December 9, 2024 · 18:47

To box office, or not to box office

That is the question and the question is valid as the movies opened up in 2018 with a revenue of $2.6m, seems little but in the few years that passed, annual revenue went up to a quarter of a billion, as such screen daily kept an eye on the Saudi market (at https://www.screendaily.com/features/is-saudi-arabias-box-office-boom-over-or-set-to-rise-again/5199910.article) in that same setting I created the script ‘How to assassinate a politician’ about the assassination of Islamophobe Geert Wilders (the current prime minister of the Netherlands) the alternative title was ‘Essay’ (I came up with that later). I aimed it for the Arabic (Saudi Arabia/UAE) market. I contacted 2-3 player, but I never heard back from them. I thought that through streaming they could also get to the Egyptian market (as well as the Indonesian markets) The ‘bad vibe’ feelings in Indonesian markets might be well received. A Dutch politician getting the Sukarno treatment might keep Indonesian people on their couch watching the demise of the Prime Minister five times over. Anyway, those were my thoughts and it seems that they didn’t agree with me. Still the setting remains. As we get “At least one of the major exhibitor groups operating in Saudi is said to be exploring a possible sale amid high debt levels incurred during its rapid expansion. Last year, AMC Entertainment Holdings, the world’s biggest cinema chain, exited the Saudi market in the face of intense competition, selling to Saudi Entertainment Ventures (Seven), which is operated by the government’s Public Investment Fund.” The intense competition was why I tried the streamers as a possible interested party. We can think box office all we want, but in the end, the people need to be entertained at home. The last time I went to the cinema, it was $19 for the movie and popcorn and a soda set me back another tenner. That’s three months of Netflix. I reckon we need to consider the home office and for a lot of Saudi’s (as well as Indonesians, Egyptians and people in the UAE) the same setting is looming. It is not that streaming is better, it is merely more affordable. Now that Apple is getting more into Saudi Arabia, it will be soon that Apple TV is coming too (or already there). And with the setting of “Bidding wars for titles from major US sellers were common, but less so now. Minimum guarantees have dropped as a result, reflecting the reality of a market that has levelled out. “When Saudi opened up, almost any film would work. But now audiences are a lot more selective,” says the executive.” Makes me feel that there is still a chance of my script making it to the screens of people. The movie plays part in the Netherlands and part in Dammam (no real reason why I chose it) and one scene in Iran. The setting of a movie that deals with islamophobia was appealing to me, because it is something nearly any Islamic person is exposed to (especially in Europe) and as such I created an idea with my copy of Final Draft (given to me for that reason) and a stronger view is given with “One bright spot is the market for Arabic-language content, particularly from Egypt. The figures underline the executive’s point: the top five box-office films of the year so far include two Egyptian titles (action drama Sons Of Rizk 3 and romantic comedy Gawaza Toxic) and one Saudi comedy (Shabab El-Bomb). According to Comscore, Egyptian titles now account for an impressive 25% of the Saudi market, while local Saudi features have a 7% share. US films, by comparison, take 53% of box office in the country.” My movie is not in Arabic, but it was designed with the stage of an Arabic version in mind. I merely lack the language skills to make it directly in Arabic. Now I see that this setting is given with “Egyptian titles now account for an impressive 25%” gives me hope that my final curtain call is not here yet. Yes, it is hope because I had never written a script before this and as I look at the tally where beside ‘How to assassinate a politician’ I am working on ‘Kenos Diastima’ (a TV series in the making), ‘Engonos’ (TV series in the making) and ‘Residuam Vitam’ (mini series in the making). I created these series partly to keep my writing skills up and it wasn’t until ‘How to assassinate a politician’ had formed more completely in my mind that I decided to make it in a script (in Final Draft) and when I started pushing that title did I start to set the blackboard for ‘Residuam Vitam’ which is still forming. 

And as we see this we also need to take notice of Adon Quinn, CEO of Saudi exhibitor Muvi Cinemas, believes that Arabic content can help drive future growth. I am willing to agree, but that is really in my favour. You see it is nice that things go to cinema (happy to help), but I reckon that the streamers in the UAE (Dubai Media) and Saudi Arabia (Aloula) will make the larger difference. The need for Egypt and Indonesia seem clear and Indonesia with a population of 277 million potential viewers should not be underestimated. As Quinn tells us “He points out the wider Saudi box-office slowdown echoes what has happened in markets around the world this year. Its main cause, he says, is the depleted supply of content caused by Covid and last year’s Holly­wood actors and writers strikes. “The strikes had a big impact on the first half of 2024,” he observes. “We’ve seen when the right content is there, the audience is there.”” But he also exposes a problem. The depleted supply is seemingly due to Hollywood. Still tapping the Canadian, Swedish and western European markets might not be a bad idea. Especially as California is about to get a few additional issues and they are not yet polarised into tinseltown (Hollywood). 

There are definitely options for the Arabic market, but I reckon that the streamers will have a much better time they do not need a movie distribution system and they can get a lot of traction roping in a potential viewing group of well over 400,000,000 people. You can fish in a barrel, but the same barrel holding either 400 million or a mere 35 million, that is the setting as I see it and as I have noticed Dubai Media is ready to get on board with that setting (I saw it was ‘proclaimed’ by certain individuals on LinkedIn). 

The market is where you cater to it and I thought it was a good idea to cater to the Arabic markets. Have a great day.

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December 8, 2024 · 22:46

The losing bet

That happens, we make bets. We all do in one way or another. Some merely hurt our pride and/or our ego. Some deals hurt others and there are other settings, too many to mention. But Reuters alerted me three hours ago on a deal that will have a lot of repercussions. The article ‘US clears export of advanced AI chips to UAE under Microsoft deal, Axios says’ (at https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/advanced-ai-chips-cleared-export-uae-under-microsoft-deal-axios-reports-2024-12-07/) is one that has a few more repercussions than you imagined it had. The global loser (Microsoft) has set up a setting where we see “The U.S. government has approved the export of advanced artificial intelligence chips to a Microsoft-operated facility in the United Arab Emirates as part of the company’s highly-scrutinised partnership with Emirati AI firm G42, Axios reported on Saturday, citing two people familiar with the deal.” Microsoft is as desperate as I think they are with this deal. They probably pushed the anti-China agenda and made mention of the $1.5 billion dollar investment deal. And as we are given “The deal, however, was scrutinised after U.S. lawmakers raised concerns G42 could transfer powerful U.S. AI technology to China. They asked for a U.S. assessment of G42’s ties to the Chinese Communist Party, military and government before the Microsoft deal advances.” And we are also given “The approved export license requires Microsoft to prevent access to its facility in the UAE by personnel who are from nations under U.S. arms embargoes or who are on the U.S. Bureau of Industry and Security’s Entity List, the Axios report said.” In this I have a few issues.

In the first there is no AI, not yet anyway as such the investment is going the way like water under a bridge. Microsoft knows this as such they are betting big and they have the US government backing them. In the worst case it will be the US government putting up the $1.5 billion themselves and with the anti-China sentiment that is a likely result from this.

In the second the setting that Microsoft is banking on is a loop setting with multiple exists. Yesterday the Financial Times informed us ‘OpenAI seeks to unlock investment by ditching ‘AGI’ clause with Microsoft’ (at https://www.ft.com/content/2c14b89c-f363-4c2a-9dfc-13023b6bce65) the events are piling up and as I see it Microsoft is on the edge if desperation. You see, it all hangs on the simplest setting that there is no AI (not yet at least). What we have is a setting with LLM’s and Deeper Machine Learning and it is clever and it is a ‘optional’ wholesome solution to a lot of paths. But it is no Artificial Intelligence. You see, as all the laws are part of ethics and ‘AI’ people look around and think that there is ‘awareness’ of solutions. There are not. It is all data managed, a somewhat clever solution to people seeking an aware-like solution in data and some kind of knowledge discovery mode. It all could be clever, but it is still no AI and at some point certain people will dig it out and I reckon the UAE will be ahead of it all. Microsoft and its Ferengi approach of ‘When you get their money you never give it back’ comes with nice loopholes. You think that Microsoft made the ‘investment’ now here is the cracker. There is nothing stopping Microsoft of putting it in a ‘bad bank’ approach and make it all tax deductible and then some. And when the “artificial general intelligence” (AGI) clause is dropped there will be all kinds of attention from all over the place and no one is looking at the details of whatever they consider AI and what Alan Turing clearly considered to be AI. When the people that matter start looking and digging the days of Microsoft will be numbered. Another bubble game created and now that they have ‘enticed’ the wrong kind of people they will want their pound of dollars. And as we are given “The Biden administration in October required the makers of the largest AI systems to share details about them with the U.S. government. G42 earlier this year said it was actively working with U.S. partners and the UAE’s government to comply with AI development and deployment standards, amid concerns about its ties to China.” And in that setting Microsoft decided to be the governmental bitch to say the least. And all these media moguls are so loosely playing along and what will happen when someone digs into this. They will play dumb and say “We didn’t comprehend the technology” and it wasn’t hard. I saw it months ago, if not nearly almost two years ago. And the media was stupid? No, the media goes the way of the digital dollar, the way of the emotional flame. So as the field opens, we see all kinds of turmoil with Microsoft claiming to be the ‘saviour’ all nice and kind (of a sort), but when you look at the setting, it is my personal speculated feeling that Microsoft wouldn’t have made this move unless they had very little moves left. And in this setting the one player is forgotten. China, how far along are their ‘designs’? And in all this what are their plans? We seem to be given the setting that it is all American, but as the media cannot be trusted what is the ACTUAL setting? I have no clue, but in a world this interactive, China cannot be far away. 

And if there are people who disagree, that is fair, but the actual setting is largely unknown. So when we get to the last paragraph which gives us “Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Investment Company, the UAE’s ruling family and U.S. private equity firm Silver Lake hold stakes in G42. The company’s chairman, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, is the UAE’s national security advisor and the brother of the UAE’s president.” Consider this small fact. Microsoft seems to be ‘investing’ all whilst the anti-China rhetoric is given. Do you think that anyone who is the National Security Advisor (of the UAE) hasn’t seen through a lot of this? So what was the plan from Microsoft? I am at a loss, but with the AI setting the way it actually is none of this makes sense. Do they really believe that Microsoft is any kind of solution in this setting? Simply look at the accusation that Microsoft has also been criticised for the perceived declining quality and reliability of its software. That is your partner in so-called AI? Just a thought to consider.

Well, you all have a lovely Sunday. My Monday is a mere 80 minutes away.

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December 7, 2024 · 01:24

The shame of neighbours

That is a little bit awkward. You see, you are you in your own eyes, but your neighbours might disagree. I know for a fact that in the past my neighbours thought of me as someone running in the light of insanity (as they saw it). I never saw it that way, but that is me. As such I looked at the BBC article (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp837p125ywo) with the headline ‘Muslim couple forced to sell house after protests by Hindu neighbours’ with a slightly tilted head. I reckon the Mahatma would be ashamed of this event. So as we see “A Muslim couple in India have been hounded out of their newly-purchased home by their Hindu neighbours who said they would not allow them to live there because of their religion.” It comes with the additional text “Hindu residents of the posh TDI City – an upscale residential bloc in the northern city of Moradabad – began protesting on Tuesday night after news of the sale became public.” So remember, when it comes to prejudice, there is no better place then Moradabad. And that is not all. Consider that you would consider barring the neighbours you have for the simple fact that they believe something different. And it is not out of this world. Consider that in America being Democrat (or Republican) might get you socially barred in places. They might not protest you living there, but the neighbours will ignore you ever after. And it is not because you did something really wrong (like chasing children) but because you have an altered faith. We have all seen the issues in the past. Being a protestant in Ireland might not get you the high fives, being an atheist in Vatican City might equally be wrongly viewed by the Catholics around you. And there has been a near forever issue between Hindi and Muslims people. On the other hand Muhammad Ali Jinnah solved this issue by creating Pakistan. As such it took me a little back. I had not expected that this issue was still major in India. And we are given “The backlash to the sale of the house, he said, “has come out of nowhere” as there are other Muslim families already living in the colony and that “we had always had a good rapport with our neighbours”.” With the more important part “Our intention was not to create any kind of unrest with this transaction,” he said, adding that “there is no law” against this transaction.” As such there was not a legality issue, it was merely discrimination. And we can see that in more than one way. There is a reason why there are no churches in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is completely Muslim, so I get it. But in India with its 14.2% Islam population, this news seems odd to say the least and I reckon that there are Mosques housing the 202,865,128 souls. So it is not a singular setting. It is my personal view that the area of TDI City are seeking a segregated life. I don’t know how to feel about that. On one side it is deplorable, on the other side this religious issue has existed in India for well over 90 years. So I cannot see why, how or what regarding this issue. It comes across as a blockage in my mind. The stupidity of certain values. Perhaps I was raised on the wrong standards in life and that is why I cannot see this blockage for what it is. 

Have a great weekend, Saturday started an hour ago for me.

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December 6, 2024 · 12:09

Early Christmas for Guerrilla Software

Yes, that happens. The moment that we hand someone an early Christmas. The fact that Guerrilla software is not Microsoft related and the fact that they inspired this idea made me want to give me the idea to them. In this it all started on November 9th when I saw something that woke up a spark of innovation. It got me to write ‘The Easy Lesson’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2024/11/09/the-easy-lesson/) and when I read the statement “Reports suggest that development on Vision Pro began in late 2015, and from that time until WWDC, Apple filed for over twenty thousand worldwide patents and spent about $130 billion on R&D.” I tasted a massive hint of negativity there. I forgot who wrote it, but the idea that innovation was slapped down because it costed a little (130 time a little) threw me off. I thought, what can I do to make it a stronger success. I get it that reporter was all about being cozy with the place where ‘free’ money is (aka Facebook) and I decided to counter that and here is the result, all freely available for Guerrilla software as well as Apple who could use a rather large win at this time. So here it is and have at it.

The idea
The idea is not a game but a visual exploration based on the game. You see, no matter how excellent the game is (and it is really good) true emersion is seen when you are in the middle of it all and as such Apple Vision Pro makes it’s introduction into the world. The idea is to use the setting of the game to show the vision holder on how immersive the Apple Vision Pro is. In this narration you are a traveller from somewhere else. You start in Mother’s Heart. It gives you a lesson in how the narrative works. You are an ‘inventor’ of the camera and as such you can set the stage. You can walk freely in Mother’s Heart see the people and interact with them. The game gives you tasks and that gets you credit coins. If you complete all tasks you get a red marker from an elder. The red marker lets you travel to another location. It also gives you a shelter. You get it randomly, but the shelter is in your name. If you do not have a shelter in that place you get a bunk in an inn or place (depends on where you are). So lets have a look at the locations.

  • Mother’s Heart
  • Freeheap
  • Sunstone rock
  • Meridian
  • Sunfall
  • Mainspring (option)
  • Ban-Ur (option)
  • Song’s edge
  • Longnotch
  • GreyCatch

Mothers Heart has one new location (still random), all others have 2-3 locations

When you are in your location you get tasks (of a sort). You are given a ride (mostly striders in first part) and the narration is set to your proving your camera. You are given an escort a son or daughter of Aloy. AshTone (Daughter) or BeeSneeze (Son). They will escort you so that the ride will ‘stay’ in the right place. Each location has rides out of town to locations where the machines are. They will have an old location to visit, machines to see and more of that. The important part is that this is not a game. You see the machines, but they are all docile. You will be able to photograph yourself with the machine in the background and you haven’t seen anything until you see yourself with a Thunderjaw or a Storm-bird in the background. It will be to get the good shots with machines or distinctive locations in the background. In this we could also enable to locations with a holograph in view and the views they had in the game. There will be the need to add a few hundred tasks in the game so that any location will have dozens of tasks but per ‘play day’ you only get 10. When 10 are completed, you get a red marker and in the first location (Mother’s heart) you get an assigned location, via a raffle bag, which will have stones. Each stoner is engraved and  signifies a location. At that point you will be able to travel to another location and start anew.

Each location will have a specific task, like only Mothers heart will have the option to see Devil’s Thirst. And each location should have a tall neck assignment. The idea is that the Tall neck and other large machines will show you these large machines through the Vision Pro making them seem a lot more impressive than on the PlayStation. All machines are docile and will not harm or attack you. There is however a setting with corrupted machines making the machines attack them on sight, the chance of that is a mere 1%, making it a rare setting. All these options make for playability and a long term entertainment setting. I wonder how long it will take for the Game map to be transferred to Vision Pro. And at this point I have enough setting to get Horizon Zero Dawn transferred including Frozen wastes. And in this the Forbidden West as well. I reckon that if this could be completed there would still be time until the third game is released. 

The towns should be near exact (wherever possible). Several ruins and old cities and each locations will have Chargers, Striders and Broadheads that can be ridden. As I see it, from the Mothers Heart (location one) Striders are used. From location 2 onwards Striders take you back and Chargers and Broadheads take you forward to another location. And after location 2, you can see the glyph on the machine to see where you will go. The locations you have already seen will be readable, the scribbled glyphs are indication that it is a new location and your focus hasn’t learned it yet. After the second location you will have 3-5 rides to chose from. And every 20 tasks after the first 10 give you an additional place to live and show off your created artwork. I have more on this, but that is for the eyes of Guerrilla only.

What I tried to envision is an original narrative with the locations all Horizon players loved and now a lot more ‘realistically’ seen through the Apple Vision Pro. As for the ‘creator’ aka ‘het Grobbekuiken’ Mathijs de Jonge. Hier is het idee, als je denkt dat het wat is, zie het als een ‘early Christmas present’, Veel plezier en een prettig uiteinde. 

Have a great day, it’s Friyay!

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December 5, 2024 · 17:07

The price of debt.

That is what I am looking at, the price of debt. You see, they are all hailing that the US economy is strong. One voice (Goldman Sachs), the one that lost it all in 2007 told the world that America would be strong at 2.5% (somewhere I read it). To all it sounds nice and I like nice, but I also query a system that is to my (non-economic view) is rigged. As we see images all over the place on how good things are supposed to be, consider:

We see the setting as tax collected. For 2023 is was “The US government collected nearly $4.7 trillion in gross taxes during the 2023 fiscal year, which is a 15.5% decrease from 2022. The IRS collected taxes from a variety of sources”, now for some it is a little more then milk money. And that sounds nice, but the other side has “As of October 2024, the United States government’s monthly interest rate on its debt is 3.3%. The average interest rate for 2024 is 3.32%, and the total debt is $35.46 trillion.” Consider the simple setting of 3.32% of $35.46 trillion. This gives us $1,170,180,000,000 dollar annually. Which would be ‘liveable’ were it not for the simple fact that this is ONLY interest. The debt remains. And now we have a problem. You see the interest is is a simple 24.89% of the entire taxable revenue and it was 15.5% less from 2022. Do you now see the problem? 25% of all taxable revenue goes to the banks that carry the debt. The federal government spent $6.75 trillion in FY 2022. This means that they spend over 30% to much, more than they had and if there was no debt we could argue, but at this setting we are faced with the simple fact that $6.75 trillion was spent over an available amount of $3.5 trillion, which is getting worse and worse. As such we could surmise that the debt will increase with a little over 3 trillion over spending over last year alone. As I see it America is done for. And the setting worsens with the optional crushing of Google in 2025 (by breaking up that firm) which give Huawei their first global win. Then the defence industry is losing more and more revenue to China and this sets a larger premise. In that setting we see on one hand “The A&D industry generated $425 billion in economic value, representing 1.6 percent of the 2023 nominal GDP in the U.S.”, yet in this we already seeing revenue shifting to China in this year alone and more revenue goes to Europe. For Saudi Arabia alone this sets the bar at “In 2024, the Saudi Arabian defense budget is worth $71.7 billion and will grow at a CAGR of more than 8% during 2025-2029.” Yet other sources give us that “Saudi Arabia estimates military spending will be 15 percent lower than budgeted this year” as such we could surmise that this implies that Saudi Arabia by itself would spend $10 billion less. Not a biggie you say, but the other side is that China now has a little over 10% on that slice of delicious gunpowder baked pie. Making the loss for America more. As such we see an annual loss of $16 billion in one year alone from one customer. As such, what would be the books on India, Japan, Taiwan, Pakistan and Indonesia? If we see these picture, we see a dangerous escalation towards some fictive nil revenue for America. Fictive because that will never happen, but as the largest players seek economic stability they will spend less and take other jobs ‘in-house’ as the expression goes and America has been too reluctant to appease to that state of mind. And now China will step in to offer just that. As I see it, the question on the dollar setting was wrong. We are given “As of March 2024, over half (52.9%) of Chinese payments were settled in RMB while 42.8% were settled in USD” against the tariffs threat by president elect Trump. The actual question would become “How long could the US Dollar keep standing?” You see, as the debt becomes a millstone around the neck of the US administration, we need to consider that some nations will seek shelter from the fallout that this setting. In 2017, on March 17th I wrote ‘The finality of French freedom’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2017/03/17/the-finality-of-french-freedom/), I set the comparison of the Euro like a barge kept in balance by 4 strong economies. UK, France, Germany and a combined economic anchor. The UK was lost and there was a setting when the French anchor would be lost too. The Euro could not survive a setting with two anchors. A simple equation. Now with the Dollar under attack the Euro could face near certain scuttling. As such the Dollar has an influence there. China seemingly doesn’t care, but the other players who make up a combined anchor might switch sides when they merely look at their own currency. And the debt? They will not care. And as such the dollar faces a lot more than the bully tactics of choice. They will need to up the game by a lot, because when one goes, so will the other and that puts the livelihood and liveability of 784 million people at the markers. 100,000 of them will do fine, but that represents a simple 0.01275348% of people who are likely to make it (outside of the EU and USA), so when were that good statistics? 

The price of debt was always there, but the media has been eager and willing to hide those facts through BS and spin and soon when the people catch on (the other 99.987% of people), the live of playing the media courtesan will be one of the most dangerous of them all. People remember. And it was a simple equation for the media. “You can fool all the people some of the time, you can fool some of the people all of the time but you can never fool all of the people all of the time” A simple setting I knew to be true as early as the early 80’s. So how long did they have at most? Some are already falling in the bad light and when the people realise that they weren’t eating potatoes, but turnips. They will become massively enraged. 

A simple setting I have known to become reality at some point. So when are we given the goods? When the interest of the debt of America is shown as a setting against the budget and at this time it is around 25%, Americans need to realise that budgets need to diminish by at least 30%, so at what point do the people realise that the simplicity of the matter is that their money is about to be gone?

Have a lovely day.

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December 4, 2024 · 20:11

The premise was already set

There were some ‘noises’ on what I wrote yesterday and the ‘ludicrous’ setting of Huawei. Well, lets have a look then. The Corner (at https://thecorner.eu/news-spain/the-government-authorizes-saudi-stc-to-purchase-9-9-of-telefonica/117825/) gave us a few days ago ‘Government Authorises Saudi STC To Purchase 9.9% Of Telefonica’ It does not sound like much, but in that setting together with Egypt (as I reported in 2023) the Saudi Telecom Company was already aligning with Egypt and now as it is settling in Spain, Saudi Arabia has now a direct line of communications with the larger part of Europe. They already had Portugal and optionally also have parts of the United Group (details are not known to me).

Then when we see merely a day ago we get (at https://www.rcrwireless.com/20241202/featured/stc-huawei-5g-saudi-arabia) ‘stc, Huawei to enhance 5G connectivity in Saudi Arabia’ and now we get “Stc noted that this solution boosts operational speed by 200% compared to earlier models. Saudi telco stc and Huawei have announced the commercial rollout of SuperLink, a digital solution designed to enhance 5G connectivity across remote areas in Saudi Arabia.” So whilst we get the softer message from Nokia on 5G and we should forget 5G, because their 6G will be da bomb (slight personal tweaking). Yes, always look at the horizon whilst Huawei is upgrading 5G to something that resembles 5G+. Another fine mess the makers of yesterday’s technology bring us. There is however no timeline for 6G and whilst we hear all the wild stories, I have to argue that the organisations that remained in the dark for the longest of time, now has da bomb? I call that a dead mans bluff. Like what they had done before and nothing came from it. Now that China and Saudi Arabia are setting the new marker we see the setting I warned about in ‘The question remains’ on the 21st of December 2022, two years ago I warned of this setting and Now suddenly we get the Nokia news? (OK it has been out for some time), but we haven’t seen anything out in the open with tests and so forth. In that same time Huawei set the proof all over the place and with HarmonyOS they can go to town, especially if Google is forced to break itself up. And as others are forcing Huawei out, we merely see other telecom companies taking the Huawei lead and offering it to customers. We can see all the ‘bigger’ telecom brands heeding the words from the US and so far it lacked any evidence. New the stage will be set that Saudi Arabia could offer a cheaper solution to people in Europe, the Middle East and Asia a solution with Huawei. Now, we get the setting that the larger Telecom companies will have to compete for the same customers. And in that setting 33 million in Saudi Arabia, a slice of 115 million in Egypt and slices from Portugal and Spain giving them slices of 60 million people. And that is before we consider the fallout all over Europe. You see, in the end these other players need people to fuel part of their profits. The anti-China rhetoric from Trump with the added anti-Huawei rhetoric will fall flat. In the near future they have the numbers and now others are in trouble. I reckon that soon Saudi Arabia will make a play for other Vodafone areas. I have no idea how far they get, but any Telecom company that starts not making their numbers will jump on that churn bandwagon. All this whilst Huawei is breaking new boundaries. So whilst someone reported the great success Nokia is making others make mention that the new setting is coming in 2027 (a presumptuous setting as I haven’t see the full papers). So what of 2025 and 2026? A two year bluff sounds nice, but Huawei is giving us “Stc noted that this solution boosts operational speed by 200% compared to earlier models and significantly extends 5G reach without requiring extensive infrastructure, making it ideal for connecting remote regions efficiently. The solution also improves deployment efficiency by reducing antenna requirements by 67% compared to traditional single-band parallel link methods, lowering tower rental costs.” A more than normal cost efficient solution and it is being rolled out in Saudi Arabia. I reckon that the UAE will follow soon thereafter and in that setting Egypt, Portugal and Spain are likely next. This gives them slices of a multiple times the Saudi population and in that setting with Egypt in their banner the Saudi 5G solution will turn heads and put the other players to shame. It would be a world first that Saudi solutions are cheaper and outperforming other telecom companies for at least 2 years. And that is until the people figure out that the Nokia solutions becomes too expensive. The rot in an economy also implies that the people need cheaper solutions and Nokia is less likely to deliver at that time. As I see it all Saudi Arabia needs to do is to figure out how to add France and Germany to that pool and the Huawei battle will be decided in favour of Huawei. Oh, and whilst you are brooding on that. Consider “Huawei technology must be removed from the UK’s 5G public networks by the end of 2027 under legal documents handed to broadband and mobile operators today” I have NEVER ever seen ample documentation that Huawei was an actual danger. It was proxy tantrums from an American administration trying to bully others to hate Huawei too. Now that the stage changes and when it does (no if it does), Germany will have to turn the rudder in their decisions. I reckon that France will immediately follow suit (a speculation, I have no evidence). All that and now it comes with a directive from Saudi Arabia, who owns a stake in several telecom corporations all over Europe and Africa.

Do you still think I was wrong (or talking shit). The evidence has been out in the open since 2020. It is the tail-side of having no economy left at present. And as I see it, the telecom companies will go for each others throats and in the meantime the STC will keep on buying stakes in the other companies. So take that setting and introduce some unaffordable 6G future solution from Nokia. Are things adding up yet? And don’t forget, 6G might be actually da bomb but it is well over 2 years away, so how are your finances holding up in 2 years? Mine won’t survive, I reckon a lot of others will have a similar problem soon enough.

This gets me to the final push. It was seen in Satellite Pro Me (at https://satelliteprome.com/news/stcs-job-attachment-program-surges-by-72/) where we see ‘STC’s ‘Job Attachment Program’ surges by 72%’ that is even better then the bulk of telecom companies had 20 years ago. As I see it, Saudi Arabia will need a massive staff expansion and retrenching of current staff as we are given “The programme offers STC employees the opportunity to gain hands-on experience, explore career paths, and develop professional skills.” As I speculate to see it, is that the STC is going places and needs staff to do so. The countries I mentioned will need extensive upgrading and a much better service and call centre setting and that is just for starters. As I see it the STC is the largest Telecom employer before the end of 2025. Oh, and that is before we even see where France and Italy are in that setting. This could be the larger push into Europe and I reckon that this is fight that Huawei is happy to see Saudi Arabia do at present. I hope I haven’t oversimplified it for you too much.

Have a great day and good morning to Vancouver where it is now 01:10.

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December 3, 2024 · 22:58

Bully tactics

The BBC (LinkedIn also) gave us a story. The BBC (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgrwj0p2dd9o) is giving us ‘Trump threatens 100% tariff on Brics nations if they try to replace dollar’. We are given “US President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to impose 100% tariffs on a bloc of nine nations if they were to create a rival currency to the US dollar. “The idea that the BRICS Countries are trying to move away from the Dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER,” Trump wrote on social media on Saturday.”Now we can shout high and low, but the simple setting is that this is merely the second setting on the line that the good times are over in the US and things are about to get a lot worse. The simplest setting to consider is that if these facts present themselves the first hurdle will crash the little economy that they have. Let me explain. If President elect Trump goes through with that. Stuff in a place called Walmart will become close to twice as expensive. This implies that Walmart will drop all goods from China and India. As such others will have to provide, which will turn out to be close to impossible. Consider that Walmart employs 2,100,000 people and as I see it close to 60% will be out of a job then. Walmart has a net income of 16 billion dollars. It comes from $648 billion dollars. Now all these Chinese and Indian goods would get a 100% Tarif. So what happens when all those goods get a 100% surcharge? The American administration will drown Walmart into oblivion. Add to that the Google issues and China will get near clean run on running the global economy. So why wouldn’t they push for a Yuan to become the new central currency? And in that process slam the American administration as well? I reckon that China is chomping at the bits to get started on that. With the hardships given to Google, Huawei gets a smashing option to take market shares from Google in Europe the Middle East and Asia. Apple will get hit, but not as much. Then we get the Walmart and its wannabe’s who rely on cheap goods from China and India and they will all pretty much lose whatever they had. When we see Walmarts closing all over America many will realise that the game for America is up. I did mention this danger for well over a decade. When you let the debt run out of control with no exit strategy there is no real solution coming. I saw that a mile away, so why didn’t these overpaid economists? Now we get the new AI bubble and soon people will realise that it is merely another gimmick. When the revenue stays away from the books, when these revenues get pushed back again and again the third step will be reached. So president elect can bully as much as they can, but the pole position was missed and whomever is in control have no solutions to offer other then austerity that goes beyond anything Wall Street could ever have predicted and the party is over now. Don’t worry the family members to Sam Walton and Bud Walton will be fine. They can relocate to a nice place where they can spend their money. The other 2.1 million are royally screwed. I will not blame any Walton. They played the economy game and they played it well, they have options. The bulk will not. And when the dollar is replaced, banks, retirement companies will as I suspect buckle as well. The impact of a $36,000,000,000,000 debt. The impact will go slow but it would be undeniable. As BRICS decides on another currency they will attract several other players and the European parties will consider the change and they will do what is in the best interest of their Euro, they will not care about the US dollar for one second. That is the reality that was pretty much spelled out half a decade ago. I get that America will try to do what is best for America, but that option was nulled when parties decided to break up Google. That was the first step towards the end. And now Huawei will be the best option for many players. So as the economic map will be redrawn, we will see a new horizon with India, China, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia at the head of this new horizon. In that new map there is no longer a mention of America, the US dollar will remain a little while longer until all other nations have dumped trillions in dollar bonds. That will be the trigger that ends the world economy as it currently is. 

Have a great day today, tomorrow is the midweek and a mere three weeks until Christmas.

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December 2, 2024 · 23:35

The version of a word

There is a word, it connects to the BBC article (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czeg2p3wjy1o) where we are treated to ‘Why so many games are failing right now – and why others are breakout hits’ the word in this is ‘game’ the definition is “an activity that one engages in for amusement or fun”. The problem is that most ‘game designers’ have no clue on games. The bulk of these ‘designers’ are setting the bar ridiculously low. Their version is to create some version that reflects a game and lace it with advertisements. You see 100K ‘customers’ implies that the designer gets 100K times a few cents. So that implies 100,000 times $0.04-$0.07 gives us $4000-$7000 per advertisement and take that 3 times then whomever downloads the game has handed their achievement towards the $7000. The world (Google, Apple et al) likes this, because they get their larger share of the cash, but that doesn’t make a game, it doesn’t even resemble a game. And mobiles and tablets are overgrown with that trash. In the years that I have seen these junk providers I have perhaps seen a dozen games at best and they are still around, the rest is easily forgotten. So the article gives us “There’s also evidence people have been spending less money on new games, choosing to stick with long-running online games like Fortnite or yearly franchises including Call of Duty and EA Sports FC. Despite that, more games than ever are getting released.” As such we see Fortnite, Call of Duty and EA sports. I like merely one of them, but these are all games. We don’t all like the same thing and as such the designers of an actual game get into a much larger predicament. 

I have met the greats Richard Garriott, Sid Meier and Peter Molyneux (and a few more). They have a different mindset and that shows. They created games that are close to timeless. Even now I could get my thrills from Ultimate 3-8, Alpha Centauri, Civilisation, Dungeon Keeper, Magic Carpet. These games let us enjoy actual gaming and they would still entice gamers today. That makes for a real game designer. There are more designers of course. As I personally see it game designer made Horizon Zero Dawn a game of near perfection. There are of course more designers. Yet as I see it, we are given “That’s not only affected premium releases – smaller studios, whose games tend to be more affordable, have also struggled to find an audience.

It’s often difficult to pinpoint why, but quality isn’t a guarantee of success.” In response I give you Hello Games, a smaller studio that game is all “No Man’s Sky”, they gave it to us in 2016 and is till debated, played and loved 8 years later. I do agree that quality is no guarantee of success. There have been these games going back to 1985. We had games like The Sentinel, Paradroid, Eye of the Beholder, Tower of Babel. The list goes on. Some become success, some do not. There is another cog in that wheel. In those days the press illuminated games that THEY liked, the game population was small. Now everyone calls themselves a gamer and that is where the plot thickens. It becomes about the advertisements and the fountain of replication. For example there are dozens of match 3 games and they all advertise. And as they all advertise to the same people the advertisers see their money bags fill up. That is not gaming. So now we get to another setting. We see it “As well as battling for player’s attention, new games are increasingly battling for their time. According to analytics firm Newzoo, annual series such as Call of Duty and online titles such as Fortnite took up 92% of gaming time, with just 8% remaining for new releases.” I have doubts about this data. I for one have never touched Fortnite and I know a few more people who did that. There will be an offset of course, like the platform in use. Tablet, Mobile, Consoles and PC/MAC. The final part I needed to look at is ““Factors like a strong IP, strong marketing campaign, community fostering, and timing can help, but the fact is that there is luck involved,” he says. Right place, right time is a big part of gaming’s surprise successes. “But gameplay matters, and innovation, so great games often stand out and find their market.”” I can agree in part with this. IP is essential, and in that setting the Horizon games stand out. A new IP is essential and Guerrilla has the goods. Still the IP was not enough. The first game gives us a storyline that is quite literally out of this world. And these two are essential to a success. Graphics snd sounds count, but without the first two graphics and sound don’t stand a chance. We can debate IP, but without it dozens will copy what you have or they will copy it as well. That sets your pool to a much smaller population. And as statistics go, consider that “14,000 games have been published on the platform this year, with 2024 already overtaking 2023’s tally” do you know what it takes to produce 14,000 games? It comes down to 39 games each day. Take the timeline and you get something unsustainable. A setting that Advertisers love, but do the gamers? And when you consider the number of games. It seems to me that the bulk of designers are set to appease advertisement funds. The red currency that dwindles on the gullibility of gamers and the BBC seemingly overlooked that small fact. They know statistics? They know the top-line of involved data? So why didn’t they see this? I know because I have been involved with games and gaming since 1985 and I have seen several iterations of gaming whilst taking the advertiser out of the loop. It is time for a better dimension of gaming and the BBC story merely confirms what I have known for several years. And in all this the BBC has been unaware of what they missed from the very beginning.

Have a lovely day.

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December 2, 2024 · 00:04

When it rains, it pours

That was the very first thought I had when I was confronted with the opinion piece in the Middle East Monitor (at https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20241129-saudi-arabia-abandons-pursuit-of-us-defence-treaty-over-israel-stalemate/) where we see ‘Saudi Arabia abandons pursuit of US defence treaty over Israel stalemate’. I have said it before and I will say it again. The US needs to stop their stop gap resolution of “We can do this, if we can have….” That is a setting that is past tense. America needs to open all valves to get any revenue out of Saudi Arabia (and other nations there). Now that we see “Saudi Arabia is now pushing for a more modest military cooperation agreement, two Saudi and four Western officials told Reuters” the US needs to stop its appeasement trajectory. On the plus side China is pretty happy with that flawed approach from America. There is every chance that China will open the flood gates and let Saudi Arabia go nuts on the Chengdu J-20. 

Is this a given? Nope, but for others to see Saudi Arabia embracing the J-20 is the first sign that America is about to lose several contracts. Not all (it fits with the modest military cooperation agreement setting) I predicted a loss of 40% towards the US defense contracts and so far there are indications that 30 billion left American shores for Europe and China (unverified numbers). But the first stage has been reached. And the setting changes if this does happen. The American loans are set to a 90%-95% fulfilment of contracts and there are larger consideration that America will at best get 60%-65% restated for America. And it gets worse for the US, Saudi Arabia has stated to grow its national defense settings and if China makes that happen all whilst Antony Blinken remains in the appeasement setting, the losses will get worse. I speculate a lot worse, but I don’t have access to anything reliable for the numbers in that game. As such, I need to add the ‘speculation’ label as I haven’t been connected to defence parties for 42 years. 

We are also given “Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman has again made recognition of Israel conditional on it taking concrete steps to create a Palestinian State” I understand that setting, but I personally belief that this should be done after the eradication of Hamas. Saudi Arabia has been under attack through Iranian proxies for too long and as such the three terrorist organisations Hamas, Hezbollah and Houthi their eradication becomes a near essential. You want to doubt this? That’s fair but the essential setting becomes that Iran wants to stop the achievements of Neom (including Sindalah, the Line, Trojena, Oxagon and Magna). At some point One of these three parties will be added to the work roster of them and they will introduce small flaws, flaws that might not be noticed now, but in a year or two when things start to go wrong, the costs will enormous. An Iran will be quiet for a larger share of the table that is how it starts and Saudi Arabia is too far ahead now. If we want to protect the achievements of Saudi Arabia eradicating Hamas, Houthi and Hezbollah forces becomes the larger setting. All those weakhearted lefties will argue that these people are really sorry and should be forgiven. I say hell with that and eradicate them all. Or have you all forgotten how Saudi Arabia was on the verge of setting the larger stage to include Israel? Some will say that Hamas was brilliant and I say that this is the final straw setting the stage of eradication for these three puppets of Iran. And Iran knows that Israel is about to settle the attacks on the territory of Israel and that would escalate things even further. Now that will happen in two stages. In the first the attacks that Hezbollah will vie for and the threats from Iran takes it even further. The danger here is that Iran could ‘press’ Houthi forces further and that would force the hand of Saudi Arabia. In that stage China could proceed by handing Saudi Arabia a support setting of the Chengdu J-20 as well as the primary delivery of the speculated Xi’an H-20. I reckon that it is not completed yet, but they could hand 3 of these puppies to Saudi Arabia so that the Saudi Airforce could strike against the Houthi Forces. (I did say could, not will). Consider that these two planes would be readily sought by other Arabian nations (including Egypt, Jordan and Iraq) this is largely speculative, but it allows China to take more and more slices from American defence industries. And as this happens Iran needs to hide, because these choices would reduce the Houthi forces to next to nothing and at that point Iranian actions would fall flat and at that point Israel has options and Hamas should have none left. 

As such the Saudi war hammer will carve slices of Yemen to rubble. In all this there are two sides that matter. The first is that the west ignored that stages that China prepared for and now we see that Saudi Arabia has selected for “a more modest military cooperation agreement” with America, as scheduled the door opens for China to get more of towards America assigned spending. As I personally would speculate is that Saudi Arabia is now in a good place to negotiate and as Blinken seemingly trusted on “We can do this, if we can have….” We see that America endangered its position for defence spending. I believe that I am correct, but there are signs that it is based on a opinion piece. Not on reported facts.

What people need to realise is that this all started on October 7th 2023 when Hamas struck the Nova music festival massacre, overall 1,139 people were killed and 250 Israeli civilians and soldiers were taken as hostages to the Gaza Strip. That started this mess but the media is extremely willing to avoid certain matters. And now we see a larger setting Saudi Arabia is (as I personally see it) ready to find a new defence partner and spend billions with that new partner. 

So when some will call this a mild rain, consider that thought because those billions would have paid for the loans which could now fall short of payment for the next few years.

As such appeasement becomes deadening. America made a massive booboo as I see it. Have a fun day.

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December 1, 2024 · 06:26

When the media uses the media

Yesterday I saw a message that threw me (at first). The BBC gave us (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c7747l84xp1o) and we are given ‘Hitman offered $71,000 for Canadian reporter’s assassination’. As I see it, it doesn’t matter who or where, but anyone paying more than $25K for shortening the life-wire of the reporter in question is over-inflating the problem. We are given “Convicted killer Frédérick Silva confessed to La Presse that he had offered the contract to anyone willing to carry out the hit on Daniel Renaud, who was covering his trial for three murders and an attempted murder in 2021.” The first thought I had was how people could fall for this. A convicted killer handing out the job to anyone for $71K? As I personally see it who is Frédérick Silva trying to escape from? Then we get “The “contract” was in place for roughly two months, but was never carried out, La Presse reported. Silva eventually cancelled the order, he said, because he had “more important issues to deal with”.” As I see it, when a person sets up a contract, it tends to be ‘fulfilled’ within a few days. So I am weirded out by a $71K contract that stays open for about 2 months and then withdrawn? The setting does not fit as some would say. Consider the premise of anyone in the lower security tier. Day one, scope where he lives, or where he frequents. Set the stage and set up a sniping position on day two. Wait for day 3-5 for the mark to show up and end his career (with a 7.62mm prop). In case of ‘dubio’ you could set it up in week 2 as well. So all the effort in two weeks explained and a convicted killer can’t do it and no one wants a $71K job? America with its problems and everyone in that setting passes up on a $71K job? And no one sees this? I had all these doubts, so I decided to take a look at the Canadian side of things and the CBC (at https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/hit-man-wanted-to-kill-journalist-1.7397281) gave me ‘Notorious Quebec hit man wanted to have La Presse journalist killed for $100K’ with the byline “a threat recently made public revealed there could have been a third attempt three years ago, when a contract was put on the head of La Presse crime reporter Daniel Renaud. “I was shaken,” Renaud was quoted saying in La Presse. “I am always careful about what I write. For me, the best guarantee for my protection is my writing.”” I read two articles and the only thing dripping off the writing is ‘how considerate’ he pretended to be seen. You see, we get one additional thing. We are given “Quebec provincial police informed Renaud in the fall of 2022 that notorious hit man Frédérick Silva, whose trial Renaud covered the year before, had put out a $100,000 contract to have the journalist killed.” If that was true the journalist either had something no one has seen yet, or there is another personal setting. So when Radio Canada gives us “Frédérick Silva was arrested in 2019 after spending months in hiding. Three years later, he decided to become a police informant and was airlifted to a secure location from jail.” So he was in hiding for months? And decided to become a police informant? What a disgrace (to some). So consider that “notorious hit man” forks out a contract. I get it, that would be needed to create an alibi and if he was so notorious some would take the contract to gain favour and fame in certain circles. And it came with a $71K bonus? I have issues with this all and I am surprised that I might be the only one. It is not the person. I wonder if anyone outside of Canada knows Daniel Renaud? That is not an attack on Daniel Renaud, he might be very famous in Canada, perhaps even more famous in Quebec. But I (and many more) have never heard of him and that is fine in this world where there are more journalists than there are pools. If you add the self proclaimed journalists we get a pool of so many people that they can replace the population of a medium sized country. So when you realise these items in the equation. Consider what these articles were all about. About a failed attempt on a life where the slightly above average precision shooter could gain an easy $71K, or a reporter that has suddenly be pushed into the limelight. 

As I see it there are way to many debatable issues here for comfort. I will let you make up your own mind.

Have a great day.

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