We all face it and we all fear it, adore it or hate it. We are being valued almost every day of our lives and it does not sit well with a hole range of people. They hate being under valued, they hate being overvalued and some merely hate being valued at all. It is the cost of doing business in todays world. The larger station became fearful when Cambridge analytics showed us how we were valued in business, in marketing and in the stride of our daily lives. That and the stage of Neom drove me 2-3 year ago to create the 5G solutions I have now, to give power back to the individual. Yet until last week via the BBC I had no idea that lies and misinformation is valued too and it is valued a lot higher than the average Joe in any nation. The BBC (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-62444302) gave us ‘Alex Jones must pay $49.3m for Sandy Hook hoax claim’, I initially ignored it, the case is a waste of my time. The man is a clown and clowns merely bring entertainment to any place, or so I thought. This article has one line that makes reading this article worth it. It is “an economist hired by the parents testified that Jones, his media brand Infowars and parent company Free Speech Systems are worth up to $270m.” Lies and misinformation valued at over a quarter of a billion dollars. It hit me straight on the jaw. You see it does no matter WHO values it, we live in a world where misinformation is valued that much it might be for flames and mere digital clicks, and it stings. I created 3 bundles of IP, I feel that one I have sold it, or at least the first part I will value higher, but the fact that misinformation is valued that high should hurt most people. Now we can go all high morale against or for this case, but the truth is that US conspiracy theorist Alex Jones found a niche market and he created (according to some economists) a net worth of $270,000,000 through opposing honesty and railing the needs off certain groups. And no one is looking deeper into this, or so it seems. And as we are given “Jones’ business had earned about $800,000 in a single day selling diet supplements, gun paraphernalia and survivalist equipment” something just hit me. You see, no matter how you see this, and $800K sounds nice, but that is not enough to create a $270M business, there is more at play here, so what is it and who are the players of Infowars? To create this net worth in 23 years is pretty impressive and that is done by conspiracy theorists even more so. This is not about the stupid and gullible, these people always exist and they are not so rich, to create this kind of wealth requires an engine, more than Alex Jones, more than what we see and the media is not all over this? Interesting is it not? Something is fuelling this business and the valuation sets the need of deeper investigation. But where to start? You see when they are this rich there are wealthy and well motivated accountants in place to make sure it does not see the light, like the UK and their ELP’s. The question is where to start. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein found out parts of this due to the ability to follow the money, but when the money is Bitcoin, global and hidden in offshore accounts, that path is pretty much a no-no. So what paths would work? It is a serious question, I have absolutely no idea (at present).
The spark of start
There is a building, it is one of the few that ca be seen from space and it is new. In this year 2029 it is 90% finished. Yet there is not a soul in the building, not one you might want to see. The building is overrun with Cobra’s, millions of them. The aggressive invasive species came, overran and took control. At some point people came, they started to clean out the snakes, but for every one killed, 5 took its place, it was an uneven battle and the people lost. It is now known as the building of a million serpents. But there is still something odd about the building. If a person was a ghost and looked at the place, they would see that the snakes all started at an empty space in the sky, or it only seemed empty. If we could stare into the void of darkness, no wait. We do not need to, dawn approaches. And it was no more than an hour later that the sun came up. Even as the glass panels minimised the sun, it was not all done and now high in the air we see a rope with a basket. In it was the star of 10,000 eyes. A relic much older than the building, and many centuries older than any building nearby.
It was a dodecicosacron if a person had a name for it. The object was peculiar to say the least. You see it was near perfect black, but the moment it was held by anyone, the object showed its eyes, thousands of it and they all stared at you and something else happened. It drew in every cobra for miles around. It was a cursed object to say the least and the person who found it was not granted a long life, because the eyes held you and soon there after the cobra’s would hold that person.
The object was so old that it defied description. To cut it short, it was non-human object. It was a tool ordained by Jibreel. When he was sent to do the bidding of the one, he went and did what was required. Yet the hunt was almost uneven, for he was sent to fight the king of Marid and this Marid had taken the shape of a cobra. It was huge and after the initial fight which was decades long, Jibreel knew that this fight would go on forever, so he thought his way into a pause and reconsidered. He created from a star the dodecicosacron and it was of such glass that the eyes of Marid would be captured by it and he would be swallowed by the object. And after the next fight which laster 60 years he threw the dodecicosacron between them both. The Jibreel paused for he had never seen such a magnificent shiny object before and that was the trap, as he saw the object his sight went into the dodecicosacron, and it took days before he realised that he was now within the dodecicosacron. And Jibreel took the dodecicosacron and buried it deep in a pit with black water, thick and non-reflective. The dodecicosacron sank to the bottom to never been seen again, or was it?
It was 2025 when a simple man was working the Shaybah fields. He was doing his normal work and he would be working on a new project the next day, a building huge and magnificent. He would be working on pipes for water and he was grateful, because the smell of oil would be gone from his nose for a long time to come. He never minded the smell, it gave him a decent amount of money, it allowed him to get a nice house where his wife looked over his two children, life was good. It was then that he heard a weird rattle, it came from the pipe and stopped at a fall pipe. He opened the valve and a blob fell through the first valve, he then closed the first valve and opened the second one. The blob fell as well as a decent amount of oil. The sand slowly took the oil and he was left with some blob. He pushed blob with a stick, it was more profound now, like some star object with many points. He put a big rag around the star and started to carry it to the shed to report what he had found when he saw a Cobra. It was coming for him. This was odd, Cobra’s stayed away, the smell drove them off, not this one, so he ran to a jeep. His boss was already at that new building, so he drove off. He was unsure, but he felt lie there was more than one Cobra. So he drove off fast towards the building. He arrived at the building, when he heard that his boss was on the roof, to inspect a dozen water pumps. He went up with one of the elevators. When he was on the roof, he saw people in the far distant, perhaps half a mile away. He saw a rope and used it to tie the rag to the star, the rag was now pitch black from the oil. He walked as fast as he could towards the group of men. He noticed his boss and nodded to his boss. The boss looked surprised. “Abbas?” He looked perplexed. You are not coming until tomorrow. Abbas nodded and started to explain the events. His boss looked perplexed and saw the black rag tied with rope. The walked towards the middle where the roof was not yet complete. And as they were talking Abbas suddenly noticed a Cobra, it was coming towards them, he shouted at his boss and pointed at the cobra, they both walked away towards the opening, but the Cobra followed. And Abbas who tried to run away slipped on something and he stumbled into the hole, holding at a ledge with all his might. The rope slipped through his fingers and got stuck on a beam below him, he tried to climb out, but the Cobra was there and it bit him, he let go instinctively and fell down, he fell for seconds and was killed immediately, there was no surviving that height and the rag with the rope was high in the air. It was still covered in oil, but it was now out in the open and every Cobra for many miles around heard the star and they all came. Within days the building was overrun and the most deadly of places in the Kingdom. And no matter how deadly the building was now, it was nothing compared to what the building was holding now. Marid was back among men, Marid was soon to be free.
Filed under Stories
Monopoly
My introduction, like many of my generation came at an early age. I was 8 or 9 when the first setting of law was introduced. It was the game of monopoly. I still have a few versions. I still have the first version (a replica). It was a wooden box with coins, the rest was pretty much the same. The coins were a nice touch. A game has rules and we have to adhere to these rules. It was then that we learned to play by the spirit of the law. The letter of the law was something I learned much later and it was even later when I was introduced to black letter law. My generation went through similar steps, some more, some less, but the generic stage was in play.
And today I got my introduction to ‘Banned Russian oligarchs exploited UK secrecy loophole’ (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62410715), so the title gives us the first setting, not a loophole but a legally allowed setting, and with that we get to “Ministers have acknowledged concerns that these companies, known as English Limited Partnerships (ELPs), have also been abused by criminals” as well as “In 2016 and 2017, the government introduced measures that forced almost all UK companies to identify their real owners. ELPs were not covered by these new transparency laws” yet no one (including the press) seems to ask why the ELP’s were left uncovered by identity stages? This is not merely a loophole, this is what I would call a backdoor. The UK (optionally government) needed a stage where owners could remain hidden for whatever reason was in play and others have the same rights as anyone else and these others (criminals and tycoons) used the law to avoid detection. And as we get “more than 4,500 of them have been set up” we see the larger station, you see this has been going on since 2017, did you think that whomever requires avoidance of detection will not use them? There is a reason why some accountancy firms charge so much, they know the law, they know all laws and that is in play. And I will go one step further when we see “According to Graham Barrow, an expert in financial crime, they are also “vulnerable to misuse” because of how little information about their activity they are required to make public” that is exactly why the backdoor exists. For some to avoid certain matters. I feel decently certain that they were not meant for criminals, but the law is funny, it will parade on the just and unjust alike. So when we are given “Our data shows the number of new ELPs being set up has gone up by 53% since 2017” I am actually not surprised. The rules of the game are clear and anonymity is coveted by the lawful and unlawful alike and now we have a situation. So whilst the BBC is trying to stage the wow factor with “Just five companies, known as formation agencies, have been responsible for 1,500 ELPs, with hundreds listed at registered addresses including one above a burrito bar in central London” I would like to remind them that MI-5 was build on a sewer. So instead of the burrito bar, they could have stated above a burrito bar in Soho, a different setting, not? And the empty statement “FBI agents investigating the Boston marathon bombing probed an ELP registered at an address currently home to a barber shop in Bristol”, so what was the result? Why was that ELP probed? What was the stage of that barbershop? And in that setting when we see “We have established that among those to take advantage of the secrecy of ELPs are members of President Putin’s inner circle.” So? It is a legally allowed setting, that is what the BBC is trying to make muddy. A legal setting is staged and no one sees anything of the politicians that ‘overlooked’ that part of the stage, why is that? And when we are given “there is no requirement to disclose who was behind Sinara, which was dissolved in 2019” we see no listing of illegal activities, merely “facilitated purchases for the Rotenbergs”, so was anything illegal purchased? We do not get any of that, it is a mere sample of BS journalism that we normally get from a Murdoch publication. And it sounds nice that we get Labour MP Dame Margaret Hodge, who chairs a parliamentary group on tax and corruption making statements regarding ‘scandalous’, but what politicians allowed for that, who raised their voices when the ELP’s were left outside the identity stations? Transparency requires ALL to be revealed, not all minus ONE. But that part of the equation is quickly brushed over by the BBC, why is that? So when we are given “In an emailed update to clients dated 18 May 2017, under the heading “Alternative Solutions”, LAS proposed ELPs as, “a way out and as a substitute for Scottish Partnerships”.” We see a simple setting, a firm updating their clients on what is legally allowed, but that part is not really given, is it. It is a setting of emotions, flaming stages but the people behind the overlook are ignored, left in the dark, why is that? And the one gem in the article is seen with “The government says it does not have any evidence of significant misuse of ELPs. A government spokesperson said: “The UK already has some of the strongest controls in the world to combat money laundering, and it’s vital that we continue to upgrade our governance to crack down on criminals abusing UK corporate entities” it is the stage of ‘significant misuse’, what makes it significant? The fact that the bulk of these ELP’s were created by 5 firms was a much larger station and could have been dealt with years ago, now it becomes a millstone around someones neck there is ‘sudden’ visibility. Yet in the time 2017-2020, who gave light to this? Who acted to stop it? These are questions that I do not see answered, why not?
In this there was a lovely simplicity to monopoly in my youth, perhaps for this day and age it is too simple. Perhaps we need a new version of Hotels, but in Hotels 2 we get to choose options like accountants, corrupt local government and a few other items, or will that make the game a little too realistic for the young? I will let you consider that, I am going back to brooding on new IP towards non repudiation, I reckon that new building in the KSA (the Line) might have need of some IP soon enough.
You thought it stung the first time?
Yes there is an interesting development. The BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-62372964) gives us ‘Judge rules Visa can be sued in abuse claim’, and interesting setting to be sure. But why is it interesting?
The setting that is given is “Serena Fleites was 13 in 2014 when, it is alleged, a boyfriend pressured her into making an explicit video which he posted to Pornhub. Ms Fleites alleges that Visa, by processing revenue from ads, conspired with Pornhub’s parent firm MindGeek to make money from videos of her abuse. Visa had sought to be removed from the case.” And it is no surprise that VISA tried to be removed from the case. They failed and now we have an interesting situation. This case gives a much larger stage. And even as we see “posted to Pornhub without her knowledge or consent, had 400,000 views by the time she discovered it”, we also get “the video was downloaded by users and re-uploaded several times, with one of the re-uploads viewed 2.7 million times” and with “While MindGeek profited from the child porn featuring Plaintiff, Plaintiff was intermittently homeless or living in her car, addicted to heroin, depressed and suicidal, and without the support of her family” even as we see the legal talk start, we see several parties hide behind “When the court can actually consider the facts, we are confident the plaintiff’s claims will be dismissed for lack of merit”. In this, I personally see that tools of exploitation have a very nasty way of biting back and that seems to be the case now. So when we are given “the Court can infer a strong possibility that Visa’s network was involved in at least some advertisement transactions relating directly to Plaintiff’s videos” and with “Visa argued that the “allegation that Visa recognised MindGeek as an authorised merchant and processed payment to its websites does not suggest that Visa agreed to participate in sex trafficking of any kind”.” Yes, they can argue all the way to that highway that goes to the city with the 666 designation. But here we see the direct application of ease versus due diligence and now it becomes a new ball of wax. Even as we see “Visa is not alleged to have simply created an incentive to commit a crime, it is alleged to have knowingly provided the tool used to complete a crime” it is a new stage, if this holds up, the amount of cases against credit organisations and fintech companies will explode in very serious ways. There is consideration that if some school shooter used his credit card to buy the gun used, there will be serious repercussions for the credit card firm used. Even as we are given “The company also said that any insinuation that it does not take the elimination of illegal material seriously is “categorically false”” I have an issue here and it is seen with “the video was downloaded by users and re-uploaded several times, with one of the re-uploads viewed 2.7 million times” as well as “A few weeks later it was removed” gives doubt to their statement. A file 2.7 million times is noticed, when it surpasses a million it is noticed, still it took a few weeks for it to be removed. Too many parties might (allegedly) have had the thought that this would blow over, it didn’t. Basically it exploded in everyones faces and now the credit card companies will have to do their due diligence on hundreds of thousands of customers who will now need checking. A stage decades overdue. Now that there is a court case, the fintech firms need to get worried and scared, because Serena Fleites has now opened a door and it is not merely VISA who will be in the hot seat and when this crosses borders into the EU there will be a whole new mess going the way of fintech. Places like Mindgeek might have moved to Luxembourg for tax brakes (speculation), but with this case Mindgeek could end up opening itself for a whole range of other issues. VISA will not take this lying down and a $460 million firm will be gotten at (whether successful or not). So this is not over, not by a long shot. I wonder what will happen next, time for a nice cuppa Joe. I might have a vanilla twist on the side. My reasoning will make sense down the road, I guarantee you that part.
Lets talk about corruption
It is a hard stage, but it is time to ask the difficult question “Is the BBC too corrupt?” It is not a question you saw coming. It is not one we would consider, but the stage is set. We need to ask the question because too much has happened. And today with ‘What could Saudi Arabia and UAE do to help lower oil prices?’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/business-62352272) I am asking that question. After the issues with Jimmy Saville and Martin Bashir we now see increased oil misrepresentations. You see, the question seems fair, but what I do not see is that Brent Crude oil prices are set to the fact that the US exports about 8.63 million barrels per day and they net imported 6.11 million barrels, so why import when you also export? For the price and we see none of that. They want cheap oil from Saudi Arabia, the UAE and any other OPEC source, so that they can sell at a profit, but we see none of that. We are merely given “Saudi Arabia is the biggest single producer in the cartel and after meeting with Saudi crown prince, Mohammed Bin Salman, President Biden said he expects supply to increase. However, Saudi officials have also stressed any decision to increase supplies would be done in consultation with Opec+.” It is my opinion that until the US and EU show firmly to be allies of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that OPEC+ does NOTHING! We need to become less dependent on oil, and the only option is to reduce its need. Not by Matt McGrath and his stupid airline articles, but by setting a clear boundary of what oil can be used for. In the US transportation requires 67.2% of all the oil available. How about setting markers to reduce that to 65% in the next 3 years? How about reducing these BS flights? On November 13th 2021 in the article ‘A COP26 truth’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2021/11/13/a-cop26-truth/) I wrote “over the last 15 years 15,000,000 additional flights were added. That amounts to 41,000 flights a day, every single day. So how much CO2 do these flights create? More people and more flights, not the flights from the uber rich, no normal airline flights. I am willing to take a bet that at least 25% of those flights are useless and could be scrapped.” So people like Taylor Swift were not the polluters, and jokes like Matt McGrath (BBC) who go on about the rich jet owners. How much pollution are they making? How much pollution do these EXTRA 41,000 flights each day create? There is your oil savings, right there. One source (AFR) gave us in 2018 “the flights have been departing only 78.1 per cent full, on average, since the route was launched – meaning dozens of empty seats.” One destination, one liner. So how many more liners are too empty? Prestige at the expense of the environment, but the BBC will not give us that, will they?
As I see it, the KSA must do what is best for the KSA and its citizens and as I see it. When you can sell strawberries by taking your time with each portion gives the farmer more to work with. You see oil is a finite commodity and when it is gone, it is gone forever but we seem to forget that, do we not? The media keeps on giving us the Middle East story about infinite oil reserves, but that is not the case and the US is passed over in all that reporting. The media oil reports give us none of the Brent Crude oil parts, are they? So when I saw the Line and the KSA options to set itself apart, I saw a station for at least three of my IP to flourish, and if they see that too the KSA will get it. I would have preferred it to go to Amazon or Google, but they weren’t biting and that is before some realise that there is still a treasure trove of 50 million streaming users around. And when the oil falls down then so does electricity (unless they make a deal with Elon Musk). Elon was the clever one, with the seats of power changing, space becomes a much more interesting commodity. Yet the foundation is that the media (including the BBC) have watered down the events of attacks by Houthi terrorists on Saudi civilian targets for too long, the US did pretty much the same thing and keeps on shouting Khashoggi (the columnist no one really cares about). In that environment why should the KSA do anything? It seems that oil will sell no matter what and at this point at a much higher price. For two years the KSA gave light to project Neom, the media shunned it. Why?
There is only so much BS we can stand for and there comes a time when people ask “How corrupt is the media?” And in light of the events I just showed you, I name my bewilderment by its name, a specific name. I wonder how corrupt the BBC has become. You need not believe me, but watch what is reported and I gave you 5 topics in this article. And when you realise that the BBC started the settings that would be the death of Princes Diana, princes of Wales, you need to get angry. The media is very set on reporting on the death dealer of Princes Diana (Martin Bashir) all whilst we see speculation after speculation on others and a remarkable avoidance of fact checking. I will admit that the BBC is still better than most, but in the Houthi settings they let too much go and this time around they need help from the victim of Houthi attack. So how do you think that will end?
It is merely the setting of a stage, but I will let you look at all the elements of that stage. I gave the evidence (as I personally see it) in my articles often enough.
Two sides of tinseltown
Tinseltown has many sides. Today and yesterday I was confronted with two of them. The first is the sad one.
Yesterday the legendary Nichelle Nichols has left us at the age of 89. Legendary as Nyota Uhura in the original Star Trek series and 6 movies. Now, people leave us all the time. This stands out that no matter where I looked Sweden, the Netherlands, the UK, America, Australia, Canada, you name it they have it in the news, and no negativity anywhere. Twitter flowed over with messages of sorrow, love and in some cases heartbreak. Actors, producers, directors from all walks of life and cinema. It was overwhelming the impact she has had on people. She had it on me as well, but I always saw myself as a nerdy sci-fi outcast. She touched the hearts of millions and they are all speaking out words of hope, words of sorrow, words of love and words of admiration. To be honest, I have not seen such a positive wave ever before, that realisation gives us that even as she leaves us, she leaves us with a gift. We are all connected to one another through the actions of Nyota Uhura. That is not a bad legacy to have, not at all. We salute you Nichelle, and perhaps we will all say hello again on the other side when we get there. Until then be with the stars until we meet again.
The other side
The other side is one that is another side of the media. The one I do not like that much, but in this case it is the Dutch NOS who (at https://nos.nl/l/2439005) claims that Taylor Swift is the biggest famous polluter. Is that so? Well it is according to a British Marketing firm. Can we have the name of those wankers please? You see, we might howl at some, but these wanking idiots (as I personally see them) are debatable in their view. “Between January and July, the singer’s plane took off 170 times, which amounts to 15.9 full days of flying. The emissions of the device thus amounted to about 8,000 tons of CO2, more than a thousand times the emissions of an average citizen per year.” So how exactly was that calculated?
You see Dassault Aviation (the people behind the Falcon 7X) give us “Falcons have fuel consumption levels that are 30 to 50% lower than competing aircraft and the lowest CO2 emissions in the market.” Then we see the stage “Between January and July, the singer’s plane took off 170 times, which amounts to 15.9 full days of flying”, so can we see the list of these 170 times? Dates, hours flown you get it, the list will give us more and I believe that a marketing firm has certain needs, needs to hide other stuff, or illuminate other stuff and usually illumination comes with exaggerated inaccuracies. So were all the flights set to the planes actual numbers? And the idea that Floyd Mayweather and Jay-Z are the numbers two and three might be right, might not be. You see, we are given “According to them, Swift regularly lends the aircraft and is therefore not personally responsible for all 170 flight movements and the associated emissions.” This might be true, but that is not the case. These people are forced into different modes of transportation because the fucking media wont give them a break, harassing these people EVERY moment they can for the digital clicks (one of a few reasons). It angers me as we seem to hold places like Celebrity Jets like gospel all whilst the data is never clearly vetted and I get the impression that the news is even worse. So whilst Taylor Swift has one plane, Donald Trump has the Trump Force One which is a Boeing 757, and he never made the list? I reckon that the Boeing 757 gives off a lot more pollution than the Falcon 7x. And the quick reference towards the British department of Transport? Do they keep lists of all the planes? Is Trump Force One there too? All questions that come to mind and all questions that have impact. How do you hold Taylor Swift accountable whilst you do nothing on the harassing media 24:7. As I see it, she might not have a choice and whilst we are at it. When we consider Rolling Stone magazine, was that vetted? If so what dit Taylor Swift actually use? All questions no answered. It makes me wonder what that marketing whatever was doing? This was about something else. Just like Matt McGrath (BBC) and his plane issues, all whilst 50% of all pollution damage comes from 1% of the facilities. 147 in total and they still haven’t closely looked at that. They were very intent of ignoring that EEA report, why is that? So a little message for the media. Do your job properly or become an uber driver.
Have a coffee
Yes, I love my coffee and at times I pay $4 for a cup of coffee. So when the article (at https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/tim-hortons-app-1.6536175) hit my eyes, I was a little stunned. You see, we all have a price, but when I see ‘Tim Hortons proposes settlement in class-action suits over data-tracking app’ with the text “Proposed settlement would offer free coffee and doughnut to affected users” I pretty much pissed myself laughing. Are people buying that? You see, the issue is not merely “Tim Hortons says in court documents it would also permanently delete any geolocation information it may have collected between April 1, 2019 and Sept. 30, 2020, and direct third-party service providers to do the same.” I very much believe that this would happen. My issue is with the back ups and where they were stored. There is absolutely no guarantee that these have not been duplicated for certain other people, that means the data is out there. And I do believe that enough people realise this at present. You see the premise of “In a report released last month, privacy commissioners said people who downloaded the Tim Hortons app had their movements tracked and recorded every few minutes — even when the app was not open on their phones” requires intent. To assure the makers of “had their movements tracked and recorded every few minutes” events and captures had to be in place, redirecting the numbers they get and even more so when we see “even when the app was not open on their phones” As I personally see it, someone went out of their way to get data, the reason could be anything, but that essential step required certain additional steps and I reckon that the backup was set in motion seconds after it was made with the ‘illustrious’ statement “copy me, I want to travel!” As such there is no doubt in my mind that this is a realistic setting. The fact that I see no mention of backups anywhere, and that the commission might not have looked into that is also a little troubling. There is a larger stage in play and the avoidance of certain corners is not a good thing, but then I might merely be imagining things. That happens too.
But I have seen issues in Europe in the late 90’s and the avoidance of back-ups by some people makes me wonder if that same trick could be in play. It might merely be me. But all that data for a coffee and a Danish?
That might be the best deal any data collector ever has been offered. So do enjoy your coffee whilst Mister X investigates where exactly you might have been and if you were there alone. Because it is not merely you, it is all around you that matters as well, and even if one app did not capture that, another app could capture who was around you at the time one app registered you. That is the larger problem, it is not one, it is what else and that together with the Tim Horton app is the issue, but I am certain that as looked into as well.
Place with a view
That is the stage, we have a view, we all have a view and we tend to have a point of interest. This ‘mess’ all started a few hours ago when I saw a three day old article on the BBC with ‘The public relations and ad firms refusing fossil fuel clients’ (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62303026) in the first instance, it is fine to refuse work, it is not always clever, but I get it. We have all kinds of industries that we shun and it is fashionable to shun fossil fuel clients, but it seems a little hypocritical to do so. So when I see “Last year, she decided that Done! would become one of the now 350 advertising and PR firms who have joined a movement called Clean Creatives. Joining the movement means they pledge to refuse any future work for fossil fuel firms, or their trade associations.” I merely shrug it off. It is a little superficial and somewhat hypocrite to do so.
Why?
Until ALL employees of that firm travel with all means that use no fossil fuel, they still depend on it. Until they have an Elon Musk battery solution for the house heating, the equipment running, they rely on fossil fuels. So to shun fossil fuel firms is a little hypocrite as I personally see it.
The article also gives us “The United Nations (UN) recognises that the burning of fossil fuels – oil, natural gas and coal – “are by far the largest contributor to climate change”. It says that they account for “nearly 90% of all carbon dioxide emissions”.” That is nice, but the facts are ignored, the MEDIA is doing everything to spin it into another direction. I discussed this in ‘Uniform Nameless Entitlement Perforation’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/12/10/uniform-nameless-entitlement-perforation/) There we see a report by the EEA (European Environment Agency) where the cover gives us that 1% of the plant are responsible for 50% of the damage, so what do people like Matt McGrath (according to some a journalist) state? “Global ‘elite’ will need to slash high-carbon lifestyles” Yea right. Fossil fuels are here to stay. If you wonder why, wonder why the US sells 73% of its oil and then sends President Biden with its hand up to the UAE and Saudi Arabia asking for more cheap oil. The article sounds nice, and it is nice that someone takes a step in any direction, but with staff shortages as they are they can make all the presumption they want. I wonder where those ideals stay when it becomes a dog eat dog situation again.
So when we see “The fossil fuel industry uses advertising agencies and PR agencies to make it harder for governments to hold them accountable. And ads are misleading and make companies seem more committed to climate action than they really are.” No one is asking when will the media give us the larger game where the US sells 73% of its oil, in that they become the foundation of shortage, but we do not really get to see that story, do we?
Reality
The reality is that we all realise that we need to change gears, we need other solutions and it is there that we see the larger problem. The EU with 147 facilities that the media avoids. The larger station that there are options and Elon Musk has several of them and in 2 years no one made a clear step towards instigating changes that allow for a different approach to the need of fossil fuel. Not today, not yesterday, not last week. The foundation of options has been out and about for 2 years. Governments all over the world have shunned these solutions, as such the story of some PR firms shunning certain players reads like a joke. Governments are at the centre of inactions, but we do not get to see that part, do we? And all this BS of making the fossil fuel companies the bad player is partly a joke. Yes, they are not innocent, yet the world needs oil, that is clear as day and until the people leave their cars at home they can bloody well shut up.
So when we see the end of the article “A lot of agencies will come to the point where they have to make the decision if they want to be able to recruit the brightest,” says Ms Townsend. “The young ones don’t want to work with oil and gas [clients].” Yes, that sounds nice and it is good to have ethical boundaries, but lets be clear. The government, the media are all in favour or misrepresenting certain parts, why are they not illuminating that side? Or are we putting fossil fuels quietly with the weapons and gambling branches? Because that has worked so well in the last decade. For me? I am in a different field, but if I can make good money in a branch and it is not illegal, ethical choices when I see the media and governments play catch and release with the truth and facts too shallow for words.
In the end, I have nothing against Marian Ventura or her point of view, she is entitled to one and she is sticking to her guns (as it seems). But to read this in the BBC whilst Matt McGrath goes on his ‘Global ‘elite’ will need to slash high-carbon lifestyles’ Don Quijote tour whilst the EEA gave us 1% of the facilities create 50% of the damage and he has not once, NOT ONCE taken a full page investigating that side of things, is just a little too hypocritical to my liking.
But it could just be me, you judge, the December 10th article I mentioned earlier has that report.
Yes there is a place, there are many places and they all have a view, but I have some serious issues with the view I am seeing.
Enjoy!
Networking for game makers
It seems weird, it even might appear dorky. Yet the setting is not to be underestimated. Now I have the advantage of age, so I was there when the very first games were new. One such moment in time was Dungeon Keeper (the very first one).
Peter Molyneux had both a slam dunk and a home run all at the same time, the world went nuts for the game and those who did still remember the game up to this day. So it was disappointing when EA trashed it in their own shortsighted ways. Now, I am not about to ‘reinvent’ the dungeon keeper game. It has been done and the original is the best. But the setting that we had where certain rooms call for certain characters, that idea has merit, it still has. Consider the Warhammer 40000 game called Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor – Martyr. They had the right approach, it is for all intent and purposes a new for of Diablo. It has its appeal, it has a few issues, but for the most it is an appealing game with a decent storyline. Now what would happen when we come across one of those giant cathedral ships? We dock and we get into the works. Now, I am very much against a game that is too alike. But the idea of being able to activate rooms, that will call for certain characters to join you has its appeal and the larger station is not getting it all up and running, but to fix things certain order must be found. So at times you will have the high need for engineers, but the next you need electricians, and the number or engineers get in the way. There are all kinds of settings we can go, for example an electrician will not appear unless there is at least one engineer, and so on. There is a stage where we need to set out what we need, what we can get and as the ship gets to be more and more fixed wealth and parts are yours, so you can upgrade your ship which will bring its own rewards and abilities. And as we map out the cathedral ship we will be able to find more, discover more and face more challenges and dangers. The nice part is that this game would have a small ship for the tutorial, get the introduction to other characters, but the larger foundation is that on a streamer, you can always add ships over time. A mere thought that took less than an hour. Yet do not despair, it will not be that easy and the art people will need to bring their A game to make it a true original. But I feel relieved, the idea that Peter Molyneux had will live on, it will entice more people and I feel that it is important to give credit (Like the Behemoth DSS Molyneux). There is a need for gamers to network, to exchange ideas and to keep the gaming community entertained. I played another Lego Star Wars, this one (the new game) is pretty fun, it has a lot of new parts in the game. It is a larger and true better game. It is a game that brings all the boys to the console (girls too). Perhaps in 10 years someone will come up with a new way to let Lego Games shine again. I do hope so because gaming for the mere fun does not happen enough. You see, I remember seeing the very first one 17 years ago. My first thought was “Cool, a game for kids” and I played in the store and it was fun to play. That was until someone from the shop tapped me on the shoulders asking if the other ‘kids’ could have a go. I looked puzzled, but then I realised I had been playing non stop for well over half an hour, I bought the game the next day. It was around easter 2005. Now 17 years later the game still entertains and that is a tough call. So even if we do not know how long this goes on, I do hope that someone in 2035 sees that game and gives it another spin. The old games can bring more joy than anyone remember, and when you see someone go on “Oh, that is so old. Why?” Stomp him (hard) and consider that some of these games only had 38Kb to work with, now we can do more but in gaming (with a f=ew exceptions) we achieve less. Why is that? A cool game does not guarantee a good game. A good game needs a decent story, it needs decent graphics (for its time) and it needs some level of challenge, yet we need to remember that no challenge is a challenge in itself. There is a reason I made the claim that I made yesterday (look it up if you are curious). Game makers are too often looking in the wrong direction, some for valid reasons, but the new ones are all following the wrong people. There is a reason I have what I have and I keep it cleverly locked away on a system nowhere near me, and for now the number of those interested would be increasing from 2 to 4. So what happens when someone figures out what I found out? Networking gets you there (well I personally hope not before I sold my IP) but networking in game makers has become too much like ‘Look how cool we are’ and not enough of discussing good ideas. The ECTS (London 90’s) was great. Talking to Richard Garriott and Peter Molyneux. They ACTUALLY shared good ideas, that time is now mostly gone, but it also means that the quality of gaming is harder to maintain. Until the end of the year we have Gods of War:Ragnarok, Gotham Knights and Hogwarts Legacy to look forward to. And after Horizon:Forbidden west that is slim pickings. Now there are more good games, not that many great games and that is a shame. Consider that HFW scored 4.6/5 at Amazon 9/10 at IGN and 5/5 at JB HiFi. Valhalla (Assassins Creed) scored a mere 8/10 at IGN and one critic gave it a mere 65%. One thing that stood out was “It’s a lot buggier than it should be but also impressive on multiple levels.” That is a multimillion project by a firm that is (overvalued) at multibillions and has a little over 20,000 people. They could not get close to a Dutch firm with only 360 people and they have nowhere near the resources Ubisoft had. That is the state of gaming and it is not getting better, but there is hope. The streamers could open more doors and make more gaming an option. And there is also the new player (Tencent) coming soon, so the streamers need to upgrade their gameplay by a fair bit. I still think that Amazon could take the larger lead with its Luna, but I reckon that they will lose ground if they go the way they presently (as fr as I can tell). They need their own games, they need to accept different settings and they might just pull ahead, I put enough gaming IP on my blog site for them to get active on, one I did today (see the beginning of this story). Whatever they do, they have less than 2 years. After that Tencent will be in play and it will not play nice. I wonder how US Congress reacts when Tencent gets over 4% of the US market, ban it like Huawei? We will see, there is time to watch it happen.
Filed under Gaming
Lawrence van Rijn - Law Lord to be 