned Saudi Arabia too often and now they lose them as an ally as well. The one player that really has all the cash is shunned. Well done America! In the mean time spending went on and it was catered to by people who have close to no ash in the first place. Now the Fortune 100 have less American companies and several of them have a spin on what they really own. The largest players who really have things are Google, IBM, Amazon and Adobe. The rest are wannabe collapsing entities. There is Netflix, but they will be in turmoil for at least a year and there is no way to tell how they are pulling through. Facebook is under the gun and they are about to lose another segment, in the meantime Meta is nowhere near ready. 

So off to article two, this is Reuters (at https://www.reuters.com/markets/us-debt-standoff-overshadows-g7-finance-leaders-meeting-2023-05-11/) giving us ‘US debt standoff overshadows G7 finance leaders’ meeting’, which could be true. You see, Japan is in deep waters, optionally too deep, but that requires financial knowledge I do not have, what I think is the case, is that they are too deep in debt and when the US goes, so does Japan. The 7 nations are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. Italy and France are already in deep waters, in part of the overspending my Mario Draghi, in part of a slowing economy. The UK has its own set of troubles which basically leaves Canada and they cannot hold the fort by themselves but that is the group that is in some kind of meeting and the conversation to raise the debt ceiling is a farce, they all know that the US is fighting of shadows of their former selves all alone, all because no one was willing to do something about overspending and they are decades too late in overhauling their tax systems. All these small issues line up to a setting where there is soon an America defaulting on ALL their loans, bonds collapse and that also pushes Japan over the edge. The Reuters article also gives us “U.S.-China tensions also cloud the outlook for the global economy that is already under pressure from signs of weakness in the world’s second-largest economy China.” This is a stage that I find debatable, from my point of view (optionally not a correct one), the Chinese economy is already surpassing America and now that they have the stage for the Middle East with larger venues into Saudi Arabia, they surpass America. The fact that Saudi Oil can now be bought with Yuan is the one push America never needed and never really could handle. With Saudi Arabia about to launch their own version (in English) of Al Jazeera will mean that advertisers have an alternative to Fox and CNN and when that channel branches out to Indonesia, Egypt, Bangladesh and India, the numbers will vastly surpass 500,000,000 viewers. In this I didn’t even consider Pakistan at present. As such where do you think Advertiser will go? America pushed the wrong buttons for years and now their birds are roosting in other nests. The third is also Reuters (at https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/yellen-warns-us-default-would-threaten-global-economy-undermine-us-leadership-2023-05-11/) giving us ‘Yellen warns US default would threaten global economy, undermine its leadership’ where we see “U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Thursday urged Congress to raise the $31.4 trillion federal debt limit and avert an unprecedented default that would trigger a global economic downturn and risk undermining U.S. global economic leadership” in this I personally believe that the US hasn’t been a real economic leader for some time. It started just before the age of Trump as the US learned that they could no longer afford the things they were doing and now these accounts are all coming up empty all at the same time. So at the end we are given “Yellen said Republican brinkmanship on the issue amounted to a “crisis of our own making” and that just the threat of a default could lead to a downgrade of the U.S. government’s credit rating, as occurred during a debt ceiling fight in 2011.” I personally feel that this is totally bogus, the issue was overspending and both sides of the isle were doing that and both sides were doing that. In addition they alienated the one player who was loaded, the rich relative was made a pariah and that didn’t sit well with that relative. This is why I approached them with my IP. I feel better when someone with the cash pays for my IP than the fakers who have a maximised credit card, implying I would be without cash for too long whilst they walk away with my multi billion dollar IP. I will not allow Microsoft anywhere near it, as such I would have no issues selling it to Tencent Technologies (with a few attached clauses mind you). And I have reason. A clear solution that could have given Google and/or Amazon billions was shunned by them giving me the excuse to go wherever I needed to go to get my golden retirement. And they connect. You see, they are all about contracting economies, all whilst innovation will go where there was no one and in my case in several cases there was no one, only in one case there was someone (Gucci), but they are only on one side of one IP I had and I had several other venues connected to it, optionally to android phones as well. And you see that same issue here. We see ‘raise the debt ceiling’ whilst 4 presidents did not stop overspending, it was not an issue and now as they lose tens of billions in industries that are all headed for China, they are all up in arms with “Yellen wants G7 debate on restricting investment to China”, just like the Huawei issue and we never were EVER given any evidence regarding Huawei. That is the effect of a bully who lost whatever innovation they had to players who were truly innovative and now they are running out of time, they are running out of fairway and they have nothing left. Two elemental parts were ignored for too long the first was overhauling their tax system, the second was overspending and in 2011 the point of no return was reached, both Democrats and Republicans worked together in making that happen and China merely waited for it to collapse and that is now about to happen. Will there be another raise? I cannot tell, but this is not enough, after this one another one will come and that is how this game is being played, almost like bluffing in Omaha poker, the issue is that bluffing is too dangerous and can often fall flat, for someone to think that they can bluff for this long is a new level of delusion. 

No matter what, we are about to find out how much longer the US can play that game and they returns to the stage of tax the rich, another delusional setting, which by the way works out well for Monaco, the Bahamas and Dubai to name but three where the retiring rich could go to actually enjoy their cash. 

Enjoy your day unless you have a PacWest Bank account, at that point you are decently screwed at present.

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May 11, 2023 · 00:38

The bigger shift

The news that caught me today is (at https://dohanews.co/saudi-arabia-mulls-launch-of-english-news-channel-to-rival-al-jazeera-reports/) giving us ‘Saudi Arabia mulls launch of English news channel to rival Al Jazeera’. I actually originally got it from the Financial Times, but they are behind a paywall, so I cannot use them as a source. So Saudi Arabia is now considering an English News Channel. This changes things. First E-Sports, now sports (Messi And Ronaldo), Formula one and now we get “A Saudi state-backed media organisation is considering the development of an international English-language news station, seen as an effort to counter Qatar’s flagship Al Jazeera network and boost the kingdom’s media influence”. I personally think that there is another reason. You see, if tourism develops in Saudi Arabia, the need for an English Channel rises and it’s need will rise exponentially. It also allows to dig into advertisement funds that have been denied them for decades. You see, the advertiser goes to where the people and the money is. The money is already in Saudi Arabia, but soon so will be the people. The stages of sports will allow Saudi Arabia exclusive news channelling and that leads to more revenue and more visibility. Even as we are given “The Saudi Research and Media Group reportedly approached media consultancies to assess the viability and scope of the endeavour, according to a number of people familiar with the project, the Financial Times reported. They said it will be the second-largest English-language broadcaster in the Arab world, after Al Jazeera English, although the preparations are still in the early stages.” And this is not all, there is another reason. As western media ‘embraced’ their Share holder, stake holder and advertiser approach to filtering information. They lost credibility and the audience. Most places no longer call it news, they refer to it as information entertainment (Fox anyone?) In addition to this, the west would finally get real information on Aramco (not filtered by Brent), on SAMI (not filtered by the pentagon) and sports. It would even propel interest into things like Camel racing, the Emirates Ice Hockey League and from that we could see the development of a Saudi Ice Hockey league. We know that they are still not a member of the International Ice Hockey Federation, but to see Saudi Arabia grow teams in Jeddah, Dammam and Riyadh, taking on the UAE teams from the Emirates Hockey League (EHL). We could see names like Abu Dhabi Scorpions, Abu Dhabi Storms, Al Ain Theebs, Dubai White Bears, Dubai Mighty Camels propel all over the western TV stations. 

If the west is embracing sports Saudi Arabia has the making to replace a whole collection of news channels that lost too much credibility. And it isn’t merely influence. As I personally see it the KSA lacks perception and awareness in the view of the non Arabian people and this could be a first step to open that door. Beyond that there are several markets where the KSA could set foot into and in this world in this current economic climate that will go a long way, what is important that the first steps are made setting the larger stage towards doing something and that is where it is at. Will it happen? This happening is a logical step after setting claims towards E-sports, Formula 1, Football and Ice hockey. Beyond that is the stage where the people will get first looks on the Line (that long building) and several other innovations coming towards us from Saudi Arabia. 

A bigger shift is underway and the US with their deceptive ‘entertainment’ like Fox and even CNN, they will have nothing to counter it. In the last 5 years they wasted too much credibility opening the door to other players and as I see it the KSA stands to add an audience of close to half a billion in the first 2 years, would you like to see the advertisement money on that pool? 

Enjoy the day before Friday.

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