Tag Archives: BBC

Absolute Insanity

This all started a few days ago and I had to mull a few things over. You see AI does not exist, no matter how strong the hype and the presentations are. Now we see also the term ‘spatial AI’, another joust towards hype and revenue grabbing (the easy way). There are a few issues with all this. You see machine learning and deeper machine learning are great, they are awesome. In addition the growth of Large language models (LLM) are adding to the mixture but here is the snafu (situation normal, all fucked up). It is all still in the hands of programmers and verifiers. The issue of human error comes into play.

So when we realise this The BBC Article (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c977elr6veno) called ‘Airline to ‘better manage’ flights with AI use’ should get some investors worried. The start is seen with “The use of artificial intelligence (AI) at easyJet’s new control centre has allowed its operations teams to better manage flights, the airline said.” It reminds me of an old setting in the 90’s when someone produced a program called Goldmine. Don’t get me wrong it was a good program but it relied on standardisation. That means that exceptions aren’t dealt with. The programmers never anticipated the exception thy were given, so alternative fields were used and in AI the use of alternative solutions tend to be devastating on data models. So when we see “More than 250 staff work in the control centre, managing easyJet’s daily programme of about 2,000 flights.” We might see the initial problem. Last minute changes (pilot gets food poisoning) or perhaps the flight attendant got stuck in location X. It does not matter what the issues are, things will go pear shaped. And that is before they are confronted with the ‘oversight’ of the programmer. 

Now there is the recognition that a system like this can reduce stress on these 250 staff members, but it will need human verification and that is not what an AI system needs (if it existed). In the end I reckon that investors will see in 6-12 months that operating costs have exploded. I reckon that Johan Lundgren talks a good talk, and there are benefits to Deeper Machine Learning and it will help any corporation but the missing part in this are the programmers. You see these solutions aren’t AI, they required a programmer and that programmer makes mistakes. It might be simple, it might be complex and when that is found it tends to be in the most inconvenient way possible. 

Interesting that the BBC didn’t see this part. It would have been the first step I would take. Which firm was involved in this system? How many programmers? What previous assignments did they have? I reckon that the investors might have some questions on all this and I hope for Johan Lundgren that he has answers.

Leave a comment

Filed under IT, Science

Balances? Check please!

Two articles passed me by in the last 24 hour. The first gave me pause to think, the second was merely icing on the cake. The first article (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-69018575) is the report where the BBC tells us that 2 brothers required no more than 12 seconds to steal 25 million dollars. This happened in April 2023. Now it is time for a history lesson. In the 13th century Amatino Manucci, working for Giovanni Farolfi & Company tarted this approach in 1299 (possibly earlier). This method was still taught when I was in school 680 years later. But the IT people al rushing to get things done faster did away with parts of that. Although this last part is speculation, it makes sense that someone got lazy. Systems have seemingly done away with checks and balances. Interesting enough the BBC also gives us ““The defendants’ scheme calls the very integrity of the blockchain into question,” US Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement on Wednesday, referring to the public ledger that records crypto payments.” I am not sure if I can agree with that. Blockchain gives a timeline, change that and the timeline gets disrupted. What matters is that crypto needs a clear set of checks and balances in place to avoid ‘batch hackers’. As I see it there is an issue with the ‘pending private transactions’ why was it pending? The reason could be very valid, but then the checks and balances for pending transactions needs an overhaul. I am certain that this is not the only case. Yes, it might be the first case, but there is a larger station. You see the department of Defense (US) will have this coming year $850,000,000,000 and how much of that is set in pending transactions? Spread over Army, Navy, Airforce, Marines and Coast Guard. I reckon the US treasury department will hauling ass to get a handle on this. 

I am not arrogant enough to live by ‘this could have been prevented’ but systems evolved so quickly and with so much ‘need for greed’ that I have serious doubts whether someone set down to consider and evaluate the checks and balances on such systems. Even a odd ball geek looking at this and trying to see it inverted because that is the point where glitches are found. 

The second one was also from the BBC (at https://www.bbc.com/news/business-68843985). In this article Jane Wakefield gives us the goods. It is given with “There has been a common theme to these stories, and it is all about how each celebrity made vast sums of money from an online investment opportunity in crypto currencies. And if this all sounds a bit unbelievable, that’s because it is – I hadn’t done a single one of these interviews, nor written any of the articles. And none of the famous people involved, or me, would dream of endorsing crypto investments of any kind.” Is is another setting where the system is not ready for the criminal element. In my mind it lacks checks and balances. Although here it is not as simple. You see there are a dozen roads to the honey jar and sealing them all will just be a waste of time. There is a setting of cloaking and Meta does what it can, but these criminals are as good as the Meta developers, often faster too. 

For now I am still of the mind to never engage with any advertisement on Meta, it is not to be trusted. No social media is and that is a hard lesson to learn, but learn it or lose your cash. This is of course no good news to the real traders there, the real novel experiencers of hobby equipment, but it has come to this. It is time for meta to get a check mark too, one for sellers, so that the people are going to the right place. I am not sure how to go about that, it is not my field of expertise. 

It is Friday here now. Joy, joy.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Media

The Gump setting

You remember that famous character? Forest Gump with his ‘stupid is as stupid does’. This is the setting that I saw happening when the BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-68025683) alerted us to ‘US regulator admits cyber-security lapse before rogue Bitcoin post’, this is not a lapse, this is a screwup of the umpteenth order. They give us “The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) did not have multi-factor authentication (MFA) in place when hackers gained access to the account.” To give a clear view, to give you proportions. MFA was a discussed issue in University when I was at UTS 10 years ago. It was invented in 1996, well over a quarter century ago, although it was called two factor authentication. It is my speculation but I think that they left it aside until the call was needed and that call was clearly needed a decade ago. As such heads at the SEC need to roll (a queen of hearts idea). As such the quote “cyber-security experts say it should be a wake-up call for other agencies” is equally a joke. Those who aren’t ready need to be sanitised on several levels. There is no boo or bah about it. The fact that it took hackers this long to catch on is perhaps a small blessing in disguise. And the quote ““While MFA had previously been enabled on the @SECGov X account, it was disabled by X Support, at the staff’s request, in July 2023 due to issues accessing the account,” the SEC said in a statement.” The setting here is the question whether this was an SEC staff request or an X staff request (it could be read either way), but to remove security for access reasons implies stupidity of an unacceptable level. It means that systems were not ready, protocols were not ready and systems were deployed and configured in unacceptable ways. Then we get “The SEC has confirmed the account was compromised by a fraudster convincing a mobile operator to transfer an SEC employee’s phone number to a new Sim.” As such is it purely the fraudster, or is the mobile operator equally guilty? I honestly cannot tell on these facts, but multiple systems were unable to perform because the human element was not correctly set in stone. At present (based on SLA, or Service Level Agreements) there is a case that the mobile operator did not have the proper hat on because certain facts might not have been known to the mobile operator. The fact that an SEC phone number got swapped leaves the guilty party in the middle, but in this I admit that it is based on missing information. That missing information might show who went wrong (SEC or Mobile operator). And above all a properly placed MFA is intended to protect against this kind of hack (and several others). And lets be clear, this was not a grocery store, this was the SEC that got compromised in this way. 

As such stupid is indeed as stupid does and I reckon the head honchos in charge there will be upturning every process, protocol and service level agreement in place just to keep their jobs somewhat secured. That might be merely my speculative view, but I personally believe that to be the only step left for those yahoo’s.

Enjoy the middle of the week.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Law, Media, Science

Spy Games

The first thought I had. An excellent movie with Brad Pitt and Robert Redford, yet what would you think when I told you it is now the BBC who engages this scenario? In comes the BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-67945137) giving us ‘UAE has funded political assassinations in Yemen, BBC finds’. Finds? Found how? Is my initial feeling. I am not stating that the UAE is innocent, I cannot prove that, but can the BBC prove it? So here we get “Counter-terrorism training provided by American mercenaries to Emirati officers in Yemen has been used to train locals who can work under a lower profile – sparking a major uptick in political assassinations, a whistleblower told BBC Arabic Investigations.” So what mercenaries? Not stating that this wasn’t happening, but the question becomes who and to what degree. You see, the presumption linked to “sparking a major uptick in political assassinations” is nothing more than speculation and who is that whistleblower? This first stage has two speculations absent of evidence and all this is linked to American mercenaries? Not the best or most credible source. Wouldn’t you agree? The best we get is that mercenaries possibly trained Emirati officers in counter intelligence. That is quite the leap towards assassination. As I personally see, the better hit is done by the three drivers. Separation, Isolation and Assassination. Yet we can all agree that this isn’t always possible, yet Yemen has a better stage. Get a Houthi rifle (sniper rifle with silencer is best), pay a few kids to be ready to paint ‘traitor’ slogans on the targets house and in the early evening blow his head of and at that very precise moment get those kids to paint the slogans with the reward of cash and each a bag full of food for the family. Not much required for that, was it? 

Then we are given “The BBC has also found that despite the American mercenaries’ stated aim to eliminate the jihadist groups al-Qaeda and Islamic State (IS) in southern Yemen, in fact the UAE has gone on to recruit former al-Qaeda members for a security force it has created on the ground in Yemen to fight the Houthi rebel movement and other armed factions” in this, where is the evidence that “the UAE has gone on to recruit former al-Qaeda members”, what evidence is there? The press has very little credibility left. As I personally see it, at best, the UAE has a list of Houthi terrorists and spread a list around with ‘There people are wanted dead or alive’, the fact that alleged members of Al-Qaeda see that as a way to make money is beside the point. You see, what evidence is there to state that former members of any organisation are now part of a UAE security force? You see the issue is evidence and we aren’t seeing any. 

This goes on with “The killing spree in Yemen – more than 100 assassinations in a three-year period – is just one element of an ongoing bitter internecine conflict pitting several international powers against each other in the Middle East’s poorest country.” Now consider that the UN gives us “Over 150,000 people have been killed in Yemen, as well as estimates of more than 227,000 dead as a result of an ongoing famine and lack of healthcare facilities due to the war.” This implies that they are dealing with almost 380K kills from various reasons. So where are these 100+ assassinations? Where is the data? Where are the names? We don’t get any and in the first example I gave you, how can you see or prove that there was an assassination and not an execution by who gives a darn? We cannot get the west the acknowledge the Iran backed Houthis attacking Saudi civilian targets with drones and now they have a case of 100+ assassinations? I have some serious doubts here.

Then we see links to two other sources the BBC iPlayer (UK Only) that is not evidence, it is merely a BBC recruiting drive covered in a chocolaty spy story. Then we get more emotions and “Leaked drone footage of the first assassination mission gave me a starting point from which to investigate these mysterious killings. It was dated December 2015 and was traced to members of a private US security company called Spear Operations Group”, so who leaked the drone footage? Has the drone footage been verified as authentic? And suddenly out of the shrubberies comes the Spear Operations Group, so who are they? Apparently a Delaware outfit. And the source gives us a meeting in London 2020. Not dripping in any level of evidence. The other scenario is that a former Navy seal told a BBC person a spy story and he got paid for this. There is no verification on ANY level. There is a photo (anyones guess if that is a real person) with “He refused to talk about anyone who was on the “kill list” provided to Spear by the UAE – other than the target of their first mission: Ansaf Mayo, a Yemeni MP who is the leader of Islah in the southern port city of Aden”, so we will not get any facts, other then the mention that Ansaf Mayo was a target. All the news started spreading these tales 8 hours ago. In a few cases a few hours before the BBC told their story. I have some serious doubts. So who was Ansaf Mayo? The BBC article gives us nothing apart from the fact that he was an MP, so why was he killed? What evidence is there that he was assassinated? What evidence is there that who did that to this person? The list of doubts go up and it all reflects on a simple Spy game story, nowhere near good enough to be the stamped with ‘Approved by John le Carré’. Last we get to ‘investigators from the human rights group Reprieve’ with the text “They investigated 160 killings carried out in Yemen between 2015 and 2018. They said the majority happened from 2016 and only 23 of the 160 people killed had links to terrorism”, so where is their top line data? Consider that that areas had a rather large slice of 380K deaths (this list is a subset of that number) and a group with little to no visibility for the longest of time has any data on 160 people and only 23 had links to terrorism? More questions, especially as too many parties (including the UN) have been silent on Houthi terrorism, they blatantly kept silent to smear the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and this has been going on for years. The list goes on and on and this is the latest approach, now against the UAE. So what gives? The west angry that the UAE joined BRICS? They angry that the UAE is giving too much options to China? Your guess is as good as mine. I have no idea. I am merely questioning the validity of what the BBC is claiming here. I have my own version of these events, which I will not state, because it is pure speculation, I have no facts to support my version and I think that I have that in common with the BBC, we did not get to see any real evidence. Consider that if any of these sources were Iranian, or Iranian sympathisers the entire article collapses like a house of cards. 

Consider that as you start this Tuesday and I am about to enter Wednesday. A simple spy game story that isn’t worthy to sit on any shelf next to spy story masters like Le Carre, Ignatius, Herron, Greene or Deighton. It was a simple setting and I am rejecting what the BBC is telling us on the simple stage of missing evidence, missing verification and missing top line data in a stage where over 380,000 people were killed, finding 650 people (including children) that were assumed to be assassinated is extremely easy, the evidence was everything here and the BBC didn’t give us any.

Have fun today and that red dot on your chest? Pure imagination.

Leave a comment

Filed under Law, Media, Military, Politics

The tables are starting to turn

This is a setting I always saw coming.It wasn’t magic or predestination, it was simple presumption. Presumption is speculation based on evidence, on facts. The BBC puts out a near perfect article (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-67986611) where we see ‘What happens when you think AI is lying about you?’ There are several brilliant sides to it, as such it is best to read it for yourself. But I will use a few parts of it because there is a larger playing field in consideration. The first to realise is that AI does not exist, not yet. 

As such when we see ““Illegal content… means that the content must amount to a criminal offence, so it doesn’t cover civil wrongs like defamation. A person would have to follow civil procedures to take action,” it said. Essentially, I would need a lawyer. There are a handful of ongoing legal cases round the world, but no precedent as yet.

This is actually a much larger setting then people realise. You see “AI algorithms are only as objective as the data they are trained on, and if that data is biased or incomplete, the algorithm will reflect those biases” Yet the larger truth is that AI does not exist, it is Machine Learning or better, as such it took a programmer, a programmer implies corporate liability. That is what corporations fear, that is why everything is as muddled as possible. I reckon that Google, Microsoft and all others making AI claims are fearing. You see when you consider “The second told me I was in “unchartered territory” in England and Wales. She confirmed that what had happened to me could be considered defamation, because I was identifiable and the list had been published. But she also said the onus would be on me to prove the content was harmful. I’d have to demonstrate that being a journalist accused of spreading misinformation was bad news for me.” I believe it is a little less simple than that. You see algorithm implies programming, as such the victim has a right to demand the algorithm be put out in court for scrutiny. The lines that resulted in defamation should be open to scrutiny and that is what big-tech fears at present, because AI does not exist. It is all based on collected data and that data should be verified by the legal team of the victim and that stops everything for the revenue hungry corporations. 

In addition I would like to add an article, also by the BBC (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-68025677) called ‘DPD error caused chatbot to swear at customer’. It clearly implies that a programmer was involved. If language skills involve swearing, who put the swear words there? When did your youngest one start to swear? They all do at some point. So what triggered this? Now consider that machine learning requires data, so where is that swear data coming from? Who inclined or instituted that to be used? So when you see ““An error occurred after a system update yesterday. The AI element was immediately disabled and is currently being updated.” Before the change could be made, however, word of the mix-up spread across social media after being spotted by a customer. One particular post was viewed 800,000 times in 24 hours, as people gleefully shared the latest botched attempt by a company to incorporate AI into its business.” Consider that AI does not exist, consider that swear words are somehow part of that library, then consider that a programmer made a booboo (this is always allowed to happen) and they are ‘updating’ this. A system is being updated to use a word library. Now consider the two separate events as one and see how much danger the revenue hungry corporations have placed themselves in. When you go by ‘Trust but verify’ we can make all kinds of assumptions, but data is the centre of that core with two circles forming a Venn diagram. One circle is data, the other is programming. Now watch how big-tech is worried, because when this goes wrong, it goes wrong in a big way and they would be accountable for billions in pay outs. It will not be a small amount and it will be almost everywhere. The one case of a defamed journalist is one and in this day and age not the smallest setting. The second is that these systems will address customers. Some will take offence and some will take these companies to court. So how much funds did they think that they could safe with these systems? All to save on a dozen employees? A setting that will decide the fate of a lot of companies and that is what some fear. Until the media and several other dodo’s start realising that AI doesn’t yet exist. At that point the court cases will explode. It will be about a firm, their programmer and the wrong implementation of data. I reckon that within 2-3 years there will be an explosion of defamation cases all over the world. The places relying on Common Law will probably be getting more and sooner than Civil Law nations, but they will both face a harsh reality. It is all gravy whilst the revenue hungry sales people are involved. When the court cases come shining through those firms will have to face harsh internal actions. That is speculation on my side, but based on the data I see at present it seems like a clear case of  precise presumption which is what the BBC in part is showing us, no matter how courts aren’t ready. In torts there are cases and this is a setting staged on programmers and data, no mystery there and that could cost those hiding behind AI are facing. It is merely my point of view, but I feel that I am closer to the truth than many others evangelising whatever they call AI.

Enjoy the weekend.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Law, Science

Here come the eardrums

Yup, it is about sound and for a second the BBC woke me up (they tend to do that). There we see (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-68004968) ‘Gamers at risk of irreversible hearing loss and tinnitus’. I never was in a position to play music too loud, or play games too loud. I at times had my earphones and the music was up by a little. But some devices (like my MD player) had the ability to limit earphone volume to protect my hearing. Huh, what? Yes, hearing. So to read this article where we are given “The new review suggests that gamers play for long periods of time with the volume turned up, beyond safe limits. It says this could contribute to irreversible hearing loss or tinnitus, a constant ringing in the ears.” We are also given that this test was done in over 14 studies which in total involved more than 50,000 people. Now I have an issue with this. It implies that these studies had no more than 5,000 people each. This is not enough, but should not be dismissed out of hand because of it. Then there was “Some of the studies they looked at went back to the 1990s, when the gaming world was very different to now.” So the ‘damage’ is larger. It is over a much longer time making me question if a real medical investigation was done. In the 90’s games weren’t taken seriously, hardware was to some degree a joke (compared to today). Sound started to come through with the Soundblaster in 1990. It became serious with the AWE32 in 1994. But the overall setting was still not the best environmental setting. The only game who took sound serious in gaming was 

There you could be ‘heard’ and you could hear opponents. It was the first attempt to more serious stealth and they did it pretty good. Now we have a new setting. The new consoles could take the entire setting to new heights, where stealth is about hearing and not being heard. Even the Horizons series aren’t on that page yet. It is all about not being seen. Still, there is no telling where they take it in Horizons 3, the PS5 is ready for this. There are some indications (from unverified sources) that Unreal 5.5 will be ready too (not sure how Unreal Engine 5 picks it up). Gamers are visual (for the most). So stealth gaming could make a big swing in the next 5 years. Those who screwed up their hearing can rely on the next Call of Duty and Fortnite3 (or 4). It will be all about the graphics and sounds will be not an issue, if it is you (the deaf person) will become the ultimate loser in that game. 

This sounds sad and it is. We have all that hardware and certain protection stages have been either ignored or could be circumvented.

My first question becomes ‘Could more be done?’ It is not clear, because the article alerts us and does not show where the borders are. It is easy to blame the parents and they were probably the one who got him the earphones in the first place. We have seen a whole range of optical improvements, starting with the Unreal Engine all the way back to 1998, I reckon that sound is soon the next wave of improvements. I reckon that this is also the moment that there will be a huge improvement in stealth games. 

Below was my achievement some time ago. I am pretty proud of it, but I do realise that these Russians never heard me, I wonder how well I ended up if that was the case. 

I do love my stealth games, and I hope to see a whole range of improvements over the time to come. In addition, consider what happens when sound becomes a real player in the next Assassins Creed games. You still think you can sneak into places Basim? Or do you need to upgrade your stealth first? A stage that is merely waiting to happen, if you could hear that it. As such finding new protection systems for the hearing of the gamers seem to have a bigger need at present.

Just a thought to consider whilst I approach Friday in 3.1 hours.

Leave a comment

Filed under Gaming, IT, Science

Warning to Google

This must be done. I have spoken out to others and I love my Google, my pixel (etc, etc) and as such it is important to speak out to them as well when it is called for.

As such it starts with the latest update to Android, the Pixel now gives the weather on my screen, this is great. Then the problem started. I woke up with my mobile saying it was cloudy and sunny. As such I went out to infuse my blood with caffeine. A process most people go through, especially at 08:00. So I walk out and I am drenched to the bone in about 45 seconds. 

As such whilst sipping coffee I take another look at the weather part. It was set to Sydney. OK, my bad. So I look at the settings and I add Burwood to the equation. But here the issue starts.

Google wants my GPS to be active. There is no reason to keep track of what I am doing and in addition to that, GPS is an additional drain on the battery. A drain I can do without. It would have been so easy to save that setting in the app. Just save Burwood. I am there 97% of the time anyway. You see here is the warning to Sergey Brin, Larry Page and Sundar Pichai. The world needs one less Microsoft, not one more and that is where you are heading. Living of captured data. You got ahead by differentiating yourself from Microsoft, not to clone its business practices making Google the big bad to become.

And it took seconds to see that saving the weather setting was the easiest. Some might like to activate GPS, some need it but forgetting those who do not like it is bad policy. You see the current big bad (Microsoft) has additional issues and more re coming their way.

They bought another gaming franchise and paid close to $100,000,000,000 for it. So at 6% (rounded down) implies that they need to make well over $6,000,000,000 to merely pay the interest. Their gaming business is stated to be making $3.9B per quarter, giving us that 100% will go into paying of this load (principle and interest) and that will take a speculated 20 years to complete. This is now a setting where we see in what I presumptively call a Ponzi approach to their businesses. 100 years later and some still think it is OK to be this stupid. I saw this in the late 80’s with a Dutch firm called Infotheek. They bought everything around them and they went the wrong side of bad soon thereafter. This is in part why I predicted that Microsoft will enter collapse by December 2026. They lost their battles against Apple (tablets), against Amazon (AWS), Against Sony and Nintendo (consoles), ad now they are shedding marketshare in Office and streaming isn’t going their way either and that will go from bad to worse when the Tencent Handheld becomes a global brand. This is what is out there and Microsoft is losing more and more battles.

Google, I do not fault you for leaving billions on the floor. You did drop the Google Stadia after all. But when we also see (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-67937725) that the BBC reports that ‘Google’s billions make job cuts ‘needless’ – union’, we see a new pattern evolve. I am not judging on this move. There are always two sides and we see one side, but the image for Google is changing and that is not a good thing. They need to show themselves different. I for one (for more than one reason) are all in favour to change that workforce. Not to fire them but to give them a chance to pick up the billions Google left on the floor and there is more than one stage here, so there is a real option to pick up a lot of money globally and I recently gave the view on my blog. So I made it open to all (except Microsoft, they can sink to hell for all I care). 

So what gives? Why does a nobody (me) give a warning to Google? I reckon that is something you all need to look at as well. 

Enjoy the day, It is Friday here, in Vancouver not that much, they still have a bit to go.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Science

The biscuit loafers

Yup, lazy cookie dealers, or as you might know them ‘advertisers’. The BBC made me aware (yesterday) the story we see (at https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-67882315) where we are given ‘Google Chrome starts blocking data tracking cookies’, now this was nothing new to me. I was ACTUALLY in a Google building in 2019 when that news hit. I took notice of it and that is about all I did. I am no Cookie Monster (this title was already claimed by a resident at Sesame Street). So when I see now “some advertisers say they will suffer as a result.” With the added “The UK’s competition watchdog, the Competition and Markets Authority, can block the plans if it concludes they will harm other businesses.” Now the question becomes. How fucking stupid can people get? This is not out of the blue, this was said 4 years ago. For 4 years the greed driven stupid population let things slide, they relied on abused technology to get their dollars in and the Competition and Markets Authority is allowing for that extended abuse? How about they do something about the abuse of the media? That’s a novel idea.

So now we get to one of the abusers, his name is Phil Duffield at the Trade Desk who gives us “Google’s solution, the Chrome Privacy Sandbox, which only works on a Chrome browser, likely doesn’t benefit anyone other than Google”, actually yes. It benefits the abused, the actual people surfing the internet. The people you abuse every 10 minutes in a game, or abuse in some way that a specific website pushes to other websites because you looked for a birthday present there that month. The actual users of the web browser, it benefits THEM.

But people like Phil Duffield are deaf to those comments. So why isn’t the BBC asking Mr. Duffield to give a complete account of what they did in the last four years? Why did they not ask him how he prepared to deal with that challenging claim of the removal of cookies? They had 4 years to prepare. 

So whilst you consider the setting of these whinging winers, lets take a look at part two, which is totally unrelated. Yet that second part gives you the larger stage of what happens when you have stupid people letting things slide. The stupid greed driven people on Wall Street no less. Take a look at the news that we saw in the last week regarding Wall Street and set this up against Arab News who gives us (at https://gulfnews.com/business/markets/uae-market-cap-soars-as-top-16-companies-hit-dh27-trillion-1.1704521660385) with ‘UAE market cap soars as top 16 companies hit Dh2.7 trillion’. Now, we get that this is a little confusing, so lets give you a hand and relate this. That mentioned multi trillion Dirham amounts to $735 billion (and change). 16 companies made seven hundred and thirty five billion dollars. And it doesn’t end there, these 16 companies was merely responsible for 74%, the total amount comes down to Dh3.65 trillion. This means that the others got an additional 191 billion. That is what not loafing implies. That is the result of being ready for what comes. For me it partially matters as Emaar Properties got Dh68.1 billion. A real estate mogul and in previous blogs you can see how I created IP that could have benefitted Toronto properties and it would most definitely benefit an Emirati player like Emaar Properties. I say that benefit well over a year ago and now I see that a player like that wants to grow and they could benefit by having an additional technology edge as well. 

Can I translate that into some percentage? No, I cannot, this is a technology no one has. And there is an upside to throwing any system upside down, it opens up additional revenue streams and even at 1% that amounts to an additional Dh680 million. To see this I needed merely one day to adjust the IP I had for Toronto. Phil Duffield. And his dodo’s (those who are about to become extinct) had four years. FOUR YEARS. I merely 0.068% of that to create something bringing in an additional stage that would bring more than Dh680 million. How much more? I honestly do not know, but that is more than I ever had in my life and I just checked my wallet, it is missing that $185,159,950 (I rounded it down to avoid having coins in my wallet). 

So when you put 2 and 2 together you will see that the whiners complain to some watchdog even as they had 4 years to prepare. Me? I merely create another piece of IP. The fun part is that when you put it all together, you see that these loafers left billions on the floor. But they still complain for their lack of imagination and lack of insight in a market where they are supposed to be some kind of captain of industry. Just like the captain of the titanic, he merely was a captain for 5 days, after that he was put ashore 3,800 meters straight down. Insulted? Angry? I get that, but be angry with the likes of these loafers not preparing and then cry foul because they are trying to extent their abuse of your privacy. The BBC never gave you that did they. Just like the Arab News didn’t give you the lowdown on those who never were part of that extended Emirati list. They went extinct just as commerce intended them to be. 

Lets pause a moment on that and realise that we are sinking our own ships by giving these loafers and whiners a platform to continue their limited sighted actions. 

Just a thought to have today.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, IT, Science

Is it more than buggy?

Very early this morning I noticed something. Apple had made a booboo, now this isn’t a massive booboo and many will hide behind the ‘glitch’ sentiment. But this happened just as I was reading some reports on AI (what they perceive to be AI) and things started to click into place. You see AI (as I have said several times before) does not yet exist. We are short on several parts and yes machine learning and deeper machine learning exist and they are awesome. But there is a extremely dangerous hitch there. It is up to the programmer and programmers are people, they will fail and with that any data model connected will fail, it always will.

So what set this off?
To see this we need to see the image below

It was 01:07 in the morning, just after one o clock. The apple wedge gives us on all 4 timezones that it was today. Vancouver minus 19 hours, making it 06:07 in the morning. Toronto minus 16 hours making it 09:07 in the morning. Amsterdam minus 10 hours making it 15:07 in the afternoon and Riyadh with its minus 8 hours making it 17:07 in the afternoon. And all of them YESTERDAY. Now, we might look at this and think, no biggie and I would agree. But the setting does not en there.

Now we get to the other part. Like hungry all these firms are tying to get you into what they call ‘the AI field’ and their sales people are all pushing that stage as much as they can, because greed is never ending and most sales people live from their commission.

So now we see:

In addition there is Forbes giving us (at https://www.forbes.com/sites/joemckendrick/2024/01/04/not-data-driven-enough-ai-may-change-that/) where we see ‘Not Data-Driven Enough? AI May Change That’ where we are given “Eighty-eight percent of executives said that investments in data and analytics are a top priority, along with 63% for investments in generative AI.” To see my issue we need to take a step back. 

On May 27th 2023 the BBC reported (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65735769) that Peter LoDuca, the lawyer for the plaintiff got his material from a colleague of his at the same law firm. They relied on ChatGPT to get the brief ready. As such we get: ““Six of the submitted cases appear to be bogus judicial decisions with bogus quotes and bogus internal citations,” Judge Castel wrote in an order demanding the man’s legal team explain itself.” Now consider the first part. An affidavit is prepared by the current levels of machine learning and they get the date wrong (see apple example above). An optional mass murderer now gets off on a technicality because the levels of scrutiny are lacking. The last part of the case in court gives us “After “double checking”, ChatGPT responds again that the case is real and can be found on legal reference databases such as LexisNexis and Westlaw.” A court case for naught and why? Because technology isn’t ready yet, it is that simple. 

The problem is a little bot more complex. You see forecasting exists and it is decently matured, but it is used in the same breath as AI, which does not yet exist. There are (as I personally see it) no checks and balances. Scrutiny on the programmer seemingly goes away when AI is mentioned and that is perhaps the largest flaw of all. 

There is a start, but we are in its infancy. IBM created the quantum computer. It is still early days, but it exists. Lets just say that in quantum computers they created the IBM XT computer of Quantum, with its version of an intel 8088 processor. And compared to 1981 it was a huge step forward. What currently is still missing due to infancy are the shallow circuits, they are nowhere near ready yet. The other part missing is the Ypsilon particle now ready for IT. The concept comes from a Dutch Physicist (I forgot the name, but I mentioned it in previous blogs). I wrote about it on August 8th 2022. In a story called ‘Altering Image’ You see that will change the field and it makes AI possible. In the setting the Dutch physicist sets the start differently. The new particle will allow for No, Yes, Both and None. It is the ‘both’ setting of the particle that changes things. It will allow for gradual assumptions and gradual stage settings. Now we will have a new field, one that (together with quantum computing) allows for an AI to grow on its data, not hindered (or at least a lot less hindered) by programmers and their programming. When these elements are there and completed to its first stage an AI becomes a possibility. Not the one that sales people say it is, but what the forefather of AI (Alan Turing) said it would be and then we will be there. IBM has the home field advantage, but until that happens it will be anyones guess who gets there first.

So enjoy your day and when you are personally hurt by an AI, don’t forget there is a programmer and its firm you could optionally sue for that part. Just a thought. 

Enjoy THIS day.

Leave a comment

Filed under IT, Law, Science

Collected work

This is what we see at times, we see several cogs, we see that there is a connection, but we cannot see, or comprehend the connection. I am no different. I miss things at times. I am not smarter than you all (merely smarter then some). 

As such we see news, but can we see the connections? I started it yesterday with the phrase “it is a place where the bullies and the woke decide on the fate of others, regardless on what the others want” now we get a few settings, all at the same time. The first is ‘Trump caught on tape pressuring Wayne County officials not to certify election’ (at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/rudy-giuliani-bankruptcy-new-york-election-b2468135.html) There we are also given “Rudy Giuliani, filing for bankruptcy after being ordered to pay $148m in damages to two Georgia election workers he defamed” You see, this is weird, especially when we see ““No person could have reasonably believed that Mayor Rudy Giuliani would be able to pay such a high punitive amount,” spokesperson Ted Goodman said.”. Rudy is a politician, a lawyer and Mayor of New York from 1994 to 2001, as such, how many defamation cases did the city of New York face between 1994 and 2001? Did any media look into that? Was there any way out of this? The more you look into the matter, the worse it gets, the less the media seems to check, the less politicians seem to do in equal measure (example Zelensky and false yacht rumours). 

Now we see, through ABC (at https://abcnews.go.com/US/fbi-surge-threats-colorado-justices-ruled-trump-primary/story?id=105855615) ‘FBI looking into surge in threats against Colorado justices who ruled Trump can’t be on primary ballot’ it is here that the bullies are shown in force and the insurrection on January 8th 2021 shows just how much problems America has. The bullies are seemingly taking over. In all this they have a larger problem. If this isn’t stopped now, it goes out of control fast. When supreme court judges are swamped with threats, the problem is now starting to look largely out of control and it gets to be worse. On one side we see that 16 states are moving papers to remove Trump from the ballots, and even if that happens, when the primary starts and whomever gets that part decides to put Trump on the ballot America faces another danger. When his ‘friends’ are given leeway and convictions overturned or removed the danger of chaos increases by a lot. If the FBI remains incapable of stopping insurrections and prosecuting bullies the chaos starts in another direction. No matter how that goes, American business will take a massive dive in revenue and that gives America another turn of bad luck and it already has several bad turns to deal with. So whomever (especially Americans) think that I am full of wind and this will never happen ready up on what is going on. The fact that the two media cases on disinformation (Giuliani and Jones) still have no end in sight, the victims are deprived of all funds coming to them and now that Jones is on X and has (according to some) 800,000 followers you should see just how bad things could get. But there is an upside (possible) the amount of nations that will take in Americans is vanishing faster than snowflakes in a heated oven.  In all this America has prized themselves out of many markets, and as such the largest danger becomes will America implode and become a haven of dangers. Some state that the US economy is growing less than ‘predicted’, but it is worse than that. France has gained defence contracts that America was hoping for, so that is $8 billion less. China is gaining more projects in construction, defense, telecom and infrastructure. So they are up more billions and America loses additional billions. So what was not clear here? This has been going on since 2020 and the media was taping over these issues with flammable content. In this the EU is not out of the woods either, more issues are rising and when we add the ‘free Palestine’ and ‘Just stop oil’ cults all over the EU, the picture becomes slightly more complete. They are seemingly heading towards an equally bad place. So feel free to disagree, but the writing is on the wall, on the web and on the Walkman. You merely have to look on what is real and fake and that is another matter that needs attention. Media is too much about fake news. The BBC gives us that a former US Marine (now living in Russia) was allegedly behind the story that Volodymyr Zelensky bought two yachts. Not only was the news false, at least one ship is still for sale. I do not care, but fake news has impact. It seems that members of the US Congress making crucial decisions about military spending were repeating the accusation. Apart from the stupidity that members of US congress have on not vetting information. According to the BBC Tom Tillis, a Republican Senator is one of those less-intelligent people. 

All these matters are important as they connect to a dislodged population and a very dislodged administration (Congress). As such the collected works of bullies and false prophets are now in full swing all over America and I am not sure if the FBI and CIA are equipped to deal with it. The CIA because not only is this a former marine, he is setting the stage from Russia no less and it is impacting US politics and policies. The bullies threatening Colorado judges are getting away with it and the FBI seems unable to deal with this at present. So I think I made my case. There is a stage with collected works and the are diverting the light, the cameras and are giving the limelight to fake news, that is how I see it.

Enjoy the day, the Saturday before Christmas is now 20 minutes away.

Leave a comment

Filed under Finance, Law, Media, Politics