I have been thinking of the simple time, the past, the adherence to simplicity that is within all of us. It is the time before the Romans (original Italians). It was the Greek setting of life. We worked for the glory of Zeus, Poseidon and Hades. I reckon I would work for the glory of Hades, not because the others were not worthy, it would be that Hades seemed more real than the others. We are all confronted with our mortality, as such we would move towards the realm for Hades and it would be up to him if I serve him in the afterlife, or if I was destined for another place. And I would not be alone, 5000-3000 years ago many would be like me. If it was the greens versus the blues, I reckon I would be a blue. But overall the setting would be similar. Now we move to recently (1941), if any non-German would openly side with Adolf Hitler, if anyone would opt to not vote actions against Adolf Hitler, the populous (populism) would find that person and string him up at the nearest tree. There are at times actions that are completely unacceptable and the Russians did that by cluster bombing CIVILIAN targets. And still they are malnourished, their equipment breaks down at the earliest notion and I see all levels of inactions. Just like Syria, just like Yemen and other places. Inaction for a reason that makes no sense. As such can anyone explain this list?
This is not right versus wrong, this is not communism versus the other side, this is acceptable versus unacceptable and the Russian actions have been unacceptable. People will state that I was in favour of Putin, I never stated this, I never was. Read the articles. I thought it was a stupid move to push politics into sports, sports and politics need to remain separated, it always does for all kinds of reasons, but in the first to stop sports to become the stepping stone for politics. I always oppose stupidity and the west has shown to adhere to greed over common sense (aka greed driven stupidity) too often. Consider the stage (as I see it), a nation (Ukraine) elects an entertainer (a clown) as the president of the Ukraine. We see the people laugh, giggle and I giggled too. I had nothing against the man, he was democratically elected and I am fine with that. In the time he put his positive marker on the Ukraine. I took little notice because the Ukraine is on the other side of the planet and I personally do not know too many people from there. I am familiar with Alexei Ponikarovsky (Maple Leafs), Dmytro Tolkunov (Ramparts) and a few others. But I know little of the Ukraine. Now as escalations have come to THEIR towns, I learn a lot more about the governments around me and their initial inactions and after that sending stuff (military and non military) all whilst civilian organisations take intelligence to a greater level (Trollrensics), all whilst the stage evolves we see their people take effort and the Dutch Nieuwsuur seemingly (according to what I have) cancelling what these people had to tell them. A person who translates, knows the places that are hit and the people that are there and the media turns away? That is what our sophistication brought, inactions towards what some call a tyrant. I am on the fence on that term, but there is an upside. Russia is 28 times the size of the Ukraine, there is more and I can list them, but I found a nice image that does it easier.
And that image should tell you something about karma too. When the military power in 21st place can hold back the military power in 2nd place for a week, what does that tell you about the spending of the second best and the impact it has had on its population for decades? Also there are voices that are telling me that the FSB is opposing this war, how wrong was acting against the Ukraine from the very first minute?
And whilst I stop myself from posturing, taking the comedian side, I can tell you that Bette Midler stated (tweeted) it the best.
Consider where you stand, consider who you allow to represent your voice, I really hope it is not one of the earlier names seen, because in that case you are in deep trouble, because no matter how this ends, there will be a reckoning, it is the populist approach and it is bout to be turned against those relying on the populist voice to advance their political strategies. What comes around really comes around this time around.
I had no real idea what happened when I initially wrote ‘Mr. S. King resigned’ on February 8th 2022 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2022/02/08/mr-s-king-resigned/), yet just now my mind created another episode. It plays in London no less. The main character is buying stuff at Fortnum and Mason. Tea, Jam, Marmalade and a few other knick knacks. He is shopping and looking at the isles of what is available and what he needs to fill up his kitchen, and just as he is grabbing a tin of shortbread an employee approaches him.
“Sir, you will have to leave”. The man looked puzzled, looks at his watch then looks at the employee. “Have I done something wrong?” The man answered. The man looks puzzled and the employee suddenly looks uncomfortable. “One of the ladies here stated that you harassed her”. The man looked perplexed. “I just walked in” pointing at the door behind him. Just a minute ago and he pointed at the security guard. He might have noticed as he pointed at the slender man wearing a security outfit. The employee waled over and talked softly to him, the security guard nodded. The employee walked back “I am so terribly sorry”, perhaps she pointed at the wrong man. “OK, the man said. So where do I find the tea strainers? The employee took the basket from the man. Please follow me, I will assist you personally. The man followed him, and soon they found all they needed to have. The man was guided to the cash register and he packed everything and charged him. Then he added another tin of cookies. “On the house, sir. I hope you do not feel offended”, the man did not yet suddenly there was this feeling, it made the hairs stand up in the back of his neck. He looked around but there was nothing to see. He left and slowly walked down Piccadilly towards Ellington Arch and his house. He was home not 10 minutes later. He was about to unpack the back when he noticed movement, he cautiously took the tin away when he saw them. Two small Ottoman vipers, their poison was rather deadly, but not to him. He raised his hand and focussed, the vipers turned to ash and he got an unusual jolt. He was used to life force feeding him, but this was a lot more and he looked at the ash again. It was over the jars, but as he blew the ash faded to smaller particles and faded from sight. The food and everything was sealed. Yet this puzzled him. He then saw the stones on his brass mirror change and he moved towards the mirror, two eyes glowing blue appeared. You are a lot stronger, not in natural ways. What happened? The man explained the events. It is not a natural thing, but you must explore what transgressed. He sat down and focussed on his visit to the shop. He focussed on the people and saw nothing specific. Then he saw a fly and focussed on the fly. Suddenly he saw more, he saw scents and also a spot of darkness, the fly stayed away from it, so he looked at it with normal eyes again. He noticed a young man, he also saw that the man observed him in fear, but he knew not why. Then the man walked away to another exit and the shop faded. He had seen the man, so he knew what to look for, but London is big, so he decided to spend time drinking tea in the Ritz ad the Gentlemen Baristas, keeping one eye and his third eye on the street. It did not take long. Saturday he saw the man, with on his arm an elderly lady, his nana he gathered. He looked and saw something perplexing, her aura was an overwhelming shade of jade, dark and powerful. The lady shivered, and said something to the man, she panicked and went the other way dragging the man with her. He saw the panic in her, but did not see the why she was afraid. The man looked around but apparently did not know where to look. They quickly left and now the ma followed from a safe distance. He was on the other side of the street and even as his normal eyes could not see them, his third eye could and that is how he slowly followed them, increasing the distance, slowly but surely and a minute later the lady seemingly calmed down. They went into an apartment on Dover street, he followed and got a little closer, but he did keep his distance. His third eye looked at the house. Nothing seemed weird, all normal, the man looked normal too, but the woman was still unearthly jade and with that he walked away.
Part X It was time to call the game and he walked into Fortnum and Mason again, this time around there were spiders all over the place, they seemed some form of Wolf spider, a little larger than anything he had ever seen, it was early there were two customers, both ladies scared out of their mind, the staff was equally scared and it made no sense to them. The man was safe, it was like there was a circle of protection around him. The spiders came towards him and the woman suddenly stated “den boreís na me écheis” and things started to make sense. The man raised his hands and drained the spiders and got jolt after jolt, pleasurable but weird. The spiders turned to ash and faded with every breeze that got into the shop. Suddenly more snakes arrived almost from her hands, but they too turned to ash and faded. The mans looked confused. “What is happening?” He looked at the man, the man suddenly saw the ring on her hand and asked “Did you get your nana anything from Greece?” He pointed at the emerald ring. “That! On Elounda. It was only €15, I paid €20” the man thought for a moment. “I need you to sell it to me, I will pay you £50”. The man nodded “OK”, the man took the ring from the ladies hand and gave a £50 bill to the man. The people around him (all 8) were still seeking cover from something that was no longer there. He looked at the ring and it made sense. His hands made gestures, first the sphere and the ring was cast in glass, then he made the gesture of an oval and a cylinder of pure light appeared and the sphere vanished. He then looked at the old lady, he saw the damage in her mind, the change of her life force and he slowly added what he received here, only part but he saw the healing, it would take time, but time is what she had. The lady became alert again. “Are you OK?” The man asked. The lady nodded. “Where is my grandson?” The man helped her up and the grandson was there. “Are you OK nana?” “Yes, but I feel so sleepy, can we go home now?” They left and after he removed the images from the other people he left, but not before he bought two small jars of olive leave tea. One he would keep himself. It was an hour or two later when he was back in Dover street. Both Auras now looked normal, one was in bed, the man was sitting in the living room. He saw a small pebble and through it at the window. The man startled and looked out the window. The man mere gestured with his index finger that the grandson had to come to him. He was fast and got there less than 30 seconds later. “What did you do?” the grandson asked. Well, I fixed things, you started them. What did they tell you what they were selling you? A ring they found in the sand at the shores. They guaranteed me that it was a real emerald. I did not believe them, but they were willing to part with it for the amount they offered. Nana loves green, I thought it would make a nice present. What was it? It was a cursed ring, with a real emerald no less, well curse is too big a word, but it drained your nana, let’s call it that. He handed the tea leaves. Give he this at least twice a week, the body will restore and repair itself normally, today you must give her one cup of tea. The grandson nodded. Also the events will have changed her a little. How old is she? Around 73 the grandson replied. Well she will soon feel 13 year younger at the very least, if it lasts, I cannot tell, so you better get into shape and ready for long walks. The grandson nodded. Take care kid. Where is the ring now, the grandson asked. At the incenter of mount Everest. Good luck finding it there. The grandson shook his head, I never want to see that thing again. Oh, and get your nana a similar ring but with a different metal and with a similar stone. It helps the fading of memories. And as she sees a different colour metal it will enforce the fading like a bad dream. The grandson nodded and the man walked away.
Part Z The man gestured in front of the window and the light brought the sphere back, he tapped in a rhythm on the stones and the eyes appeared. This is unusual the voice spoke, you never call me. The man showed the ring in the sphere and the eyes became large and bright. “Where did you find that?” It was found on Elounda by a tourist he said. What is this? “It is Olympian, it is one of the rings of Hecate” The man explained all that happened and the eyes started to shine like the beacon of a lighthouse, it saw through the man in every way and then the voice spoke again “You are stronger, I will give new lessons soon, but for now keep the ring out of human hands and it is best you do not touch it either, Hecate has her own way with her abilities and that ring should not have been away from her. The sphere became a cylinder again and it vanished. The eyes faded and there was suddenly the ring of the doorbell. He opened the door and the postman was there. Here you are sir! And the man walked away. The man looked at the parcel, he opened it and there was a book inside. It was all leather and the pages seemed to be vellum. It merely had ‘Ἐλευσίνια Μυστήρια’ on the cover and when he opened it the pages were blank, but they did smell lovely. He reckoned it was the lesson he was supposed to get. Well, time to make some tea, have a piece of toast with marmalade and get to work.
We all step on it at times, at the moment it is me, I am standing on the thin ice, but I feel it is important to stand here. I see all the anti Russian propaganda and tweets and I get it, I really do. But then two events were shown that made me wonder. The first one was given to us by Reuters. It was (at https://www.reuters.com/world/us-orders-12-russian-un-diplomats-leave-by-march-7-russian-envoy-2022-02-28/) ‘U.S. expels 12 Russian U.N. diplomats over security concerns’, not just diplomats, UN diplomats. It is true, the UN value has been overrated for some time, but in this case, I am not sure it is a good idea. The article gives us “The U.S. mission to the United Nations described the Russian diplomats as “intelligence operatives” who had been “engaging in espionage activities that are adverse to our national security.”” It does have the term ‘national security’, so I reckon we will not hear the actual truth until 2042. Then we get “Those diplomats that have been asked to leave the United States were engaged in activities that were not in accordance with their responsibilities and obligations as diplomats”, I cannot oppose it, I cannot disagree with this, because I actually do not know, but it was ‘months’ in some setting of investigation and they chose today of all days to come forth with this? That does not make it not true, but it raises questions, it raises several questions and I am not the person with the answer. Perhaps they interfered with the US shakedown on oligarchs, perhaps they were actual spies. And when I saw it I initially shrugged and let it go. But then David Heroux (CBC) gives us the image below and it is important to see it.
You see, I have always been a fan of the idea to keep politics OUT of sports. Sports are to be left alone, now that does not mean that it is always possible, but really? Throw the Russian Paralympic committee out? Of all the places they COULD have been thrown out, that was the Paralympic place. And at present the least said about the UEFA and FIFA their actions the better, these money grabbing dodo’s are not worth any consideration at all.
You see, this is not merely about the Russians, it is about us. What did WE actually do in Syria? What did WE do when there was a chemical attack? The US was cowardly enough to keep to the left and out of it, yes that was not what they investigated. The doctors reported, the US has several satellites overhead, but NO ONE saw anything. Then we see a similar setting in Yemen again. How many actions AGAINST Iran were taken, I am not talking about economic sanctions. I am talking ACTUAL actions. Some might have seen news (somewhere in 2021) that Iran exported more oil, yet did not make more money, they stated that middle men gained more profits, so the CIA and FBI can hand over a list of those middle man people can it not? I reckon not. A nation that is bankrupt needs every coin they can get and this game has been going on for years.
It is the hypocrisy we see. I am all for Ukraine, I think they are allowed everything we can offer, but that was not the case for Syrians, that was not for Yemeni’s was it?
I get it, that some people have vested interests and that is fine, governments should keep vested interests out of it. At present Syrians and Yemeni’s wonder why the Ukraine can get help in days, whilst they were waiting for years. I cannot explain that injustice, can you? So, I here admit that I am on thin ice, I really do. Yet there is a larger injustice seen and it should not stop people from helping people in the Ukraine, but they need to understand that there have been fires going on since March 2011. I would state that we do not close ALL the doors towards Russia, which makes me wonder about the UN issue, but I admit, it might have valid reasons, the timeline is just a little too warped and there the media is optionally equally at fault. Yet at present I feel convinced we need to keep politics out of sports, there will be a time when that informal route is the only route we have and we should keep it safe, in addition we keep the athletes out of politics, games are for us all, politics are (alas) not. We are given an hour ago by the Guardian ‘Russia’s NHL hero Alex Ovechkin has a rare chance to hit Putin where it hurts’, I disagree. He is an athlete, in the NHL and he is very good. He is not someone’s political tool. We get that people need to speak out, and if he does it of his own accord that is fine, it is his right. But it is not ours to make him our political tool. A lot of people might not agree with me, but that is where I stand. I get it, in the past he was pro-Putin, his choice and at present he most likely regrets this and it is his option to alter that course (make amends seems to crass). It is not treason, he is still Russian, he merely plays a game in the US an he is one of the best on the planet. We all make mistakes, some small, some larger. Yet should he be held accountable for actions he cannot control when the CIA refuses to shine the limelight on Iranian actions because the national security agenda has different topics? There are two measurements in play and we are fed both at the same time. It is dangerous and it is wrong. Feel free to disagree (it is your right) yet also take time to ask people in Syria and Yemen how they feel about these two measurements. Just my thoughts on the matter.
This is what we have at times, we see the news, we do not completely trust the news but we see what we see and we think we are being deceived. This is not at the front of our minds, but it is definitely in the back of our minds. I a not different, I tend to check several sources, but in the end, this is not always possible. So the BBC gives us (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-60525591) ‘IPCC report warns of ‘irreversible’ impacts of global warming’ you would think this was serious enough, and you could (not would) be wrong. You see, we see “the authors of a new report say that there is still a brief window of time to avoid the very worst”, is there? We are also given “there’s hope that if the rise in temperatures is kept below 1.5C, it would reduce projected losses”, now for the bad news. You see on the 11th of February the BBC also gave us “The number of trees cut down in the Brazilian Amazon in January far exceeded deforestation for the same month last year, according to government satellite data. The area destroyed was five times larger than 2021, the highest January total since records began in 2015”, as some might say it, that weasel Jair Bolsonaro was so eager to be seen ‘positive’ at the COP26, yet we also get (from the HRW.org), ““The Bolsonaro government now wants the world to think it is committed to saving the rainforest,” said Maria Laura Canineu, Brazil director at Human Rights Watch. “But these commitments cannot be taken seriously given its disastrous record and failure to present credible plans for making urgently needed progress in fighting deforestation.”” The Brazilian government (those connected) are eager to fill their pockets before some deforestation commitment will more and more likely be delayed by 3-5 years. So matters will go from ‘worst case’ to ‘worse then worst case’ soon thereafter and most reports seemingly do not take that into account, so when I see “a brief window of time”, I wider what window they are talking about, we are being buried alive and governments are letting this happen. Although, my sense of humour tells me that Vladimir Putin could save is here. If he presses the nuclear button, we will see a global population drop of 60%-85%, at which point the problem is solved. There is no deforestation required when no one needs wood and what forests are left will be enough to give oxygen to the 15%-40% remaining. You think I am kidding? You thought that America would intervene? They did less then that, as I personally see it they are more likely filling their credit cards as we are given “the Biden administration recently announced the creation of a taskforce that will take aim at their lucrative assets, including yachts and mansions”, the media does not give us the list of where those ‘registered’ assets will go. I doubt that 100% will go to the Ukraine. Yet I am diverting. You see, the article also gives us “Coral reefs are being bleached and dying from rising temperatures, while many trees are succumbing to drought” which is inaccurate, in Australia, the delicate balance was disrupted for some time through pollution and overfishing, all whilst the lame reactions to overfishing and the Australian super weak legal responses is making that happen again and again. Then we get the angering quote from the UN ““I’ve seen many scientific reports in my time, but nothing like this,” – UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres”, you see if he never seen anything like this, then the United Nations have a much larger problems, because environmentalists have been saying issues in this direction for a decade, so someone (or a collection of grapes) at the UN is not doing their job, most likely they are given a too specific brief and waste year after year (with a high income) on that brief and whose fault is that?
So far the only truth at the COP26 was given by Greta Thunberg with the accurate setting of “just more bla bla bla” And when I wrote about it, I already predicted it (well not Putin pushing the button). And in the end, did anyone pause at “since records began in 2015”? Perhaps I was asleep, but was the environment, pollution and deforestation not a larger stage for well over 25 years? We could of course go for the extreme solution and just get rid of 95% of the population, it solves employment issues, agism, population, housing issues, deforestation, overfishing issues, and carbon footprints. If a person is not there, they have a carbon footprint of zero. You see, the worst could be just around the corner and you won’t see it until you wonder why you are glowing in the dark. Nuclear winter will clean up the rest, that is now becoming an actual possibility.
Yes, that is the station I found myself in this morning. It was not completely new to me, I did write about it in the past (too tired to find the exact article as I have written in excess of 2250 articles at present), but the stage is a little different now. Consider war (see the TV for specifics), we know it and it is now closer to many homes than it was months ago. But we nearly always played an EA or Ubisoft version with respawning NPC soldiers. What if the setting is staged finite and no spawning all over the place? What if the stage is London, Munich, Amsterdam or Paris? A stage where you get inserted into a random location and your war-zone is a 10 block radius from there. Google Maps has nearly every detail, so do other mapping solutions. And you could be defending, escorting local civilians and giving aid. You get no choice until you get to a certain rank. How long would YOU last? It is time to teach the gaming soldiers a little realism. And when you face that you think different on Call of Duty Beachhead with high realism. That is nothing! I think some people are catching on what it is like, somehow they take more notice on events in the Ukraine than they ever did in Yemen or Syria. I like games that have NEVER be done before. A lot of my IP is set to stages never done before and that is where we optionally see a side of gaming that is totally new and innovative. Others were there before you with other games (several examples in this year alone) and I believe that this is the way to go, whether it is a console or streaming system, innovation beats iteration EVERY. Time.
And as these systems are more powerful, we get a setting where we can launch a game like that (or kart) in our own streets, redefining gaming realism acceptance on a few levels. I remember seeing Red Dawn, the Chris Hemsworth edition (I saw both editions) and when we see one of the kids state “We are living Call of duty and it sucks”, I heard someone giggle behind me stating that this would be cool. Yes, the response of a wannabe soldier. I however was in the Middle East, I saw what Hamas did, I saw the bodies. That wakes you up real fast and perhaps a game is not the worst setting to educate people. It has been done before and perhaps it is time to unite these elements. I don’t know, is it wisdom or folly to go that way? I honestly do not. On one side I am merely creating new IP, but I want something deeper in gaming IP, and amazing story (Horizons Forbidden West) is one way to go, when it goes to stories the game Portal (by Rob Swigart) is another direction and that can be equally fulfilling. Still there is a call, not one of duty, but one of fulfilment. We all have it, we want to plant our flag, set our footprint and leave some kind of legacy. When you are a dedicated gamer, we all want to be a Sid Meier, a Peter Molyneux or a Richard Garriott. Not everyone are driven to release mutant camels and that is fair, but where we will be going (streaming systems) and what is possible is almost at the touch and I personally think it is important to push Microsoft out of this market before there way remains the only gaming-less option. The problem is that it would have been easier if Google had taken up some form of game creation department and with the fact that gaming revenue is predicted to be $138,000,000,000 by 2023 is something that seems overwhelmingly attractive, but that is me and for now my idea to sell 50,000,000+ systems remain under lock and key (on a cloud location far far from home). But it is merely one direction and there are plenty of other directions, the revenue speculation opens those doors and even as a large chunk is set to microtransactions, the people are seemingly fed up with the EA and Ubisoft stage of microtransactions. I also gave a few other options (go look for them) and they are largely set to streaming systems. So is there an upside to THIS IP I now mentioned? No, it is merely another road one could wander, and it is here because I cannot wander them all and I am handing my ideas for free use to Amazon and Sony developers. It is a choice I made as Google decided not to create games. The old stage is seemingly fading, or at least I think it is fading, and what is around the corner is almost within reach and it will be bright and exciting, that is what I think, you might think different and rely on great franchises (like Gran Turismo) to set your beaker of desire. That is fair, gaming is what YOU want it to be, I merely want there to be alternatives for you to consider trying.
Yes, there is a first light, a support to my views, which was inevitable, yet I believed that it would take some time to become visible. Yet Al Jazeera (at https://aje.io/fuzpwd) gives us ‘‘Double standards’: Western coverage of Ukraine war criticised’. Here we see “the speed of such an international response – which includes the exclusion of Russia from some cultural events and treatment of it as a pariah in sports – has raised eyebrows at the lack of such a reaction to other conflicts across the world.” Now, this is nothing new. The lack of reporting on Houthi attacks on Saudi civilian targets is astounding. Yet we are also given “CBS News senior correspondent in Kyiv Charlie D’Agata said on Friday: “This isn’t a place, with all due respect, like Iraq or Afghanistan that has seen conflict raging for decades. This is a relatively civilised, relatively European – I have to choose those words carefully, too – city where you wouldn’t expect that, or hope that it’s going to happen.”” This is the part I have been waiting for for some time. A speaker like D’Agata making the mistake of speaking out before his ‘stakeholder’ was able to correct him. It leads to “His comments were met with derision and anger on social media, with many pointing out how his statements contributed to the further dehumanisation of non-white, non-European people suffering under a conflict within mainstream media.” As I personally see it, certain key people have basically painted themselves in a corner and this is not one media, one place or one nation, this setting of filtered information bringers is very global and it includes a lot of players, yet no one is policing the media are they? Justice Leveson tried to hold people to account, but the British media bitches cried and stated that they could police themselves. So when you investigate the media and those who shied away from mentioning certain events and ignore others, especially issues like bombing civilian targets in Saudi Arabia and they were eager to show tea grannies holding a CAAT sign, what does that tell you? And now we see people like D’Agata fumbling the ball. So as I personally see it with “This isn’t a place, with all due respect, like Iraq”, it was news, was it not? What do reporters do? What do newspapers do? That is the larger problem, when I see people, citizens giving us more relevant news (you know who you are troll-hunter), more collected news than the larger news agencies, it becomes well beyond embarrassing so as such the words by D’Agata are more then red cloths on a bull, they are the stage where we are given a setting of filtered information and that needs to stop. As the news is all about circulation and revenue, digital revenue we see a media that is trusted even less than a mere gossip bringer on Facebook. Did the media not figure this out? Perhaps they do not care because the connected stakeholder does not care. Perhaps it is my personal speculated view, but the Al Jazeera article gives a view that I am more likely correct than not. And the words by D’Agata merely reinforces it. I reckon that CBS has some cleaning to do.
I have always been a firm believer of the quote ‘Via ad sapientiam scientiam requirit’, which translates to ‘The way to wisdom requires knowledge’. It is something I have close to forever embraced. We can go into all directions on WHAT wisdom is but I have accepted that it is slightly different for every person. Yet without knowledge you will never find that place. Even blindly poking a map with a needle will never get you there. This is merely the stage of nearly everywhere. Whilst people are focussing on what it happening between Russia and the Ukraine, whilst people are wondering if they are next (Bulgarians). I know that I know nothing on what is happening now, so it seemed wise to occupy my brain in different ways. And weirdly enough, I came up with new IP, military IP. My mind designed a new weapon system to incapacitate submarines. I have no idea if it works, but the setting is always nice to use in a story, a game or a movie. Where? I cannot tell, not yet. But the mind goes where it wants, sometime to places we desire and sometimes to places we cannot fathom. And for some reason, my mind went to the deep blue see, thanks for that granduncle! And I came up with a new submarine disabler. Now for the functionality I am all up in arms. I have several ideas on a few matters, but the targeting part is still a mystery (as I am not up to speed with submarines and torpedo’s) but I grasp the basics. The thingamajig (sonar) connects to the target and when distance becomes zero the whatchamacallit goes boom. But what happens when we decide not to go boom? And that is where my mind went and that is where the kraken torpedo becomes the reality of whatever story (or script) follows.
You see people are all about destroying and I went in the other direction, the same as the weapon I designed in ‘The impact of insanity’, an article I wrote on January 20th 2019 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/01/20/the-impact-of-insanity/) where I designed a stealth weapon that could disable the Iranian navy. If the big boys will not deal with them, I will. So I handed the idea to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and I left it to them to decide. It is after all their direct enemy and to some degree their problem. I also came up with the idea to melt down their nuclear reactor (see other articles) and that idea came to me via a snow-globe, so my brain is as wacky as it gets. I prefer IP in IT, gaming or entertainment yet I do not have a choice in the matter. My brain goes where it wants and I reckon that if it meets up with any of 5 certain ladies it will go in a very different direction again, which could lead to really hot IP, LOL.
The setting of what might be is to be treasured yet it almost never goes into expected directions. It might just be me, but there is every chance that the makers of the Aloy series saw where their track would lead them. We can see now (3 hours ago) all the bickering, the BS accusations and small stages. For example someone gives us “The game doesn’t have any game-breaking issues, but it does have some that are vexing players. For example, everyone hates Aloy’s hair.” Yet the problem is the use of ‘everyone’, and that cannot be, because I have not found any part that I hate and after 20 hours of actual playing I am somewhere between 15%-20%. Watching the environment is overwhelming and it is the SECOND TIME EVER that I used photo mode. The first time was Assassins Creed Origins. For the most I do not care about photo mode, it is nice and some like it yet not everyone cares. I do not, it is an extra and this time I cared. I merely took one snap to show just how perfect the game looks and when you can do that at an active point in the game, that makes the game amazing. And ever as Metacritic is at a mere 88% (Xbox players will be haters) I feel certain that it will get to the 90%-95% where it deserves to be. Now, I cannot tell if the people of guerrilla adhere to ‘Via ad sapientiam scientiam requirit’ but I am curious to find out. At some point someone dreamt up Aloy, someone dreamt up the robotics that wielded Zero Dawn and now what we see now. A true new gaming IP was created and for me that matters, because the game has shown me so much innovation in one game it is game changing and that matters, because innovation will always matter. Innovation is the game changer of ANY industry and we all got there through knowledge. It is a much longer debate to see if there is a relationship between innovation and wisdom (example Facebook) because wisdom is grown and it allows us to create a safe road, a silk road or a fast road, it is the application of wisdom that matters and it is not always a guaranteed given. We are all slaves to our thoughts, we are all driven to the creative mind. We can overanalyse, we can do so much, but can we understand it? I want to because just like nearly any other gamer I would like to come up with the golden idea for a game changing game. I think I have one that sells 50,000,000 Amazon Luna’s (Google does not design software for Stadia) but it is what it is. Beyond that I made several game IP freeware for Sony and Amazon developers. My mind will not stop designing and that is fine (but it makes me lose sleep).
We can speculate on what might be, but I believe it to be a waste of time. I merely write down the IP (not all in this blog) and move on, it is the best I can do and whatever will be will be, what might be is a road to nowhere. So there is a 4th road, so am I at some crossroad?
You see the setting of ‘Putin saw America has become weak under Biden’ is wrong, it did not become weak, it was weak and has been for some time. Getting a bully to talk loud does not make America less weak. The American inactions regarding:
Chemical attack Homs Syria 2012
Chemical Attack Douma Syria 2018
Houthi terrorist attacks Yemen 2014-2022
Ukraine under Russian attack 2022
As you can see, Americans are all talk and lack actions. It is not because they do not want to act, it is because they can no longer act. A debt surpassing $30,000,000,000,000 is making sure that this cannot happen, the US has become nothing more than a paper tiger. And let’s be clear, this is not merely the US, the EU is in a similar state. How I went to school and heard these preaches and stories, that if there was ever a chemical attack, the nations would unite against the attackers. In 2012 we saw the reality of what was preached for decades, they merely united and scolded the transgressor making very sure that words like ‘seemingly’ and ‘alleged’ were everywhere in that text. We saw a repetition, with the western media not reporting on Iranian involvement and remaining silent on Houthi attacks on civilian targets, the United Nations added to this by calling out one party and not the other one (Iran). The complete view on the uselessness of western politics set in action.
So when we get ‘told’ the simplicity of “America has become weak under Biden”, it did not, it was weak and will become weaker still. It is the order of things when your credit card is telling you to stay at home whilst the neighbours house is on fire and you cannot afford to buy a bucket. You do not want to let the neighbour know that you cannot afford a bucket, so you set in motion talks, but the neighbour does not want to talk, HIS HOUSE IS ON FIRE!
/so when Al Jazeera reports ‘New sanctions come as Yemeni rebels ramped up attacks against Saudi Arabia and the UAE in recent weeks’ (at https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/23/us-issues-new-sanctions-on-alleged-houthi-financing-network) 3 days ago, my response is that the US gets a functional navy that can stop smugglers, so far I have seen less than 3 successes over a time of 6 years (at least) and we see how the US Navy seemingly cannot stop anything. That is not their fault (I think) and there could be half a doze reasons, but let’s be clear, the western media to a much larger degree is silencing that part all over the place. And we can shelter on the setting that no one cares about Syria and Yemen, but the Ukraine is too close to home (for the EU) and now we get to see the blame game, we get to see the opposite side, just like the US and EU were silencing any issue on Iran, we now see ‘China refuses to call Russia’s move on Ukraine an invasion’ (source: Australian Financial Review). So how does that feel? The blunt question is ‘Why would China care about Ukraine?’, Why would China push for a setting that it does not need to do? I do not think it is right, I merely think it is as it is.
We need to accept that inaction comes with consequences and a consequence now is that Russia wants EU expansionism stopped and Russia took the step it felt it could take and that sucks for the Ukraine, but the inactions of the EU and the US (economic sanctions are not real actions), and I am proven right in another BBC article where we saw yesterday “Ukraine isn’t in America’s neighbourhood. It is not located on the US border. Nor does it host a US military base. It does not have strategic oil reserves, and it’s not a major trade partner”, it was the sad truth for Syria, for Yemen and now for the Ukraine. It is what the US calls policy and that is their take on it, it doesn’t make any president weak, but as I see it, when you need to set a filter to that degree, it also implies that you are no longer a superpower, especially if you cater to Iran who allegedly is now (or will be soon) enriching Uranium to 20%, so when this escalates in the state of Israel and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, will it still a stage of inaction? I reckon so, the debt will remain for decades giving China and Russia an almost uncensored way to change the political map all over the Far East and the Middle East. Now there will be people who do not agree, and that is fair. I would merely like to point out that the past has proven me right and the present is merely continuing the stage that I am still not wrong.
Europe is in danger of a lot more than you think and it seems that in this case the US is not playing the game to the harder degree, they seemingly no longer can.
In four days people who missed the big screen release get to see it and those who saw it will see it again. For me it will be awesome. Dune (2021) was an amazing trip. ‘Ticket to Arrakis, one way please and make it a window seat’, but the masterpiece by Hubbard is to be read, to be seen on the screen and not yet seen and felt in person. I have several versions and I saw the other one too. Until this version arrived the SciFi channel edition with Alec Newman, Ian McNeice and Giancarlo Giannini was my favourite. It is a really good version, it felt real, it felt down to earth and told the story in an amazing way. So until I saw the new edition (which was always going to happen) I had my doubts, mainly because the SciFi edition was awesome and we all tend to resent anything troubling that view. It was nice to see the announcement that Thanos was coming, Bautista looked a lot more like the written monster Rabban then László I. Kish ever could. In all versions of Dune we see a slim man, so it felt right that Jason Mamoa was chosen. I was toiling on a lot of things, that was until I saw the trailer.
The trailer was the clear indication that this was going to be next level stuff. I knew nothing about Denis Villeneuve (other than he seemed to be that guy who won several GP’s in the 90’s), but the trailer put him on the map for me. Of course I realised later that he was Canadian, not a French racer and responsible for the Arrival and the Blade Runner sequel. They were good movies, really good, but it was nothing compared what I saw when the lights in the cinema turned off and Arrakis (Caladan too) was shown to us. The ornithopters, the machines, the works and especially the sands. We saw a new look on the Sardaukar and the Atreides family. In this Denis might have chosen Chalamet because he is a good actor and looks like a boy. The 155 minutes that followed blew my mind. The music was off and not from this world, it impacted the film in a massive way. The lighting and the stage of using lighting in this way was truly amazing. Dune rocked and ruled the world in unexpected ways, so as soon as possible I will get this movie and watch it again and again until part 2 arrives, which is set to be released on October 20, 2023, which is another 20 months of bloody waiting (not happy me). But that is how it is.
Dune (2021) has set a new level and set the bar for anyone else optionally much to high to ever attempt it ever again.
It is here that I need to take on critique “Stephen M. Colbert of Screen Rant noted that its complex story and Villeneuve’s directorial style were bound to have selective appeal, and that this is reflected in negative reviews thus far”, I disagree. The story starts on Arrakis (the Zendaya scene) and it sets a good tone, The story is clear and follows the book, it skipped one or two issues, but there is every chance that the second part will take these parts up, and lets be clear they are small issues, really small issues. As to the side of ‘selective appeal’ I cannot completely answer. The movie has an uncanny realistic approach towards lighting, it is seen in several ways and at times it makes you wonder what the appeals was of CGI lighting (like the Black Widow movie). This is not an attack on the movie Black Widow, it shows that Denis Villeneuve took the extra 5 miles to get it near perfect (perfection is an on location movie on Arrakis). The ornithopter scenes are unreal and the filming of Charlotte Rampling in the Bene Gesserit scene transgresses from perfection into overwhelming in a few ways. The movie checked all the marks and added a dozen more. This is one of those ‘must see’ movies whether you are into Fantasy/Science Fiction or not.
I really cannot wait to see it again, it will help pass the time until part two is here and the complete story is shown to us. This is more than the continuation, there is so much more to see, I cannot wait to see how Dennis Villeneuve brought them into the light. In this light I merely wonder to some degree how he was missed as Best Director in the upcoming 94th Academy Awards. I do get it, the other film makers did amazing work in the past, and optionally now too (I did not see all of them), but this time around he is up against Spielberg, Branagh, Campion and Anderson. So the competition was fierce, still Dune is on the list for best movie (and 9 other nominations), so there is that.
My mind has been pounding on some new IP. Not really IP, more of a concept on what Ould become great IP. Yet will it be mine? I doubt it, there are plenty of takers, but for some reason I believe that Adobe has the inside track here. Whilst players like Microsoft make all the spin, make all the presentations, they deliver too little. Whilst they are all about Office365, we see a collection of bugs that still have not been resolved. And as they grow their product they also grow the traps and the pitfalls.
So as we see (or recall) “The bug in Exchange Online, part of the Office 365 suite, could be exploited to gain “access to millions of corporate email accounts”, said Steven Seeley of the Qihoo 360 Vulcan Team in a blog post published yesterday (January 12 2021).” It would be come time before we could see “The Exchange Server flaw is one of 55 vulnerabilities fixed in Microsoft’s Patch Tuesday update. Microsoft is urging administrators to apply patches for a remote code execution vulnerability in Exchange Server, which is being exploited in the wild. (Nov 2021)” as I personally see it, Microsoft is digging its grave deeper and deeper, all whilst complaining to Congress about anti competition issues. How about fixing your bloody program? Optionally in less time it take a woman to get fucked, get pregnant and deliver a baby? Rude? You ain’t seen nothing yet! Microsoft complains wherever it can, against Apple, against Google and it takes over 36 weeks to get the Exchange flaw seemingly under control. I used seemingly as we also got this year ‘Microsoft kicks off 2022 with email blocking Exchange bug’ with the added “A coding mistake after a January 1 auto-update is causing the FIP-FS anti-malware service to crash with the 0x80004005 error code when it encounters 2022 dates”
Apart from the idea that kicking Microsoft should be regarded as a civil service there is actually a bigger fish to fry.
The who now? You see this is in part about Web3, it was one of the stopping points that my mind entertained towards some of the software that I saw in ‘Pristine and weird’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2022/02/24/pristine-and-weird/), I gave additional views in ‘The hardware perimeter’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2022/02/25/the-hardware-perimeter/). I still believe that in some respects Adobe might become the salvation. In 15 years of Adobe I have crashed less than half a dozen times, Adobe, or as I tend to call them (with a giggle) Macromedia Plus. You see, Adobe is a union (OK, they bought the other place) of Adobe and Macromedia. You might think that this is not a big deal, but it is. The union of two great innovators in their field. I truly wonder if Microsoft understands what an actual innovator is, they spun it so often in so many area’s that I truly believe they forgot what true innovation is. But consider Adobe and Apple, what if Adobe gets the sources of Pages, Numbers and Keynote? They would be close to ready. They still need a good database to stage the next scene but there are all kinds of solutions in that direction.
The hardest part (for them) would be the web in a web stage. This is not some fictive side, it will be the connection side of collections of blockchains (finance, documentation, hardware foundations and document tallies. The example you saw earlier is something I saw somewhere and it fitted the bill as closely as I envision it (I do not have the right software to make my own) that might get the closest to what is required, as well as a new need for checking the integrity of blockchain based connections. The need to check the integrity becomes overwhelmingly essential and when it comes to integrity checking, there is every indication that Microsoft is not really on board with that need, or its board of directors might be filtering out anything negative until AFTER it launches. In that setting a player like Adobe (or Google) is a much safer bet and that matters.
You see, I saw as early as 2009 that the borders between hardware and software were overlapping in some grey area. The initial stage of brand of hardware would be overshadowed by the software controlling it and there is the rub, the court cases where we get some version of ‘She said versus She said’ will overwhelm courts and the law is nowhere near ready on such cases, because the rules of evidence are not ready to process what gets to court. You see, to some extent Web3 might be a solution, the blockchain need will govern the desire, but there is also the larger case. We are given settings like “the idea of decentralisation” as well as “a possible solution to concerns about the over-centralisation”, but the borders of what we see to what is centralisation and decentralisation is becoming blurry. We see voices like Kevin Werbach, author of The Blockchain and the New Architecture of Trust making mentions on the lack of decentralisation, some give us issues on scalability. But what is scalability? It is a serious question. You see Microsoft, Google and Apple have their own ’version’ on what constitutes scalability, but always towards THEIR OWN design and I get it, that is one point of view, but when did you see a clear presentation where the CONSUMER is shown a presentation to see scalability towards their organisation and another organisation? An accountant compared to KPMG? A consultant compared to Deloitte? You think it does not matter but it does and the cloud brought it a lot closer than anyone realises. The booklet version is “scaling is the process of adding or removing compute, storage, and network services to meet the demands a workload makes for resources in order to maintain availability and performance as utilisation increases”, but as I tend to say, cloud computing is computing on someone else’s server. The term of scalability ‘adjusted’ from home processing to cloud processing. It is there that you see the larger stage of bilateral processing. The workstation (like I described earlier) with a thick client and local stages, often connected with a secure server that protects its settings and a cloud environment. A sort of 2 stage security in place and that is the larger danger. Microsoft (et al) want you to trust them, all whilst they screwed up your life with 36 weeks+ Exchange online dangers and they cannot change, they are too much involved with their board of directors and THEIR needs of the story as it needs to be. And as I rudely stated at the beginning with every chance of getting screwed over and their ‘spin’ impregnating you, but the turnaround? There is none! And what do you think their liability is when you see that your IP is gone? So whilst the news gives you “Vulnerabilities are being exploited by Hafnium”, how long until a message from the cloud provider is given to you that due to configuration errors detected we do not consider any liability against us to be valid? And let’s be clear, Microsoft Office is Exchange, Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Access. They have had 25 years to clean it up, but the waves of iterations (new options) have given rise to issue after issue. Is it such a surprise that this stage might start flowing towards a player like Adobe who will add a near universe of new options and all that arranged in some next generation skin that incorporates some version of Web3?
There are other players (Amazon, IBM) but in what I saw in ‘Pristine and weird’ Adobe fits the bill better and more complete. Even as I saw additional parts, I saw a stage where hardware is more interchangeable with software and Adobe has proven the field there. You see, as hardware from Cisco, Dell, Huawei and Juniper become more generic, software will have a much larger impact and the hardware will merely open doors to WHAT is possible and how fast the new options could be. A different setting but not merely due to the cloud, but because the one man show technologies are on the way out, pretty much like Microsoft already is. A stage that has now become too unreliable to consider trusting. And where will Apple and Google be? Apple will most likely have a larger niche, Google has been accomodating on several levels, so they both have larger fields and for them it matters in the long run. Other players will need to push for their niche, a cooperative niche or they will become obsolete, almost as much as Microsoft soon will be. But that is merely my point of view on the matter and my point of view on where we are going. Feel free to oppose my side, but do not forget to check all the facts, for now they are on my side of the equation.
Lawrence van Rijn - Law Lord to be 