October 7, 2020 · 02:39

The creative virus

At times we all have it, the ability to create, some have it all the time, think of the carpenter making a new table, some throw it into hobbies, you see some of those dioramas made and shown via YouTube and you wish you could make them, they seem so simple, but the truth is a little harsh, these people make it seem amazing, because for decades they work on something this amazing. We pine at the exploding submarine, the megaladon eating a surfer, The waterside diorama, they all look amazing, some are a little more functional and we see how people restore old butcher knives or swords, not always real, some of the fantasy prop making are very much worth watching, but they have something in common, they are made by people passionate about creating and restoring. 

I wish I could restore a sword or a butchers knife the way it is done, but I do not have the tools or the skills, I cannot change a rectangle piece of iron in a tempered and polished knife. I know that, I can analyse, I can write and I can combine the two. So as I watched NCIS in the background, I created the first half of a short story, the story was in me and I brought it to the surface and onto pieces of paper. Half way to 10,000 words. I was also working on something larger, but I got stuck at 55,000 words. I am not giving up, but the mind needed to rethink some of the parts I had written, is it about writing them, or is it about the Chile – Peru trench? Perhaps it is about the Huawei upgrades applied to Chinese satellites, a new communication system, which actually has a side effect, the new protocols apparently have the ability to ignore oceanic thermal layers, as such they will be able to see what is there at 7300 meters deep. It is a setting that changes things, is it not? And yes their opponents will find a solution in 3-5 years, first a graduate at the University of Moscow will set the premise of what SHF is also able to do, then the system evolves, yet that play will have a larger interest and only one player has the ability to see, but will they get there?

The story is not about that, but the book is about what got what there. I would call it historical fantasy, the stage before the stage and how we got there. But for now it is about a short story and a waiting queue. The premise of what we expect to see and especially when it is about something else, we forget that at times. It goes to the beginning of Clue, do you remember the game? Who played it and asked from someone else a card they had, hoping to set the opponent on the wrong foot, the tactic works best when there are only 3 players. But the is the stage I see when I look at the UK, China and Russia, all whilst America still thinks it matters. But the old stage is gone, if you cannot afford the ante, you can merely sit at the table watch others play. It is in that stage I got the idea for the first short tory and the second is already in my mind, optionally there are a few stories there, or so I think they are. As I see it creativity is like a virus, we can infect others and perhaps that I what these YouTubers did when they put their videos online, the showed me what I could never do and as such I started to look on things I could do, is that true? Well, I will know soon enough, but in the end it is merely another story to tell and it is mine to tell, although I am still curious about what Russia is up to, they have been vying for time. We see all the experts looking at their Yasen-M submarine class, and it makes sense to look at that, but China had other ideas at present (I honestly do not know what) and here is where the speculation starts, I wonder if a project that they call сосулька (whatever that is) is worth my time, or my imagination. Yet no matter how I turn, I remain optimistic on the progression of my creativity. I would have written about what is now, but I see so much time wasted on American Politicians that now have Covid-19, it is just not fun anymore. And that is beside the Facebook (against their promise) is catering to political advertisement, so whatever hole they are digging, they are doing it themselves. 

So in all this I wonder what will happen tomorrow, yet that will be another day. For now I can clearly small the scent of chocolate wafers, I feel like having them and in this the page is not bout food, but about the choices we make which optionally lead to the desires we have at times. I cannot answer all questions, especially not the ones I have, yet I acknowledge the stage the the creative mind sets for itself, it does not matter whether it is short sighted or delusional. It is a stage where I (at least I think I do) can create something. And as we see the this year alone gamers are spending $50 billion and as some sources state that the market will surpass $200 billion by 2023, I think it is time that I get a sliver of it and it all starts with a good story, so that is where I will start, and in that perhaps the short stories are merely the beginning of something more.

We all get to places, but we tend to never ever go in a direct line, perhaps my route was never in IT, it was merely a sage where creativity was fuelled and I got there via other means. I do not pretend to have the answers, I am merely (at the most) guessing, are you not? Where will you go and do you think that a straight course gets you there?

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October 5, 2020 · 20:14

A Freebie for you

Yes, you read it right, I am about to give you all a freebie. Over the last two days I set in motion a new piece of IP, but there are parts that I am not ready for, the idea is, but I am not, So I am making it public domain with this article. It all started two days ago, there was an imbalance and I set it in writing but something happened as I did it, I realised that no one had taken it to this level ever before, all the clever people at Microsoft, Apple and Google, they have nothing on this, so I am making it public domain. I have at least 4 more pieces of IP, several ready for patenting, all mine, and this is my way of pushing the world into action. I considered to be a Jonas Salk in disguise, but that is not me, this is about something else and the power of progression is not to sell it, but to make it common good for all, if it cannot be patented it is open source to all who consider it and even as they do, there are a few persons who have the advantage, they worked on the paper that could be the foundation of what this becomes. Yet before I do that, I need to tell you the story how this came about, it is actually important, it makes what comes next easier to comprehend. 

My background in all this is data, I have been involved with data systems, legacy systems, cleaning data and arbitrary manipulation of data for well over 30 years, so I have been around a long time (I am actually that old). I was there when DBase 2 started, I was there at the beginning of the Clipper Compiler. The start of Microsoft SQL Server (which they bought from Sybase), the VAX/VMS data systems, IBM DB2 on AIX and more. I have seen data in so many ways it could be regarded as scary, but that was the past. An imbalance hit me two days ago and it resulted in the article ‘The mind stage’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/10/04/the-mind-stage/), I gave my view, however some threw questions at me, two were valid. So I set out to answer them to the best of my ability and it resulted in ‘The accusation and more’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/10/05/the-accusation-and-more/), yet as I wrote the article and set out with the examples, an idea hit my head and I had been busy all day today (in the back of my mind) to sort it out, in all this the discussed paper ‘Optimal control of a rumour propagation model with latent period in emergency event’ by Liang’an Huo, Tingting Lin, Chongjun Fan (et al) set my mind in motion.

To explain this a little more, consider a page rank (something Stanford University came up with for Google), every page has a rank and that is what sets out some level of importance or perhaps influence is at times a better word. And until now it was often enough, but 5G allows for people to be exposed to data 10 times more and now we see the pressure that the reader is exposed to, what is relevant? You see from the market research side we get exposed to bias, it results in: 

  • Irrational Escalation
  • Social Desirability Bias
  • Knowledge Bias

Yet the stage is no longer a level playing field, the exposure to the people is almost 100%, as such we see the need for an additional number, a ‘bias weight’, this is however not linked to the document but the reader, at this stage it is there but it is mappable, in the future it is less likely so, and like response weights, factorial weights and other corrective measures, no-one has taken the time to set the stage for bias, but in 5G it will be a big thing, much bigger than anyone realises. 

As such the stage is more important, if 100% is exposed to bias via news, via social media, via websites and preset stages, it becomes more and more important to figure out how much bias a person is exposed to and 5G allows for this (well 4G allows for it too, but the systems slow down too much), with 5G it all goes faster, so the stage needs adjustment and adding a group of filters becomes essential for all kinds of reasons. The paper gives us “Rumours are part of our everyday life, and its spreading has a significant impact on human lives. Hayakawa defines rumour as a kind of social phenomenon that a similar remark spreads on a large scale in a short time through chains of communication”, which I accept, yet bias moves in pretty much the same way, we have however until now never given it the consideration it deserves. Just like rumours, bias works like accumulation and that is where the sausage gets the sauce, yet in all this, who is the biased person? Can he influence our needs positively or negatively? That answer needs to be found. Not because it is nice, or because it is essential, but for all kinds of data collecting fields all kinds of product fields and all kinds of manufacturing it will matter soon enough, when 5G is racing at top speeds, it will become a massive issue and the developers need time to get any kind of systems in place, so I am making the thoughts public domain, and you all get to have good luck with it.

In this field, feel free to delete my thoughts, feel free to ignore me, but whomever works out the math will make one hell of an amount of money (please remember me if you do). Oh, and those who think I am rambling? In 1997 I came up with a servicing solution and the company at the centre, my bosses laughed at my idea, I still have the email somewhere, Facebook came 4 years later and did what I thought of (and more). I had one other idea which Sony got, but they neglected it and now some see the benefits the this system had, so I am decently certain on my ideas.

The work I looked at referred to Daley and Kendall, yet in that stage the setting is to some degree missing or incomplete (for my purpose). As we read “At any time an individual can be classified as one of three categories: X(t) denotes those individuals who are ignorant of the rumour; Y(t) denotes those individuals who are actively spread- ing the rumour; and Z(t) denotes those individuals who know the rumour but have ceased spreading it”, we can exchange rumour for bias, but the would be incorrect (incomplete is more correct), even as we see three directions of bias (mentioned earlier), we need to see that in two dimensions. Internal bias and external bias. For this example I will use gamers (myself), I am a PlayStation guy, I dumped my Xbox because of Microsoft actions and I lost faith in their product. So there is an internal bias towards Sony (optionally Nintendo too), and it is in the ‘automated’ negative towards Microsoft. We cannot do this on every brand, it becomes a data mess, but the exposure I have on classes might be different, a stage of Z scores in 6 parts (3 internal and three external) might be easier, and as this is set to the person, the seeker online, it is the persons bean (a java bean pun), so we need to find a larger solution that can paint whole populations by the actions they take, and this is not about transgressing on privacy, but on the system wielder disregardful of who they are, So as Kendall and Daley were in a stage of three, it is not merely ignorant of the bias, there will be an internal bias towards brands, towards application and towards choice, but the external factor is one that we see if the person has been exposed to, so we see part of the solution in front of us and to find the core the adjusts bias is partially found and over time optionally completed, but in this we are not about what the score is, but if  certain score exceeds a certain value, if that is the case the person is biassed, and now we can decently reflect whether the person is the one that we seek (we being the interested party whomever they are) and with the number, we get a much larger efficiency towards what the goal was. The old expression is ‘all cats are grey in the dark’, which now gets us to ‘all seekers are equally grey on the internet’, which changes the game for everyone, yet when someone learns of an ability to filter or weigh bias, that stage changes and it will change for everyone depending on the internet.

So whatever you decide, have a great day.

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October 5, 2020 · 00:51

The accusation and more

Yup, we all get accused, the of course includes me. In this case it is about ‘The mind stage’ which I wrote 22 hours ago. Apart from some of the deleted hatred stuff, there were some accusation that I was exaggerating about Ubisoft. As such here is the rundown. 

In the last 24 hours we see ‘Survey Finds That 20% Of Ubisoft Employees Do Not Feel Respected Or Safe In The Workplace’, and there are 3 more, then we get a few review based links with titles like ‘Hyper Scape has not met Ubisoft’s expectations’. This last headline I have no issues with, the article is clear and focussed on the game. That is part of life, the others is about perpetuating a stage well over a month old, and I get it, Ubisoft is newsworthy, but these articles are about getting clicks, as such the story is adjusted (like the survey) and there is no real stage on how long this continues. I get it, we seek what we are interested in, yet the imbalance that comes with this is also skewing the view of the people.

This matters, mainly because it comes with dangers. I have seen this before, but this time around I found FMI (Future Market Insights) divine us ‘Top 3 Cognitive Biases That Can Skew Market Research Outcomes’ (at https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/blogs/details/skew-market-research-outcomes). The stage is set to 

  • Irrational Escalation
  • Social Desirability Bias
  • Knowledge Bias

You think that this is something that balances itself, but that is not the case, it sort of relates to the sight you cannot be set to unseen. This is easily set to another stage, almost a decade ago there was a video that was called 2 girls one cup, now I was fortunate to avoid it, but anyone who has ever seen it will forever be cursed with the ability to recall it. It is something the mind cannot set to unseen and it optionally haunts you forever, even if you are able to forget, the moment it is mentioned it comes back (in technicolor plus)

So when we get to irrational escalation, sometimes it is referred to as cognitive bias or preconceived notions, it will influence you, as such overly negative views will filter you to be negative from the start (a political, or adversarial tactic). The further away it is, the easier it is to remain negative about it, because daily events will not change or adjust it to a more balanced view. In this the mind loves any form of balancing. Some sales techniques are based on this, especially if the sales track is more than instant sales (like cars, houses and larger investments), the balanced mind accepts more options especially as it can reweighs the positive and the negative to its own setting. It is not always logical, but it works, some people have an entire stage set up for this approach and they are doing a lot better than most. 

In the stage of Social Desirability Bias, we actually continue from the previous setting, the balanced mind. It becomes about projection in the conversation, often the view is set to a relationship of something the person is ready to accept, in Ubisoft case it becomes “remember how much fun we had in Origin/Brotherhood, but now you are a Viking”. It is also a view of adjustment where the positive gets a lot more time than the negative. It is also the first page where data gets skewed, whether the data is collected or instantly available, the skewing is set to a plus point, the more positive one is not on how it is shown, but how the recipient of the information gets a skewed perspective reflective towards their own feelings on the subject. This is mostly seen in market research and how it is brought (the story maker) into a presentation that is given to share holders and stake holders of the setting, yet that same approach works on everyone that the story is trying to reach. Then there is knowledge bias, it is more generic but cannot be ignored. As such we see the station of gaming, we see the bias of positivity is used to inflate the positive and the negative part does the opposite, branding tends to be the power. An example is ‘As you see this, we see the resolution, yet the Nintendo Switch can not show us this, we could argue the the other cannot do this either, we have after all the mot powerful processor in our system’, in this we see a stage where we are given (slammed with) the term teraflop as such we now see the application of both knowledge bias as well as cognitive bias, yet what we forget is that the processor is merely one element in the setting, for people who know sound equipment, it reflects as ‘buy the most expensive amplifier, it solves everything’, yet if the speakers are ignored, the sound remains awful. The same for the processor, the environment around it will be equally important. And here is the kicker, most gamers merely look at the power of the processor, thinking the this solves it all, but like looking at any console, it is not the hardware, the games are the station of testing and the is where some come out better than others. This is a setting where Ubisoft failed, the idea was accepted and then it was given to marketing and the idea was drowned (or smothered) whilst not setting the stage correctly. I had stated a few times that testing was insufficient (or the issues could not be fixed) this ended up being seen in too many games. 

It is not just a Ubisoft issue, EA was equally stupid, relying on Knowledge Bias of the first three games and then dropping Mass Effect Andromeda on the same population, the effect is that a brand is now dealing with a massive effect of negativity (pun intended). They need to clean house and they need to do this fast (one more than the other), yet the stage is evolving and not for the good, the three markers have been used too long and too often, there is a larger bias running now, it is set to the lack of credibility and soon that will end up being the marker we see advertised and propagated. Here I need to make a jump. In 2015 Liang’an Huo (et al) gave us 

‘Optimal control of a rumour propagation model with latent period in emergency event’ this is important as we see here “Because network information has always suffered from a lack of credibility, people cannot believe it immediately but are able to believe news from their friends and relatives more easily. Especially, rumours mostly come from a network and then spread in real life mouth to mouth. Many rumours come from a network and are hidden in the depths of one’s heart for a period of time before he/she becomes a spreader or stifler in real life”, yet as I see it, it is not limited to information networks, there is a credible case that we can alter this into “because aided and given information has since the digital age suffered from a lack of credibility”, we see the stage where one ‘network’ one’s ‘connections’ are now a much larger stage of subjective perception (subjective bias as well as cognitive bias), and this is where the wheels come off the train and they then call it a hovercraft with needless rails. Yet when we consider “By means of the Lyapunov function and LaSalle’s invariant set theorem, we proved the global asymptotical stable results of the rumor-free equilibrium and the rumor-endemic equilibrium by using the Poincarè-Bendixson property” the paper now gives us “an optimal control problem is formulated, from the perspective of a manager in emergency events”, which applies to emergency events, yet in the mind of the buyer, a console is an emergency event (even if they ignore it), they are dealing with peer pressure and the fear of buying the bad product is optionally killing them inside. In the past we had VHS versus VCC (some might remember that) and marketing set us to the weaker product because that is where the need was, a fluctuated ‘peer pressure’ part and that is now reflective in the news we are given, they are adhering to share holders, stakeholders and advertisers, yet the people are weary. And that stage is getting flooded on a few stages where the marketeers are remaining in the ‘more is better’, yet the imbalance is now hitting people to a much larger degree and they are rejecting all information as their cognitive bias is set to minus 100. So now we see the application of market research in the field. If we consider business strategy as a solution to consoles and software, the stage changes when we consider “an organised effort to gather information about target markets and its customers; know as much as possible about them and identifying who they are”, yet the three bias flags and the flooding of less and less accepted information makes all that harder and the stories linked to them are adjusted, but are they correctly adjusted? The market knows less and less yet they proclaim that they do. As such we reflect on the Ubisoft stage, insider how accepting a vast amount of gamers are towards the marketed hype creation (a flaw Microsoft has as well), and as knowledge bias is shifted (through the teraflop stories) and cognitive bias is limited as people are less trustworthy of handed information as such they now more and more rely on their own ambassador of a product (the gamer next door), optionally the mechanic they know from school when they are considering a car, the stage changes and we see new reflective bias and the partial title of that paper ‘Optimal control of a rumor propagation model’ now comes into focus. It is seen in the conclusion where I state (an altered version) “Rumour propagation can have serious consequences; thus the study on how to take effective measures to control its spreading through filtering is of great practical significance”, I added ‘through filtering’, the setting is that we need to be able to filter through deletion of bias and controls spreading by stopping propagation of those affecting knowledge bias and cognitive bias. You think it is easy, but it is not, it will optionally become a new set of markers that will impact web surfing under 5G. Ubisoft brings it to the surface as it was the most pronounced there, but there are dozens of other sources in a similar predicament. It will stage a new form of marketing the needs to set the stage of weighted and unweighted data and the effects of boas filters, it will end up being a new form of filtering.

It is perhaps the only moment where I feel that the paper is missing something (it was not on them), It is seem when we see ‘General rumour propagation model with latent period and having constant immigration’, it is my personal view the there is a need to see ‘General rumour propagation model with adjusted weighting due to pushed trending external adjustments’

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October 4, 2020 · 18:33

A coin with 2 sides of greed

This morning started out alright, I was still pondering on what I had wrote yesterday and I still stand by it. Any voices on complexity are not dimmed, the issue is larger than I wrote about it, but to take the full scope makes the matter too complex, I was all about oversimplification, as that tends to show things, but it also polarises any view (including mine). This is what was in my mind when the news on Proton-mail and Andy Yen hit me. You see the moment any firm goes into some preaching stage of ‘App Fairness’ mode, the hairs in my neck tend to rise to the occasion. Now, those who read my blog regularly will have seen that I have no issue slapping the big boys silly whenever I can. So like the proverbial pitbull, I have had a mouthful of pants with Apple, Google, IBM and Microsoft logo’s and a chunk of their asses. No matter how big they are, I do not pull my punches (much more fun the way), so let’s have a look at Andy Yen, actually, let’s do something else first, it helps you to understand the station where I am at.

In 2008 Apple launched the App store, initially with around 500 apps. Apple saw in the early days the third party developers would bring home the bacon, but in those years it was not easy being a developer. Those developing for windows had well over a decade of experience and in those days the Software Development Kit would cost a developer $1500, with the additional programming packages and consultancy lessons. So ANY developer would be out of pocket between $3,000 and $5,000 and they would not have anything to show for it. The cost would drastically increase when the program was ready, but the was for another time. So in those days Apple got clever about it and gave us “To publish apps on App Store, developers must pay a $99 yearly fee for access to Apple’s Developer Program”, now consider the first setting of $99 versus $3,000, a new stage that allowed the dreamers and the wickedly clever to publish without a setting of some bulk investment and there was another part, “The income app stores take is 30%. Apple started setting that as a standard – they weren’t the first, but the iOS app ecosystem has been used as a model by many other players in the mobile app space”, now consider the you are a small developer, selling your software will need servers, protection software, shopping kart software, income checkers and go on from that. Apple delivered a system that does it all, so the developer will only need to upload their readied product. Thousands of dollars saved and the small developers get an almost free ride and they pay later through every sale. 

This is beyond fair, because the one million programs that came in the first decade would evolve, these people had a second option. They would sell their program for $0.99-$5 and Apple merely takes 30% of the sale, 70% remains with the makers and that contribution setting was already in play with software houses from the 90’s, yet those programs were often $299-$999. A mobile with the option of programs costing less than $5 are more easily sold and these makers suddenly made thousands of dollars, most of them massively happy. In that same light under Microsoft these developers would never exist. The cost of being up and running would strip all revenue away. As such Apple (and Google too) would create a wave of people creating the thousands of dollars to fuel the system would basically be paid for by the more successful players in this field.

So when I see the headline ‘Why we joined the Coalition for App Fairness’, I merely see a greed driven non-truth that is (as I personally see it) fuelled by greed.

So now the you have some of the background, we see the real deal, people like Epic Games and Proton-mail, they had an idea and they used that system to get ahead, which is nice for them, yet now, now that they made it, they want to avoid fees, they want the 30% that they initially signed up for as well. It is basically the same with Epic Games, once they made the numbers, their success went to their heads and they are now fishing (or is that phishing) for the 30% they signed up for? They want to avoid the apple fee and for one player it makes sense, yet this system was designed so that the small players would get a chance to become big, a stage that many faced. So when I see these ‘displays of fairness’ I merely see greed driven players merely wanting more.

The setting is however larger. The quote “First, to be clear, our mission at Proton is to foster an open, free, private, and secure internet. We exist today because a large community of people agree with these goals and support our work. Helping to found CAF does not in any way signal a deviation from these core values. Proton will always remain fiercely protective of our independence in order to put user interests first” gets to be ripped to shreds when we see “to foster an open, free, private, and secure internet”, yes they do have a free option, but it is limited, which might be fair enough, their goal is to be ready for the 4.00 € and 24.00 € a month users, whilst their free accounts are limited, the paying ones are driving this and so far they got 10 million people in their accounts, I am not aware how many constitutes free accounts.

Another point was “Our purpose for joining CAF is not about advancing the goals of Spotify and Epic, but about making sure that you, our community, have a voice in this important debate”, is the so? I find it debatable, for the simple reason that we are also handed “ProtonMail is run by Proton Technologies AG, a company based in the Canton of Geneva, and its servers are located at two locations in Switzerland, outside of US and EU jurisdiction”, whilst this sounds nice, outside of jurisdictions comes at a price and one could argue the organised crime finds the approach appealing, as do some people the want to avoid data accountability, but for the most, I am on the fence of how reliable data safety outside of jurisdictions tend to be (I am not making any statement on the security they run). So the app store has them as a free app, which implies that they are free, but they offer ‘Offers In-App Purchases’, and their own Twitter account gives us “We actually don’t understand the significance of paid account here? ProtonMail doesn’t offer in app purchases on Android, so purchases need to be made through our Swiss website”, and there is the kicker, they want it via their own website to avoid the 30%, exactly how Epic Games set it up, once they have the foundation of users, they want to avoid Apple (and/or Google) fees. 

I need to admit that Andy Yen is in a slightly different setting (as is Epic Games). You see, he started with the backing through kick-starters and ended up with a beginning capital of $500K, 5 times of what they needed to get started, a lot do not have that option, which I admit is not the stage that Andy Yen cares about (yet he claims the opposite), we get it, but when we see ‘a better internet that puts people first’, we need to realise the this was exactly what Apple did (Google too), by setting the contribution cycle almost EVERY developer had their chance at stardom, and whilst we see ‘free app’, how many people would have taken it up when the app had to be bought at $9.99, or $19.99? You forget that if we avoid the contribution cycle, we see the the funds need to be found somewhere, do they not? You really cannot get it both ways and for the most the contribution cycle is the most fair, because it is only taken from actual sales, so the newbies get to be there for free or for nothing (or both), and the big players basically pay for the little people.

Consider that and the fact that there is a price for being able to chose from 1.75 million app on a store. If that setting did not exist these store would end up having well over a million apps less. And this year, in the covid year, there is suddenly the need to avoid paying because the investors need to be appeased. As I personally see it greed is the final equaliser against choice, because these players want to be the only provider and the current stage allows new developers deploy their system, optionally a real innovative one, but they get a to because the costs of starting are not there, not like it was anyway.

Happy now?

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October 4, 2020 · 03:46

The mind stage

Where is the border of sanity? The is the question that is central at this point. Yes, we are having slightly too much fun with the new President of the United Stage, it is Mr. Covid, he is only 19 but running the US. As the news is exploding all over the news and the internet, we are given name after name, cluster after cluster and it is hitting the White House, the Senate and optionally Congress as well. After that there have been the dozens of attacks on Saudi Arabia, yet Iran is left outside of consideration and Ubisoft is getting hammered. Now, in part Ubisoft has itself to thank for what is happening, and I am not referring to the news that 25% was a witness or victim of unacceptable behaviour, or whatever that means. I am not making light of the situation, I truly am not. Ubisoft is part of its own problem, as marketing is trying to inflate hypes, we see this with ‘Prince Of Persia Remake Nintendo Switch Box Art Leaks Online’, as well as ‘Ubisoft Appears To Tease Rayman Project, Deletes Post After Fans Get Too Hyped’. The problem with hypes is not the they are hypes, they are the figments of illusional marketing. To set this straight I need to take you to an alternative setting

2 out of 3

There are three levers for a new house, one has the settings Cheap-Expensive, the second is called ‘Fast build – Slow build’ and the third one is ‘High quality – Low Quality’, the issues is that you can only select two, the third one will be set against you, which ones do you choose?

Marketing has a similar stage. Large visibility- small visibility, quick – slow, large placement versus small placement and high quality versus low quality. There are a few more elements, but this is merely to illuminate, in these four only two can be set and now you see the danger for Ubisoft as it ignored timing and quality, whilst keeping visibility and placement to large, and now the ignored quality is costing them. So as we see leak after leak (which I believe has been orchestrated by marketing element), we see all the setting in place and there is no consideration towards quality. So whilst we see “The players are back in the game but the way Ubisoft handled the whole ordeal didn’t hold up to a good standard. As a way to thank the players for patience with the patch, the devs offered some freebies to lessen the inconvenience caused by tardiness. One of them was the custom Desert Eagle and the other a grand total of 1,200 Skell Credits” we see the adaptation of quantity, and to fix it the gamers are treated to ‘some freebies’, as I see it the horse has left the stable and the stable is no longer theirs. And that setting is about to be set in a real live testing. The two games where things cannot go wrong for Ubisoft is AC Valhalla and Watchdogs: Legion. If either goes wrong the larger downfall stage for Ubisoft will be set. 

As I personally see it, they seemingly just will not learn, the last time they got it right was 2017, and I believe the they are at present out of options. As their marketing hands us story after story, leak after leak, they are sailing from the setting they need to be in (and perhaps behind the screens they are), and I hope they are, but the first hurdle is 40 days away and they better not miss a beat. 

So how does this touch on Saudi Arabia?

We see marketing via the media and newspapers, anti Saudi Arabia and the silence towards Iran. First things first, Saudi Arabia now has the initial setting of full 5G completed. No matter that this is Huawei, there is a stage where China now has options to open talks on all kinds of matters. Pompeo gave us via newspapers that they are using seduction and nuclear weapons, but that might merely be a second stage. Even as Huawei is opening technology, China does have the option to open up towards larger weapons contract, destabilising US interests in the middle east. All whilst Saudi Arabia with a functioning 5G becomes a testing ground for 5G, allowing Saudi engineers to create a larger benefit, optionally setting up new apps, all tested and ready to be deployed outside of Saudi Arabia. it is merely the setting on the side and the people opposing this are the ones who are afraid to lose too much coins.

Now, I am really willing to accept that it is all in my mind, but the setting stages of media marketing and media exploitation is getting out of control and that is what we now see, we see marketing driven media out of control yet the people who need to see what is going on are ignoring it. And the weird part is that it is happening to Ubisoft and it is happening to Saudi Arabia, two seemingly unrelated pawns in a much larger game, yet is it a real larger game, or one that is merely in my mind? Ignoring this is wrong, it is the same stage that these conspiracy theories have (I am always right, I am the only one who sees this). I try to back all the things I see with other links and verified news, Yet that does not stop a person to see what that person believes, but it does not mean that it does not exist. It is a larger stage of data versus insight. One cannot compare apples to pears.

So even as I see the marketing and media frenzy, I see both elements as separate ones, these two players are merely hit in a similar way. Consider the pro Saudi News, the one relating to Neom city, so a 500 billion dollar investment and we see in Google 21,000 hits? Whilst we see 54 million negative mentions towards Saudi Arabia. Does that not strike you all as weird? Now, I am not stating that Saudi Arabia is innocent, that it has no issues, but the world (pretty much all of it) tends to go coo-coo where money is concerned, and $500,000,000,000 is a lot of money. It inspired me to make four parts of my IP. And let’s be fair, out of $500 billion, even a 0.1% is well worth anyones time (I am hoping for a mere 1% and I am willing to end with only 10% of that), so as we set that trickle, do you think that the players like Google and Apple are not ready to jump in at similar settings at a moments notice? You have got to be kidding, but the media remains silent, 21,000 hits on Neom city? Are you for real? The same can be seen in light of Ubisoft, 6.5M, yet only 1.5M when it comes to Ubisoft and PS5, a lot more mind you, but there is a stage where they seemingly overlap in treatment by the media and that is what I saw. I feel justified in what I see and I feel justified in bringing it to light. Even as a lot will agree that Ubisoft has coming what it asked for, there is a larger stage which is completely absent of fair dinkum (an Australian expression meaning fair play) and I have an issue with that, just like the never ending anti-Saudi news. I saw a right wing poll with the question “Single Greatest contributing factor behind decline of UK”, from the 3237 votes, 72% voted that Islam was the reason, a stage that together with the anti-Saudi waves has become unacceptable, yet all these governments making anti-discrimination claims are massively incapable to do anything.

We are turning several corners at the same time and I for one am completely ignorant on what might be a solution. I merely wonder if we are returning to the age of the crusades, christians against Muslims and I for one had hoped that we had learned our lesson by now.

So if you think it is in my mind, fine, I get it. However, the Google Searches, the news items, they all seemingly prove me right. And this is all before we take a notice of the growing amount of anti-Islam and anti-semitism all over the western world. Is it all truly in my mind? It is (as I personally see it) not a stage that is merely in my mind, it is a growing stage and it is out there and we can no longer continue on the path that we are.

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October 3, 2020 · 13:42

Speculations, tomato juice and oil

Yup, when we see tomato juice and we call it blood, it is called a speculation. Until the liquid is tested, it could be blood, but that setting is quickly diminished when we test the liquid, and in this the setting of speculation is also important, when we say ‘it looks like blood’ it is one thing, yet when we say ‘I can clearly see that this is blood’ it becomes something else, yet the person could still hide behind a second statement by saying ‘I really thought it was blood’ and all is OK (from that point of view), but for others it is less clear. So that is the setting I had when I saw the article in Al Jazeera yesterday and I wrote about it in ‘To decide in anger’, I wrote about it yesterday at (https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/10/03/to-decide-in-anger/). So this morning I walked past my favourite bookshop and learned the they had the book Blood and Oil and the sales lady took me straight to it (bless her happy youthful heart), so roughly 73 seconds later, I was the owner of the book. A book I honestly would not have bought if I had not read the Al Jazeera article, so they can add the statistics to that part too. 

In this I learned early on that was in a style that I liked. It is also a dangerous style to use when it is anything else but fiction, and that is how we need to see it, it is for the larger extent a work of fiction. In this chapter 18 (In cold blood) which is about Jamal Khashoggi is as I personally see it as massively fictive.

To explain this I need to take you on a small journey. In the UN report (by UN Essay writer Agnes Calamard) we see at [208] “It also seems improbable that this plan to murder was hatched by the team on its own, or as has been apparently argued at trial, by the team leader alone, once on site”, the application of ‘seems improbable’ is clearly speculative, it makes ‘plan to murder’ fail as speculative as well. Consider that in Common law there is Murder, which requires the evidence of intent and there is manslaughter, which has a lower stage of evidence. In addition any of these actions are void of any evidence towards the Crown prince, no matter what is stated, the evidence has never ever been produced.

So when we see in the book on page 303 “the bloodcurdling detail of the brutality of the killers, dismembering Khashoggi’s body like butchers”, it is merely one of 4 issues I found in the chapter. There was never any evidence of any action, because there was never any evidence and this is what these fictional writers are setting their optional success to, it helps the they are well known writers of the Wall Street Journal. 

This is merely one of the parts of the journey. The other part is one the is a little more scientific. Consider that you add 50 quotes that have a high probability of truth, it is unproven, but those who know will of course highlight any the they know to be true. So as 20-30 out of the 50 are proven to be true, it will taint the other 20 with the ring of truthfulness.  It you give 50 quotes the are highly likely, every hit will optionally be given the ring ‘that might be true too’, this is beside the point that the chance to get one right becomes increasingly likely. It is there the the book (which is nicely written) goes from partial fiction to non-fiction. It is not new and it actually comes from Robert Ludlum (that is where I got the tactic from). He wrote about it in his book ‘The Chancellor Manuscript’ there the writer Peter Chancellor gets his fingers on details, facts he cannot prove and as an academic work it would be laughed at, but he sets it out as fiction and as people look at the book ‘Reichstag!’, people would look at it and wonder if it could be true. It is the the stage where a group called Inver Brass pushed Peter Chancellor and it was merely the beginning. This is exactly the stage the Blood and Oil find itself in and with the stage of what could be true, we can now see a larger stage. In this I looked at it differently because of all the materials I had looked at in the last few months. I do not regret buying the book, because as a fictional work, it reads nicely and plenty of us are curious about the Saudi Royal family, the pictures are a nice addition to the book. And if I can find 4 debatable offered facts in one chapter, I can find a lot more in the book, that is if we treat it as non-fiction. The setting goes on, when we see certain quotes we would consider that the leak would be the personal assistant to Mohammed Bin Salman, consider just how unlikely that is. Would ANY personal assistant be that open about the optional next regent of Saudi Arabia? It would be the highest position that any non-Royal could ever hold (I am assuming the any person assistant of the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia is not a member of the royal family). 

It is perhaps too funny, but I am just now realising the I am listening to the Mikado whilst writing this. A topsy turvy play on the gentleman of Japan. I feel that the setting is correct, and the stage where we cannot distinguish between fact and fiction is overwhelmingly appealing, but for me Blood and Oil is because of what I do know a work of fiction, the rest hat I cannot proof to be either is happily accepted in the fictive state, it makes the book easier to read. 

Even as the back of the book makes reference to ‘investigative journalism’, it is nice to see that the work from people of the Wall Street Journal can be easily seen as fictive, I wonder what other fictive works the paper optionally offers (a ha ha ha moment from my side).

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October 3, 2020 · 04:14

To decide in anger

We know it, we do it, even though our inner voice screams not to do that, we still at times do it. I had such a moment hours ago on a few settings, in the first there is WordPress pushing their Gothenburg editor fiasco on their users. I would think that 2/3 of the ratings being a 1 star for the new editor would be a clear message to not enforce an editor the is not ready, but there is no fighting stupidity that is linked to the ego of others, so as such we see a group of people now looking to Wix as an option, I wonder how long it takes for WordPress to catch on.

The second issue was quite the opposite, I just learned that La Famiglia Trump has the Coronavirus, I got pinged by over a dozen papers, so there is for some the small satisfaction that the coronavirus could kill him before the election does, some will be thankful, I merely see it as an option where people can consider taking the day off, stay at home and not vote, time will tell. Yet the final two were the larger anger settings. Here it is important to set a few things straight. I am a christian (Catholic), I tend to be neutral on religious matters (for the most), but the utter stupidity that we see (at https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/10/2/macron-announces-new-plan-to-regulate-islam-in-france), where we are given ‘Macron says Islam ‘in crisis’’, so how stupid does a person need to be, especially when he is a non-Muslim to make a statement like that? There is the additional “‘Islam is a religion that is in crisis all over the world today’, says Macron, as he unveils plan to defend secularism”, which only makes things worse. As I see it secularism is a form of ego driven faith in nothing but self and your own greed (or hunger for power). In a world where well over 80% believes in something more (even the agnostic adhere to that), we get an atheist thing towards us the there is nothing more, well, he is allowed to believe this, yet in a nation that is Catholic driven, why does he not state that towards the Vatican? Afraid the there is little boy movie that he might be interrupting? #JustAsking

In addition as we are given a little repetitive quote by Al Jazeera “President Emmanuel Macron has unveiled a plan to defend France’s secular values against what he termed as “Islamist radicalism”, saying the religion was “in crisis” all over the world”, we need to take notice that apart from Christianity, he also does not push the setting towards India (Hindu), which is another billion people. As such we could flag the statement as discriminatory. So why is he isolating the Muslim voice here? When we look at the issues in play in India, there is a lot we could say, President Marcron isn’t doing that, so what is his game? It is a fair question, he seems to be aware of the world issues in some way, so the question is relevant.

The last piece is from Al Jazeera as well (Qatar is in rare form today), here it is another attack on Saudi Arabia, the story (at https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/10/2/mbs-why-the-world-may-be-stuck-with-the-ceo-of-saudi-inc), gives us ‘MBS: Why the world may be stuck with the ‘CEO of Saudi Inc’’, well as I see it stuck is a bit of a stretch. Perhaps we forget that MBS stands for Mohammad Bin Salman Al Saud, Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. This means that when his father Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the current King of Saudi Arabia relinquishes the crown, Mohammad Bin Salman Al Saud becomes King of Saudi Arabia. When? We do not know, yet as his father is 84 years, so there is a decent expectation that this will happen within the next 20 years. In addition, the nation of Saudi Arabia is a monarchy, so this setting was never a surprise, as such the entire ‘stuck with’ falls under the stage of what I call BS. In addition there is “Two years after the brutal murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi by a Saudi hit squad” we seem to ignore that never any reliable evidence was delivered. We could go on with the setting the Jamal Khashoggi is merely missing. OK, I do not believe that either, but if the media ignores vital facts, I can do the same thing, fair? And I will give Al Jazeera that they do give light to the with ‘Two years on, Khashoggi murder unresolved, body still missing’, yes, the murder remains unresolved. As such I could accept that Khashoggi is most likely killed, yet murder sets a level of intent that cannot be proven, and without a body a manslaughter conviction is a fairy tale in any Common Law court.  Anyone accused would most likely walk away, no verdict given. In the end the article is exactly what I expected, a mere written form of advertisement towards the newly released book ‘Blood and Oil’, it also gives us (on the cover), the sub-line ‘Mohammed Bin Salman’s Ruthless Quest for Global Power’, here I take a little bit of a distance. In the first I haven’t read the book, so the stage of ‘Quest for Global Power’ is optionally a stretch, in this American presidents are more easily accused of that. Yet, let’s not forget that the King and Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia have (optionally) a sworn duty to do what is best for Saudi Arabia, I wonder if the book touches on that. And in Muslims terms there is another side to the Al Said family. They are (the king is) Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, one could argue that the responsibility of the King (and optionally) the Crown Prince is larger than life. Consider that ALL Muslims accept that these two places are the heart of their faith, in this 24% of the entire population of the planet, 1.85 billion are Muslim and their faith is centred on Masjid al-Haram (the Great Mosque of Mecca) and Al-Masjid an-Nabawi (the Prophets Mosque of Medina), 

That is some responsibility, it is one that the royal family accepted and it has been the centre of their actions. I wonder how much consideration was given to these parts of the larger equation by Bradley Hope and Justin Scheck. If we look distant and fair to actions in play, we can argue the most nations are looking for Global Power. The UK, the US, Russia, China, all players seeking global power, it has been like that for decades. Yet now there is a new stage, as Saudi Arabia embraced 5G, they are no in a stage to get ahead in the game, r better stated, they could end up with a decent slice of the 5G environment, mostly because others were stupid and made accusations that had no evidence creating a vacuum, and Saudi Arabia, especially in the Neom sage has embraced whatever they could get and that is now optionally a much larger slice of a cake they never vied for. Yet the article gave me one part that was actually insightful. It was given to us by Patricia Sabga. She states: “The Saudi royal family is something of a black box. It’s largely impenetrable to outsiders, including people who have spent decades visiting and studying in Saudi Arabia. How do you go about carving a window into that black box?” There are two sides, in the first the this is optionally true, but how many royal families will allow carving a window in their private lives? And second to that, why would the Al Said family allow it, no matter whether other royal families have done so? Privacy is an expensive commodity and it seems to me that privacy should not be given away, but that is merely my take on that.

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October 2, 2020 · 23:52

A new road

We all have new roads, some roads are completely new, some are ‘sort of’ new. We tend to like the ‘sort of’ new roads as they feel more familiar, but it does not imply the this is the best road. This is the way we move forward. In all this, how does one react when we go towards a road we have never seen before? Consider the stage the this is not some adventure, it is a choice of life, a choice that impacts one’s life to the latest degree, do we feel as certain? 

As some are in a stage where they are considering that President Trump could optionally die of Covid before the next election, we see that this is perhaps the weirdest years we face in half a century. In the UK we see lockdowns with a 5 minute warning, now the is one way to change the settings of any game, yet is it wise? It is in the same direction that others face, a new road, different decisions, but is it all really new? We could call all the plays in the international scene, but we have seen it before, it is a play based upon a play that is old and stale. Even now as the EU wants to limit the apps Apple and Google put on phones, it is merely a variant of Internet Explorer V3 all over again, the greed driven will never learn. So whilst we get informed on “Draft rules would force the tech giants to share their data with rivals, and limit how many of their own apps they pre-install on devices”, I am actually surprised that they did not give us “share their data with non-Chinese rivals”, a stage the we have seen before and one that we will see again, to be honest, I am not certain if the people setting the rules have any clue who the people are that they represent, merely the setting of larger tech company trying to get a grip on technology the they ignored for too long. And ever as we are told “The draft rules, known as the Digital Services Act, aim to set the ground rules for data-sharing and how digital marketplaces operate. They are expected to come into force by the end of the year”, we see a stage where tax rules are ignored, it is too complex for them, they will do it later (or so they believe). Even as we are told “The case has taken on urgency because of the dependence of thousands of EU companies on the tech giants for their business”, a setting which I regard to be a joke, because those ‘thousands of EU companies’ refused to budge on several items when too going was good, they merely latched on like leeches, getting max result for zero effort, I know this because if that was not the case, I would not have the IP I have now, and there are only two contestants for the IP to get ownership, the rest is merely dumbstruck on the side of the road and as they are realising that the digital highway os beyond their comprehension and as they feel the floor slip from under them as 5G comes into power, now they all cry like little girls, all with their own version of ‘Google/Apple is such a mean old bastard, boo hoo hoo hoo’ theatrics and optional fake tears. 

My view is given by a few quotes, the first one is “The App Store was opened on July 10, 2008, with an initial 500 applications available”, we then see the that the app store grew with 2 million apps in 2017 and now it has 1.75 million apps. So these people had a decade to get involved with Apple, as such where it their timeline? Bullet point idiots basing their needs on concepts. Where it the actual and factual engineering in place? The story for Google is pretty similar. Global businesses  (not merely EU companies) with short sighted goals, short sighted, merely because their spreadsheet was dictated by financial people, not a long term sight in place. I reckon (my speculation) the some people tarted to reconsider their position when Apple announced the 10 billion download mark somewhere in 2011, but at the point the credit crunch got in the way and the people (more lazy than anything else) decided to wait, but the Digital highway is one where waiting is a sin and Google showed the easy enough. And now, as companies are realising that 5G will merely see exponential options where established apps are in place, unless you have a third party data need and that is overwhelmingly attractive, but there the Google and Apple stores are a problem for them. They will happily play with GDPR fines, yet the Google and Apple stores are the problems and as I see it, and as I see it, the EU is stupid enough to force open the doors to others. 

My vision?

Why is this my vision, because we are told “limit which apps Apple and Google pre-install on your phone”, just like the setting it had in the Internet Explorer v3 age. I thought they would have learned by now. In the first, Apple people go iOS, Google people go Android. In all this we the consumer chose what WE want, but did you see any of the in the article? Our voice is not heard ad not given any power, because it is about appeasing ‘the dependence of thousands of EU companies’, the companies that were asleep at the wheel in the first place, not merely asleep, they have nothing to contribute, a concept at best but when you look at the staff, they have none, yet they will sure others the these people will be hired the moment certain steps are finalised, and it will be a ‘complex issue’ to say the least. In all this, these companies have never considered a new road, adjustment and aggregating what they have and what they are delivering, but they all hide behind players like Epic games with, if a game maker can do it, so can our EU business enterprise, can it not? And there we see the first flaw from the very beginning, these people are mostly clueless. Should you consider me wrong, then consider that on the digital highway beyond Apple and Google, the third player is one the started as a book shop, a bloody bookshop no less (Amazon) and its owner, who copycatted his hairstyle from Telly Savalas (just like Vin Diesel did). So consider that whilst we see another gravy train trap our choices in what THEY call open choices, but it is not, it will make life harder for the consumer, not easier and none of them will guarantee your data.

So in the words of Lieutenant Kojak “Who loves you baby!”

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October 2, 2020 · 02:14

You’re useless and you know it

Yup, quite the opening headline and  would like to tell the reader the it is about him or her, but no such luck, the headline (as is) can only be given to the most useless of useless, the US Senate. Yup, as some voices stated in the past, the US has fruits (US Congress) and nuts (US Senate) and there we sit in the middle of the tutti frutti of the dance floor, one might almost invite Madonna to come over and add a little spice to the mixture.

Yet Reuters who gives us (at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-senate-tech/senate-panel-approves-sending-subpoenas-to-ceos-of-twitter-facebook-google-idUSKBN26M6FA) the headline ‘Senate panel approves sending subpoenas to CEOs of Twitter, Facebook, Google’, with the quote “The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee on Thursday unanimously voted to approve a plan to subpoena chief executives of Twitter, Alphabet’s Google and Facebook for a hearing likely to be held before the election on a prized legal immunity enjoyed by internet companies”, We can go in every direction possible, but lets start with “passed into law as part of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) of 1996 (a common name for Title V of the Telecommunications Act of 1996), formally codified as Section 230 of the Communications Act of 1934 at 47 U.S.C. § 230. Section 230 generally provides immunity for website publishers from third-party content”, In this we see two elements, the first being that in 1996 there was no Google, no Twitter and no Facebook, in the second on larger beneficiary was the online presence of FoxNews, Yahoo and lets face it as I personally see it, Microsoft who started part of the mess we have now. 

To invoke what I did (the useless part), it is important to see “After passage of the Telecommunications Act, the CDA was challenged in courts and ruled by the Supreme Court in Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1997) to be partially unconstitutional, leaving the Section 230 provisions in place. Since then, several legal challenges have validated the constitutionality of Section 230”, in this Justice John Paul Stevens (Supreme Court) wrote in June 1997: “We are persuaded that the CDA lacks the precision that the First Amendment requires when a statute regulates the content of speech. In order to deny minors access to potentially harmful speech, the CDA effectively suppresses a large amount of speech that adults have a constitutional right to receive and to address to one another. That burden on adult speech is unacceptable if less restrictive alternatives would be at least as effective in achieving the legitimate purpose that the statute was enacted to serve. … It is true that we have repeatedly recognized the governmental interest in protecting children from harmful materials. But that interest does not justify an unnecessarily broad suppression of speech addressed to adults. As we have explained, the Government may not “reduc[e] the adult population … to … only what is fit for children.””, as such how stupid does a US Senator tend to be? It passed the Supreme court, it passed a few stations over the term of 20 years and optional alleged beneficiaries (Google, Facebook, Twitter) are called into a Senate hearing? Some sources even state ‘Letting Platforms Decide What Content To Facilitate Is What Makes Section 230 Work’, the latter one is up for debate, but the setting of section 230 is not, it is a legal thing, so why would someone set the stage for a hearing the is basically pointless set the stage? To get a few free dinners and perhaps tax deductibility? I do not know, I merely ask.

The setting of a stage 40 days before election, is the current view and when we see “top Democrat Maria Cantwell, who opposed the move last week, saying she was against using “the committee’s serious subpoena power for a partisan effort 40 days before an election,” changed her mind and voted to approve the move” I wonder what this really is, because as I see it, it has nothing to do with big tech, and optionally section 230 is also not in play, but what is? There is the optional quote given “Republican President Donald Trump has made holding tech companies accountable for allegedly stifling conservative voices a theme of his administration. As a result, calls for a reform of Section 230 have been intensifying ahead of the elections, but there is little chance of approval by Congress this year”, yet optional settings of “stifling conservative voice” would not change that, this is about intentional hurting facilitation, changing the premise of free expression, the moment big tech is held responsible, no opinion is heard and the anti-Trump (those who highlight stupidity) is seen nearly everywhere, as such, President Trump needs every amount he can get. I do not think that this is the right path and more important changing law on this scale to bake (not make) awareness of something set almost in stone for 20 years does not help. 

In this I want to extend my friendliness to give a shout to the largest part of the problem, mainly Republican Senator Roger Wicker, even s he gives us “After extending an invite to these executives, I regret that they have again declined to participate and answer questions about issues that are so visible and urgent to the American people”, I merely wonder if he has any clue who the American people are. This train of thought is seen as Politico gives us “under the newly unveiled Online Freedom and Viewpoint Diversity Act, the legal shield would protect the companies only when they take down specific types of content, including material “promoting terrorism” or which promotes “self-harm” or is otherwise illegal”, as such, when was there an upside when we consider ‘specific types on content’, as I see it it the setting towards a biased filter of what constitutes free speech and freedom of expression. As such the simple question becomes: ‘Who has seen S.4534 – Online Freedom and Viewpoint Diversity Act?’ Deputy Counsel Elizabeth Banker did and gives us “Section 230’s otherwise objectionable clause underpins crucial content moderation efforts that make their platforms safer for everyone. Eliminating that clause will make it harder, not easier, for online services to remove content like misinformation, platform manipulation, or bullying that’s neither illegal nor in the bill’s new description of allowable moderation. This bill would also hamper platforms from adapting to future moderation challenges.“We also have serious First Amendment concerns with this bill. This bill would limit the ability of private online platforms and services, including small forums for schools, churches, and local sports leagues, to set and enforce rules for their communities.””, a direct powerful view given on September 8th (at https://internetassociation.org/news/statement-in-response-to-the-introduction-of-the-online-freedom-and-viewpoint-diversity-act/), as such we takeaway “Eliminating that clause will make it harder, not easier, for online services to remove content like misinformation, platform manipulation, or bullying” does this constitute the idea that the speculated biggest bully in America wants a free pass? And there are also “serious First Amendment concerns” which cannot be ignored. 

When we see this level of issues from the very beginning, how stupid is any senator participating in this, and when we demand under freedom of information their names and tell people that this lit constitutes a list of people attacking free speech, how happy will they be? There is of course the issue of the elected Democrat from the state of Washington Maria Cantwell, I wonder what she has to say for herself, especially it he hearing happens before the elections, I reckon that President Elect Biden will not have too much need for her, but that is merely my speculation.

 

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October 1, 2020 · 04:30

Gaming on a serious level

Yup, one sees a game, the other sees an application and the third sees a solution, that is how it is, how it, for the most has always been. I got introduced to Palantir in 1998 or 1999, I got access and took a look at it. At the time I was working for other parties and I noticed that Palantir government had a setup the was nice, it was not what we now call IBM Miner, but it had potential. So when I got introduced to the news giving me ‘Secret and unprofitable Palantir goes public’ I took notice. You see, I started to wonder what was happening, the quote “Seventeen years after it was born with the help of the CIA seed money, data-mining outfit Palantir Technologies is finally going public in the biggest Wall Street tech offering since last year’s debut of Slack and Uber”, it gets to be a little worse when we consider “Never profitable and dogged by ethical objections for assisting in the Trump administration’s deportation crackdown, Palantir has forged ahead with a direct listing of its stock, which is set to begin trading on Wednesday”. You see the setting is not great for Palantir and as I see it, over 17 years they made their own bed, this is seen with “The company has just 125 customers in 150 countries”. Now, I can claim that I am not the brightest person (even though I passed the Mensa requirements), but the stage of 125 customers in 150 countries is not manageable. Even as they ‘hide’ behind “Our software is used to target terrorists and to keep soldiers safe”, you see, the software has a foundation and a base. Even as one foundation part is to hunt terrorists, the base is to analyse data. I can hunt terrorists with IBM Statistics, IBM Miner and Mapping software, it might not be fast, but it will get me there (well, mostly anyway), so in the setting we see with Palantir, we see a larger failing, especially over 17 years. They had well over a decade to extent the bae and create an additional foundation, optionally getting another 125 customers, yet that was not what they did, is it? So when we see “Palantir paints a dark picture of faltering government agencies and institutions in danger of collapse and ripe for rescue by a “central operating system” forged under Thiel’s auspices”, I merely see an excuse. You see Palantir has no need or reason to rely on a station with ‘faltering government agencies’, by extending the base and creating another foundation they would not need to rely on the side and add an optional third foundation called reporting. The need for washboarding and sliceable presentations have been a larger requirement for close to a decade, these options are required in the intelligence world as well, leaving it up to others means the the slippery slope of business intelligence becomes smaller and less pronounced, a place that relies on long term vision has been lacking that a lot, has it not?

Even as Scott Galloway from New York University gives us “They’re massively unprofitable and they’ve never been able to figure it out”, the obvious question becomes, were they unfocussed, uncaring or just lazy? The vendor the relies on government jobs can’t rely on them for more than 2 years, if the program is not showing forward movement, there is no long term justification and when we see “Palantir has accumulated $3.8bn in losses, raised about $3bn and listed $200m in outstanding debt as of July 31”, we see the faltering position that Palantir is in. It cannot rely on the customer base it has, because well over a third has extended its credit card too much, as such they need to adapt to a form of Business Intelligence gathering, data mining, slicing and washboarding and set a new stage in long term reporting. As I see it, Banks and financial institutions will have extended Business intelligence needs and additional needs as well. If you think that financial fraud is big now, wait until banks automate under 5G, it will be a tidal wave 5-10 times the one the banks face now and they will need to have additional ways to find the transgressors, relying on the police will be a monumental waste of time, which is not the flaw of the police, it is the consequence of the times and their needs. I state financial institutions, because it is not merely the banks, it is the credit crunch seekers that will need to find the people with outlandish debts and as the laws will adjust because the banks will no longer accept that the wife gets the house so that they can live in luxury of what they could not afford, the game ends soon enough, the credit drive will force change and there would be a market for Palantir if they adjust. They need to adjust faster the they are ready for, but the current agenda does not allow sleeping at the helm. As I personally see it (on small and debatable data), Peter Thiel took too long and even as we are being told “winning a modest contract early in the COVID-19 pandemic for helping the White House gather data on the coronavirus’s impact”, I wonder how the data collection part was achieved, in light of all the places where no data gathering correctly existed, the stage of the gathered data becomes debatable. 

The article (at https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/9/30/palantir-goes-public-in-biggest-wall-street-tech-offering-of-2020) as a lot more debatable parts, in all they are tracks that could have been highlighted by adding a few commercial data gatherers to the fold from day one. There is the other need for a setting of adjustment and weighing of origin data, all whilst all the data is scrutinised. I reckon that this would set a stage where the findings of Sarah Brayne would be considered in house and not after certain stages went live (or perhaps they were merely ignored). She found “the Los Angeles Police Department’s use of Gotham, found the software could lead to a proliferation of unregulated personal data collected by police from commercial and law enforcement database”, I will add to this, the setting that the software was designed to people employing trade craft, they would be outliers on the entire board, a setting that rates questions on people who seek cheap solutions because of budget, seek evasion because of divorce and outstanding bills, the acts are similar but not terrorist in nature.

OK, I admit, I do not know the exact setting in LA (other that Lucifer is their consultant), but the setting of outlier data came to mind in the first 10 seconds, and the finding of Sarah Brayne and ‘proliferation of unregulated personal data’ supports that, apart from the fact that unregulated data tends to be debatable and optionally in part or completely incorrect, data mining gives us the option to clean if the sources are known, unregulated personal data takes the out of the equation because the origin of the data (the person adding and manipulating data) is unknown and as such the data becomes unreliable. 

That is a lesson that banks would have told them quickly, if not them, then players like Equifax, because Palantir will end up in their fairway, the odds would not be even for Palantir. Yet Palantir needs to grow if they are to exist in a stage after tomorrow, to the there is no doubt, the US, UK and most EU nations cannot continue on the intelligence data foundations that they currently are. So as we see that, how many customers could Palantir lose? Growth is as I see it the only path that remains, banks are the most visible needling of more intelligence gathering, but they are not alone and Palantir needs to gird their loins.

 

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